Joe Lansdale - Mucho Mojo

“I’m a guy who hopes he can show you there’s more to white guys than someone who just wants in your pants. More to this white guy, anyway. I don’t deny that getting in your pants is on my mind. I look at you and biology takes over, and I’m enjoying the sexual aspect of our relationship, but I want more. I’m not going to push you on the matter, but I want you to know that.

“OK. Enough on that. Let’s see. What else? I’m a college dropout. I was a draft resister during the Vietnam War, and I’m proud of it. I stood up for something and didn’t wimp out. Didn’t run off to Canada. Didn’t get religion. ’Course, there was a down side. I went to prison for refusing to step forward at the induction ceremony. I did eighteen months. Let’s see. What else? I was married. The woman made a fool out of me, even after we were divorced. She was like catnip to me. She waved her butt and I followed. She nearly got me and Leonard killed once.”

“What?”

“I’m only going to talk so much about this right now. Later, maybe I’ll have more to say. But the gist of it, without being too specific, is I let her pull us into something I should have known better about. A way to make quick money, easy. Only it wasn’t easy. Leonard knew it was a dumb idea and he told me so, but I was headstrong, and he went along with it anyway, because of me. Ended up my ex-wife, Trudy, got killed and I got injured, and Leonard got his leg hurt bad. He was lucky it healed up the way it did. They thought for a while he’d lose it.”

“My God, Hap… That explains those scars you’ve got?”

“Some of ’em. So, I’m an ex-con and I nearly caused my friend to lose his leg because I couldn’t keep my dick in my pants.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“You’re right. I’m giving myself too much credit. It wasn’t my dick leading me around. It was some foolish vision of true love. I used to believe in that. Sometimes I still do. Maybe that’s what sapped my ambition, there not being any true love. Though to be honest, before Leonard got hurt, I wasn’t exactly a ball of fire either.

“Trudy and prison could be blamed, but I guess finally, you always got to blame yourself. I let my idealism get stepped on, and I began to think it was a sham, that there never was anything to it, because nothing ever changed. But I’ve come out on the other side, now. I’m not ambitious, but I’m not lost either. I’ve got my faith back in humanity, and it’s people like you that do it.

“There’s bad stuff out there, but you look around, there’s good too. I’m not saying I’m ready to wear flowers in my hair and tell everyone to just love one another, but I do think things can be better than they are, and that each of us, in his or her own way, can have something to do with making it better. I also like blueberry ice cream, fluffy bunny rabbits, stuffed animals, especially teddy bears, and cute shoes, if they don’t fit too tight.”

“You silly ass,” Florida said.

“Oh, one more thing. Earlier today, I found a dead body in a pond.”

We got back to the house late and took the bedroom Leonard had left us. He was asleep on the couch. We made love again and talked some more. I told Florida all I knew about Illium Moon, about how we found the body. She thought we should call the police. I did too. But Leonard had taken bullets because of me, the least I could do was give him some time.

“You never heard any of this,” I said. “It comes up, except with Leonard, you don’t know a thing.”

“Oh, Hap.”

“Not a thing, Florida.”

“That poor man… down there.”

“He don’t know he’s up or down. Another day isn’t going to matter.”

We finally snuggled and fell asleep, and I dreamed.

And in this dream I was under water. Down there in the bookmobile with Illium, but I could see clearly this time. It wasn’t as dark as it had actually been. Uncle Chester was there too. They were swollen and spongy and their faces were no longer black. They were the color of damp oatmeal. Illium was sitting behind the wheel. He had a jar of coupons. Beside him, on the passenger side, reading a paperback copy of Dracula, was Uncle Chester. I was in the back, leaning between the seats, watching them. They didn’t seem to notice I was there. I looked over Uncle Chester’s shoulder. He was reading the part of Dracula about the “Bloofer Lady,” the vampire child murderer. I could read it clearly, even though the words were gibberish, hieroglyphics at best.

Illium unscrewed the lid on the jar in his lap, and the jar filled with water and the coupons floated up and out, paraded before him like small, wafer-thin fish. He plucked one of them between his fingers and put it back in the jar. He grabbed another, and another, but as fast as he put them in the jar they floated out. Uncle Chester turned and looked at Illium. He shut the book and held it in one hand. With the other he reached over and clutched at the floating coupons. He helped put them in the jar, and still they floated out. The process was endless. Illium and Uncle Chester grabbing the coupons, putting them in the jar, and the coupons floating out.

I turned to the back and there was a trunk in the van, and the lid was up. It was Uncle Chester’s trunk. I looked inside. There was a little black boy in there. Nude. His eyes wide open. His lips formed the words Help me, but I turned away.

On the opposite side of the van, mounted on the wall, was the painting Leonard had done of the old house amid the trees. The paint began to bead, then bubble. The bubbles filled with colors of the paint and streaked down its length as if crying Crayola tears.

I felt uncomfortable. Hot. I realized I was holding my breath. The back door of the van was shut. I tried to open it. It wouldn’t budge. I turned and tried to walk to the front of the van, but now I was swimming. I tried to ease between Uncle Chester and Illium, make my way to the driver’s window, but it was closed. I was growing weak, dizzy. I grabbed at the window crank and attempted to roll the window down, but the crank wouldn’t work, and now Illium and Uncle Chester had hold of me and were yanking me back. I twisted and tried to fight them. Their faces were more puffed than before. Their eyes poked from their heads like peeled grapes. The little black boy was out of the trunk. He swam between them, took hold of my shirt. His eyes were pleading. His hand tugged at me. His arm came loose at the shoulder and floated up, but still his fingers held my shirt. Then his other arm came loose at his shoulder and floated to the top of the van. Then his legs. And finally his head. His torso came down to rest on my chest, and his body parts bobbed all around me, shedding flesh, leaving only the floating bones, the rib cage lying across me. I tried to pull the skeletal arm and fingers from my shirt, but I was too weak. The bony arm began to tug. Coupons swam by me. Illium and Chester Pine leaned over me and smiled. The water turned murky. I felt as if I were blacking out.

Then I woke up hot and mummy-wrapped in the covers. The moon was filling the room. Florida had rolled to the other side of the bed. The moonlight was mostly on her, and I was in shadow. I noted that the shadow made my skin dark as hers. I untwisted the sheets and sat on the edge of the bed and took in some deep breaths. After a while, I rolled back on the bed and took hold of the sheet and covered Florida and myself.

I thought about what I had dreamed. It seemed pretty silly now. There was a logical explanation for everything in the dream, but I felt my unconscious was also trying to tell me something I’d overlooked all this time. I still didn’t know what it was, but I thought I had hold of the edges of it, and if I kept my grip, I might pull the rest of it into view.