Rose

Rose

Rose

Damn, I gonna miss that girl.  

I fell in with her by just a fluke of damn luck.  She was dancing at a piss ant dive strip club just outside of Denver by about twenty miles out on a piece of blacktop that only people that don’t want to run the main roads use.  Fucking place was a fall-down drunk joint; not in any city limits, out too many miles on the road to nowhere for the County Deputies to care to drive out to unless forced by a worthless fight call.  

Dudes were passed out on the freaking floor and it was only ten o’clock.  The parking lot looked like a cheap-ass “junkyard” car lot; with cash sales only with no refunds.  Every car in the parking lot was at least fifteen years old with fenders dented on every corner and some along the sides.  What a junkyard; the clientele had to be a bunch of losers, druggies that must have been turned lose by their fat old ladies with heads full of curlers or so dope sick they couldn’t make it down to the dive or just paroled looking for a drink and a fight, kicked loose from a seedy trailer park or the County lock up.  About every fifth running wreak was an old but nice pickup; even with the dents, the kind that screams “Red Neck” right down to the gun rack in the back window; a couple even sported old mangy dogs sitting dead bored in the bed of the trucks.

I’d just come across the State of Kansas, what a fucking place.  I’d been told it was flat as a pancake, but that was a hell of an understatement.  Four hundred miles on my tired old oil-smoking Plymouth road runners’ speedo; two quarts of oil every fill up whether she needed it or not; blue cloud of burnt oil followed us everywhere we went.  

Another three hours across some godforsaken State my eyes were straining to see the white line.  The night sky was lit with banks of neon lights; they covered every inch of the tar paper building I could see up ahead on the two-lane highway.  I’d seen those types of joints before and they begged “Come on in, have a couple of beers, there’s titties to be seen”.  

I pulled into the dirt parking lot leaving a plum of dust in the air so high and wide that the next four cars wouldn’t be able to see the neon until they were already passed; I pulled right up to the front door and it occurred to me that I’d just driven into the sixties like on an ol’ Twilight zone TV show.  If I was a little smarter I’d backed out and kept going until morning; driving until finding the next Texaco station where I might just be able to score another six-pack of Bud and a fresh pack of smokes before they cancel my card.

Good sense was not on the menu so parking next to one of the better-looking wreaks; I jumped out and headed for what I expected to be a real letdown.  At the front door was a bouncer; fat fuck, crew cut and over the hill in his early twenties, that looked to be about a decade and a half ago.  Fat fuck said “$10 cover charge” and put up a full ham-sized arm towards my chest to stop my advance.  I kept on going until his hand was on my chest and pushed him back a full step.  Again he said “$10 cover charge” in his “I’m so fucking fat and scared shitless someone will call me out voice” I looked down at his hand and he quickly pulled it off my jean jacket; my favorite jean jacket.  I looked him in the eye and said “I’m with the band”.  “$10 cover charge,” he said softly for the third time.  I looked at him with my “Are you fucking kidding me look” and closed the distance he made with his retreating step.  Face flushing and taking but another step backward he wasn’t happy with my aggressive manner and in his face attitude; we were now inside the joint and the music was obviously from a cheap recording and crap speakers that must have come from one of the dollar stores.  “$10 fucking bucks to cover the band fuck face” I growled in his fat face so close my lips brushed his like a soft kiss.  He jerked back and I walked around him into the stinking nasty assed dive; it was smaller than it looked from the outside.  

There were maybe ten tables spread around the square building and six rickety stools at the shabby dirty bar.  The place smelled of old beer and older barf with a twist of body odor thrown in; made you breathe short shallow breaths through your nose so you wouldn’t get any in your mouth.  The floor was uneven; boards warped and cracked with golf ball-sized holes every foot or so.  It came to mind; “I wonder how a couple of these fat ass losers made it in here without going right through the floor”.  There was a spotlight shining on one giant round ball hanging from the ceiling looking like it could drop like a stone and kill someone at any moment; it must have been four feet across.  It was made up of broken mirror pieces glued on some sort of round; something. It was hanging in the center of what was supposed to be a dance floor; luckily they had high ceilings or the girls would have to dance around the stupid thing.  The dance floor was a half circle and only about ten feet around.  It was raised three feet above the main floor of the bar; broken linoleum tiles and some kind of patch material was all twisted and uneven as much as two inches from one spot to the next.  The thought of seeing one of the girls do a spectacular naked spread eagle fall entered my mind and I dismissed it with a quick smile and a shake of the head; I have crazy thoughts sometimes, funny ones but crazy.

I took a seat next to the junky dance floor still thinking about a spread eagle fall into my arms when the barmaid that had to be in her sixties asked me what my pleasure was.  I smiled my biggest shitty grin and said “Oh I think you know” followed by a twisted toothy grin.  That was all it took and she was all smiles and gushing friendly, I’d just made her day.  “I’ll just take a Bud; no glass needed” With a wink she was off. 

My Bud was back in a flash and I asked her when the floor show was going to start.  “Bout ten minutes or so” was the answer with a toothy grin and a slight toss of what had to be the most dyed hair in America.  She bent over the little table showing every inch of wilted tits that were so over the hill that the hill couldn’t be seen in the rearview mirror.  I gave her a little nod and dismissed her; her reply was a deep huff, twisting her wrinkled lined mouth into what used to work as a pout; she was off like a rocket.

Ten minutes turned into twenty and finally the music picked up a notch or two and the drunks started to clap and shout; even woke a couple up from the floor.  Five minutes later just as I was beginning to think that no one was going to come out; I about shit myself sitting right there in my hard ass seat with my warm and almost empty Bud in one curled fist; out comes one of the most beautiful women I think I’d ever seen.  I damn near pissed myself right then and there.  She was about five-ten, tits hard as rocks that had to be “C’s” if not bigger, and the thinnest waist under those big bad girls I’ve seen in years.  Thank god no cheap costume was hiding her stomach, those abs; six-pack going on a short case.  Thighs that a bodybuilder would have been proud of; lines of muscles rippling under tanned perfect skin.  Toned calves; triceps that had to be gym built; biceps that were groomed to perfection if not a little large for a medium-sized woman born and raised in heaven.  Her hair was nearly white it was so blond, free-flowing well past the middle of her back; thick like a thatched roof.  My face ached from the stupid smile on my face.  A hard punch in the shoulder brought me back to the moment; did I want another Bud?  Oh hell yes, yes, yes, yes; another huff was all I noticed as my eyes were glued on what had just walked into my life.

The goddess on the raised floor above me swayed, twisted, and spun; high kicks showing flexibility were just one of the many talents she must possess.  Her movements to the shit music straining from dollar store speakers were probably the best I’d ever seen; smooth, sensuous, perfect.  “Perfection of movement and rhythm” was what my brain was saying.  Perfect smile; teeth so white that the flashing light from the spotlight off the mirror ball reflected blinding white light from her teeth into my eyes.  Eyes an incredible deep sea blue.  Why were my eyes watering so? I was in the presence of an angel from heaven and my mind was not thinking pure thoughts as the front of my pants would attest to.  In an instant her bit was up and she left the floor as quickly as she had appeared. I found myself standing at the edge of the dilapidated stage, it was all I could do not to jump up on the stage and follow her like a moth to a flame.

 Somehow another Bud had appeared in my fist and was almost gone; magic. 

I sat there stunned for more than just a few minutes without noticing that another dancer had taken the stage and was trying to get someone to realize she was working her ass off spinning, kicking, grinding it out just trying to get noticed.  I wasn’t the only hard dicked patron in this shit hole sitting there with glazed-over eyes, dizzy light headed from what we’d just been blessed to see; it sure wasn’t the beer and a half I’d drank or even the joint that was smoked out on the road.

I left a twenty on the table and started looking for a way into the back rooms where I had to find my angel.  Off to the right side of the bar were the doors going to the shitter’s, Men’s, or Women’s; hidden off to the left of the opening was a single recessed door with peeling paint that at some point in the last millennium looked to be red.  It had an “Authorized Person’s Only” sign hanging by a bent nail on the upper half of the door.  It was leaning heavily to the left since someone hadn’t even put a single nail in the center of the sign.  My heart was pounding as I twisted the knob and found it to be unlocked.  I stepped through the door into a dark hallway sporting maybe six doors at random spacing down both sides of the hall.  I silently closed the door on its rusted hinges without a squeak of protest and put my ear to the first of four doors without hearing a sound coming from inside.  The fifth door on the right I could hear the faint movements of a person and gently knocked.  A sweet woman’s voice called in response “Come in” I opened the door and looked straight into a mirror against the wall no more than six feet away.  The reflection was that of my angel from heaven in body powder and nothing else.  She was pulling her blond wig off and didn’t act as though she even knew I was there staring at her naked reflection in the mirror.  She made no move to cover up, only turned and said “Oh…. I saw you in the audience…. Did you like my performance?”  “I loved it” I croaked; somehow the sight of her perfect breasts and body had taken the air from the room.  She wasn’t blond, but strawberry blond and the rug matched the curtains perfectly.  The color was more strawberry than blond but not to the point you’d call her a redhead.  She was breathtaking even in the foul dim single sixty-watt light bulb over the dressing room mirror.

I realized I was standing in her dressing room where I wasn’t supposed to be with a raging hard on and she was completely naked; I noticed the weirdness and said “I’m sorry my name is David and I just wanted to talk to you after the incredible performance you just did” She waved an arm dismissing my compliment, making her right breast raise and bounce with the jester.  “Yes, you are David from Chicago…. I’ve been waiting for you” With that announcement her nipples raised to full erection; she didn’t seem to notice.

“They call me Rose that is the name that I use here I have no other I know”.  She made another dismissive wave and turned back to the mirror again working on wiping clean the makeup from her gorgeous face.  As the colors came off her incredible beauty increased.  The makeup was covering and taking away from her natural beauty.  I stood transfixed by the sheer beauty that was before me, she was becoming more breathtaking by the minute. 

“How do you know that I’m from Chicago”  “I just came into this crap bar less than an hour ago”.  Another dismissive wave sent chills up my back as I again watched her breast make its journey up and back to the natural position. 

“I’ve been waiting for you David of Chicago”  “I need a ride to my people, will you take me there David of Chicago?”  What do you say to the most gorgeous woman you’ve ever laid eyes on and she asks you five minutes after meeting her to give her a ride; plus that is the direction you’re going anyway? 

‘Ummmmm……… Of course”…

She had her bag packed; one small suitcase that was no larger than the standard airline carry-on.  She finished cleaning the paint off her face and tossed all her makeup; which wasn’t much, into the suitcase with a click she shut it and headed out the door.

“Wait; don’t you have to get your check or something from dancing” as I raced to catch up.  She’d already made it down the dark hall and was going through the “Authorized Persons Only” door.  She spoke over her shoulder not slowing down “Nope, my time here is over and my debt is paid.”  Across the bar room floor with a wave to the bartender and past the fat-assed bouncer with no more than a slight wave of her hand.  Standing just outside the shit house door of the tavern slash strip club she surveyed the parking lot as though she would know which my ride was. 

To my dwindling surprise, she walked to the passenger side of my Road Runner and waited for me to open the door for her.  I wiped the surprised look off my face and opened the door for her; as she got in she said “We need to go West, David of Chicago” 

I got in the driver’s seat and leaving a cloud of blue oil smoke and dust in the air; we headed West through Colorado towards Idaho; she was asleep within two minutes and laid her head against my shoulder.  Her strawberry blond hair covered her face but the slow delicate breaths told me she was fast asleep.

Two hours later and a hundred and fifty miles later she woke and told me she had to be at the meeting place no later than June 21^th the summer solaces; and fell instantly back to sleep.  At dinner our first night I asked her where we were going and she handed me a satellite photo of the Middle Sister Mountain in the Cascade Range in Oregon.  We had two full weeks to get there.  That was all the information I was going to get; she changed the subject, gave half answers, and laughed when I asked her for more detail on why she had to be at the Mountain on the summer solaces.

Our time passed in a flash; traveling, eating, sleeping, and making love every night.  I fell completely in love with my Rose.  After the first day, I didn’t ask any more questions; I was so mesmerized by Rose that anything she asked or said was taken as a fact.

June 21^st came to us as we were making love; wrapped in twisted sheets of the Best Western in Sister’s Oregon.  It was a small resort town with too many gift shops to count.  We woke at 8:00 am the morning of the summer solace.  Rose was wired higher than a kite; there was no comforting her and the thought of calming her down was not an option.  She rushed me into the Plymouth and off we went towards the Mountains.  She sat in the passenger seat with her legs crossed up in the seat.  The only thing holding her in the seat was the shoulder strap.  Her eyes were closed and she directed me left or right as we came to a crossroads.  We left the blacktop and headed higher on gravel and then dirt roads.  Dirt roads turned into logging tracks which the Roadrunner just couldn’t make up.  This didn’t faze Rose; she just instructed to back up and go right at the bottom of the road; never opening her eyes.  After several missed turns and logging roads, she suddenly said “Stop; this is as close as we can make it.”  She leaned across the seat and gave me a long hard kiss on the lips.  “Goodbye David of Chicago, I will see you again and we will be lovers once again, forever.”  She reached into the back seat, grabbed her small luggage jumping out the door.  “I will see you again; David of Chicago; I will send you a message when I’m coming back”  Without a second look she was gone into the brush of the Middle Sister of the Cascade Range.

I’m telling this story now because today in the mail I received a postcard with a strawberry-colored rose on the front and a message that read “Tomorrow David of Chicago, June 21^st the summer solaces, I will see you then.” Signed “Rose”

I’ve waited forty-seven years for my Rose to return.  I can’t wait to see her.

From the Ramblings

t

Endless times

I love you so much.

I’ve waited for so long.  I’ve known your soul for eons untold; I’ve watched and waited for you.  You’re soul is so young; impatient, impetuous, it’s lacking the time honored calm of the eon’s.

The winds of time put us together again for a short time; lovers touching as we once were.  Then separated by honor and responsibilities blessed and commanded by the gods.

Our souls now travel on different planes; touching but not connecting as they once were.  I reach out for you but we are but travelers on roads that will not connect in this age.  I long for your loving touch; my lips on your lips, lovers again for millennium on end.

Live well, we will meet again in years forward…………… I love you so much; I’ll wait for you forever, time has no meaning for us we will be again together.  Pray it will be forever, if not, for a moment in time as the last time we met. 

I’ll love you forever; time has no meaning.  I’m waiting for you.

Endless times 

From the Ramblings

t

Bloodless Days

Bloodless days.

I have visions of my brothers dying in the streets; I lay wounded unable to move inches from the line of bullets skipping off the cobbles stones. 

I can’t take my eyes off of the spark the little pieces of stone that explode into a puff of dust each time a bullet hits skips looking for flesh to tear. It stings my face making my eyes water from the dust and sharp splinters of rock.  I smell the dust the metallic coppery ozone scent from the bullets like hot wiring.   My ears ache from the sound of the guns the rockets. 

Men run past ignoring me for dead taking killing rounds from the defenders falling where their lives end. Bullets continue to rip their bodies as they lay dead in the street.  I was lucky I fell out of the line of fire from the machines guns, others not so lucky.  Blood is everywhere; slowly flowing down from the high point in the center of the street.  There two of my men lie dead or soon to be dead their bodies jerk and flop like rag dolls every time a bullet finds flesh.   Blood slowly flows making its way to the side of the street with a curb of stone; three large streams, innumerable small creeks of red gleaming in the sun sparkling in a myriad of blinding flashes.  All the running blood comes together at the curb and forms a river just inches from my eyes.  It’s mesmerizing watching the life flow by me; sometimes damning up behind a piece of rubbish making the  blood form a small red pool, then flowing, racing along into the nearest storm drain. 

Just at the limit of my sight I see my comrade’s blood eddy behind a small piece of debris inches from the drop into the sewers; making a small whirlpool, a vortex of swirling blood, it sucks in other pieces of debris from the street into the storm drain.  A drifting piece of torn brunt drapery slowly floats from above leaving a trail of white smoke as it lands in the flowing blood taking its place among the dust and splinters of exploded wood; it makes two full circles and drops through the grate. 

Whiffs of smoke from hundreds of small fires slowly drifts in and out of smashed windows swirling around the support beams of street level family owned shops then vanishing into the shadows.  I see ghosts, movement in the smoke filled depths of the shop across from where I lay.  The smoke is heavy inside the buildings, trapped by the lack of breeze and internal fires. Heavy machine gun fire rakes the buildings front filling the street with chunks of plaster and dust; a spent crushed and twisted bullet slides across the cobble stones bouncing against the curb shooting straight up and lands so close to my face my eyes can’t adjust to see it clearly. Again I smell the metallic coppery smell of death.   A deafening boom then instant crack as a tank shell breaks the sound barrier, then another ear splitting boom when the tank shell hits above me and across the street above the shops into the apartments of the people who use to live here.  Huge pieces of cement fall from the building smashing the corpses of my men in the center of the street.  Furniture rains down, cups, plates littering the stones.  Three men dart out of the gloom and smoke of the shop across from me; running for their lives.  I pivot my eyes and watch as they all three are cut down by machine gun fire; twisting tearing clothing hides the brutal rip of flesh.  Their bodies hurled yards down the length of the building’s face before dropping at the opening to the alleyway.  Smoke whiffs up from the bodies as tracer ammo catches clothing on fire; it dances in the air twisting in a tight column and then blows slowly around the alleyway corner.

My eyes catch movement as a body from above hits the cobble stones with a sickening hollow wet sound.  His head is turned towards me as eyes open and he looks into my eyes being just feet apart.  We both lay where we fell; starring into each other’s eyes as the clamorous sounds of the battle rattles in our ears. He begins to say something but doesn’t have the time as a machine gun bullet explodes his head in pink spray; mists of foggy pink drifts down the street towards the smoking bodies. 

I hear and feel a deep rumbling that I’ve only heard from a distance before.  It continues over the next few minutes getting louder and louder until it’s a roar the street shakes and vibrates with its movement, little dust devils dances in my face twirling dancing moving left then right, their height growing as the monster closes in on where I’ve fallen.  Turning my eyes to the limits up in my eye sockets I can just made out a large form that belongs to the rumbling monster.  The tread of its chains chew the cobbles stones chipping them grinding them to a fine powder.  The T72 Russian tank is making its way down the street looking for anything to kill.  Smoke turns to diesel exhaust as the tank nears where I lay.  I realize that the street is blocked across from me by large chunks of concrete; they lay between me and the building on the other side of the street.  The most open area is on my side of the street, where I lay unable to move.  The beast stops just feet from my head, the barrel of the tank has already passed where I lay; I’m choking on diesel fumes and the fine dust that the tracks are carving into the stones.  My eyes are watering; my eye lids are gluing together with the toxic exhaust fume filled dust.  I must have passed out; the explosion from the main gun of the tank blew my ear drums out.  I woke to T72 tank treads four inches from my face; a blur of steel passing within inches of my face, the tracks riding the edge the stone curb, edging along closer and closer to the top of the stone curb cutting a grove deep and expanding towards my face.

Two months later.

Ggggrrrraaapppphhhhh… Ggggrrraaapppphhhhh… Ggggrrraaapppphhhhh… God I hate that fucking sound…

What are they doing?  I can’t see but it’s coming from over my head.  Oh cutting a fucking onion… Ggggrrrraaapppphhhhh…Ggggrrraaapppphhhhh… damn sound makes me crazy, how does cutting onion make me so crazy………… stop….that sound I don’t know what it is but it’s bad; it hits me deep in my soul.  It’s something that I’ve heard before; sometime, somewhere in the fight for our Country I’ve heard that sound; god I can’t stand that sound.  I’m hungry, but that sound just makes me want to kill that fucker making dinner; another scrape and I’ll slit his throat.  I can almost see from my bed as he moves to cut another slice from the onion.

Who would want to kill the fucking cook?  I must be totally crazy to want to kill the guy that makes the food to fill our stomachs.  Ggggrrraaapppphhhh… Ggggrrraaapppphhhh…Ggggrrraaapppphhhhh… fuck me…………..  I have no idea why that sound makes me so crazy.  I just want it to stop.  God damn fucking Ggggrrraaapppphhhh; I’ll kill that fucking ass hole…………..fuck him I hate that……………stop, stop STOP……………. Fuck, fuck, FUCK….. It’s got to stop…………

A face in my face; the nurse gives me another injection to soothe the demons.  It’s decided to move my hospital bed further from the opening of the kitchen; a favored spot with most of the wounded. 

I’ll sleep now, the world is turning a funny color of grey; things will be better tomorrow or maybe the day after.  For now it’s just sleep and hopes of a bloodless day.

From the Ramblings

t

An ode to the night

An ode to the night.

You rob me of my sight, my ears prick and strain at every sound in the night; are they beasts or phantoms that wish to prey on me this night.  I stumble and trip upon the litter you scatter and leave for me when I lose my sight.  You come with silenced speed; the light of day rapidly dimming screaming it’s almost the hour of night; I scurry about before the coming of the night making sure my defenses are up to the fight.  I fear the darkness you bring, all those things I cannot see with my poor human sight.  My human ability to smell proves to be a heartless cry; I cannot tell who is just out of sight, creeping towards me in your blanket that steals my sight. The tricks you play on me make my flesh tremble with fright; I damn you each and every minute of the night.  I huddle in my hut afraid of your might, my bedding pulled so very tight, I toss and turn all through the night.

   

 I have sleepy days and sleepless nights.

The morning sun brings me cheer that I’m still alive; I will hunt you all the hours of the light, if I find you death will be your plight.

From the Ramblings

t

I am painted

I am painted.

I am painted; my body is but a canvas of my life, imagines of those lost and things to be remembered.  My flesh cut then healed prays the true color of my faith; red, black, white and blue, these are the colors which mark me.  A name, an inscription a memorial to those who have fallen.  My skin shows those and that which are important to my very being.  Permanence of color a picture story of my integrity, my love for those living and lost.  Don’t be shock by what you see; these are things that make me who I am.  These are the images that have carved my soul before you.  Love me and I shall love you forever in return.

 My skin is marked; this is who I am, respect my colors.

From the Ramblings

t

It's a job

It’s a job.

I have a calling card so to speak, that of leaving three in the head and one in the heart.  I’ve heard some guys leave slashes with a knife making an “x”; some their initials.  I think that’s silly.  I don’t mind the wet work but cutting one’s initials in the mark is just a bit too much for my likings.

I had a job once to end the life of a round heeled bitch of an acquaintance of mine.  She knew the score the minute she saw me.  Two thousand bucks was lot money even back then just to plug a friend’s bitch, but he wanted her gone; gone for good.  He was a bit more than pissed at her for running around on him.  The big two grand pay day proved that to me.

She begged me not to mess her face up.  Gee how one’s fame gets around.  I promised her and plugged one into her heart.  Since she was dead I figured what the hell and put my three calling cards in her forehead.  So much for begging, I got a paying customer to keep happy; besides he’s a friend of mine.

People are funny; let them get a little close to you and they start asking all kinds of fucking stupid questions.  “What was your hardest job?”  “Do you enjoy killing people?” Really?  What the fuck is that?  I answered with three to their stupid heads and one to the stinking heart; I hate people.  Sometimes I wonder if I might have a problem.

I’ve had a few girl friends over the years; blondes mostly.  I don’t know why but the blond ones just seem to be what I’m drawn to.  Pretty faces, killer bodies; some with smarts, some dumb as a box of rocks.  They think it’s exciting what I do for a living.  Most I tire of and leave my calling card on their heads; whatever.

I ran into this one broad that talked without taking a breath for hours about how she did this and did that. Blah Blah Blah.  Turns out she went to school to be a head doctor.  She was all over me with questions.  She wanted to make me her lab rat.  That bitch could talk a mile a minute and didn’t shut up until I put the first one right between her pretty blue eyes.  I hate the fucking doctor types.  All questions; how does that make you feel?  Did you fuck your mother?

My worst job was this uppity rich fuck.  Five thousand bucks to end his miserable life.  Usually your mark has a schedule that they live their pitiful lives by.  This ass was all over the board.  Never a set time leaving for work, lunch anywhere from noon to three, never home after the five o’clock hour, nope not this one, he’d leave for work anywhere between eight and eleven.  Two hour lunches, longer if he was banging some new bitch.  Home at all hours of the evening.  He was driving me crazy.  I had to get this job done; I had other business to take care of.  Giving up I made an appointment with his secretary for three in the afternoon.  She led me in and sure enough dumb ass was sitting like a stuffed duck behind his over large ego desk.  I took a seat as offered; the one on the right.  Big shot started into his gaggle and I pulled my gun out screwing the silencer on the barrel.  He watched the whole thing not missing a word of his spiel.  I think he only figured it out when I sighted down the barrel and my first round hit his forehead.  I thanked the front desk girl on the way out.

Jobs don’t always go as one might want.  I had this one guy that was paying a thousand and a half.  It was mid winter and the streets were slick with ice.  I followed him up 2^nd avenue and just before he went into a café I tapped him on the shoulder.  He turned just as planned.  I had my barrel two inches from his forehead when I slipped on the ice and landed on my ass.  Eyes the size of dinner plates he turned on his heel and jerked the door open.  Thinking he’d make it into the restaurant and maybe out the back door; who fucking knows.  He made two steps before I had my gun up and firing into his ass.  The rounds pushed him into the café and he landed five feet right in front of the bar.  I was so fucking pissed at falling on my ass I gave him four in the head.  I demanded and got seventeen hundred for the job.

I tried to retire once.  Thousands in the bank from hundreds of jobs over the years.  The calls just kept coming.  I raised my rates; turned down all but the ones that might be a challenge.  The calls and jobs just wouldn’t stop.  I started to take only jobs that had multiple hits to accomplish; they paid the best.  You want the whole front Office killed, I was your man.

I really only remember one job; the rest are just numbers, moments to be forgotten the same every time.  It was a Tuesday morning; seventh of March if I remember right.  The lottery was up to twenty two million seven hundred thousand.  Not a record but damn close.  Two weeks after the winners were announced my private phone was ringing off its hooks.  Silly fucker forgot, neglected to put his ten bucks into the business pool.  They’d won fair and square; he wanted them all dead.  I took the job for ten thousand bucks cash, all up front.  It was easy really; they had a party to celebrate their good fortune.  I walked in with the caterer and faked myself as a photographer.  As they were blowing out the candles I was blowing out their brains with a full auto MP5 I’d stolen from the local Police department.  Going through two full mags, I had to do some cleaning up with my side arm.  I was in and out in only five minutes.  That’s a good hourly wage if you ask me.

There’s this building up on 43^rd Street that some rich guy is fixing up and turning it into an apartment building.  I liked the location so I bought a floor.  The whole damn thing ten thousand square feet; living in style now.  I’ve semi-retired, I’ve only been doing a job about every other month.

Bought a cat; furry little fuck but she loves me and wants my lap every minute I’m home.  I’m thinking of putting in a pistol range; movie theater too.  I don’t go out much, only if the weather is sunny and warm. The cleaning lady asked me the other day if I’d been sleeping ok.  I about gagged; she die if she knew how I made all my money.  No doubt about it, she’d die for sure.

I sleep just fine; to me it’s a job, I got no worries.

From the Ramblings

t

I’m a Centurion

I’m a Centurion.

I am a humble Centurion of Roman rank one hundred men under my command.  This has been my job for the last twenty four years

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We woke three hours before dawn readying for the days battle.  We are but a blink of the thousands of commands readying around us for the bloodshed to begin.  I worry not; we’ve defeated Army’s twice the size of today’s challenge.

 

One hour to light we finish our morning meal and help each other into armor.  Chest plate squeezing shortening my breath I walk among my men checking armor, weapons shields.  This day will test the heart of my most seasoned of men.  Our foe numbers in the thousands, hundreds of archers, countless mounted cavalry.  This is the fight we’ve trained for over countless months, some years.  One can taste the excitement in the air within the troops.  Men; boys jumping, crashing into one another unable to contain the exuberance of the coming battle, Seasoned warriors laughing, punching the young and untried of battle remembering the first time they ran to fight, sweat on brow, sword hand aching to kill the enemy. As the time comes near I caution them to hold ranks regardless of twist and turn of the battle.  Our strength lies in unity, precession attacks, retreats, thrusts. I warn that our quarter will be challenged this day by cavalry and archers will fill the air with their death.  To this I receive cheers and banging of shields.  My men are as ready as they will ever be.

Morning light winks over the far hills, small wisps of clouds dance on gentle breezes.  It is a good day to die.

Taking our place among the scores of units, I glance left and right.  I see fellow Centurions from distant battles squaring their ranks, calling orders above the chatter of warriors.  To our front hundreds of yards in the distance are the hoards of barbarians.  It isn’t easy to estimate their numbers but one could easily say they were in their thousands.  Cavalry units mixed in between mobs of foot soldiers, archers at the lead counted in the hundreds.   Surprising was the discipline of movement.  The weight of their army was to our left, but as a whole they moved to center, facing our troops squarely. Having the morning sun in our face we lowered shields with precision reflected the morning sun directly into their eyes.  With the blinding light we could see numerous hands rise to block the glare.  A faint but clear laugh rose in the ranks.

A horn sounded the command to begin marching toward the countless ranks of barbarians.  Our lines were perfection of evenness. We marched as one; towards the hordes, no one a head, and no one behind the moving line of death.  Three hundred yards out their archers released their arrows.  Our ranks knelt raising shields to the sky as thousands of deadly arrows sought flesh and bone.  Two units on our far right broke the line rushing the left flank of the archers.  Cutting them down in scores those remaining fled back into the ranks of their foot soldiers, bodies lay everywhere. Our two units covered in blood smoothly returned to their position in the advancing ranks. 

We halted our march just long enough to break the arrow shafts from our shields.  Some had few, others looked like porcupines. Checking for casualties we suffered few, mostly nicks and small cuts from ricocheting arrows.

I motioned an adjoining Centurion and we met behind the ranks of our soldiers.  “Ah a good morning Maximus, you look well today.” “That I am” he said with a pat on the back.  “I’m curious they seem to have some training but made no move to protect their archers?” “They are barbarians and only fight for their own tribes; a few hundred dead archers from another tribe makes no problem for them” Maximus said shaking his head. “I’m a little worried by the number of cavalry we’ve seen.”  Maximas with a hearty laugh said “Cavalry are only as good as the horse is trained.  We have a few surprises for them, we will see if they’ve trained their horses well.”

With the sounding of the horn I rejoined my men and we in unison moved forward.  Shields aiming the morning sun again into their eyes.

Two long, one short blast of the horn warned of a cavalry charge coming from the North.  Stopping our forward march, seven units swung to the rear forming an “L” shape of defensive line. Over a small hill came two hundred mounted men; horses running at top speed towards our new formed line.  Seven lines deep knelt, shields edge to edge, long lances dug into the dirt.  On they came with idea of running horses over our men.  Seeing a solid line horses jumped landing four to five deep into the line.  Rider and horse were pulled to the ground; a pink fog drifted over the rear lines.  Center group seven to twelve broke rank in a large unit movement, in minutes the barbarian horsemen were surrounded.  Our front line closed the gap left by the attacking units.  One through unit six squared the formation into a perfect square closing off any retreat.  The screams of men and horse filled the air.

 One loud horn blast started the forward motion of men, leaving behind the remains of men and horses moving our troops over and way from the piles of the dead.  Clear footing was needed for the advance.  Formations changing back to the normal triangle of attack we closed the distance to the hoards of warriors.  We had lost just fifty men to their hundreds.  As the distance between our troops and the hoards closed, faces became visible to the unaided eye.  Wild eyes were seen among the ranks, nervous men shuffled feet.  Leaders screamed orders at the top of lungs keeping the men together, working as a unit

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A whistle so piercing it hurt the ears brought our physiological war to the battle.  Ten thousand men stomped their feet in unison, swords struck shields; very low menacing shouts shook the air.  “Meeehaah, stomp, bang of swords hitting shields.” So loud any attempt at shouting orders was useless; it was deafening.  The air vibrated “Meeehaah, stomp, bang of shields.” I could see numerous fighters take steps backwards.  What started as just a hint grew bigger and bigger spreading as one terrified soldier passed his fear to the next.  The Officers of the barbarians were useless, only being able to control soldiers close to him.  Unseen by the enemy we brought our archers up to the rear of our lines.  With a whistle they launched a thousand arrows into the sky.  Hundreds of unprotected men fell to the ground, some with just one arrow, and others with many.  Their lines were decimated by the surprise attack.  Horns blew three short one long the signal for full attack.  All ten thousand strong rushed forward knocking men to the ground with shields, swords hacking and slicing into their numbers.  Within minutes units broke left, right engulfing the entire Army of barbarians.  The circle of closing Roman soldiers stepped upon the bodies of the dead, making them seem even larger to the dead and soon to be dead

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Several units broke off of the main attack and dispatched those still living within the thousands of dead.  Lame horses some with huge wounds limped among the dead. They too would be put down after the scores of wounded.  Our medics raced aid to our wounded, stopping gushing blood from sword wounds.  The cries of dying men filled the air.

Two hours of search and kill silenced the battle field.  Soldiers chased down wounded horses one by one killing them all. 

I had seen this before being in my mid forties with many battles under my belt. It never seemed to stop unnerving me the cleansing of the field.  We asked no quarter and gave none.  Our enemy was defeated to the last man.  A few had been able to sneak through both ranks of fighting men and make a run for the forests.  This was anticipated and they too were cut down by our own cavalry one after another.  No warrior was allowed to leave the killing fields, their defeat was complete.  Let those at home wonder their fate, hundreds if not thousands massed, not one returned.

Glory is the Roman Army.

From the Ramblings

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