Read Online Here Come the Dogs by Omar Musa - Free Book Online Page A

easy.’
    She starts to tattoo
    the postcode of the Town
    onto his neck.
    His face is emotionless.
    She is mumbling along to the song –
    â€˜From the Pacific Isle of Samoa
    via Middlemore, still as raw as the day a baby boy
    was delivered on.’
    Delicate with the needle,
    efficiently wiping away blood and ink
    with a paper towel,
    she is finished quickly.
    â€˜And now?’
    â€˜A joker. Right here.’
    â€˜On your hand?’
    â€˜Yeh.’
    â€˜Can you prove you’ve got a job that lets you have a hand tatt?’
    â€˜Ah . . . What?’
    â€˜I don’t do face or hand tatts if you can’t prove you’re not gonna lose your job if you get one.’
    â€˜Nah. I mean, I can pay.’
    â€˜I’m sure you can, babe. I just don’t do it. Sebastien should have told you.’
    â€˜Orright.’
    He sits back down with his mates. They talk among themselves.
    â€˜It says Johnno’s next.’
    â€˜How much longer till me?’
    â€˜You Solomon?’
    â€˜Yeh.’
    â€˜Ah, shouldn’t be long. Maybe twenty minutes. Sorry, babe, Seb called in sick. Probably hungover. Fucked everything up.’
    â€˜No worries. I’ll be back.’

    A joint

    I duck out the back and roll up a joint.
    This weed is wet.
    That dodgy fucker Grunt
    flysprays his weed
    to make it heavier, I heard.

    Gotta be careful.

    The main street is changing.
    It even has a coffee shop. With a barista.
    Fucken sacrilege.

    I think of some mad lines from a Horrorshow song:
    â€˜Every day, the heritage fades/
    Gentrification, nothing’s gonna get in the way.’

    Change is a nest of white ants in the wall,
    acid to the face.
    Sudden or slow,
    it terrifies me.

    Today’s heat like a fillet blade,
    taking strips off me.
    I blow smoke,
    mouth tasting ashy but the weed working nicely.
    Someone joins me. It’s the tatt artist.
    She has a smooth, pale throat.
    â€˜Finished already?’
    â€˜Yeh. Those fellas chucked a tantrum cos I wouldn’t do hand tatts.’
    â€˜Ah.’
    â€˜Idiots. I’m not gonna take responsibility if they wanna fuck their lives up.’
    â€˜You gave that guy a neck tatt, though. What’s the difference?’
    â€˜Dunno. Gotta draw the line somewhere, I guess.’
    â€˜You want some of this?’
    â€˜Don’t smoke. Thanks, though. Come in, babe.’

    Skin

    I point at an elephant in an art book I brought with me.
    It’s stylised, with swirling designs on its hide.
    An Albanian king had it on his chest,
    supposedly.
    Suddenly Aleks’ voice comes into my head.
    Anytime you hear of someone getting clipped in Melbourne,
    it was probably an Albo that done it.

    â€˜Nice piece. Why this one?’ she says.
    â€˜My mum’s favourite animal.’
    â€˜Aww, a mama’s boy.’
    Truth is,
    I don’t spend enough time with Mum,
    even though I still live with her,
    but I say, ‘Yep. Heaven lies at the feet of the mother.’
    She looks up, her eyes a startling green. ‘I like that.’
    â€˜Yeh. It’s in the Qur’an. I think.’
    â€˜You Muslim?’
    â€˜Once upon a time.’
    â€˜Well, it’s nice. Problem with most hip hop guys is that they all think their mum’s a queen but every other woman’s a whore.’
    â€˜True.’
    â€˜And you?’
    â€˜I got a girlfriend.’
    â€˜And?’ Her cat eyes shine.
    â€˜I treat her very well, thank you very much. You worked here long?’
    â€˜A while. Moved from Auckland a few years back. Hey, you’ve got nice skin. You must eat well.’
    â€˜Dunno.’
    â€˜You get all types. If you’re lucky, it’s lovely and buttery. You should thank your parents.’ She wipes some ink and blood away.
    â€˜I’ll try to remember.’
    â€˜You a coconut?’
    â€˜Samoan.’
    â€˜
Afakasi
?’
    â€˜I’m Samoan.’
    â€˜Woah. Calm down. Just