21

The Jade Emperor watches from the mezzanine, hair slicked into a pompadour, black leather jacket, white t-shirt tucked inside a pair of blue jeans. Two heavenly servants are gawking at the car parked behind him, brocaded interior, gold rims, whitewall tires painted in Chinese script. Randy snaps at them and they scurry off, looks over at The Jade Emperor then down to the empty dinner tables, a paper peach lantern on each glowing in the swirl of ballroom light. The buffet lines the back wall, platters of chicken feet surround a blue and white Ming bowl filled with Asian pear macaroni salad. A ladle dips into braised pork balls, pours it over a bed of rice as two Heavenly servants carry a jiggling green dragon jello mold, set it in the center of the splayed peaches that fan out like the wings of a giant bird.

“You’re making me nervous with that thing.” The Jade Emperor looks over as Randy pockets his watch. “Shouldn’t The Empress be here by now?” He slicks his already slicked-back hair. “You told her about the thing?”

Randy hugs his clipboard to his chest.

“I informed her of your request.”

“And?”

“She was…displeased.” The Jade Emperor lets the silence hang. “I believe,” Randy searches for the right words, “the cultural significance of Grease was lost on her.” There’s a loud crash. They peer down at a platter of Sichuan green bean casserole smashed on the mahogany floor. “I do have a few last-minute things to attend to if you wouldn’t mind…”

“What about Lao Tzu?”

“Your majesty?”

“Is he coming?” Randy nods, “And The Bull Demon?”

“A ‘maybe’.”

“Zhinü?”

“Prior engagements.”

“Should I text people or would that seem desperate? We set out a hundred places. We’re going to look like idiots if more people don’t show.”

Randy glances in the mirror at his black leather jacket, duck-tailed hair sculpted into a V.

“Fortunately, the way we look has no bearing on the attendance.” He hears bustling from the hall, walks over just in time to open the door. “The Empress your majesty.”

She enters in a yellow poodle skirt, matching cardigan over a white blouse, two diamond dragons pinned to her blonde wig.

“What the hell is this?” The Jade Emperor looks her up and down. “I wanted slutty Sandy. Black leather Sandy. She’s the best Sandy.”

She brushes by him.

“I know what you wanted, but this is what you’re getting.” She pinches her skirt feeling the scratchy wool. “My father would be turning over in his grave if he saw me like this.”

He touches her shoulder.

“You look great.”

“I feel ridiculous.”

She checks her makeup in the mirror.

“Honey, you said you wouldn’t do this.”

“Do what?”

“This!”

She snaps her compact closed.

“You know what you’re real power is?” She smoothes a wrinkle from her sweater. “Making me pity a king. And to think I fell for it again.”

The lights dim, the music dies as a hush falls over the ballroom. Randy opens the car doors, as they slip in and everyone takes their position.

The Jade Emperor turns the key as the engine roars and the lights on the dash come alive.

The Chrysler Imperial Cloud Car 
hovers on a giant lotus blossom
smoke billows from the green petals
as the car lifts
glides over the balcony
high above the crowd 
a heavenly servant clicks on the spot
follows as they sail toward the stage
the smoke falling
spreading out
as the floor disappears
and the sound of one hand
clapping the other
echos a hundred times
throughout the heavenly chambers

The seats are detached from the car and pushed to the back of the stage as The Jade Emperor and Empress wave to the crowd then make their way to sit down. The drummer waits for The Jade Emperor’s butt to hit the throne as the bass drags and the guitar blares through the silver Magnatone. The lead singer does a little dance before singing into the mic,

“I live in an apartment
on the ninety-ninth floor of my block
And I sit at home looking out the window
imagining the world has stopped”

The Jade Emperor cradles his Royal Heavenly Goblet filled with the finest nine thousand year old peach liquor and takes a sip, scans the crowd watching everyone dance.

“Looking for someone?”

His eyes rest on Lao Tzu in his QT uniform.

“The Knower of the Way didn’t even dress up.”

“He looks just as ridiculous as everyone else.”

“We do the same thing every year. I thought we could change it up a bit.”

“The eternal is unchanging. It doesn’t flaunt in fancy cars and white tuxedos listening to this decadent racket. We should be playing yayue,” She takes a sip, “though who am I to say this to the ruler of heaven.”

“What makes dragons and jade so immortal? That was a style at one point. It didn’t always exist down there.”

She turns her head to look at him for the first time.

“It didn’t exist down there? We don’t follow what they do down there. They follow us, or have you forgotten?”

Hey! You!
Get off of my cloud
Hey! You!
Get off of my cloud
Hey! You!
Get off of my cloud
Don’t hang around ‘cause
two’s a crowd on my cloud baby

The song ends as the lights dim and a spot is thrown to the floor. A man walks out dressed head to toe in black velvet. He holds a long pole with a soft plush heart dangling from the top. It lights up as he shows it to the band, The Jade Emperor, The Empress, the crowd then to the red curtain draping down. A large shadowy head pushes its way through then stops. He jiggles the heart and it’s drawn out through the slit as the spot lands on a large googley-eyed Betty Boop. She looks side to side then enters the stage as fifteen men file out holding her long sequined snake of a body.

A gong is struck and the drums kick in. Her body contorts. The men dance. Turn her into a pretzel. Her eyes move with the music as she’s hoisted in the air. Her body makes a circle below, winds around then they switch. Her head drops as her body circles above. The black-velvet-man runs across the stage and Betty’s head pops off, follows him around, chasing, as her body shakes and falls to the floor. A long sparkly trail of organs hangs from her neck, as she licks up the felt blood drops that fall from the heart now frantically dancing on the pole. The gongs are smashed and the drums pound as The Jade Emperor takes another sip of his immortal peach liquor.

The black-velvet-man stumbles, falls, as Betty descends, feasts on the pulsing heart. The stage turns red. The gel lights flood the floor, strobe, as her head cracks open and streamers shoot out into the crowd. The drums stop and out leaps a cute furry monkey. He dances around the stage, over her crumpled body, the heart, the torn-apart head. A blue river is shaken behind, turns into a waterfall held by men on ladders. Monkey jumps through the fabric into a giant gold Burger King crown. He plays in the middle, hopping from side to side, climbs the peaks before the paper crumbles and falls flat on the floor. 

A trap door opens and a 2-D Yama jumps out. Monkey lets out a shriek. The painted backdrop of hills and clouds whirl behind him as he runs. It slows to the peach orchard. A few poster-board trees are brought on as Monkey picks a ripe one from its branches, gobbles it up, the spot hits him, strobes, as the set changes to The Heavenly Royal Banquet Hall. Cudgel in hand, he smashes everything in sight, paper lanterns, paper food, jugs of wine. He tears up the throne and carpet, the tables, chairs and platters.

As he finishes a thunderous gong is heard and a giant mountain descends from above. He cowers beneath as the frame hits the floor. He peeks out of a small cutout as a man dressed like the Hamburger Helper runs on stage and slaps on a Buddhist seal. Applause breaks out across the auditorium as Tang Sanzang enters. Flowing robes, staff, riding a man in a white horse suit. He tears the seal as the mountain splits and the monkey emerges only to have a small gold band placed around his head. They exit as the music changes and the mouth of a cave is wheeled on. Pig comes out, big fat cotton belly, rubber pig nose, dressed like Oliver Hardy, small fat tie, Hitler mustache, holding a nine-pronged rake. 

A family walks and he plucks the youngest daughter away. Starts to dance. The thunderous drums are replaced by a lone pipa as they glide around. Twinkling Christmas lights pushed through black gauzy fabric shine as a low-hanging moon bobs down and sways with them. The music stops and Pig rips off her baggy peasant clothes revealing a white Marilyn Monroe wedding dress underneath. 

Monkey walks on to scattered applause as Pig whirls around, lifts his rake only to be beaten and forced to kneel. They walk in place as the scenery is changed to a desert. A giant fan is switched on as tumbleweeds are tossed. A river billows out as Sand hides behind it. Men dressed like swords rush on stage, jump around then quickly leave as Sand leaps through the fabric, his demon quelling staff in hand only to be beaten and forced to kneel.

The four of them stand center stage as the demons come from all sides. White bone, Red Boy, The single-horned rhinoceros and so on. Monkey waves them off with his gold-banded cudgel. The craggy mountain lights up as a disco ball drops sparkling the stage. The scriptures descend from high. Much applause as Buddha arrives. Tang Sanzang’s body is dumped in the river and wheeled off as a projection of him is sent up to heaven. The gates open. The Jade Emperor and Empress on either side wait with open arms. The music concludes in a crescendo as the crowd applauds. The red curtain is drawn and the band kicks up again.

The Jade Emperor stirs his drink in boredom.

“I’m going to mingle.”

He makes his way to the buffet table, fills his plate with weird pickles and crackers, meats with long skewers and barbequed chicken feet. Lao Tzu is on the other end doing the same. They exchange glances. Lao Tzu looks at the giant platter of shrimp, dips one in the cocktail sauce and pops it in his mouth.

The Jade Emperor picks a few shrimp for himself.

“So you’re still mad at me.”

“I’m Lao Tzu,” he says thumbing his QT uniform. “I don’t get mad.”

The Jade Emperor fishes around the pretzel bowl.

“Look. I’m sorry I sent you down to earth and made you get a job.”

Lao Tzu puts his plate on the table.

“And?”

The Jade Emperor looks up at the ceiling.

“And you can come back to heaven if you want. Honestly, I can’t even remember why I banished you.”

He takes a scoop of macaroni salad and slops it next to the shrimp.

“Because…” he lowers his voice, “you got a yin yang tattoo on your butt and when you decided to show it to me, I called you an idiot,” Lao leans closer, ”which you are.” The Jade Emperor stops chewing, starts to laugh. “It’s not funny!”

“It’s a little funny.”

“It’s not!”

The Jade Emperor takes an ice cream scoop of the green jello-molded dragon.

“Seen Monkey around?”

Lao Tzu narrows his eyes.

“He found me at QuikTrip. He was looking for Tang Sanzang.”

“And did you tell him?”

Lao glowers and looks at the untouched cheese plate.

“No.”

“After this take Erlang, find that Great Sage of ours, bring him back, and this time, don’t let him escape.”

He bows reluctantly as the Jade Emperor scans the crowd, see’s Elvis talking to Guanyin, gives a little wave. Someone taps his shoulder and he turns to see The Bull Demon in a James Dean jacket, gold ring in his nose, red eyes, giant curved tusks, sharp fangs munching on a plate of goldfish crackers. 

“Great party,” offers him some goldfish, “are they a thing?”

“Guanyin? She doesn’t…you know. She’s above that.” The Jade Emperor sets his plate on the buffet table. “Elvis on the other hand would sleep with this bowl of macaroni salad if you sculpted it into boobs.” He pours himself a drink from the punchbowl. “So, how’s the demon business? Eat any monks lately?”

The Bull Demon sighs.

“Not to sound like the old man that I am, but, it’s hard these days. Not many monks. Everyone flies. Not like in the old day when some traveling monks would show up at the mouth of my cave.”

“So what are you going to do? Sell insurance?”

“I thought about turning it into a museum but I couldn’t find a bank to….apparently eating people and being an all-powerful demon doesn’t mean much for your credit.” The Jade Emperor pours him a drink and hands it to him. “Thanks, and then I start thinking, is this the life I want? Tourists walking around taking pictures, gawking at my severed head collection?” He finishes it in one gulp. “Used to have an army of a hundred thousand. Covered the hills and valleys. These days…who wants to be the demon that haunts a tiny hill in the middle of nowhere? They all go to the city. Underground subways. Dilapidated apartments. How can you compete with that?” The Jade Emperor nods, slowly starts moving away. “The demons that do hang around are on their phones all day. No weapons. No fiery auras and thunderous proclamations of power. Now you make some asshole in Tokyo feel shitty about himself by posting a snarky comment, but then what? You don’t get to eat them.”

“It’s a young man’s game.”

The Bull Demon shakes his head.

“How’re things up here? Surprised The Empress would let you do this.”

“What do you mean, ‘let me?’”

“Who’re you talking to?”

“Yeah, well, she’s not happy about it.” He pokes the ice cube in his drink with his straw. It bobs down then pops back up. “I don’t know if I’m going through a midlife crisis but I just don’t care about any of this. What do we do up here? Sure, there’s heavenly splendor, but if I have to look at another auspicious cloud I’m going to puke. How long can you appreciate…” he throws his hand in the air, “all of this? I’ve been appreciating it and appreciating it and honestly, I’m worn out. I’m done. I mean, you tell me, what do I do here? What do I really do?”

“You’re The Jade Emperor. You rule heaven. Once a year people make offerings and then you judge everyone. C’mon, not the worst job in the world.”

“Yeah, well, don’t get me wrong. There was a time where I cared, but after judging, judging, judging and then watching the same thing happen year after year, you have to ask yourself…you know what I’m talking about?”

“So…what, you just make it up?”

“Randy made this algorithm that we feed the requests through but it takes forever because all the documents need to be scanned. Apparently everything’s a big picture when you scan it. He explained it to me once but I wasn’t listening. I mean, I don’t even know how it works and it’s probably doing a better job than I ever did. What does that say?”

The Bull Demon takes a bite of nacho salad, nods in approval then goes for more.

“I had to go to the dentist the other day. Me. The Bull Demon. Sitting in a chair looking at some stupid magazine they ripped out and stuck to the ceiling. Glossy picture of a waterfall. Water pouring down. Lotus blossoms in the wet grass and I’m looking at this stupid thing while a beautiful young woman, who should be terrified of me by the way, digs in my mouth. Doesn’t even care I have fangs. And it’s like, how did it get to this? I should be eating her. But I don’t even want to. So can I blame her? It’s my fault she’s not frightened, right?”

The Jade Emperor takes a drink.

“My dentist has one of those screens that’s attached to the chair with that arm-thing but nothing’s ever on except that screen saver with the color-changing logo bouncing around. I don’t know why but it’s mesmerizing.”

“Three cavities. Three! I’m not supposed to have to deal with this shit. You dismember an entire family and cook them for dinner, the last thing you think is, ‘I should brush my teeth.’”

“Look who’s coming.” Princess White Fang walks by and smiles. They both wave. “I heard she’s sleeping with Red Boy.”

“No way.” He watches her leave. “Heard you got someone new.”

“Who told you that?” The Jade Emperor looks behind him. “Not true.” Takes another drink. “Not yet at least.”

“What are you going to do with another woman?”

“I’m more interested in what she’s going to do with me.”

The Bull Demon shakes his head.

“You'll never learn.” Takes a bite of macaroni salad. “Princess Iron Fan and I are back together.”

“I saw you make an entrance. Thought it was a formality.”

“We’re giving it another shot.”

“You’re a bull demon and she’s a petite woman with a giant iron fan. How could it not work.” He pops a pretzel. “Haven’t seen Monkey have you?”

“Here?”

“Just…around.”

The Bull Demon scratches his chin. 

“I haven’t seen him since…I can’t even remember.”

“I know you guys are friends. Thought he might’ve stopped by.”

“Causing trouble again, huh?” He scratches his chin with his giant demon claw. “You want some advice? Leave that monkey alone. Nothing but trouble, but you can’t help yourself, can you?”

“I can’t stop helping myself to these chips.” The Jade Emperor pops one in his mouth. “Anyway, if things go sideways I want to know I can rely on you, or at the very least, that you’ll stay out of it.”

“I got enough problems.”

“Good,” he finishes his drink. “I’m going to see about a woman.”

He walks through the crowd making chit-chat, shaking hands as more guests stream in and the room starts to fill. Elbows and shoulders press against him as the band starts up and everyone raises their hands in the air. Someone tugs on his leather jacket and he looks down to see a furry-faced monkey. He jumps back as the mask is lifted and a hairy dwarf with horns laughs, gives him a wave before disappearing in a sea of tulle. The Jade Emperor makes it up on the stage, pushes through the curtain, mills around before seeing two guards positioned on either side of a holding cell, looks through the glass. Darlene is sitting on a bench looking through her purse.

“She got on stage and was saying curse words,” the one on the left says. “She told everyone to,” he leans in, “go fuck themselves.”

“Let me in. It’s bad enough you’ve shanghaied my date.”

The door swings open as The Jade Emperor enters. The Heavenly Guard peers in then closes it behind. They both stand there listening to the muffled conversation. The one on the right coughs. Looks over.  

“Frank.”

“What?”

He motions his head toward the door.

“What do you think they’re talking about?”

Frank takes a peek then stands back at attention.

“You trying to get us killed?”

“No…I….”

Two drunk dragons wander in and start making out by the ice machine.

“You can’t be back here.”

They ignore him. Frank shakes his head. Looks at this watch.

“You working a double?”

“I’m working till this thing’s over.”

“What’re you doing after?”

“Going home and going to bed. What’re you doing?”

“I don’t know. Thought I might…” he adjusts his uniform. “I’m thinking about,” he lowers his voice, “going downstairs.”

“You sneak down too, huh?”

They both look at the door. Wait for it to swing open.

“Few weeks ago I went down and forgot to materialize.”

“I hate it when that happens.”

“I was going to meet this woman at a hotel but I’m this spectral visage. No body. Nothing. Wispy tracers and shit. We’d been planning this for months so I wasn’t going to stand her up. I float up to our room and there’s this old man, crying and praying and he looks up at me and says, ‘Jesus?’. Didn’t miss a beat. I answer, ‘Yes, my son’. Goes on to tell me about his ex-wife, his daughter, and the whole time I’m thinking, shit, he’s going to want some advice. Some real advice. Jesus advice. And what am I going to tell him? My mind’s racing, and he’s getting worked up and then out of nowhere, he reaches up to the ceiling, falls face down on the floor and dies. Heart attack. Bam,” he smacks his hands together, “like that. That’s when it hits me.”

“Wrong room?”

“Wrong week. Felt like such an idiot.”

“Who hasn’t pretended to be Jesus? That’s the oldest trick in the book.”

“Oh yeah? What’s your great downstairs story?”

Frank checks the window again. Darlene and The Jade Emperor are sitting on a bench. He has his arm around her and looks like he’s explaining something.

“I have a girl I visit once in a while.”

“Girlfriend?”

“I don’t know. We haven’t cemented our relationship status. It’s casual. Anyway, when I go down, I really go down. You know what I mean?”

“Sure.”

“She lives in LA and I stay in her apartment, but this night I was supposed to meet her for dinner and then a movie at El Capitan, but I wanted to get a little loose beforehand so I stop at this bar. The Sandlot? I can’t remember. I’m drinking and, look, this is going to sound weird, but…I have this thing, when I drink, when I really drink,” he leans in and whispers, “I like to smoke a little crack.”

The other guard’s eyes grow wide.

“You smoke crack?”

“Only when I’m down there and only when I get drunk. Up here. Don’t touch the stuff. I know it’s supposed to be the most addictive thing on the planet but it doesn’t work that way for me. Anyway I’m drinking and I’m getting to that point where I’m looking around thinking, where can I score? I start walking the street. Bunch of tourists. Nothing. Then I see it. The door to Madame Tussaud’s wax museum propped open with a chair. People are in there cleaning. I can hear the vacuum and they’re yelling at each other in Spanish. It’s late. I’ve missed the movie. So I slip through the door and start walking around. There’s Madonna and Nick Cage and The President. Whatever. Then I go into this room and it’s dark and red and spooky and all that’s in there is, I kid you not, the severed heads of The Three Stooges.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Swear to God. I look around and, what the fuck, I decide I’m taking one. I grab Moe, because its gotta be Moe, right? I’m wearing this trench coat and I tuck the head under which makes me look like I’m pregnant but I figure that’s better than walking the streets with a severed head. By this time I’m getting hungry. I missed dinner. Totally forgot about my girlfriend.”

“I thought she wasn’t…”

“You know what I mean. I’m starving so I make my way to a grocery store. Walk the aisles holding this head under my arm cause it’s getting heavier and sweaty and the wax is starting to soften and I can’t get a good grip anymore. I go up to the register with three frozen steaks and she just waves me through like, ‘don’t even think about stopping’.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Yeah, so then I’m lost, trying to find my way back to Shelly’s and I get there, but I don’t have keys. We’re not that close, right? I stand by the front door hoping someone will come out but I get tired of waiting and head around back to the fire escape. Climb the metal stairs. Smash the back window with my hand. Get blood all over the head, my coat, the kitchen floor. I shove the head in the fridge, throw the steaks in the oven, turn it up to 400 and pass out.”

“Did she ever find out?”

He shakes his head.

“Wasn’t the first time I stood her up. She knows me well enough to take herself out. Dinner. A movie. The whole thing. Calls one of her girlfriends. They stay out drinking till God knows when. Gets dropped off three, four in the morning. Makes her way up the stairs and the apartment is full of smoke, I mean coming-out-underneath-the-door-smoke. Like a bad sci-fi movie. She opens it, fights her way to the kitchen, turns off the oven, pulls the charred steaks out then goes to the backdoor and see’s all the blood. Follows the trail into the bedroom and finds me in my trenchcoat passed out on her fancy Egyptian sheets. She yells and screams but I’m not responding so she goes to the kitchen to clean up and that’s when she opens the fridge.”

“And?”

“Shit. I left out the most important part. When I went into that wax museum. It wasn’t The Three Stooges. Why would you have the severed heads of the three stooges in a dimly lit room? Found out later it was Stalin, Hitler, and Mussolini. The great dictators of the world. Shelly, poor girl, opens the fridge and sitting on top of last night’s Pad Thai was the bloody head of Adolph Hitler.”

The door swings open and The Jade Emperor walks out with Darlene.

“What would your parents say if they knew you were back here?” The Jade Emperor points at the drunk dragons who stop kissing, bow profusely before disappearing through the curtain. “Nothing worse than a couple of horny teenage dragons.” The Jade Emperor extends his arm to Darlene. “May I have this dance?”

She slips her arm through his as they walk down the stairs and into the crowd. The Jade Emperor gives a signal to the band. The drummer raises his sticks as the “ooooohs” and “aaaahhhs” begin as the lead singer steps to the mic and sings,

Earth Angel
Earth Angel
Will you be mine?

They dance slowly around the crowded floor, careful not to bump into anyone. Darlene looks behind her as she’s dipped and brought back up. The Jade Emperor stares in her eyes, their hands clasped together as they take small careful steps around the room.

My darling dear
Love you all the time

All the eyes fix on the couple as the spot lights them up. The Bull Demon leans against the buffet sipping his drink, his arm around his wife. Randy stands at attention backstage peeking from behind the curtain. The Empress frowns from her throne as Nezha and Erlang and Lao Tzu and all of the guests clear the floor as Darlene is twirled, her blue checked dress billowing up each time she’s spun, her pigtails dangling each time she’s dipped, her ruby slippers tapping the wood planks of the floor as the disco ball is dropped from the ceiling sending a million tiny shards of light sparkling all over heaven.

12

"Life is a mystery
Everyone must stand alone
I hear you call my name
and it feels like home"

Madonna blares over the PA as Darlene saddles up to the bar, fresh from another bathroom break and already quite drunk. Loraine, who she’s just met and is now one of her best friends, is slumped over in her stool. Steve the Electrician, as he’s known, though mostly to separate him from Drywall Steve (they both have mustaches and wear hi-vis shirts) is playing pool and occasionally glancing at the TV wedged in the corner. Darrell leans on the register, towel slung over his shoulder, eyeing Darlene, trying to decide what's more of a hassle, cutting her off or letting her drink. She plops down in front of him and smacks the strap of a big purple bra that someone’s staple gunned to the ceiling. On the inside cup “Janet” is written in bubbly cursive, except the A’s a heart.

"Janet's sure got big tits,” she says pulling on the strap. 

"I don't know anything about it," Darrell says washing a glass and stacking it to dry.

"And Darrell doesn't know anything about it." She holds up the shot. "Must’ve been quite a pair. Probably thought she was doing everybody a big favor." Shoots it then wipes her mouth. "This ain’t no TJ. Max neither." She reaches up and gives it a tug. "Victoria’s,” she says in a slurred English accent pinching her fingers together and making ‘the fancy’ gesture. 

"Don't touch the bras. They're part of the decor."

She ignores him.

“Bares her breasts to God and country and nobody even remembers her.”

"I remember her," Steve says laying his pool cue on the table and taking a seat at the end of the bar.

"Well, god damn…” 

She puts her finger to her temple.

“Steve.”

“Steve!” She smacks her head. “Tell us something ‘bout Janet, Steve.”

“Well…” He takes a drink, sets his beer on the coaster and starts to pick at the label with his fingernail. "She’s got big tits.” 

Everyone laughs.

"Had,” Loraine says looking for her purse for the fifth time. “Died of breast cancer last year.”

"Dang." Darlene sobers up, looks at the bra, lets out a sigh then perks up. "Let's drink to Janet!" She pushes her glass across the bar. Darrell crumples in the face of tragedy and pours everyone a shot. "To Janet!" She raises it up then gulps it down. "You wouldn't believe the week I've had." Fingers a cigarette out of the pack. 

"You can't smoke in here."

Darlene fisheyes him then lights it. Takes a drag.

"I don't abide by your rules Darrell with two L's. I DON'T ABIDE!"

"They're not my rules. I just work here and it's the law."

"The law." She scoffs. "You abide by the law Loraine?" Loraine manages to shake her head and continues to shake it long after the conversation has moved on. "After the day I had it makes you think about the law." She pushes her glass closer to Darrell and gives him ‘the look’, a mix between bedroom eyes and ‘I’m about to leap over this bar and beat your ass’. "Would you believe I've spent the last few days with,” she gets unusually quiet, “a monkey man." 

Darrell’s face turns red and he points a finger at her. 

"We don't allow that kinda talk Darlene!”

"What kind of talk?"

"That racist garbage."

She straightens up.

"I'm not racist! You're the one that’s fucking racist!” She slams her glass on the counter. “I spent the last few days with a god damn magic Monkey.”

"I'm racist," Loraine says holding her hand up as if she's waiting to be called on.

"Oh honey, put your hand down."

"Well I am."

“I want another one damn it," Darlene says pulling Loraine's hand to the counter, "and get her somethin’ too."

Darrell walks over and pours a beer for Loraine and a shot for Darlene.

"That's it," he says with as much authority as he can muster.

She takes a sip, thinks about arguing then looks at the TV. A muted televangelist in a white suit is gesticulating wildly, a yellow 800 number beneath him as black blocks of garbled text fill the bottom of the screen. 

"I was raised on this shit," she says pointing. "Didn't go to church but on Sundays when I went to Tracy's…” She leans back and folds her arms across her chest. “She was this cunt that lived the next lot over. Her parents had cable and when they weren't home we'd watch dirty movies. When they were home we had to sit through this bible-beltin'-holier-than-thou-gimmmie-yer-dang-money-so-I-can-cruise-on-the-SS-Pill-Popper-with-my-Christian-airbag-of-a-wife.” She points to the hole in her head, “The fragile minds of children.” Takes a drink. “Idle hands and what-not.” Let’s out a dry smokers cough as she moves the cigarette to the other side of her mouth. Gets out her compact. “God forbid we’d rest our innocent eyes on a boob or a butt or a decapitated head." She looks in the tiny mirror checking all the familiar spots. "Tracy. Pffft. You know she told the Sullivan twins I…” Clicks it shut. “Nevermind about that.” Self-consciously touches the hole in her head and lets out a heavy sigh. “This god damn week.” Raises the shot to her lips then sets it back down, pauses for a moment listening to Madonna belt it out.

“I hear your voice
It's like an angel sighing
I have no choice, I hear your voice
Feels like flying”

She laughs. Shakes her head. 

“You know there’re Gods among us? Beings with power you can't imagine and they're nothing like what that strutting easter bunny of a preacher is going on about.” She watches him pace on stage holding a crystal flask, his headset almost invisible next to his greased hair shining under the stage lights. “I've been to hell or purgatory or whatever you wanna call it and there's no fire or brimstone. Actually, it’s pretty much like this.” She squints. “They had the law down there to Darrell and I didn't abide by it neither."

"Jesus is king," Loraine says.

"That's right," Steve pipes up at the end of the bar. "You accept Jesus Christ as your lord and..."

"Don't give me that shit. You know how many folks have said that to me in my…” She waves them off. “I'm not talking about stories in books. I'm talking about Gods. Wearing zebra-striped pants. Flying on clouds.” She extends her arms out as far as they’ll go. “With long…sticks. Gods. Plural. SSSSS. On this earth. I mean, can Jesus lift a car over his head and jump across the entire state of Florida? You show me in your book where it says he can do that."

Loraine starts searching for her purse.

"God is everything," Darrell interjects.

Darlene swivels her head around and her eyes widen. 

"Darrell with two L's jumping into the fray." She takes another sip. "So you're telling me that I'm God and you're God and poor racist Loraine here is God. Are you God Loraine?"

"Jesus is God," Loraine says. 

"Loraine doesn't think she's God, Darrell!"

He cleans another glass and sets it to dry.

"Some people don't see their connection to the perfection of everything."

Darlene almost falls over.

"Ho. Ly. Shit. Darrell’s a god damn hippie. You got a yin-yang with a peace sign and some flowers on your chest? Lift it up. Lemme see.” 

She finishes the shot. Stares at the empty glass. Purses her lips as a thought rolls over her. 

“If….everything’s God…” She traces her finger around the rim. “Then I'm God…” Darrell nods. “…and that means….that whiskey is God too.” Darrell stops nodding, folds his arms across his chest.

"Not gonna work Darlene." 

"God is LIMITLESS, you…" her voice lowers, "secret hippie." She bangs her glass and gets real loud. "Darrell's a SECRET HIPPIE everyone!" She picks up Loraine’s beer and sloshes half of it down the front of her shirt. "Shit! That wasn't a mistake. It was….,” squints her eyes, “meant to happen. Just like this..." She grabs a stack of coasters and starts throwing them one by one across the room like little Frisbees. “This was meant to happen Darrell!”

“Oh God, I think I'm falling
Out of the sky, I close my eyes
Heaven help me”

He walks from behind the bar as Darlene closes her eyes. 

"The spirit’s guiding me Darrell!” She opens one eye and see’s him bending over to pick up a coaster. “Don't go messing with God's plan!"

He picks up the last one, takes them back to the bar and places them next to Loraine. 

"Watch these for me will you?" Loraine smiles and puts her drink on top of the stack and gives him the thumbs up. “And as for you,” he put his hands on his hips, “if you can’t settle down I’m gonna have to..” Darlene’s eyes are transfixed, her mouth opens as she points behind him unable to formulate words. “What?” He turns in time to see a "Breaking News" banner flash across the screen as shaky video loops of a monstrous Pig smashing into the side of an Applebee’s. He cranks the volume just in time to hear, 

"…Gainesville Florida today as over a 196 people are dead and blocks of downtown destroyed by, from what we can make out, appears to be… a mutant hog. I wish we had more to tell you, but right now here’s what we know. The pig is at large. Downtown Gainesville Florida is in ruins and 196 people are dead. We’ll update you as soon as we learn more about this incredible story. I’m being told that if you'd like to send donations to the people of Gainesville that information should be at the bottom of the screen. Wait a minute.” He puts his finger to his earpiece. “We have a woman who was at the scene. Nancy? Can you hear me? Nancy?”

It cuts to Nancy standing next to a frazzled woman who's nervously picking at the side of her left arm with her right hand making it look like she's holding herself. Nancy blankly stares into the camera then nods and begins.

"I'm here with Amanda Jensen who says she was on the scene when ‘The Pig’, as people are now calling him, went berserk. Amanda can you tell us what happened?" 

The microphone goes over to Amanda.

"Well, I was sitting in a coffee shop drinking coffee. A vanilla latte. And then I heard this sound like a freight train and then the building across the street exploded and a giant cloud of dust rose up and there was flashing. In the sky. I remember the flashing, and then everyone started screaming because we thought it was a terrorist attack and we didn't know what to do so I took my kids and hid in the bathroom till it was over."

The microphone goes back to Nancy.

"So you didn't see the monster?" She shakes her head. "Can you say what you think might've caused him to start destroying the city?"

"Well, I can't say for certain but when I broke up with my Reggie he was real mad and he got drunk and messed up our apartment something awful. So maybe it was something like that."

Nancy pulls the microphone back and looks into the camera.

"That’s the word on the street Ted."

"Well, I'll be damned," Darrell says turning it down.

“I told you!"

"You said you were hanging out with a monkey."

"I was hanging out with him too!"

"It's those GMO's," Steve says at the end of the bar. "I knew they were gonna cause something like this. Splicing fish parts with corn."

"How’re you gonna get a mutant pig outta fish parts and corn?"

"Well there you go," Steve says gesturing. "It's right there on the screen."

"It's a sign of the apocalypse. Like Jesus said," Loraine offers. 

"It says in the bible that a pigs gonna destroy Gainesville Florida?"

Loraine nods. 

"It's in there."

"Show me. You show me where it says that."

Loraine raises a wobbly finger then starts looking for her purse. Darlene, sensing she needs help, scoops it off the floor and slings it onto the bar, a small leather-bound book with gold edges spills out along with lipstick, a half-drunk pint of Evan Williams and a condom. 

"You keep a bible in your purse?"

She doesn't answer as she’s too busy licking her finger and turning the pages.

"Hey. Secret hippie. How bout you. Any bright ideas?"

Darrell puts down a glass. 

"It's just a fact that we've made contact with conscious beings. Beings not from this planet.”

"Aliens," Loraine says not looking up.

“That’s right.” 

"We’re all aliens cause we're all from outer space," she says.

Darlene pats her on the back.

"That's true honey." 

"Oh! Here we go!" Loraine stands abruptly, one hand in the air, a finger extending to heaven. "Jesus restores a demon-possessed man. Mark 5:1." She makes eye contact with everyone to make sure they’re listening. "They went across the lake to the region of...oh…I can't pronounce that."

"Who went across the lake?" Steve asks.

"I don't know," Loraine says flipping back a few pages.

"Just keep it coming darlin’.”

Loraine nods. 

"When Jesus got out the boat, a man with an impure spirit came from the tombs to meet ‘em. The man lived in the tombs and nobody could blind him anymore not even with a chain."

"Bind him,” Darlene corrects. 

She clears her throat. "For he had oft’ been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. Night and day. And in the hills he’d cry out and cut himself with stones." 

"Oh!” Darlene winks at Darrell. “This is more exciting than I thought.

"When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell in front of him. He shouted at the top of his lungs," Loraine’s hand raises higher in the air, "WHAT DO YOU WANT WITH ME JESUS SON OF THE MOST HIGH GOD? IN GOD'S NAME DON'T TORTURE ME!' And then Jesus says, ‘COME OUT OF THIS MAN YOU IMPURE SPIRIT!'"

"Honey, are there any pigs in this story?”

She nods and smiles. 

“And then a large herd of pigs," gives an extra-long look to Darlene, "was feeding on the nearby hillside. The demons begged Jesus, 'Send us among the pigs; allow us to go into them' and he gave 'em permission and the impure spirits came out and went into the pigs.” She slams the book. “So says THE LORD!"

She gives a Mick Jagger-like dance move before sitting back on her stool.

"It's all the same thing," Steve replies. "GMO's are the hand of the devil who works through Big Pharma which poisons our drinking water. And you know who controls Big Pharma?" No one responds. "The Jews." He takes a drink. "Alex Jones has been talking about human-animal hybrids for years. Chimeras. Pig humanoid harvesting farms in China.” He shakes his head at the startled glances. “It’s on the internet. You just gotta look it up."

"That's bullshit," Darlene says.

"Well, it beats your magic monkey theory."

"I don’t care one bit for your jew theory, Steve. I wanna get back to Jesus."

"It's in the bible," Loraine says holding it up for Darlene to see.

"Thank you dear. Let me hold that for you." 

“Like a child
You whisper softly to me
You're in control just like a child
Now I'm dancing”

"You know that Pig?" Loraine asks handing the book over. Darlene nods turning the bible over in her hands. "You're real pretty," she says reaching for her head. 

"That's nice honey, but don't go messin’ with my hair."

Loraine leans in and whispers loudly, "You want me to tell your fortune?" She digs in her purse and pulls out a deck of tarot cards.

"Loraine! What would Jesus think about you getting all witchy?"

She gives a serious look. "Please don't tell him." Shuffles and flips three cards over as Darlene, Darrell and Steve lean in to look at The Hanged Man, an upside-down Nine of Swords and The Tower. 

"Well…what do they mean?"

She studies them carefully then chews on the end of her finger. 

"I don’t know what this one means,” she says pointing to the Nine of Swords, “but this one means ‘change’”, she picks up the hanged man, “Like something’s gonna happen that’s significant…like a big change…in your life.”

"Ok, honey. I think the witching hour is over. Why don't you take your cards and your bible and…God knows what else you got in there.” 

The clip of Pig is interrupted with another eye witness account. Darrell turns it up as a young woman is being questioned.

"Can you describe him in more detail for the folks at home?"

"Sure. First I just want to say hi to my mom in Philly and hi to Sharice. Hi Sharice! West Side High! Go Eagles!"

"So you saw ‘The Pig’ in person?"

She nods enthusiastically.

"And what did he look like?"

"He was real ugly. I mean REAL ugly. Like…ugly for a pig."

"Anything else?"

"He was fat."

"Did you get any sense of why he was upset?"

"I don't know but it seemed like, you know, the stores he smashed had people of color in them and so I can't help thinking, this being America and all, that that had something to do with it. You know, because he was a white pig."

The reporter turns to the camera.

"A nazi mutant Pig attacking people of color in Gainesville, Florida. I think a lot of people are sitting around the TV asking themselves, 'Is this what America has become?' Ted."

It switches back to Ted in the studio with a still shot of Pig in the upper left corner with a swastika and a question mark overlaid.

"Lots of questions being asked but few answers. We now turn to our expert on these more,” he clears his throat, “cultural issues. Kate Mannis. Kate, you have a masters degree, why do you think Pig hates people of color?"

Kate, a clean-cut young professional in her thirties, gives a knowing nod.

"You really have to look at the socio-cultural environment that we as Americans have produced, or rather, the one that was handed down by the colonialist oppressors we call ‘the founding fathers’, and you have to ask yourself if we are visited by a demon Pig that feeds off the sins and hate of our country, how could he not be racist and sexist and homophobic?"

"You think ‘The Pig’ was targeting women and gay people as well?"

"Absolutely. He's the perfect symbolic manifestation of the horrors of whiteness and I have to say it's refreshing to see the ugliness that was hidden for so long finally come to light."

"Hard words Kate," he turns to the camera, "But maybe ones we need to hear. We'll be back in a minute folks."

"Horseshit," Darlene says pulling out another cigarette. Darrell opens his mouth, but before he gets it out, "The world is coming to an end Darrell! Let a woman smoke inside for God’s sake!”

She lights it up and looks back at the TV.

A man is spraying himself with a cloud of green mist. He sparkles as the mist turns to crystals that seep into his skin as two women in sexy black dresses join him in the shower and start caressing his muscles. The shower explodes into a stick of deodorant then liquefies into the words, “HARD STICK”. That quickly fades to a couple on the beach eating Doritos. The guy bites into a chip and his head turns into a volcano of cheese which gushes over the beach drowning the woman as they both are carried off on a wave that splashes them down on a deserted island, her wearing a cheese bikini and him holding a bag of Cheesy Doritos. The commercial ends and then it's back to the news.

"This just in," Ted says holding his hand to his earpiece. "New footage has surfaced of four men apparently ‘flying’. You can see it here." Another shaky video pops up as The Heavenly Kings streak across the sky. "These unidentified men are also responsible for some of the destruction as the one with the sword can be seen fighting ‘The Pig’. I have to warn our viewers some of these images are quite graphic so if you have young children at home it might be best for them to leave the room. Kate, what do you make of this recent development in this extraordinary story?"

They switch to a shot of Kate and Ted sitting next to each other then to the footage of a Dunkin’ Donuts on fire. A man crashes through the storefront window burning alive and screaming.

"First I can’t help noticing that it’s four men that are perpetrating this violence and I feel like a broken record but this is yet another example of toxic masculinity and our culture of violence writ large. Secondly, it should not be surprising that these men are white.” There's a shot of one of the Heavenly King's opening his umbrella, water gushes out that liquefies an entire family stuck in their Dodge Caravan as their glowing green skeletons wash down the street.

Ted interrupts.

"It does appear the flying men look Asian or at least have an Asiany appearance. We've had reports of..."

"Being Asian is also a part of whiteness Ted. I'm honestly getting tired of explaining this, but yes, just because you're Asian doesn't mean you also aren't benefiting from white privilege." The camera pans to Pig who’s stabbing at Zōchō-ten, his blows being deflected as he's thrown into a parking garage. "Regardless of where they’re from, it’s obvious these men feel entitled because they’ve grown up in a culture that’s fed their every desire.” The shot cuts to a Starbucks, people fleeing with their Fitbit’s and Frappuccinos, their heads lopped off left and right as the bodies fall shaking to the asphalt. “Movies, video games, pornography, every cultural manifestation teaches men they can do whatever they want and nothing bad will happen.” 

A man jogging down the sidewalk whistling along to an Aerosmith song blaring from his earbuds is cut in half, his torso falling to the ground as his legs splay on top of him.

Ted swivels in his chair. 

"And now we turn to our conservative columnist, Mark Richards. Mark,” an older white man in a suit gives a curt smile, “why does America hate people of color?”

He raises his eyebrows.

"Well, I'd like to start by addressing the issue at hand, which is, there's a mutant pig rampaging in an American city and he needs to be stopped. What we don't need is this divisive talk about who’s killing who or what color the person is. We need to stand united and say to our common enemy,” his voice grows much louder, “We will not let the deep state coordinate with the Chinese government in order to test biological weapons on our own people!” A school bus skids through an intersection on two wheels them topples over as children climb out of the shattered windows fleeing into the street as a 30-foot snake slithers over it crushing it into the ground. “This is obviously a Chinese plot orchestrated with ‘the elites’ to form a globalist world government that hopes to divide us…“ The Rock N’ Bowl explodes sending flaming bowling balls sailing through the sky cratering into the YMCA swimming pool, punching holes in the bottom and draining the water onto the offices below, “Biological weapons. Animal human hybrids grown in secret laboratories. Mutated communist Pig DNA. There’s no telling the depths these people will go to in order to destroy this great country of ours, because,” the footage ends with Zōchō-ten skewering six people on his sword then pushing them off with his foot sending them tumbling into a pile, “The United States is the greatest country on earth!" 

Ted turns back to the camera, a blood-dripping Twitter logo in the upper corner.

"This real-world rampage has caused a rampage of its own…on social media. We have reports of six tweets in the last hour that seem to show support for ‘The Pig’. One here by U3ks82ak reads, "Pig is my hero" another by user_dkslj_2aa simply says "I like Pig." He turns to Kate, "Kate, what do you make of this show of support? Are there other pigs out there? Is this some kind of religious demon cult that’s been lying dormant and is now starting to emerge?"

"People are saying 'demon cult' and I think that's fine. I think you can call it whatever you want but the fact of the matter is..."

"Now hold on a minute," Mark interrupts. "The social fabric of this country is being torn apart. Parents are getting divorced. We have men and women going into the SAME bathrooms! Of course we have a mutant demon pig attacking us!"

"Turn this shit off," Darlene says. "I can't take it anymore." 

"I told you it was the globalists," Steve says. "That Mark fellow knows what he's talking about."

"Mark is an idiot!" Darrell says. "How can you possibly take that guy seriously?"

"BOYS," Darlene raises her arms. "You think there’s gotta be one right answer, but what's more likely," she pauses, "is that you're both idiots." She takes a long drag. "I used to think I knew how things worked, but then some asshole shot me in the head, and I gotta tell you, it opened my eyes to one simple fact," her cigarette dangles from her lips as she leans in. "Nobody has a fucking clue what the fuck is going on. Not me. Not you,” she points to the TV, “and especially not those people!”

"I love you,” Loraine says trying to touch her hair again.

"I love you too honey."

“But I have to pee," she whispers. 

Darlene nods and helps her stand.

"He who throws the first stone,” Steve says pointing at Darrell.

“You’re the one throwing stones!”

“The sinful stone is cast into the water,” Loraine corrects him.

“Don’t you start with me,” Steve says. “We got a chi-com pig on the loose and you can’t even see it when it’s right in front of your face! Thinking this is all a bunch of bullcorn! I don’t hear you coming up with a plan. What’s your big plan, Darlene?”

She stops in front of the door to the women's restroom.

"My plan is to help Loraine, and when I'm done, if you're still sittin’ there, I'm gonna punch you in your stupid fucking face with this hand," she says showing it to him. "And so while we're taking care of business, I want you to think about which eye you like more, the left or the right." She swings the door open with her foot and pulls Loraine in as it slams behind her.

Steve sits there holding his beer. 

"Are you going to let her hit me Darrell?" Darrell shrugs. "It's not right. Fighting a woman." He finishes his beer and throws a twenty on the table. "This ain't right Darrell," then walks out.

"See you tomorrow Steve.” 

Darlene pushes the door open and saddles back up. 

"She's going to be a while," then looking down the bar, "Did that pussy leave?"

"You said you were going to hit him."

"Oh gawd! Can't a man tell when a lady’s joking?"

"I don't know Darlene. I thought you’re gonna punch him."

"Yeah. Well. Maybe I was. I don't know anymore."

He restocks the beer then seeing Darlene’s grown quiet, "So where's that monkey of yours? Is he meeting you here?"

Her head sinks lower.

"We had a falling out."

"Want to talk about it?"

"Well…that depends Darrell with two L's.” She lifts her head up. “May I have another drink?"

He pours a beer and slides it over. Darlene takes a sip then lets out a deep sigh.

"You ever fall in love with an asshole?"

"I've been the asshole someone’s fallen in love with."

"Yeah. I've done that one too."

“It's like a dream
No end and no beginning
You're here with me, it's like a dream”

Darlene looks over to the glowing green rectangle of the stereo.

”God damn this is a long song.”

”I think I accidentally hit repeat.” He walks over to check.

“We’re living in a material world Darrell….and…I don’t know what kinda girl I am anymore.”

He finishes stacking the napkins then walks back over.

"So, you and this monkey were...romantic?"

"Darrell! I outta smack your mouth.” Takes another drink. “Not him. It was this other…guy. Shit. Don’t even know what to call him. I had this…” she grimaces. “It’s hard to explain but…Jesus Christ, Darrell, can you turn off this god damn song!.” He pushes a button and the bar goes quiet. Darlene lets the silence settle over her. 

“I lost someone today, and you know what the worst part is? We were awful for each other. People tried telling me. I lost friends over this shit. Lost my god damn dog.” Mashes her cigarette onto a coaster. “You know, you see yourself making these mistakes. You watch…like it’s someone else. Opening the door. Turning the key. Driving over there. Sitting in the car looking at that door wondering what you’re gonna find when you open it. And all with these hands,” she holds them up, “but they don’t belong to me. They don’t do what I want…or…they do what I know I want but can’t say.” 

She pounds a fist on the bar then flattens it out, her palm resting on the polyurethaned wood. She traces the circle of water with her finger, draws a line that glides for a bit then runs dry. 

“It just felt so damn good.” She looks up at Darrell for some recognition and he gives her a nod, “but at the same time, there's this…it’s like some kinda,” she looks past him to the small retablo painting hanging above the bar. A Mexican man is dancing with a skeleton, flat blue sky, wonky purple alleyway with Jesus crucified behind him, a small white cloud at his feet as he bends his head in silence. “It’s like that god damn painting right there. Dancin’ with death. Holding each other, feeling his bony hips push against you, falling and mesmerized and the whole time you’re dancing and dying but it feels so good you don’t want it to end. Your skin’s peelin’ off but…it feels good. Why would that feel good, Darrell? That should feel awful right?”

He shakes his head not sure what to say.

“Honestly can't tell what's a bigger surprise, that there's a magic monkey in my life or…that feeling.” She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. “And it doesn't go away. When you lose ‘em. There's this nothingness, like the dance somehow made it all worthwhile and now that it’s over, everything after….just feels like a joke." 

Darrell sighs, puts both hands on the bar. 

"That’s…a lot.” He scratches his head. “You ever….see a therapist Darlene?"

She looks back insulted.

"They understand what's going on ‘bout as well as the TV! Besides, I got Darrell with two L's and you're free."

“Well then,” he pours himself a drink and holds it up to her, "to living life and not knowing shit."

A big smile breaks over Darlene's face.

"I'll drink to that!"

10

Darlene looks over the top of her sunglasses to make sure she heard him right, her cigarette dangling as Monkey fidgets with a bottle cap bending it back and forth till it splits in half. She rolls her Virginia Slim to the other side of her mouth. "So..." Her eyebrows disappear behind her sunglasses as the wrinkles spread across her forehead. "Wouldn't it have been easier to just take everyone's phones in the first place?"

"Yes, but coming in on a wave looked cooler." 

"Oh lord." She reaches in the backseat and cracks a beer without taking her eyes off the road." You're just like my second husband Francis. Hated to be called that though that was his name." She takes a drink then tilts it toward Monkey who shakes his head. "Frank. Always Frank. I only called him Francis when I was mad at him or when I wanted to fuck with him which...was frequently." She stops to ponder this as she takes another drink. "Anyway, don't know how I started talking bout him." She looks over to Monkey. "You thought about what you're going to say to him?" 

He shakes his head. 

"That man has THE biggest chip on his shoulder. Felt like the world owed him...well, the world." She takes a drag. "You know we were together. Him and me. Stole my god damn dog. Best worst time of my life. Caught him sleeping with half the girls at the restaurant. God knows how many customers. But, he had this way about him. I know how that sounds. Like I'm some abused woman or something. It wasn't like that. It was like...he was above it all. He'd do something so terrible. I saw him..." She shudders. "I don't even want to tell you the things I saw. Then afterward, he'd just look at me with those eyes..."

"And you'd forgive him?"

"Hell no! I'd punch him in his god damn face. We'd wrestle around. Start drinkin' THEN I'd forgive him."

Monkey shifts in his seat so he's facing her. "He was in the dining hall in heaven the day I, you know, destroyed it." He looks down at the bottle cap and pushes the two pieces together. "Because of me, he knocked a punch bowl off the table and smashed it. The Jade Emperor thought he did it on purpose and banished him to earth as a demon. He lived in the desert like that for hundreds of years before we met again."

"Dang. Over a punch bowl? The Jade Emperor sounds like a DICK." Darlene shakes her head. "And the way you talk about Heaven..." She finishes the beer, crushes the can and sticks it in a plastic Walmart sack in her console. "Here in the US of A, we have our own ideas and it's nothing like that. You know, wings and harps and shit and a giant palace where everybody's happy all the time. The gates are right. We have gates. But it's supposed to be more like...paradise."

Monkey looks up at the sky, the long thin clouds creeping along.

"Yeah, it's not like that at all." He looks in the backseat at the case of beer and the golden arms on top of a red sparkly tower that twists down to a wood base with a small brass plaque. "I never asked what happened back there."

Darlene raises an eyebrow, flicks her cigarette and takes a long drag. "Lots of ways to get an arm-wrestling trophy. Some like to arm wrestle. Never cared for it myself." 

They pass a sign that reads 'Big Pine 5 Miles' and before long the town emerges, a restaurant here, a gas station there.

"Hey look!" Darlene says pointing. "The liquor store!"

She pulls into the drive-thru and starts tapping the steering wheel with her fingers. The white dodge pickup moves ahead and they're in front of a plastic contraption, a man's face bent over looking through the box. 

"What'd you want?" 

Darlene stretches as far as she can without actually getting out of the car.

"We're looking for that guy that tried to crawl through this...thing." He shakes his head and points to the intercom button which she pushes and yells into the small black box, "WE. ARE. LOOKING. FOR. FLORIDA. MAN."

The guy leans in. "You mean Crack Head Dave? Works down at the junkyard. Locals call him that on account that he smokes crack." He raises a finger and wags it at both of them. "You see that son of a bitch you tell him to stay the hell away from this place. Just got this new unit installed." He puts his hand on the box. "Whaddya think?"

"Oh, it's nice," Darlene sits back in her seat. "Where's the junkyard?" He points his finger and Monkey and Darlene traces the line to a mountain of cars a few blocks away looming over an industrial parkway. She gives a little wave then speeds off, takes a hard right and barrels down a side street till they arrive at a fenced-in lot.

A red backed man 
wet t-shirt around his neck
scrambles up a mountain of used tires
two Cubans argue over the price of scrap
as another drinks out of a milk jug
A crane lifts the body of a crashed light blue Civic 
drops it in the crusher
the sound of metal on metal  
and glass shattering
fills the air 
as Monkey and Darlene
enter the yard

There's a trailer out front operating as a front office, door shut, blinds pulled down. A small white Chevy splashes through a lake sized puddle, the word "YARD" scrawled in messy black sharpie over the doors and hood and trunk. They watch as a man gets out with a crowbar, bashes the windows then scrounges around picking up the trash. Shoves it in with his bare hands then signals to a guy in the crane, who swings it over, picks it up and sails it over to three men with torches who start cutting out various parts before it's dropped in the crusher and turned into a misshapen cube.

"Can I help you?" a man cracks open the door trying to preserve the little cool air that the window unit bungeed to the trailer can muster. 

"We're looking for Crack Head Dave," Darlene says walking towards him and stopping at the small set of stairs made out of milk crates. The door opens a little wider but it's dark inside and all she can see is his eyes.

"Nobody calls him Crack Head Dave 'cept his crack head friends. You crack head friends of his?"

"Just friends," Monkey says stepping forward. 

The man looks him up and down.

"Jesus H. Christ, son! They should put your wrinkly face on every drug poster 'cross this country just to show the kids what'll happen if they go messing around with that shit." He squints at Darlene then points. "He's over there. Not in a particularly good mood today so don't go pissing him off. Hard to get a decent day's work outta him. On account of the crack."

Darlene smiles. 

"Got a light?"

"NO SMOKING IN THE YARD!" and he slams the door.

She raises an eyebrow. 

"Guess it's true what they say 'bout southern gentleman and their silver tongues. Real charmer that one."

They walk towards a pile of cars half smashed and stacked. The ground is patchy with grass and oil stains and bits of rearview mirror, a few purply green puddles shimmer as they walk past the crane and the men with torches. There's a little shack made out of corrugated metal with no door and a golden retriever, half an ear gone, panting in it's shadow. Further out they see a dark blue Ford Escape with the hood up, a man's body halfway inside. He stops working as he hears them come up from behind. Gets real still. Monkey pulls his cudgel out and waves his hand telling Darlene to get back. 

"Sand," Monkey calls out gripping it tightly. 

He doesn't move. 

Monkey looks back nervously at Darlene. 

"Sand!" he calls out again. 

Sweat drips down his back, runs the ravine of his shoulders then is wiped away. He sets a pair of pliers next to the front left headlight as his hands disappear back in the engine. 

Monkey hears a heavy sigh as he turns to face them.

Grizzled red beard 
and bald head 
eyes sunk behind a pair of sunglasses
shirtless 
with a brightly colored plastic skull necklace 
dangling
the skulls laughing 
in yellow, red and green
ripped jean shorts
and the remnants of shoes
a blue glowing pulse in his chest
hands holding a Valucraft alternator
that he throws in the dirt
looks at Monkey and smiles
then goes back to digging
in the Ford

Sand picks up the pliers and starts in on something then stops, his back turned.

"Thought I'd be happy to see you. Knew you'd track me down eventually." He pulls some plastic piece out and throws it behind him. "You come to fight?" Monkey doesn't answer. "I pawned my staff a long time ago." He throws another piece on the ground then pulls himself out of the hood and turns around. "Besides, I couldn't much beat up..." He looks over to Darlene. "Oh, hi Darlene." Takes the shirt that's hanging in the window and wipes his face and chest. "I doubt I could take Darlene here much less the Great Sage Equal to Heaven. Never stood much of a chance against you anyway." He slams the hood. "So you came all this way. Now what?"

"Where's the monk?" Monkey says eyes still searching for any sign of the staff.

"The monk. And here I thought you came all this way for..." He scratches his beard. "No, 'how ya doing'. No, 'what happened to you?' No, 'what can I do to help?' Just, 'where's the monk?' Suppose I don't blame you. We never were friends. Not really." He looks behind Monkey. "Surprised Pig didn't make it down. He hiding somewhere? Hey Pig," he calls out to no answer. "Thought you were trying to get the gang back together. Knew you'd never be satisfied with...what was that heavenly appointment? Fighting monk? Like that was going to satisfy you." He picks up the pliers. Turns them over in his hand. 

"When they were handing out our 'rewards' I said to myself, 'that monkey's going to enjoy himself for about five minutes before he gets bored and starts getting everybody riled up again." He points the pliers at him then sets them back on the car. "Have a real knack for that. Making it seem so...important, like the whole universe depends on whether we succeed or fail." He leans against the car folding his arms against his chest. "Hate to break it to you, but...we failed. We failed and we failed and we failed and the universe is still here. You do good and no one cares. You do one bad thing, and...well..." Sand's face has a slight spasm of anger. 

"You're a good man." Monkey says. "No one blames you for what happened."

"No one blames me." A smile curls across his lips. "Hmm. That's one of those things people say and the second it comes out of their mouth, they know how stupid it sounds. I know how stupid it sounds. Hell, even Darlene knows, don't you Darlene?" 

Darlene bites her lip and looks at Monkey. 

"No one blames you. I ate an entire family. Did I ever tell you that Darlene? They were crossing the desert for...god knows why. Guess I never asked. Funny thing is they could've crossed a thousand different ways and not run into me, but, for whatever reason, they did. And I ate them. Ate their kids. Ate the father and mother. I ate them alive. Felt bad about it for a long time, but now, it's just a story I tell. I don't feel anything about it anymore." He looks at his grease-covered hands. "Didn't want to, but, The Jade Emperor in all his wisdom saw fit to send me back here, and..." 

He smiles, puts both hands in his pockets. "You didn't know me then," he says to Monkey. "That's too bad. Don't think there's anyone left alive that knew me like I was. I lived my life. I lived it like I was supposed to. It felt right, like the things I did mattered, like they added up to this great unfolding mystery that was playing out. But then you came to heaven, drunk out of your mind and started trashing the place." He stretches his long lanky body, cracks his neck. "I have to admit. I was impressed. A little monkey challenging all of heaven. And for what? Because you were bored." He laughs to himself. "I was watching you and for one second I let my attention get away from me and I knocked that bowl off the table and......" He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, "and after that, everything in my life went slightly off track, like there was this one thing that wasn't supposed to happen, but since it did, every little thing after that was the tiniest bit off, and pretty soon, it was like I was living someone else's life and that great unfolding mystery...didn't seem so great anymore. Now it was like some unsolvable blackness that spread out and touched everything around me. 

It was like it was laughing at me. Does that make sense? Not in any grand cosmic way. I'm not talking about a swirling galaxy of stars. I'm talking about this car right here," his hand smacks the headlight, "or that stack of tires. This puddle. Like they're laughing. You can't hear it at first, but that's just because you never took the time to listen, and once you do, you hear it. You hear it in the clouds and in that trailer and in that puzzled look on your face. Laughing. At the ridiculousness. Of me."

He shrugs it off, walks over to Darlene and Monkey's eyes blaze with fire as he readies himself. "Don't worry. Just want to bum a cigarette from Ol' Darlene." He stops in front of her. "Hey Sugar. Sorry bout all this. I really am. You don't deserve this and I didn't deserve you." She doesn't move. Just stares in his face as he digs in her purse and pulls out a pack. "Virginia Slims. That's what I like about you Darlene. Some things are all over the place, but others..." He lights one and puts them back in her purse.

"You know," he says pointing. "I thought I was lost in that desert forever, but then this Monkey comes along and frees me and I follow him on some godforsaken quest, just like you're doing now. Fifteen years. On the road. Fighting demons. Getting in and out of trouble. And then we make it. We survive and we get our reward. What was it they gave me? Made me a Golden-bodied Arhat so I could go back to heaven and spend the rest of eternity serving the man that sent me to hell."

He stops pacing and looks up, feels the sweat drip down his forehead. "Look at that thing up there. Burning like a god damn fireball in the sky. Unrelenting. Doesn't care about us. Just going to go on burning till it can't. Suppose even the sun gets tired. Tired of doing the one thing it was commanded to do." He takes his sunglasses off so he can see it with is own his eyes, two pools of black, no pupils, staring into the sun. 

"I'm tired. I'm tired of THIS" he says motioning to the junkyard. "And this," he says looking down at his cigarette. "I'm tired of craving. I'm tired of wanting. I'm tired of being tired." He takes a drag and blows it out in a cloud that hangs in the Florida air. "I don't want to be here anymore. Can't say it any simpler than that. I don't. I've tried to do something about that. Believe me. I tried. But I have this damn heart," he says touching the blue light in his chest. "Lao Tzu did this," he says tracing with his fingers. "Thought he was helping me." He walks over to the car, places one hand on the hood and holds it there.

"I'm sorry Darlene. I'm sorry you met me when you did. I wasn't very good to you. I wasn't very good, but," he feels his palm burn. "I just don't want to be here anymore. I don't. I shouldn't be here. I lived my life. I lived it. I did it right, once. And then I'm expected to just do it again? Live it all again? Pretend like I haven't done this?" He lifts his hand and looks at the fiery red skin. "You get tired after that. Of trying to make it work. And then what do you do? Dedicate yourself to serving the people around you, knowing there's no reward? That nothing you do can save them from the hell that awaits when they die?" 

He throws the cigarette and it sizzles in the brown water. "There's no helping some people. You give them what you think they need and they just fail and fail and fail and...I'm tired of failing. I'm tired. I don't want to be here anymore Monkey. Do you hear me?" He walks over towering over him, looking down. "Can you help me with that?" 

Monkey shakes his head. 

"No. I didn't think so. I didn't think you could do it." 

He walks back and pops the trunk of the blue Ford and starts rummaging around. 

"If Pig were here I could've talked him into it. He would've done it for nothing. But you. You were always so stubborn. You still think this world makes sense and that you're going to fix it. But look around. Look at these people. Confused, weak, ignorant of everything around them. But, you know what? I don't blame them. I don't blame them for not understanding. I mean, who can make sense of this? Once you've seen it for yourself. The stupidity of how the whole thing's put together, well, there's nowhere left to hide after that."

He steps out from behind the car holding his Demon-Quelling-Staff, the crescent-shaped blade shinning in the sun. Where the colored jewels had been, now only scratches and pry marks, the leather banded handle dried and cracked. 

"So I guess I'm a liar too," he says gripping it with both hands and pointing it at Monkey. "Guess I'm a lot of things I never thought I'd be. I like you Monkey. I do. I respect your power, and deep down, I know I can't kill you. Hell, I probably can't even land a blow when it comes to it, but..." he readies the staff in his hands. "I can kill her. Nothing personal Sugar. You know how I feel about you," he says as a smile breaks over his face and his eyes well up a bit.

Monkey opens his mouth to respond but it's too late. Sand is sprinting aiming for her head. Monkey leaps, hand outstretched and smashes into him as they summersault across the yard sending the cars flying. Sand swings his staff and the crescent blade comes down around Monkey's neck, the two tips cutting into the dirt. Monkey slips under his legs and kicks him in the back. He sails across the yard into the mountain of tires. Monkey charges forward, stops and grips his cudgel tightly, scans the pile of tires. Nothing. 

"Sand," he calls out.

The mosquitoes swarm as the water inside The Goodyears, Bridgestone's and Michelin's slosh and settle. Monkey waits, crouched in his stance feeling the dry patches of grass beneath his feet. A tire falls from the top of the pyramid, bounces in front of him then rolls in a circle and stops. His eyes look down as Sand leaps from the pile, Demon-Quelling-Staff in hand. Monkey raises his fist. Sand, smiling, shifts his body as Monkey's outstretched paw plunges into his chest. 

Darlene frantically gets up, takes a few steps forward then stops. Monkey has fallen on top of him and she watches as Sand whispers something in his ear. She turns away, hears the scream, silence, then the small padding of Monkey's footsteps as he walks over holding the beating translucent heart, a soft blue light pulsing inside. She looks past him to the body, small against the backdrop of cars, then to Monkey, then down to the heart, which she takes in her hands. Monkey puts his paw on her shoulder and she recoils.

"Don't you fucking touch me!"

He backs away as she slouches in the yard, her body silently heaving. The last few drops roll down her cheeks, hang on the tip of her chin then fall to the beating heart in her lap. 

"I loved that man. I loved him. I knew who he was. What he was. The things he did. I loved him knowing that." She looks up at Monkey. "And you know what? He's right. I've seen where I'm going. It's no better or worse than where I am now. Just last's forever. And that's the real hell." She looks down at the heart which has turned a soft translucent pink. "I should've died. You should've let me die. Now I know. I know where I'm going. I've seen it. How can I go back to..." She stops herself. Stands. Hands the heart to Monkey. "I've had enough of this. I'm not like you. Either of you. I'm a human being god damn it." She touches the hole in her right temple. "I don't know what I am." She starts walking to the car. "Just leave me alone." 

Monkey follows but Darlene pushes him back. 

"You know people come to Florida to hide from the rest of the world, but where do you go to hide from Florida?" She walks back to the car. "The Keys. That's where. Already here so might as well get to it." 

She digs around the backseat and pulls out a beer, cracks it open and takes a long drink. The door of the trailer opens and the manager sticks his head out.

"You can't drink here!"

"FUCK YOU!" Darlene shouts.

She reaches back and throws the can at the door which quickly closes as it smacks off the vinyl siding and lands on the milk crates below. She hops in the car, starts it up and peels out disappearing down the industrial parkway. 

Monkey watches her go then walks back to the body. His red beard has turned grey, the gaping hole in his chest the blackest black he's ever seen. No gooey insides. No guts. Just absence. He sticks his hand inside and watches it disappear. He pulls it back out and watches as a soft shimmery purply green swirls around his wrinkled fingers then disappears. He crouches over the body and reaches his whole arm in feeling for the bottom, puts his head inside to look around, then his shoulders, his waist and legs and feet and pretty soon he is surrounded by a thick dark that pushes against him, the light disappearing into the tiniest star twinkling above as he sinks deeper into the blackness. 

Monkey looks around but there is nothing to see. He sits in it, feels his mind churn and race. Thoughts come flooding. He sees Darlene slumped in her car. The blood pouring out of her head. He sees Pig looking back in terror. The lifeless body of the girl. The sunflower dress. Her arms hanging limp. Mara's face. Her small hands holding her sword. Then Pig and Mara trapped somewhere calling for help. Crushed under a great weight. Then the abandoned house. Fire blazing in the living room. Their faces wet with blood. He sees himself. His own bloody face. Chewing on a leg. See's her face smashed in with his cudgel. Her eyes pleading. Looking. As his cudgel comes down. Over and over. 

He closes his eyes but there's no difference. There's nothing to escape to. He runs but there's nowhere to go. Feels his joints and muscles move and work and the movement keeps him occupied, makes the images disappear, but pretty soon, he tires, has to stop and the images return. The eyes. Staring at him. Unblinking. He sees himself drunkenly smashing the heavenly dining room. And Sand, dressed in splendid jade armor. The punch bowl shattered on the floor. And the eyes. In the shattered glass. Watching.

He takes a deep breath and exhales. Lets it out. Feels his chest shrink. Feels the heat on the edges of his upper lip and in his nostrils. Takes another breath and watches the images flash. People call for help, but he can't help. Mara screams. He sees her face and thinks, "That's not Mara." See's Pig loafing around leaning on his rake and says, "That's not Pig." See's himself trapped under a mountain. Tearing apart a tiger. Burning a demon's cave. High up on his summersault-cloud overlooking the world. Back at the waterfall. The Handsome Monkey King. Drinking and laughing. His reflection in the water pouring down. "That's not me," he says.

He feels himself lifting, looks up, but there's only darkness. He thrashes around to find the speck of light above him, but can't figure out which way is up, whether he's turned around a dozen times or not at all. The once enveloping softness turns hard and heavy. He stops moving, grows still, reaches in his pouch and pulls out his phone, turns the flashlight on and looks around. The beam extends to nowhere in a perfect cone of light. He turns it off and looks at the blue screen, pushes a few buttons and a video plays. He floats in the darkness watching a dog ride a skateboard. The video ends and another plays then another. The eyes disappear. Pig and Mara disappear. His mind locks on the screen and he lets out a deep sigh as he sinks further into the abyss.

9

Darlene looks at the hole in her head, body slouched in the seat, dried blood on her face and breasts. "Ugh. Why'd I have to be bent over like that." She puts both hands on the door and leans in. "Makes it look like I have a double chin." Examines her reflection in the driver's side mirror. "Do I always look like this or is it cause I'm dead?" She smiles and her reflection smiles back, lights a cigarette and walks around looking at the burnt rubble, the roofs of cars smashed in, newspaper stands knocked over, the glossy real estate magazines spilling out on the asphalt. She reaches down, picks one up, flips it over. On the back is a genie wearing a purple hat, his six hands raised with magic sparkle swooshes coming out of each palm and in the center a small silvery can that says GENIE GUICE. 

"Hey," she calls over to Monkey who's holding a red GMC Suburban in one hand while digging through the broken asphalt with the other. "HEY!" He looks back. "Do I have magic powers?" He stares blankly so she wiggles her fingers to try and clarify. "You know, magic." He shakes his head. "How bout, what do you call them? Can alive people see me? I'm invisible right?" He shakes his head again. "Guess you're alive and you can see me, though you are a magic monkey." He frowns, says something to himself and continues to dig as Darlene ponders this last point. "Only monkeys can see dead people." He finishes searching and walks over wiping his hands on his pants and scouting the horizon. "Seems pretty arbitrary if you ask me."

"What?"

"That Monkeys can see dead people."

"Who told you that?"

Darlene shrugs, puffs on her cigarette and wanders around crunching the broken glass with her heels. She stops in front of a hedge that was planted to hide the trash bin behind it, extends all ten fingers, squints her eyes and focuses. Monkey walks over, looks at her then to the bush then back to her wiggling fingers. 

"What are you doing?"

"Shhh! I'm gonna set that bush on fire."

"No. You're not." He puts his paw on her hand and lowers it. "You can't do any of those things." 

"Well god damn it. What fun is it being dead if you don't get magic powers?" 

"That's what I've been saying. It's not fun. Being dead is boring and it lasts forever."

She looks back at her body slumped in the car.

"If I go back, is that hole gonna stay in my head?" 

"I don't know," Monkey says impatiently. "But we're in a rush so..." 

"Never gonna live this down," she mutters, her voice lowering, "Hey Darlene, you're so dumb you've literally got a hole in her head." Monkey sighs as the black billowing clouds from a charred cop car wafts over them. They exchange looks. "All right, give me a god damn minute. It's not every day a girl's got to make a decision like this."

"There's no decision! You have to go back to your body."

"How does it work? Do I just touch it or say some words or something? Do I need a running start? Help me out here Monkey. I've never merged with my body before. I mean, I took mushrooms once with Darren when we went on one of his famous," she uses air quotes, "camping trips," lets her fingers hang in the air for emphasis then puts both hands on her hips. "Felt like I merged with something that weekend and it definitely wasn't Darren in the back of his Ranger. Spiritual stuff, or, whatever. You know what I'm talkin' bout." 

Monkey frowns and looks at her cigarette.

"Do you always smoke this much?"

"Damn it Monkey! Do you have to make me come out and say it? I'm nervous." 

"Oh." He scratches his chin. "There is an ancient Buddhist technique that might help. But it requires I do some magic." 

Darlene looks at him suspiciously. 

"Well...I suppose. Long as you don't shrink my head or nothing."

Monkey nods.

"First you have to close your eyes."

She shuts them tightly, takes a drag and exhales.

"Like this?"

"Sure, now count to ten."

"One...two..."

Monkey picks her up, spins her around and tosses her through the window. She instantly merges with her body, falls out of the car and rolls to the ground.

"You son of a..." She lifts herself up and dusts off, checks her face in the mirror. "It didn't go away. Look at this!" she says pointing to the hole, tilts her head so she can see it better. "Maybe I can put some makeup on it." 

Monkey calls his summersault-cloud which swoops down and hovers next to him. 

"C'mon," he says. 

"C'mon where?" 

"We've got to find Pig and Mara." 

"On that thing? No way. I'm not leaving my baby," she says putting her hand on the hood of her car.

"We don't have time to argue about this." Darlene gets in the driver's seat, shuts the door, puts her seatbelt on and grips the wheel tightly with both hands. "Fine," Monkey says. "Have it your way." 

She lets out a shriek as her LeBaron lifts off the ground. Monkey carries it over to his summersault-cloud, leaps on top then shoots off a thousand feet in the air as he scans the horizon with his fiery gaze. Darlene's shrieks turn to hysterical laughter followed by a, "Ho...ly...shit," then clapping then more laughter. Monkey continues to scan as he hears the car door open then see's Darlene's head pop out upside down. 

"Do you think this is good for my suspension? I'm worried you're mangling her with your super monkey strength." 

"It'll be fine."

"You're gripping on the sides, right? Where the jack goes and not on any of the vitals?" Monkey ignores her and continues looking. "Just checking," Darlene says, her head disappearing, the sound of the car door closing then, "Is it ok if I turn on the radio?" Darlene turns the dial passing over the day time preachers and AM talk show hosts. "We get really good reception up here. I've never even heard of some of the stations. 99.4? The river? Oh god. It's smooth jazz." She flips around a little longer then, "Oh wait!" digs around the glove box, pulls out a cassette, winds it a bit with her finger, pushes it in the tape deck and cranks up the volume as Judy Garland's voice echoes over the clouds. 

"Somewhere over the rainbow 
way up high"

She sings along for a while then the car door opens again and Darlene's head pops down. "How bout we just go to Big Pine. We can be there and back before you know it and we'll catch up with them after. I'm sure they're fine. Probably just holed up somewhere." 

"I doubt it," Monkey says, "But, it would be easy to get there without Mara." He thinks for a moment then, "Buckle up." Darlene lets out an "Eeeeeeeeeee!" and clicks her seatbelt as Monkey leaps across the state of Florida. He lands on a long stretch of road, ocean on either side lapping at the massive concrete columns propping up a long stretch of highway running straight through the ocean. Darlene's still screaming as Monkey sets the car down and looks around. She stops, puts her hand on her chest to feel her heart then pulls out a Virginia Slim and takes a long drag as Monkey hops in the passenger seat. She exhales, adjusts the rearview, raises an eyebrow as she revs the engine and peels out. Monkey looks behind them.

"The sign says Big Pine is the other way." 

"I know where Big Pine is, but ol' Darlene's lived in Florida half her life and never seen the sunset in Key West, and we're just a few miles away." Monkey frowns. "Uh oh," Darlene says pinching Monkeys face looking for a cheek but failing to find one. "There's that look again. Relax. Your friends can take care of themselves. Besides, I just want one little peek at this sunset then we can hop in the car and come right back. Thirty minutes tops. I did go out of my way to drive you guys down here you know."

"You didn't drive us. I just leapt over the state." 

"Well, you did get me killed today, so there's that." 

"I brought you back to life!" 

"Yeah, but now I have this hole in my head!" she says pointing to the small bullet hole in her right temple. Monkey slouches in his seat as Darlene taps her fingers on the steering wheel smiling, throws a glance at him and squeezes his leg before stepping on the gas and letting out a little yelp. "We're going to Key West!" 

The sun's still high when they arrive. Darlene runs into a bar, Monkey follows close behind. 

"Do a shot with me!" 

He shakes his head but Darlene is already leaning over the bar holding up two fingers, asking the bartender about his mother and telling him about how her mother died last year in a boating accident and all about the house she grew up in which, "wasn't exactly a house, but more like a cobbled-together shack that floated when the water got too high." Monkey takes his eyes off her and is slapped hard on the back, spins around only to see Darlene pushing a shot in his hand. 

"We're in Key West!" she yells before gulping it down then motions for Monkey to do the same. He does so reluctantly and sets his glass on a nearby table then tugs on her arm. 

"C'mon, let's see the sunset." 

"We just got here. Let's go to the end of the strip and do the walk," she says sticking her elbow out for Monkey to grab. 

They walk down the street as people stop to laugh, take pictures and say things like, "That woman has a pet monkey!" or "Look at that Monkey!" or "Nice Monkey!" Not the most brilliant commentary, but to be fair, it is hard to think of witty things to say when you're drunk at three in the afternoon and you've just seen a woman with a hole in her head walking down the street talking to a four-foot tall monkey in tiger-striped pants. They make it two blocks before Darlene ducks into another bar. This is one is packed and they have to squeeze through a sea of old men in beige. 

Monkey looks behind him and sees, 

24 men on stage 
big white beards 
safari outfits 
beer and guts and smiles 
cheers as one stands
to recite a poem
he wrote 
about fishing 
The crowd is holding paper masks 
with a man's face 
on a stick 
two almond-shaped 
cut-outs 
for eyes 
as they cheer 
and the overhead fan blows 
the vinyl banner
that reads 
Ernest Hemingway Look-a-Like Competition 

Monkey tugs on Darlene's shirt. "Who's Ernest Hemingway?"

"Oh, some fisherman," she says raising her hand to get the bartender's attention. Monkey surveys the crowd as the staff moves some tables around getting ready for the arm wrestling competition. 

"Americans sure love their fishermen." 

He reaches back to tug on her shirt but she's gone, another woman standing in her spot wearing a bright pink tank top, her well-oiled hand waving a twenty-dollar bill. Monkey looks around, but is lost in a sea of beige. He pushes his way out to the street but she's not there either. "Of course," he mutters to himself then walks the rest of the way to the beach by himself. 

"This stupid sun's backlighting me. Is there a filter for suns?" 

A woman in a one-piece with giant red splashy flowers is looking at her phone as her husband hands their kid an ice cream, pays the vendor then screams, "I don't know!" There's a young woman lying on the beach in slumber party pose letting the waves crash over her. She gets up as her boyfriend shows her the picture, shakes her head then runs back to the water. "I want the waves crashing behind me. Also my face looks weird in that one. Can you crouch lower?" she says shielding the sun from her eyes with her hand. He flattens himself against the beach as she gets back into position and smiles. 

Monkey scans further and there are at least a dozen women having their picture taken doing yoga or pretending to hold the sun, or, in one case, both. There's a mother propping their baby next to a pre-made sandcastle, carefully curating a blue bucket here, a red sand scoop there, before running holding her phone yelling, "Don't move! Momma's gonna be right back!" Further out, there are rows and rows of women in beach chairs taking pictures of their legs, holding beers, daiquiris, posting emojis of hotdogs and smiley faces tearfully laughing. One woman, by herself, is carefully making footprints in the sand then trying to walk back and photograph them but the ocean keeps washing over and making them look like smooth divets. It happens a third time and she yells, "Jesus Christ!" before changing plans and flashing a peace sign next to a sailboat. 

"Did you see the pic that Jennifer posted last night?" a woman in a red bikini says walking by. 

"Oh my god. No. Where?" 

She shows her phone to the other woman who immediately starts laughing then, "and you liked it? You're such a bitch." 

"I know," she says tossing her hair. "Where's Chad?" 

Chad is sitting by his cooler playing pool on his phone, looks up long enough to give his girlfriend a wave then switches over to Instagram to make sure he's liked all her photos. The two women walk to the edge of the water, giggle and run away as their toes get wet, wrap their arms around each other as the red bikini lady extends her right arm to get a good shot. She takes five or six just to be sure and is about to walk back to Chad and yell at him for being on his phone when a giant wave crashes over and they're sucked out to sea. Their heads pop back up as another wave crashes and they wash up on the beach, two skeletons, bones picked clean, eyes covered in tiny grains of sand staring up at the sun. 

Monkey peers into the waves and sees, 

A demon with a thousand bloodshot eyes 
covering its body 
shovel-shaped mouth 
and taloned hands 
It moves invisibly in the water 
comes out with the surf 
sinks its claws in unsuspecting shoulders 
and cleans the body  
of muscle and flesh 
it's jaws click in ecstasy
as it writhes 
and removes the bones 
of all 
it's content 

Monkey reaches behind his ear, pulls out his cudgel and leaps into the waves. 

"Look," someone shouts, "that Monkey thinks he's people!" All the cellphones turn toward a wet exasperated monkey splashing in the water as people laugh and click and share. Monkey summersaults through the air and comes down hard on top of the demon, but his cudgel passes right through. As more people turn to stare, another thousand eyes open on its body, all searching, looking for flesh. It leaps out on the beach, it's taloned hands raised, mouth open, as it lets out a gurgled high pitched scream.

Monkey turns to the crowd, jumps up and down cursing them, waves his hands for them to leave, but they only laugh and text their friends who come running with hot dogs, bud light lime's, pool noodles and five-foot margaritas. More phones, more people, more eyes pop open on the demons till there's not a speck of flesh, just eyeballs squeezing together. 

"They can't see it," Monkey thinks as he dodges the talons which sink deep into the sand leaving five gaping holes that fill with water. He pole-vaults over the monster, lands, grabs the end of his cudgel with both hands, swings it over his head, catches an unsuspecting purple tube top on the end and rips it off sending it flying across the beach. The topless woman lets out a yelp and drops her phone in the water, the screen glows blue then the ocean turns it black. Monkey watches as a single eye from the monster disappears. He scans the beach at all the phones then smiles to himself, leaps in the water and is gone.

Deep down on the ocean floor
a mighty jade dragon 
pearlescent scales 
fine wispy beard 
and claws 
shinning in the light 
plays cards with  
an extremely upset looking tortoise 
and an aloof black snake 
small wood table between them 
sunk into a bed of seaweed 
drinks and chips and coasters 
a crab waiter that scurries away 
as the tortoise throws down 
his cards 
and the red and blue and white chips 
float off 
into the dark waves 
of the deep 

The dragon looks over as Monkey bows and hurriedly gets up. 

"I don't mean to disturb you but..." 

"But there's a terrible thousand-eyed demon. Yeah. We know. He's been there for years. Keeps to himself mostly." 

"He's eating people!" 

"Yes, well he can't exactly live off tortoises can he?" The dragon shuffles the cards. The snake yawns. The tortoise looks at Monkey and scowls, folds his arms against his chest. "I wish I could help you," the dragon continues, "but this is all the way up from the Jade Emperor. Nothing I can do about it." The tortoise continues to glare at Monkey. 

"What?" Monkey says returning his stare. 

"Oh you don't remember me?" Monkey shakes his head. "One day you barged into The Dragon Palace of the Eastern Ocean demanding we give you a weapon, and when we gave you that cudgel of yours, you smacked me over the head with it right before you left." Monkey stares blankly. "Not ringing any bells?" 

"Sorry."

"Don't mind him. He's mad I've been beating him in cards all day." 

Monkey turns to the Dragon. 

"I need a giant wave to crash over the beach. Do you think you could do that?" 

"Well, sure I could do it," he says dealing out the cards and picking his up, "but, you know, the Dragon of Wind and Waves is in charge of, well, wind and waves. I think there's a medium-sized one coming in a few hours if that would work." 

"No, I need something big." 

The dragon fans his cards out, rearranges a few. "If you want something out of the ordinary you'll have to go to Heaven and get the proper paperwork. If I make a giant wave The Dragon of Wind and Waves is going to get all pissy and the last thing I need is for him to start sticking his nose down here." 

"He's on vacation," the snake says trying to pick his cards with his tail. 

"That's right. He is on vacation." The dragon thinks for a moment. "You'll have to go to the Dragon of Clouds and Thunder. Not really his department, but he might be able to help you. Why don't you sit down for some cards and..." but before he can finish Monkey has leapt out of the ocean and straight up to the Western Gates of Heaven. 

The snake manages to play his first card flopping down a 2 of clubs with his tail. 

"Well that was rude." 

The dragon throws a queen of spades.

"Oh, you know him. The world's always ending with that one."

Monkey stands in front of the giant brass bars of the heavenly gates. A small guard station is unguarded, a clipboard hangs off the side. Monkey picks it up, flips through the pages of names then turns it over. Someone's scratched the words "Steve was here," into the wood and then underneath that, "No he wasn't". Jupiter is sitting on the edge of the clouds, feet hanging over, smoking. He looks up, sees Monkey hanging the clipboard back up, throws his joint over the side and quickly rolls to his feet. The gate is already ajar as Monkey walks up and Jupiter stands in his way. 

"You're not supposed to be here," he says holding his hand up.

Monkey sniffs him a couple times then looks in his bloodshot eyes. 

"Does the Jade Emperor know you're smoking again?" Jupiter turns red and his eyes widen. "Because from what I remember, he's already told you to stop smoking twice and I think a third time comes with a punishment." 

"You damn Monkey," he scowls. "What do you want?" 

"I need paperwork for a giant wave on a Florida beach later this afternoon." 

"The Dragon of Wind and Waves is on vacation." 

"You'll have to ask the Dragon of Clouds of Thunder." 

"Ah crap." 

"What?" 

"It's just that...he doesn't like me." He bites his lower lip. "You'll have to come with me." 

"I'm not allowed in heaven." 

"I know but, just turn into one of the things you can turn into and I'll sneak you in." 

Monkey pulls a pair of sunglasses from his pouch and puts them on.

"There's no need. These work just fine."

They walk together down a white clouded path, up a hill, past the stables and the peach garden, and the great palace of the Jade Emperor, past Lao Tzu's laboratory, to a squatty office building, a giant jade dragon fountain shoots water from its mouth onto a fish as Jupiter opens the door and Monkey follows him down a maze of hallways till they come to the door that says, "Dragon of Clouds and Thunder" etched on a wooden slate that's hung by a nail. Jupiter raises his eyebrows then pushes it open as they enter a cavernous chamber, seven alabaster pillars split up the room, an enormous dragon is curled around them, and in the middle of the room, a blinking crystal ball. 

"WHAT!" he booms as they enter. "Oh. It's you." He narrows his eyes at Jupiter. "What do you want?" 

"I...uh...have a request from...Monkey...a monkey about...a wave...in Florida." 

"You're bothering me because a monkey wants a wave on a beach in Florida?" There's a long silence as Jupiter struggles to come up with an answer. The dragon finally lets out a sigh and says, "I couldn't even help you if I wanted to, which I don't by the way. Look at my crystal ball!" Monkey and Jupiter look at the ball then back to the dragon. "IT'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE BLINKING!" the dragon says furiously. "It's been doing this all morning. I put a call down to The Office of Magic and Crystals but they haven't even bothered to get back to me." All three stare at the blinking ball then the dragon's eyes narrow toward Jupiter. "I'll make you a deal, if you go down there and get them to fix my ball, I'll make whatever sized wave wherever you want it." 

Down in The Office of Magic and Crystals, Monkey and Jupiter sit waiting in hard orange plastic chairs pushed against the wall. There's a giant glowing crystal on the far wall with a slot at the bottom that's pushing out a seemingly endless paper strip that's covered the floor and has started to reach the tops of the desks that are currently occupied by two busy dwarves who are hurriedly cutting it up with scissors and putting them into file folders that are then given to other dwarves who are rushing around the office in a near panic. The reams of paper stop and the crystal turns a dark purple. 

"It's out of paper," one dwarf screams as another digs through a stack of cardboard boxes in the corner, finds a new reel, opens up the crystal, which is hinged on the side and fits it inside before slamming it shut. The crystal turns pink then starts spitting out more paper as everyone continues rushing around. 

Exasperated, one dwarf turns to the other and says, "We've got 35,342 requests from the state of California in the last hour!" The other dwarf rolls his eyes. "Julie alone has put in 300 requests since this morning." 

"Broke up with her boyfriend again?" 

He nods. 

"I've got," he picks up one of the strips and flips through the stack, "'Show me my place in the universe.' 'What does it all mean?' 'Why doesn't Brian like me like I like him?' and then one here that just says, 'Pizza'." 

"I've got a 'Pizza' over here too," the dwarf says combing through his desk. 

"You can just take those, 'place in the universe' requests and put them in the shredder." 

"Really?" 

"Yeah, new rule." 

The dwarf on the right looks up at Monkey and Jupiter then back to his papers. "I suppose you two want something of great importance?" Jupiter is staring at his hands so Monkey hops out of his seat and gives a small polite bow. 

"We're here on behalf of the Dragon of Clouds and Thunder. His ball isn't working. He said he called this morning and no one's gotten back to him." 

"Oh. That." The dwarf closes a folder and hands it off then leans back in his chair. "I would love to get right on that, but as you can see, we have our hands full. We told him to turn it off and on again. Did he try that?" 

"I don't know." 

"You don't know," he leans forward, sighs, opens a big leather book and runs his finger down a long list of dates. "Friday would work. How's Friday?"

"What can we do to...speed things up. I'm kind of in a hurry." 

The dwarf looks around and laughs. 

"Well, if these requests stopped coming I guess we could get all caught up, but..."

In an instant Monkey is plunging towards the earth. He drops into downtown Los Angeles, see's five different crystal shops, leaps into one and finds a man with dreadlocks sitting on the floor in front of an elaborate amethyst display, aligned in intersecting circles and triangles. 

"Welcome to High Spirit Rock Company," he says smiling, putting his hands together. "We're having a special today on..." 

Monkey whips his cudgel out, smashes all the crystals on the floor, in the display case, around the man's neck, on his wrists and in his pockets then leaps a thousand feet in the air and looks down with his fiery gaze. He plummets to the street, pushes down a chubby man in an "I am the Universe" shirt as he hops on the head of a woman in a white flowy linen dress ripping the crystals off their necks as he crashes through the window of an apartment complex disrupting an Ayahuasca ceremony led by a Shapibo Joe and His Mystical Guitar of a Thousand Voices, crushing their crystal altar and Shapibo Joe's Mystical Guitar, as he leaps through the wall and is gone.

A woman and her friend sit cross-legged in her bedroom a large chunk of golden onyx between them, Alex Gray poster on the wall as they burn sage and chant and pray, hands clasped together, eyes closed. They hear a strange sound and open their eyes, shocked to see the crushed onyx before them. 

"Look!" the friend says, "It's saying, 'your old life is crumbling. Leave it behind to embrace something new.' You should take that job in Arizona!" 

The woman looks unsure. 

"But what if the crystal IS the job?" 

Monkey leaps back to heaven, back to The Office of Crystals, a bit out of breath. The dwarves are wide-eyed looking at their giant crystal. 

"Well, I don't know what you did, but you managed to stop about 85% of incoming requests." 

The other dwarf turns to Monkey. "If you went to Taos I think we could knock out that other 15% pretty quick."

"No," the head dwarf says. "We don't want to put ourselves out of business." 

"What business? Are you getting paid for this?" 

"Don't start with that again. This is Heaven. What do you need that you don't already have?" 

"How about two weeks of vacation and a crystal that doesn't run out of paper?" 

"Excuse me," Monkey interjects, "but can you go look at that ball now?" 

"We'll talk about this later," the head dwarf says reaching down and picking up a tool bag "Now, let's go see this crystal ball everyone cares so much about." 

Back in the office of The Dragon of Clouds and Thunder the dwarf looks at the ball blinking on and off. He puts his tiny palm on top of it, hits it a couple times, reaches down toward the base and feels around before finding a white cord which he follows down to an electrical outlet. He pulls the plug, waits 10 seconds then plugs it back in. The ball turns red and starts blinking then is a solid red then eventually softens and turns blue. 

"Great. You're all set." 

"So what was wrong with it?" the Dragon asks. 

"I don't know what was wrong with it, but it's working now. All you had to do was plug it back in." 

"I did that," the dragon says, "but it didn't work for me." 

"Did you wait ten seconds after you unplugged it?" 

The dragon pauses.

"Yes." 

The dwarf shakes his head as the Dragon waves his tiny hands over the ball and mutters some magic words. 

"Is that it?" Monkey asks.

"That's it," the Dragon says. "But next time..." 

But before he can finish Monkey is falling back to earth, back to the beach where The Thousand Eyed Demon is waiting. He readies his cudgel but the demon doesn't respond. His arms are folded across his chest and all of his eyes look irritated.

"Oh, so now you're back and I suppose you think we can just start fighting again?" Monkey cocks his head and looks confused. "I've been sitting here ten minutes. TEN MINUTES. I mean, we were doing our thing, battling in the water, with your fancy stick, and then you just leave?" He puts his claws on what should be his hips. "Frankly, it's embarrassing. For you." He points to Monkey. "I've fought plenty of people and no one's left in the middle, so it's not my problem." Scans the crowd of beachgoers not wanting to make eye contact. "I'm a god damn professional. Even when I'm not feeling it, I'll at least be courteous enough to finish. But you? Not even a word. Not even a, 'Hey, I'll be right back. I gotta see Princess Iron Fan.' Not even a thought about how it'd make me feel." All of his thousand eyes blink as he folds his arms tightly across what would be his chest, "It never occurred to you, did it? I'm just another demon. Another notch in your belt. Yeah, I eat people, but I also get my feelings hurt like anyone else."

Monkey looks puzzled. "You don't want to fight me?"

"I mean, I WANTED to fight you. I was in the mood about ten minutes ago, but now, it feels so...forced." 

"Maybe if I start attacking you, you might get into it again." 

"Maybe, but now we're talking about it and it just feels weird." 

Off in the distance, a giant wave grows. Monkey see's it and leaps into the ocean. The Thousand Eyed Demon takes a deep breath, turns and readies himself only to see Monkey's gone again.

"Oh my god, are you fucking kidding me?" He throws his taloned hands in the air. "I am going to the..." but before he can finish a shadow eclipses the beach. It's almost sunset. All of the tourists are taking off their sunglasses, readying their cameras, pointing their phones at the sun. The Thousand Eyed Demon turns to see a massive wave, Monkey on top, gold banded cudgel in hand, riding his Summersault-cloud like a surfboard, the sun blotted out as it looms over the entire beach then crashes, a thousand watery hands strip the cell phones and swimsuits of every beachgoer pulling them back out to sea.

The demon peels himself up as Monkey stands triumphantly in front of him smiling.

"What was that supposed to do?" He brushes himself off. "What, so you got sand in my eyes. Big deal." 

The beachgoers start to get up, naked, slightly chilly, A few dive behind beach umbrellas or flip over lounge chairs. Others jump into the water. Some just laugh and start running around. Without their phones, the monster's eye start to pop, 500 down to 200 then 100 till he is just one giant beachball sized eyeball. Monkey walks over and picks him up, looks behind him and sees Darlene running toward him, a trophy in one arm and a six-pack of beer in the other. He waves but she doesn't respond.

"You're not too late for the sunset," he says admiring the trophy with two golden arms on top, "Did you win?" 

"Screw the sunset," Darlene says knocking the beach ball out of his hands. "What're you out here playing with toys? We got some real problems here!" 

Monkey looks behind her and sees The Ernests falling out of the bar, angry, red-faced, a mass of beige with arms waving, carrying fishing poles and beer mugs and copies of A Farewell to Arms. Darlene yanks Monkey along as they high tail it to the car, hop in and speed off, Darlene laughing as she takes out a fortune-teller stand, tarot cards scatter in the wind, as the psychic dives out of the way and the two speed off down the road to Big Pine.