I was sitting at the side of the desk in the station, staring out the south window. Across, the street was a row of trees. There were three trees in particular that always held my attention. If one looked at them from the right angle, the branches and leaves formed an almost perfect likeness of Albert Einstein. I wondered if Barbara Walters had worked at a gas station.

It was dark at the moment, so I couldn't see the Einstein tree, only my frowning, translucent reflection in the window. Poopie was sitting at the desk, rambling on about something I couldn't be bothered to follow. I watched as a pair of headlights pulled into the parking lot. I heard a car door shut and, a few moments later, Josh appeared in the office.

Poopie spun around in his chair, "Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop! Poop..."

Josh glanced at me, dumbfounded. I shrugged. I'd seen the behavior countless times before but couldn't understand it any better than anyone else.

"Dude, what the fuck?!" Josh's face reddened and he broke out in uncontrolled laughter which soon gave way to a deep hacking cough.

"Poop! Poop! Poop!"

I noticed a car pull into one of the lanes and stood up to get it, since it was on my island. Poopie jumped up, "I'll get it! It's Vanessa!"

Josh went into the backroom to smoke some pixie while Poopie hopped outside to service his beloved. I moved from side to side in my seat, trying to get a clear image of her. It was no use - she was obscured by the pumps. However, my luck was in - once Poopie had finished her gas, she pulled around into the parking lot and came inside with him.

Maybe beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder, maybe Tracy had forever ruined it for all other women I would ever meet. Or maybe Vanessa really was a grotesque slug. Whichever the case, I gasped audibly as what resembled a white pillow case filled with potatoes rolled into the office with Poopie.

I had always expected her to be somewhat wanting in the looks department, but I hadn't expected it to be this bad. She was terribly overweight and had a permanent scowl etched onto her face. It could have been drawn on with the same pencil she had used to recreate her missing eyebrows. She was pale, but not pale enough I guess, since her face was coated with a thick cake of ghostly white makeup. She wore black lipstick and her bobbed hair was dyed blue-black. She wore an Ankh necklace and all-black clothing and was carrying a black umbrella. She reminded me of a demonic clown.

"Hey Darren! This is Vanessa! Poopie, this is Darren!"

"Hi," she monotoned.

My nose subconsciously cringed, "Hey."

"And that's Josh in the back room."

There was a cough and a weak, quivering, "Hey" from the back room.

"Wait, so you call her 'Poopie'?" I observed.

"We call each other Poopie! It's our pet name!"

"You call each other 'shit'?"

There was more coughing and laughing from the back room and my own laughter drowned out Poopie's response.

"Anyway, how's it going Vanessa?"

"Okay, I guess. I hate this time of year. I hate the smell of life."

I must admit, I admired the girl's ability to kill a conversation. Except, in her case, she didn't just let it die there. Instead, I spent the next half hour hearing about how much she hated life, anything alive and the sun.

Quietly, I managed to slip away into my own mind, away from the treatise on Death and the violent hacking echoing from the back room. Even during the previous epoch, with the constant buzzing-around of the pixies, the station hadn't been this bad. It seemed to have lost something. It was just a shell of its former self. The days of crazy, carefree drugs had given way to serious, debilitating addictions. Toad had gone from plump and spirited to emaciated and withdrawn. Josh had gone from a wild partier to a slave of his pixie pipe.

* * * It was a couple of months before I was finally scheduled an interview with Susan's company. I threw on the only pair of jeans I owned that weren't stained with oil or grease and put on a sweater and the boots I wore to work during the winter. It was the closest I ever came to dressing up.

I managed to get myself to the interview a few minutes early and met up with John, the head of the "Product Engineering" department. Just the name sent shivers down my spine. It reeked of corporate newspeak. What was wrong with just calling it the "Department that builds shit?"

The interview itself seemed to go well. John started by asking me a few questions and I remained mostly focused, only occasionally distracted by various cute women walking past the office from time to time. Eventually, the interview metamorphosed into an interesting conversation about electronics and computer programming. Before I knew it, we had spent an entire hour just chatting.

Finally, John brought the interview to an end, shaking my hand, "It was great talking with you. I'll let you know in a couple of days what we can do for you."

"Great! It was nice meeting you."

I was certain I had bagged it.

* * * That night, I stayed at Tracy and Star's place. Tracy had the night off, so we decided to stay in and watch some movies and Jerry Springer reruns. We were in bed watching television when I heard a commotion outside.

I scooted over to the window and opened the shade a bit so I could see what was happening. Tracy's landlord was in his Bronco in the parking lot. The owner of the buildings on the other side of the lot was standing outside waving his fist at him.

"Holy shit, Tracy. You have to see this."

Tracy scooted over next to me, "Oh God, not again!"

The two landlords yelled back and forth at each other, the exchange growing increasingly more charged. Tracy and I giggled at the display until, finally, her landlord put his Bronco into gear and tried to run over the other landlord, who ran inside one of his buildings.

"Holy shit!"

"Should we call the police?!"

"Fuck it. Let them kill each other."

"Darren! That's scary! Maybe we should go out."

I rolled my eyes, "Let me guess, Sam's Bar & Grill?"

Tracy shrugged.

"No, Tracy. Seriously, you need to quit drinking."

"Don't tell me what to do!"

"I'm not telling you what to do. I'm telling you what you need to do."

"Don't you think that's a little hypocritical?"

"No. I didn't go around telling people I loved how much they suck and how I hated them."

"I don't remember doing any of that."

"Oh, so that makes it Okay? Look, I had the interview today and it went well. This is a big thing for me. Something I'm not entirely sure I want to do and I'm doing it for you. I'm doing it because I love you. So what am I supposed to think when you don't want to quit drinking for me?"

"But it's no big deal! I'm just young. I want to have some fun."

"Well, if you call getting so wasted you can't even remember what happened and then waking up in your own vomit 'fun'... If it's no big deal, then stop doing it."

"Okay, fine. I'll cut down. I'll just stop drinking after a couple of beers. Happy?"

"Okay. Thank you."

* * *

I sat at the desk with the small black and white television spewing forth a constant stream of poison, like Tracy's alcohol-saturated vomit. Poopie was holed-up in the women's restroom checking the plumbing. There wasn't a customer in sight.

I browsed without interest through one of Vanessa's magazines that Poopie had borrowed. It was some sort of goth publication and featured various models posing in coffins. I was interrupted by the phone.

It was John.

"Hey, Darren. Well, unfortunately, we can't hire you in this department since you don't have a degree."

You wasted a fucking hour of my life. You knew I didn't have one when I went in for the interview, you idiot. Fuck, I cut my hair for nothing.

"Okay."

"But, I gave your resume to my friend over in Software Development. He's interested in talking to you."

I was shocked, "Really?"

"He'll be giving you a call sometime before 6."

"Okay! Thanks!"

"Take care!"

I hung up the phone and tossed the magazine over to Poopie's section of the desk. On the cover, a pale blonde girl with false fangs smiled from a pink coffin.

Posted by DevilMonkey at 2:37 AM

Print Friendly · Digg it · del.icio.us · StumbleUpon · Netscape

Comment Policy:

Anonymous comments are allowed. All anonymous comments and comments from those not registered with TypeKey are moderated. They WILL NOT appear until they are read and approved by a moderator.

It is strongly encouraged that you sign up and login with a TypeKey account. Once you do that, your comments will be immediately posted.

Comments

Posted by: John at December 28, 2006 04:38 AM

Posted by: This Charming Man at December 28, 2006 05:09 PM

Posted by: Ryne at December 28, 2006 07:34 PM

Posted by: Wysefool at December 28, 2006 08:15 PM

Posted by: Ben at December 28, 2006 08:34 PM

Posted by: brihan at December 28, 2006 09:44 PM

Posted by: waitress13 at December 28, 2006 10:37 PM

Posted by: Mitch at December 28, 2006 10:46 PM

Posted by: Anthony at December 28, 2006 11:22 PM

Posted by: mocen at December 29, 2006 01:04 PM

Posted by: Nikita at December 29, 2006 09:56 PM

Posted by: Wayland at December 29, 2006 10:27 PM

Posted by: CaptainCanada at December 31, 2006 03:44 AM

Post a comment

Name:

Email Address:

URL:
Remember Me? YesNo

Comments:

Please type the phrase 'devilmonkey' in the box below (required):