The night before I died, I made dinner for Julie. I did the best that I could to produce a traditional Iraqi meal using my camp stove and microwave. Wasn't bad, considering the limited facilities.
She asked me where I'd learned to cook. I told her you pick up a lot of skills in the Armed Forces that can be transferred to civilian work later on. Killing, for instance. I told her I'd worked as a hit man for a while. I'd whacked some heavies at startups all over the Valley. Remember Kellogg? I did him. My employer's son needed to move up. Answer: erase Kellogg. Told her I learned three computer languages. The one that got me work, though, was Arabic. I interpreted for the Court in San Jose for a while. Drank myself out of it. Western took me in after that. No questions. Baldwin was on to me right off, though. Which is why I wear the big red "A" for alky on my sweater I rattled on and on. I think she had planned to sleep with me before she came over and heard all this but when she left she just thanked me and shook my hand. "See you back at the charnel grounds," I said, meaning work. I don't know why I called it that, but she just nodded and smiled like I'd made a joke that wasn't funny.
* * *
On the day of his death, Harley talked to Bear in the shop. Bear was sanding a huge table top by hand. He did everything by hand. He only resorted to power tools of any kind when there was a rush job. Otherwise he pretended to be living in another century. Bear said that he thought Harley had an alcoholic mind. He should come to meetings. Harley said he'd think about it. He knew he wouldn't. He'd had enough of meetings. Had enough church, groups, armies of the day and night but he didn't say that, he said maybe.
Bear was a hunter and gatherer. A guy who would have been happy living up in the hills. He spent some of his vacations alone. He hunted and gathered. He lived the way he wanted to. Finally I told him we're all a bunch of assholes, we're just assholes. There's nothing worth saving here, for all your talk of Higher Powers and Grace and Goodness. Fuck that. Fuck all of it.
But see here, soldier. No one questions the correctness of these statements as applying to the man who has taken "too much", who is really drunk, or who is dead drunk, or simply dead and drunk at the same time (which is not unusual in the condition of warfare). But how about the soldier who likes to take a beer or two or who wants a shot of whiskey when he has had a hard mission? Is the man who has had just one drink, or two or three, any worse for it?
Unless a soldier leaves liquor strictly alone, he should certainly know his limit – know what he can take without getting lit or really hammered.
And that is hard to say, brethren. It depends on the individual and also on circumstances. A man who weighs 200 pounds can stand about twice as much liquor as a man who weights only 100 pounds. Like any other drug, the effect is in proportion to your body weight. You get more kick out of a drink taken on an empty stomach than after you have just had a square meal. Fats in the stomach – milk, cream, butter, cheese or olive oil (these are all available of course to employees right here in the Test Kitchen, together with the whole meals served gratis with the understanding that the consumer will waive his right to litigation and fill out the questionnaire regarding the dining experience of the test meal) – help to keep you sober.
On the other hand, imagination and what you want, can help the effects along. A man who wants to get a little "fucked up" succeeds in gathering that strange glow of stuporous and unfounded well being around him which causes birds and small animals to self destruct in his vicinity sooner than the man who is afraid of what the liquor may do to him. And besides, the former doesn't have to hold himself in, since everybody knows how alcohol ought to work.
So Harley, well, Harley just walked out of the carpentry shop and he got himself some beer. It was Mickey's they call them with the wide top so you could swill it right down, ahhh yeah. He bought three and went out behind the sheds. Baldwin said "let's go over to the warehouse" and Harley said "let's not." Baldwin just scowled and called for one of the other guys. Harley tried to cover. "I got a doctor's, remember?" and Baldwin looked relieved. "Righto," he said. "You go ahead on with that." He did. He started walking, even though he'd taken his car. The VA was easily within walking distance of Western Living. On the way he stopped for another Mickey and drank it as he strolled along, whistling the Dias Irae. He didn't bother to cover it with the traditional brown bag, that's tacky. Anybody knows what you're up to that way but when you just go ahead and swill that beer like it was a soda, well But hey, there's Jack-el, there's old Jack-el, whadaya know, and he's looking both ways before he creeps across the street at the crosswalk. Now, listen. Who'd run that boy down, will ya tell me that, killer?
"Hey, Doctor Jack-el!" Harley calls. "I need meds. You renew my meds today, Doctor?"
Jack-el smiles, obviously not understanding. But Harley is speaking Arabic, he forgot. He waves the doctor on with a smile, his most sane and winning smile, works every time in an HR department, or at the pharmacy when he's a few days early, or at Mazie's little lunch concession at Western when he doesn't have quite enough for that BLT and chips and a soda which he'll empty out the can and fill er back up with something more interesting. Vodka usually, because, as everyone knows, you cannot smell vodka on the breath of a man of alcoholic mind, brethren. However, the lunch room is kind of bitty and close. You get drunk sooner in a crowded, poorly ventilated room than you would in the fresh air. You feel the effects sooner if you are sitting down than if you are standing up – and you are less aware of the effects. If you want to stay sober, the best thing to do is stand and put one foot upon the head of the tallest person in the room or walk briskly back and forth, reciting from your Manual. Or go out and lie under the stars. Do some howling. Singing is OK, too. And don't forget to chew some cloves, just to be on the safe side. So when you hit on Miriam in Accounting she'll say yes, dinner, blowjob, check, and check a quickie in the Test Kitchen pantry on a fat sack of Basmati rice. Yum-yum-yummers but she's fine!
It seems to him that he stopped home first. Blake was out there watering. "Heidy-ho!" he greeted him. Harley waved and went out back. Why did he need a gun? He didn't need a gun but he threw it in his backpack anyway, first checking the clip. Just in case. Just in case. You never know. The enemy is all around you, wearing your own face. Do not trust a man who wears your own face. "Caesar, now be still ," cetera, cetera. That's Rule Number One. Next comes Rule Number Two, which is he remembers the Arabic but it makes no sense in Arabic. Not any more. Blake says, "Heidi-ho!" again when he leaves. Nods his head like a mechanical cow. What cow? Well, the creamers at that place in Gilroy. Like his old CO, and he looked just like that, nodded his like that. The waitress wondered why he was laughing so hard. Well, Heidi-ho! Heidi-ho! Father Truth stood in the crosswalk, holding up his phone. "For you," he said, looking sour. "Tell em we don't want any," Harley cried. "We gave it to her at the office we gave daisies, we gave worms, dogs, goats, weed, the children of infidels, the pointless Holy Books of my People, the Penurious Laws, leaning Tenets and useless chimneys, Futures Uxorious and otherwise Meaningful to the Sacred Economy, the Precious Lifestyle, the Suits, polished tiles, rightful art, bailed out bookies and hookworms of He Who Acts Alone hawhawhaw!" Father Truth went "hawhawhaw!" right back. Father Truth hated him with a hatred that could not be named but it always had his face, Harley's smug face, the face of the Dark Angel, who calls you to ground, who covers you with the ground. Harley moved fast. He was in and out. Jack-el seemed to move in quick insect frames, everybody moved that way, in stop motion down-sampling over crackling wastes only to find themselves at the mercy of Salah-udin, until Harley broke free into realtime and he was running, he was really running for the beer the guard had thrown him, but then he went out like a quarterback in slowmo replay HE jumps HE reaches he's got the ball and he runs with it through space made of thick, unscented milk and honey. He doesn't see the others coming, rounding the corner too fast. I guess they forgot to slow down like they're supposed to but what do you expect from wannabe hiphoppers in yellow Crusader Cabs? He sees the girl go under, sees the red wash of Pollack action and the wet weight of it drags him down and he goes with her and there is silence and then a soft music of the tabor, the oud, the sound the wind makes over the desert, the kiss of palm leaves brushing together. He goes to her and smiles and rises. They are reported to have been holding hands as they entered Paradise.
This story was commissioned by Benjamin Buchholz for his projected anthology The Dust Girl. The pivotal event of the story, in which the girl is killed, actually happened, and I have used some of Ben's own descriptions here. Thanks is owed to him for permission to let the story appear at Unlikely.
Brent Powers feels that humans were made by a god who is funny in the head.