LOWLIFE HIGHLIGHTS

Boulder, Colorado - Part 2 - The Heart of Juliet Jones

It’s late afternoon on a sunny day and I’m back on the hill panhandling, wasting my life, looking for the ultimate goodtime without the requisite labor. A cat I know, named Greyhound, waves to me from across the street. He is long and thin with blonde curly hair, deep blue eyes and a carefree face. He told me he built a one-room igloo in the Alaskan wilderness and lived there for three years hunting and fishing and surviving like the Eskimos. He said he used to sell LSD in capsules he filled himself while licking his fingers of the residue. He says he was high for seven months. I met him at a happening in the park in Denver. I watched while he and a speed freak named Benzo shot up crystal meth with the same needle. He offered me a hit, but I declined. Sharing needles leads to hepatitis C. Speed can be fun and a spike in a vein can be a happy rush, but Hep C turns your skin and the whites of your eyes yellow and sometimes you die before your time. I asked if maybe I could snort a line, but Benzo said no man, that’s a waste of good dope. His face was vibrating like a Magic Fingers motel bed, and he was skinny as a prisoner of war. He looked like a poster child for drug abuse.

Greyhound crosses the street and says hey man, what’s happening?

I tell him nothing much and what’s happening with him.

He says he’s on his way up some mountain to a commune, free food and dope and chicks. “You should come along. Gonna be outa fucking sight. Free food and chicks and dope, man. I been up there before, it was all drugs and chicks and food. You should come along. I ever tell you I coulda been in the band Steppenwolf? Yeah, no shit, I was gonna be the singer but everbuddy was jealous, so I quit that shit, man. You should come along up the mountain. It’s like this commune with free love and shit. You got any bread, man?”

“I don’t know, maybe a dollar or so. Why?”

“Mescaline, man. Good mescaline, I can give you a cap for a dollar.”

I dig out a crumpled single and we make the trade.

Greyhound tells me he’ll be back in a while with wheels to take us up to the commune. I’m not really sold on the idea but figure if nothing else I can take the mescaline and go to my pad and enjoy the mellow high. Maybe I’ll read a book or try to write a story. Greyhound takes off and I check out the drug which is in a horse-sized capsule. I go into the bar and grill, The Joint, and order a beer to wash down the mescaline. I hang out for a while then back out to sidewalk to hustle enough coin for a Salisbury Steak TV dinner and a Hostess Cherry Pie. I’m doing nothing at all when a psychedelic fist wallops me in the head and in a split second, I’m as high as I’ve ever been; body-shaking high. No way is this mescaline, its hardcore acid mixed with speed, or maybe something more, something less pleasant. I’m stuck in the pavement and I’m thinking I may not be able to move from this spot until my rush has been flushed out and that could take a while. I wonder if the drug is STP. I’m bouncing around the inside of my head, when I get an idea for a short story. It’s based on the newspaper comic strip The Heart of Juliet Jones. Juliet’s younger sister Eve Jones looks like Tuesday Weld. In my story she comes to life but she’s still the size as in the newspaper panel. She takes off her clothes, and I dip her in a jar of Vaseline and then she shinnies up and down my hard dick. I figure I’ve got my finger on the pulse of the zeitgeist. I just have to get a typewriter and learn to spell.

I’m someplace that’s not anywhere when I notice Greyhound’s face a few inches from my face.

“Hey, man, let’s go get some pussy and food and drugs, my man’s waiting for us. Check it out.”

At the curb a Volkswagen bus is putt-putting. Benzo the speed freak is at the wheel. I notice the sun has gone down and wonder what time it is. I attempt to shake a host of delusions from my head and I need to pee.

“Hey, Greyhound, man. What the fuck did you give me. My head is all full of something and it’s not mescaline. It’s too heavy and I’m kind of freaking out, man. What time is it? I think I want to go home.”

“Forget that shit, we’re going to head up to the commune, man. Chicks and food and wine and drugs, way better than standing here trying to make a crummy dollar.” He has a hold of my arm, pulling me toward the van. My legs are shaking and I’m walking like I'm on stilts. We get to the van and I’m standing in front of the sliding door to the back of the bus trying to breathe. Greyhound opens the passenger-side door and takes the shotgun seat, so I slowly slide open the side door, and it’s dark inside and a very large German Shepherd dog growls and barks and lurches at me and I scream, GODDAMN FUCK MOTHERFUCKER. Jesus fucking shit, Man! Fuck! Shit! Fuck!

The dog stops barking and sits with his tongue hanging out and Greyhound and Benzo, are laughing hysterically. My mind is blown; I’ve lost all control and just about pissed my pants. Benzo tells me the dog’s name is Gar and don’t worry Gar is a sweetheart. There are no seats in the back just the floor and a dog and when my eyes adjust, I see a teenage girl, about fifteen, sitting crossed legged and wearing overalls. Her hair is dark and long, and she’s wearing a fake handlebar mustache. She looks at me, but she doesn’t say anything and nobody acknowledges her. I’m shaking like flickering neon, and the dog is making me nervous. “Hey, Benzo, listen, man, you think maybe you could drop me off at home, it’s not too far from here, probably on your way up to wherever it is you’re going.”

I’m not sure if Benzo is talking to me or to the fucking moon, he says, No time, no time, man. We got, got, got, got no time, and with that he puts the minibus in gear and takes off with a little squeak from the back tires. I got, got, got, got no time. I got, got, got, got no time. I got, got, got, got no time.

Greyhound is having a good time. He says, “Hey, Benzo, what time you got.” Greyhound cracks himself up.

I’ve been sitting here on the floor of the VW bus for fifteen minutes or so and it hurts my back and neck and it’s dark and I’m tripping and Gar the dog is panting and staring at me like I’m a soup bone. The girl with the handlebar mustache is facing me and I can only really see her when occasional lights flash into the van. Each time I look at her she makes a goofy face at me, except I’m not sure if it’s her or a hallucination.

Benzo has the music cranked up, Visions of Matchstick Men, which hurts my ears. I haven’t a clue where we are though we are traveling uphill along curvy roads. I’m feeling a little carsick and I need to empty my bladder before it explodes. Gar, the dog—as if he reads my mind—stands up and walks over and raises a hind foot and pisses a long smelly yellow stream on my right tennis shoe, then goes back where he was and continues to stare at me.

I yell over the music, “Hey Benzo, your fucking dog just pissed all over my foot.”

Benzo yells back, “Yeah, man, Gar’s a sweetheart, don’t worry about him. He likes people.”

The girl with the mustache—except I’m no longer convinced the mustache is really there—is laughing and it pisses me off. I yell through the music does she think Gar pissing on my foot is funny. She says yeah, she thinks it’s funny and wouldn’t I think it was funny if he had pissed on her foot. I tell her yeah; I guess I would and who is she. She says she’s Benzo’s sister and how about we don’t talk anymore, she wants to listen to the music.

The VW is breathing in great heaves, and the music is a chainsaw in my head, and Benzo’s sister is making faces at me again, maybe. It feels like we’ve been driving for hours. We are on a bumpy rutted road for a while and climbing slowly in first gear and finally we stop. Greyhound opens his door and a second later he has dissolved into the night. It’s the last time I ever see him. I slide the side door open and step out. Benzo turns out the headlights and interior lights and all I see is dark. He lights a Colman lantern and climbs out and walks around to where I am. He is wearing baggy white underpants and a bathrobe, and I wonder if he’s been wearing this all along. His hair is scraggly and his face is kinetic like he has wiggly worms under the skin. I don’t think he weighs more than a hundred pounds though he towers over me. There is a pickup truck parked a few yards away and a guy in a cowboy hat sitting on the hood. Benzo tells me that guy is his connection but don’t tell nobody. He walks to the pickup and sets the lantern in the truck bed. I look back into the van and can barely make out Benzo’s sister.

“Are you okay in there?”

She says, “I’m as okay in here as anyplace else.”

I’ve gone a few yards from the van and the pickup truck and I’m trying to see my hand in front of my face. I shake a Kool from the box in my pocket and light up with my Zippo. I can see the stars above and they’re majestic and I want to reach out and touch them, but they might burn my fingers, so I just stand there and look and smoke. I’m thinking I need to chill. I need to keep a level head and then I think oh, wow, level is the most perfect word in the English language. level. Fuckin A, I need to tell somebody. Something with teeth bites my butt and I jump and yelp and kick but don’t connect and I light my lighter and look down and Gar is panting like a nice doggie with his tongue hanging out. “Jesus, Gar, you scared the fuck out of me. You might look like a good boy, but I think you have some problems to work out.”

I hear voices and see a reddish yellow glow of what I’m hoping is a campfire. Someone is playing guitar. I walk toward the light and Gar walks with me. I tell him it’s okay to walk with me, but it doesn’t mean we’re friends. My shoes are still squishy, and I can smell the dog piss which reminds me I still need to pee.

“Hey Gar, hold on a minute, I gotta take a leak.”

I unbutton my fly and let go a yellow stream. Gar’s standing a few feet away, so I say hey, Gar, think fast. I swivel and tinkle a few revengeful ounces of urine on Gar’s head. Gar snaps and laps at the yellow rain and I pivot away. “Jesus, Gar. That’s gross. I know I shouldn’t pee on your head, but I didn’t expect you to fucking lap it up. That’s really gross.”

Gar lets out an agreeable yap and then an arf.

“Yeah, well, you can think whatever you want. Let’s keep going, see if we can find civilization.”

By jerking my pee stream away from Gar I managed to piss on my Levis, right leg from the knee up to the pocket.

We’re getting closer to the fire and the people around it, and I can see a few canvas tents set up, some with lights inside; they look like brown paper bags holding candles and floating through the air. It makes me think about all the dead people I used to know. The people around the fire, six in all, four guys and two chicks, are standard issue hippies and none are good looking except the chick playing Itchycoo Park on guitar. People nod and I nod back. The fire is relatively small, and everyone is sitting cross legged. There’s a bearded long-haired guy on one side of the Itchycoo Park chick and on the other side a guy with short hair and spaced-out eyes. There’s a couple of feet between the chick and spacey eyes, so I squeeze in. Gar goes around and squeezes in on her other side.

Nobody seems to have anything to say and I’m on top of some mountain in Colorado and I’m more stoned that I want to be and I don’t know anyone and this is one of those times when no one talks because they are listing to music and it’s uncomfortable as hell and then it get worse when I go into some kind of atmosphere shift and all of a sudden everything is different except it’s not. The blood in my head rushes to my feet then back to my head. The chick finally finishes her rendition Itchycoo Park and sets down her guitar. She looks at me and I smile and she tells me I smell like pee. My smile is frozen as is every atom of my person. She turns away and scratches Gar on the neck and says what’s your name, little doggie? He nuzzles her and she leans away and pushes Gar and says, oh fuck, man, you smell like pee as well. “Wherever you guys came from I think you should go back.”

I get up and Gar and I find our way back to the VW. The pickup truck is gone, and the van’s engine is running and the headlights are on. I open the passenger-side door and Benzo’s sister is in the driver’s seat. I ask her where’s Benzo and she says who cares and I say not me. I ask if she’s going back to Boulder and she says yes. My door is open and Gar is standing a few feet away looking at me. I say Hey, dog, you coming with me or are you gonna stay. Gar says bark bark and then turns and walks into the night.

“Okay well fuck you, I don’t like you anyway.”

Benzo’s sister has removed the mustache and I’m not sure she ever had it on. I get in and we take off throwing dirt and pebbles. She drives like a carny thrill ride and goes the wrong way a few times and hasn’t mastered a stick shift. I tell her maybe I could drive for a while, and she says maybe I could get out and walk for a while, so I tell her never mind. I ask her if she was wearing a mustache earlier and she says that’s crazy why would she be wearing a mustache. I tell her I have no idea.

I ask her if she has ever thought about the word level.

“Why would I think about the word level.”

“The way it’s spelled, you know. It’s like the perfect word. l e v e l. Think about it.”

Benzo’s sister rolls her eyes and turns on the radio and cranks it up. In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida.

It’s around 3am when she lets me out on the hill. She reaches into a pocket of her bib overalls and takes out the handlebar mustache and hands it to me. I tell her thanks and keep your nose clean. She crunches the VW into first gear then drives away. When I get home, I’m still a bit jangled and high and my roommate, Mark, is snoring. I stay up and read for a while then take a shower and go to bed. When I wake, I have a couple of cups of coffee and then get dressed and put on the mustache. I take a bus to the unemployment office to check out the jobs board. On the way back I pick up a newspaper. I check out the help wanted ads for a job, but first I go to the comics page and read The Heart of Juliet Jones.

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