Ghost of Mackenzie

Scratching the surface with a psilocybin mushroom chocolate would be a good start, but I wanted to see between the chinks of reality’s armor.  So I piled on with three hits of LSD, and headed to Mackenzie Park before the world started to melt.  Sitting on the cliffs two hours later, the clouds had rainbow hues.  There were little slits in the sky over the ocean.  Bats?  No, they weren’t really bats, but what were they?  Birds?  Were they even there?  Consciousness was getting slippery.  The goddess looking down at me couldn’t be real.  

Confident that I was high as I could be, I decided to strip away the final layer of mundanity.  Between two buds, I smeared on a mustard colored gob of DMT, the spirit molecule.  The DMT immediately caught on fire when I touched a flame to it.  Tamping it out with the lighter I inhaled once.  Suddenly, I could see every crest of every ocean wave with startling clarity.  There was a rushing sound, a buzz vibrating every molecule of my being.  Careful now.  One more hit?  Alone, it was difficult to bring the pipe back to my lips, but I managed.  

As I exhaled, a wave lept up the lava cliff, a foamy white hand waving ‘hello’ with such

flare, such… personality.  I lay back with a prayer to understand life, to gain perspective on what it meant to be me, and closed my eyes.

I know what you’re thinking.  Drugs.  Drugs aren’t the answer.  They only provide escape.  Reality is the day to day grind.  You might be right, but what I ended up seeing felt more real than washing the dishes or waiting in line at the grocery store.  

There were cogs, gears in different shades of brown.  The teeth were squared off, and they were layered over one another, slowly spinning.  But I wanted to see beyond them.  Fascinating as the cogs were, I knew they were only a wall of sorts, blocking me from… I wasn’t sure.  With my eyes shut, I tried to glimpse around, tried to see beyond these cogs.  

A light switched on in the upper left portion of my field of perception, and as I glanced up, I noticed a red ball floating in front of it.  The red ball was small, and I knew there was someone behind the light, but I couldn’t see who.  The ball began to float from one side to the other, the cogs spinning, seemingly going about their mechanical duty without any consciousness.

“Hey,” greeted a good natured male voice behind the light, “what’s the square root of… no one gives a fuck.”

There was something candid about the voice, and I peered, trying to see who it was.  Without an accent, I thought he sounded like a typical white guy.

“What’s the quantum meaning of all the… no one cares!” he proclaimed with gusto.  

I detected a cynical note, a jeering sort of tone in his voice.  The ball floated back and forth, and there were bright lights in my periphery, framing the cogs.  

“Life is really precious,” declared the voice.  “Wait, no it isn’t.  You could jump off the cliff right now, and no one would care.”

Now I was sure that this being was more than a bit malevolent, taunting me.  Without mentally forming any words, I frowned, thinking that my family would surely miss me if I died.

“Yeah, they might miss you, but they don’t matter.  Nothing matters!”  He sounded cruel with a comical affectation.

With a wordless impression, this red ball character explained that everyone I knew would blip out of existence.  We would all die, and no one would remember any of us.  

“The big bang happened, everything expanded, and will go on expanding long after you’re gone.  You don’t fucking matter in the least.”

This realization was quite disheartening.  This was DMT, the spirit molecule?  I had been much more pleased by the rainbow hued cloud goddess I’d seen before hitting the pipe.  She had looked down on me with a kind benevolence.  Before taking two tokes of the deemster, I had conjured a feeling of gratitude and thanksgiving.  I had wanted to love and feel loved by…

“You got a great story, sure bro, but nobody fucking cares!”

Now there was canned laughter.   

Flustered, I sat up, deciding I’d had enough of this red ball’s negativity.  I was being trolled.  

Opening my eyes, I looked out at a pixelated world, so obviously digital in nature.  The ocean and sky were comprised of square dots, but be that as it may, I was stone cold sober.  More sober than, well, sober.  What was I doing with my life?  Drugs.  How stupid.  I didn’t need drugs or sugar or any of the gnarly shit I put in my body.  I needed to take my life more seriously.  If there was no one that really gave a fuck about me, then I needed to give a fuck.  No one would be there to tell me to get my shit together.  Why would I consume anything that was unhealthy?  Weakness and habit, that’s why.  It was time to be real with myself.  Time to evolve and drop all the poisonous crutches.   

Though my eyes were open, the red ball being was still there, standing to my right, an invisible presence hovering over me.  

“I just punked your ass, Mr. Mushroomjesus,” blurted the voice.

Blinking at his ominous tone, I was surprised at how keenly aware I was of his energy.  He was right there, a shimmer in my periphery.  

“Mr. I like purple, give me a fucking break.  I just punked you!”  The ghost was spitting the words with venom.  “You piece of shit, thinking you want to know what’s real.  You don’t give a rat’s ass about truth, and I just punked you.”  

“Interesting perspective,” I mentally told the ghost without looking up.

“Interesting?  Really, you loser?”

The ghost gave me quite the ear beating, a mind beating, and then it drifted off down the coast with a cruel laugh.  Five minutes later, the DMT had worn off, and I could no longer see the pixelated nature of reality.  My perception was still warped with mushrooms and LSD, but the smiling goddess in the clouds was a side note.  The bats, sure I could still see them, but I knew they weren’t really flying out over the ocean.  It was all mental fluff, distracting fluff, and I hadn’t come here for that.

As I climbed back into my wheelchair, I scoffed at the idea of suicide.  How stupid, even if I didn’t matter.  Truth.  I cared about truth, didn’t I?  A little irked at what the ghost had said, I suddenly felt alone.  Mackenzie Park seemed mournful as the offshore breeze sang through the Ironwood canopy.  I picked up my ukulele and strummed, but the bright and happy strings resounded with a hollowness that underscored the lonely vibe.  I almost teared up.  

“What’s the square root of… no one gives a fuck,” I repeated aloud to myself.  I knew what he had meant.  Obsessed with science and the workings of the brain, I often relayed what I learned to others.  They didn’t give a fuck.  Not really.  All my stories, all my insights went in one ear and out the other.  

I frowned.  There was something deeply unsettling about the ghost’s words.  It had obviously been watching me for quite some time.  Had he really mocked the fact that I like purple?  Who was that jerk?  

It was a hallucination, not real, you might contend.  Well, what part of reality is real?  A mutual consensus of verifiable facts that can be scientifically validated, like rocks or trees, those things are real.  A voice in your head on psychedelics is not only delusional, it’s insane.  Is it?  And yet, a year and a half later, I remember the encounter.  The experience affected me profoundly, and I can’t help but wonder if I’ll meet that asshole of a ghost when I slip out of my skin.  Until then, what’s the square root of… ha!  

Neighborly Doodie: A Parody

Some people are unfortunate enough to have neighbors that like to complain about the most trivial things.  They tend to blow things out of proportion and always find a way to make themselves the victim.  On my street, it’s this paralyzed guy, Jasper.  He’s trying to take a mountain out of a molehill.  It’s not like it would take dynamite to blast through the little deuces my dog drops in his path, and I think he should accept that sometimes life is messy, and that’s okay.    

Let me start at the beginning.  About a year ago, I adopted a puppy.  My son and I love him.  I’m not sure what dynamic Jasper has with dogs, but whatever it is, my dog doesn’t like him.  My dog is wary around certain people--maybe it’s Jasper’s wheelchair, but my dog’s never bit him.  He’s a good dog, and only barks, and like all dogs, he needs to poop.  

I couldn’t believe how dramatic Jasper was being when he said my dog was taking a shit at the end of his driveway.  Profanity is a low vibration, and my son was home, but anyways, Jasper was way out of line, practically yelling.  He talked about setting a bear trap--isn’t that messed up?  Well, his threats turned out to be empty, thank God.  I knew it was all drama and refused to let him upset me.  Jasper only wanted to vent, complaining about getting my dog’s poop on his hands.  He said it had happened on more than one occasion.

This was all last year, and he was saying dog poop had something to do with the urinary tract infections he’d been getting.  He was so worked up that I tried to reason with him, getting him to take a breath and chillax a little.  I explained that my dog wouldn’t be able to fit through the fence.  Jasper should give it some time.  My dog was still growing and wouldn’t be able to fit through the hog wire in a few months.  This was a year ago.  Now that he’s fully grown, my dog still fits through the fence, but when Jasper first complained, I said that there was no need to jump to red alert.  

A year went by without any complaints, and I thought Jasper was over it, but no.  He wants the world to be this neat little tidy place, and wants me to cooperate.  More than willing to compromise, I said he could email me, and I could send my son over to pick up my dog’s poop.  It shouldn’t be a problem.

Originally, Jasper wanted me to sure up my fence so my dog couldn’t slip out, or put him on a runner.  Then, with a year interval gone by, a few days ago he messaged me.  He claims that my dog had been attacking him with shit bombs, pooping on his sidewalk and wheelchair ramp, throughout last year.  The morning he contacted me, he alleged that my dog came into his house and took a dump on his living room floor.  

Like I’m supposed to believe him.  He said he left the door open so that his girlfriend’s dog could play with my dog on the street, but the dogs wound up playing in his house.  Why would he leave the door open?  Even if there was dog poop on his living room floor, he has no hard evidence, no actual documentation, pictures or video of my dog pooping.  It could have been his girlfriend’s dog’s mess on his living room floor.  Even if my dog has been using his sidewalk, ramp and deck to do his business long before his girlfriend’s dog arrived a month ago, I can’t assume anything.  And with two dogs on his property now, I can dismiss it completely.  Just because my dog was playing in his house that morning doesn’t necessarily prove anything.  We both know my dog is innocent until proven guilty.

His girlfriend’s dog is never chained up.  Jasper’s servant also has a dog, so it’s not like Jasper has the right to complain about my dog pooping on his deck, sidewalk, ramp, and driveway.  Did I mention Jasper’s girlfriend's dog, comes in my yard and eats my dog’s food?  Yeah, and I’ve seen it pee on my car tire.  It’s probably gone poop in my yard, so Jasper shouldn’t get it twisted.  His girl’s dog pooping in my yard might be a little different than my dog taking a dump on his living room floor, ramp, sidewalk and deck--he claims it’s on a near weekly basis--but it’s splitting hairs, really.  It’s just poop.  Get over it, and where’s the proof it’s my dog?

So many people try to find a way to make themselves come off as the victim in situations that are just part of life.  We all have different trials and tribulations, but it’s our reactions that matter.  For Jasper, it’s his wheelchair, and I’m sure being paralyzed isn’t the greatest, but now he’s found a way to use his situation as leverage to say ‘poor me’.  His audacity is unbelievable, and I can’t take any of it seriously.  It’s funny, but then again not everyone has the same sense of humor as me.

Get this: Jasper says that he goes to the Urgent Care for antibiotics ten times a year to get treatment for UTI’s--urinary tract infections.  He said something about having to insert a plastic catheter down his dick every time he urinates, but I had to tune him out when he started pointing to his hands and talking about my dog’s poop.  They were grimey, but come on!  Honestly, I thought it to be quite an inappropriate overshare.  There was no need for that kind of imagery, but my heart goes out to him.  I suppose that he was trying to imply that my dog’s poop, or fragments of it, travel down his urethra when he inserts the catheter.  I think he called it his piss hole.  Like I said, he was being more than a little crass and irritable when he approached me last year.  I wish my son hadn’t been home to hear the vulgarity.  

At least he’s only messaged me, so far, about my dog’s mess on his floor.  He’s a loose cannon.  He can be funny, but it’s in an inappropriate way that makes most people uneasy.   

Anyways, shouldn’t he just wash his hands to avoid infection?  I can see that touching his bare hands on his wheels, in order to get around in the wheelchair, is about the same as me wiping my hands on the bottom of my shoe every time I take a step, so if I were him, I would definitely be on top of my hygiene.  Maybe he should wear gloves, I know I would.  

My point is that he shouldn’t blame me for infections that result in running over my dog’s poop with his wheelchair wheels.  His personal hygiene, or lack thereof, is his responsibility--not my problem.  It’s not like I can wash his hands for him, and it’s not like he’s willing to help me out with my dog.  He hasn’t offered to pay to line my fence with shade cloth or pay for a runner.  Not that I would, even if he did.  My dog has never been caged, like a criminal, and if it’s up to me, he never will be.  

If I could offer Jasper advice, in regard to encountering my dog’s poop on his ramp, sidewalk, deck, and now living room floor, it goes as follows:  First, make sure to watch where you’re wheels are going, and take note of what they might run over.  Your trajectory should vary depending on the circumstances of where my dog has dropped a its pile of fecal matter.  Second, when it’s dark, you should use a flashlight when you go up and down your ramp and sidewalk.  And to sum up one and two, being the athletic you are, even in the wheelchair, you should be able to dodge my dog’s piles of poop.  Obstacle courses are fun.  Try and see it as a game--with fatal consequences in your case!  Joking, I’m sure it’s not really like that.

And like I said, you could always text me.  I told you to yell at my dog if you see him in your yard, and I know you think that will lead to more of the “shit bombs” on the path to your car, but have a heart.  Their animals bro; learn to cohabitate in peace with thanksgiving.  We’re so lucky to live in this paradise.  

That guy, Jasper, sigh*.  There’s so many crazy people in Puna!  Did I mention that I even left him this dog scraper to pick up my dog’s poop?  It might be a little difficult to maneuver in the wheelchair, but at least he should be able to scrape up the poop at the end of his driveway.  Your welcome, Jasper.  I paid for that.  As far as sterilization after scraping, a little bleach in water coupled with a furious scrubbing, should do the trick.  That might be impossible for Jasper, but he’s got a girlfriend now.  Not being misogynistic, I’m just saying that she could help out in areas that are difficult for Jasper.

 If he drives up, and my dog’s poop is there to greet him when he opens his car door, he could just back up a little.  I bet there’s ways to get around it.  I’m sure I could if I were in the wheelchair.  Maybe he needs glasses, I don’t know.  He acts like my dog’s poop is such a problem.  I even said I’d come over and clean it up, so what’s the issue?  I’m being pono, my responses reasonable, and I hope he can understand that sometimes life is messy.  We can’t control the universe, only our reaction.  This is probably some cosmic test for him.    

The bottom line is that he should make his girlfriend and servant leash up their dogs, yeah, and then maybe I’d feel inclined to listen.  As of now, I can’t take his overblown antics seriously.  UTI from my dog’s poop on his ramp, sidewalk, driveway and deck?  Please.  With the dogs on his land running amok, he’s got no legs to stand on, both physically and metaphorically.  Everyone I bring this up to agrees that I shouldn’t give it too much thought.  They’ve met my dog, and once you get to know him, there’s no way you’d want him imprisoned.  Unlike Jasper, I have a heart.  I’m a peaceful warrior and that means I will remain strong in my stance, but I refuse to let the whirlwind of petty egoism sweep me up.  My feet are on the ground.   

Did I mention that Jasper’s girlfriend’s dog is always coming over, shitting, pissing, eating my dog’s food?  Get real bro, and stop being a hypocrite.  You say that the dog’s on your land poop where you don’t wheelchair, but you can’t know that for sure.  You have no proof.  Besides, even if you get my dog’s poop on your hand, and aren’t in a place that you can properly wash your hands, like your car or something, you shouldn’t whine about it.  You have medical insurance, so it’s not like you pay for the antibiotics.  And what’s a little fever?  I bet you wouldn’t die from those UTI’s, if you didn’t take antibiotics (which you do), so quit being a snowflake.  Your not that fragile.  Take some personal responsibility for your own health, and don’t use your “paralyzed card” to try and gain my sympathy--especially when you’re such a hypocrite.  

Dog poop, deal with it.  Without any video evidence, and without keeping your dogs leashed up, I see no reason to keep my dog from using your sidewalk, ramp, deck, and end of the driveway, as it’s shit depository.  Besides, I’ve seen that he’s pooped in the street.  Right now, there’s white flattened splats of it that cars have driven over, my dog’s poop flattened like toxic albino pancakes, baked in the sun.  So that’s the road in front of your property, so stop saying my dog always goes on your land.  The road is public property, and even if my dog has targeted the pavement at the end of your driveway, it’s not like you own that piece of the road.  You happen to use it--not my problem.  

I’ve noticed that people who see themselves as victims say things like ‘always’ and ‘never’ which are hyperbolic and dismissable.  My dog does not always poop on Jasper’s driveway, ramp, and deck, but like I said, his ‘life threatening’ concerns over my dog’s poop are his problem, not mine.     

It’s true, I could put some shade cloth on the interior of the hog wire fence which surround my property, and then my dog would be contained, but do you know how much that would cost?  Are you offering to pay for it, Jasper?  And a runner?  That’s like dog torture.  

And as for convincing me, I’ll just let you do that before I even think about giving your concerns a second thought.  Just like my dog hasn’t been filmed pooping--actually caught in the act--you only have suspicions that my dog’s poop has led to various urinary tract infections.  You allege that, but again, you have no proof.  

In closing, if I were you, I would clean my hands better.  But enough of that, I’m sure after reading this, you’ll do that.  You’re a smart guy, Jasper.  Be smart, but be rational.  Your girlfriend will help you out, and I know your ego won’t like it when you ask her to help you out. I bet she’d be grateful to scrub up the spots where my dog shit with some bleach.  For you, that might mean learning to be humble, but I think that will do you some good.  Anyways, I wish you nothing but the best.  From a peaceful warrior like myself, I hope I can impart some wisdom, and that is to love all of God’s creatures.  Respect my dog, Jasper.  I’m sure if you show him that you love him--if you can become vulnerable and allow him to see you, and not this sarcastic front you use, he will poop elsewhere.  Until then, grow, and let the light of love open your heart like a lotus flower.

Perfect Pitch

Around the corner, of the most happening place on a Monday night, a shifting bunch of ruffians loitered about on the sidewalk.  They were all heedless of the shaking heads of upstanding citizens who rolled by them in an abstract wash of traffic.  When the sky opened up, and it began to pour, a few of the idlers wandered around the corner, across the street, or down the sidewalk in zigs and zags.  Only two scruffy looking no-gooders were left standing on the sidewalk under an overhanging roof which had been purposed to provide shelter for anyone but the likes of them.  It was a sidewalk, meant for walking, but Ferguson and Tyson had been standing, leaning against the wall for the last ten minutes.  If it had been a bus stop, perhaps their presence would be more excusable, but they had no business just standing where they were.  No business other than demonstrating a flagrant disregard for the law.   

“Dude, you should roll a joint,” Tyson cautioned.  “Smoking that pipe is hella sketch.”  He peered down the glossy street of Pahoa, wary.  Even in the rain, a blue light atop any police vehicle would stand out, obvious enough to spot in the night.  At the same time, it seemed an unnecessary hazard to chance being forced to stash Ferg’s enormous pipe.  It was the type of pipe that couldn’t be palmed or easily tucked back in Ferg’s backpack.  That, and there was perfectly good weed that would be wasted if the bud was lit up and cherried in the bowl.  If they needed to get rid of it in a hurry… ugh!  This was so dumb.  There was no reason to risk anything like this.  

Tyson had never before imagined a place in which people could be so brazen, lighting up in the heart of town.  Considering himself a resident, having be-bopped around Puna a few months, he still had the willies when Ferg did this, firmly believing that there were certain ways to go about smoking in public, and joints were sensible.  Joints, not pipes--especially ones like Ferg’s monstrosity.  

Besides, joints tasted better.  The last person on rotation wouldn’t be left to inhale butane and ashes.  Unlike pipes, joints intensified after each draw with an oily resin working its way down into the sticky roach end.  A roach could always be pocketed for later.  With a little paper crutch, rolled in the place of a filter, fingers wouldn’t be burnt on the end of a joint.  Nothing would go to waste, delicious to the last puff.  With a pipe, inevitably there’d be some unlucky schmuck handed a tragically cashed bowl.  The last hit would taste like sweaty socks and defeat.  Tyson could think of so many reasons not to smoke out of a pipe in public.  

“It’s weed, homie,” Ferguson pontificated, tamping down a bud into the pipe with his thumb.  “The cops here are cool.  They don’t want to see anyone smoking meth, but we’re just getting irie.  No one cares.  The war on herb is over.  This is my medicine, brah, relax.”

Tyson wasn’t convinced, but that didn’t stop him from accepting the pipe when it was passed over.  The music from the open mic drifted around the corner, as did a few scraggly characters, reeled in by the skunky aroma.  All were expecting nothing less than a toke, and then disappeared again, happy to bestow their stoned attention on whoever was on the mic.

“Does anyone have a nickel bag?” asked Bart, ragged looking as he lumbered up.  It was less of a despicable question than his usual one--an endless loop of groveling about a dollar someone might be willing to part with.  As was to be expected, Bart’s eyes were black holes of insatiable need as he looked to Ferguson.  

“A nickel bag?” scoffed Ferguson.  “Scrape up twenty, and maybe, but five bucks?  Come on, man.  I’m not risking jail time for five bucks.  It’s kind of insulting that you would even ask for a nickel bag.  If I start selling nickel bags, people will be calling me little Nickie, and I can’t have that.  I ain’t little Nickie, Bart.  Ask Derek.  I got an eighth if you come up with a twenty.”  Bart looked unsatisfied with the answer, so Ferguson explained, “I just loaded some dankness in my bowl.  You’re gonna like it--frosty goodness.”

“Derek said he was out,” Bart said, in that sickening F minor of dreariness which dominated his personality.  Dreariness and longing comprised Bart.  He scuffed about the art of living, trying to cop anything he could, like a city pigeon in an outdoor food court.  

Charlie thundered down from the gas station, his skateboard wheels howling with a ferocious sound, like the roar of a jet engine, until he tried to hop up onto the curb.  He almost made it, but almost doesn’t look pretty on a skateboard.  The green wall was there to greet him, not giving as he flailed off the board and thudded into it.  No one asked if he was okay.  They took his moaning as a sign that he’d live.  

“Come on Ferg,” Bart tried to bargain.  “I shared that bottle of Mickey’s with you the other night.  Five bucks for just a gram.”  His eyebrows were pressed up, begging, and Ferguson looked away.

“At wholesale, yeah, maybe I’d do a gram for five bucks.  But anything less than twenty, no way.  Not worth it.  You gonna bail me out of jail if I get caught?  Didn’t think so.”

Tyson shook his head, thinking it was an absurd stance to take, more than hypocritical as Ferguson passed over his beast of a pipe to Charlie.  Ferguson was asking to be caught.  Still, there were no blue lights down the street.  Even if no one else cared, Tyson would be the self-designated lookout.  He deemed it his responsibility give the six-up cry, if he saw trouble headed their way.  

“Well, how bout just a little pinch, then?” continued Bart, persistent in his pursuit to acquire a crumb of weed.  Bart hovered, floating in like a mosquito returning to circle an ear after being swatted away.  Ferguson felt a loathing.  Bart didn’t buzz, but he sure as shit was a buzz killer.  But, being the irie fella Ferguson thought himself as, he chose to drop some knowledge of irie living.  

“Brotha Bart, why do you always gotta be asking for this, asking for that?  We’re smokin’ a

bowl right now.  Try to live in the moment, and enjoy what I’m loading.  It’s on me, brah.  For free, so be irie, not needy.  Give thanks.”  Ferguson gave a benevolent nod for Charlie to pass over his glorious pipe to Bart.

“But I wanna have some for the morning, just a bowl,” whined Bart, even as he clasped his dirty paw around the pipe.  

Ferguson was ready to smack him up side the head for tainting his headspace.  He was a patron of the open mic, here to surround himself with positive vibrations, but a dark cloud clung to Bart, permeating the space of all unfortunate enough to be in his immediate proximity.  Ferguson had a bit of a mean streak, but checked his temper, and bit his tongue.  

Through the drizzle, an enormous truck was grumbling up the orange lit street.  No one looked until it stopped in the middle of the lane, and a white floodlight from the passenger door caught them all in a terrible beam which was so bright it felt hot on their faces.  

“Got you now, fakas!” bellowed a deep and angry voice from the truck.

Ferguson, and the rest of the sidewalk urchins, began shielding their eyes, blinded and unable to see who was addressing them with such hostility.  The truck’s engine revved, and then it sped away, an enormous belch of diesel smoke left lingering behind like a stinky ghost.

“Bart, were you holding my pipe like that the whole time?” Ferguson demanded.

“What?” Bart asked, with a vapid expression, never being the quickest to put things together.

“Do you guys smell something funny?” Tyson queried.  “I think they released some gas or something.  I swear, I smell something.”

“Come on dude, that’s diesel fumes,” Ferguson quipped, then turned back to Bart, outraged, and scolded, “I can’t believe you stood there with my pipe held out in the open like that, you dumb fuck.  You know they must have been videoing us, right?”

“What?” Bart blubbed.  “It wasn’t my fault.  I didn’t do nothing wrong.”

Ferguson winced, feeling pained to be in the company of such a moron, and then rolled his eyes up the road to where the truck had gone, expecting to see it loop back around.

“I didn’t see no one recording us,” Charlie mumbled.  He’d just recovered from the slam into the wall, rubbing his shoulder.

“That’s because no one could see behind that light,” retorted Ferguson.

“Maybe they used the spotlight thing to try and scare us,” said Bart.  

“You’d better hope that’s all it was,” said Ferguson.  “I wasn’t the one holding the pipe like an idiot.”

“Hey Ferg, its your pipe.  You passed it to me,” Bart complained.  “I didn’t do nothing but hold onto it.”

“You never think, dumbass,” Charlie joined in, standing next to Ferguson, as if he had some skin in the game.  “You stand around all day and mooch off us.  You’re too dumb to do nothing for yourself but sponge up what we score.”

Ferguson took his pipe from Bart, but he didn’t like being lumped in any category with Charlie.  The ‘we’ part of Charlie’s chiding caused him to take a step back, physically distancing himself from the two.  

Although the open mic would be going strong for a few more hours, Ferguson thought it might be wise to skeedaddle.  If the cops (or whoever ended up watching that footage which he was confident the truck had captured) did roll up, they’d be looking for Bart first.  No one would have to know it was Ferguson’s pipe.

“Shoulda rolled a joint,” Tyson maintained, in a told-you-so reprimand.  He rolled his eyes, and walked around the corner.  Ferguson didn’t appreciate being reminded that he hadn’t followed sound advice.  There was nothing in life more aggravating than somebody on their high horse who would run their mouth with a ‘shoulda this’ and a ‘shoulda that’.  Once the chips of any situation came to rest, it was a 20/20 perspective, worthless in the present unfolding of the Now.  A ‘shoula’ was usually from some broke-ass Punatic who needed to get his own affair in order, unaware Ferguson had his game on lockdown.  He heaved a sigh, not wanting to be stuck here listening to Charlie and Bart.  However, whatever girl, bless her heart, was singing her lungs out, she couldn’t hit a note.  The open mic’s speaker blared out the inharmonious subtleties, which were more than audible from around the corner where Ferguson stood.  

Pahoa had talent, but Ferguson had been cursed with an ear which would often inflict a psychological sort of pain when people sang off key.  A curse, despite that his high school music teacher had touted it as a gift, saying that his Perfect Pitch was exceptional, as it was rare.  Ferguson was no Mozart, so what good did being tortured by a note that was a little flat, or a tad sharp, do him?  Little to none, but with his irie medicine, it was almost bearable to be around the corner from any musician who couldn’t perform flawlessly.  Of course, no one could hit every note, but after a toke, Ferguson could listen without cringing.

In the meantime, Charlie and Bart were blah blah blahing.  Both of their voices were insufferable, grinding on and on about strains of weed, as if they were aficionados.  As if anyone around here (especially those two) would turn their nose if it was an indica, instead of sativa, which had been loaded into a bowl.  As if anyone in Pahoa weren’t a cannabis aficionado.  

Ferguson sighed, knowing that it wasn’t Charlie or Bart’s fault that they’d been equipped with sub-par mental faculties.  Just like Ferguson’s too-picky ears, their talents were hard to put to use, but much more difficult to point to.  Unless annoyance was a talent, Ferguson didn’t think either of them had much to work with.  Nature never claimed to be fair in distribution, but it was kinda sad, as they began to harp on about unjust laws prohibiting CBD oil, stating arguments they’d overheard and could now plagiarize, trying to appear informed as they talked over the top of one another.

However, Charlie and Bart’s imbecilic banter wasn’t at the root of Ferguson’s perturbation.  No, his discomfiture sprang out of the not-so-idle-threat of the truck returning.  He couldn’t shake the notion that if he deciphered his gut’s opinion correctly, and the pang of foreboding was an omen which he’d do well listening to, it was time to bounce out.  

“Come on, just a little nugget,” pleaded Bart, pulling on Ferguson who was looking up the street, apprehensive and brooding.  

“Hey dipshit,” Ferguson snapped, turning to the parasite.  “Unless you can come up with a twenty, fuck off.”

“Would you be down to do some bartering?  I got a fair trade.  How about some trade, Ferg?” Bart haggled, obtuse in his offer, completely unphased by Ferguson’s lashing words of rebuke.  But then he reached in his pocket and pulled out a smartphone.

“Whoa, where’d you get that?” Charlie asked, leaning in.

Bart didn’t answer Charlie and tried to pass the phone over for Ferguson’s appraisal.

“No way am I gonna touch that,” Ferguson said.  “Whoever that belongs to, return it now, before I beat your ass.”  

“No, it’s mine.  I traded it at Kehena for some shake,” said Bart.  It was a dubious claim.

Ferguson took the phone, tried to turn it on, but the screen remained black.

“The guy said it needed a new battery, but it works,” Bart insisted.

“What guy?” Ferguson asked.    

Before Bart could answer, a familiar rumble caused Ferguson’s head to pop up in alarm.  A big truck was headed toward them with a distinctive diesel chortling.  It might have been a different jacked up diesel monster, but Ferguson wasn’t about to stick around and find out.  He handed Bart the phone back, and stepped around the corner.  The wailing sound of dissonance (even the girl’s guitar was out of tune) didn’t register as anything but background noise to Ferguson.  All he perceived was the angry churning of the diesel engine around the corner, gurgling in the key of B flat major.

Just as he leaned against the wall, a spotlight flooded the sidewalk, further blackening the shadow in which he was hiding.  Ferguson listened to the truck’s doors open, followed by argumentative voices, ones full of complaint, hurling accusations in chaotic sevenths and fifths, then more diminished notes which were tight with indignation.  Ferguson listened to Bart protest, heard Charlie’s skateboard clatter on the cement.  It didn’t sound like a physical altercation, but Ferguson wasn’t swayed to move from the wall’s shadowy enclave.  He glanced over to Tyson who’d been leaning next to the open mic stand.  Tyson straightened, and took a step forward, but only a step.  The rest of the audience, which had been focusing on the brave guitarist, bleating her soul’s stirrings into the microphone, turned their heads, but no one could see what was happening on the sidewalk around the corner of the cinderblock wall.  No one ventured out to witness until it was all over.

After the truck’s doors closed, the spotlight was extinguished, and the truck tore away again, up the hill and out of sight beyond the gas station.

When the fumes cleared, Ferguson rounded the corner to inspect the scene.  On the sidewalk Charlie’s skateboard lay like an overturned turtle, belly up and quivering.  Ferguson looked down the street, thinking that Bart and Charlie must have bolted.  He scanned the vicinity.  Across the road, a schizophrenic ice-head was flapping his arms in the air, but Bart and Charlie were nowhere in sight.  They probably ducked behind the museum, Ferguson reckoned.    

“Dude, did Bart and Charlie just get kidnapped?” Tyson asked.  

“Oh my Goddess!” exclaimed Amanda, a freckle spattered dreadlocked warrior, her trusty ukulele hanging by her side like a short handled battle-axe.  “Who’s missing?”

“Charlie and Bart,” said Ferguson.

“Maybe it was the cops,” Tyson suggested.

“No way,” countered Ferguson.  “There are only seven cops on patrol in the entire district of Puna, and that’s not the way they’d handle someone smoking weed.  I’m thinking Charlie and Bart probably ran away.  I’m guessing that whoever was in that truck, stepped out to whoop their asses, but those two are fast.  They probably decided it wasn’t worth the effort of chasing them and drove away.”

“Then where are they?” Tyson asked.  Ferguson gave no answer, shrugging and bemused as he looked down to the bank, and then up to the glistening pavement to the gas station.  

“So, they were smoking weed out here on the sidewalk?” asked Amanda, in a D minor of disapproval.

“Yeah, and the truck shined a spotlight on us earlier,” Tyson said, filling her in.

“Why does everyone smoke out in the open here?” Amanda asked.  “People should smoke in the alley, not out on the sidewalk.”  

Ferguson and Tyson smirked.  Amanda--how new she was to the island, having flown in from somewhere in the midwest a few weeks ago.

“We’re not in Kansas anymore,” exclaimed Ferguson, a genuine smile lighting him up.  “You’ve seen the license plates; we’re over the rainbow.  That means the black and white world of the squares has no business boxing us in.  Not here.  This is Puna, and if some living meme of gentrification wants to draw a line between me and my freedom to be irie, they should ask me why I am partaking in the sacrament, my medicine, and I will explain myself.”  

Amanda swung her ukulele to her shoulder, shaking her head, incredulous.  “It puts unneeded heat on everyone here,” she argued.  “Now, look.  Bart and Charlie just got abducted.”

“We don’t know that,” Ferguson said, looking toward the museum.  “Why do you have to put dark energy into whatever it was that happened?  Be more aware of what kind of vibration you put out into the world with your words.”

“Dark energy?” Amanda laughed, and then grew serious and went on, saying, “I’m being real.  You should smoke in the alley, not out here.”  

“Maybe it was a SWAT team,” Tyson offered, having heard Ferguson’s spiel about his God-given right to be irie too many times.  Tyson knew he was about to launch into a sermon, so he tried to reroute Ferguson, asking, “Or maybe, like a DEA sting operation?  You know, like a special task force?”

“No,” reckoned Ferguson, relenting to the subject change, but shooting Amanda a defiant look.  “That was some gangsta shit, right there.  I’m gonna cast positive vibrations with my words now.”  Ferguson was looking out of the corner of his eye at Amanda, who was now spinning the neck of her uke like the nervous tail of a cat.  He declared, “Bart and Charlie got away.  It’s all good.”

The off-key girl on the mic ended her set, and there was a heartfelt applause and  gratuitous hollers of approval.  Amanda lifted her chin, and haughtily excused herself.  She was up next, so enjoy, and please smoke in the alley from now on.

Ferguson walked over to pick up Charlie’s skateboard.  He spun one of the small wheels, but it halted.  It could use some new bearings, he mused.

“Should we call the cops?” questioned Tyson.

“You can,” Ferguson replied, “but don’t mention me.  I’m out.”  

Tyson called out, as Ferguson skated down the center of the road, “Hey, what if Charlie wants to know where his board is?”

Without turning around, Ferguson shrugged, and gave another pump with his foot into the moist air of the night.  

Charlie never returned to ask about his skateboard.  The next day, Bart wasn’t at the Tin Shack begging for a dollar, as was his morning schtick.  The day after that, when neither of the missing transients reappeared, rumors began to circulate.  

Someone eventually went to police station, and reported them missing, but no one was sure where Bart or Charlie resided at night.  Tyson recalled that they’d both slept up in the baseball dugouts, but it had been weeks since anyone had seen them up there.  No one knew their last names.  It didn’t take much time for all the ultracrepidarian conspiracy theories to take shape.  For weeks, at the beach, the Natch tables, and along the sidewalks of town, there was little talk of anything else.  

Their absence was a trending topic of discussion.  As the wave of gossip rose, socialites who had never spoken a word to Bart or Charlie, surmised that it was queer--more than a little suspicious that neither of the vagabonds could be found online.  They were both millennials.  Most social media addicts surmised that they must have had accounts before their abduction, but now their accounts were deleted.  But where was the evidence?  No one could remember receiving a friend request from either.  Those in the community with the highest technological proficiency, purported that Bart and Charlie's Facebook accounts might have been deactivated, but they wouldn’t have been deleted, if they existed at all.  It was a moot point.  No one found any online photos, or any pictures, to plaster up on ‘missing’ posters.  

It was the CIA who captured them to work in a FEMA camp, reasoned a handful of flat-earthers, but no one took them seriously.  The truth was, no one was sure whether Charlie or Bart were missed.  No one knew a thing about their families, either one’s origin, and it became evident that they were each other's only friends.  Some said Bart had been around longer than Charlie, but no one recalled when either had arrived on the island.    

It wasn’t that he particularly missed Charlie or Bart, but Ferguson feared he’d be identified by the picture.  Or had it been a video they’d shot?  Maybe he’d been wrong about the truck videoing them, but then what had that spotlight been for?  Throughout the next couple of days, a panic would grip him when he detected the roar of a diesel engine, but with time, homeostatic normalcy set in, and the sound was a bit unnerving, but nothing to fret about.  

As for Bart and Charlie, Ferguson still preached that they ran, and didn’t stop running until they were in Kona.  Why not?  It was a positive reconstruction of the unknowable past, especially in contrast with some of the theories about their involvement with terrorist organizations.  If the right voice could bring up the Patriot Act, most heads around were sure to nod with solemnity.  

After a few months, the rest of the Pahoa loafers forgot that Charlie’s skateboard hadn’t always belonged to Ferguson.  Ferguson’s was the face people expected to see.  When the rush of skateboard wheels on pavement could be heard rolling down from the gas station, everyone knew it would be good ol’ Ferg.    

In the daily dawdling of the rest of the idle souls, which haunted Pahoa’s sidewalks, or slouched under awnings, festering up the place, nothing of consequence had changed.  In a succession of Mondays, the street dwellers would sidle along the side of less disheveled folks, all gathered around the open mic, like a warm hearth after sunset.  

As for Ferguson, he was humble in his concession.  Tyson’s suggestion about rolling a doobie had been solid.  Instead of bringing his custom blown, double-helix dragon pipe, Ferguson now sparked up joints--joints he’d prerolled to share on the sidewalk.   

After a toke, their foggy minds often traipsed down well worn and familiar paths.  Each stoned meandering would flip through its own unique set of possibilities.  What had happened to Bart and Charlie?  But no one spoke aloud what nobody could know for certain.  They hadn’t for weeks.  Every plausible scenario had been thoroughly exhausted.  New topics of discussion trended, but as for the missing?  Out of sight, eventually, meant out of mind.  The confused memory of the two nitwits faded like smoke curling up from the end of Ferguson’s medicine.  He passed the diggidy to Tyson, and spun a wheel of his skateboard, introspectively.  

He’d installed new bearings, and so round and round the little wheel went.  It was no longer encumbered by the friction of rust and street scum.  New was good.  And the skateboard had always been Ferguson’s, hadn’t it?  

The wheel went round until a trilling voice wrapped around the corner, and Ferguson pinched it to a stop.  He had to look, and turned his back to the street to peer around the wall.  His jaw dropped.  She was new, a perfect face amongst the autumnal influx of other not-so-pleasant-looking travelers fleeing winter on the mainland.  Ferguson listened, pleasurable goosebumps raising the hair on the back of his neck.  Every note swept the air, flawless.  As the rain began to fall, he stood straighter, stupefied, with a lopsided grin of twitterpation.  Droplets landed on his shoulders emitting the smallest of interfering noises with their contact.  He stepped to the center of the sidewalk where the acoustics were triangulated.  

Ferguson inhaled the fresh smell which permeated the air, feeling rapturous.  While entranced, a spotlight illuminated his back, his shadow leaping forward into existence, long and black as the light was bright behind him.  He tuned out the diesel engine.  It was growling out an ominous melody in B flat major.  Ferguson was leaning forward, trying to soak up every bend and fluttering of the voice of this amazing artist.  Never before had he heard anyone who could belt out with such Perfect Pitch, floating up and down the scales of the melody like grace itself.  As big hands gripped Ferguson by the arms, pulling him to the street, he only stammered, grateful to be alive and witnessing this most irie of vibrations rise into the night.