Peanut Butter Raisin Popcorn

American Life. Detroit. Novel Excerpt?

“If the world is flat, how come chemtrails killed Michael Jackson?”

I wished, immediately, that I was at a party in the Riverfront Lofts, being asked this by a trust fund textile art MFA who made burlap earrings to smash the patriarchy.

It was on the Fort Street bus, headed downtown, and the woman asking looked like life had been shooting rough luck at her out of a hockey arena t-shirt cannon for about two decades.

She needed a hug and probably a refill on the 32 proof hip hop wine she was drinking out of a cracked plastic Sprite bottle.

I had neither of those things for her.

My car was on fire, Petra Dobref was trying to fuck the Chaldean mob into killing me, and I had given Larry McGillicuddy my last ten bucks in cash for peanut butter raisin popcorn so his kid could go to LGBTQ Clown Camp in Chicago.

I owed this woman a respectful answer.

I didn’t, but the world did, and at this moment the world had asked me to treat her with dignity.

“Drugs killed Michael Jackson is what I heard,” I said.

The woman’s tongue reached up and licked the visible metal post barely holding her implanted tooth to her gums.It was reptilian, grotesque and seemed thoughtful at the same time, like the singer of a neo-Glam band who snuck some Jungian pop psych lyrics into a ketamine ballad.

“Why the fuck,” she said,with sympathetic eyes and Jello nostrils, “would they tell you the truth?”

She was right.

Why would they tell me the truth.

“Would you like some peanut butter raisin popcorn?” I asked.

“Granola makes me grunt when I shit,” she said. “ And that wakes up my dog.”

I was going to tell her there was no granola in this popcorn. But I couldn’t be 100% certain of that.

Why would they tell me the truth?

***

Author’s Note: I’m almost to my 5 year anniversary here (Aug 21). The amount of support I’ve gotten twists my brain into a balloon dog that can actually fetch. I could probably release an entire book of amazing things you have said about what I’ve written. The streak of 1226 stories was a tribute to all of you who commented and encouraged and wouldn’t let me quit, even while saying “we’re here for you if you do quit.”

I’m going to try to create another small streak of writing, and while I do I hope you tell at least one other person to read the 1750+ stories that are here.

If you like this one, or any of them, and would like to see this collection of short stories grow into year 6, a few bucks would be greatly appreciated.

TIP JAR