38
Shit Pail drops another still-burning cigarette butt between her thighs and into the shit pail. At this point, Rupert might have lost his sense of smell, it having been seared from his nostrils.
“So, wait,” she says, shifting and closing her legs to keep the residual smoke from escaping until the butt finally goes out. “The cops showed up? How’d they get there so quick, I mean, inside the cave?”
“Well,” Rupert explains. “Who can tell why they even answered Joe’s ass-dialed 911 call? But I did find out later that there is a serviceable entrance down into the caverns through the Osprey School’s Visitor Center gift shop.”
“No way.”
“Way. Been there for years, apparently. I suspect the clerk there had something to do with it, but I have no idea, and frankly, I’ve kind of had enough of that craziness.”
“Now you just get high,” she says.
“Yep.”
“Well, how did you and Leenda get out of there?”
“Paddle-squid I left on the bank at Webb’s Cove, unscathed by the speedboat crash that killed Osceola and that poor, violated ostrich. Worked a lot better with two people. Took it under Cock’s Footbridge, past the Guptill House and the pioneer boatyard, and kept going north past the Bird Keys and into Little Sarasota Bay. We docked at someone’s personal boat launch on Siesta Key and then walked down Midnight Pass about three miles . . . ”
“That’s an awful lot of traveling for a pedal boat and walking,” Shit Pail interrupts.
“We had a lot to talk about.” Rupert smiles. “Did you know that there is a point about three inches above the ankle, on the inside of the leg, that when electrically stimulated can bring a woman to orgasm?”
Shit Pail looks at Rupert. “No. I did not know that.”
“Well,” Rupert squirms a little uncomfortably. “Now you do.”
Shit Pail nods and rolls her eyes.
“Anyway, once we got to where the resorts are, Leenda called us a cab and we went back to . . . ”
“The Royal Courtyard Econo-Regency Chalet,” Shit Pail said, enthusiastic.
“Actually, we got a room over at the Regency Courtyard Royal-Clarion Inn.”
“Ha! Yeah, I guess you didn’t need to see that Angel chick again,” Shit Pail says, smiling.
“You got that right.”
“So, then what happened?” she asks, still smiling.
Rupert opens his mouth and then shuts it.
“None of your business.” He pauses, then says: “I did see in the paper that a large group of despondent Tweakers had descended upon a ritzy retirement home that night and terrorized the wealthy retirees.”
“Is that related?” Shit Pail asks.
“Might be. I don’t know. It was pretty weird, though.”
“Says the guy saved by a mutant-big aloe plant.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah,” she says, eyeballing him through squinting lids. “That’s all, um . . . pretty unbelievable. And I’m high as tits.”
“I know.” Rupert sighed. “To be honest, I’m not quite sure it all happened. Maybe some of it, but not all of it. Probably.”
“How’s the anxiety now?”
“Fine, when I’m high. And I’m usually pretty high.”
“Since you smoked that crack . . . ”
“Meth,” Rupert corrects.
“Crack,” Shit Pail counters.
“It was meth.”
“Okay.”
Shit Pail nods. Rupert nods with her.
“So, uh, you still with Leenda? Whatever happened with her?”
Rupert breaks into a huge smile, the biggest smile Shit Pail’s seen on his face all night.
“Leenda loves me.”
“Even like this?”
“Fucked up? Yep.” His smile becomes comically bigger. “She loves me no matter what.”
Shit Pail nods and looks at Rupert for a moment.
“You know what?” she says.
Rupert looks at her expectantly.
“You should get clean.”
He breaks the eye contact and looks down, thinking. Then finally:
“Yeah. I should.” He looks at Shit Pail. “I will.”
“Because you love her, too, and even if she puts up with this shit, she shouldn’t have to.” Shit Pail’s smile would be pretty if she had any decent teeth left. She passes the remainder of the blunt to Rupert. “But for right now, here’s to one last burn.”
He takes and hits it, thinking of Leenda.
As he exhales, they hear the sound of heavy footsteps moving toward them, and then, like in the caverns, a police radio. Then, a knock on the door.
Shit Pail tries to jump up and Rupert averts his eyes, but her pants have been down around her ankles for so long, she’s forgotten them. She almost takes a header, but not only manages to stay upright, but also to get her pants most of the way up while yelling: “Yes! We’re in here! Help!” And then muttering to Rupert, “it’s about goddamn time.”
The doorknob to the closet turns without any fuss and the door swings open, revealing the half-amused/half-disgusted face of one of Sarasota’s finest. He recoils at the smell and disappears, but his face is replaced by another, who grimaces and says:
“It’s unlocked, idiots.”
Then, from behind him: “You’re under arrest for trespassing.”
“Idiots.”
Sock it to me...