Sam Pink: Witch Piss

I looked down the block to where Spider-Man was pointing.

Fwooosh.

“Man,” I said.

“Yeah, du.”

“So where is he? Is he alive?”

“Oh, he with his dad now, up in Arlington Heights. Him and the stepmom. They got money, bro! His dad’s uh, um, a retired engineer. Plus, they fuckin suing everybody, man. Gah be nuts. The driver, the police, everybody man.”

He backed up, his fists out to his sides as he looked up at the sky, acting out something, grimacing.

“They suing everybody,” he yelled, “Naaaaaaaaang!”

I was laughing.

He came closer again and wiped sweat off his forehead. “He got a compressed spine, bro! You kiddin me! Nah, but he’s doing ok. His dad don’t let him drink now. Locked the motherfuckin booze in the basement with a padlock.”

I imagined Danny trying to bite through the padlock for some reason — gnawing on it, then snapping his fingers and saying, “Ah rats.”

“Man, lotta accidents happen at this stop right here though,” Spider-Man said. “Shit, like, two years ago, I’s drinkin a beer over there.” He pointed across the street at a bus stop down the block. “Sitting right there, had my beer, ok. Then, fuckin boooosh, fuckin four cars smash into each other, right there man, at the intersection. Gah be nuts. I’m drinkin a beer, and motherfuckers”—he hit his fists together and said, “Coooooooooorrrsh.” He backed up, spreading his arms out like he was exploding out of something in slow-motion. “Fuckin bananas. One car goes fuckin airborne, du!” He pointed at the stoplight. “See that bitch right there? It was that high, bro. Shit spun over upside down and the other cars smashed into buildings, people thrown out all over. Fucking blood, guts. I got up from the bench, I’s like, naaang. This one bitch, she layin there”—pointed to the street—“layin in the gutter, like”—he straightened up with his hands tightly at his sides and his eyes closed then shook his head side to side while vibrating his lips, making an engine/speedboat sound.

“Oh shit,” I said.

“Ok?” he said, laughing. He slapped one hand into the other, raised his eyebrows. “Bro, then I found a arm in the street! What!? This one du lossa arm! Gah be nuts! Bananas. Fuckin walnuts, man. Kiddin me?”

He closed his eyes and shook his head.

He folded one arm beneath the other, rubbing his chin with the other hand, still shaking his head side to side like, Here we go again!

“And I’s just out by the bus stop, drinking my beer,” he said, shrugging. “Shit, I’m always first on the scene.” He came up to me and showed me a Spider-Man ring on his left ring finger then pointed at his hat. “Spidey’s allllllllways first on the scene, bro. Man, I thought to myself, ‘Why’s it always me. Why .’”

“It’s because you’re always hanging out,” I said.

“Bro, I ran out into the street, see du’s arm, fwoosh, I run to the 7/11, run straight the fuck in, go to the back. See that?” He turned me a little by the shoulders and pointed through the 7/11 windows at the ice coolers. “I grab a motherfuckin bag from there, run out without paying, straight out into the fuckin street. Crack the bag open, pour some out, grab du’s arm”—he laughed a little—“grab the fuckin arm and tossed it into the bag, shook that shit up, chirsh chirsh.”

I was smiling. “Oh shit, man. I wouldn’t have thought of that.”

“Dahhhhhhhhhh,” he said smiling, raising his eyebrows up and down.

Then he did some kind of strut where he carefully lifted and set his feet while pointing downward.

“Did it save his arm?” I said.

“Nah, I don’t know. I never seenem again, gah be kiddin me. Fuckin bananas.” He calmed down, blinking a little to clear his watering eyes. “Woo. But yeah.”

“What if it saved his arm and he always wonders who did it?”

Spider-Man looked at me for a couple seconds.

Maintaining eye contact, he knelt and covered the lower half of his face with his forearm.

In a weird, extra-gravelly voice, he said, “It is what I must do for my city.”

“Hell yeah,” I said.

He stared at me over his forearm, breathing heavily like, “Sersh…sersh…sersh.”

Then he stood and smiled.

“You should’ve grabbed chips and candy too when you got the ice,” I said.

But he didn’t hear me.

He was adjusting the brim of his hat, making a face.

“Shit man, then I’s in the middle of the street directing traffic! Fuckin blood and glass all over. Dahhh. Shit. I got du’s arm in a bag and I’m directing traffic. You serious?” He came up to me and hit my arm. “When the cops finally got there, the one officer’s like, ‘Thanks, Spidey.’” He hit me again and started laughing. “Waaaayyyooohhh. Wha’s really going on?”

We both laughed.

A girl walked up to the corner, waiting for the ‘Walk’ signal.

She had on headphones.

Spider-Man looked at her from bottom to top — holding his one elbow, scratching his beard a little.

He tapped her arm with the back of his hand.

“And how are you doing today?” he said, in an overly polite tone.

She took off one of her headphones and said, “What?”—her eyebrows raised.

Same tone, he said, “And how are you doing today?”

“Fine.”

“How’s your day going?”

She went to put her headphone back on but stopped. “Fine.”

“Well it’s supposed to be perfect.”

“What?”

He started to say the same thing but she smiled halfway through, put her headphone back on, and walked across the street.

Spider-Man watched her.

“Nang!” he said. “She got a ass!”

He started doing a weird strut again.

A motorcycle sped down the street.

Spider-Man watched it.

“Wooooo,” he said. “Thassa bad-ass bike, bro! See how that shit was chopped-out? Nang.”

He told me about a comic book character he liked who had a magical motorcycle.

If you mentioned something comic book related, he’d tell you as much as he knew about that character and also jump into the plot of the movie and start acting it out.

“Shit man,” Spider-Man said. “[Character] is a bad motherfucker, gah be kiddin me! Du’s skin is made of liquid metal. LIQUID METAL, BRO! Come on!” He made a motorcycle revving motion with his hand. “Gagga gagga, vooosh. He hop on that bike, shit, his skull burst inna flames, furrshhhh. Fuckin nuts.”

“Nah, he’s a pussy,” I said, for no reason, knowing nothing about the character.

Spider-Man laughed. “Dahhhhh. Liquid metal, bro! The fuck!?”

I said, “So what does that mean. Is it like—”

“Bro, that shit is liquid, metal. Fuck a bullet, fuck a knife. Gah be kidding me. Plus his motorcycle goes 700 miles an hour, du. Seven. Hundred. Fucking. Miles an hour, man. Peel that fucking pavement, man. Leave that shit melted. Bike goes so fast, you go up the side of a building.” He pointed down the street to where the Sears Tower was visible. “Go up the fucking Sears Tower, no problem. Jump off the top of that bitch and land in the street, fwoooosh, fucking zoom by, flip over all the cars, smash out all the windows. Oooooosh.”

He mimed being exploded backwards out of something, a pained looked on his face.

Then he made a motion like he was taking out a whip, whipping me with the sound effect ‘Tish.’

“Du’s got a fucking chain-whip too, man,” he said. “Fucking rip your head off, son. Tish.”

“Oh fuck no,” I said.

“Oh fuck yeah , du,” he said, turning and whipping something else. “Tish.”

“What if my skin is made of liquid metal too?” I said.

“Fuckin nuts, bro,” he said, lighting a handrolled cigarette. “Fuckatta here.”