Saturday
It was close to noon when Max woke up, sweaty, dry-mouthed, his head throbbing. The sun streamed through the blinds like an unwelcome guest. He could hear Jerm playing Call of Duty in the living room. The smell of weed and sandalwood incense mingled, making him nauseous. He turned onto his left side to face the wall, then rolled back over. He checked his phone; the display showed two new messages. It was Julia. The first said, "GMMM," and the next, "Last night was fun, Biker Boy."
He closed the phone and grunted, then flipped it open again and texted back, "That was fun," he wrote.
He tossed the phone into the pile of clothes he’d worn last night and thought, How did she get my number, and why is her contact saved? He traced blurred steps: arriving at Rudy’s apartment, more drinks, Rudy immediately cutting up lines of coke, tuning in and out of conversations about things he didn’t care about, trying to play along. On the back patio for a cigarette, Julia steps outside as he lights up. She asks for a cig; he lights it for her. He heard Rick ask Damien if Julia went outside. Rick steps out now. Weird vibes. Rick asks why Max has a Honda and not a Harley. Jealous vibes. Max asks Rick if he rides an electric bike in New York. Julia snickers. Rick goes back inside, saying to Rudy, "Your friend is really cool, dude." Julia rolls her eyes. She asks Max about his life: Mom’s in Venice, Dad’s somewhere in Virginia. "What’s he do?" "He’s homeless or something. I don’t know. Not my business." Julia vibes with him: wounded outcast. Max plays it cool, says she smells good, changes the subject. She grabs his phone from his front pants pocket, brushing against his cock . She struggles to type her contact. Damien comes outside, says, "What’s up," and passes Max a blunt. Damien notices Julia digging Max. He’s ambivalent. He saw through Julia the first day they met. Rick’s a sucker. Max can’t help it.
Max walked into the kitchen wearing Mickey Mouse boxers.
"Long night?" Jerm asked, without breaking focus from the game.
Max filled a glass of water from the tap, rubbed a single ice cube across his forehead and around his neck. Sweet relief. Then he let out a long, wet fart.
"That was fucking disgusting," Jerm yelled from behind the TV.
Max was too hungover to laugh.
He fixed breakfast: white toast with butter and black coffee the consistency of motor oil. He sat next to Jerm and ate. Jerm yelled, "FUCK!" and smacked the arm of the couch, then plugged in his headset.
"Riot shield faggot. Fucking camper. Pussy, faggot."
An alert popped on the screen: Chat ban - offensive language.
"Wow. Reported me, you fucking virgin faggot. Can you believe this shit?"
Jerm turned to Max. Max shrugged, finished his toast, rolled a skinny joint, and placed it behind his ear. He walked to the sink, rinsed off his plate, and set it on the drying rack. He took the coffee pot to his room and shut the door. Gun sounds muffled on the other side. He went to his small stereo setup on the hardwood floor. A Walkman CD player was plugged into the small amplifier. He sorted through a stack of CDs: punk mixes Daisy had made for him, a Mozart CD, Motörhead, Danzig, ‘90s alternative. He pulled out a disc with Jerry Garcia - Oregon State Penitentiary handwritten on it and put it in the player. A tinny guitar started playing the opening riff to Deep Elem Blues.
He pulled out his pack of cigarettes from the breast pocket of his jean jacket on the floor. Two left. He cracked his window, lit up, and placed the last cigarette behind his left ear. He smoked the joint while the album played out.
2:16 P.M.
Max went on a Publix run and bought burger supplies. The mission was nearly aborted for a Chicken Tender sub, but Terry was working—red-faced, clearly drunk, coughing, and spreading an excessive amount of mayonnaise on a customer’s sandwich.
Who’s this chick? Blonde hair to her shoulders, tight white T-shirt, pleated tennis skirt. He watched her arms get goosebumps under the vegetable mist.
He picked up supplies: 90/10 ground beef, tomato, onion, a bag of peanuts still in the shell, beer, buns.
When he was pulling out, the blonde was in a black Lincoln Navigator. She looked at Max. He put on his shades and drove off.
Sunday
They stood under a battered green awning, catching quick relief from an afternoon downpour. Rudy gestured to Max for another cigarette and struggled to light it as a breeze passed. Max and Jerm sweated through their shirts.
The rain let up after the second smoke. Cicadas resumed their drone. They crossed US-41; a Black man on a beach cruiser passed the opposite way, wearing a plastic poncho.
Max and Jerm went into the Shell gas station. Rudy stood outside, smoking one of Max’s cigarettes, a cluttered collage of ads for cheap cigars and beer behind him. Cars stopped at the light on the wet road. A woman stood on the median, holding a 2-liter orange soda bottle cut at the neck with a handful of change at the bottom. She was in a fentanyl slouch, her skin pink like a Chinese spare rib. When Max and Jerm exited with beer and cigarettes in plastic bags, Rudy held up his phone, showing a fashion photo he’d found on Google. The model on the runway was in a near-identical pose to the woman on the median. They laughed.
They walked two blocks west down Bay Shore Road to the small park on the bay. Canopies of oaks and tropical plants shaded the sidewalk. Large houses were shrouded in lush, jungle-like landscapes. It was a weird concept—the upper crust of society lived here on the west side of US-41, while only a mile and a half east were housing projects and trap houses sandwiching a working-class neighborhood and an art college. You could see all levels of society in a short walk.
The bay park was a narrow stretch of coast bordered by a sidewalk on Bay Front Road. The mudpeople gathered at the center platform 10 yards down. The trio posted up on the concrete steps at the far end, across from the historic Spanish-style mansion. Waves crashed on the small beach as people let their dogs frolic. Jerm played reggae on his phone; Concrete Jungle by Bob Marley came on. Golden rays pierced mountainous storm clouds. The breeze was thick with humidity, vital and lush—Max’s preferred atmosphere. Jerm put on sunglasses he’d stolen from the gas station, the price tag fluttering in the breeze. A flock of pelicans glided by, then torpedoed in succession—one, two, three, four.
They sat at the bottom of the steps near the water. One of the mudpeople started playing an acoustic guitar and singing The Kill by Thirty Seconds to Mars with total conviction.
Rudy laughed and said, "What the fuck?"
"Dude sings that shit all the time, and this other song," Max snapped his fingers, searching his mind. "I don’t know, Chevelle or some shit."
Jerm skipped to a dub track on his phone and lit a joint. Max passed Jerm and Rudy a beer.
A middle-aged woman with frizzy hair walked by with her labradoodle and looked at them with disdain. Max smiled and waved.