Fiction
Pretty Girl
Ken Wainio
Ben had an Uncle Lloyd who ran a rest home. The state subsidized the enterprise allowing Lloyd to keep three or four tenants. "Rest homes are for old people you think we want to make it with some old lady?"
"It's not just for old women young crazy ones too."
"Yeah I've seen them before Warden they're ugly as shit."
Ben shook his head. "Lloyd's got some pretty ones."
"How come you haven't got in their pants before?" demanded Lonnie.
"Lloyd's kind of difficult that way. You gotta catch him in the right mood usually when he's drunk. And the girls aren't always around. Sometimes they stay different places."
"What makes you think there's a pretty one around now?"
"Because I just saw her the other day when I went over to bring Lloyd a fresh bottle. She was outside grooming her horse. Her name's Cecilia. She's got long black hair and a really nice body."
"No shit?"
"No shit and when I came out of the house she was straddled across the horse rubbing her pussy getting off sure as shit. And she gave me the biggest nastiest grin I've ever seen."
"Why didn't you fuck her on the spot?"
"Because asshole my mom was waiting for me in the car. We were just on a liquor run for Lloyd."
It was raining again. We had no transportation and the three of us had to walk three miles across the valley finally hitching a ride between the country store and tracks. Mrs. Domingo's ratty old chicken house was just by the road. Lonnie suddenly rushed down the bank giggling crazily. He scooped a handful of chicken shit and flung it at us speckling our clothes. We pursued him into the chicken yard scattering hens and plastering Lonnie with black stinking muck. A free-for-all until Mrs. Domingo screamed at us to get the hell out before she started shooting. Lonnie and Ben were splattered from head to toe. I'd gotten off the easiest by being the most cowardly. Only my cap was totaled and I rinsed it out in a mud puddle.
Lloyd's rest home was really just two shacks dragged together in a clearing surrounded by white fir and scrub oak. Lloyd occupied the front shack and his tenants inhabited the larger anterior one he called his barracks. There was a bathroom and a hand railing along the front steps, which met all the regulations for him to take in state wards. He had no other income and it was keeping him in liquor.
We entered without knocking.
Lloyd was sitting at a rickety table with a checkered blue and white oilcloth in the center of the room. He was drinking whiskey and chewing tobacco occasionally spitting into a coffee can.
He sniffed the air. "Smells like you boys been fucking chickens in the coop again."
"Naw we're looking for girls."
"All covered with hen shit."
"This here's Lonnie and that's . . ."
"Shut the fuck up I don't care who they are."
Lonnie and I positioned on a dusty old couch with the stuffing coming out. Ben settled in a chair by the wood stove. Lloyd beaded us one by one with an ancient watery eye ready to kill but then laughed instead. "Sorry crew."
"You don't look so good yourself Uncle Lloyd."
"Don't feel too good either. Kidneys leaking back aching liver puffed up and rotting like a dead cat."
"How you figure you go on living?"
"I don't move. Trick to living long is staying in one position. Girls bring me what I need and tend the fire. I just sip and chew."
Ben straightened his shit-spattered army jacket, slicked back his kinky wet hair, and grinned famously. "Where are they Uncle Lloyd the girls?"
"Sally and Loas be in the barracks."
"You know I don't mean them old crones I'm talking about the young ones. I know you got one or two around somewhere."
Lloyd cackled into his can. "Not for you."
"Come on Lloyd at least let us see Cecilia."
Lloyd wheezed spat shook the spit around in the can farted looked us over threw back his head and screamed "Cecilia!"
Low music had been playing in the back. Now it stopped and we heard shuffling feet and low muttering voices. A hoary face peered out of the barracks door. It belonged to a woman so old wrinkled and dirty she looked like part of the rotting wallpaper. She advanced haltingly into the room cocking her broken yellow glasses on her nose. "What you want Lloyd?"
"Where's Cecilia?"
"She went down by the creek to fetch some bay leave and wild onions."
"What for?
"The stew that's what for."
"Well how long ago was that?"
"Couple hours."
"Takes a couple hours to get some leaves and onions?"
"Hell she took off on that horse. Might be clear across the valley by this time. You know how she is."
"Well shit where's Loas? These boys want some pussy."
Eyes swimming in her cloudy glasses she stared at us hard. "Pussy huh?"
She stuck her head back in the barracks. "Loas come out here Ben and some of his friends want some pussy."
We heard more muttering and scraping around and a woman even older and more broken down than Sally appeared. She was about six feet tall gray hair pushed back from a massive forehead skin hanging off her like deflated bags.
I could tell by the empty way she moved sensing the room like an animal she was totally blind.
"Shit I can smell them all right. How many are there? Smells like a whole army."
"Just three reckon we can handle them?"
"Why sure be my eyes now honey and lead me to them."
Sally took Loas by the arm. "Let's start with Ben he's the most horny one."
Ben was in the corner with Sally and Loas between him and the door and by the time he was half way to his feet they were on him. "Shit get away you crazy old crones it's Cecilia I want not you."
"Oh hell now Ben Cecilia ain't going to do you no good. That child's off somewhere on her old horse. Loas get hold of him whilst I take a gander at his pecker. See if it's right for our needs."
Loas reached out a snakelike arm and got him around the neck. Sally knelt down on the edge of the hearth and began clawing at Ben's zipper but couldn't get a grip with her stubby decaying thumbs. "Hell boy hold still you want some pussy or not?"
Loas had gotten him from behind and was smothering him with her bulk. She was a good three inches taller than Ben and twice as broad. "No you let go or I'll flip you you old cow I mean it I will!"
"Go ahead if you think you can," she growled putting all her weight on his back while Sally struggled with his pants. She had given up on the zipper and was just trying to rip them down.
Lloyd was laughing his guts out. "You know Loas was in the state pen twenty years for killing her first husband. And she's been in more loony bins than you have inches on your cock."
"Help you guys get them off me god-damn it!"
Lonnie and I had already backed safely to the door. There was no way we were going to get involved.
Sally had finally got his pants to his knees and was groping his crotch.
"Hell Loas he ain't even got a hard-on it's soft as a turd. How you figure you're going to get pussy with a thing like this?"
"Maybe we can firm it up with some Pine-Sol that'll put some fire in it. Get the jug whilst I hold him down."
"Ah shit Loas it ain't no use. This puny thing's almost dead as Lloyd's. Might as well let him go and see if these other boys got anything more valuable."
We skipped out in the yard. Ben came flying after us trying to get his pants up.
"You boys running off so soon, there's two hot ladies if you change your mind."
"Fuck you old witches next time you try that I'll kill you I swear."
"Hell you ain't going to get no action from a corpse. I tried that one time it didn't work."
We hightailed up the muddy drive Ben swinging his fists and cursing us for not helping him. Lonnie dodged a blow. "It was your fault Warden there probably isn't even a Cecilia."
"Yes there is!" He stopped dead in the road to look back. "Damn she's beautiful."
It was true. Her beauty haunted us all the way back along the winter road.