NOTE: This story contains a scene where a body literally hits a floor.



PsychoBillieJean was a real rock-n-roller with a chip, a good head, and a tattoo on her shoulder. The tattoo read, "Quod me nutrit, me destruit." Whatever made her feel good--or just feel--she'd do it. She put a lid on her past because she couldn't unscrew it. When she found a good fit, she immediately threw it, and when she wanted to fight, everybody knew it. Her brimstone eyes stared their way through Hell's souls. I needed her; she needled me--her moan, a pandemonious cacophonous wail in my veins, a spiked shot that felt like pain and dripped like wax from the waning moon. 

She played a fierce tune, that PsychoBillieJean! Drove her Gretsch like a hot rod, going easy downtown. Quaint slick streets and country bumpy roads! A hum and a purr of an engine redlining. A psychobilly fever--screaming for life, perpetually dying.

PBJ: The Right Reverend Deacon Johnny Bacchus! (she said, shaking her head on the plasticky motel pillow).

RRDJB: In the flesh.

PBJ: What are you writing?

RRDJB: I'm not. I'm stereotyping (I said, setting my compbook on the one nightstand).

PBJ: You've had too much…. (she said, sitting up in bed). When I get back, I'm going to give you more.

She tripped to the bathroom, didn't bother shutting the door. The fluorescent white light raced out and fought with the red neon from the motel sign--"Vacancy!" Ya damn right! The lighting? Fighting? Well, maybe--maybe not. It's a fine and violent line, but we do what we got to--to save the specious urges that impact us.

PBJ: The Right Reverend Deacon Johnny Bacchus! (she said, sauntering from the bathroom naked).

RRDJB: In the flesh.

PBJ: I was a hardcore fan of you and your first band before I was even street legal. And just look at me now, living the dream.

RRDJB: What are the odds?

PBJ: This tour is gonna make us famous. You can bet on that.

RRDJB: I've been famous before.

PBJ: That was a good start, but now, you're going to finish the job.

Her mixed metaphors were rocket surgery, so I woke up and smelled the roses. When I woke up again later, the sun beat me up, and PsychoBillieJean sat on the dresser, strumming an unplugged electric guitar, humming an unsung eclectic classic.

PsychoBillieJean was a shiny new model. I had become a rusty antique. My embroidered shirt was draped across the bedpost, reminding me that old punks are like bench seating: You can't renew; you can only reupholster. I was buttoning my shirt when she threw me the guitar, said:

PBJ: I gotta go out. Handle something.

Funny, after all the things I'd let her handle, I realized I didn't know her well enough to ask where she was going or why.

RRDJB: Need a ride?

PBJ: I'm calling a cab.

She used an Uber app on her smartphone, but she still called it "calling a cab." She had a sick sixth sense of nostalgia for sentiments that she was born too late to value. 

RRDJB: (Looking in the mirror) I didn't need the app to tell me that.

PBJ: Come again?

RRDJB: Not today.

PBJ: (Laughing) I mean, what'd ya say?

RRDJB: I said I hope things work out.

PBJ: Me too. I'm gonna get us that deal. I'm meeting with the producer who declined. Say Cheese!

She held her little purse up to my face. I could see the little camera--looked like a plastic roll of dimes stuck to the strap.

RRDJB: What's gonna change?

PBJ: No one says "No" with their pants on the floor.

She smoothed her lipstick by rubbing her lips on my cheek. Then, she headed out the motel door letting in just enough breeze to highlight the smell.

#Rest#

Buzz! Buzz! FLACK! buzz?

My phone vibrated its way off the dresser into the mostly empty drawer.

RRDJB: Yes.

PBJ: Come get me! Come get me now!

RRDJB: I don't know where you are.

PBJ: I don't have time for this!

RRDJB: Doesn't change the fact….

PBJ: I'm at the MirandaView Motel out Highway 6. It's where we bought the stuff

RRDJB: I don't remember.

PBJ: Look it up.

She hung up.

Then, Buzz! Buzz!

A text popped up: "hairy up park in back."

#Rest#

The MirandaView was an old school single-strip motel with a fence where a pool had been filled in and replaced with large green dumpsters. The no-tell had catered nightly, in its heyday, to non-single people for the most part. It overlooked a tired highway in the front and a swampy mire in the distance in the back where I rolled around wondering how I'd know where to park. Then, a rolled up bedspread poked out before it fell out of a window, making a large dusty thump on the make-shift dirt path where other people had driven around to park out of sight.

A balding head poked out of the bedspread's top, and PsychoBillieJean poked her head and her raven tresses from the large, sliding window. 

PBJ: Pop the trunk! 

The sunshine seemed to violate her face as she climbed through the portal from whence the dead had sprung. She tossed her purse in the front seat and grabbed one end of the parcel, helping me load-- 

Had she done this before?

PBJ: Now don't go flying out of here (she said as we left). Just drive around and make a right.

#Prestissimo#

PBJ: I didn't mean to kill him, man, like, I was just going to blackmail him, right? And he got all, "You can't do this to me! Don't you know who I am?" right? So I said, "Yeah"--real respectful-like, right? I said, "Yeah, you're the man, and if you weren't, I wouldn't be here, we wouldn't ha' done that 'cause you look like a dusty walrus, and I wouldn't have a reason--right?--to take movies of "The Man" in action, right? And show your wife, right? But I said, like, "We don't have to go that route, and you're going to be rich after this album--" And he said he was going to stop me right there, right? He was all, "I'm gonna stop you right there," right? "Nobody's making money off albums. People are streaming music for free. We're trying to make money; you're trying to make history, you and that decrepit creepy relic. He can't even tour in three major markets because of past lawsuits. He's a danger to himself, others, and probably you. You oughta look out for yourself," he said. That's what he said, right? So I did, right? I looked out for you and me, right? Like, we don't need his vote, but he sure ain't gonna vote against us, not no more. That's for sure! (Laughed, as if at the rain.) Right?

And she started to cry.

*****Laughed! 

Then, she cried. 

*****Laughed! 

**********Then, cried.

RRDJB: There's a moon.

PBJ: What?

RRDJB: There's a moon out tonight. Full.

PBJ: We gonna shoot his ass to the moon?

RRDJB: We'll ride and wait for dark. Under the moon, we can see where we're going when we drag him down and drop him off in the river. 

PBJ: (Laughed!) You got a spot?

RRDJB: I got a spot.

PBJ: (Laughed!) I love you!

She leaned against the door.

*****Laughed!

PBJ: I really do, you know. Right?

And, then, she started to cry. 

#Coda#

Months later…

PsychoBillieJean became a rich rock-n-roller with a sycophantic candor and a contract in her folder. Months later, as we got in the car, she laughed. Out of nowhere--laughed. She laughed harder. Then, she broke down.

PBJ: You know I have to find that Uber driver.

RRDJB: Why?

PBJ: He called me the other day--

RRDJB: He has your number?

PBJ: That's how calls are made.

RRDJB: You still have the same phone? It's not a burner?

She didn't answer.

PBJ: Isn't that ironic. I wanted to blackmail that producer; now I'm being blackmailed.

She laughed.

RRDJB: Why do you have to call him?

PBJ: He's the only witness. You know I gotta finish the job.

She could tell I wasn't fully onboard.

PBJ: What?

RRDJB: You'll never be content. 

Instead of the argument I'd hoped for, she curled her lip and tightened her face like she was trying to protect her nose from smelling rotten peaches.

PBJ: Content? (she said). 

She thought, maybe in her voice, that the word wouldn't sound so…so final. So antique. Or maybe, she hoped, in its mercy, the word would provide its own ipecac, and she could cough up the poison of someone suggesting she should settle in a softshell beside the seashore. She cocked her head a little to the right: 

PBJ: Content?

She lowered her head, and her black hair veiled her eyes. But not well, and not her thoughts. Content! I'd said "Content." Her eyes poked through the veil and asked:

PBJ's VEIL: How old are you?

PsychoBillieJean had never asked before. She'd never seemed to wonder. But the black veil…evil…live….

RRDJB: Don't call the Uber driver.

PBJ: Why not? (she and her suspicious eyes asked).

RRDJB: Your number will be the last one on his phone. They'll know. I got a burner.

PBJ: So…so you're going to call? And handle it.

RRDJB: I'm going to call. And I got a handle.

She threw her hair from her face with renewed vigor. Her fanatical, fantastical eyes grew bigger.

PBJ: But wait….

PsychoBillieJean held up her palms.

PBJ: But wait….

PsychoBillieJean upheld her qualms.

PBJ: I want to drive this time. Just one time. The get-away. Just for kicks.

RRDJB: Why not?

Quod me nutrit…

PBJ: I really love you. You know that, right?

…me destruit.

#Ad Infinitum#