“About the pancakes,” I say. “You’ll have to make them for yourself. I feel too fucked up still to wield a spatula right about now.”
She pouts a little. It’s times like this where it’s easier to remember how much younger she is than I am.
“But you always make them better than I can,” she states.
I nod. I know, I’ve tasted hers before. “Sorry, Doodle. Not this time.”
‘Doodle’ is the nickname she tried to get me to use on her when sex first became less than being just business transactions. Somehow, the only time I bother to trot out the nickname is when I’m trying to make a point, or I’m too wiped to do something for her. This is more or less some of the latter. It works this time, because she doesn’t make any further protests. This would be a moment for a bottle of Morgan’s, like earlier, if she put up more of a stink. Violence doesn’t solve anything, but it soothes my inner maniac to think about.
“Maybe later, then. I’ll see what you have in the fridge for now.”
She hops off the bed, shoving the blanket aside. She trots off to the kitchen, going past me without so much as a glance. My body turns to watch her as she goes.
I rest my arms on my knees. Dipping down, I reach for a shirt on the top of the bin. I cover my crest of chest hair with the shirt before putting it on. I’d get rid of all the hair on my body, if I could make it so that none of it ever comes back again. I wouldn’t even have eyebrows if I could get rid of them permanently. Waxing, plucking and shaving are women things, so I never bother with those. The only thing I shave is my head.. that seems manly enough. I don’t do it very often anymore because I’m always with a woman, and they never want me bald. I suppose it should bother me more that they don’t like me to express my preferred choices for my own physical appearance. What can I say, I like being liked. Well, by women, anyway. For now, I live up to their whims so long as it gets me laid. At a time like this, I could shave my head and have no qualms about it. I haven’t been laid in two months. Mind you, Jill shows up once or twice a week. Doesn’t mean she ‘services’ me as often as she appears. Lately she’s only really been coming by to eat. We never talk about where she lives, or any hard details of her personal life. We don’t really tell each other anything. I’m assuming that she doesn’t have a lot of food wherever it is that she normally stays.
But I guess that none of it matters. The girl is a dope when it comes to making food for herself; I don't think she ever really had a Mama to do that sort of thing for her, teach it to her later, like the good ones do. I didn't really either; I just seem to have a keen sense of what goes well together. Maybe that's my hidden talent. I should have been a fucking chef – yes. This motivates me enough that I get up and go to the kitchen. Jill is standing with her hip cocked to the side, browsing through the sparse offerings of my tidy white fridge. "Is all you have mustard and old Chinese?" she asks, keeping her head in the door.
"Seems so. Tell you what – I'll make those pancakes, after all. Drunky-crash be damned."
I have a bag of mixed berries, just for these sorts of occasions. She usually picks out the blackberries, so I try to leave them out; she seems to go more for the blueberries and the raspberries. Maybe next time, I'll just buy a bag of blueberries. I'd make her crepes if she liked them; I have my stepmother's recipe, the only thing that she and I ever bonded over. I pick out the big blackberries, putting them aside for one of mine. The batter doesn't take long to whip up – no boxed shit for this adventure. I don't seem to have a lot in my fridge, but I always keep random supplies in my cupboards. It seems lately I'm shopping more for her, anyway. She won't eat fruit raw, or vegetables, so I've been sticking to canned/dried soups, side-dishes-in-a-box, and instant oatmeal. I'm more of a steak-and-potatoes kind of guy at heart. I'll probably go back to that once she moves on. If she moves on. I've been waiting for her to bring up marriage – not out of love, but out of the sheer advantage of having a provider. Oh, Corrina would love that. My little personal prostitot, sitting at home with me for every meal; sidewalk-dancing in the later hours. Yeah. She would totally approve of that; she'd probably never talk to me again, just sort of fade off, taking all of my ACDC with her. Goddamn insufferable bitch. She never understands me, as is.
Back to the pancakes: hers and mine are on the pan, sizzling away pleasantly. My headiness slackens enough to allow me to enjoy the cheap delight of the smell pancakes make while cooking. Mine is bigger, but that's usual. If I made hers this big, she'd eat less of it. I work with what I know, and go from there. I bet I'd do real well with the part of the IQ test where they check you for pattern recognition. Mine breaks in half during the flipping part. No matter.
I dole out the pancakes on plates. Not particularly paying attention, I give her my plate. She's just as observant. She takes a big bite, with an over-sized fork I'd picked up from somewhere up north. It takes me a moment to register that she's not breathing right: wheezing, rasping, breath whispering less and less as the moments go by. I look at her too late; her whole face is blue, and her hands are massaging her throat with weakening fingertips. She slips out of the chair, hitting the floor with a metal-scratching-linoleum thud. I just stand there and blink, too out of it still to really get what I was looking at. Her eyes look up at me, stunned and scared.
Oh, right. She was allergic to blackberries.. that's why she always picked them out.
It’s too late. I try CPR, the Heimlich.. but all in vain. I want to feel bad, maybe cry. Men aren't supposed to cry, but we often do, when we can get away with it.
Poor little Jill. Poor puffy-faced nymph. I don't know what to do about you, though, I think to myself, wandering in my head. I sit there, on the floor with her, her head lolled in my arms, body cradled in my legs. I could leave her on the street. I could leave her here, and never return. I could dump her somewhere, my special little friend that she was. It wouldn't be unusual for her to turn up by the railroad, or any where else of the red light district. It wouldn't even be unusual if she were to be found behind a bar, like the gang-kills. Too bad the bars all know me here.
Jill ends up resting temporarily in the cab of an abandoned red Chevy pickup in the back of my apartment building. I leave her there, with the expectation of questions from cops later, and the eventual news report on the local channel. I almost wave as I walk away, remembering belatedly that she's past caring about such pleasantries.
Poor allergenic, achy-breaky Jill.
Yes. Poor Jill. Ah, but why do I still feel drunk? It interferes with my notion of proper mourning. It interferes with all of my feelings of logic and process. Feeling it as I do, with this drunkenness of unusual lengthiness, I decide to seek out Jimmy Delongue, and ask the little booger if he spiked my drinks when I was over. Where'd Sheila say he was? Her place? Sure. That's a spectacular place to start. Her place is a few blocks away, so I decide just to leave my car where it is, in the parking lot, none too far away from Jill's quiet place. So, with the pancakes still on the table a few floors up, I wander down the street, with a swagger I only acquire with inebriation.
Bye-bye, Jill.
Yes, goodbye…
