The Lightening Strikes

The Lightening Strikes The Tarmac
Part 1

‘No man, I mean, look at the car outside.’  His friend, Jasper obeyed and followed his line of sight to the car beyond the window.  A rust encrusted, badly painted, panged piece of shit with slashed tires.
‘What about it?  It’s a hump of crap.’  Could Aubrey really compare the human life to that of a burned out car?  The unkempt darkness of Jasper’s topiary atop his head turned quickly back towards Aubrey Sykes, the immortality obsessed greatly bearded dirty man.
‘Yes indeed.  Who would want to drive that car?  That car is as good as dead’ a fake surprise sigh, ‘Unless!’ he pointed rather violently in Jasper’s confused, milky face, Jasper continued to twiddle his thumbs, through paranoia.  ‘Unless what?’ leaning his head forward, slightly tilted, in deep curiosity and this time cupping his hands, he stared full into Aubrey Sykes’ eyes, in a hope that he could understand better.  ‘Now, J’ the singular letter by which Jasper was known by his close nit group of friends, ‘What would you do, say, if you had all the money in the world, and wanted to drive this car forever and into beyond?’
‘I wouldn’t do anything’ Aubrey’s knowing smile and laughing, “in the know” eyes vanished instantly at Jasper’s jovial refusal to bite.  More angrily, but still friendly (after all, the two had been friends for some time) he retorted back, attempting to instil guilt in his closed-minded companion.  ‘As I would have said if you gave me the correct answer I was looking for…’ suddenly Jasper cut in, rude little one, Aubrey Sykes thought.
‘What was you looking for, Sykes?’  Jasper was genuinely confused, having no idea what he was supposed to have said, and therefore would have to pretend he understood Aubrey Sykes’ following lecture.  And that’s always tedious as hell.
‘The answer I sought after presently from you,’ he had this manner of speaking, Aubrey.  He was an educated man, and yet the place where he lived, and the people he shared it with had whittled him down to some conspiracy theorist dope fiend.  His way of talking was such that he could easily be speaking sense, but on the other hand, his little speeches always lacked that quality that made people believe them.  ‘Would have been more along the lines of “I would just have to keep changing the parts, keeping it in check”’
Jasper scrunched his face further and Aubrey once again seemed lightly amused.  ‘But I don’t wanna drive that god-damned car,” lightly amused to slightly irritated, after years of drug abuse Aubrey’s emotions are never too profound, ‘Especially if I have all the money in the world,’ a moment’s thought, ‘I’d buy a plane or something.’  Aubrey was astounded by his answers, Jasper has managed to hook himself on so firmly to drugs (like all of those who frequent the house), that not only can he remember if he just took a piss or not, but he’s totally incapable of embracing hypothetical situations.
‘You astound me, my friend.  All this is only hypothetical, I’m trying to explain to you, in a very simplistic manner of course,’ further scrunching from his companion prevailed, hinting at mild offence, ‘My main theories on prolonging the human life.’

*

Michael Siddel sat on his decrepit, infested chair in his decrepit, infested flat and ate decrepit, infested food.  But that didn’t bother him at the time, because what was a lot more astounding than the sheer amount of mould on his sandwich was the large, ferocious Alsatian, foaming with rabies and sporting a rumbling bass of a growl that was stood opposite his chair.  It snapped in the direction of Michael, who had seen this before.
It didn’t seem to bother him, and he continued to thriftily nibble the edges of his sandwich in silent disgust, and wonder whether he should start buying things for his home, his only possessions being the chair he was sat on, and the sandwich he was eating.  Come to think of it, Michael didn’t even have any idea where the sandwich had come from.
The beast (it would be inaccurate to describe something that size as simply a dog) was becoming more agitated.  Once again, Michael had seen this before.  The animal had never attacked Michael in the three years he had been visiting him, but it did destroy everything in the house.  Five times that thing had turned up at his newly furnished house and destroyed it all within only an hour.  Five times Michael would come in from a hard day at Ikea, take a seat and push the needle in, like a pencil navigating through a basketball hoop.  Five times Michael had woke up the next morning to remember, with tear-filled eyes, that it was in fact himself who had done the damage.
But every time it came back, it looked so real…Michael could feel its warm, moist breath on his sullen cheeks, he could hear its low rumbling calling card and he could smell the dank, disgusting and solid smell in the air, that every pore on the animal’s body produced.  This time, it  would not destroy anything, Michael had thought.  This time, it would not leave in his sleep and only return uninvited next time he tried to shoot up.
He had bought this chair for one dollar.  He had been proud of his purchase.  He had noticed the chair in street, took it off the street’s hands and left a dollar on the pavement.  Then the street had lent him a dollar for the bus ride home.  It was one of the most rewarding transactions in a long time for Michael, and he wasn’t having it ruined by an overgrown mutt.
Michael Siddel slowly took a red pen out of his left pocket.  The dog-like monster became scared and whimpered.  It laid on the floor in submission as the pen was brought higher above it’s head.  It cried it’s final moments away, and as Michael slowly brought the tip of the pen to his left temple the canine viciously jumped in attack towards him, but it vanished in a shadow-flash, sucked into a tiny dot in the middle of the room like an old television set being turned off.  Finally the dot vanished as the tip of the ball-point pen was mercilessly thrust into Michael’s head.
He slumped on the floor of his empty room, his blood cleaning the dust and old food that dominated the floor as it slowly engulfed every tile with a red, burning with the fires of the sun.  Michael Siddel, and his imagination, were dead forever.

*

‘That stupid motherfucker’ lamented Skinner, a usually dusty, creased person sporting his new suit bought especially for the funeral.
‘Remember where you are’ Aubrey reminded, slowly, quietly and carefully.  Also in a new cheap suit.  The congregation was small.  Only the drug addicts had shown up to the funeral.  Any sign of family or real friends failed to show itself.  Instead, the clergyman, who wanted to get this done with so he could go on his break, delivered his sermon to four badly suited wasters mourning a dead comrade in tied arms.  If only he could take them all into his church…Offer some free coffee or something, get them all in, lock the doors and gas them, the holy man thought.  Then he realised how much he reminded himself of Hitler and adjusted his disgusted expression to one of a friend, however much the idea of being friends with this rabble made his stomach turn.
‘Michael Siddel was a sad loss to us all’ he lied, ‘He was a vibrant character, a friendly man, with always an ear for those he loved’ or so he had been told.  Of course, he hadn’t known him personally, it would be blasphemy to be associated with…them.  ‘One so young, to be taken so suddenly, and with his own hands, is a wake up call to us all’ suddenly something snapped inside the old man as he looked the ugly bearded Aubrey Sykes in the eye.  His upset face was once again adjusted, this time to boiling anger.  He pointed a gnarled finger at the troupe, ‘And let it be a wake up call to you dopers!’.
All four of their faces lit up, bringing them back to earth from their bored thoughts.  ‘If you continue to let poison run through your veins this will continue to happen.  Death…needless death.  Look at you all!’  The fourth member, Alfieri looked down at his beautiful suit which his father gave him years ago and was offended.
‘I don’t have to listen to this, you god-fearing nazi!’ Aubrey was fuming, ‘This is a funeral!’  The clergyman attempted to retort but was cut off by Syke’s continuing onslaught, ‘Sure, we have a different lifestyle to you but one of our friends has died!’  The clergyman looked genuinely embarrassed by what he had said, and allowed himself a soft and almost silent ‘I know’ in reply.  Aubrey shook his head in disbelief, collected his three companions and walked home angrily, all the way raving about the clergyman and his disrespect.  The clergyman took a seat on one of the pews, looked up at the son of his god, and cried; all the while asking himself what had become of him.

*

Alfieri was a mysterious man, and one of few words.  He would sit in the corner of Aubrey’s ambient bedroom, preparing the drugs for their use.  Be it rolling the spliffs, constructing lines, tearing off the acid or heating the spoon; he did it all for them.  He wasn’t forced, it was more of a rapport he had worked up with construction.  In his life before the drugs he had worked on a building site, and wherever his hands were busy, his mind was happy.  He had immigrated to the U.S. whilst a child with his parents.  His mother had named him after one their country, Italy’s, most prolific tragedy writers, and tragedy was something which ran in Alfieri’s blood just as much as his wide array of narcotics.
Aubrey, the addicts’ leader, was afraid of him and often mused (when he wasn’t around of course) that he could be an undercover cop.  He had all the right specifications; he wasn’t in the house as much as the rest, he was a lot tidier than the rest and above all, his almost complete lack of speech.  It was that which put Aubrey truly on edge.  What was he thinking as he sat there, with all his little equipment, just listening to what people had to say.  It was very odd indeed, Aubrey often stressed.  If you were to look at Alfieri next to the other three addicts you’d see he was the least odd out of any of them, and that (it seemed) was what topped it off for Aubrey.
As Aubrey was taking all this into account while quietly sizing him up Skinner continued his story.
‘So I get to the shop right, ask for some king size Rizlas for tonight and the broad at the counter starts giving me some shit’ he was ecstatically throwing his arms around as he told his story.  Inevitably the story would end with minimal interest or laughter from the rest, but Skinner (whose stories were notoriously boring and pointless) never seemed to notice, managing to fill the room with his own ecstatic laughter anyway.  ‘And I’m like, “What the fuck, bitch, who are you to judge me?” yeah?’
‘Yeah, we get it you sexist fuck.’ cut in Alfieri, not looking up from his joint, whose rare speech could usually be enticed by Skinner’s terrible stories.  Jasper and Aubrey laughed at Skinner’s shocked face and as quickly as Alfieri had diverted from his work, he had already returned to carefully placing the evening’s herbs atop the murky tobacco.
‘’Scuse me, Syke’s, I gotta take a gypsy’s’ Jasper managed in-between laughter.  Syke’s looked surprised, and retorted,
‘You just went for one, you spaced, ridiculous little man.’  Halfway through standing up Jasper remarked, ‘Did I?’ to which Aubrey nonchalantly nodded.  ‘Well whatever, I need another.  Besides, you’re just as spaced as me.’  Quietly and softly once again from the corner came Alfieri’s voice, eyes now intently on his work again.  ‘That as may be, Aubrey maintains his composure, and at least had the mental capacity to remember his last piss.’  At this Skinner pretended to find it funny, and was followed by a very definitive ‘Correct!’ from Aubrey, with particular emphasis on the first syllable.
As soon as Jasper left the room, embarrassed, Aubrey straight away began talking about him, ‘I swear that kid’s got diabetes.  The amount of shit he eats.’  Alfieri was in a good mood, as he once again found himself contributing, ‘Personally, I reckon he’s got a jazz mag stored up there, y’know’ ending his sentence with a slow lick of the Rizla and a quick gaze into Skinner’s eyes.  Skinner was genuinely confused, as he found himself being most of the time.  He just wasn’t up with the lingo, ‘I didn’t know he liked Jazz…I thought he was a techno geek.’
‘The guy’s hardly a geek.  More of a wannabe.’ chimed in Aubrey, it was a usual occurance for Skinner to completely miss the meaning of something so this was hardly new.  ‘Besides, you pre-school reject, he means a wank mag.  To use the parlance of our times.’  As Skinner’s face caught on, Alfieri for the first time in the evening laughed, but carefully, making sure not to loose the green.  Mid-laughter Jasper re-entered the room.  ‘Eh, guys, isn’t it odd without Mike around?’  Aubrey, unlike Alfieri was never short of something to say, and as usual sarcastically replied, ‘You mean you miss his jaunty ramblings in the corner about some dog and constant whitey?’ Aubrey taunted, ‘’Because if so, you’ve smoked more than I’m aware of.’