Read Online Portland Noir by Kevin Sampsell - Free Book Online
Authors: Kevin Sampsell
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into Matter. The tan and white check of the tiles doesn’t make me feel so unsteady tonight. I apply some lipstick in the mirror. Back out at the bar, all the hipsters and the business owners are huddled closer together than most nights—abuzz with the news. One of the kids with a bleached mullet thinks it’s a serial killer targeting lesbians. He seems impressed with his own theory, ashes his cigarette in a glass tray.
Marie Claire shakes her head, sips her Rumba. “The two women used to be an item,” she says gravely. “It’s not random lesbians. It was either murder-suicide or a Romeo and Juliet kind of a thing.”
The bleach boy snickers. “You mean Juliet and Juliet?”
No one acknowledges him.
His hipster girlfriend breathes in my ear all sultry, “I heard they both recently joined NiftyWebFlicks.” She glares at the guy from Clinton Street Video.
The waitress with the hamburger tattoo nods. “He’s a loose cannon, that one.”
I can’t tell if she’s talking about the guy from Clinton Street Video or about Wilhelm, who plays pool by himself, refusing to make contact with anyone.
The waitress shrugs, looks down at me. “Absolute martini?” She asks it like it’s a rhetorical question, but I’m ready not to have a usual anymore. “Bombay,” I tell her. “Bombay martini.”
I tap the table as I wait, consider the theories.
As soon as the gin hits my throat, I feel strangely distracted, inspired. My mind bends and wanders.
Pretty soon, the regulars have changed the subject. They’re on to a new mystery: someone has stolen the little picture of Marie Claire from the bathroom in her restaurant. That picture was so cute—Marie Claire at age six or seven, her geeky cat eye glasses, her hair askew, hardly a hint of the beauty she would become. I down my last drink. Was that three? Four? I don’t even feel the cold outside as I float home, cut across the rail yard, slither in the front door and across the living room, floor boards creaking.
In the light from the neighbor’s back porch through our bedroom window, I watch Spider as he sleeps. I don’t know if you’ll understand me when I tell you this, but there are people in this world who’ll do you wrong. No matter what Oprah says, there are people in this world you can’t forgive. There are people who, just the sight of them makes your chest go tight, your throat hot. Even when they’re sleeping, the rise and fall of their chests just fills you with this sudden panic and you think: No one will ever love me. And you think: You tricked me . And you’re right. And then that panic morphs into a quiet kind of a rage that radiates from the center of you and tingles down your arms and into your fingers. It used to frighten me, that feeling. I didn’t know what to do with it. I didn’t know how to make it go away.
I watch the vein on Spider’s neck as it pulses life now. He shifts a little, snores, then shifts again, goes silent, that pale neck at once vulnerable and inviting.
Anger is the enemy of art . Spider said it himself. Smirked when he said it. But there was a lot Spider didn’t know. He tried to make me believe that the anger lived inside of me—like it was something intrinsic I couldn’t exterminate even if I wanted to. He thought he had me, like a fly in a web. Just like Mustang once thought she could pull the wool over my eyes. Just like Birdie. I chuckle, only a little, when I think of Birdie’s stupid face. Did they really think I’d just let it go? Family, I laugh, sigh. I study Spider’s neck and smile. Did he really think I was so stupid? That I’d never figure out how to handle an enemy of art? I feel those Bombay martinis in my very blood now, making things clear. As I reach for Spider’s neck, for that stupid vein, I’m filled with a perfect sense of calm. I think about all the paintings I’ll soon make—all the shows I’ll have at First Thursday and Last Friday and whatnot. I glance up at the picture of
Marie Claire shakes her head, sips her Rumba. “The two women used to be an item,” she says gravely. “It’s not random lesbians. It was either murder-suicide or a Romeo and Juliet kind of a thing.”
The bleach boy snickers. “You mean Juliet and Juliet?”
No one acknowledges him.
His hipster girlfriend breathes in my ear all sultry, “I heard they both recently joined NiftyWebFlicks.” She glares at the guy from Clinton Street Video.
The waitress with the hamburger tattoo nods. “He’s a loose cannon, that one.”
I can’t tell if she’s talking about the guy from Clinton Street Video or about Wilhelm, who plays pool by himself, refusing to make contact with anyone.
The waitress shrugs, looks down at me. “Absolute martini?” She asks it like it’s a rhetorical question, but I’m ready not to have a usual anymore. “Bombay,” I tell her. “Bombay martini.”
I tap the table as I wait, consider the theories.
As soon as the gin hits my throat, I feel strangely distracted, inspired. My mind bends and wanders.
Pretty soon, the regulars have changed the subject. They’re on to a new mystery: someone has stolen the little picture of Marie Claire from the bathroom in her restaurant. That picture was so cute—Marie Claire at age six or seven, her geeky cat eye glasses, her hair askew, hardly a hint of the beauty she would become. I down my last drink. Was that three? Four? I don’t even feel the cold outside as I float home, cut across the rail yard, slither in the front door and across the living room, floor boards creaking.
In the light from the neighbor’s back porch through our bedroom window, I watch Spider as he sleeps. I don’t know if you’ll understand me when I tell you this, but there are people in this world who’ll do you wrong. No matter what Oprah says, there are people in this world you can’t forgive. There are people who, just the sight of them makes your chest go tight, your throat hot. Even when they’re sleeping, the rise and fall of their chests just fills you with this sudden panic and you think: No one will ever love me. And you think: You tricked me . And you’re right. And then that panic morphs into a quiet kind of a rage that radiates from the center of you and tingles down your arms and into your fingers. It used to frighten me, that feeling. I didn’t know what to do with it. I didn’t know how to make it go away.
I watch the vein on Spider’s neck as it pulses life now. He shifts a little, snores, then shifts again, goes silent, that pale neck at once vulnerable and inviting.
Anger is the enemy of art . Spider said it himself. Smirked when he said it. But there was a lot Spider didn’t know. He tried to make me believe that the anger lived inside of me—like it was something intrinsic I couldn’t exterminate even if I wanted to. He thought he had me, like a fly in a web. Just like Mustang once thought she could pull the wool over my eyes. Just like Birdie. I chuckle, only a little, when I think of Birdie’s stupid face. Did they really think I’d just let it go? Family, I laugh, sigh. I study Spider’s neck and smile. Did he really think I was so stupid? That I’d never figure out how to handle an enemy of art? I feel those Bombay martinis in my very blood now, making things clear. As I reach for Spider’s neck, for that stupid vein, I’m filled with a perfect sense of calm. I think about all the paintings I’ll soon make—all the shows I’ll have at First Thursday and Last Friday and whatnot. I glance up at the picture of
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