Appalachian Galapagos (23 page)

Sam began to saw.

It went into the neck easily, drawing very little blood. When he reached the bone he had a little more trouble, but after some grunting and extra muscle, he managed to get through.

The head rolled to the side, Lenny's eyes looking towards the ceiling. Sam stared down at the severed head and realized for the first time how far he had gone.

He could not believe what he had just done and wondered briefly if he lost his mind somehow, after all he had been awake for almost twenty-four hours.
I've just severed my best friend's head
, he thought.
And we didn't even discuss what we were gonna do with the body!

"Shit," Lenny said.

"Oh this is fuckin' great," Sam said, his voice a low whisper. "Now what?"

"This sucks," Lenny said, his voice sounding like it was coming out of two wet speakers, all hollow and water logged, a dash of a nasal twang. His eyes looked down towards his body. "Fuck this is weird."

"Lenny, what the hell we gonna do here, man? You ain't dead." He stared at the grisly and mutilated body, swallowing hard. "And you don't look like you're gonna die in the near future."

Lenny stared upwards. "You're gonna
hafta
throw me in the river. Ain't no way, I'll survive that. I should have drowned myself in the first place."

"How you gonna drown, you dope? You ain't got no damn lungs. Hell, I don't even know how the fuck you're
speakin
'."

It was almost midnight by the time he got Lenny's body into the trunk of the car. It was wrapped heavily in plastic, weighted down with barbells, and was already starting to smell as it decomposed.

Sam got into the car and looked down at his friend's head. "You're already
startin
' to stink man. Fuckin'
disgustin
'."

Lenny's voice sounded a little muffled as a result of where the neck sat on the car seat. "I think
stinkin
' is the least of my troubles.
Sinkin
'
is what I gotta do. I just wanna die, man. I can't believe this shit is
happenin
'. Hopefully, the river will do me in."

Sam turned down one of the side roads, knowing it would be a good idea to avoid traffic. "You better hope the river does you in. Because my help stops here."

Cop lights flashed in his rearview mirror, causing Sam to squeal like a schoolgirl, his fingers gripping the steering wheel in heart attack inducing panic.

A quick look down at the speedometer told him he was speeding. "Fuck! A cop! Now what? You're gonna get me thrown in jail,
goddammit
! Fuckin' murder one! Murder one!"

Lenny laughed. "Oh, man, this is too rich. What the hell we gonna do?"

Sam looked around the car, wrestling with the sudden urge to stop and run into the woods screaming. Reaching his hands into the back seat, he poked around through fast food bags and soda cans until he came across a paper grocery bag full of garbage. He picked up Lenny's head by the hair and tossed it into the bag abruptly tossing burger wrappers and other trash over the grisly bullet ridden face.

"Well, this is an odd experience," Lenny said from the nearly inaudible confines of the bag.

"Shut the fuck up! I'm
stoppin
' now! Don't say a word or you'll fuck us both!"

The officer got out of the car and walked toward them, twirling a flashlight cockily, hiking up his pants by the belt with one finger until they came up to the belly button of his impressive girth. He reminded Sam of Jackie Gleason in
Smokey and the Bandit
. He ambled up to the window, spat into the road, and said, "You were speeding, sir."

"Yes, I know, Officer," Sam said, trying to control the shaking in his voice. "I didn't realize it. If you wanna give me a ticket, I'll understand."

The officer turned the flashlight on and shined it into Sam's face. "Have you been drinking and—uh, why is there blood splattered all over your face?"

"I hit a deer before," Sam said lamely, knowing full well that he was screwed.

The officer smirked. "Get out of the car please, sir."

Sam obliged him, wondering if now was the time to make a run for it.

"You want to tell me the real reason you have blood all over your face," the officer said, shining the flashlight over Sam. "And your clothes and hands too. Get down on the ground, sir. And put your hands behind your back."

"Officer, please, you have no idea what you're gettin' into."

The cop put his hand to his gun, his eyes almost daring Sam to make a move. "Sir, don't make me bring this out! Now get down!"

"Leave him alone, asshole!" Lenny shouted from the car.

The officer froze, staring at the car in bafflement, his eyes darting to the car and back to Sam again like
pinballs
.

Sam knew it was time to come clean, it was the only way. "Listen, officer, my friend Lenny there tried to kill himself tonight. He was
havin
' a bad time with stuff, recently losing his wife and all. Anyways, some weird shit happened and he wouldn't die, you see? He shot himself three times in the face and it did
nothin
', didn't even hurt. I tried to help him by
cuttin
' his head off, but that didn't work either. His body is in the trunk and his head is in that there grocery bag. He's still alive."

"Goddamn you, Sam! I told you I didn't want no one to know!" the bag shouted.

"You shut up, asshole!" Sam shouted, giving the bag the finger. "This shit has gone far enough!"

The policeman looked over at the bag on the car seat and then back to Sam, his finger tugging absently at his pencil thin mustache. He pulled the gun from its holster and aimed it at Sam, his eyes narrowing. "Reach into that car and get that bag, you ventriloquist motherfucker! Do it now!"

Sam nodded. "Damn straight, I'll get the bag, let you see for yourself."

He snatched the bag from the seat and emptied it into the grass. The head rolled out amongst soda cans and burger wrappers, coming to a stop with Lenny's nose in the air.

The police officer's mouth snapped open ridiculously wide and a rush of hot air fired from his mouth like a geyser of fear. "You sick bastard!" he said, backing up.

"Everything he said was true," Lenny said, smiling as he blew a wrapper from the side of his mouth.

The cop opened fire, rocking the severed head backwards with each hit. The head rolled over a bit—nose, back of the skull, nose, back of the skull, before coming to a stop.

"I already tried that, you fat fuck, it doesn't work," Lenny said, spitting out some gravel from his broken teeth.

The cop fell backwards in slow motion, hitting the ground so hard that it vibrated the earth. Sam put his fingers to the cop's neck, relieved to feel a pulse.

"Now look what you did, you happy?" Sam asked, sighing. He walked over and picked up Lenny's head, tossing it in the car.

Ten minutes later, Sam was standing over the abandoned bridge, Lenny's head held before his face in the moonlight. He had already tossed the body into the dark river below.

"This has been the most surreal night of my entire life, man," Sam said, smiling at the ghoulish head. "I'm seriously gonna miss you. You sure you don't wanna stay?"

"Well, okay, but you're going to have to go get my body then."

Sam gasped, almost dropping the head.

"I'm
kiddin
', asshole," Sam said, grinning through his broken teeth. The bullets the officer had fired had done quite a number on his mouth.

"I hate you."

"I know. I'm gonna miss you too, seriously. Thanks for
doin
' this for me. If this don't work, it won't matter, because I'm gonna be stuck down there in that water. I seriously wanna die. I wanna get off this planet, man. It's just not my place. There's a better world
waitin
' for me."

"I wonder how in the hell this happened?" Sam asked, enjoying the way the cool midnight breeze blew through his hair.

"Who knows? Makes you wonder if there really is a God, eh?"

Sam chuckled. "It does at that. You've been one of my friends since kindergarten, Lenny. And I'm honored to say that. When I get to heaven in like seventy years or so, you better have a cooler full of cold beer for me."

"I will. Thanks, Sam. You're a true friend. I'm sorry about the cop."

"Ah, that's okay. It's not like he's gonna say anything. Who will believe him?"

"Bye, Sam," Lenny said, the chilly wind whistling through the bullet holes in his head.

"Bye, Lenny," Sam said, letting go of the head and watching it plummet into the darkness below. It hit the water, splashed briefly, then bobbed back up like a top as it went sailing slowly down the river.

"Fuck...
gurgle
..." Lenny managed to say as he went bobbing away. "Fuck...
gurgle
...I ain't...
gurgle
...
dyin
'...shit...
gurgle
...I knew you should've...
gurgle
...used the wood shredder."

Sam turned and walked away. He had done his best. It was someone else's problem now.

Two months later, an old fisherman was gazing down at the obscene decomposed head at the end of his hook, his eyes wide in a sea of wrinkled flesh.

"Look up Sam Weber and tell him we have a major fuckin' problem here," Lenny said, his voice wet and soggy.

I saw him hassling the other customers of the coffee shop before he ever came to me. Like an Egyptian beggar, he leaned in with supplicated hands, his clothes frayed, skin coated with a mosaic of dust and grime. Try as he may, he wasn't able to persuade the patrons to pause drinking their coffee, staring at the gathering throngs of people outside the large window or picking Beignet crumbs from their clothes. The man was background for the larger show, nothing more.

My
head throbbed from yesterday's
Lundi
Gras celebration. Along with thousands of others, I had danced and cheered as Zulu and Rex arrived marking the official start of the Lenten
Carnivale
. Like a middle-aged Rave, we gyrated and consumed as if the spirit of Pan himself was within us. It had been too easy to lose myself in the large crowd. Too easy to forget my own demons and become an appendage of a greater namelessness.

But now, I was paying the price. Lightning cascaded and thunder shook by bones as my hangover multiplied the actions of my overworked synapses.

My turn now, the beggar headed towards me. I stared deep into the chicory blackness of my coffee and willed him to turn away. I had my own problems and wasn't feeling very qualified to help others until I had solved my own. His shadow crept over the white of the tablecloth until the coffee and my two
ringless
hands were embraced in his darkness.

"Do you know the smell of leaves burning in winter?" he asked.

The aroma of hot chocolate with marshmallows—steam drifting upwards, the heat warming shivering hands.

The crispness of cold air.

The earthy aroma of an old man in black galoshes, faded denim dungarees, green cap tending a pile of leaves with a long rake—earth burning.

The stench of death, a temporary stillness of the living, until the white blanket is lifted.

"Yes," I said.

We both inhaled, the gasp slicing conversation. Me because of the sight of his haunted, pain-filled blue eyes; him because of my response.