A Death, Baked Bob, and the... Ch. 02

It felt funny getting out of the shower. Being under the running water for so long my skin tingled from the lack of it. We all went downstairs, where most of the people were mingling. I walked through the crowd naked, enjoying the exhibitionist moment. When I was in a corner of the room I turned and Tyler and his two goons were standing there. His razor sharp gaze made a pass over my body. "You're one hell of a party favor."

The two goons fanned out and I had nowhere to move. The guests were obviously intimidated by Tyler's crew and avoided looking their way. My eyes quickly scanned the room but couldn't find Renee anywhere. Tyler took a step towards me.

"Has Renee been skimming on me?"

"I...wouldn't know. I'm new here. She doesn't share that kind of stuff with me."

Tyler cornered me. His two goons watched out for partygoers as he slithered up to me and got in my face. I was breathing heavy and there was a lump in my throat that I couldn't swallow.

"You know," he said, "supposedly the most painful way to kill someone is setting them on fire. Because you're burning from the outside in, your internal organs are still working the whole time. You live through all the excruciating pain until your nerve endings are destroyed."

My skin felt cold and I realized I was sweating. It must have been all the talk about fire.

Tyler smiled. "Now I only find that particularly helpful if you only want to torture someone. But if you're trying to get information, it's no good, 'cause it's kind of hard to talk when you're burning up. So I started researching. And I found out that in Medieval Times they would hang someone upside down with their legs spread." Tyler moved in close. Not enough to touch me, but right at the point where I could almost feel his presence against my naked flesh. "Then two guys with a saw, a big, long one, would cut their way straight down, crotch to cranium. See, since you're hanging with your head to the floor, all the blood is rushing to your brain and keeping you conscious the whole time. You can feel every bit of pain. And since you're able to scream, you're also able to talk."

I finally managed to swallow. He smiled again. "Guess my high school teacher was right. History is helpful."

Tyler backed away. I realized I'd been holding my breath and let it out. "Just keep that in mind," he said, and took out a card and handed it to me. "That's where you can reach me. I'd be most appreciative if you find out anything you think I should know."

The three wise-guy men left and I started breathing regularly again. Suddenly Zhi walked up to me. There was a sympathetic look on her face that eased some of the fear I still felt. "Are you okay?" she asked.

I curled up the card in my hand, since I was naked and couldn't hide it anywhere. "Fine," I said with some shakiness in my voice. "I'm going home."

The next day I went to see Monica.

The flowers on her grave were gone. It looked so bare, just a headstone and a pile of dirt that had started to match the rest of the earth around it with small bits of grass sprouting up. It was like she was settling in for the long haul. A soft breeze blew, and I closed my eyes and breathed in, imagining I could smell her scent again. I touched her headstone and looked at the area where she was laid to rest. An overwhelming urge to hug her came over me, so I lay down on the dirt covering her. My body facing hers now, I turned my face to the side so I could breathe and pressed down, digging my hands into the soil. A whimper escaped my lips. All that separated us now was six feet...six feet and the breath of life.

Later on that day I was working at the video store when Bob came out of his office with a worried look on his face.

"Keisha, I need you do me a favor. A big one."

I pointed a finger at him. "I'm not watching your fucking iguanas again, Bob. Those things need obedience school."

"It's not that. The dammed delivery company screwed up the shipment of new releases. Only way to get it for tomorrow is for me to go down there and pick it up."

"Okay," I said, thinking this seems like a simple problem, and forgetting that with Bob nothing is simple.

"Thing is my cousin Jessica is in town, just for the day, and I'm supposed to meet up with her." Bob looked at his watch. "I'll never make it."

I sighed and held up a hand. "Don't worry, I'll go pick up the shipment."

"I wish you could," Bob said. "But it can only be picked up by the person who it's addressed to, and that's me."

He stared at me. I caught on and started shaking my head. "No. No way."

"All you have to do is hang out with her for a little while. When I get there you can take off."

"Bob, I am not going to show up there with some shaky-ass story that sounds like bullshit. Hell, I know it's the truth and I still think it sounds like bullshit."

"That's why I already called her to let her know you're coming," Bob said. "I even described you to her so you can find each other. And just so you know, she's wearing a lavender blouse, a black skirt and combat boots. She wears combat boots with everything."

"Why don't you just send her to your apartment for a while?"

Bob's eyebrow arched. "What, so she could see all the pictures of naked women I have on the walls, or the porn collection I'm still trying to organize by fetish? I remember Monica was always impressed by that." Bob frowned and said, "I just don't want her sitting alone in a coffee shop waiting for me."

I closed my eyes and shook my head. "Okay, I'll do it." I opened my eyes. "But you owe me."

"Sure. Two weeks paid vacation and use of the company car."

I laughed, and suddenly realized it was the first time I'd laughed in a while without the assistance of chemicals. Bob put on his jacket and headed for the door. He stopped and turned around. "Could you do me one favor? Dress up a little?"

"Why?"

"Just because I'm sending a pinch hitter doesn't mean she has to look like one." Bob's eyes looked over my jeans and T-shirt.

I sighed again. "Sure. I'll even put on perfume, okay?"

"Great, thanks."

I went home, took a shower and got out a skirt, a decent top and a pair of calf-length boots. It almost felt strange dressing up after months of working at a video store, where I could wear my pajamas if I wanted to, and spending time over at Renee's, where I didn't have to wear anything at all. I realized I felt good about doing this, getting dressed up to go out for a social occasion. It was something I hadn't done in a long time, not since Monica started going downhill. I was feeling so good that I passed on the thought of popping a pill when I looked at my bag and remembered I had some stash in there. Maybe tonight I could have a good time with just pleasant conversation and good company. But as I walked out the door I realized that how much of a good time I had depended on what kind of person Bob's cousin was. I checked again to make sure I had my pills, just in case.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: At this time we are going to change the point of view to someone else. I really wasn't looking to do that in this story, and even if I was, he was the last character I'd have put in the driver's seat. But the stubborn jerk begged to have his voice heard, and I mean he really begged. When begging didn't work, he resorted to bribery. I didn't give in easily – it took two bottles of Captain Morgan's Private Stock, a quarter of his best green, and DVD copies of 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (Special Edition)' and 'Better Than Chocolate' before I caved in. So no one can ever say I'm too easy.

Hey audience. My name is Bob Callahan, but you can call me Baked Bob. All my friends do. Speaking of which, I have a friend who is in need of some help. She lost someone recently and...well fuck it, you've been reading the story, and you know what's going on. Didn't mean to treat you like an idiot, it's just that there's always one fuckhead who needs a recap. That's why they put those "Previously on..." in front of all your favorite TV shows, like the faithful viewers need a reminder of what they watched a week ago. It's just wasting time that they could use to make more show!

Sorry, I got a little off track there. I do that every once in a while, like when I came up with the idea for how I'm going to save my friend Keisha. This was a few weeks ago, when I'd just finished smoking some green, actually a lot of really good green, and was standing in my kitchen when the idea hit me. It was so brilliant that it blew all the other thoughts out of my head. This caused a major problem, because suddenly I forgot what I was doing in the first place. When I looked down I noticed I was holding a piece of broccoli in my left hand and my shaving razor in my right. What the hell had I been planning to do? Was I going to eat and then shave? Or was I going to shave the broccoli? Maybe I was going to pit them against each other in a battle and see who would win. Fuck it, I'd figure that out later.

I went to my computer and got on the Internet. Cyberspace is the greatest invention ever, next to the compact disc. And DVD's, and bongs. The cool thing about the Internet is that you can find almost anything and have it come to you. When you're stoned this can be a very useful tool, especially when you're doing what I was about to do. Tool. While it was signing on I went to my stereo and put on Tool's Anima. Mood music helps too.

It only took me twenty minutes to find five sites where you can post lesbian personal ads. I did what was needed to sign up on each of them and set about placing an ad. Now to write one. Hmmm. I'd never written a personal ad before, and somehow I felt it needed some sappy, flowing language. I went to my bookshelf to see if I had anything that would help. Henry Miller, Edgar Allen Poe, a biography on Bill Hicks, Walter Mosley, some Vonnegut, a guide to farting, a bunch of High Times issues and a shitload of comic books from Batman to Y:The Last Man. Great, not one thing that would appeal to the kind of woman Keisha would like. Probably not much that would appeal to any woman.

I went and smoked some more to help me think. It only took two hits before I realized I could steal stuff from other personal ads. "Fucking stupid!" I said to myself as I slapped the side of my head. This is what happens when you're a technical person; you're always trying to think of a complicated solution when the simple answer is staring you in the face. I checked some of the other ads and found almost no flowing, romantic language at all. Some sites made people fill in forms that made their traits look like the technical specs to a piece of machinery. Great way to meet somebody you want to get romantic with.

I finally settled on 'GBF, 29, seeks GF, 18-40, with no issues and no baggage. D&D free. Picture a must. Must be local and must be single. Not looking for couples, swingers, the curious, or men who think they can change me.' Just to translate for you non-personal ad people, GBF stands for 'Gay Black Female' and GF is 'Gay Female'. Or maybe it's 'Girl Friend'. Fuck it. 'D&D' means 'Drug and Disease', and I wanted to find someone who wasn't on drugs so they might help Keish with her problem. Some of the other sites allowed more room so I described her personality - funny, sweet, intelligent, ambitious (not lately, but I skipped mentioning that), creative and occasionally moody. I threw in that last one because most people put 'honest' and yet didn't list any traits that might sound negative. I know the idea is to attract someone, but if you're going to be 'honest' you should put at least one thing that warns other people of what they'll have to put up with. For instance, if it were my ad I'd put 'complicated', so they would know ahead of time that they might storm out in frustration like my other girlfriends have.

Now there was another problem – a picture. I was asking for one, so to be fair I should give one, but how to get a picture of Keisha on the computer? I didn't own a scanner yet. Then suddenly I remembered Asian Andy had given me a digital camera for Christmas last year, which means he probably knew I'd need it for this. He's super useful that way. Once he told me not to go to an outdoor Slayer concert, so I didn't, and someone in the crowd got hit by lightning. That could have been me. I mean, the guy survived, but getting hit by lightning would suck. Knowing Andy has its advantages. (Although there was this other time when he called and told me not to go to the supermarket that night because I'd meet a woman, fall in love, get married and then she'd cheat on me and dump me. I stayed home, but the next night Andy shows up at The Stoned Tongue with this super hot model-type chic on his arm and they're joking about 'the vegetable aisle'.)

I found all the pictures from the camera, but the only one with Keisha had her posing with Monica, their faces cheek to cheek. Damn. I took a chance and emailed Ramon, a buddy of mine in Mexico who's a whiz with photo stuff. One year I found this picture of Paris Hilton bending over and I had Ramon put me in the picture, looking like I'm kicking her in the ass. I sent it out as a Christmas card that year and everyone loved it. Everyone except Monica, who never appreciated my sense of humor or anything else about me.

Ramon emailed me back (he always seemed to be online) and told me to send him the picture to see what he could do with it. While I waited I listened to some Mudvayne and Hatebreed, then switched gears and put on some Miles Davis. The iguanas like Miles. Finally Ramon sent the picture back. It was incredible, he had removed Monica from it and Keisha didn't look any different. I told Ramon I owed him big, put the picture in the ads and submitted them. Now I'd have to wait.

The first day I got four replies. Two of them were obviously fakes because they sent pictures that I'd seen in my porno surfing. Another said she was thirty-four, but her picture looked like she'd had one too many plastic surgeries. The last one seemed legit, but I emailed her and never heard back. And so it went. The amount of replies grew everyday as more people checked the sites. There were many fakes (I got smart and rooted out suspicious ones by asking them to provide certain pictures – standing in a living room, bedroom, outside, holding up a newspaper, doing a headstand, etc.), and quite a few legitimate ones who didn't seem to fit Keisha's bill. Through emails and Instant Messaging I was able to get an idea about the respondents' personalities. A few were obviously mentally unbalanced, but the majority were people she just wouldn't click with instantly. I was being very selective, remembering that I had only one shot to get this right.

Of course, some of the women caught on to the fact that I was a fake and that generated quite a lot of hate mail. There was one lesbian who figured me out and yet we still ended up becoming good friends, and a bi-sexual girl who wanted to get together anyway. Another beautiful upside to the Internet, you never know who you'll meet (some say that can be a downside as well). But two weeks later the replies started dwindling and I realized the ads had run the course. A few responses still came in here and there, but by the end of the third week I had given up on the idea and went back to figuring out the broccoli and shaving razor dilemma.

I came home one day, certain that in some frenzy of uncontrolled humor I must have thought that there was no chance anyone had shaved a piece of broccoli bald before and that I had to be the first. I decided to follow through on it after I checked email. Maybe I could create the 'broccoli comb over'. I checked my personal email, admired a sexy picture the bi girl had sent of herself, and then realized I hadn't checked the account I'd set up for the personal ad recently. There was one email. I opened it and downloaded the picture before I read it to see if it was another fake. What I saw stopped me cold. She wasn't beautiful in a model type of way, but when it came to the type of naturally beautiful girl you'd see on the street she was the most stunning I'd ever seen. It looked like the picture was taken in a park with her sitting on a large rock, and something about the setting seemed familiar. She looked young, and I suddenly started wondering if she'd even graduated high school. I noticed she only smiled with her mouth, but it still made her face light up. Except for the eyes. There was something about them that didn't agree with the smile in some way.

Suddenly I realized where the picture was taken. It was a park in the next town, meaning she was very local. I looked in the body of the email. Her name was Jessica and she stated her age at twenty-four. She mentioned a few things about herself, including the fact that she had just moved into town from out of state. Great, very likely Keisha didn't know her already. Also, her musical taste runs somewhat similar to mine. I suddenly thought it would be great if this worked out because she and I would have something in common. It always bummed me that Monica didn't care for my personality. This girl was sounding really great. I sent an email back to Jessica, trying to sound as much like Keisha as I could, hoping that this would work. Jessica emailed me back without a problem and we conversed that way for a week. The 'relationship' was going great. My hopes soared.

Then everything happened suddenly. I was in my office at the store when I signed over to the 'Keisha' account to check for messages. Before I had a chance to check anything an IM came from Jessica. She wanted to talk on the phone. Fuck. That was where I fell into problems with the other respondents who figured me out. What the hell was I going to do?

Think asshole, think. Tell her you're phone's busted. She'd say go to a pay phone. A minute went by. The computer made a "bing!" sound. "Still there?" she wrote. Shit! What do I do now? Think. Where's my bowl? No time for that kind of thinking. Tell her you don't have a phone! She wouldn't believe it. Thirty seconds go by. Bing. "Hello?" Breathe goddamit! Give her Keisha's phone number! Yes! No! Keisha's not home, and I'd be telling her to call. Bing! "Keisha?" Oh crap. Give her the store number, Keisha will answer. Can't do that! They need to meet. It's the only way this will work. Bing. "Is your name really Keisha?" Fuuuucccckkk!!!!! How can I put this off? No...wait...don't put it off. SPEED IT UP.

I wrote, "Sorry. I'm at work, and someone had an emergency problem. I was thinking since we're so close let's just go ahead and meet. You know the coffee shop on Park Street?

Bing. "Passed by, never been inside."

"Want to meet me there at seven?"

There was a pause. Bing. "Sounds good. You remember what I look like, right? ;-)"

The symbol meant she was joking, but I realized this would be a big problem. Keisha doesn't know what Jessica looks like and the photo of her was on my home computer. I could tell Keisha to look for a blonde, but with my luck there'd be a dozen blondes in the place, and her going up to the wrong one could blow this whole thing. I wrote, "Not sure...what will you be wearing?"

"A pink tutu and a large foam cowboy hat."

I laughed before I remembered that she wasn't helping me. Think. What would Keisha say? "Come on, give me something to anticipate."

"You're weird. A lavender blouse, a black skirt and combat boots."

Combat boots? "Combat boots?"

"I wear them with everything. What will you be wearing?"

I froze for a moment before remembering to think like Keisha. "Sorry, I don't plan that far ahead. Gotta get back to work, see you at seven."

I signed off, sat back in my chair and checked my pulse to make sure it was still there. According to the clock, this mental heart attack only took ten minutes. Another example of why fast paced life sucks. Time to slow down. I took out my bowl and enjoyed a long, relaxing hit. Now on to my next problem, which was getting Keisha to the coffee shop. Another hit first. Ahhhhh. Properly relaxed, I fired up the remaining brain cells to find a solution. My eyes landed on a pile of shipping boxes. Uh huh. Delivery mishap...gotta show ID...cousin's in town...just keep her company...porn incase she suggests the apartment...owe you big time. Perfect. And solved in under thirty seconds.