Trailer Park Noir

Twenty-Three

As morning turned into afternoon, the hot breeze that murmured through the trees overhead picked up and became a blistering wind. The dry, rustling trees crackled and shushed as the wind whipped them back and forth. Blossoms blew from the silk trees and fluttered through the air like a pink snow, skidded over the ground, bounced and spun. By noon, the temperature was one hundred and eight, and by two it had gone up another four degrees to one hundred and twelve.

The temperature reported on the radio and television and in the paper was always five or six degrees lower when it was that hot so as not to scare off tourists. The official temperature came from a thermometer at the airport, suspended over a cool, well-watered lawn in the shade, and it was deceptive.

All the swamp coolers in the Riverside Mobile Home Park hummed and rattled and dripped. Fans whirred and some swept slowly back and forth.

In unit nine, there was a lot of laughter.

Reznick and Kendra lay on the bed together, naked and with no covers on. They had been going at it all day.

He scooted down on the bed and rolled over on top of her. He put his face between her breasts, squeezed them together on his head, and said, “Now I can die happy.”

Kendra giggled.

He pressed his mouth to her rib cage and blew hard, making a loud farting sound, and she burst into raucous laughter, saying, “That tickles!”

He propped himself up on his elbow and kissed her. They’d kissed so much that day, his lips were numb.

“You tickle me,” he said.

“I want some more screwdriver,” she said, handing over her glass.

“Sure.”

Reznick took the glass, then sat up on the edge of the bed. The pitcher was on the night stand, next to a bowl of melting ice. He put some ice in the glass, then poured the mixture of orange juice and vodka into the glass. The ice cubes cracked and popped as he handed it back to her.

The mixture was mild, but it was working.

That morning, Kendra had said, “I want some wine. Steven gave me wine.”

“Oh, he did, did he?” Reznick had said.

“Yeah. I liked it. It made me feel… goofy.”

“Well, I’m sorry, but I don’t have any wine.”

“Can’t we go get some? We could go to Handi-Spot, couldn’t we? Just up North Street? Sometimes Mommy goes to Handi-Spot for cigarettes and beer.”

Reznick had thought about it. He’d never had much taste for wine. Vodka had always been his drink.

“Ever had a screwdriver?” he’d said.

“No. What’s that?”

“It’s orange juice and vodka, and if you think the wine made you feel goofy, you should try that.”

“Okay, let’s go get some orange juice and vodka and make some screwdriver!” she said.

“You’re feeling adventurous, huh?”

“Yes, adventure… ous.”

A year of sobriety down the drain, Reznick had thought then. But when he looked at the naked girl lying in bed beside him, as he moved his eyes slowly up and down her pale, milky, voluptuous body, he was overcome with a desire to celebrate. He’d decided then that he would make the screwdrivers mild. He wouldn’t overdo it, for his own sake and hers.

They had dressed and gone to the Handi-Spot Market in Reznick’s car. In the store, he’d told her to go find herself an ice cream bar while he got the liquor. On the way home, she’d reached over and squeezed his crotch as he drove.

“Has anybody ever sucked on you while you drove your car?” she said. She took a bite out of the ice cream bar, licked ice cream from her lips.

“Yes, and it nearly got us killed, so thank you, but no thank you.”

Kendra was adventurous. She’d been insatiable in bed, wanting to try everything. She had exhausted him, but at the same time invigorated him, so he was able to keep going back for more and more.

Now they sat up in bed with their backs to the headboard, and Kendra held up her glass in a toast.

“To, uh… to… “ Her face brightened. “To fucking!”

“All right. To fucking.”

They clinked their glasses together, then took a drink.

“This is the last, though,” Reznick said. “You need to take a shower and sober up before your mommy comes home from work.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll eat some peanut butter to hide the smell.”

His eyebrows popped up. “How’d you know about peanut butter? That’s an old alcoholic’s trick.”

“Steven told me about it.”

“Oh. Good old Steven.” Reznick remembered the sensation of stuffing the weights into Steven Regent’s abdomen and tried to eject the memory immediately. It did not eject so easily, though. It was not what he wanted to think about right now. It made him frown, darkened his mood. He swung his legs off the bed and stood. “I’m gonna go check on the dogs. They might want to go outside.”

He stepped into his shorts and pulled them up, then went down the hall to the living room. The dogs were napping side by side on the couch.

“How you guys doing, huh?”

They lifted their heads.

“Outside? You wanna go outside?” He opened the door, then the screen. “Huh? You wanna go outside?”

They stared at him sleepily, then put their heads down again, uninterested.

“Okay, suit yourselves.” He closed the doors, then went to the kitchen, filled a glass with water, and drank it.

He thought of all the noises of opening up Steven Regent and stuffing his abdomen with weights.

The damp whisper of cutting him open.

Reznick turned on the faucet again.

The wet smacking sounds.

He filled his palms with water.

The farting sounds.

He bent down and splashed the water on his face and scrubbed his hands up and down a few times.

He closed his eyes and saw the body lying before him in the beam of the flashlight that Anna held. It had been opened up, its dark guts glistening, milky eyes staring, mouth yawning open.

Reznick put both wet hands on the edge of the counter and leaned forward, let his head dip low between his shoulders. He felt nauseated. Part of it was the booze. It had been awhile since he’d had any. Yeah, that must be part of it.

But part of it was also those images on the backs of his eyelids, the memory of what he’d done the night before.

His temples began to throb. An ache developed behind his eyes. He frowned as he rubbed his eyes with his knuckles, then rubbed hard circles on his temples with his fingertips.

“Marc?” Kendra called. “Where’d you go?”

Suddenly, he did not want to go back to the bedroom. He’d had his fill for now. He felt far away from amorous. A shadow had fallen over him, a deep, dark shadow that had obliterated his desire.

He sighed and went down the hall to the bedroom.

“Time for you to go home, Kendra,” he said.

“Aw, c’mon, not already,” she said. Her whiny voice made her sound like a little girl, and it rubbed him the wrong way.

“No arguing. You need to get cleaned up and sober for when Mommy comes home. Eat some peanut butter, make sure your breath’s clean.”

“She might go dancing tonight. Can we get together then?”

“Maybe. But for now, you need to go home.”

She sighed as she got out of bed slowly. She came around the bed and pressed her body against his. “You sure.”

He put his hands on her shoulders and gently pushed her away. “Positive,” he said. “Get your clothes on.”

“But I thought we were – “

”Get your clothes on,” he shouted.

Kendra flinched and her smile shattered and she stumbled backward.

Reznick immediately regretted snapping at her. He stepped over to her and put his hands on her shoulders again. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve got a bad headache. I didn’t mean to bark at you like that. Get dressed and go home, and we can get together tonight while your mommy’s working. Okay?” He tipped forward and kissed her forehead.

Her smile slowly returned. “Okay,” she said. “I… I had fun today.”

“So did I. You’re a beautiful, incredible girl, Kendra.”

She smiled and bowed her head in embarrassment. “I’ll get dressed now,” she said in a whisper. “Hey,” she said as she dressed, “you wanna coupla my pain pills for your headache?”

Reznick nodded. “Yeah, I’ll take you up on that.”

Kendra carried Dexter home and Reznick followed her. He got a couple codeine pills from her, then went back to his own trailer. He drank them down with a glass of water, then went to the recliner and stretched out, turned on the TV.

He frowned the whole time. His lips were pressed together tightly. He couldn’t get those images and sounds out of his mind. All the blood. The smell of the blood. The reek of fecal matter. Those milky, staring eyes and that yawning mouth – as if it were trying to scream one last time but had no voice, no breath.

Reznick got up and paced for a while.

He went to the refrigerator, took out a cup of blueberry-flavored yogurt, and ate it. He tossed the cup into the garbage, washed the spoon, then paced for a while.

Outside, the wind continued to blow. Even as preoccupied as he was, he could hear the trees whooshing in the wind overhead outside.

Conan went to the screen and walked in lazy circles, then sat facing the door.

“Need to go outside, boy?” Reznick said. He opened the screen door and Conan shot out of the trailer.

He tried to leave the screen door open, but the wind slammed it around, so he closed it and listened for Conan’s scratching as he continued to pace.

Open eyes… open mouth… open abdomen… glistening black guts… wet, farting sounds…

Conan scratched at the screen door and yapped once.

Reznick let the dog in, then closed the screen door. He closed the door halfway, leaving it open to create a draft.

He went to the kitchen and found the bottle of vodka. He got a glass from the cupboard, some ice from the freezer, and poured some vodka over the crackling cubes. He put what was left of the vodka in the freezer. He took the glass to the living room and stretched out on the recliner again. He let the vodka stand on the lamp table for a while and chill.

He browsed the TV stations for something to watch and settled on an old movie with Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy. He watched the movie for awhile, tried to immerse himself in it.

Finally, he took the glass from the lamp table and took a sip. Then a gulp.

“Aaahh,” he sighed, looking at the glass with its beads of sweat dribbling down the sides. “It’s good to have you back.”