NOIR RICH BROOKS CONTEMPLATES THE MONTH OF NOVEMBER
by Orson on Nov 5, 2009 1:24 PM EST
Email
Print
Another cold day, he thought. His breath snapped in front of him like a frozen ghost. It disappeared as quickly as a married woman leaving your bed: suddenly, and sure to return in a few sad, empty seconds. He'd been breathing for years. It didn't seem to help.
He thought about pouring a scotch. He poured a scotch.
Only drunks drank in the morning, he thought. Fine. I'm not a drunk, I'm thirsty. If the water happened to be brown you couldn't blame the thirsty man. He drank it. It warmed him a bit. It always did.
He then put on a clean shirt. If there was something scotch and a clean shirt could not fix he did not want to meet it.
Of course he had met something scotch and a clean shirt could not fix. She was as long an outrigger to the waist. Treacherous from the waist up if you were a tailor, but he wasn't carrying a tape measure and thread that night. She stood at the bar waiting for the world to spin around her. He was happy to fall into orbit.
"What's a lady like you doing in a pit like this?" He tried to look into her eyes when he said this. He failed.
"Waiting for the right tiger to fall into my trap."
Her voice purred like the motor of an Indian motorcycle, and the rest of her was just as dangerous. They danced into the Waikiki night. The band played luau, the bartender played rum down their throats as fast as they'd drink it, and her fingers played on the back of his neck as if to show exactly where she could break him if she chose. Dames like her were like pickpockets, keen on misdirection. She would go for his heart, not his neck. Like a good pickpocket he would be miles away before he noticed it was gone.
He would have left memory behind if he hadn't looked at himself in the mirror starting the car. The engine warmed up, and he ran a finger over the scar. That night a native decided to get restless. This one was handy with bottles. Normally he liked men who were handy with bottles, but only when they were pouring him the stuff to make him forget the nights, the broken hearts, the pain a man felt when he woke up alone, or with someone, or sometimes both.
This one was handy with a bottle the other way. He didn't like those as much.
The islander left a Honolulu Passport on his cheek for life. Only cost the islander a sock in the gut and a chair over his head. This seemed like a fair price even in wartime dollars. He spent that night in the hospital getting stitched up like an old baseball. She went home with a Dago named Sully. No one said beauty had taste or even needed it.
The window fogged up as he waited for the engine to warm up. Everyone has scars, he thought. Not everyone has memories. At least he had that...for now. It wouldn't be cold in Hawaii today, he thought. It never is, especially for sad men dreaming of blue skies streaming endlessly above the casket of grey clouds covering their limited days.
He pulled out of the driveway. He went to work. That was all there was to do.
40 comments
|
0 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
Upon seeing her leave with Sully, his thoughts narrowed to but a pair of syllables: “Bullshit”
by swampchomp on Nov 5, 2009 1:28 PM EST reply actions
Sully, my ass.
It was some jackal named Joker that was cheek-slapping Miss Highty-Ho.
Deep in his heart, to this day, Rich Brooks knows this as sooth.
by NFLmentality on Nov 5, 2009 1:32 PM EST reply actions
I was hoping you’d work in “and a few new ones went home.” Sounds like a damn seasonal bird watcher making a journal entry.
by Tim James on Nov 5, 2009 1:33 PM EST reply actions
Or given the wartime theme, perhaps some new recruits that were bounced out of basic training.
by Tim James on Nov 5, 2009 1:34 PM EST reply actions
“He’d been breathing for years. It didn’t seem to help.” lol
by TrevJo on Nov 5, 2009 1:34 PM EST reply actions
Blasphemy! No way the Kentucky coach is drinking Scotch. Only the finest Kentucky-made brown water for him!
by Wareagle on Nov 5, 2009 1:34 PM EST reply actions
I know that brown water is the only medicine I’ve found to cure my pain after losing out on the love of a Polynesian hooker. That and pills. Lots and lots of pills.
by A drunkards ramblings on Nov 5, 2009 1:42 PM EST reply actions
Kevin@ LSU:
The reason Orson could be sure of the spelling is that there is a graveyard, not far from my parents’ house in rural NC, that has a headstone with a carving of a man fly-fishing that reads ONE TOUGH DAGO. We both thought it was the greatest thing ever, and figured that hell, if the man put it on his tombstone spelled that way, it must be correct.
by TCOAN on Nov 5, 2009 2:06 PM EST reply actions
A Dago named . . . Sully? As in, Sullivan? Sounds mighty Irish for an Italian.
by Domer Guy on Nov 5, 2009 2:10 PM EST reply actions
BEST. MEME. EVER.
Treacherous from the waist up if you were a tailor… you m-m-m-make me…happy.
by My Shorts are made of Denim on Nov 5, 2009 2:11 PM EST reply actions
Anxiously awaiting the Spurrier/Rick Bragg meme
Not so much the Kiffen/Judy Blume meme
by Kerwin4two on Nov 5, 2009 2:16 PM EST reply actions
Sometimes the right tiger is all that’s left.
Forget her, Rich. I did the day after.
Sullivan013
by sullivan013 on Nov 5, 2009 2:16 PM EST reply actions
As an Italian with the FF Team name “Fightin’ Dagos”, I can assure you that’s the correct spelling.
But, yeah DomerGuy – “Sully”? Seriously?
by GamecockTony on Nov 5, 2009 2:25 PM EST reply actions
Any chance we can get a fictional round table with Schnelly, Brooks, Bowden and Paterno?
by GamecockTony on Nov 5, 2009 2:26 PM EST reply actions
November. In Lexington, it’s colder than dog snot but without the redeeming possibilities of new snow. You get Thanksgiving — but that’s just one compressed travel clusterfuck to wind up spending a day with the wife’s relatives, and there’s no Christmas tree with a bottle of scotch under it at the end of the trip. November, I tell you, is bullshit.
by DevilGrad on Nov 5, 2009 2:45 PM EST reply actions
Nick Adams and Robert Jordan approve of this post.
by Floyd on Nov 5, 2009 2:46 PM EST reply actions
Bravo, maestro, bravissimo! You certainly have that Chandler-esque dark existentialist patter nailed. I love these pieces.
by SC'Eer on Nov 5, 2009 2:46 PM EST reply actions
Does anyone else hear a lonely trumpet playing in the background of these posts?
by Big Jon on Nov 5, 2009 2:52 PM EST reply actions
I feel that a meeting between Noire Brooks and the detestable Mr. Leach could bring an Armageddon worthy of excitement.
by gibbypoo on Nov 5, 2009 2:53 PM EST reply actions
Thanks for making my life even more depressing, Brooks.
The FLU is my BITCH LOVERRR!!!
by Brandon on Nov 5, 2009 3:26 PM EST reply actions
While I don’t doubt that Brooks pours Scotch to put the flames out, it’s worth mentioning that he had his own signature Makers Mark bottle produced recently.
No bullshit.
by Jay Hampton on Nov 5, 2009 3:29 PM EST reply actions
Excellent sequal Swindle.
Sullivan13 “Sometimes the right tiger is all that’s left.”- LOL
by tzubear on Nov 5, 2009 3:29 PM EST reply actions
Sully is short for Sulla, as in Lucius Cornelius Sulla (138 BC – 78 BC), twice consul and later dictator of Republican Rome and a known dago.
by Golden Hand on Nov 5, 2009 4:01 PM EST reply actions
“She went home with a Dago named Sully. No one said beauty had taste or even needed it.”
Kudos to you for your fine taste in racial epithets, sir.
by refoy_bama on Nov 5, 2009 4:04 PM EST reply actions
You, sir, have missed your calling. You were born to write pulp novels.
by Harris on Nov 5, 2009 4:21 PM EST reply actions
Rich Brooks Noir warms my heart and burns my soul, like a good 12 year blended malt scotch…
by Philip on Nov 5, 2009 5:18 PM EST reply actions
“If there was something scotch and a clean shirt could not fix he did not want to meet it.”
Amen.
Then I fumbled through my closet for my clothes,
And found my cleanest dirty shirt.
An’ I washed my face and combed my hair,
An’ stumbled down the stairs to meet the day.
by dirt sandwich on Nov 5, 2009 5:30 PM EST reply actions
I saw Coach Brooks Tuesday. I said hello. His maintained his frown.
by Old South on Nov 5, 2009 6:43 PM EST reply actions
@25: Not necessarily playing. A note here and there, whistling out mournfully. I imagine a washed-up bluesman in the corner of a dive bar, with a beat-up old trumpet, trying and failing to recapture something he lost a long time ago.
by Mike on Nov 5, 2009 7:46 PM EST reply actions
……A DEEP RUMBLING OF BASS AND MUCH SHAKING…… what? no? well a fella can dream, right?
by Alpinesumo on Nov 5, 2009 9:45 PM EST reply actions
@32
Seriously. This is gold! I don’t know what an Indian motorcycle is, but boy is the thought of it intriguing.
by BullGator on Nov 6, 2009 7:38 AM EST reply actions
Blasphemy! No way the Kentucky coach is drinking Scotch. Only the finest Kentucky-made brown water for him!
That’s a Brooks-Noir for another day… Another day.
by CincySooner on Nov 6, 2009 7:44 AM EST reply actions
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
Certain photos copyright © 2012 by Associated Press or Getty Images. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of Associated Press and Getty Images is strictly prohibited.
