It was the belt, always the belt, but there was that one time the buckle came loose and opened the edge of his eyebrow, right on the bone.
The eyebrow hair grew back over the scar and curled, like a handlebar mustache that someone would take too long to make perfect.
Nothing was perfect.
Nothing.
That one night with Laurie Doyle was perfect, right up until the meth or whatever it was cut with loosed his bowels and he got warm diarrhea down his leg and on the gray upholstery of the F-250 Laurie got off her divorce from Dennis Walchuk even though they had only been married 82 days.
Jerry Rykien thought of Laurie often, how even after he diarrhea’d on her truck upholstery she still told him he could cum and they’d clean it up later, but he couldn’t cum, even though his dick was meth hard and Laurie was hotter than the asphalt on the Ginger River Bridge in July.
Jerry flicked the butt of his roll yer own into the dry dirt underneath the evergreen shrub in front of the library.
Jerry had never been in the Shevver Memorial Library, never, til his PO told him he had to take an introductory computer course to make him “more employable.”
He had never been on the internet, never saw a reason to be, even after Toby Benson told him he got excellent fishing tips on there and Toby got measured for a state record catfish but come up ¾ of an inch short.
Nothing was perfect.
They did the internet in the library class, and it was kinda fun, and Jerry was enjoying “goin’ down a rabbit hole,” like the lady called it.
He read an article about a guy driving his car into the Pagano County Fourth of July parade, because the Durriel City Council had denied his fireworks store permit, too close to a gas station.
Three people were deceased, and one of ‘em was named Laurie Spourman, and she looked just like Laurie Doyle, except older.
Laurie Doyle had moved to Durriel about a year after the truck diarrhea thing, the “youre funny sometimes but it ain’t working” speech.
Break in the computer class was over.
Jerry could go back inside.
But that damn computer was telling him things he didn’t want to know.
Jerry walked away from the library, tapping his hand on the bag of Bugler in his pocket.
Almost empty.
Two more smokes max.
Went in Ferricorn’s to take a piss. They had the sign up, Restrooms for Customers Only, but they never enforced it. They could have saved money not buying a sign if they weren’t gonna enforce it.
Jerry smelled sausage cooking. Thought it was sausage. Nostrils were a mess from meth,even though he hadn’t touched it in seven months.
He was hungry, but he couldn’t bum food at Ferricorn’s.
Couldn’t rob ‘em either.
Jerry laughed at that thought. Just sticking up Ferricorn’s in a town where every damn body knew him.
Didn’t wash his hands after his piss because he didn’t feel like his dick was dirty and Ferricorn’s had them automatic flushers now. His urinal didn’t flush, but wasn’t no way for him to manually flush it.
Nothing’s perfect.
He looked at his reflection.
Crazy ass eyebrow looking back at him.
Still curled after all these years.
Pulled out his Gerber multitool he stole from he forgot where, and shaved the damn thing off dry.
The scar was really apparent to him now but Jerry Rykien was relieved the weird, curling eyebrow was gone.
Fifty four years old, couldn’t believe he had never thought to cut it before.
Or maybe he did and decided against it for some reason.
He jizzfuckit, Jerry’ed himself for not thinking it through, not remembering he’d have to shave the other eyebrow.
He reached to do that and the mirror showed him the twinkling crimson stars where his other eyebrow used to be, pinpoints of blood someone might expect from dragging a Gerber blade across their forehead.
When the second eyebrow came off there was even more blood. Jerry wiped it once with the shitpaper in Ferricorn’s that was for customers only, shoved the bloody paper in his back pocket.
Decided he would go to Laurie Doyle Spourman’s grave in Durriel.
He would kinda walk, kinda hitchhike. One of the Kotecki Sod truck drivers running to Durriel would give him a ride, Scooter or Billy or one of them.
He laughed thinking that he had never been to his father’s grave.
Ever.
They hadn’t spoke in years, just like him and Laurie.
There were flowers on the hostess stand at Ferricorn’s.
Jerry Rykien stole the yellow one to take to Laurie’s grave as he walked out.
Out on the sidewalk he realized it was plastic, and he remembered that he had zero damn clue where the cemetery in Durriel was.
Nothing was perfect.
A lady in a bacon and eggs shirt that was too tight on someone half her size told Jerry his head was bleeding.
He started to tell her to fuck off, but then he remembered Laurie Doyle forgiving him for shitting in her truck. By the time he decided to thank the woman it was too late, she was inside Ferricorn’s.
Jerry was gonna find Laurie’s grave even if he had to walk his bloody head all the way to Durriel. He was gonna thank Laurie, and he was gonna apologize for the flower being plastic.
Sending this from my phone, from Detroit.
Please leave a comment.
If you like it and feel like giving me a small token of appreciation that would be super cool
“When was the last time you did something for the first time?”
I’m old, but I try to be like Jerry and do things that I haven’t done before. It takes courage when you no longer have the innocence of youth. But life is for living, not just existing. Let’s hope Jerry rebuilds his life, one step at a time.
This story was a radical departure for you.
Jerry has changed and is still changing.
He doesn't know where he's going, but he's got a goal, so he's headed that way.
Hopefully, Durriel turns out better than where he is now.