Bug

Bug

Dear Mr. G,

 While northbound on I-95, just 3 klicks south of Yemassee, South Carolina, I’d  pulled over to the side of the road to change a flat tire on my ’67 Dodge Dart GTS.  Yeah, I know, bitchin’ car.  I popped the H-cap and was struggling with the lug nuts, obviously tightened by some gorilla, when I thought I detected movement in the brush behind me.  I stiffened and braced myself, and got this terrific adrenaline head rush, when I heard a voice say 'hot enough for ya?'.  Not looking around, ‘cause I suffer fools and strangers poorly, I replied 'yeah, and when I find the stinking cockroach who tightened these lug nuts, I will really be hot'.  I then heard the word 'asshole', so I jumped up, turned around, and squashed him with my left foot, which was shod in a Doc Martin’s hobnail soled punk rock shit kicker boot.  You can imagine the impact that had on your poor friend.  Gotta say though, he wasn't much of a roach.  Wouldn't have lasted an hour in Nam.  Shit, the bed bugs in Nam would’ve taken him out. 

 After I lit a smoke and calmed down a bit, I realized that he had really said 'that's cool', not 'asshole'.  Oh well, you shouldn’t sneak up on somebody.  ‘Specially me. 

 Anyways, I feel really bad, especially more so if he was a family member or close relative of yours.  I noticed there were some papers taped to his back, and found your name and address, and I am forwarding his remains and personal effects to you.  He didn’t have no dog tags. Might’a been a spook or something, who knows.  He was toting some canned mackerel, but I ate that.  Spoils of war, babycakes.  Oh yeah, he had some speed, and I took that too.  Just a couple of white crosses.  Probably scrounged it at a truck stop.  I gotta long drive ahead and already have wasted enough time dickin’ ‘round here.

 Anyway, I have left a small memorial for you at the site, an empty Pabst Blue Ribbon can, in case you care to visit.  You know how you see all those flowers, crosses, and other stuff at the side of the road where I guess somebody got snuffed.  Are those people buried there or something?  Were they so deeply ground into the tarmac that it was impossible to scrape them off?  Let’s go visit Uncle Albert’s grave at mile marker 183?  Anyway, it seemed to be the thing to do.  I noticed that there were a lot of empty Pabst beer cans around here, so to help you out, it's the one with Pall Mall menthol 100's butt's crammed in it.  Not the regulars, the 100's.  I have to go through that every time I buy a pack.  Jeez, it’s hard enough for those people to make change, much less understand english.  Sorry for the butt's, but I didn't realize that the can was destined to become a memorial.  It is near a hand written sign, nailed to a tree, in the woods bordering the highway, which reads 'Joy to the World, the Lord is Coming'.  That one always cracks me up.  What’s the next line, 'Let earth receive his load'?  Da da, da da, 'and wonders of his spunk, and wonders of his spunk...'.  Sorry if you are religious, just my sick sense of humor.  Sure hope that the big guy upstairs has a sense of humor too.  ‘Specially ‘bout that commie ear necklace.  But I ain’t got that no more.  Also, I left a dandelion sticking out of the top.  Looks, well, kinda nice.  Better’n an M-16 stickin’ in the dirt with a helmet on top.  Seen a lot of those.  Half the time there wasn’t nothin’ under it ‘cause there wasn’t nothin’ left to find.  Ever see what an RPG does to a man?  Don’ ask.

 Sorry about the little fella.  Before he died, he forgave me, well actually he cussed me out pretty bad, but I knew he didn’t mean it, and said that he was sworn to pass on something very valuable before he passed out, I mean passed on.  It was supposed to go to someone named Igor, but it was too late.  He told me about something that he called the 'Roy Cohn disclaimer', and that it was a very powerful secret, known only to a select few.  No shit, Sherlock.  Can't wait to pull that one on somebody.  Was your friend, by any chance, a Grifter or Gypsy?  He then asked me to sing his favorite song, 'More often than not', by David Wiffleball or somebody like that.  Some shitty Canadian draft dodger or the like. Strange request, but I knew the song.  I mean, who doesn't?  Jerry Jeff Walker did a real kick-ass version I heard on a jukebox once in some Texas bar.  Left a couple of teeth in the gravel parking lot there too.  Them were some nasty rednecks. Well, to make a short story even shorter, he then croaked, during the third verse.  His final words were ‘give my love to my mama and my 15,341 brothers and sisters’.

 Sorry that I didn’t have a body bag with me to stuff him in.  Only had a baggie, but that had my weed in it.  Which reminds me, if you scrounge around a bit in the Pall Mall butts, you may find a roach or two of a different color, if you know what I mean.  Also, sorry about the Roy Cohn thing, but I’m gonna need that for myself for a bit.  Got some trouble with the IRS, you see.  But, I am an honorable man, and will get it to you someday.  That’s my solemn promise.

 Whoa, flashback time.  Incoming!  They’re in the wire!  Blow the Claymores!  Where is that fucking M-60?  Shit, shit, shit, oh fuck, Medic!  Medic!  Don’t forget his leg!  See ya in hell, Charlie!  Take the body, but leave the morphine.  I said leave it, mother fucker!!  Oh god, oh god, oh god……………….