Fallout: Part III of The Journal Series

Chapter Fifteen: A Crash Course on the Probability of the Existence of the Jinx

January, 1999.

"And where the fuck are you now, huh?!" The words were corrosive, oozing with brimming disdain. "I know there's something going on, so fucking tell me what it is! Who is she, Slash?!"

A vicious growl of rage ripped my throat like eroding desert winds, leaving the soft tissue irritated and stinging, the smoke I inhaled intensifying the burn.

"There is no 'She,' Perla!" I yelled into the mobile phone, just as incensed, slamming my hand on the steering wheel. I hardly winced from the dull ache. "I'm literally sitting at the fucking studio, goddamn it, now get off my fuckin' back!"

"Then why don't I hear anything? Where the fuck are you?!"

My cackle was scornful, enraged, fringing on insanity as I bored a hole into the red brick wall before the hood of the car. 

"I'm parked outside waiting for you to shut the fuck up so I can go in," I clipped the words through bared, grinning teeth, mocking and sarcastic, cold and matter-of-fact. "You think I'm gonna drag this bullshit inside and wave it around for everyone to see? Izzy won't put up with it, Duff won't put up with it, and frankly, I'm fuckin' tired of puttin' up with it!"

"Fuck you!" The back of my skull smacked the headrest as I drowned out her bitching with a savage roll of my eyes. Her screaming dissolved to fiery murmuring for approximately five seconds, and I faded back in just in time to hear, "So fuck you, Slash!"

I calmly spat, "Fuck you, too," and violently punched the button to hang up. "Bitch."

It wasn't two seconds later that my phone rang again. I had no problem denying Perla's call, nor the three others that came in rapid fire succession.

I sighed aloud to myself, roils of stressed breath and heavy grey cigarette smoke clouding the car. I glanced at the clock, made an irked face, then glued vehement eyes to the now silent cellphone, muttering, "Come on, motherfucker. Where the fuck are you; I ain't got time for this shit."

Goddamn it, this was taking too long. I was parked out back behind the studio, set to meet my dealer any time now. I was just gonna meet him, pick up my shit, and be on my way. Nice and easy.

A couple snorts of Oxycontin would do me some fucking good, I figured. Calm my nerves. Put me on an even keel before we were set to rehearse and record around eleven A.M..

"Fucking Perla," my lips snarled on her name. "Get a fucking clue and just fuck off already. Jesus fucking Christ."

I was about to spew more profane phrases into the air when the phone rang once more, this time with glorious mercy.

"Hello?"

"Hey, man, I'm right around the corner. Where you wanna meet?"

"Uhh..." 

I glanced around all sides of the car, the coast clear of everything except a feral grey tabby cat perching atop a closed Dumpster, basking in the single beam of sunlight that reached the cold, narrow parking lot.