Page 63 of Malice and Surrender
“Oh, they died.”
“Well, if that wasn’t the most comforting thought,” I mumbled as Wilder leaped onto an old crate and flipped over the top of the fence, landing without a sound. He stood and sprinted off into the dark. Great, I lived beside Batman.
I needed a new fucking life.
I’se The B’y that builds the boat and
I’se The B’y that sails her and
I’se The B’y that catches the fish and
Brings ‘em home to Liza
I belted at the top of my lungs and held the round of…whatever in the air. Some liquid sloshed out and soaked my hand, but caring about shit like that was beyond me. Getting shit-faced was the most logical thing to do in my predicament.
Hip-yer-partner Sally Tibbo
Hip-yer-partner Sally Brown
Fogo, Twillingate, Morton’s Harbour,
All around the circle
What else does one do when one found out that you spent ten years in prison for no good reason? I mean, I always knew that I’d been in prison for no reason. It wasn’t like my cock had jumped off my body and fucked Raine before reattaching itself. The thing was, when I thought she was being vindictive and hateful like we’d been at war, I could accept that. Two enemies were facing off, but the reality was worse. Raine sent me to jail based on a tattoo—a tattoo on a board on the wall of my foster father’s friend’s tattoo parlor.
Sods and rinds to cover your flake,
Cake and tea for supper
Cod fish in the spring of the year,
Fried in maggoty butter
I looked down at my hand and the bird and flower tattoo and thought about cutting my hand off. Would it help? No, but maybe I could burn the thing off or slice it off. Glancing out at the room of bikers keeping their distance from me, I smiled and then yelled.
“Come on fuckers! Sing with me.” I managed to pull myself up onto the bar, and the bartender ran for cover as I continued to sing and kick the glasses off the top.
Hip-yer-partner Sally Tibbo
Hip-yer-partner Sally Brown
Crash. The first glass hit the wall and shattered into a million little pieces. Why was it that everyone else could let loose and party and act like an asshole, but when I did, they stared at me like I’d sprouted horns on my head? Then again, maybe I had. I turned to look in the large mirror behind the bar, and the image was fuzzy, but there were no horns.
Fogo, Twillingate, Morton’s Harbour,
All around the circle
I don’t want your maggoty fish
They’re no good for winter
Crash. Another glass shattered, and two guys standing around dove away from the airborne projectile. Laughing hard, I raised my glass, toasting those in the room, and then took a big swig and decided to chug the rest of it down. It burned on the way down like it was trying to burn the sin right out of me, but there was no hope of that.
I’d been born and bathed in the blood of sin. I was created by assholes, fucked over by assholes, and now I was the biggest asshole of the bunch.
Well, I can buy as good as that,
Way down in Bonavista!
