Little Baby Faulkner

20

Late, later, latest into that night and into the next morning, did Brooklyn and Charisma and I sit up downstairs in their house snorting of cocaine, yes, but most epically snorting and blowing our noses in that order before piling up a line—a rail!—from our now seeming impossibly huge supply of cocaine. We each carried a roll of toilet paper. We each had our own stack of coke set upon living room furniture..piles upon piles upon piles.

We watched Jeopardy. Wendy and Charisma's grammy went upstairs somewhere before we went on our drive to drop off Rambuncto and crew—they were silent now—the only sound was the sound of our snorting. Even the dogs knew not to interrupt that.

"Category: Authors. In 1937 his sister said he had 'hats of every description,' which he would use as a 'foundation of his next book.' "

"Come on, Matthew: You should know this!"

"I have no fucking clue."

"Dr Seuss!"

"What?"

"He's saying because he has hats. Hats, Charisma! Hats!!"

"Oh..! Because Dr Seuss—I got ya!"

(More snorting and blowing of noses.)

"Ok. Guys. He's doing the next one."

"Category: World leaders. He came to power 34 days before FDR and left it 19 days after him."

We all sit stumped.

"Adolf Hitler."

"Did you get that one? Wake up Brooklyn. We need all hands on deck for this shit here."

"Yeah, it's because—from their perspective—"

"Oh I see—never mind!"

(We all dipped into our coke piles and none of us was even able to snort coke anymore with the snot pouring out of our noses. These were the kind of snorts that you would normally not ever do in front of your fuck buddy—they were that epic and that personal.)

"Historical figures. Clue: A 2012 poll by Britain's national army museum voted this man, born in 1732, as the nation's greatest military enemy. George Washington!"

"Motherfuck! George Washington!! George Washington's mother. Fuck!"

I stood up. "These motherfuckers are here to fuck with us, every man and woman in our country. These aren't simply Jeopardy questions, they're assaults on the fabric of our democracy."

"No, what he said," declares Brooklyn, and Charisma catches me looking over Brooklyn with those wolf jowls, slobber pouring out the side of my mouth.

Charisma mouths the words to me: "Want to come upstairs?"

I'm about to whisper, "Yes. Yes!" but the dogs are up and out the house with barking/roars and instantly, too: Brooklyn up and out behind them and Charisma's up and out behind her and they're screaming, "Did you open the door?" and Charisma's like, "No!" I'm like, "What should I do? Should I come out there with you?" and both are like: "No!"

So I go to the front screen door and prop it open.

Brooklyn runs by—followed by Chuck and Seymour. "Do you see them?" she asks.

"No!" I say.

And as Brooklyn goes, here come the dogs, but it's too late to yell at Brooklyn, "They're behind you!" but I yell it anyway. "Brooklyn..!"

Then I run to the back door and prop its screen door open and Charisma comes past me as a shadow, saying: "No! Close the doors. We'll open them when we get the dogs in."