Author’s Note: The is where I would recommend you read prior volumes as callbacks will be very much abound here.
It was a dark day. Sun was there, as it always has been, as it always will. But it was a dark day. The Z/28 was surely hungry for road today. And I fed into it. I was pushing it hard today. The music was so loud and thrashing. The vocals growled to me,
Locked away for eternity
Misunderstood by obscurity
Everything you had, you fucking flaunted
Isn’t death, what you have always wanted?
It was heavy. I can dig it. I found myself on the homestretch to where I was headed today. It felt right.
I could see the small outline where the hole was. Couldn’t see any arms sticking out of it. I pulled off the road and headed for it. As I did so, I glanced at my passenger seat. There was a bottle of 10 year Hangman’s Noose and a pack of vanilla cigars. I knew they would go well together. But there’s a difference in knowing and experiencing. As I pulled closer, I still saw no arms. He must have known I was coming. The V8 is distinguishable from the environment around here. It felt like déjà vu. I turned off the engine and grabbed the aviators, the cigars, and the bottle to bring out.
“Hey, you down there?” I announced. I took a few slow steps towards the hole, starting to feel the air was wrong. The smell of decay wrought the space surrounding the hole. I was able to peer over the edge and see the body. It was him. Hard to tell honestly. Skin was dry and baked from the sun. Insects had their fill of detritus. Nothing but carrion now. I couldn’t help but let out a hollow “Fuck..”
Well there was no stopping this event. I continued on by opening the bottle and grabbing a match with a cigar. The smell was atrocious, I won’t lie. I lit the cigar and dropped it in the hole. Following that, I poured some of the bourbon down beside it. What a fucking waste. I mean, the price of the bottle was a scar on my cheek. But it feels right, doesn’t it? What is that feeling? The one we get when we sense there’s more importance, there’s more essence that’s intangible or immaterial? I felt it when I shot the hitchhiking murderer. I feel it now. When something feels right… I lit my own cigar and took a drag followed by bourbon. He was right. It was really good. Better than flowers or a cross.
I placed the cigars and bottle down before pacing back towards the trunk of the car. Popping it, I grabbed a briefcase that was chained to the back of the interior of the trunk.
He rummaged through until obtaining a small tank with a mask attached. Holding the mask to his face, he loosened the valve on the tank lightly as he began to inhale the gas. He did this for approximately four seconds.
I placed the tank and mask back, and grabbed a water bottle from the briefcase. I drank the remainder of the water inside and took a deep breathe. I’ll finish this cigar and leave.
It took a while but I found myself getting back in the car with relief when it felt right. Any stresses I had in my brain were washed away in an awesome wave. I just wanted to keep driving. I wish I could have spoken with that man in the hole one last time. But maybe he’s where he wanted to be. I drowsily put the car in gear and peeled through sand, back to the road. The station came back in…
“Now if you want to chime in, just give us a call. The Desert’s favourite macabre man here to say, hey, there’s always plenty of fish in the sea. But some are a whole lot better than others! This is the Beta Blockers with Walking Dead Man…”
I only exist in some kind of hell
I’d get up, if I knew I had fell
