I also enjoy drug fiction.
I’m talking the work of William S. Burroughs for wild, stream–of-consciousness
imagery and gritty street truths; and Hubert Selby Jr., for taking it down to
the gutter and placing the needle to the literary vein. Tack on a bit of Jerry Stahl—Permanent Midnight
is completely insane—and Charles Bukowski for the liquid side of addiction. All of these writers, in one way or another,
transcribe truths that most of us would not admit to or even acknowledge. Well, perhaps--we writers like digging into those places, too; at least the writers of worth... Either way, they have a knack for crawling
under my skin, into my brain, and becoming my addiction when I read their
work. Fascinating, since I’ve only
dabbled in drugs and don’t drink much at all—wine; Jack Daniels; love Bloody
Marys, though.
The creative aspect of drug fiction is what really hooks me,
as I enjoy dabbling as well, allowing my brain to go to those places where the
junky might go, and allowing the speculative elements room to roam. Or, as with this story, slipping into their
world and acclimating myself to the irresistible urges via words.
This one is the ultimate drug run gone wrong, so wrong.
Here’s a sample of the madness as it takes off, another opening
sequence. We get a feel for our amped up narrator, as well as the other side
of the dual meaning for the title of this story—some people got religion as
their addiction, y’know?
***
The knock at the door could only mean one thing: Desi was
here, with the drugs no less, not that I could really deal with any more right
now, but why stop anything of such mind-numbing, reality altering magnitude
when it’s got the pedal jammed to the floor?
I can stop
tomorrow. There’s always tomorrow.
I unlatch the
lock, swinging open the door with much flourish, eyes skittish, wanting to grab
him and drag him in and--
“Hello! I won’t mean to take up much of your time.” A Jehovah’s Witness or some like-minded
Messenger of God, fercrissakes, and his silent, strap-on buddy.
Options align as
bowling pins awaiting the kiss of the rapidly spinning ball. Do I torture him for my own amusement with
snippets of my thespian talents and portray a Satanic serial killer, complete
with a drooling, halitosis smitten smile and a black marker upside-down cross
on my forehead ala Manson’s swastika etchings?
Do I resort to politeness, after all, I was voted Mr. Politeness in
kindergarten, given a red ribbon, like one does for a prize pig at the county
fair--“My, he sure is plump!”--in a quest to expedite his removal posthaste,
without eliciting anything more than a furrowed brow or a plea caught in his
throat, God’s Messenger gagging on the message?
He interrupts the
squirming, beached marlin madness in my head.
“But we're
visiting folks in your neighborhood”—no way, I think, if they’d made it to
Harold’s they’d be in the sausage grinder by now, live cams filming it all for
internet prosperity—“and were wondering if you read the bible.”
I pause, options
hazy, and choose the prize pig route: I snort at him.
***
Yeah, this one’s nuts!
But as nuts as it is, it does what I call the Joe R. Lansdale thang. What are you talking about, John Claude? Well, when I first started reading Lansdale
in the 80s, I loved the way a story might just mosey along and he's just rambling on in mega-funny guy mode, or simply getting disgusting, and it would meander and
dawdle and the reader would get settled in, kickin’ back to the lunacy and WHAM—all
of a sudden there’s a nail through the hand, or there’s some other shocking
sense of mis-logic as rule of thumb, and the whole thing now has you by the lapels and there is
no letting go until the grim and usually quite messed up finale.
This one kinda does that.
Totally nuts!
I tell ya, it’s all about balance and pacing when laying out the TOC to make optimum sense of themes and overlapping elements, so the next story is the other addiction story, but of a completely different tone. Serious as a sledgehammer lobotomy.
Another story with a song as the title? Yeah, well...
No comments:
Post a Comment