REVEREND DILLINGER FLAIKWAITER - WHERE IT ALL BEGAN

Dillinger Flakewaiter is a tortured human being-this, the first chapter of a finished novel, simply introduces him to a point and speaks to the inglorious commitment of mankind to useless war.

*posted with Permission from Elwood Jake, author*

TORTURE IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN by Elwood Jake

Chapter 1 – The Beginning

Time stood on my feet, held me down; the trigger had been pulled and that was that. It must have been right, correct, justified; I knew it had to be - the killing I mean. What else was there but that?

I had been told how it would be, how I should feel, what I should do, so I did it. Rhymes and reasons obliterate your guts when you are standing wondering about the ‘why’ and ‘what the hell was I doing here’. It was enough that as I was pulling the trigger I was just thinking about that strawberry ripple cone that was four scoops for a quarter. God, that was great ice cream! So it was him, her or it that I was killing, never thought it was me, always thought for a damn long time that it was them that was getting killed, but me? Hell no!

It is over now; well, it ought to be, but as most of you know who have stood in the same damn place, well, it never is, is it? I trundle on, oblivion the sword that defends me. Stuff like booze and drugs and wives and kids that always make me stop, most of the time I do, sometimes I cannot. What is that thing they say happens to saints? You know, the times when they bleed and cry, except they really don't? I don't know, but it is not the same. I think saints and angels are there just to make me feel so right about the so wrong. Maybe that only makes sense to me and the others who stood beside me, but damn sure at least they understand.

My slug for them and theirs for me and it is inside, somewhere deep down in my guts. I came around with theirs in me and my buddy somewhere near me. He was dead. I held his guts in my hand and I don't know how it happened but hell, that don't matter, really. The strawberry ripple is so good down at the ice cream store but now it is gone, just far away somewhere. I guess it is where fairies dance and children play and lick at strawberry ripple and never, never have the idea in their head that, other than shooting maybe a robin with an air gun, death was Never-neverland and hey, Alice could kill and the killed would just get up and ask you for a treat or at least some strawberry-ripple. It was all gone, as I said, and all I had was his guts in my hands, just slippery red goo and nothing much to worry about. Hell, it was not my guts; it was his guts, and then I knelt to John, cupped his head in my hands, wiped the blood off his cheeks. We had stood, watching for the enemy, couldn’t see a damn thing till the fire rimmed around our bodies, dropped John to his knees only to strike again, a thunder that smashed him back, up and away.


#


Whicker strained, rebelled at my red, white, and blue T-shirt as I leaned back and clasped my hands together above my head. Sylvia, a long sanguine creature who had chosen me among many, stood behind, kneading the tightened muscles surrounding my shoulders as though they were a good slab of dough that had to be made right for baking.

“It’s nice to sit here, isn’t it, hon? I mean the veranda where Mom and Pop spent those long summer evenings, sitting, holding hands and just loving each other, watching that old sun put the day to sleep. Don’t you think Becca?”

I had heard it before, this signal of quiet passion sent to me from down deep inside where I was sure the devil dwelled, disguised by screaming blood-white angel wings. I dropped back, into her, pressed my head up against her breasts. Gently, they took me in, naked, firm, hard brown nipples for the suckling, dauntless, mother’s son.

#

“Dillinger? I am dead, right? Gonna go somewhere I suppose, right, brother? You got my hand? Oh Christ, it hurts!” I dropped back, into him, pressed my head up, against his breast; they took me in, blood guts for the suckling, dauntless, mother’s son.

#
John is dead. So what? He had told me about his mother and his brothers, a sharp horny sister that he had always to protect. “Dillinger, that old man just took the hell off and fuck us! Can you believe it; he just upped and fucked off!”

“Yah Johnny, the way of the fucking world, just is. What the hell you gonna do except fuck em? That’s it. That’s all you can do, man. Me? I pushed my old lady in front of a Goddamned bus when I was sixteen. Let’s face it, if anybody had a noticed, well hell, I wouldn’t be fucking here with you and a bunch of assholes and guns and bullshit, now would I, Johnny?”

“You fucking killed your mother Dillinger? Christ, that’s hard. Your fucking mother?”

“I didn’t kill her; the damn bus did. All I did was make a suggestion!”

“Hey Dillinger, you got a smoke?”

“Yeah sure, here, take two, might as well smoke while we’re waiting. Won’t be long now.”

Sergeant Grady Quinn came up to us, started shooting bullshit our way. I shot the motherfucker right between the eyes. I’ll admit he did look back at me with that ‘what the fuck’ stare; not the first time I’d seen it.


#

I found myself staring at John. That hard ‘what the hell’d you want me to do, kiss his ass and tell him yes sir no sir’? That’s when the shell landed close, blew us up and down, made me kiss his guts. Quinn was most definitely dead, John soon would be and me? I had something hard and red to chew on. Then I woke up in that nice white hospital room. Christ, that was sweet. So full of dope I could not feel a damned thing. Sweet non pain ‘Christ, this is a nice room’ kind of feeling. You ever feel that? Like it was as children think, I suspect. It has been a long time since I thought as a child. Bullets, bombs and assholes tend to make you think other than childish thoughts.

Nurse Nancy came up over the hills and told me gently that I was alive and nothing major was missing. “Thanks,” I said to her; at least I thought I did. Apparently I found out at a later date that I had said something totally untoward and had shocked the hell out of her. Now can you imagine that? I mean, shocking a damned nurse who had been running around in piles of guts and men screaming at the top of their lungs. Anyway at a later date I was reprimanded by her but she forgave me for what I said. Kind of a mid- western thing I think. I am from the coast, Santa Monica actually. Long, dark surf- city body and, at the time, nice golden locks to boot. Guess the Marines can knock that out of you but it still sits there in locked-up anticipation of your next Nurse Nancy. I suppose that is what started the problems and not Quinn. Nobody ever said a damned thing about that mother fucker. Nope, not a damned thing!

#

Nurse Nancy and I went out for beers and shots. She hung around for a few years and like Quinn, she started to rub me the wrong way. I was out there, you know, doing the normal shit like work and more work. Sure, there were a few broads on the side and some good sex along with good drinking but man cannot live by lust and booze alone; he must have a direction in his life so I decided to find mine. I decided to do whatever the hell I wanted, so I did and I joined a traveling circus. Not that life had prepared me for such an endeavor but hell, a circus is as good as anything when one is not sure and on the prowl for self fulfillment if not at least a little justification. So Robard’s Freak show came to town and picked me up.

“So, what the hell can you do for me, Mr. Flakewaiter? You got any special talents that might be useful in a freak show?” Hilliard Robard asked me this stupid fucking question. Why is it stupid? I’ll tell you: it was obvious I was a fucking freak. Anybody who had a good look at me could see that. It was fucking obvious.

“Mr. Robard, you can see I am a fucking freak, can’t you? Look, I have decided to join up with you guys and there is not a damned thing you can do about it, so just go with the flow and tell me where I can plop my shit and we can get on with it, alright?” I glared quite strongly at the idiot asker of obvious questions. He seemed to get my point and called his right-hand man into the office. Well, it was really his left-hand man because Albert, the two left-handed man, had two left hands. What the hell can I tell you? It was a freak circus and the first place you might find a damned freak right?

“Albert, take Mr. Flakewaiter with you and see to it that he gets bunked up. You are going to have a nice freak roommate until further notice. Now you can leave. Mr. Flakewaiter, we will talk later when I decide what kind of freak you are going to be here and have a nice evening.”

Albert and I walked over to his digs. “Hey Albert, how long you been a freak anyway?”

“Shit, I dunno. Mind if I call you Dillinger?”

“Hell no, Al. Mind if I call you Al?” I really didn’t give a shit if he cared. After all, he was a damned freak, right? “So Al, how long?”

“Ever since the last war, Dillinger, the one before this last one. Quite a bit of time, I suppose, isn’t it?” Al opened the door to his digs and begged me enter.

“This is quite the shit hole, Al. You like living in this shit hole, Al?” I threw my tote on the bed of my choice. Al did not have a choice; I was his master right from the start.

“You may call it a shit hole and maybe it is, but now you are also living in a shit hole, Dillinger. You like living in a shit hole, Dillinger?”

Al growled at me so I smacked him hard right in the mouth. He went down and I bent over him and picked him up by his left handed lapels. “You ever rude to me again, you shit head mother fucker, I am gonna make you hurt like you never hurt before, understand Al?”

I threw him back on the floor and gave him a light kick in the groin. Al groaned and asked me what the hell was wrong with being a mother fucker, as he had fucked quite a few and they were all quite pleasant fucks.

Me? I saw a wash basin, ran some water and cleaned off my hands. Al was a puddle in his own shit house that was now mine as well. I let him lie there and decided to go for a walk. If he was there when I got back - I had decided to buy a bottle of scotch or vodka, wasn’t sure yet which - but I knew he probably would be there and he would be alright as I would share with him and talk of his war and mine. Talking of wars always made things right and if it didn’t? Hell, I’d just kick his ass a bit more. That is, if I had a mind to. I wasn’t sure if I had a mind to but that could wait. Time for a nice stroll and that was that.

#

“Hey, you. Where the hell is the crappiest bar in town?” I asked some fellow wandering aimlessly down the road.

“You want a crappy bar, bud? Well, there is one about a half block down the road there. Antoinne’s it is called, but the locals call it Tony’s. Crappy as hell, that dump. Hey mister, why the hell you want a crappy bar anyhow? You look like you could have a drink in a far less crappy bar than Tony’s, that’s for sure?”

It seemed like a respectful and earnest question, so I decided to answer him. “I want to have a drink in the dump just to watch the low life assholes like you who are looking for a life. What? You think you are not a low life asshole, Mister? I bet you got a fucking asshole wife at home and kids and you owe somebody a shit load of money, don’t you, and I bet you never held a gun or fought in a war and you probably don’t even know what the hell your prick is for, do you, even with kids, right? Somebody did your wife just so she could sit down with herself and somebody else’s specimen and giggle and google and tell you how much the hell they look like you, you dumb stupid son of a bitch! There, you like that answer, Mister? That good enough for you?”

Mister wandered back into the night. He knew he was a dumb low life asshole; he knew it before I told him. He was on the way to blow his brains out before he was asked the question. Now he knew he had made the correct decision, so he did.

“Yup this place is just as that fellow said it would be. Christ, what a shit hole! Hey! Keep, gimme a beer and double up on some hard stuff. I don’t give a shit what the fuck the stuff is, just make sure, if you like the fucking way your face looks, to make it a Goddamned double, now hear?” The Keep did not react, just poured the drink and placed it in front of me.


Now let us stop just for a minute or two, alright? There might be a few folks out there that think I am just playing around, but the truth is I am not. I have come to the place and time in life when the truth has finally stared me in the face and I have to handle it as a man who has loved war and loved women and lust and all that crap. You know; the man who has searched and finally found? But to make things straight with you and me, I have to continue the story and tell you what led up to where I am and why, which seems perfectly understandable to me and if you are half the person I think you are, you will also accept this and understand. If you are not then it best that you just go off and kill yourself or something, because what is going to happen here is far too important and should only be read by people who care about themselves and even more about me, which of course would be perfectly understandable. You understand, don’t you? Well, of course you do. Now, let’s continue, shall we?

#

I drank my fill and found, much to my dismay, that no one was going to cause any problems. I wondered if it was perhaps my face that scared them off, a freakish one to be sure. Couldn’t blame anyone for not wanting to try it on with my face.

It had been a rather handsome face, they tell me. If you could look at it now you would understand why I could not find any trouble in that low life bar which I sought so desperately. I have very little of that old face left; the pain had gone other than the odd twitch which they say is caused by nerves getting re-routed or something like that. The lips are almost gone but still quite capable. The scars? Hell, I read somewhere that some women find scarring quite sexy. I suppose that is true, as I have had my fill, but to tell you the truth I think it was really the fact that I was just flat dangerous and that seemed to get those whores going. Oh, they were whores for sure, at least most of them.

The lady referred to in the opening was not, although she did always have whorish thoughts which were good for me and I should think most fellows, but that is getting away from the order of things, so back to my face. The scars were caused by burning mostly, a couple of long side-by-side ones that start in my hairline on the left side and rip my face almost in two. Jagged they are, and only start to fizzle out when they dive into my neck. The burn scars? Doctor Jameson down at the VA said that I was lucky because they were just on the other side of my face and were not so bad that over time they would fade quite a bit. They have, but at the time I am talking about, they washed the right side of my face from the cheekbone down to just above my clavicle in opaque brutal ugliness.

Some of the whores used to like to pet my face, even lick the scars and the burns. They would get all hot and bothered and I’d just fuck them really hard and tell them to shut the hell up. ‘I ain’t talking about it. Now shut the fuck up and get to doing what I am paying you for’, even if I was not, quite often because of the scars they liked to lick. Of course they did, as that is what I was paying for and I always demanded good quality fucking for my money or my attention or my pity. There are a lot of whores out there who pity fuck and most of them are too stupid to realize that it is me doing the pity thing and getting my rocks off and usually damned cheap, but what do you expect? They are women and like most of them, all cheap and all whores. Now back to that crappy bar.

I was leaving with my bottle when I noticed this cheap whore sitting on some asshole’s lap. I thought ‘now is the time for a bit of fun, yes sir’. So, I walked up to her and this is what I said to the whore.

“Get rid of the slug. I need a good fuck. Come on let’s go!” I grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her up off the lap of this giant slug she was on. At first she did not realize I was saving her but when she did, and it did not take long, oh boy, was she ready to leave with me.

I ignored the slug and spoke out of pity to her instead of just dragging her off for a good fuck. I think I was already starting to change. Well, a little bit, I suppose. So I am telling her that I am saving her from this giant slug and that she should be grateful and not charge me a nickel but just fuck me and suck me because I was saving her, which I was. So, just as I had wished, the giant slug stands to take back his whore.

Of course, before he could stand, I put an elbow in his nose and just smashed it like a damned watermelon falling off the back of some Mexican’s pick-up truck. All over his face it went and the slug started to scream at me that ‘what the fuck, you asshole’. So, like I said, I think I was already starting to soften up. Beats me, but it seems I must have been because I put him out of his slug misery pretty quickly, I thought.

He was holding his watermeloned nose so I just stabbed him really hard right in the eyes with a couple of erect fingers which, of course, blinded him. I mean really blinded him. The slug could not see, might not even be able to see today, for all I know and care, which I don’t. So, nice as I was ,I grab the back of his head - mind you, I left his nuts in peace; after all he had a right to father other black ugly giant slugs for folks like me to punish.

Anyway, I just grabbed the back of his head, greasy hair, ‘Christ does this slug ever wash his hair’? I guess not and so I just smashed his face and his hands and his blind eyes into the table five or six times till the cracking of bones in his face started to sound more like thuds. Then I stopped and left him alone.

What a saint I was becoming. Took the whore back to her place because I did not want to share her with Al. I might share some hooch but no pooch. So I fucked her good and paid her five bucks and let her lick my scars and my burns then I kicked the shit out of her. A grand evening it was, I must say. Headed back to Al’s shit hole which was now mine as well, found him sitting, trying to clean his face and when he saw me, he started. Well, that was a normal reaction. I told him to shut the fuck up. I was not going to smack him if he did not say anything stupid and we cracked the bottle and drank it all and talked about his war and mine. Yes, friends, it was a grand night indeed. I slept like a damned baby, dreamed of the killing and all the wonders that I had experienced and when I awoke, you know what I felt? I bet you don’t. I bet you five bucks and a whore. You wanna know?

Hell yes, you do, so I will tell you. I felt different, kind of softer as I was telling you. I thought to myself, ‘Dillinger, you are turning into a right fine fellow’, then I went to look for the fellow that called himself the boss of the freaks. After all, I had to find out what the hell kind of freak he thought I really was. Then I could decide if he was right or if I should change his mind. See how logical I was becoming and so much kinder? Yes, I was feeling all soft and cuddly. Then I ran into that damned Erma with her damned beard and her tits and everything started to change again.

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