Girls with Dogs

I saddled up to the bar next to Milanovich. It wasn’t the first time I could remember drinking with him. He always had a story and each and every story always had a moral… a philosophy. His reasoning was quite undecernable and to question it was like asking why to some brute trauma brought on by reality, like why did that child have to die or why does one get brain cancer. My place was only that of a mere listener, an observer to validate the moment had ever even occurred.

I ordered Budweiser, the McDonalds of beers, the same everywhere. The Serb was drinking vodka and OJ, the same as always. He starred down at me puffing on his cigarette, reading me. He blew the smoke from one corner of his mouth and turned to stare out the window. I took a long, cold gulp from my beer.

“You know how girls with dogs like it doggy style?” He was pointing with his cigarette and two fingers at a college girl walking her dog outside.

“What?” For a minute I thought I must have misunderstood him. But I knew, I knew I had heard what I heard.

“They do. You can tell how a woman likes her sex by the animals she keep. You know the girls who keep cats? They like the petting, you know, more playful sex. Those women with the birds, they like to suck dick. And dog girls, they like it in the ass… or doggy style”

“You might be right,” I replied.

“Oh, I am.”

We sat in silence for sometime while we drank our drinks. A group of people behind me hooted over the clack of a shuffle-board game. Johnny Cash sang for all the suffering people of the world in Man in Black from the jukebox. I ordered another beer and threw a ten dollar bill on the bar. Johnny Cash and shuffle board can make a man mighty thirsty for beer. The Serb ordered another screwdriver and pulled out a fresh cigarette. He threw the pack in front of me offering me one. I pulled one from the pack and stuck it in my mouth. He lit it for me.

“You need to hook up with 2Toes.” He said it suddenly, pointing the cigarette at my face. “The man was hit by two cars in one month. Pure Maine white trash, like those fucking Canadians, he’s impossible to kill.”

“Who?”

“Tommy2Toes, the beast. He created The Ugly Lovers. It’s a book of drawings. Just the ugly people fucking each other, old men with saggy balls, old fat women with saggy tits and all drawn so nice.” He said it with a calm smile on his face. I couldn’t tell if he was serious or not. “Don’t ask him about the two toes thing. He doesn’t like to talk about it.”

“Ok, maybe I will. What’s the course of action?” I had already drank my entire beer. The jukebox was playing Merl Haggard Mama Tried as I ordered another beer.

“I don’t think it’s really important right now what we do. Keep yourself exempt, just don’t forget your importance in the global revolution. It doesn’t matter right now. What about weed?” He smashed his cigarette into the ashtray as he asked the question.

“I don’t know. We could go talk to the Argonaut. He’s bound to have something.” I really didn’t put much thought into the question. The beer was cold and I felt like I could drink ten or twenty of them sitting right where I was.

“Fuck that asshole! He fucking pisses me off. Everything I don’t like in a human. He’ll go nuts and shoot somebody some day. Probably you.”

“Maybe. It’ll be more his problem than mine.” I was trying to ignore the whole direction of the conversation.

“Listen to me,” he suddenly turned and stared down at me. “I think this is important for you to understand. My father’s uncle lived for one hundred and two years. He fought in both wars against Germany. Got shrapnel in the first war and two bullets in the second. He was in a hospital camp outside Moscow after the second war and had to follow the train tracks back home by foot. He walked from Moscow back to Beograd. It took the fucker almost a year to walk home. He lived till he was one hundred and two, fucking smoking, fighting wars, drinking vodka and living in the same house on a one way street. Then the Yugoslavian government changed the street this one day. They made it both ways instead of one. He came out to go for his morning walk the next Monday. The bus, it hit him and killed him. What the fuck you gonna do?”

“Look both ways, I guess.”

- Aimless John Valentine 2002

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