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As he puffed on his evening
joint, Tink glanced across his third-story room at his clock, and
grimaced as he saw that it was past three. (Fuckin’ speed!)
Looking out the greasy window above his bed, he noticed that the
local heat was on it’s usual across-the-street-third-shift-beat,
straining, no doubt, for a whiff of the evil killer weed – in
order to protect the citizens bettah! As he snubbed out his joint,
he crawled into bed, secure in the knowledge that the tho 74’s
chained below in the parking lot of the Dixie Drive-In were under
the scrutiny of the city’s finest…
-MORNING-
Sleep was over too
soon – sorta’ like first gear. Jerry, the other occupant of the
apartment in question, ambled into Tink’s room - puffing on his
morning joint, eathing cereal, and scarfing up a beer –
simultaneously.
“Lo’, shitferbrains…’ he
mumbled, somewhere ‘twixt a snort, a scarf and a crunch…
“Holy shit!” exclaimed Tink,
wondering as he rolled over howcum this human disposal never
gained any weight. “Whafuckin’ timzit?”
“Almost noon, if that’s
whatcha wanna’ know. We gonna ride over and see Porky?”
“Yeah…” nodded Tink. “Soon’s
I get dressed…” Whereupon he rolled out of bed and pulled on his
jeans, which could have easily saved his ass, were he to run short
of engine juice on a country road. Safety first!
As he walked out on the
balcony overlooking the drive-in, Tink yawned and stretched,
looking out over the street; busy buildings full of tranquilized
citizens. The two motors shone brightly back from below – like a
chick’s face when she digs ya’.
He fondly recalled the night
some jerk had decided to move up to a Harley, and had cut the wire
which scaled the side of the building, thinking he could safely
proceed with the removal of the aforementioned bikes. Since the
wire that scaled the side of the building didn’t really do a
damned thing – and the real alarm setup was entirely underground,
the dude was mildly disturbed to see Jerry run butt-nekked out
onto the balcony, whence he commenced pumping off several rounds
of buckshot at the swiftly receding ass…
“When’d you make it in,
man?” asked Jerry as he walked out into the May sunshine, smoking
his dessert.
“Bout two. Went over and
talked to Deek, and picked up on that red-headed nymph we met…”
“How was it?”
“Tight, mah man…tight!”
After the usual morning
pleasantries – you know, the stuff you rap so you know you didn’t
get ruined enough to forget your vocabu-what-zit, the pair made
their way down the flights of stairs to the street. Jerry7 fiddled
with the lock and chain, and then both proceeded to inspect things
as if they hadn’t built ‘em.
One kick…two…Jerry’s knuckle
sprang to reluctant life, spitting out the night’s accumulation of
shit. Tink’s pan belched out a blue flame and followed suit. A
minute or two for the heart to warm up, and the two chrome
sculptures lumbered out into the “wunnerful world of asphalt and
assholes…”, as Animal once said.
Two lights East and a right
turn saw our heroes rumbling along the Westside bypass, and
holding the limit as they headed for beautiful suburbia with its
station wagons and pot patches and other assorted nifties.
Ten minutes of heavy cruisin’
saw them at their destination. The orange-black shovelhead in the
driveway was sufficient testimony as to the whereabouts of the
dude they sought. As the roar subsided, the front door opened and
Porky stumbled forth, a tangle of black curly hair blowing about
him, making him look like a madman as he toked on his
dessert. He passed breakfast around, while various glances were
cast around to the different machines, as is common amoung us
civilized people.
The three
exchanged greetings and walked toward the house, while up and down
the street the neighbors eyed the situation from between their
venetian blinds, and frantically phoned each other to confirm the
dat of the next KKK meeting…
Inside the house
– the usual bedlam – Porky’s ol’ lady chsing kids all over; toys
and bike parts scattered everywhere.
“How inna’ fuck
you ever get any sleep around here?” asked Tink, doing his best to
be heard above the din.
“So who sleeps?”
chuckled his kid-chasing chick on her 32nd lap around
the living room…
“Whaddaya’ say
we get down to business, Pork?” sniffed Jerry, who mentally put
marriage and two-bangers in the same category. As Porky lit yet
another joint, Jerry counted out the cash for the weeks stash.
When the joint went out, Porky dissappeared momentarily – only to
return with another joint, and a small brown parcel, which he
handed to Tink, who nodded. “Good stuff?”
“Guaranteed!
Only finest kind authentic treated Tibetan Ceremonial Trip Weed!”
“Oh bullshit!”
laughed Tink, stashing the goods beneath his jacket.
“You comin’ to the party
tonight?” asked Jerry, as he struggled to open a beer can.
“Motherfucking shit! What fuckin’ pervert designed this bastard
beer can? How in hell do they expect you to open the damn thing if
the fuckin’ ring comes off?!?”
“I’ll get it fart,” offered
Porky, and promptly whipped out his .38 – blowing three quarters
of the top off before Jerry could think to yell.
“Thanks,” muttered Jerry, as
his two buddies hysterically rolled on the floor. A few more
minutes of wasted conversation and planning for the evening’s
bash, and the three left the house. Jerry and Porky headed for the
local Harley shop, and tink headed for the nearest ‘authorized’
stash place. As the trio went about their business, across town
Deek and Animal were firing up their breakfast…
Deek and Animal were kinda’
a strange pair. Deek was a small sharp lookin’ dude with glasses
and a bushy beard. As for Animal, go dig up yer Aunt’s
encyclopaedia and look up ‘Grizzly Bear’. They stumbled around
with the ol’ morning groggies, preparing to meet Jerry and Porky
at the shop. This morning’s back-room discussion was to center
around a subject dear to all: Party tonight.
AFTERNOON
A very important thing that you
should be made aware of at this point in the story is that there
are three kinds of ‘low lifes’ here in the South: Spades, Hippies
and Bikers. If you happen to fall into one of those categories –
tough shit. All three, and you can bet your ass there’s a warrant
out on your ass. Any-so-how…
Back at the royal third
floor palladium, with all aforementioned persons present, things
started cookin’. Plans were made for a midnight run to the local
romancin’ place atop a nearby mountain, raiding parties were sent
to the local brewery, and Porky attempted to make the Guiness Book
of Records by rolling no less than a gross of joints in about an
hour.
Bikes, snatch and suds
arrived all afternoon, as the local boys made it into town for the
first big bash of the summer. By 7 o’clock, the place was jumpin’.
Everywehre in the apartment were the sounds of laughter, and
moans, and – well, you know…
Jerry rolled the Sportster
he was building out onto the balcony and fired it up, much to the
delight of the rednecks gathered below in the usual Friday night,
Dixie Drive-In beer-drinking and engine-revving contest. The
fuzz…strangely, were nowhere in sight.
Nobody was paying much
attention to the intermittent cranking of bikes below in the
parking lot. Every now and then, some stud would talk one of the
local wenches in the Drive-In parking lot into taking a little
spin.
Animal had just pulled in
for about the second time that evening when all hell broke loose.
As he entered the apartment, he walked toward the balcony…a
contented look on his face which made several present wonder just
where he’d been. As Tink entered his room which also happened to
be the room with the entrance to the balcony, he was bowled over
by 265 pounds of fast-moving meat.
“Get yer ass offa’ that
motor!!” yelled Animal from somewhere around the second flight of
stairs…
“What the hell?” yelled
Jerry, as he rushed into Tink’s room and out onto the balcony,
jumping over the dazed Tink to do so. From his perch above the
parking lot, he stared open-mouthed at Animal’s pan veering out of
the Drive-In and down the road – obviously not driven by its
owner, who was running swiftly some twenty feet behind it, with
one hellacious string of curses floating along behind him.
“Jesus H. Christ!” hollered
Jerry, loudly enough to be heard in the next county, “Somebody’s
burned Animal’s bike!!”
If you’ve ever seen one of
those old SAC films where all the fighter pilots come pouring out
of the barracks when the alert sounds, you got a pretty good idea
of what happened to the party. At least 25 dudes were kickin’ and
cussin’ as a stream of motors poured out onto the street in the
same direction taken by the pilfered pan. Jerry was hot in the
lead, and nobody was too far behind. Tink slowed and took on
Animal, who’s lack of wind didn’t’ deter him from voicing the
misery to befall the thief.
The chase led the enraged
group out of town on the main Westbound thoroughfare, some mile
and a half behind the tail light of the stolen bike, which was no
slack mover. At the city limit, Deek went down – this Triumph
striking a goodly sized dog that had time his street crossing
poorly. A pair of motors dropped back to assist, while the main
pack, bound for vengance, forged on with added zeal.
Jerry and Porky, having the
two strongest bikes in the group, were slowly closing the gap
between the chasers and the chased. The pair could make out the
lines of their friend’s motor as it banked sharply up the road
which led to the local sporty-car heaven – a five mile stretch of
curvy mountain road that was considered risky at 35 mph in
daylight. By now, only three bikes were hot on the stolen vehicle;
Jerry’s, Porky’s, and a down-home dude name of Floyd with a hot
Sportster – Animal’s 80 incher proving too much for the average
street machine to follow.
“Shit!” thought Jerry – he
could’a at least picked a slower motor!
The group was 7 or 8 miles
from the start of the chase, and it was getting tricky to trying
to straighten out tho more hairy curves. As the crest of the
mountain loomed into the beam of the headlights, Jerry thought he
heard a sound ahead.
“Hot damn! Maybe the little
motherfucker has run out of gas or such!”
A sorry sight met the tired
eyes as the top of the hill gave way to a half-mile of
down-sloping road; a huge bon-fire some hundred yards away slowed
the group down quickly. Jerry slid to a halt and surveyed the
scene – as did Porky and Floyd. A late night Highway Patrol road
check had been the last leg of the journey for the thief. Animal’s
motor – or what remained of it – was embedded in the side of the
car, both burning fiercely. Scant feet away lay a badly broken
figure, the charred uniform clearly recognizable. Floyed pointed
silently a dozen yards further up the road. Another figure. He
walked slowly to where it lay, and bent down.
He remained only a moment,
and stood up. Jerry was puzzled as he saw an unmistakable look of
grief on Floyd’s face. He walked over to where his friend stood
and gazed down at the corpse of what had been the cutest little
blonde chick at the party.
“God…” moaned Jerry as he
turned away, “she asked me three times if she could drive me
around the block. Said her daddy was a bike heat and taught her
how to ride…”
“That he did…” came Porky’s
strained voice from behind. “Shit!”
“We’d better beat feet man,”
said Floyd, pulling Jerry towards the silent group of motors.
As the trio mounted up and
headed back towards the apartment, the only sound on the mountain,
other than the receding roar…was the crackling of flames.
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