The Garbage Times - White Ibis Read online

  ‘You gotta get dis weirdo out too,’ she said.

  She motioned behind her while directing her eyes in the same direction and nodding backwards.

  ‘Hey, you really like turquoise,’ I said, touching the rings and bracelets on her arthritic hands.

  She hid her hands.

  ‘Stahhp,’ she said, laughing. ‘Don’t touch my hag-hands. Just get dis weirdo out.’

  ‘Fine!’ I yelled.

  ‘Don’t yell!’ she said, squawking.

  Before I walked away, this guy nearby asked the bartender if we made chocolate martinis.

  She put her hands up and squawked, ‘Why would you ask me dat?!’ and walked away with her face in her hands.

  I not-seriously said, ‘Hey, man, get the fuck out of here.’

  He shrugged. ‘What?’ Then he slouched. ‘Fine, man.’

  He left.

  The server came up and hugged me and said, ‘What up, sexy?’

  I undid her hug by the wrists and dropped her hands and said, ‘Hands off me, bitch, I’m working.’

  I walked up to the ‘weirdo.’

  He had his elbows on the bar, asscrack coming out his sweatpants.

  ‘Hey, man,’ I said.

  He turned.

  He had a huge wound on his forehead—golfball-sized and irritated and leaking rusty fluid.

  ‘Ah?’ he said.

  ‘You have to leave.’

  ‘Ah?’

  ‘Leave. I said you have to leave.’

  ‘Oh, ok. Sorry. Sorry, don’t beat me up.’

  ‘I’m not going to beat you up.’

  ‘Ah-k. Ey, what time is it?’

  ‘Nine.’

  He looked at his watch and said, ‘Snine already? I should go.’

  He left.

  ‘Taaaaaaank you,’ the bartender said.

  She was doing dishes.

  I pointed to my cheek and tapped it.

  She leaned over the bar and kissed my cheek.

  The server walked up and set empty glasses on the bar, picking wet receipts off a tray and flicking them to the ground.

  She asked me to check on the women’s bathroom.

  Whenever there was a problem I’d be asked in a hushed/apologetic tone if I could ‘check on’ it.

  Which always meant something was wrong.

  No one ever just checked on something like a bathroom.

  Let’s see, ah, there it is, bathroom’s still there, great!

  So I went to the women’s bathroom.

  And in the first stall, what did my very eyes check on but a toilet filled with shit, shitty paper, and a single bloody tampon.

  I checked on it real good.

  It was definitely there.

  Yes.

  I stared coldly.

  Yes, you are there, aren’t you.

  Yes.

  Hello.

  Hello, bloody tampons and shit.

  How nice of you to come.

  Nice, but, also, a bit arrogant—don’t you think?

  Is it … are you … am I to believe you think you’ll be allowed to stay?

  Because guess what: no!

  Wrong!

  I smiled, staring coldly and not blinking.

  I moved the toes on my left foot and watched them come out of the side flap of my boot.

  Haha, I love you I love you!

  I hiked my pants and took a breath, acknowledging in advance the possibility of defeat so as to prevent defeat.

  Because nothing could defeat me!

  Nothing defeats the garbageman, motherfucker!

  I grabbed the plunger behind the toilet.

  I put the plunger into the water and stirred the clog a little.

  Oh yes, because they like when you open them up a little before plunging.

  Yes, that’s right.

  I covered the hole with the plunger lips.

  And then …

  Why … then I went deep.

  I plunged deep and slow … koosh koosh …… koooosh.

  Yeah, you love it, you stupid fuck.

  Koosh … koosh.

  The plunger folded backwards … frip.

  I straightened it under the rim … flok.

  Some water splashed my boot.

  Water always got on me though, so whatever.

  Let that be a reward then.

  Yeah.

  Yeah, a medal.

  I pressed the plunger down again and did some fast little plunges … shik-shik-shik.

  Yeah.

  Fuck yeah.

  Feel it, you little fuck.

  Again.

  Again and again.

  Until the toilet choked and swallowed.

  Choked and swallowed like a good little fuck.

  Like papa’s good little shit-eating fuck!

  I set the plunger behind the toilet—for whatever came next.

  Knowing there’d always be something to check on.

  I went to wash my hands.

  Someone had puked in the sink.

  Oh, hello, puke.

  Nice of you to join us!

  I was just checking on your friend over there, and …

  I wrapped my hand in toilet paper and swept the vomit out of the sink into a garbage can, which hit the bottom with a drumming sound.

  I looked at myself in the mirror, opening my eyes wide and smiling at myself.

  My my, what a handsome man …

  A truly handsome man …

  Someone came into the bathroom.

  ‘Oh shit, sorry,’ she said.

  I stretched my back, lifting my arms up. ‘Hey, how ya doin?’

  She laughed. ‘I’m—just great.’

  ‘All right!’ I said, nodding. ‘That’s what I want to hear.’

  I left the bathroom.

  The bartender was pouring a beer.

  She looked at me.

  I wiped off my hands with the rag on my belt loop and winked, hitting my chest with my fist.

  She made a face, topping off the beer. ‘You look weird. Were you doing drugs in dair?!’

  She always accused everyone of being on drugs.

  Or gay.

  In her world, everyone was either gay or on drugs.

  Or both gay and on drugs.

  But never not gay and not on drugs.

  I grabbed my dick and gestured at her.

  She laughed and put her hand on her chest and coughed, holding the beer out to the side.

  ‘Stahhp! Quit maykin me laugh! Oh hey, watch [Regular] over dair. He’s doing the hair ting.’

  [Regular] was a Vietnam vet who came in every day.

  Anytime anyone got near him for too long he’d start grinding his teeth and biting his lips and glaring at them—even if they didn’t notice it for a long time—until the inevitable fight, when I’d have to throw out the other person/people no matter what because of how much money [Regular] spent.

  It was stupid.

  Tonight, same shit.

  He was whipping his long hair around, and hiking his pants over his huge belly, sitting at the corner of the bar with a group of people behind him.

  His face was totally red and he was talking to himself.

  The look on his face so evil.

  I laughed.

  What if I just let him get killed?

  What if I just let that happen?

  Could I just tell the police I didn’t mind if he died?

  Is that illegal?

  Shrugging and smiling: ‘What? I didn’t like him!’

  He was folding and unfolding his arms, staring wide-eyed and grinding his teeth.

  Goddamnit.

  When he got up to go to the bathroom, he yelled, ‘MOVE, YOU FAT CUNT!’ into this lady’s face.

  Two guys went at him.

  I ran over.

  He took a halfassed punch to the face and almost fell but recovered and then there was the normal awkward wrestling.

  I stood in the way while the guys started swinging.

  Punches bou
nced off my shoulders while I faced [Regular] and screamed at him to fucking relax.

  One of his drinking buddies pulled him back in a chokehold and [Regular]’s pants fell down.

  I made the other people leave and [Regular] fell asleep facedown on the bar, pants around his ankles.

  *

  It was a slow night overall.

  Near closing, nobody was there except the ice forming on the inside of the windows and door.

  I sat at the bar near the server and bartender and said, ‘All right, so this shit boils my onions to a crisp. Why do we have the ten-ounce AND fourteen-ounce plastic cups? Let’s be honest, no one uses the ten-ounce cups. Why? Why do we do it? Somebody tell me why!’

  The server looked at my head and motioned for me to lean forward. ‘Hey, come here,’ she said.

  I dodged back.

  Sometimes she just slapped me.

  ‘No, for real, come here,’ she said.

  I leaned my head towards her.

  She gently pulled something off my head with her nails. ‘This shit been there all night.’

  It was a wisp of cobweb or fuzz or whatever.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, watching her drop it.

  The bartender laughed, covering her mouth with her hands. ‘I saw dat, but I didn’t want to tell you because it was so funny.’

  ‘I understand,’ I said, folding my hands.

  There was nothing to do.

  So we started drinking.

  Old Style tallboys and shots of Malört.

  Our only other customer the whole night was a very old man in a curly bleached-blond wig and businesswoman suit—knee-length skirt and high heels—and holding a purse, with lipstick and a couple days’ stubble.

  He talked in a very high-pitched warbling accent of some kind.

  ‘Oh heavens, the weather!’ he said, struggling to close the door, then adjusting his purse. ‘Atrociable!’

  He smelled like old lady perfume and mint.

  He ordered an Old Style tallboy.

  ‘All thanks to you, fine people,’ he said, bowing.

  Then he went and played this videogame machine we had—where you controlled a chef on screen, making the chef run back and forth to catch pineapples falling from the sky—talking to himself the whole time, referencing ‘the Duchess.’

  The bartender said, ‘I didn’t even know we had dat.’ Then she went tup tup with her lips, and swatted around at her face. ‘This goddamned fly. I tink it touched my lips, gehhhh.’ Then she laughed and made a diamond-shaped hand gesture over her crotch with her gnarled hands. ‘It’s coming for my dried-up cherry!’

  I laughed.

  The server shook her head. ‘You fuckin awful.’

  The bartender poured more shots of Malört.

  ‘Pour one for the Duchess,’ I said.

  I walked a shot of Malört over to the guy playing the video game.

  ‘Ohhh heavens to Betsy,’ he said. ‘Thank you a thousand times most graciably!’

  ‘Well, fuck yeah,’ I said.

  We tapped glasses and drank the shots.

  He adjusted his purse and continued playing the video game.

  I took our glasses back to the bar.

  There was a show on TV about a whale killing an employee at an amusement park.

  The 911 transcript showed on the screen along with the audio from the call.

  We all watched, the server and I sharing a plastic cup full of gummy worms.

  Dispatch: Tell me what happened … did you notice blood in the water?

  Caller: No, the uh … we just … we found her floating. She was scalped. I didn’t see any blood though.

  Dispatch: Ok, so, now um what happened with the, the—

  Caller: The arm?

  Dispatch: Yes, the arm. Did he let go of it?

  Caller: No, he swallowed it.

  Dispatch: He swallowed it.

  The show cut to shots of whales swimming in the ocean and emotional music playing.

  I improvised a song.

  A song about whales.

  Whales being whales.

  Oceans and whales.

  Whale-filled oceans and wonderful wanderings.

  I asked, if not we, then who would protect the whales?

  Would it be left to pure chance?

  And who would ride the whales to freedom with me?

  ‘Will you?!’ I sang, touching the server’s nose. ‘Or will you stand by the shore?!’

  She was laughing. ‘I hate you,’ she said, covering her mouth, half a wet gummy worm between her nails.

  ‘Can I have a gummy worm?’ the bartender said, swiping her hair to the side to get it out of her mouth. ‘Please. Dose look good, I want one.’

  ‘I want one,’ I said, doing an impression of her.

  ‘Stahhp,’ she said, taking a gummy worm and biting it numerous times in quick succession.

  The Duchess walked up to the bar and set down the empty tallboy and adjusted his purse and said, ‘Oooooo-k then, off now. My blessings to you, each and all.’

  ‘Later, have a nice night!’ I said.

  As he walked by me, I pointed to my cheek.

  ‘Oh,’ he said.

  He kissed my cheek and left.

  We started closing down the bar.

  I went downstairs and carried up cases of beer and stocked them in the coolers while the bartender and server did paperwork.

  We told each other shit that’d happened at the bar lately.

  The bartender said the night before they had to throw out some girl who was in the bathroom pants down on the toilet blowing a guy who was doing coke off the toilet paper thing.

  I started doing dishes.

  Grabbed a bloated lime wedge floating in the sink and threw it at the window and it went foonk.

  ‘That seems like,’ I said, ‘like if I were the guy I’d’ve just let her go to the bathroom first, ya know? Shit like that really boils my onions to a crisp. It really does.’

  The server said she had to wake up [Regular] in the bathroom after he’d gone in there and passed out pants down and shit himself.

  ‘Again?!’ the bartender said. She slouched, an anguished look on her face. ‘He always does dat, I don’t get it! Why does he do dat?!’

  I put cellophane over all the liquor bottles.

  I plugged the taps and poured hot water down the drains beneath them.

  One of the drains had to be plunged.

  I grabbed a small plunger beneath the sink, and, because why not, the purple rubber glove next to it.

  ‘I heard they kicked dumb-ass over here out this place the other night,’ the server said to the bartender.

  ‘What!’ the bartender said, looking over her reading glasses at me.

  ‘Yup,’ said the server.

  I leaned over the drain and pushed down on the plunger head with the gloved hand, pulling the handle upward with the other.

  I explained that I’d gotten drunk at work and on the walk to the train I tried to do a pull-up on some construction scaffolding but hit my forehead on a nail and cut it badly, then for some reason came back to the bar, bleeding all over.

  ‘How long did they let you drink for?’ the bartender said, folding her arms.

  ‘I did like fifteen pull-ups though,’ I said, plunging.

  ‘How long did they let you drink for?’ the bartender repeated.

  I wiggled my fingers in the purple glove, then touched my chin. ‘Til like ten in the morning.’

  The bartender pulled at her face with her hands, looking up. ‘Why did they do that! We’re all gonna get fired and die!’

  I did a few last plunges and took the rag off.

  When I lifted the plunger, there was a long translucent piece of beer scum coiled beneath.

  I picked it up carefully and motioned like I was going to whip it on the bartender but it almost hit my face and I said, ‘Oh shit,’ and then just threw it to the floor in the same motion.

  ‘Can we leave?’ the server said. />
  ‘Yeah, you can leave,’ the bartender said.

  *

  I walked the server a few blocks to a parking garage.

  We split an old candy cane she had in her purse, sliding over iced sidewalks and walking over high snowbanks.

  She talked about her boyfriend.

  ‘Like, he coo or whatever, but it ain’t that serious. If he caught a bad facial burn or whatever, I’m out.’

  ‘What if he crawled to you right after the burning—didn’t even go to the hospital—and grabbed at your feet, sobbing, begging with his charred face, “Please, please, keep me as your boyfriend, please.”’

  She laughed. ‘I hate you.’

  I kicked over a construction sign to bridge a huge area of ice by a curb.

  We walked over the road sign.

  At the parking garage I went into the lobby area with her while she waited for the elevator.

  We kept alternating saying ‘fuck’ and making sounds like zuhduhduh, trying to warm up.

  Eventually she said, ‘You cute but I ain’t about to date no I-talian.’

  She was smiling and pointing at me with her head leaned back.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘You I-talians know how to hide a body. I date you, they ain’t find me for eight years or some shit. Find my ass in a suitcase in the river.’

  ‘So what though?’

  She laughed.

  She took her phone out and scrolled through it.

  The elevator opened.

  She put her leg in to keep the door open.

  ‘Wanna see a new one of [her daughter]?’

  I slapped my hands together and rubbed them and said, ‘You know I do.’

  She showed me a daycare picture of her daughter sitting on a small stool and smiling, top and bottom two teeth the only ones in her mouth.

  I laughed. ‘I like when they only have the teeth like that.’

  ‘She funny as hell.’

  ‘It’s like rat teeth.’

  ‘My little rat.’

  She showed me a video of her daughter behind the steering wheel of a parked car, slapping the steering wheel along to music, trying to sing.

  It was some good shit.

  It really was.

  ‘Don’t let her date no I-talians,’ I said.

  She laughed. ‘I hate you.’

  We hugged.

  ‘Night, baby,’ she said.

  ‘You good to get to your car?’

  ‘I’m good.’

  Only thing was, she wasn’t …

  Found out a few days later someone attacked her and killed her right after I left.

  Just kidding, she was fine.

  I walked to the train.