Short story from Peter Jacob Streitz

ZUCKERFACE

 

Fucking drunks! I loathe this shithole and all its chitchat. I mean, talking to today’s dipsticks is like believing that a broad’s bald pussy is womanhood. Hell, even if some bum bones the bitch . . . baby hair—if the fish ain’t gutted first—will appear in the form of whining pain in the ass if it’s not a breech birth. But then again, what the fuck do you know sittin’ there like some hoity-toity thinkin’ I can’t hold my hootch.

Ooooh, so ya don’t like my tone do you? Well, okay then—come closer and read my tweety little lips . . . no, goddamn’it I didn’t spit on you . . . that was a beery blowback from my draft, my pint . . . so dig me forming my tweety little lips into one hundred and forty characters. See, I’m all puckered up, kissey-like, meaning the first syllable is you naked as a jaybird. Nah, forget that, wrong . . . you got no character so I’ve wasted a fucking vowel.

What’ya mean that’s mean?

Don’t get all pissy. I’m sorry as shit, really. Listen, you ever heard of a picture being worth a thousand words . . . or mass media . . . I call it, masturbation media like that Facebook thing, that billionaire’s domain I guess ya’d call it. You know, Zuckerface? Oh, like I’m so stupid. Well let me tell you sweetcakes, I once had a thousand strangers as friends on that thing and it wasn’t easy. Speaking, of easy, what’s your number honey pie? Jesus, alright, I’ll admit to using phony photos of family shit . . . then lyin’ my ass off about kids, and crappy marriages, and pieces of ass I never fucked other than with my palm. But that wasn’t the worst of it, some of these fucking pricks, these strangers, would claim I’m stalking them. Report me. Harpoon my ass. Saying they never heard of me. Worldwide this happened. Then that cocksucker Zuckerface would cut my verbal balls off . . . no contact for a week or two. He’d throw me in the pen, purgatory. Couldn’t do dick. No “in or out” so to speak.

That’s a laugh riot to you?

Okay stop there, Missy Puss-Puss, where ya goin’ I haven’t finished yet. Jesus, I’d sign his sappy-ass Terms&Conditions, promising to behave and Zuck-the-Fuck would let me back in . . .

And what the fucking-H are you looking at? You want some of this, me . . . or the blond bomb I was just talking to? The broad? Okay then. Hey man, no hard feelings. I mean, isn’t that a military cap, homeland security I’m guessing? I’m just saying, I was in the force, seriously. Got fired from a job so I enlisted—talk about explosive! And no, it wasn’t for boozin’ I ratted on the boss. But that’s neither here nor there until I wound up in Afghanistan. Worked KP duty mostly. Kitchen Patrol. Don’t know, just kind’a cut out for it. Use to like the ratty little kids and mothers coming around. Shared leftovers, scraps. But on Thanksgiving and Christmas we’d give balls to the wall. Yet I think them being there, the girls and women anyway, was against ortho, ortho, oh hell, orthodoxy; like it’s easy for me to say. Regardless, I was armed. An M9, with a laser thankfully . . .

Oh, like I’m boring you. What’a about your comrade . . . at your shoulder? Interested in guns, weaponry? Barkeep, “Bravo” ol’ buddy ol’ pal—a round for my friends here, doubles, beer backs. As I was saying, I had a lot of down time to practice shooting. A deadly aim, lethal I was . . . Okay Bravo, I know you’re the big cheese. I understand. Honestly, I don’t know why I’m even talking to these two mooks. It not like I’ve said this before, posted it around . . . especially not that medal stuff, or commendations. Don’t know, maybe it’s something to do with that bombing in Boston . . . that kid getting killed. Those people . . .

Who knows, really? That’s enough. Hey, Bravo, that barbecue still on for next Saturday? After another shot—on the house—I’ll promise to do all the cooking . . . remember, I once fed an army. Beans and franks. Meaning, my two friends here are more than invited, right Bravo? Two new friends.