CONTINUED ATTEMPTS AT FLANNAGAN TAM
Mott is with Loo the afternoon Jerry Garcia o.d.ed on heroin in Cali. They drive in Loo’s small, puke-green car having taken cd’s back to Zia’s in Tempe, AZ. Loo is ornery because he didnt get any money for his music. I did. My guitar was in the back seat. We drank cheap beer in cans and lit a bon fire and sang happy, melodous, Gratful Dead tunes that neigher knew the lyrics to,
That night Mott got drunk and mad and punched Loo in the mouth. That was the last time Mott saw Loo, his best friend.
* * *
As soon as Mott walked thru the slider into the POD on his side he was met by a younger white man: his head was shaved and his eyes were tattooed a la Alice Cooper.
“You’re in the corner, number 18, by the showers but out-of-view from the cameras … Gladiator School! Great cellie: Ghost …” The kid took Mott’s green foam mattress over his shoulder. “My name’s Jeff,” he said, “follow me …” They passed men playing cards and chess at stainless steel tables with benches but most walked in a big concentric circle, before and behind them. Above on the left side was the bubble were the cops watched. They also shouted shit over the inner-COM.
“Ive got two reefas,” Mott told him, “I need a light …” Jeff held his right index finger to his lip; Mott thought about being insulted. Jeff looked at Mott and raised his eyebrows up and down. Now, Mott really got mad and stomped his right foot, hard, up and down on the tile.
Mott’s cellie, Ghost, was a big, bald, bad-ass white boy with a swazie tattooed on his belly. He pointed up indicating the upper-bunch, the bunk which Mott prefered.
Mott love Ali. He want a tattoo of her smiling face, mouth open, seductively, eyes: Closed. Farrah Fawcett hair, only dark brown with red highlights … the hair strands tattooed across Mott’s right buttocks … he longed to stare upon it, over his right shoulder, looking into a mirror and masturbating …
He hadnt engineered the logistics yet. Quite.
Tam stood in the corner of a white cell and lost count … he’d awakened upon a shoulder and remembered to breathe. At least 50 motherfuckers in here: blacks, mexicans, whites … there’s an Asian guy … fascinating.
“Flannagan!”
Drunk, greasy and nauseated, Tam staggers across bodies toward the sliding, cell door. “We rollin’?” he says to the D.O., meaning: “Ive been printed and mug shot and classified so … where’s my bed?”
Tam’s mouth was a putrid dish of dirt but the drinking fountain didnt work: nothing did and getting water was like finding gold.
Tam had been booked into county jail 100 times before. 4th Ave, downtown Phoenix; Maricopa county; Sheriff Joe. He goes upstairs to Max … Max is the best.
“Tam is a BITCH’S name!” says the D.O. … the Deputy Officer … the Door Opener … the retard the cop the PIG?!? Now, that’s not a very nice thing to say …
Another D.O. hands the first some small cards, white with green print. He whispers, wet, into his partners’ ear, “His father’s name was CARROLL …”
Together, they laugh like grocery cashiers, only face-to-face. Two white, fat, middle-aged turn key republican short-haired … Swine.
“Fuck you,” Tam told them
The second pig slammed the cell door.
* * *
Mott thought about Loo, mayhap his best friend, whom he hadnt seen in ten years. He didnt know if Loo was alive or dead. As Mott walked along the edge of Ocean Beach, his bare feet wet with sea weed … Loo lived in Laos. Last known.
And? And, Loo thought too about Mott; in fact, Loo had sent Mott an email, minutes ago: There’d been an earthquake in Asia … causing a tsunami … And? And, Mott strolls along the San Diego coast shirt and shoeless.
“Mott embarrassed me, last night,” Ali told them, attempting to be funny and self-abrasive: “I dont like when Mott makes fun of me!”
Mott stood and looked around the room. He looked at Eli.
“My my my, Ali … Poor, misunderstood.”
“He know so much!”
,,,,,,,,,,,,,,this scene should be a tender turning…of almost making Ali …CRY in near SHAME …
Mom told him not to sign … 21 yrs old … “Those lawyers on tv … Lollie lost the deal!
“Yeah, so, this is The Zone: Skid Row … strange driving thru it, Ali …” said Mott.
An equal amount of whites, Mexicans and blacks. Same old railroad tracks; same old buildings; same old St Vincent’s campus, overrun with people: some walking, some lain down.
“Ali?” said Mott, “what do they call hot sauce in England?”
“The Queen’s cunt?”
“No!” said Mott: “Katchup …”
Allen Mahan 