>>> The Lady's Shave
By staff writer NG Hatfield
February 20, 2008
Iâd been sitting in the passenger seat of Appleâs beat-up Mercury Cougar, spinning a CD around my finger, whistling an old Third Reich war hymn my grandfather used to hum while he peeled potatoes. The car, white and injured from front to back, was in the parking lot of a gas station somewhere between my college town of Morgantown and our destination of Parkersburg. I was waiting for my buddies to get whatever it was they were buying. Or, in Hoagieâs case, whatever it was he was stealing.
Outside the car, a thick July fog had landed between the Appalachians. I told myself behind the whistling that it was going to be a hot one and delicately arranged the side view mirror to catch the better part of an Asian girlâs ass.
She looked my age, dressed in a dark business suit, and was filling up her Volkswagen Beetle. A redneck in this old Chevy truck, the color of soot, parked beside her and got out.
âHey there girl,â I heard him say. There was a brief pause between the girl looking up from the nozzle and from what I took by the claps of heels on the asphalt, her sprint over to hug the man.
âHey Buck!â
“I woke up to a bunch of drunk guys mocking me and my ‘cry for help.'”
I was half-amused, half-pissed. I had expected her reply to be something that Iâd hear, had I said something similar. When I noticed their familiarity, I realized there was no alternative but to listen, to see under what pretenses had the man and the girl experienced the pleasure of each otherâs company. I, of course, assumed they were friends; it had been my experience that people who have fucked donât act so cordially in any social setting, let alone the sluggish arena of an early morning parking lot.
âHowâve ya been?â she asked.
âOh, shootinâ beers and drinkinâ deers.â
I thought, you canât be serious, and watched the supple curve sliding down her backside appear in the mirrorâs reflection and then rise out as the yokel lifted her up from the ground in another tight hug.
She giggled and they slipped inside the gas station, muttering under their breath.
I figured they had seen me watching in the mirror, but it was seven in the morning and I didnât give a shit.
I reclined in my seat and rubbed a headache from my temples; a week before I had tried to kill myself and something about that hadnât left me just yet.
âIâm sorry.â
To which I said, âIâm sorry too.â
We were both sorry, Apple and I.
I had been crashing at his place for the summer, not having a bed to sleep in besides the driverâs seat of my broken down Buick and the new and uncomfortable queen-sized or doubles of women I could get drunk enough to keep me around. Once I had run out of money, though, those women were few and usually too ugly to even bother with.
I hadnât had a job since the car broke down and Iâd been out of money about a month before the attempt.
âYeah, well I was an asshole.â
I agreed and started shoving the last of my clothes into a wicker basket. The bongs and bowls we had smoked out of all summer clanged off the coffee table onto the dirty hardwood floor.
âI shouldnâtââ
âYou shouldnât have what?â I wasnât for a discussion. Apple had told all of my buddies, from jail-time-serving miscreants to holier-than-thou straight-edge teenagers, about my suicide attempt in the context of a joke and I wasnât about to hang around.
âListen man, itâs just it was funny that it wasnât sleeping pills.â Apple was always trying to be light-hearted about shit that was serious business. Except when he was drunk, the world could end and Apple wouldnât give a damn.
âYeah, well it was meant to be sleeping pills,â I said.
Which was true. I had grabbed a bottle of sleeping supplementsâherbal deals that are very different than sleeping pillsâand dumped the bottle into my mouth with the gin, assuming Iâd die. But, I woke up to a bunch of drunk guys mocking me and my âcry for help.â
âI donât want to deal with your funny shit any more,â I said to Apple.
âThen leave.â
âIâm going to leave.â
âThen get the fuck out.â
And I got the fuck out. I tossed my bags into the trunk of my broken down car and started walking into the woods around midnight.
But a week later, it was done with and we were pushing along Route 79 South towards Parkersburg and listening to an old cassette that Apple had dubbed before the trip; on its thin, white marking-tape, the words WHEN YOU GET THIS YOUR CAR WILL BE IMPOUNDED HAHA were scribbled: a testament to both Appleâs sense of self-deprecating humor and his tendency for bad luck.
âYou ever going to get your old car back?â Hoagie asked.
âOne of these days,â Apple said, and hit the fast forward button on the tape player.
Appleâs old car was nicer than the jalopy we were riding in, but had been impounded. He had an emotional attachment to the thing; his father, before he died in some freak work accident, had bought it for Apple on his all-important 16th birthday.
Aside from his somewhat strange musical taste, various horns and harpsichords blaring in odd meter, Appleâs car was silent for the first parts of the trip. That is, until we hit Route 50 and a box-truckâthe color and size of a dirty, old box-truckâwas in front of us swerving lane to lane.
âThat guy is so fucking drunk,â Jaymee said, and laughed in her nonchalant way. I couldnât tell if she was happy or
sarcastic.
âApple,â I asked, âyou mind getting around this guy? I donât want to die before this adventure begins.â I started thumping a pair of drumsticks on the back of Jaymeeâs seat. At the outset of our trip, she had forced me to sit in the back with Hoagie and I wasnât about to let her enjoy the ride as much as I wouldâve.
âCan you stop with that shit? Youâre not a drummer.â
âDoesnât the act of drumming,â Hoagie asked, âequate one to a drummer?â He started packing a bowl with dank green weed. He held a stolen bottle of juiceâthe spoils from another raid on a gas station right outside of Morgantownâbetween his legs as he worked with a grace and dignity reserved for only the most serious marijuana smokers.
Jaymee, who never had much for direct contention, sighed and pushed the rewind button.
The highway was a boring thing. The farthest from our original intentions. And the radio was the only device in the car that had any serious amount of entertainment value. Outside: trees to our left, to our right; trees behind us, in front. Trees frozen as still as only trees in a thick fog stand; trees that frame the road with green and brown and black. Trees, trees, trees.
And with all those trees taunting us, Hoagie, Apple and I smoked a bowl on the way. Hoagie and I played hangman in the back to pass the time. Hoagie's sentence: THAT TREE WAS A GREAT FUCK. Mine: MY COCK IS RAW WITH HERPES. We had a good time and when we broke through to sobriety, I was in a parking lot of a gas station somewhere between Morgantown and Parkersburg, admiring the ass of that Asian girl.
âI canât believe this shit,â Apple said from behind the raised hood of his car. He gave it a pound with both fists, I thought, for dramatic integrity.
âWell shit,â I said, and lit a cigarette.
âSo much for an adventure,â he replied, ignoring my pessimism, but remembering my word choice of âadventureâ from earlier. But in a way, that was Apple. He had a tendency to have big dreams and big heartbreaks as a result of their failure. Then excuse both with a bowl weed.
âLet me take a look,â Hoagie said. I heard the tinking and clunking of metal on metal as he studied under the hood for a few minutes. âYep, weâre fucked. Alternator's gone to hell.â
I got out of the car and stood beside Jaymee, who was leaning against a brick wall near an imposing, green dumpster. For some reason, it smelled of hotdogs and liquid cheese.
âYou see that Asian girl and that redneck go in?â I asked.
âYeah.â
âDid they sneak by us on the way out?â
âNo, theyâre still in there talking to the attendant.â
I peered around the building into a large window and saw the blue jean suit of the redneck rocking back and forth in laughter. A red bandana hung from his jacketâs pocket. He was blocking my view.
âWell if I know anything about rednecks, itâs that they know cars.â
Jaymee laughed and lit a cigarette.
Hoagie had apparently overheard me and galloped over. âYou think that guy has a good alternator laying around?â I saw that his run to our spot was just to mock me.
âNo, but heâll know of a good towing place, asshat.â I was proud of myself for thinking of an ego-saving idea on the spot. I winked at Jaymee, then Hoagie.
âWell go talk to him then.â
And I headed inside with the intention of introducing myself to his good-looking companion.
The Asian girl and her country-bred step-brother, as it were, knew of a good towing company, but the price wasnât right. So Jaymee ended up calling her uncleâs towing place back in Morgantown and we were instructed, almost haughtily, to stay put.
âStay put?â I asked. âWhere the fuck are we going?â
âI donât know. Itâs familial input, I guess. Just shut your mouth.â Jaymee defended her father with a balled-up fist and when I sat down on the hot hood of the car, she began drawing faces in the dirt of the parking lot with her unsandaled foot.
âSay, friend, you look awful sweaty. Can I get you something?â The hick and his step-sister reappeared from the gas station.
âYou can get him a new outlook on life,â Apple said, smiling. I had an inkling that his recent interest in my suicide attempt had a lot to do with the fact that I had made successful conversation with the Asian girl earlier. But, with as much control as I could muster, I lit a cigarette and let him explain to our new friends that I was a raving lunatic. In about thirty minutes, he had told the story.
âThatâsâŠgreat,â the Asian girl said and hugged my arm.
I asked what.
âThat you decided to live.â
I wouldnât call it âdecide,â I thought, but I just smiled and nodded.
She handed me a number on a business card and her step-brother gestured with his hand on his stomach, âWell I guess I should go say goodbye to Daddy. Heâs that guy right there.â He pointed at the attendant, who waved a withered arm out at us and smiled.
âYou know if you buy the large soda, you can get a free bag of those chips, dog?â
I thanked the Yo, donned head to toe in shiny black fleece, for his unsolicited help and ended up stealing both the large soda and bag of chips.
When he noticed that I hadnât paid, Hoagie said, âIâm proud of you,â and gave me a square pat on the shoulder.
We got back to the Cougar and watched the Yo leave with the drink and the snack he had presumably paid for, in a neon purple RSX.
âWhat do you think possesses a dude to drive something like that?â Jaymee asked.
âHeâs resentful,â Hoagie said.
âOf?â
âHis triflinâ hoes, obviously.â
We all laughed.
Apple pushed his head through the driverâs side window to see what was up.
âJust stole this,â I said.
With his hand on the receiver of his cell phone, he instructed both Hoagie and I not to steal again, at least while we were still stuck in the parking lot: âThereâs no means of escape, you know.â He then turned and began pacing through the gas pumps as he talked to whoever it was about the price of alternators.
âHeâs right,â Jaymee said.
Hoagie and I nodded and began to offer suggestions to beat the heat, which had welled up significantly since our arrival.