Jin Tsubota and Tony R. Rodriguez
A Tsubota haiku and a Rodriguez response
[Since the end of the 2006 Christmas Season, Jin Tsubota has sporadically emailed his
close friends a litany of haikus that have each embodied a smidgen of his wild endeavors. Because
imagination can run rampant when a reader dissects a haiku, Tony R. Rodriguez has decided to (hopefully)
compliment the works of Tsubota by writing a short story that opens a bigger world to Tsubota’s madness — one
haiku at a time.
what will get me more
ladies, an embroidery
machine or my bike?
—Jin Tsubota
It’s pretty hard to imagine me rolling around a living room floor with two hot chicks, each of them tugging at me in euphoric madness. Ordinarily this scenario would only come across my brain waves via moments of quiet self-indulgence — and I can’t count how many times I’ve done that when no one was around. Back in college, my roommate Wes used to call me Maverick because he caught me touching myself one day as he walked into our dorm. He said that the combination of my intense facial expression and the way I held my jet fighter control stick reminded him of Maverick, the Tom Cruise character in TOP GUN.
Wes is a real douche bag, but I still keep in touch with him, and I do suppose I owe him for my success with these two hot chicks. He recently got me a job working as a bartender at The Water Hole, a remedial dive bar in San Francisco’s Sunset District. Wes put in his two week’s notice and told his manager that I was a hard working bartender with five years of experience, and that I would be great as his replacement. Of course, it was all bullshit, though my knowledge of mixing cocktails has always been extensive. My plan was to only work as a bartender until I got fired. I figured I would last a couple weeks.
So far, I’ve only been on the job for three nights.
This brings me to my carnal act with the two hot chicks:
Last night, I started work twenty minutes late. I indulged quite heavily with a twelve pack of Fat Tire the night before and decided to sleep all day. As I walked through the front door of the bar, my manger pointed to a vintage clock on the wall that read eight twenty. He gave me this look of disgust and annoyance, which to me meant that the eventual chain of events leading to my termination has already begun. I smiled at my manager, parked my bike to the left of the front door, and made my way behind the bar to assume my duties.
Three and a half cheerless and forlorn hours trudged by and the evening seemed to promise nothing but monotony and self loathing. I needed a drink. I needed a good buzz to pass through my system and throughout my cranium, ever spilling fantastic waves of inebriated bliss. But something better happened instead.
Two gleaming women with red eyes slithered through the door with heavy words and heavy steps, both of them plopping onto a couple of stools right in front of me. They were gorgeous and obviously intoxicated with liberating madness all too familiar.
“Dirty Martini...no olives — use as much Grey Goose as you can...bartender,” requested a Brunette with red highlights in her hair. I turned to her Blonde friend and asked for her drink call, but she was oblivious to everything, so I made two Dirty Martinis, congesting my chilled shaker with an excessive amount of vodka.
The Brunette smiled at me, tossing a crumpled twenty on the counter a few inches in front of her. I finished mixing and gave them their drinks and change. My eyes were pasted to the rack on the Blonde, the poor helpless little drunkard with bags under her eyes. Again I thought to myself, I need a drink. I looked around for my manager, and it appeared he had vanished. I blocked the view of the camera behind me by arching my midsection and elbows outward so my body somewhat fanned out like a decorative Chinese hand fan. I brought out three large-sized shot glasses, filling them all with Grey Goose until the liquid kissed the rim of each of the glasses.
And we toasted. Slam. Down the hatch. It felt great. It tasted great. These two chicks looked great. My manager passed by, staring with a grimace of ostensible disdain. He mechanically nodded his head toward the door and told me to move my bike to the back of the bar, so it wouldn’t be in the way of customers.
I did.
When I returned to the bar, the Blonde smiled and pointed to my bike near the back corner of the bar. She began laughing hysterically, covering her mouth with her shaky fingers and her flowing blonde hair of sunshine tresses. The Blonde told me that her bike looks just like mine, and as she said this, her words flopped out of her mouth like diluted water balloons. She went on and on about her and her bike and her escapades around the hills of San Francisco. The Brunette laughed at her friend’s relentless attempts at storytelling. I just smiled and nodded, nonchalantly playing the role of the interested bartender. None of it made any sense to me, but I continued to smile nonetheless.
As soon as the Blonde finished her third story of bike riding, I again covered my actions from the view of the camera and poured three more shots. The Blonde immediately slammed hers, while the Brunette hesitated. I leaned closer to her and said, “Go for it.” She shook her head and gave me an unpromising You’re-Bad-And-I-Kind-Of-Like-It smile. And she took the shot without any further reserve. Immediately, the Brunette took hold of the remaining contents of her martini and allowed the poison to slowly leak down into her throat. It was seductive to watch. The time paused in a fantastic moment of amazing stupor.
“Finish your drink,” the Brunette then whispered into the Blonde’s ear. Following orders immediately, the Blonde pounded her martini in a quick flash of obedience. The two began whispering things into each other’s ears, smiling ever so crassly toward me. The Blonde laughed as she turned to face me, looking directly at me through fiery and sparkly eyes.
“I want to ride your bike,” the Blonde told me.
I had wondered what she meant by the word “bike”.
“Where’s your bike?” I played back at her.
“At...home.”
“Can I see it?”
“Maybe.”
The Brunette was watching both of us and smiling all the while.
“Can I come over and see it?”
“Maybe.”
“You need to tell me: Yes or No.”
“Yes.”
Immediately, I locked the register, walked to the office in the back of the bar, tossed my manager the register keys, told him I quit, and grabbed my bike. The man who was no longer my manager began cursing up a whirlwind of fractured thoughts. His obscenities were persistent and firm. I signaled the two girls to follow me out of the bar, which they both did.
Once outside, the Brunette told me that the two of them lived three blocks away, just off the corner of Nineteenth and Irvine. I told the Blonde to ride my bike while I became familiar with the Brunette. I put my arm around the Brunette and pushed a few of her red highlighted locks back. She squeezed me as if we had been dating for years. I could smell the alcohol in her breath — and it smelled great. I rubbed her shoulder and her arms as she buried her head deep into my chest. It seemed as though it was a slight struggle for her to walk and have her head on my chest, but she wasn’t planning on changing positions. The Blonde was riding almost a block ahead of us, swerving along with the chill wind of the Sunset District.
Upon arriving at their place, I noticed the Brunette had what appeared to be her initials stenciled into the back collar of her loose fitting jacket. I asked her why she has her initials on the back of her collar, and she replied that she hasn’t made any time to stitch her initials. We walked into their place and strangely I became drawn to an embroidery machine on top of their table. I walked over to it as the Brunette called the Blonde to come inside and to leave the bike outside. Continuing with her submissive state, the Blonde did as she was told and then sat herself on the couch. The Blonde smiled toward the Brunette and turned on the DVD player and television. Within seconds I began hearing soft cries of lascivious excitement coming from the television. The Blonde had put on an adult film, and there I stood: dumbfounded and believing that There-Must-Be-A-God.
I panicked, not knowing my next course of action. I clumsily sat myself at the embroidery machine and asked the Brunette to take off her jacket and hand it to me. I began lacing the machine with bright pink thread. The Brunette told me that she’s going to take off more that just her jacket — and she did. [God, she did.] I told her that I’m going to complete the project of stitching her jacket. The Brunette smiled and began massaging my back as I worked the rapid needle of the machine. The Blonde began undressing herself on the couch, whimpering that we should join her.
I couldn’t believe what was happening.
I couldn’t stop stitching for the life of me.
The Brunette was getting creative with her massage.
The Blonde was getting creative with her fingers and her tongue.
I gave up and finished halfway through, flinging the jacket toward the wall. I lifted the Brunette onto my shoulders and flung her onto the couch where we then laid next to the Blonde, and the three of us embraced and became a trio of blending souls living a life of dangerous actions. I didn’t even know their names. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. We spilled our bodies onto the living room floor and became animalistic. Maverick had returned.
When I left their place, I noticed that my bike had been stolen. But I didn’t care. I walked two blocks to a liquor store, bought a twelve pack of Fat Tire and decided I should call it a night.
©2007 by
Tony R. Rodriguez
