Boys’ Night

August 14—one year since the ban. To “celebrate” we all brought our finest bootleg equalizers, good and loaded. T-bone flaunted his homemade barrel and switch, and Barko fashioned a tracker from an old pair of binoculars. Molasses, slow as always, took a look at the stockpile and said, “You can do that?” and we laughed because we could do anything we wanted. Once you figured that out, there was nothing else to learn.

Everybody always chipped in on boys’ night, plenty of beer in the bilge of the boat. Barko brought that old-ass flag that still had five too many stars, but nothing some scissors couldn’t fix. Molasses brought THE GOOD BOOK for Sunday cleanup, and we all hoped Skeeze would deliver on his promise not to clog the head again. The real kindle on the boys’ fires was T-Bone scoring five vials of glansze.

For my part, I nabbed one of those lifesize cardboard cutouts of President Shit-for-Brains from Dooley’s, that novelty store that sold toys to the local mankids. Same place I bought all my die-cast serpents and griffins. The boys, eyeballing T-Bone’s stash, didn’t even see me tuck it in the corner. I pulled my shirt up over my mouth. The cabin smelled like overcooked cheese.

Ever since the neighbors accused us of “fomenting a coup de turd,” we only met up on the boat, on our water, where we could shoot and spark and speak whatever truth we wanted. Out we drifted, and Barko dumped a few beers in his ballooned gut before he plunged the glansze up the boys’ rectums. Despite our all-for-one mentality, the boys didn’t mind so much that I didn’t take my dose because it meant they got an extra quarter a piece.

With glansze, the first couple hours were the hardest, like someone squeezing your brain into doughy biscuits. I’d done it enough. At its peak, you saw the world through shit-colored glasses. Sure, maybe you felt like a god, but eventually every face you saw reflected the thing you hated most about yourself.

So at the two hour mark, Barko’s manic eyes believed we’d beat his kid the same way he did. And Molasses thought we were letting his mother die alone. T-Bone, who’d never admit it to himself, saw us all as closeted homosexuals. And to Skeeze, we’d screw another man’s wife. Yeah, any time you read about a guy ripping his neighbor’s throat out through his neck, blame glansze. Even level-headed people might commit a sort of self-immolation on a friend.

I plopped the Commander-in-Thief right under that old flag to try to corral the boys’ ire. T-Bone spotted it and tweaked, screaming, “Say something,” probably just so he could tell him to shut up. Then he threw the first punch, just like any Saturday night at the bar, but only knuckled the wall, bleeding and giving the boys shark teeth. They barefooted over the shag carpet like they were walking on soup, all of them, probably thinking the highway billboards were right and the president really was the ANTI-CHRIST RISEN.

You know how sometimes you get pissed off when you hear somebody blaring music on their phone in public, only to realize it was your ringer going off, stuck in your pocket? We all sort of got looks on our faces like that. Like the waves smacking the keel transformed into an old lullaby we couldn’t figure out.

Skeeze said, “Is that music?” and then the rest of them nodded. I assumed it was the glansze, but then, sure as shit, I heard it too. Sort of like what you might imagine if you closed your eyes and thought of a bare naked angel singing and playing the harp. But not just one. A bunch of them. And not the kind of angel you’d find in heaven. More like the one you find at a titty bar.

They forgot Mr. President. Skeeze darted up the cabin ladder like a ring-tailed lemur. Despite his failure with the ladies and the gray in his beard, they never left his head. I arrived last. The song, how do I say it, got more floaty. The ladies weren’t so much singing as they were moaning. Not agony. More the sound you make when you finish pissing.

I stood stock still, watching the boys wooz like cartoon characters in love. And they limp-wristed the grips of their guns, pointing them at the sky, hunting fireflies or trying to kill a dream, thinking every shot fired brought them closer to immortality.

Something inside me loosened. Unclenched. All my life, I tried to fight it. Whatever it was. The government, my boss, ex-wife, President Dumbass. Maybe all in my head.

I’d thought about it while I painted my diecast creatures. I didn’t want to be immortal. Just wanted to be at peace. These ladies turned down the static. Real freedom. A light in the fog. I studied those old stories, the ones older than THE GOOD BOOK. I had a hunch who they might be.

On some boys’ nights you rise; some you fall. On this one, we’d drown. For me at least, I knew freedom sat rusted at the bottom. The boys could hoot and curse, threaten the ladies all they wanted. Even shoot at them.

I’d let the sweet song have me for lunch. And as the rocks smashed the hull of the boat, I smiled. The boys, with their over-easy brains, sobered up. Funny how you wake up, right before the end, and realize just how wrong you had it.