Deerhoof

Part 2 of 6 by Peter Wild

I called your name, sang Josie in that pathetic sea shanty sing-song way I have that you detest and I know you heard me because you jerked your shoulder, the way you would if some salesman or something was invading your personal space, you jerked your shoulder even though I was about forty, fifty paces away from you. It occurred to me that I could stay, try and win my money back and drink more beer – but if I did that whatever shit I was in would magnify beyond all proportion by the time I eventually made it home; so I didn’t stay. I did shout your name once more, though, as I legged it after you, heels kicking up sand behind me – shouted Josie, pleading, like a kid asking for ice-cream. You didn’t respond, didn’t look back, didn’t so much as register that there might possibly be a question in need of an answer. By the time I made the car park (sweaty, and it has to be said sort of desperate-looking like that guy at the end of the Don Siegel version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers), it was starting to rain and you – you were in the car with PJ Harvey shrieking Sheela-Na-Gig at top volume, driving away without so much as a second look at me, wearing that expression that says: I know you’re there and I know you can see me and I know you know that I can see you but I’m not going to let on to you, you can go and fuck yourself, you can go and fuck yourself, and when you’ve finished (fucking yourself), you can walk home in the rain and let’s all hope that the rain helps you work your shit out so that by the time you get home you’ll be in a position to apollo-the-fuck-a-gise, because that’s where you are now and that’s what you need to do. Knowing a futile gesture was called for, I removed my shoe and pitched it high and dumb in your direction, or in the direction of our rapidly diminishing car at any rate, and I said shit quietly once and then (as my shoe bounced off the bonnet of some other schmo’s car, thereby forcing said car’s car alarm to blossom forth in all its shrill glory) much louder – SHIT! – into the rain-wet, argument-spoiled night.

6S

Peter Wild, author of Deerhoof, Part 1, makes his online home at peterwild.com. "Deerhoof" is a six-part story, with each part exactly six sentences. Look for Part 3 on Tuesday, March 13th.