Hollywood Nights
Part Eight
“Well, I guess you can tell that the deal fell through.” You sounded frustrated, not worried, or angry, or terrified, just…frustrated.
I barely registered your poorly timed sarcasm as I stared at Howie, he was clutching his side and his hands and forearms were slick with blood.
“What the hell happened?”
Howie tried to speak to me but you bowled over him, “The directions led us to a fucking trailer out in the canyon. There were two cars full of people and Howie didn’t recognize most of them. We were in the middle of making the deal and they tried to rob me.”
“Tried, what do you mean tried? They were armed right, so just give them the money.”
Howie grunted what I thought was an agreement with that obvious statement but you only fixed me with a cold stare. “You love me, I know you do, and you’re not stupid so I know, that you know, it wouldn’t have just been a robbery. They would have killed us both out there in the sticks and you would have been left to wonder what happened to us with no one to call. I took control of the situation.”
“And taking control involved Howie getting shot?”
I was pointing down at our obviously injured friend/couch crasher and he was definitely nodding and grunting in agreement that time and you only shook your head and looked down disapprovingly at Howie. “It’s buckshot, I watched my mother clean some out of my uncle’s leg once after a hunting accident when I was little. Howie here will just have to man up while I clear it out and patch him up.”
You spoke and then looked at me expectantly. When I wasn’t catching your meaning, you nodded toward our bedroom. “Go get me the kit, please.”
I didn’t need to wonder, or question. Fuck our precious lifestyle. Our easy life should have ended the night before with you being carted off to your ER demise. Howie had been shot, fucking shot! We were coke heads, not gangsters. When I didn’t budge you grunted in disgust and rolled your eyes at me before pushing me aside to go get the kit yourself.
Howie tried to get my attention, I’m sure of that now, I know he reached out for me and grabbed at my shirt with one of his blood-stained hands but he was already so weak. He tried to whisper, to groan and grunt through the agony. “She…she did th…”
I was busy back then, so wrapped up in the drama of it all that I only shrugged at him, “Who did what?”
Howie grimaced and closed his eyes and pressed his hand back over the seeping wounds at his side and you were back with the kit.
“We’ll need some extra stuff. A big bottle of hydrogen peroxide, sterile gauze pads, a few roles of ace bandages to cover it all when I’m done. Do you have any money left over from what I gave you?”
You were standing between Howie and I and telling me what to do and asking me if I had the means. Of course, I had the means. I didn’t need to use pocket change for purchasing. That wasn’t the issue. The issue was a man had been shot and was bleeding on our kitchen floor. Our friend was shot and bleeding on our kitchen floor. I didn’t need to go down to the drug store for supplies, we needed to call an ambulance for fuck’s sake!
You held out a handful of capsules and a small glass of water and spoke soothingly when Howie didn’t take them. “There are what they give me for my periods, trust me man, you won’t be feeling shit after a few of these.”
Howie took the pills and the water but he looked over to me as he took them. He swallowed the pills and handed the water glass to you but he kept on looking at me. I know he was trying to tell me something but you were there, reminding me that the extra medical supplies weren’t going to buy themselves.
I nearly ran down to the Sav-Ons that we all grew to avoid because the night manager there took to scowling at us all disapprovingly when we came by. I ignored his scowl and presented my Sav-On time finds that he was required to run across the scanner and give me our frequent buyer discount for. I left the overly bright halogen palace feeling thoroughly chastised for being one of those people.
I was hoping to come back to some sort of M.A.S.H. scenario. I was nearly finding my way to honest prayer that you would be sewing Howie up and he would be peaceful, found in a state of grace and bliss brought on by high strength painkillers hand fed him in his time of need.
Instead I came upon a scene of insane horrors. Howie was glassy eyed and making space for inevitability, he was gripping a handful of your blonde hair, his mouth open in dismay as you sucked and sucked and sucked at the fresh cut made at the side of his neck. I stood there for a few minutes, stunned as he yawned and gripped and pulled at the animal busily feeding off of his essence. Howie looked beyond all of it and stared out at the thin curtains and the blinds and he nodded down at the animal feasting on his ruin. His eyes glassy and his mouth dropping open, he still wanted me to know and acknowledge exactly what the fuck was going on.
There was a lot of blood huh?
Yeah, there was, you bet your ass there was. Most of it ended up being yours, sport!