March 3, 2008
Running.
Clawing through the heavy, mustard-gas darkness that came away in spider-web shreds between his fingers, Vincent's fists and legs pumped up and down like pistons. His breath was shoved out of his lungs in cataclysmic sighs and his entire body was shaking.
Shards of glass were hanging in front of his eyes. Jagged holes of light in the night's all-inclusive embrace of downtown Madison; frayed ruptures in the smothering velvet blanket in front of him. The night was coagulating with car exhaust. And sweat. The smell of blood and sweat.
Harsh, sweet, dizzying.
He choked on the oxygen ravaging his lungs, burning his throat, scalding his tongue. Acidic and angry, and yet he drank at it even more desperately. Vincent imagined the smoldering cold air probably tasted something like antifreeze. Or gasoline. He was pretty sure that if he lit a match at that moment the air would combust and perspire dazzling napalm raindrops, eating holes in the black bleached asphalt and revealing the throbbing crimson heart of the city.
And still he ran.
Gasping air.
Napalm air.
Vincent turned a corner, praying to God that the bastard chasing him would trip and impale himself on his own switchblade, which was drawn and screaming for Vincent's skin. Tearing through puddles of rainwater and juking around iron monster dumpsters that leered at him like urban gargoyles, Vincent realized that if the switchblade bastard caught him he would probably die. Lunge, plunge, withdraw. Stab. And stab again. And again.
Roses blooming across a cotton t-shirt.
Dabs of red paint on an immaculate human canvas.
Another tragic gang related homicide.
Hell, he hoped he could keep running. Running forever. Running away from the switchblade, running from Juan, running from the Norteños.
Running!
He grazed through jaundiced pools of incandescence radiating from streetlights that seemed to lean forward a little closer – long-necked – to watch the chase, silently betting on the outcome.
The kid's fast.
But he can't run forever.
Look, the other one's getting tired.
I guess there's no running from a death, though.
Vincent squeezed his eyes shut as he felt his sides ripping open – naked and exposed, bayoneting pain like premature knife wounds. Like foreshadowing. It was true. He couldn't run forever. There would come a point when his legs would explode in a storm of burning petroleum jelly and his breath would turn into cement and drop through his lungs. He had to stop some time. He had to get the switchblade bastard off his tail.
Through the sounds of the night – sirens and screams and grinding inhalations – Vincent heard his pursuer's panting. Almost by his ear. It was beautiful music, really. An instrument that whispered the tantalizing prospect of death. A strange temptation. Pain twisting seductively in a passionate dance before his eyes.
Vincent shuddered.
He should have never stepped into the car with Juan.
The Mustang had been his funeral hearse.
A hill. Down the hill. The sidewalk seemed to be falling away from him, dropping down into an all-inclusive embrace from the city below, where headlights and shop-fronts scintillated against the backdrop of a smoky horizon. Like jewels sparking on a table top. Watched by urban skyline beasts.
The switchblade bastard was even closer.
Footsteps like drumbeats. Like heartbeats. Beautiful music for a beautiful city.
Vincent danced along and a mixed paint world swirled dizzy maelstroms in front of his eyes, drizzled with blood-trails of red and yellow and black.
Faster!
His mind screaming at him, his body heaving, Vincent stumbled and turned another corner, into a motel parking lot. The open verandas of the motel puncturing the lot in a half-rectangle laughed at him, dimly lit room doors gaping at him like the mouths of titans.
They roared laughter.
They sang laughter.
More music. Knife-shaped saxophones playing notes that hinted of an after-life and a body bag. And sneaker-beats that shredded the night with frightening harshness.
There was a line of cars in front of him.
Vincent jumped onto the hood of a Honda and slid off, his knees buckling under him as he hit the ground. His pantlegs were immediately soaked in a cocktail of rain water and oil and he tried to get up. His legs responded with silence. Aching. Spent. Useless stumps of flesh that planted themselves on the asphalt and refused to get up. Vincent sobbed, his breath rattling.
Nothing could save him now.
He could imagine his mother now, a cigarette dangling out of the side of her mouth, watching him. She pulled on the Camel, closed her eyes, and massaged her forehead. Consequences, chico, she was saying. You run with this kind of crowd, you should expect this kind of treatment. It serves you right. Smoke wreathed her: wings on an unforgiving angel.
It serves you right.
He tried to heave himself up again.
Instead, the parking lot spun.
Suddenly, no more footsteps.
The switchblade bastard had seen him disappear behind the Honda.
He came around the car slowly, his face half-shadowed in the parking lot light. The other half was emotionless. Tattooed with ice-chip eyes and a mouth that looked as if he had taken his own knife to his face. Jagged. A coagulating scar. Vincent shrank against the car beside him as the other stepped forward. Something about the kid's face was curious. It had a regal, elegant kind of physical poetry to it that appealed to Vincent; the kind of face that belonged on canvas, half-shadowed as it was now. A monster from a bad dream.
The switchblade bastard was laughing.
Mother was frowning.
“You thought you could run, maricón? You thought you could get away alive? Huh?”
Vincent didn't respond.
The other laughed. “Must not understand. This is the real world now. This isn't a joke. This is a war. This is Madison at it's finest.”
The switchblade grinned – a stilettoed grin – and glinted in the darkness.
“You're gonna pay.”
Vincent's fists balled up, solidifying into two sacks of lead shot, and he felt something tug at the edges of his mouth. A sneer. He was sneering.
Why the hell would he be sneering? He was staring death in the face! His head was on the chopping block! He was smiling!
Glorious, defiant stupidity, tasting like sweet wine.
He just couldn't stop himself.
The smirk blossomed into fruition. And the switchblade bastard smiled. So the kid had a spine. There would be some opposition.
More fun, then.
I read it though 
. It may just be me though. I suggest getting some opinions on it.
