Eric Dimbleby - White Out

Marianne won’t be able to help. Cause I ripped her in half.

Skipper can’t help. Cause I skewered ’em like a pig.

There’s another house, just across the way. One, two, three, I move down the line. Pickin’ one place after another, wishin’ on those dreams that only a wanderin’ man can grow inside him. Marianne had mentioned the other people, the neighbors next door, and she said that they were still home, waitin’ out the storm like everybody else.

I think about movin’ the snowmobile, but it’ll be buried by the snow in no time. Just like everything else. Just like the whole damn world, sinkin’ deeper and deeper. The mailman and the snowmobile won’t be much of a problem.

Ding dong. Ding dong. Just a friendly neighbor, lookin’ for some sugar.

Here comes the pity parade, so everybody get them binoculars out. Light your sparklers. Poor ol’ Edgar is all ripped up n’ broken. I’m damaged goods, but I can play it up to my advantage, do my little possum act for the people. I been practicin’ all my life and it’s my favorite move. Somebody once called me the world’s slickest con man, but that person don’t say nothin’ anymore, mostly cause I snipped out his throat with a pair o’ rusty hedge clippers.

I’m crawlin’ across the snow, dragging my body towards the next house in the line, hoping that somebody is home. I keep on movin’ from one house to another. Reminds me of that game where you buy up all them little red houses and then you start buyin’ up them big green hotels. Or is it the other way around? Either way, I hated that there game. Too much countin’.

I’m feelin’ my way through the snow. Can’t see shit. The wind is whipping like a son of a bitch. I’m feelin’ mighty tired, like I need a nap.

Dammit all to hell, I need a break from all this drama. Marianne’s house is tainted and I can’t go back there. Skipper ruined it, even more so than the pissy cats and that stench of Marianne’s perfume, clingin’ to everything like an STD. Fuck that place. Not a good place to settle in and definitely not one you want to settle up in either.

Skipper put a hurtin’ on me. Pretty bad one. I can feel the blood oozin’ out of me.

I wish I hadn’t been so loosey-goosey with him. You see a dope like Skipper, wearing some asshole’s mustache and putting himself out there like the world’s biggest doormat, well, you can’t help but let your guard down a little. I’ve run into a lotta fellas like Skipper in my day, and that son of a bitch won’t be the last. In the end, I always take what I got comin’ to me. I never been bested and I never will. Skipper mighta had some tricks up his sleeves, or maybe I was just bein’ sloppy, but I got that beast still lurkin’ inside me, sittin’ pretty right next to Jesus Christ.

Thems a dangerous combination.

It’s snowed a lot since I settled in and settled up at Marianne’s house. A few days ago, I might have been able to sneak in through the first floor windows, but they are gone, gone, gone. Doors ain’t available, buried deep in the icy shit, but the top floor windows of this new house are reachable. On the front of this house, there’s a drift of snow that done made me a nice ramp all the way up to the top. Might even be able to climb on the roof if I get a good boost, not that I want to.

I came to a conclusion, ya know, that this snow is testin’ us all. We’re drownin’ in it. If I had to guess, it’s cause of all the sin that we done created. Commie presidents, abortion clinics, vegetarians; all that stuff adds up, and one day God says, through some big fuckin’ megaphone so all us dummies can hear it: “ Y’all are sooooo fucked .”

If I go too slow, the snow’s fit to bury me, so I pull myself along my belly like the clock is tickin’ faster and faster. I can remember back when I could see the lawns, when What’s His Face (the one with all the painted angels pattin’ each other of the keister) first picked me up on the side of the road. Now I don’t even know where the damn grass is. It’s down there somewhere, but I bet my momma’s headstone that I won’t be lookin’ at it for a long, long time. Reckon I might never see it again.

I can’t hear nothin’ inside, what with all the wind blasting around out here, but I did see a little bit of smoke comin’ out through the chimney. That gives me some hope, and I start to pull myself up the snowy banks a touch harder, digging my nails into that crunchy shit, hollering out loud. I’m a fucking animal when I get backed into a corner, ya’ hear?

It don’t feel much like I’m bleeding (not too bad, anyway) from what that cunt Skipper did to me, but it’s gonna be awhile before I’m healed and feelin’ good again. That’s why I hope this is one of those settle-in-settle-up kinda lily pads.

I make it to the top of the snowdrift and I tap at the window with my finger. It’s so iced over that I doubt anybody could even see me from inside there. And I can feel my face icing over, just like the window. Sure, I could crash my head through, crack it open and take care of business the old-fashioned way. But if I pull that move and I might just get a shotgun in my face. I don’t know who lives in this here house, so I gotta play it cool like cucumbers, make my move when the time is right.

I tap on the window again, resting my numb mug in the snow, hoping to build up some redness to my face, get that pity party-parade moving in the right direction. If I’m out here too long, I’ll get that motherfucker they call frostbite all over my face, and Jesus knows that’ll end it quick. I once saw a man that had to have his nose removed cause he climbed all the way to the top of Everest and then he fell into some ditch. He looked like a fuckin’ twit, with a little black nub where his nose used to be. I’d rather die than lose my nose, cause I wouldn’t be able to smell all that sweet pussy anymore. Zing at nobody in particular .

There’s something on the other side of the window. I can make out a small form through the ice crystals. It looks like a little boy, but he ain’t moving much. He comes closer for a second, and then backs the fuck up again. He ain’t sure what to think of this silly fella that dragged his frozen body over to the window. Don’t blame him, neither. I’d be scared of me too.

I push my face against the window, trying to get a good look at the boy, but he’s gone now. A few seconds later, a man follows the boy into the room. I know it’s a guy because he’s a whole lot fuckin’ taller, but I can’t make out either of their faces, just their shapes.

The taller one gets closer to the window.

And here I am, just waitin’ for them to open the window for me; the world’s meanest fucking possum.

This place is comfy!

Holy shit. This is the place that a wanderin’ man like me (yeah, I know I said that about the last two places at first, but you gotta keep trying til you find the slipper that fits I say) wants to settle in and settle up with. Makes a man almost want to put away his boots for the rest of his days. That sounds a little crazy, what with how special these boots are, but I might just trade the boots for a warm pillow.

They got food. They got warmth.

The guy keeps yappin’ on about his son and how smart he is. Good for him, I want to say, but I hold on to my tongue so I can figure out a proper plan. Kid ain’t all that smart, actually. Dumb little shit, he keeps staring at my boots like I’m some sort of circus freak or something. I’m gonna stick my boot up the kid’s ass.

They got booze, too. The real nice stuff, that top shelf crap that fellas like me aren’t even supposed to know about. Kinda stuff they drink at the White House and golf courses. It don’t even taste like booze cause it’s so dang smooth. Guy keeps giving it to me by the glassful, but he’s mighty skimpy about the fake-ass fire logs and the beans.