Actually, what the hell is this “little did I know” business. I didn’t know at all that I would soon be joining her in the very same hospital, because I can’t see into the goddamned future. Why would I be able to know that even a little? “Little did I know.” Jesus.
You can take pretty much any sentence in this book and if you read it enough times, you will probably end up committing a homicide.
So Rachel was in the hospital, and Earl and I were at home watching Withnail and I, an obscure British film about two actors who are constantly drunk and on drugs. They take an insane vacation in the countryside, where they almost starve to death. Then the uncle of one of the actors shows up and basically tries to have sex with the other one. We were just getting ready to do a new film, but we hadn’t gotten Mulholland Drive in the mail yet, so we found Withnail and I in Dad’s collection and it was good enough that we were debating doing a remake of it.
It was actually sort of awesome. The constant alcohol-related freaking out of Withnail reminded us a lot of Klaus Kinski in Aguirre, the Wrath of God, and we were fired up that there were accents that we could try to do. In general, I would say Earl is slightly better than me at accents, but that doesn’t mean he’s actually any good at all.
“How does he say it? The Irish man in the bar? ‘I—Aye cahlled him a ponce.’”
“Naw. He say it like, ‘OI CARLLED HEM A PON—A PORNCE.’”
“Ha!”
“PAWWWWRNCE.”
“Oh man. That’s not it, but that’s a lot funnier.”
The word “ponce” kind of dominated one of the scenes. It turns out it’s British slang for “child molester.” We thought it was a little fucked up that they had a slang word for that, but then Earl pointed out that in America we say “motherfucker” all the time, which is just as disturbing.
“It fyeels like a pyig shat in my head.”
“HOW SHID OI KNOW WHERRRE WE AHRE? ET FEELS LOIKE A PEG SHAT IN ME EDD.”
“I think that’s a different British accent.”
“Yeah. It’s the one from Fish Tank.”
Fish Tank is an obscure recent movie we saw about an insane English girl from the projects. We loved that movie. We gave it an A for accents, A+ for profanity.
“So in this remake—”
“We gotta have ‘ponce’ in the title.”
“Yeah. That’s a good idea. We could call it Poncy Scheme.”
“The fuck’s that mean.”
“It’s like, a play on Ponzi scheme. Like the whole Madoff thing that happened a few years ago.”
“The fuck you talking about right now.”
“It’s fine. Never mind.”
“This title don’t have to be all clever and shit. We could just call it Two Poncy Dudes.”
“Actually that’s not bad!”
“Ponce-Ass Dudes on Vacation. Simple as hell.”
“That’s perfect. So I think you should be Withnail.”
“Withnearl.”
“Yeah. So I think the plot is pretty straightforward. Most of the time you’re drinking and then freaking out.”
“Lighter fluid and shit.”
“Yeah, that scene is going to be awesome.”
“I’m also gonna be that gay uncle. Draw a fake mustache and pretend to be all fat and shit. Be like, Boy, I’m gay as hell. I’ma fuck you.”
At the end of the movie, Withnail is bellowing at some wolves in the zoo. This scene was on our minds for some reason, so we decided to shoot it first. However, we didn’t have access to wolves. Instead, we decided that Earl should try bellowing at Doopie, the Jacksons’ big terrifying dog. This meant we had to go to Earl’s house.
“Maybe when we done with this we should visit Rachel at the hospital,” Earl commented as we got on our bikes.
“Oh,” I said. “Yeah. I don’t know if today’s OK to visit or when visiting hours are or whatever.”
“I called em,” said Earl. “We can show up anytime before seven.”
This was sort of surprising to me, and I was thinking about it on the ride to Earl’s. I mean, deep down, Earl is obviously a much better person than I am. But I still didn’t expect him to go to the trouble of calling the hospital for visiting hours and stuff. I guess it’s not really that hard to make a five-minute phone call, but it still struck me as something I wouldn’t have done unless someone made me do it.
Then I continued thinking about it and I got kind of depressed that I don’t even have my shit enough together to call the hospital and figure out when I can go visit. I really needed to step it up, or I was going to be the worst friend in the history of dying girls.
Basically I was thinking, thank God for Earl. Because I don’t really have a moral compass and I need to rely on him for guidance, or else I might accidentally become like a hermit or a terrorist or something. How fucked up is that? Am I even a human? Who the hell knows.
INT. JACKSON LIVING ROOM — LATE AFTERNOON
MAXWELL
Roll your damn pants down.
EARL
I biked over here.
MAXWELL
No one wants to see your weird-ass socks.
EARL
Nobody care about my socks.
MAXWELL
angrily
No one wants to see them nasty socks.
On our way in, we stumbled into Maxwell, one of Earl’s half brothers. Earl had his pant legs rolled up. This caused Maxwell to become enraged.
If you are confused as to why this would cause Maxwell to become enraged, that is totally understandable. I’ve learned over the years that basically anything can get anyone in the Jackson house enraged.
Cause: Madden ’08 disc is scratched
Effect: Maxwell hurls Brandon into the television
Cause: Humidity
Effect: Felix uses Derrick’s forehead to inflict damage on Devin’s face
Cause: There is a bird outside
Effect: Brandon strides around aiming blows indiscriminately at people’s testicles
When a fight breaks out, everyone is fair game, and unfortunately that includes the doughy, slow-moving white kid. As a result, my reflexes at Chez Jackson have become pretty quick. The moment someone takes off their shoe to hit someone else in the face, or someone else has their elbow in another kid’s mouth, I am halfway out the exit. If we’re not near an exit, I try to hide behind some furniture, although then when it gets shoved into a wall, sometimes I become part of that wall.
Anyway, Maxwell put Earl in a headlock and punched his head while Earl thrashed around. The commotion attracted the attention of several brothers, including Brandon, the thirteen-year-old psychopath with the “TRU NIGGA” neck tattoo. He came hurtling down the stairs like a missile with elbows. His teeth were bared, and his eyes were locked on mine. I made a small shrieking noise and turned to run.
Maxwell and Earl were in Brandon’s way, so I actually did make it out of the door before Brandon was able to elbow me in the head. The problem is, I got too excited. When I got to the end of the porch, instead of jumping, I sort of dove, as in, headfirst.
There’s a convention in films where, when someone is flying through the air, time slows down. The person gets to observe all of the various details of their environment, reconsider their course of action, maybe even contemplate the notion of God. Anyway, this convention is a lie. If anything, time sped up. My feet left the porch and immediately I was lying all scraped up on some cement with a broken arm. Almost as immediately, Brandon was standing over me.
“Yeah, nigga,” he piped, in his not-all-the-way-dropped thirteen-year-old voice. “Yeah, clumsy bitch.” He kicked me kind of halfheartedly.