The Wrong End of the Knife

By

Kent McKee

Int. Detective’s Office. Late Day

(We see smoke floating around in a room. Shades are slanted down. More smoke is blown up into the frame. Slow jazz is played as soundtrack. Pan down as even more smoke is being blown up. Camera follows smoke down as its going up. We see a young man in a white shirt, loosened tie, and slacks with his feet propped up on the desk.  He is smoking. This is MARTY.)

MARTY (voice-over)

It’d been a slow day. An even slower month. And the year=d gone by slower than an afternoon of waiting for your VD test results .  Yeah, the private eye game wasn’t so hot around these parts. No cases to solve. Nobody has affairs in this town, nobody murders, nobody even results to violence in disagreements. And I’ll tell ya I was plain sick of it. IC(office door is flung open, it’s MARTY’s secretary. She has a shrill voice.)

SEC.

There’s a girl that wants to see you.

MARTY

Customer?

SEC.

Who knows. She looks sorta trampy.

MARTY

Whaddya mean?

SEC.

I mean, she looks sorta trampy. Like she hasn’t had a shower in a few days, and the last one she did have was probably in a motel room being rented by a trucker.

MARTY

Listen, I don’t pay you to make assessments of my clients. I don’t care if that girl out there is Courtney Love. I need some dough, and I need it real bad. So you send her in. I’m on the level here, you say another word and you’ll be seein’ stars.

SEC.

Okay okay. (looks out office door) You can come in now.

MARTY (v.o. cont.)

But when that dame walked into my office I was the one seein’ stars. She was something all right, a real angel. And my secretary Doris was rightYshe was a bit on the skanky side-which is exactly what I look for in a woman. The dame was sexy all right. Maybe a little too sexy. (To SALLY) What can I do for you ma’m.

SALLY

Detective Sanchez?

MARTY

Yep

SALLY

You don’t look Mexican.

MARTY

I’m not.

SALLY

But-your name’s Sanchez.

MARTY

Just cause a fellas got the name Sanchez means he’s Mexican all of a sudden?

SALLY

Umm-well, yeah I thought so.

MARTY

Well you’re wrong Miss- dead wrong.  Lotsa guys with Hispanic last names aren’t actually Hispanic.  Nicholas Cage for example. Real last name is Lopez. But I don’t see you playing twenty questions with him.

SALLY

Nicholas Cage’s real last name isn’t Lopez!

MARTY (defensive)

Ok, so it aint! I changed my last name.  It used to be  Marty Mulligan.  But that don’t too tough, does it? Guy like me needs some street cred. Sanchez sounds tough. Guys named Sanchez are the leading cause of knife wounds in this country. And guys named Mulligan are on the wrong end of the knife, if ya catch my drift….

(e-mail us or Kent if you want the rest. It features Pritesh Patel teaching Marty how to be Indian.)

A real and true story by Fartlin (Kaitlin)

you are in Seathole and I miss you.

i’m sitting at the northgate transit center waiting for my damn bus to come and this really skeezy dude: overweight, glasses, wearing sweatpants, etc. approaches me and asks me to read this paper he wrote.  he then hands me a folded up slip with all this poetic wa wa garbage and asks me to read it and tell him what i think.  as i’m trying to read and not outright laugh, (oh you’ll see, i’m not just an asshole, it’s funny) he’s all putting his foot upon the bench i’m sitting on, looming and asks what i’m doing, if i’m just “hangin out, or what?” of course i’m not just fucking hanging out at this dumpy transit center by my fucking self writing in my fucking journal after dark!  fuck!  so i sez, “no, i’m just waiting for my bus home from work!” then, waving his crotchal region ever so subtly in my direction he has the nerve to ask, “do you live by yourself, or what?” i had to think quick, i was a little shocked and freightened so i sez, “oh, no, i live with my mom and dad…yep…” awkward silence and i’m thinking, go the fuck away so i can either a:laugh really hard at this mastery of words i’d just been presented with, or b:feel confused and pissed that some bedwetting mouthbreather just bothered me with his tard poetry jam and then pried into my fucking personal life.  but it didn’t end there, he sez, “oh, how old are you?” i wanted to just blurt out, “FOURTEEN!”  or “SEVENTY-ONE!” my rational self stepped in and sez, “eighteen?” i don’t know why, i’m twenty-four, but i felt doomed no matter what i said to this character and didn’t want to disclose any factual information.  maybe i should have just pissed my own pants right there on that bench…a part of me had a feeling this guy would cream his sweats right there on the spot if he was confronted with a piss soaked pubescent girl…

he then asks, “can i call you sometime?” ARE YOU MENTAL? so i sez, “no, my mom and dad are really strict about  boys…” awkward silence, blank retard stare  and then finally he sez, “ok, well you have a good night, you take care, ma’am”  ok will do.  kowafuckingbunga dude.

five minutes later…it just won’t end!  dude comes back needing more reassurance that his paper was good and if i were in an actual college classroom setting, would i give it an a, b, c, or d?  A +!  of course i told him that.  at that point i was just afraid of getting knifed, dragged into the parkinglot and choke fucked…so here’s the icing on the cake

war inside the garden

a prince and carriage stroll at night like shadows from the moon.  venus broke the news with rain and flowers began to grow.  a rook and castle came that year directing thoughts from wee. the king and jester settled once for a plot in marigold.  hope that finds a season’s end means starts to every seed.  carry through dark of night a map of treaded dome.  warring carts knew mortar once and the kingdom choose to stay.  laughter sounds through dark of night.  a perfect stone from drops of rain means chances for the self.  a green hedge glows through dark of night and battle never came.  the queen of darkness went to sneeze and lost the sun forever. springtime holds a single foe and green stems grow each day.  destroy the art of yellow blossoms where people share the day.  a heart from heaven tows renown and angels came to see.  a beehive sweats wax from skin and dictates for the sun.  desert sands inherit rain where magiv wanders freely.  the front line houses daffodils like lions with a mane a black and orange cannon ball weaves beneath the sun.  a yellow haze breaks the night and blossoms know the way.  a tyrant came from war one day to see the piper’s face. rainbows hold the fate of kings and hare a pot of gold.  mountains chant into the wind and garden flowers listen.  join a sovereign to journey’s end and take from evermore.  gold colored children own the bible and chant for food and water.  see the future of a gourd and glow in autumn’s day.  listen hard to a pedal’s song and dance among the chosen.  to end a season and it’s rain smile when dreams are made.

blake carlton 1/9/09