chapter Three – Island Girls

Randall looked up from a Cabela’s catalog. He needed a new job. He needed to get out of here. He prayed that Mexico would provide refuge from the demons he had birthed over the past three years. He hadn’t slept in weeks, maybe months. The dusty opaque jars resting on the mantel confirmed that. Maybe these night visions really would end soon. The Turkish Bitch thought so, but what the fuck did she know? Eleven tattooed girls with nothing on. Hearts and nipples. Shits and giggles. Every jar held a rotten story. He wished he wasn’t their ghostwriter.

Yes, he’d find a shack in some Mexican hills. He’d sit down on a grass rug and smoke hash for a very long time. Then he’d clear his head with some mescaline, lots of mescaline. He’d drop one pill every three hours, whether he needed it or not. Randall still believed he could stop the repetitive notes of the harmonium. Those laughable thoughts converged only in what he took as his relatively sober moments. Clearly, he needed a drink. He needed to catch his breath. He needed to breathe deeply. He needed to stop this bullshit. He needed a curtain call.

Randall made a hundred grand on each girl, with the promise of five mil should The Girl succumb to his song. He knew the plan was to keep The Girl alive, but it would be better for her to join the eleven princesses. He hoped this cop knew his stuff. He hoped he was a good woodsman. He hoped he was a good shot and killed them all quickly. Fuck Mexico. One more loon-filled night. 

At least he kept the girls hopped up on coke and heroin, his general anesthesia. They neither felt nor expressed any pain while he did his Cleopatra piercings, tattooed, and eviscerated them. Who really cared what he did? They died with him. That was that. He killed them and put them all in jars. With apologies to Mr. Greg Brown. You can taste a little of the summer, taste a little of the summer, taste a little of the summer, my grandma’s put it all in jars. Maybe he would find a “root cellar fruit cellar” in Mexico. You never knew.

Tonight, on the shore of Lake Abol, the Old Ones feasted on his rejects like ravens quonking at a kill. Randall still couldn’t see the appeal of these maybe fourteen-year-old girls. Cute, but definitely headaches. He thought he remembered reading somewhere, “Teenage pussy is much overrated.” Amen. Chou said if we got The Girl before the White Hats did, the happy fucking children life as we know it would continue without interruption or impediment forever and ever. Three cheers for Chou.

Oh, sure, occasionally he put on a rubber while Franklin, the wizard of this operation, and those wild-eyed Valkyries tickled his balls. But he didn’t really care one way or another. He was just playing the something-to-do card. Masturbating with a zonked-out kid. Wrong? Potentially. But making a living squashed any thinking about a systematic ethical quest. He rejected his mind’s wanderings as simply Mexican mystics playing with his gin-sloshed brain. Was he in the cloud of unknowing or the dark night of the soul? Neither possibility took him to a nondysthymic place. Fuck. He took a quick gulp of his Tanqueray and tonic.

Randall checked his watch. Somebody should be here soon to pick him up or not. Franklin had told him that once they got rid of the Lake Renegade plane, not to worry. Right. Randall was worried. He worried about Franklin’s laid-back approach. Unfortunately for Franklin, Randall knew that smart-ass cop would figure out their modus operandi very soon. Chou said the cop knew about frequencies and about The Girl, but Franklin assured him that they would find The Girl by tomorrow night. No problem. Oh yeah, no problem. Hell, we only have another million acres to search. Franklin had radioed in that the wings were off the plane and everything was tucked nighty-night tightly into an eighteen-wheeler headed for Perth Amboy. Without the plane, this was supposed to get easier? Fuck him.

He figured he’d be picked up on somebody’s last call, perhaps coinciding with his last call. But he also expected one of the many wackos wandering these night woods with high-powered rifles to shoot him before then. The prospect of his impending death made him feel like singing. Maybe The Girl liked da blues. He would try a happy Greg tune. He picked up his three- quarter Martin flat back and picked a few notes. Sounded good. Why was this Girl so resistant? He shook his head. I try to stay here. But my blues go walking, my blues go walking. They go out walking, I try to stay here. Hmma-hhmm go walking around, oh yeah, my blues go walking around. Happy in a loonie-toonie sort of way. Love that Canadian change.

To continue reading this chapter, download the complete e-book below.