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By Christopher Submitted by chris Date: 2001 Aug 11 Comment on this Work [[2001.08.11.13.47.7016]] |
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Zuma strides nonchalantly through the door, fashionably late for dinner by exactly two hours and thirty-one seconds (more or less). He has a runny nose. He could use a laxative. He looks like hell. Cleo is sitting on the divan wearing only Zuma's extra-large NAPA Auto Parts t-shirt and her (genuine) Indian mocassins. She is eating from an oversize bag of Cool Ranch Doritos. There is a Queen cd playing on the stereo. The sight of the apartment - with its sick-looking lavender walls and Queen's bombastic Brit-noise echoing throughout the three rooms - makes him sick. But he smiles. Cleo speaks first. "Think you're late enough?" "'It's never too late.' That's what Grandpaw would tell from his wheelchair, bless his heart..." "Jerk." "Baby, look..." "Baby, look..." She mimics him with icy disgust in her voice. "I'm here now...and I'm sorry. I just wanted to stop off at the Eight Ball for a beer." "That would explain the booze-stink, then. Get away from me. Go eat a bowl of stale pretzels for all I care." Zuma kneels before Cleo, contrite, his nose running. "I'm sorry...really. I shoulda told you I'd be late. You know I love you, right?" Their eyes meet. Cleo softens. They embrace. "I'm sorry for being so mean. I can get that way," she says. "It's okay. I had a hard day at work. And being around Roberto always cheers me up." She pushes him away, violently exploding. "Roberto?!" "So? We're friends." "Since when?" "That's it - " "You're trying to make me think I'm crazy!" "Look, I don't apprec - " "He's my EX! JESUS!" "I can't help that." "You don't see anything a LITTLE wrong with this picture? I want - just once! - to met a guy who wouldn't think it's ok to drink a beer with my ex - my ABUSIVE ex, I might add." "He's a nice guy..." "I'm calling my mother." "Go right ahead. Typical..." "Bastard!" A cheap Mexican vase they had purchased in Laredo last summer comes flying at Zuma's head. He ducks. It shatters against the wall spraying technicolor shards. "I need a smoke." "You would. I'm calling my mom." Zuma heads for the sliding glass door that leads onto the patio. He tries to step over the pink balloon on the floor(from a friend's wedding shower the week previous) but misses and pops it. At last he is outside, looking out at the shimmering lights of Tulsa. They shine with a harsh clarity in the cold, dry air of another blue norther. Oklahoma. The place to be. Zuma holds his head and thinks. He thinks of sunlight and clouds and black lab pups. He thinks of blue water and laughing children. This makes him happy until the inevitable bull shark swims into his reverie and takes a bite out of one of the kids... So he tries to think of funny things, like Jeff Foxworthy telling an audience that you know your relationship is fucked when you're commiserating with your girlfriend's ex. Even that doesn't make him laugh. Jeff Foxworthy would never use a word like "commiserate." Not in ten million years. |