Two Characters.
K-Boy. The Big Man.
They could've been there the whole day and not noticed. Lying at odd angles on two bean filled sacks listening to the funky psychedelia of the Sixties. Waiting for the man, Lt, to come.
A guitar strummed a beach tone and the drums called for another toke.
They could've been there the whole day and not noticed a thing except the shape of their feet.
"I didn't hear any Chimpanzees that time, did you?"
Moments deliberation. "I heard a couple."
This is the degree of their conversation.
All action. Lt at the door about to stroll in with his Afghan hounds.
The two Afghans entered first and sat themselves exactly where they wanted to be. They turned their disdainful eyes upon the Big Man and something appeared to be communicated. They knew what was to be done. They knew there would be no dignity involved either. The Big Man gulped dryly. Deep inside his big cavities he knew the secret agenda too.
The Big Man remained silent. Even when Lt followed after the hounds. A description of Lt is not required. He is a dealer just like any other. He also happens to be their friend. Handy.
The hounds were to be consumed raw from the stomach outwards. Pure hound. Imported. Direct from Afghanistan. Little known fact: the stomach juice of an Afghan hound induces a euphoric state of hyper-tension within the diner leading to trans-perceptual visions of enormous clarity. The meat of the carcass assists with the delicate landing of the senses.
Lt walked the hounds through to the kitchen and ordered them to lie on their sides. The hounds complied and gracefully eased themselves down onto the disgraced linoleum of K-Boy's erratic greasy spoon. They tried in vain to maintain what dignity they could salvage. This was afterall their death song. Not yours. And not mine.
The Big Man knelt at the edge of the linoleum, his hands clasped before him. He appeared to be respecting the hounds dignity. He appeared to be respecting the hounds dignity. He appeared to be respecting it as if it might get him off the murder charge.
The hounds raised their tousled heads and glared down the sides of their muzzles at him.
"Not a chance," they said with well formed vowels.
Accessory to murder. That would be the charge.
Only the Big Man heard this because he was the only one expecting to hear something.
Lt approached and the hounds rested their heads. Their black eyes watched the man-boy make preparations above. Lot of knives.
'To die at the hands of Children.'
Lament of the dead Afghans.
Lt had good contacts in the Afghan trade and the two he had brought were pedigree. He took his knife and made neat slits in each gut whilst simultaneously snapping their necks with his boot. Blood spread across the linoleum and quickly made islands of them. The three boys watched and waited, dipping fingers and tasting the crimson promise of Afghan.
Little known fact two: Afghan stomach juices reach potency exactly three minutes post death. Anyhting before is impure.
Lt led the feast. They were his hounds.
He bent his head down into the guts and pulled the clean slit apart, poking the knife tip through and slicing the stomach wall open. He slid the knife to K-Boy as he began his filthy sucking at the hounds insides. The body flinched with every ravenous gulp of the internal juices. Every squelch was like rape to the ears. The hounds regal eyes rolled back and the Afghan majesty was gone, leaving behind it these two ragged skins. Bloodied and gutted.
K-Boy had begun as Lt finished and passed to the Big Man. K-Boy drained his share of hound before slicing away a chunk of shoulder meat for the ride down later. The stuff they had been smoking had got them high and mellow but Afghan was a ride on the big machine. He fell back into the blood slick linoleum and watched in awe as the ceiling sped away from him then returned at terminal velocity only to expand and diminish at point of impact.
The meat was cold by the time he returned from the void. His hadns were slick with the blood on his clothes and his breath. He imaged what he could do if he had the power of creation and then discovered it had been in his pocket all the time. He created worlds and solar systems, gave them life and wondered when they should die. He had, he was, power incarnate. He was omnipresent, ubiquitously existing in every mind. He was everything that would and had ever been. He was the voice in your head and the words in their mouths. He was sight and infinitely quick. He was brooding oak, growing, knowing. He was the vibration sound that buzzes the ears of all our generations. He was one beat. One time. But above all of that, he was nothing at all.
He was close.
Coming down from Afghan was never easy. Chewing raw hound meat didn't seem to make things any better. What a trip though. He had felt all those things and more; he had felt nothing.
Later K-Boy awoke to an empty flat. Blood stained clothes and blood caked dirty mouth the only evidence of his trip. He peered around the kitchen with eyes aas black as rotten blood. The Big Man had cleared the carcasses away and mopped. K-Boy was grateful. There is no head fuck like a kitchen slick with blood and shredded Afghan corpses. It was the head that freaked him the most. The dead eyes and flaccid pink tongues.
He vomitted black puke and crawled to the fridge for a Stella. His head swan somewhere before or after him, his stomach hid, scrunched up in the tightest ball.
He needed the Stella. Hair of the dog.
It was the weekend.
He allowed himself these indulgences on the weekend.
