Bruce Wagner - Dead Stars

Rikki smoked & got his email. A friend sent a video of four guys in A&F/HOLLISTER hoodies banging this girl at school who never turned down a rape. They were all wearing Obama masks, it was kinda funny, kind of okay. He scanned the stickamgirls/facebookam/ Talk To A Stranger sites where the screen’s split into webcam twos: like, a girl would be in her bedroom on the top screen, watching the stranger in his bedroom on the bottom, & there’d be a scroll of whatever they were keyboarding each other usually just shit like show it to me, you’re so fuckin hot, show me your tits— bullshit like that. For some reason the girls always showed their faces but the strangers typically made sure the webcam cut em off at the neck so that all you usually could see was their hands strobe-stroking their big dicks. The one he started to watch was funny because the girl’s little sister burst into the room in the middle of it & saw what was going on and shouted “Perv!” at her sis then left, slamming the door. A 9-year old calling a 12 year-old a perv cracked him up.

Rikki got out the bong & settled in for some hardcore tubin’ but suddenly got hungry. Went to the kitchen and made a bigass sandwich — double turkey, double roast beef, beaucoup Jarlsberg, lettuce & tomatoes & jalapeños & grey poupon. Big bag of honey mustard kettle chips. A water pitcher filled with crushed ice & coke zero. He tried picturing the kitchen as the one in the new bungalow/duplex, but it wasn’t a nice fantasy, it made him bummed.

On his way out, he saw the letter on the breakfast table.

Z E N H O S P I C E P R O J E C T

Dear Dawn,

Thank you for submitting your application for our End-of-Life Counselor Program. Regrettably we will not be able to include you in our fall training. We are very pleased to have received an enthusiastic response to our Call for Candidates including applications from hospice caregivers, psychotherapists, chaplains, and healthcare professionals.

In order to select participants we carefully review each application assessing each candidate’s established experience, commitment to end-of-life care and the merits of their proposed plan for use of the training. We appreciate the obvious attention you gave to preparing your application.

Please understand that this decision is not meant to discourage your interest in caring for those with life-threatening illness. On the contrary we feel that the culture needs more people with your demonstrated dedication to improving end-of-life care. We hope you will continue your efforts in service and that you will remain in contact with

Zen Hospice Project

and

The Institute on Dying

.

Yours,

Frank Ostaseski

Founder & Guiding Teacher

Zen Hospice Project/Institute on Dying

Back in his room, Rikki fell into his own kind of funk. He was even more guiltstricken now for laying the pregnancy trip on his fosterfolks. The timing was so shitty — right in the middle of his mom’s depressathon. He’d always wanted to make them proud; now this was how he chose to repay their loyalty and commitment, their unconditional kindnesses. He wouldn’t let them adopt him, he’d spare them of that additional hassle-y heartache.

He felt like a monkey, not a man.

That’s right: they had a monkey in their house, a ganja -smoking monkey that ate their food & yanked his dick & got his load off watching Jap schoolgirls getting raped.

It was time to put away childish things.

. .

New father, new baby, new life.

(Permanent new legal parents, Dawn & Jim.)

New dreams, new ambition.

(Uhm, there weren’t really any old ones.)

All these lets and shit were always buying houses for their parents. They’d turn, like, 18, & say, “The birthday present I got myself was buying a house for my mom & dad. It was the best present ever,” some such shit, & Rikki would smirk and call them dicks but now it was like Who the fuck am I, they’re out there doin shit & I’m just smokin weed and pullin my pud. Mom ’ould damn well come out from her room if I knocked & said, hey moms, it’s Rikki, can I talk to you a sec? I, uh, I just, well uhm I just bought this house for you & Dad. It like has a pool? It’s, like, a mansion in (Malibu) (Hancock Park) (the Holly Hills) — so many rooms (in my father’s new house) — you know I don’t mean to break confidences but Dad told me about those buddhahead mutherfuckers. Sorry for the language Mom. But like, uh, I made a donation? And they wrote another letter, I’ll show it to you, it said they were REALLY SORRY for what they did, they want you to COME UP & do that job they originally didn’t want you for. I bought a ticket for you, 1st-Class, for you and Dad. Got you a room too at the 4 Seasons right near where the buddhaheads are doing their bullshit.

He suddenly had an Idea, the Idea of his young life.

Rikki’s epiphany was to seek out his heroes & take counsel from those bigger-than-life fathers whose movies had sustained him during the Lost Years when he wandered the DCFS* desert of dark, crappy, DVD-stocked dens, trekking by court order from group- to residential- to assigned-family homes, till (free at last) he reached the promised land (Dawn&Jim): Laurence Fish., Denzel W., Forest Whit., Morgan F., Wesley Snipe. He knew they were approachable — if he could find them! — & would see themselves in little boy Rikki, crying for help. Wikipedia said Fishburne lied about his age to get his first part in that war movie, said he was 17 but he was 14… could I do something whack like that? Something dope/fucked up for real? Naw, prolly I’m just a punkbitch. He needed to go hunting for courage like the lion in Wizard of Oz. He’d yellowbrick it to the Wizard — his BIGGEST role model hero Antwone Fisher — the man whose mama was in jail when she gave birth to him, & whose papa was a gangsta just like Rikki’s (Antw.’s daddy got shot before Antw. was even born). . . . Antwone Fisher , soul brother/teacher/father, raised in the System just like Rikki was except Antw.’s best foster family happened to be his very first one , but the state (like they do) took him away from the good fam & put him in with hella bads & Antw.’s life went to shit till he joined the Navy… whereas Rikki’s best placement wasn’t till the very end , the rest of them before, before Dawn & Jim, the rest being multitudinous shitholes — though, no matter how shitty or crazy the placements, each made sure to have its dark, DVD-stocked den, not only because it kept the kids occupied, but for the show&tell required to impress the [very] occasional visiting social worker. . a key difference being that Rikki didn’t join the Navy, not yet anyway, & didn’t see how he ever would——

Antwone made himself a player out of sheer guts, got a job as a studio guard, infiltrated the Hollywood System so he’d be heartbeatclose to what was going on. Sitting there daydreaming in front of the paused porn, he started to think maybe he would even apply for a job like that once they got settled in their new space.

He’d write a script about his life just like Antw. did, then get Antw.’s advice if the script was any good & see maybe if Antw. could help get someone to direct it into a movie the same way he got Denzel to direct his. Or maybe Antw. would read Rikki’s screenplay and want to direct it himself.

It was all good.

He knew he had a shot with those niggers, especially Antwone because of the whole shared hard knocks/DCFS/gangsta dad/crackhead mom/adoption thing. Yeah yeah he would sure to have a shot because