Sam Pink - The Self-Esteem Holocaust Comes Home

They exit the house out a sliding glass door at the back of the livingroom. Outside it’s raining a little, and almost morning. They go behind the garage, to the alley. They piss together in the alley. Elvis zips first, and picks up his cigarette from a nearby cinderblock. He looks up and down the dark alley while the Rhino Stripper continues pissing. A skinny raccoon comes out from the side of the garage and bites him on the leg. Hissing, rabid.

RHINO STRIPPER: Motherfucker [gets raccoon facedown by the neck, and lifts it eyelevel] You FUCK.

It hisses and scratches his face. Rabid. He grabs its whiskers and pulls them until they come from out of the face. The raccoon screams, clawing. And the Rhino Stripper drops the raccoon, kicks it into the plywood wall of the garage. He kicks it deep, creating a hole. Broken arms and legs swing out through the hole. And blood follows — through the clumped hair and the splintered wall, in a long dilation. Elvis and the Rhino Stripper watch the dilation.

ELVIS: That thing is dead [pause] I am looking at a dead thing. The hole is holding a dead thing [points] Look at the reverse birth.

RHINO STRIPPER: [points a forefinger at the bleeding hole and clicks his thumb] Happy Birthday [looks around] Guess what, I feel a whole lot better. I really do. I feel like those women in yogurt commercials must feel, like I’m free and airy, you know? I feel like a woman. [kneels by the raccoon] Here, help me.

The raccoon is stuck in the wall as the men try to remove it. They tug it out. When it comes free its face is an uninhabited sock puppet. Elvis holds it, examining. He puts it on his head, blood dripping down behind his jeweled sunglasses, and into his fake cottony black sideburns.

ELVIS: You need a hat? Maybe a little purse or something?

RHINO STRIPPER: No thank you.

ELVIS: Ok then.

Elvis throws the raccoon corpse up into a tree across the alley. And the two men stand staring at where it went but can’t really see it. Still too dark for far-sight.

ELVIS: [looking in direction of raccoon] I remember before I lived here, I lived in Brookfield.

RHINO STRIPPER: [yawning] Where?

ELVIS: Brookfield. It’s like a half hour away from here. That was the only other town I lived in. There were always raccoons tearing up the lawn and the fucking garbage and shit. All the time [picks up rock from alley and throws it in direction of raccoon stuck in tree] My dad set a trap one night [rock clinks against fence] And two days later there was a huge raccoon, biting at the rungs of the trap. My dad asked me to help him carry it down behind our tool shed [throws another rock] Out of view from the neighbors [clink] He set the cage down and brought out a small caliber gun. He started shooting the raccoon. It was point blank right at face and neck and stomach. After like four shots [pause, throw, clink] it was screaming and thrashing. Fucking bleeding all over the ground and the cage. Real big watery drops [wipes rain off mouth] And my dad got this really weak look on his face. He kept asking me to look away whenever he shot. He even put his face into the crook of his elbow at one point, as he shot. It took like twenty shots to fucking kill the raccoon. Thing was pissed [throws rock at garage] But it fought with some meaning man — I don’t even know. It fought for its shitty little life like its shitty little life meant something [lightly jabs the Rhino Stripper’s arm] Hey, do I sound like Elvis at all?

The Rhino Stripper stares.

RHINO STRIPPER: Were you trying to?

ELVIS: [looks away, throws another rock] Not really.

They continue to throw rocks up the tree, hitting nothing but the eventual ground. Clinking. More people now around the backyard, some entering the garage.

ELVIS: Hey — do you think raccoons get halos too?

RHINO STRIPPER: That raccoon would need a really bent up halo [throwing rock] Should we fill the bloody hole we’ve made with rocks, to grow more raccoons?

ELVIS: No.

The Rhino Stripper throws a rock at a parked car, wiping his muddy hands off on his g-string and then his plastic rhino nose. A broken bottle sounds from inside the garage behind them. People yelling.

RHINO STRIPPER: [acknowledges garage sounds and then looks up vaguely at the air] If it keeps misting like this we’ll be able to see a rainbow in an hour probably [turns to Elvis] You know?

A pause.

ELVIS: So what?

RHINO STRIPPER: [throws rock, clinking sound] Good point.

They stand next to each other, staring out at the woods. Sound of light rain and people in the garage. Then a loud bump from the other side of the garage wall behind them. And more yelling. Inside the garage everyone is standing, and screaming something that can’t be discerned over the other screaming. Off to the side there’s a couch and some garbage cans. And the janitor has another man — dressed like a ballerina — against the garage wall, arm around the ballerina’s neck. The strain of squeezing the ballerina’s throat fills the janitor’s neck-veins into definition. Long scratch marks cover the janitor’s face, where the ballerina has scratched, and is still scratching. People yell at what is happening and yell more when the ballerina pulls his head out, stepping back. The ballerina breathes long breaths then, face looking raw and pulled, one ear ripped along the top arch bleeding. Someone throws a bottle at him but it misses and hits the ceiling, doesn’t even break. After a few breaths the ballerina comes at the janitor and swings. The janitor avoids it by moving his head to the side, and the ballerina hits his barehand hard against the wall. He recoils, and holds the already smeared knuckles. He steps back, unable to yell.

SOMEONE IN THE CROWD: [turns to someone else] Why are they fighting?

A bottle hits the wall by the janitor and rains on the ground.

SOMEONE ELSE: The janitor guy wanted the guy in the ballerina costume to admit he likes the show “Cheers” [shaking head] He wouldn’t admit it. They agreed to let whoever wins neuter the loser.

I personally, I fucking love Cheers.

SOMEONE ELSE: Me too.

SOMEONE ELSE: [pushing forward to see] Yeah it’s not that bad.

The janitor punches the ballerina in the face. Repeatedly. Thick slapping sounds follow each punch. And the ballerina falls, but keeps getting up. More punches. Bleeding from his eyes and nose, he keeps getting up. One of the punches though, he falls, and his broken hand goes beneath him, bending. He has trouble getting up. And a priest steps from the crowd and kills the ballerina with a brick to the back of the head. Then the crowd swarms the ballerina. They kick him. Ribs cave. Face caves. Everything in the kicking gets caved. And the priests take out box cutters and cut long lines into the back and stomach area while others continue to kick. One of the priests pulls down the ballerina’s shoulder straps and the other priests cut. Then a priest in a holier robe comes up and hands the janitor a pair of long scissors. The janitor leans over the body while lower priests violently remove the ballerina’s underwear. And the janitor cuts off the ballerina’s genitals, one hand on each scissor handle.

THE JANITOR: [to the priests] One of you light the couch on fire so we can send him to Heaven when I am done.

One of the priests empties a gas canister onto the couch. From the silence, a dry burst. The couch fiber curls. And smoke fills the garage, gradual.

SOMEONE IN THE CROWD: [smoke thinly around his head and face] I thought neutering was when you cut someone’s lips off.

The janitor stares at the blood pooling between the ballerina’s legs. He puts his hand over his mouth, disappointed.

THE JANITOR: Oh man [takes hand from mouth, purses lips] Shit. I didn’t know that [cuts the lips off the ballerina’s face in two struggling snips] There we go.