Jesup, parth the sixth

and the next day he was in the back seat of the family station wagon his stereo a trunk and a couple of suitcases in the back

off to atlanta on his way to the new world his new world where he would find his path

off to spend a year in school

where his keseyesque dreams of freedom and love and peaceful coexistence picked up from random library visits where he accidentally picked up the electric kool aid acid test because the title sounded kind of hip and different from well-intended and idealistic teachers from his weekly viewing of love american style all of these dreams would slam into the fucking late seventies all about me i'm ok you're ok graduates of the covenant yes the promise that they had made to ron and his kin back in the sixties when they were listening when they believed the hippies when the sign said long haired freaky people need not apply when they said they were going to change the world age of aquarius there's gonna be a revolution power to the people right on then

they the hippies they these revolutionaries

they got tired of fighting the world they just became the world broke the covenant nineteen seventy seven they had broken their promise and ron johnson on his way to atlanta to go to college

spend the school year in atlanta

where he tried to love the dead but some new found cynicism would get beneath his skin seep into his blood he tried to love the dead but he had been exposed infected invisible spores of anthraxian doubt permeated his miracle his suspicious heart fell in with the pistols and the clash and the stooges and he got a tattoo and

it was harsh and

it was daring but

he still managed to find sally's name in his darkness

and then jesus hell he got left behind after ron's first taste of crystal clear liquid love dripped dropped beneath the tongue just a little dabba do ya plop plop fizz fizz oh what a relief it is hop on the bus tune in turn on jesus hell he wasn't so much left behind as he simply joined the card game like any other schmuck and

ron would accuse the hippies of treasonous high crimes and

ron would find hope in on the road redemption in naked lunch resurrection in gravity's rainbow and forgiveness in basketball diaries

his president his fellow georgian he held lust in his heart for fuck's sake ron he held his lust gripped in his hand

strong like bull

and ron would flirt with the college girls at the dorm parties down at everybody's pizza where they would guzzle beers and play quarters and wales tales and sneak drunken winks and tickled toes and invitations to go join her outside to share a joint next morning find himself sneaking out of alabama hall

sometimes with his momma monogrammed underwear in hand

sometimes with hers

but that had happened only a couple of times maybe four or five some vicious drunken rutting in the stalls

love maybe it was stronger

he'd go back to jesup on some weekends before thanksgiving and then during the winter it became harder to break away and then springtime in atlanta oh sugar oh baby ain't nothing like springtime in atlanta when the dogwoods bloom and the robins sing and the dew settles back on the green green grass in the late evening and

the coeds unveil in lullwater park

but he'd still make it home every now and then he'd still make it home and he and sally they'd get together

he'd find his way home every now and then he'd make his way back to jesup something about it had a hold on him he'd end classes on friday something would tug at him sort of like the feeling to light up a cigarette nobody told him he had to nobody told him he needed to he'd just walk off campus to where he parked his old truck open the door turn the key and head on home sometimes not telling anyone he'd just show up in jesup his momma wouldn't know his daddy wouldn't know his friends he would find the crowd wasn't that difficult not like there were a lot of place to go his friend they'd go hey ron like of course he was supposed to be there like it was

just another friday night

and he'd end up hanging with his friends doing the shit that he and his friends did and toward the end of the night when things would wind down he'd go find her he'd find sally and they'd get together

and they'd fuck

they would make out and they would touch each other and they would pinch and tickle each other and kiss and bite and nibble and giggle

and they would fuck

sometimes they would fuck in his truck parked down by the river out through the woods back in that little clearing where one night when it was raining and they couldn't get into the back when they stayed in the cab and the steam from the outside and the steam from the inside caused the metal roof to sweat and drip and in the dusky dawn of the dashboard light scramble her sandled foot had knocked off the rear view mirror and where she'd bumped her head on the steering wheel and raised a whelp so big next day she had to brush her hair back into an off kilter pony tail claim to her mother that it was fashion

during these times these weekends these holidays they didn't talk much at all they hardly ever spoke had no time for conversation the notion of the spoken word of language lost to the nuance of whimper and moan there was no room for any such see spot run

ron he'd come driving over after having been hanging with his friends where he'd been drinking and smoking and bragging and cussing and spitting and doing the same things that they had always done that those that had come before them had done thy kingdom come thy will be done

sometimes guns would be involved if maybe one of them pulled out a q-beam and started spotting varmints their beady little eyes glowing out from the woods maybe a opossum maybe a raccoon maybe an armadillo someone would have a pistol someone would have a twenty-two rifle or a thirty thirty taken from the rack of their truck someone would have a shotgun there'd be a cacophony a staccato of shots followed by the cannon like blast of the twelve-gauge overkill a haze of blue smoke hanging in the darkness the sharp sulfur stinging

the eyes would disappear

dead or alive into the peaty distance they never knew they never cared on earth as it is in heaven

sometimes there'd be fights crazy clumsy swinging stumbling bloody fights if quaaludes had been consumed and quaaludes were often consumed so there were a lot of fights a little vitamin q coupled with a few beers combined with a natural ornery tendency to say what one thought at any given time with an especially blunt drunken honesty drowned in self-important judgement of one's sister one's girlfriend one's momma and grandmomma

hey i like your black loafers speaking of black loafers how's your old man

ah geeze

sorry man that was a dirty crack shit speaking of dirty cracks how's your old lady

and a punch would be thrown and another and a circle would form and a nose would be bloodied and an eye would go red to black and blue and they would knock the shit out of each other knock each other into a pulpy mess of methaqualone mystery oblivious and numb to the pain confused by the blood streaming into their eyes by the gap formed from a suddenly missing tooth by the mask of spun sugar threads wrapping around their minds with a seven fourteen blanket

pummeling

pummeling

with bloodied knuckles that would swell to bursting the next morning

pummeling each other amidst cheers jeers and beers until one would fall into the arms of his mate collapse into an exhausted embrace then someone would step out from the circle and he would nobly say in that good old boy meets john wayne the peacemaker voice he would say oh kay boys let's break it up before someone gets really hurt

and they would all laugh except the one on the receiving end of the ass kicking he'd be glowering staring at the crowd with that fucking stink eye muttering oaths of revenge

he is a just god he is a vengeful god

but most of the times they'd just tell lies and half truths about fishing and fucking mostly about fucking the who the when the how many times the did she swallow and yeah every now and then yeah

on occasion

sometimes

an honest emotion or fear would float around

like when the subject came around to vance he'd died last summer he'd died last summer in a fucked up way he got really drunk he had a fast car big yellow chevelle with black stripes big tires

wheels that said i'll fuck you leaning over a pine log stretched out in the middle of the meadow in a rainstorm

vance in his yellow chevelle screaming down the road the road curved left yance forgot to follow fucking big ass oak tree defining the bend absorbing the car caressing the chrome crushing the cranium

a bodily trauma on a grand scale

ron's friend billy he says yeah i hear they found his tongue bit clear off found it stuck up on the tree

then they'd be quiet for a while not silent but quiet a quiet sigh exhaled a quiet gaseous burp swallowed a quiet glance around

then

those that went away would talk about how they missed the place but can't see coming back those that stayed behind just not understanding what it was that anyone needed to do anyplace not getting why anyone needed to go outside of jesup georgia

and a couple or three or four that had gone away to the university in athens where their daddies had gone before them their daddies already being the town lawyer the town doctor the town pharmacist they planning to return to step into their daddies' shoes they not really saying much they usually being one of the over-luded prize fighters oft times the muttering one sitting apart from the crowd licking his wounds