“Whatever, man.”
The nighted downtown streets bustled with cars and Christmas shoppers. Strings and strings of Christmas lights glowed, swaying in a light breeze; at intersections, garlands of shimmering tinsel looped from phone pole to phone pole. Down the road, they heard, “You better not pout, you better not cry…”
“Shit, tomorrow’s Christmas, man,” Case Piece realized. “Been so busy slingin’ skag, I forgot.”
“Yeah, man, Kuh-wiss-muss! We need to gret some crandy cranes!”
“Fuck, I guess Menduez don’t even celebrate Christmas.”
“Rye you sray that?”
“Well, shit, man. Can’t see a dude who cuts puppys’ heads off bein’ much into Christmas.”
“Oh, yeah…”
“And I guess he back in the warehouse now. I seen him bring in a puppy last night…”
Case Piece and Sung said nothing for several grim minutes. They knew what was in store for that puppy…
Case Piece slowed, eyes opened in a sudden supervening awareness, “Yo, yo, I feel a Rap comin’ on…”
“You grow, Crase Pleece!”
Case Piece strutted his stuff in the street, pointing his fingers down in the fashion of pistols. “We come in, then we leave, I got tricks up my sleeve, you better fuckin’ believe, this the best Christmas Eve! Diggy dick, doggie daw, I got some Browntown jaw, I live to bust the law, like none you ever saw, and I clip to your clop, clean the floor, with a mop, I sell drugs, then I shop, I’m the king of Hip Hop! I teach the pig a lesson with my fuckin’ Smith and Wesson, with you I be messin’, word that rhymes be confessin’! I’m the Vee-Eye-fuckin’-Pee, I’m the dude you wanna be, I drop a buck, I pick it up, I see my boyz, I say ‘Wuz up?’ I drink a beer, I take a pee, I shag some trim, oh my, oh me! I do a dime, I do the crime, I’m gettin’ laid like all the time, and without-out even trine, I think up shit that rhymes!”
“Grawd damn, Clase! You Hip Hop jreen-nee-uss!”
“My good blood, Menduez, he do whatever I sez, and Highball be our ‘ho, her gobble-game is super-pro. After a john, fill her with cum, she go get me, a Coke and rum! She got great tits, got great can, get on the mike, my man! This who we is, this who we be, we’re the NSG-3! We’re the thugz, there ain’t no finer, my dawg Sung, he from China!”
“Aw, fruck, man!” Sung grimaced. “Ko-wee-ah, Ko-wee-ah!”
“Shit, sorry, man. I keep forgettin’…”
Just as they turned onto a residential road, they found themselves facing a smoky rumbling and two dim, misaligned headlights.
“Who this?” Sung asked.
“Junkies, I hope.”
The vehicle was an overly large and very old dented black delivery truck.
“How much skag we got, Sung?”
“Froor bags.”
“Runnin’ low. Maybe we get rid of it now…”
Smoke chugged, then gears shifted and the truck rumbled forward.
“Why, hey there, fellas!” cracked a decidedly redneck voice.
“Shit, ‘necks, them rope-a-dope kind from the hills,” Case Piece muttered beneath his breath. “These dudes ain’t gonna cop no smack, man.”
“Maybe they rill! Who knows?”
A shaggy head leaned out the driver’s side window of the truck; a bushy beard consumed most of the face.
“Hey, my dawg. I’m yo’ man on the scene, know what I mean? We’se bustin’ moves ‘cuz were phat on the grooves. You want some smack, jack?”
The shaggy redneck looked cockeyed at him. “What’s that, fella?”
“Fo’ shizzle, my mizzle. I got tizzle in my gizzle. This a drug ‘hood, man. If you coppin’ drugs, then we’se your thugs.”
The redneck looked to his long-haired passenger. “Dumar, you got any idea what he up’n means?”
“Shore don’t, Paw. Must be some new kind’a citified talk.”
“It’s Browntown yaw-yaw, Paw, the jaw and the law. The talk of the street and we the dudes you need ta meet. If it’s dope you grope, then I’m your hope!”
“You grow, Clase Preece!”
The redneck looked frustrated. “Aw, well, fella, you’s can probably tell we ain’t from ’round here, and no offense but I ain’t got no idea what that was just come out’cher mouth. See, what we’se wonderin’ is, we’se hopin’ you can tell us if’n you seen a big white fancy motor-home drivin’ ’round here?”
“Mrotor home?” Sung said very, very slowly.
“That’s right, son, a big ‘un. City fella named Paulie drivin’ it.”
“Sorry, Pop. We ain’t hip to your hop,” Case Piece lied with reasonable effect. “We don’t know no Paulie and ain’t seen no motor-home.”
The redneck stroked his beard. “Aw, well, that there’s too bad, son, but thank ya fer yer time’n you’n yer friend have a happy holiday!”
“Solid,” Case Piece said and watched the truck rumble away.
Case Piece looked gravely to Sung. “Shit, man. You know who they is? They the dudes laying some serious big-top mezzy disrespezzy on Paulie and his crew.” Indeed, how could he forget that movie on Paulie’s laptop? They drilled a HOLE in that chick’s head, and then they, then they…. “Paulie said they was rednecks. How else rednecks like them be hip to Paulie?”
“Shrit, man! We better crawl Prawlie up white now and tell him!”
Case Piece reached halfway down his fuckin’ ass for his phone but, “Shit. My cell’s back at the crib. Let’s go!”
They jogged through the cool night, blinking sneakers slapping pavement. When they turned past the warehouse front gate…
They stopped.
Just like the other night, the Winnebago sat before the warehouse, its tiny windows lit. Paulie’s two over-coated strong-armers stood outside, smoking cigarettes.
A muffled scream seemed to explode from inside the motor-home.
Highball! Case Piece realized. “Bros, man, what’s—”
“Goin’ on?” Cristo said with a smirk.
Argi looked stone-faced as he flicked an ash. “Them rednecks hit us again, harder than last time. Paulie ain’t happy.”
“On a fuckin’ rampage again so he’s ventin’ his frustrations on your whore.”
“Shit, man!” Case Piece dashed into the Winnebago, just in time to see a red-faced and insane-eyed Paulie stuffing Highball’s head once more into Melda’s vaginal morass.
“Those fuckin’ guys! GodDAMN it, Doc! They piss me off SO MUCH!”
Dr. Prouty sat hunched to the side before the open laptop. He raised his brows at Case Piece, as if to say, Things aren’t going so well today.
Highball, as usual, had been stripped naked, and now, with her head completely swallowed, her bare legs flailed, her heels drumming the floor.
“Paulie, holy shit, man! It ain’t right to keep stickin’ Highball’s head in there just ‘cuz you’re whilin’!”
Melda giggled. She was eating Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream Pies as Highball’s terrified head churned deep in her loins.