Pricks Cunts & Motherfuckers: the Novel about New York City
by Wolf Larsen
I was working as a catering waiter at a fashion show in Greenwich Connecticut for the day. The skinny skinny models wore skin, bones, a few skimpy clothes, & not much else. None of them wore breasts – at least not real ones. I wondered how those models sat down – because they had no ass to sit on.
After the fashion show the guys with money and the models attached themselves to each other like maggots – I mean magnets.
On the way back to New York City I made sure I got in the gay or fun van. I felt sorry for the guy who took my place in the other van with those fools. We started passing around champagne and wine bottles that were left over from the catering affair. We took swigs straight from the bottle and soon everybody was in a gay or festive mood. What a great job!
Soon there were two couples all over each other kissing & kissing passionately like they had just met each other (which they had). One couple was the man & woman variety. The other couple was man-to-man. The two couples kissed side by side.
Better yet was that we were on the clock getting paid! The job paid half wages for travel time. What a great job!
Back in New York City I went to the shithole bar. I put my fat ass on the barstool and started drinking my favorite drug: alcohol.
I was starting to feel nice & numb & anesthetized from the neck up when the shithole was suddenly inundated by a bunch of cockroaches or yuppies or something like that. They were out slumming it for the evening, and I guess they figured there’s safety in numbers.
I had just spent the day serving annoying cockroaches, so why would I want to drink alongside of them in my free time?
Yuppie places often have men at the door that don’t let in working people or “white trash” or whatever they call us – so why should we let the yuppie cockroaches in our places?
I left.
I walked around. I found this little dinky-place-directly underneath the Port Authority Bus Terminal. What a beautiful sleaze pit! It made the other shithole in the wall look Park Avenue in comparison!
I no more than walked in the door when some guy suddenly tried to jump me or attack me or hug me or something! I immediately threw him to the floor.
It’s amazing how fast things like that happen. Your gut reaction protects you and goes on the offensive long before your brain even realizes what’s happening.
He got up and whined, “I’m going to get my people and come back!”
“If you need your friends you belong at your mama’s tit, not in some bar,” is what I felt like saying. But I said nothing. If I had a dollar for every time I kept my mouth shut and didn’t say what was on my mind I’d be a millionaire.
He left. Perhaps if I had any common sense I would have left before he came back with “his people”. But I don’t have any common sense. I’m probably stupid too. But at least I know I’m stupid – unlike many other people of all walks of life.
I sat down between a woman who looked more BUTCH than anybody I’ve ever seen and some ugly brown dude that looked like a hoodlum.
I just wanted to finish getting properly drunk. I didn’t want to talk to nobody! So of course the ugly brown dude starts talking to me.
“I’m Puerto Rican,” was the first thing he said. It was the kind of thing that only a Puerto Rican in New York would do.
is what I was thinking. But what I said was, “Cuanto tiempo tienes en Nueva York?”
“Oh, so you speak Span-ish,” he said in a slightly-mocking voice. His voice was a mixture of sarcasm and pseudo-respect mixed in with a who-gives-a-fuck-attitude for good measure.
“Yeah, don’t you?” I asked.
“No,” he said smiling.
“But I thought you said you’re from Puerto Rico,” I asked. Meanwhile, I was thinking,
“I’m a Puerto Rican from New York,” he said.
“Oh, that’s nice,” I said.
Then he said, “Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.” It was the kind of conversational nonsense that people always say to each other even though nobody’s listening, because that’s the way you have a normal conversation. In order to be normal you have to chatter about stupid empty things that don’t matter.
While he chattered on & on about whatever he was chattering about (listen? What for?) I was thinking,
While I thought this I smiled politely in his face and said uh-huh uh-huh at all the appropriate moments as he talked and talked.
He made me nervous, although I tried not to show it. He was exactly the type of %&^*$@^$&# you never wanted to show you were nervous to.
“So, are you a homo?” he asked suddenly out of the blue.
That’s when I understood what kind of bar this was. I honestly liked the whole rough & wild you never knew if you were going to have to brawl feeling of it! But I didn’t care for the homosexual part of it – well I wasn’t sure – I had mixed feelings about the homosexual part – like I’ve always had.
Anyway – he blah blah blah’d some more. He was homophobic. He hated gays! But he also liked rough sexual action with men – it was in between the lines of the conversation. His words were saying I hate gays I hate gays while the tone of his voice and his eyes kept saying you wanna fuck? you wanna fuck? while his right fist was grinding & grinding into the palm of his left hand.
I was turned on! I really wanted to fuck this guy up the ass! But first, I would have to kick his ass a bit. That’s the way he wanted it.
He wouldn’t mind bending me over too, but at least one of us knew he would die if he tried.
The whole time I was playing this neutral I-don’t-give-a-fuck go away role, but I was repulsed & turned on and feeling violent & sexual all at the same time.
Finally, he left. I was both relieved and disappointed!
Then the butch lesbian to my left said with a smile, “Come here often?”
We both laughed big loud laughs. Her laugh was a huge baritone that completely filled the little bar. It made you wish you had earplugs.
“That guy – he was a real nut job,” said the butch lesbian.
“Yeah he was, he’s so nuts that even all the nutty people in New York notice,” I said.
“Think so? Here in New York the competition for nut job of the year is just way too fierce,” she said.
“Pardon me for saying this, but – anyway – you’re a lesbian right?”
The eyes and her smile regarded me with amusement. Her body, on the other hand, was ready to attack me. I could just tell – my instincts were just screaming it at me!
“Don’t worry, I’m not homophobic. Promise me if I say something you won’t hit me,” I said.
She laughed. But her body was still poised to lunge at me.
“I usually only hit people in self-defense,” she said. “But every once in a while somebody’s mouth…”
She didn’t finish the sentence. It wasn’t necessary.
“Please don’t hit me,” I began. “But you are the most butchest lesbian I have ever met. You are the queen of the butch lesbians!”
She smiled. “Why thank you!” she said.
I suddenly didn’t feel like I was going to get hit anymore.
“Anyway, if I come back here will you protect me? I bet you can really kick some ass!” I said.
She laughed. “I don’t like fighting! It’s ignorant,” she said.
I put my right hand out and said, “My name is Bernie Hawkins.”
She shook my hand and said, “I’m Wolf Larsen”.
“What do you do Wolf?” I asked.
“What? For money?” she asked.
That threw me off. “Yeah!” I said.
“For money I work as a seasonal laborer in Alaska,” she said.
“That’s great,” I said.
“No, it isn’t,” she said.
“Whadya mean – Alaska! Land of the midnight sun! Polar bears! Igloos! Eskimos! –”
I didn’t get a chance to finish because Wolf Larsen was laughing her ass off. One guy was covering his ears.
“Is it cold in Alaska?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “Look, I just got back from Alaska a week ago. Can we talk about something else?”
“Can we talk about butch lesbians some more?” I asked.
Wolf laughed again. Ouch! My ears!
“You see, I worked alongside of butch lesbians. They were great! Well, not all – but most of them. Anyway, they were like one of the guys! I hope that doesn’t sound patronizing.”
“What kind of work did you do?” she asked.
“I loaded up containers at a factory,” I said.
“By forklift?” she asked.
“Sometimes, but usually by hand,” I said.
Her face winced. “That’s no fun.”
“Work is a four letter word – what can you say?” I replied.
“Hey! I’m going to a poetry reading. You wanna come?” she asked.
“A poetry reading?” I exclaimed. “Huh? Now? It’s late! There’s a poetry reading at this hour?”
“Yeah! You wanna come?” she asked.
I thought,
It was like one of those spontaneous things that you’re doing because you don’t know why you’re doing it. I guess I have a what-the-hell-why-not approach to life.
We jumped in a cab. It was late enough that you could actually get somewhere in a cab in New York.
In the cab I asked her, “So if you live in Alaska what are you doing in New York?”
“I don’t live in Alaska. I work there,” she said.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” I said.
“I live in Harlem, New York City 8 months of the year and I work twice a year in Alaska for a total of 4 months.”
“You only work four months of the year!” I exclaimed.
I was all ears. So was the cab diver.
“I work up to 100 hours a week,” she said.
“I’m sorry to cut in,” said the Indian (Pakistani?) cabdriver, “but is that related to the fishing industry?”
“Yes it is,” said Wolf.
“What do you fish? Salmon?” I asked.
“No, not Salmon. Anyway I used to work on the fishing boats, but often we worked for free. Now I work on the docks – and it’s union – so at least we get paid.”
“What do you do the other 8 months? If I may ask ma'am,” asked the cabdriver.
It occurred to me how many of these people from India & Pakistan had something called manners. And their English was impeccable! Maybe these Pakistanis & Indians could teach the New Yorkers how to speak English. Maybe they could teach the New Yorkers something called manners too.
“I write. I travel. Stuff like that,” Wolf said.
“That sounds like a great life,” said the cabdriver.
“It’s a great life 8 months of the year!” laughed Wolf. She didn’t laugh so loud this time, thank god.
“But Alaska sounds like an adventure!” I said.
“It’s an adventure alright,” she said, “the kind that gets people killed.”
Copyright 2006 by Wolf Larsen
