Saturday, April 18, 2015

Kim's Watermelon Gun

I am on the light rail. I am traveling to my downtown office from the Medical Center.

The trip will take eighteen minutes.

The rail cars are grey and sad and although they are not yet old, they look old. A long, dull seat runs along each side of the train, so that when there are other riders on board (which is rarely), I am able to stare at the person across from me with impunity. In my head, I write a story about each person I see.

Most of the stories involve what the person sitting across from me will do when the train crashes.

I am wearing obnoxious, jumbo-sized headphones and listening to The Flaming Lips’ Clouds Taste Metallic (1995), which is the best album The Flaming Lips ever did.
  
And Kim's got her watermelon gun
Cause it’s the consciousness of love ♪♪

Just north of Binz, a new kid steps onto the train and sits across from me. Twenty-two. White. Six-one. Snappy pin-striped business suit. He’s got those kind of generic good looks where I’d never be able to identify him in a police line-up.

The thing is, he is staring at me. With an intensity, he is staring at me, even as he seats himself. I turn and look over my shoulder, out the window, into the rain, but there is nothing outside but grey. It’s been weeks now since the rains began and they are not letting up.

Business Suit is trying to get my attention, and I can feel the heat of his stare on the side of my head, down my ear and along my cheek. He is saying something that sounds like “Freaky!” and I begin wondering whether I am going to have to kill him before this is all over.

♪♪ And wouldn't it be dumb
If all their atrocities were just forgiven?

My fingers dance to the music. My head remains turned and I watch as the train clunks through grey. Down the seat to my left, a big black woman looks at me and then looks across at Business Suit. She wonders if I hear him. If I see him motioning for me.

I do.

Business Suit motions for me to take off the obnoxious headphones. He says, “I dig this look you’ve got going!”

He is interrupting a sacred ritual, shoehorning himself into the midst of “Kim’s Watermelon Gun,” and he shows no sign of giving up. Being ignored is not breaking Business Suit.

With my hands dancing to the song, I turn to him, give him a stern single nod, and go back to staring out the window.

This is all I will give him.

The train pushes north through water, past Sears, past a mystery building calling itself the Label Warehouse, and Kim’s still not giving them her watermelon gun.

Two blocks. Three. Business Suit goes in for another try. “Seriously,” he says. “You look like an alien or something. You know, like so ugly that it becomes really, really shocking sexy?”

I try and remember any worse conversation starter from my past. I cannot.

The world outside the train is grey and my whole upper body is moving to the music now. Business Suit throws up his hands and gets off at Holman although I am confident that the Ensemble Theater was not his original destination.

He brushes my leg as he steps by me. “Bitch, I was paying you a compliment,” he says.

The umbrella which he begins opening is a black Alexander McQueen with a gold skull handle. It clicks open over his head as he steps out into the rain and he says, “Fucking dyke.”

I assume this to be a lucky guess. I burst into laughter. The big black woman to my left clicks her tongue. Shakes her head. She looks apologetic somehow. Embarrassed by humanity.

My trip downtown on the light rail will take six more minutes.

43 comments:

  1. What a dick.

    You know, if more men were set on fire when they behaved this way, less men would behave this way.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Haha... I think this guy is going to end up inadvertently setting himself on fire with or without anyone's help.

      My only question is: Does this sort of approach ever work?

      Delete
  2. Who talks to strangers on mass transit!?! It's like getting on a crowded elevator and facing any direction but the door. Watch your local news, because that insane jackass is one more awkward social interaction away from a complete mental break.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. Has it ever occurred to yopu that I might just be THAT good looking? Or at least weird-looking enough that someone doesn't want to blow their one chance in life of getting my number?

      While on mass transit...

      With a horrible, horrible pick-up line?

      OK, he's probably nuts. But still.

      Delete
  3. Glenn Close said it best in "Fatal Attraction", "I will NOT be ignored!"

    You have to have steely resolve to ignore someone capable of boiling your bunny. I'm so impressed.

    Of course, had you taken off your headphones, smiled openly at his awkward idiocy, and offered to take him home for a hedonistic roll in the hay, he'd probably use the same exit line as he left your place. And with any luck at all you could have wrinkled up the suit for his ass before he found the door.

    Bunny boilers are like that. Touchy.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You heterosexuals and your strange mating rituals.

      With lesbians, we simly see someone who looks promising and enter a sober, practical conversation about whether we're going to move in together.

      No bad pick-up lines. No boiled bunnies.

      Delete
  4. Katy. Was his suit well tailored? If so, I know the type. His daddy bought him the suit and he's one more awkward social interaction from herpes.

    Fuck Walmart!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That reminds me of the "The Official Uniform of You Can't Arrest me, My dad is a lawyer" meme. (http://weknowmemes.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/official-uniform-of-you-cant-arrest-me-my-dad-is-a-lawyer.jpg )

      Ah, I think they're basically like everyone else. They figure if they act fearless, no one will notice how scared they are.

      I notice.

      Delete
  5. It's a curious psychopathology that binds the weird mix of vanity ("of course every person I speak to will be hanging on my every word"), entitlement ("I can be barbarically rude because I'm dressed as if I'm civilized"), and predatory misogyny ("What did they teach me in the He-Man Woman Hater's Club about how to do sex for self-aggrandizement on a woman I fear? Oh yes, I will do the 'negging' on her ...") that constitutes the villain in your narrative. Love how, in the end, the comically deflated, self-styled Baron Samedi reveals his death's head in a snarl of defeat at the protagonist.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cdog, I've not heard Baron Samedi in a blog comment thread before tonight. You win the internet today...

      Delete
    2. You have just described Patrick Bateman from "American Psycho" (or else I did without realizing it).

      Seriously!

      And if he had opened with his knowledge of the Genesis discography, like Bateman did, I might have considered jumping the fence for once.

      Delete
  6. Many miles ago, The military remove two of my wisdom teeth but gave me a bunch of liquid valium in return.

    Myself and a buddy were riding the New York subway back to the base and spotted two strippers that worked close to the base. I thought it would be a good time to chat up the chicks with loose morals. However, having a mouth full of cotton and a rubbery face, it was hard for the understanding hussies and my buddy not laugh at me. Best train ride ever

    In the big mango, people interact with their wifi connections but not with each other...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You should never have allowed anyone to take your wisdom teeth! That's how they steal your wisdom!

      Although a bottle of liquid valium was a pretty good trade...

      Plus you got to make some strippers smile.

      Delete
  7. What happened to my comment? Your blog ate it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Could you describe the missing comment for me?

      I'll tell you if I see it around...

      Delete
    2. It was wearing a homburg hat at the time. It may have been smoking a cigarillo.

      Delete
    3. I need more comments with homberg hats around here.

      I might have to institute a comment dress code...

      Delete
  8. Was it the mustache on your avatar that gave you away or made you irresistible...

    ReplyDelete
  9. Them main reason I own a truck.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. And you're up there where people are supposed to be able to get around ONLY using public transportation.

      I know a couple people in Rhode Island who don't even have driver's licenses. I ask them if they don't need one and they ask, "For what?"

      I have a van, but apparently these things can get unreliable after 30 years and a couple hundred thousand miles...

      Delete
  10. Hetero men are programmed to be dicks around attractive women. It's a liability. Some just haven't learned to keep it all inside until the impulse to be a dick wears off.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. I believe it is programming. Even if they were never told to behave badly around women, it's something they just pick up unconsciously in the culture.

      I'm glad I'm not looking for a partner of that species.

      Delete
  11. Men have two brains, but only enough blood to operate one at a time. In Suit's case that may even be doubtful. Pointing and laughing usually makes them go away. You did well and gave him more respect than he deserved.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks. I'm going to try out the pointing and laughing thing next chance I get!

      Delete
  12. I thought it was about Kim Jong Un and the new watermelon gun he invented; you know, the one that's going to make John McCain demand that Obama invade North Korea at once. Now I'm going to have to think up a story about Kim Jong Un and his watermelon gun.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. It would be an honor if one of my posts inspired a Butcher-Tale.

      John McCain never needs a good excuse to call for an invasion. I don't watch "Meet the Press," but McCain is on there every other week, and he is almost always calling for the invasion of another country. Somebody ought to keep track of how many countries he's called on President Obama to invade...

      Delete
  13. OK, I've just officially started the FUCKING DYKE FAN CLUB FOR STRAIGHT MEN WHO HATE 99% OF ALL OTHER STRAIGHT MEN. I'm unsure how to fit it all on a t-shirt or button, though ... perhaps I should just rent blimps and billboards. Annual dues will only be fifteen cents, too. When it gets super popular and super well-known, we'll abbreviate it. We'll all wear t-shirts that just say FUCKING DYKE on the front. And maybe an ice cream cone or something on the back.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm not saying that anyone ought to dislike straight guys.

      I'm just saying I don't understand how straight girls manage to be swept off their feet by that mess.

      However, your t-shirts sound awesome!

      Delete
    2. I've hung around queer girls talking about straight men. And I've hung around straight men talking about queer girls. The former are WAY funnier and the latter are WAY meaner, for the most part. I'll take the former. You'll get one of the first t-shirts, too. :)

      Delete
    3. There are plenty of horrible lesbians.

      But for the most part, we're not being rude to strangers we want to pick up on trains.

      Delete
  14. Well, fuck. I think I have to stop blogging now after reading your writing. :/

    ReplyDelete
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    1. My kids threaten to stop eating after tasting my cooking, and I have an ex who said she was going to stay off the roads after seeing my driving. I'm never sure if these things are compliments or not...

      Delete
  15. You had to be a Dyke since you didn't fall for his obvious charms (so yes, it was a lucky guess). I always wonder about these guys who try idiotic pick up lines or flash their junk at women thinking they will swoon. Was he expecting a transit blow job? We can only hope he was hit by a bus while looking at himself in a store window, or at least dropped his 180 degree Starbucks in his pinstriped lap.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. Sending unsolicited pictures of their genitals is another straight male behavior I have yet to understand.

      Maybe HHS can do a study about why guys do these things - what sort of reaction they honestly expect.

      Delete
    2. I don't have a huge data sample so statistically is isn't valid. With that qualifier, 100% of heterosexual women I know have no interest in receiving an unsolicited picture of a man genitals.

      I am sure the male pre picture thought process goes like this. "My penis is awesome! I bet if I show it to her she will think so too and demand to see it in person" We could do a survey of the disgraced politicians who sent dick pics on what they expected to happen. that is a pretty good sized sample population.

      Delete
    3. That reminds me of an SNL sketch a few weeks back. Hillary Clinton was announcing her Presidential campaign via cell phone video.

      Bill Clinton walk up behind her and says, "Can you believe you can use a cell phone to film something like this now? Why, if that would have been possible back in the Nineties, I... Well, I would be in jail."

      Delete
  16. Not all that hard to understand .

    It's the best picture they have of themselves .

    Glenn

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi, Glenn!

      I really hope that I understand how these male humans work a little better before my 5-year-old gets any older. I don't want to hear about him doing this crap...

      Delete
  17. Showing off your junk doesn't have many benefits. Neither does being rude.

    ReplyDelete
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    1. I suppose in both cases, it seems like a good idea at the time. It's sort of like drinking too much - later on, you're wishing you'd thought through things a little better ahead of time.

      That is not a defense of showing people your junk.

      Delete
  18. Good reading post Katy,
    I had shared it on my Fanpage.
    Thank for share

    ReplyDelete

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