7

The train door is flung open
a sudden burst of light 
blinding
as a dark hulk of a man 
leans his elbows 
on the boxcar floor
jug of water beside him
Monkey's eyes adjust
as he makes out a pair of 
blue and white striped overalls
octagonal wire-rimmed glasses 
a bemused look
smiling in the shadows
as he drums his fingers 
on the painted wood boards

"You know, the thing about hopping trains, is yer supposed to hop off at some point, at least, hop-off before I show up." He shoves the plastic gallon milk jug across the floor hitting Pig in the side. "Every once in a while I'll find some migrants back here. Usually half-starved and dying for water." He stands upright, his hands resting on the straps of his bibs. "Usually headed back to where they came from so I don't bother 'em much." Looks down the tracks one way then the other. "Where you boys from?"

"Memphis," Monkey says.

"Well I shoulda guessed. I mean where else would a pig, a little girl and a talking monkey be coming from 'cept Memphis. Vegas maybe." Snorts and scratches the back of his head. "I remember seeing on the TV some years back an exposé on a hairy-faced family in South America that was cashing in on the fact they looked like werewolves. Wouldn't be relations of yours, would they?"

"Where are we?" Monkey asks standing and dusting himself off.

The man leans back in the car, elbows on the floor. "Why you're in the sunshine state. The place where vacationers come for a weekend and stay the rest of their lives. The state of oranges and Seminoles and six-toed cats, of spring breakers, body shots, and topless teenagers. The land of the lazy, as my cousin Gary calls it. Called it, I should say. Died last winter. A consummate alcoholic and dry-waller to boot so don't know how much stock I'd put into what he had to say. Rest in peace, and all that."

Monkey looks blankly at the man who looks blankly back at him.

"You're in Florida son," he says shaking his head. "Not too swift are you." He see's Monkey look around the empty train car. "They took off. Did you the favor of leaving the door half-open, which is why I'm currently standing here. Not typically one to intrude on people's travel plans, but when I see one of my doors open and then happen to look in and see a monkey, a pig-faced man and a little girl, well, let's just say it piqued my curiosity." 

Pig and Mara get up and the man leans back out, tucks his hands inside his bibs. "Well, despite being somewhat of a grotesque, you do share my cousin Gary's fashion sense. He also has a hard time passing up the modern stylings of the Flying J or Love's. You strike me as a Love's man if I may be so bold."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Pig says rubbing his back with both hands.

"Not the sharpest tool in the toolbox," he says then looking at Mara, "How bout you darlin'? Are you the brains of this operation or are you all just ping-ponging along wherever the paddle smacks you?"

"I'm not your darling." 

The man nods and smiles.

"Different times. We're living in different times. In my day...well...funny how I'm still alive but it's not my day anymore. Living in someone's else's day I suppose. One helluva long day if you ask me, and as far as I'm concerned, you can have it. Not that I'm a nihilist or anything. You folks nihilists? You got that kinda look about you honey...I mean...dang, not sure what the appropriate nomenclature is as we aren't acquainted well enough for proper names."

"Mara. And no. I'm not a nihilist."

He adjusts the glasses on his nose and looks up at her.

"Funny thing about nihilism is it's the only belief system you fall into. Doesn't take any effort really. You start believing in something and then ever so gently slide into the warm soothing waves of apathy and when people ask you what you believe you still say, 'Oh, I'm a Christian or a Buddhist or whatever' but little do you know you're neck-deep, totally unaware of the waves lapping at that pretty little chin of yours." He turns to Pig. "How bout you Porky? You have deep-seated beliefs in the nature of reality or are you just plugging along trying to get your fill?"

"It's a little early to be talking like this, isn't it? I'd rather get out of your way and get where we're going," Pig says moving to the edge of the train car and looking down the tracks. The man moves out of his way and slaps the floor with his hand.

"Well I'll be. A pragmatist! Possibly a hedonist given your demeanor and the stereotypical inclinations we hold in this culture about pigs. Goats too. Hooved animals seem to be inexorably tied with our notions of sin...for some damn reason. You have any goat friends in Memphis? Do they exhibit, I don't know the polite way to say this, a proclivity for producing progeny?"

Pig steps off the car ignoring the question. Mara follows, then Monkey.

"Suppose it's rude to assume you know a goat. Suppose it's like meeting a Cuban fella and asking if he knows the other Cuban fella you know, which I did by the way just last week and it turned out they did know one another. Sam and Clark. Not the high watermarks of preserving cultural heritage, but who am I to judge." 

Monkey turns to the man. "We're looking for a friend. Sand. Sometimes goes by Friar Sand. Ever heard of him?"

He raises his head, looks up at the sky and squints then, "Can't say I have. Don't know many men of the cloth, though if there's one thing we do not lack in Florida, it's churches." He points down a line of trees trying to hide a chain-link fence that runs around the perimeter of the yard. "You know they built a church across the street from a gentleman's club right over there in Pensacola? Titties and Tithing, my cousin calls it. Called it, though even that wasn't strong enough to pull him back into the fold."

Mara gives him a look of disgust, which does not go unnoticed.

"Oh...Mara...I didn't mean to offend, but if you find me jarring and anachronistic you'll be sorely disappointed as the progressive wave which your youthful frame rides upon has not yet crashed over the great state of Florida, and so our crasser behaviors have yet to be washed clean by your, how should I put it, feminist sensibilities, partly I suspect because of the lure of all those beautiful bathing bodies oiled and propped in the sun. Hard to keep those big ideas in your head when the sun's baking your brain like a biscuit and you're a little tipsy from one or two strawberry daiquiris sitting on top all that fried grouper you just ate. Makes people forget all that philosophizing that your friend Pig here doesn't seem to care too much about, which brings us full circle I suppose, back to the rising tide of nihilism and the way it creeps up on you. Why, Mara," he says grinning, "if you were to walk out on one of our gloriously crowded beaches this fine morning someone might even tell you to smile, or, more likely, they may ask you to remove your top, though your age might prevent the later." The smile disappears and he looks serious for a moment. "Depends on the daiquiris, I suppose," scratches the back of his head. "Lot's of things depend on the daiquiris down here."

He looks at Mara then Monkey then Pig then back to Mara. No one responds. 

"Well as it appears I'm going to have to continue to bear the weight of this conversational load, I will in my own southern way be brief and get to the proverbial point that I shall now poke you with so that you may be on your way though as those words just tumbled out of my mouth I now realize, Miss Mara, the sexual connotation of the latter turn of phrase which one could arrive at that I now regret."

"Spit it out," she says putting her hand on the hilt of her sword.

His eyes widen slightly then regain the same bemused look as before. 

"I see you have a point of your own so I'll say this. I don't know where your friend is but I do know where you can get the best fried grouper sandwich as well as catch up on the local gossip, and while you appear to be worldly, you do seem a bit on the dim side when it comes to local flavor and so my parting gift to you is this. If you're looking for your friend the best person to ask is Darlene down at Mad Mary's Fish House of Horrors, not the actual name of the place, but if you call it that they'll know who sent you. Right up the road there," he says wagging his finger. "Yes sir, Darlene knows every low-life and ne'er-do-well from the salty shores of Alabama all the way down to the tip of this fine state jutting out like the lonely cock of America that it is. Imagine she might know where this Friar might be hiding. I assume he's hiding. I mean, you don't know where he is, and we are in Florida where everybody's hiding from somebody."

The man pushes the train door shut, wipes his hands on the side of his overalls and steps over the track.

"I'm hiding from my good for nothing ex-wife, who, God bless her soul, taught me the one lesson I've seemed to learn in life. Never trust a Heather. I know. I know we're living in the declining age of stereotypical thinking, and I should be ashamed of lumping all those wonderful people into my own narrow rubric of personal behavior but you know there's just some things you got to hold on to because, I tell you what, I could count the number of Heather's who've screwed me over on one hand except for the fact that one of them, Heather Lauler to be precise, took it upon herself to chop off my pinky with a meat cleaver at 2 in the AM," he says holding up his hand to show them his stub, "as I was snoring away in her waterbed of all places on a god damn houseboat, which, if you can imagine someone dumb enough to put a waterbed on a houseboat, you have some inkling of who I was dealing with. But enough about me," he says examining his own pinky for a moment before putting it back in his pocket. "Who're you hiding from big boy?" he says looking at Pig.

"You, as soon as we find our way out of here," Pig mutters.

"Ha! I'll take that. I'll take that. You know you're funny, but I suppose you have to be when you're that fat and ugly. Life has a way of beating a sense of humor into us more portly individuals," he says patting his belly then looking at Monkey. "Suppose you got hit with the ugly stick a couple times yourself, though didn't seem to knock much humor into you." 

Monkey doesn't respond. The heat is sweltering and everyone is still adjusting to the morning.

"Well, seeing as I caught you all in a moment of deep reflection where everyone seems to be scouring their souls for some semblance of a reason to continue, I will make my way back to a task I seem better suited to, unhitching these cars. Y'all remember to say hi to Darlene for me," he says waving as he heads off down the tracks.

Monkey, Pig and Mara look at each other then head off in the direction the man pointed, Mara kicking the gravel in the grass, Pig taking his shirt off and putting it over his head to block the sun, and Monkey, hopping from wood beam to wood beam watching the steel tracks shine and curve into the distance. 

The diner emerges, shimmering, wavy, a mirage of 1950's decor shoved together into a semblance of a building. They push through the glass doors and squeeze into a maroon pleather booth, Monkey and Pig on one side, Mara on the other, looking at the laminated turquoise outlined menus. The traffic on the main drag rolls by muffled by the enormous purple drapes that hang down letting the tiniest bit of light in at the cracks. The ceiling fans run full tilt wobbling along making a constant, "Whirrrrrrr," while coffee is poured, drawers open and close, the fluorescent lights blare and the carefully curated selection of Betty Boop, Marilyn Monroe and Elvis posters remain duct-taped to the walls. The eyes of the cartoon characters and the customers stare as the waitress approaches and Pig turns his menu over to look at the drink selection on the back.

"What'll you be having darlin'?" the waitress says holding her pen to her pad not looking up but obviously addressing Mara.

"Coffee. Black."

She turns to Monkey and Pig.

"Nothing for us," Monkey says taking the menu out of Pig's hands and glaring at Mara then to the waitress, "Do you know if Darlene is working today?"

"Darlene!" she yells to the back with no answer. She turns and smiles. "Friends of hers? Who should I say is calling?"

"Tell her we were told to come to Mad Mary's Fish House."

The waitress rolls her eyes, "Oh gawd. John sent you? Hey Darlene!"

"WHAT!" comes a voice from the backroom.

"Excuse me," the waitress says smiling putting the menus back on the circle clip next to the three different kinds of sugar. She walks back to the swinging door by the kitchen, a piece of paper ripped off with the words "Darlene's Office" written in black sharpie stuck with scotch tape flutters as she pushes it open and sticks her head inside. The voices soften and they hear, "Are you going to hide all day? You got some people out here to see you and I know how you like the weird ones, so you don't wanna miss this bunch. John sent 'em."

There's a snort and an abrupt laugh then, "John. Shoulda finished that motherfucker off when I had the chance. You know I was aiming for his dick. Confused it with his little pinky. Won't make that mistake twice."

"Come on out here. It'll do you some good. You can't sit in here all day smoking cigarettes and playin' Candy Crush."

The door is pushed open and there she is,

Darlene
tying her white apron
on top of her muted pink and white striped dress
a cigarette hangs
haze of smoke covering her face
that doesn't seem to lift
her plump form 
carried on slender legs
glides its way past the customers
to stand over the table
her ruby slippers tapping on the linoleum
as she plucks the cigarette from her mouth
and pushes it in a glass of ice water  
her thick mascara 
blue eye shadow
and red lips burn through 
the cloud 
that's quickly dispersing
as she pulls her ticket book from her apron
and clicks her purple gel pen 

"So the first thing you gotta know is that John's a god damn liar. Everything he told you is horse shit including the fact that we're a fish house, which we're obviously not and never have been, if you haven't figured that out yet. We serve burgers and fries and hash browns and shit like that, pardon my French. We have a steak and eggs special every Tuesday. Most people get the special. That or the biscuits and gravy." She does another quick sweep of the group, her pen pushing into the pad.

"We don't have any money," Monkey says which makes her smile and nod.

"Of course you don't. Why would I think John'd send customers." She looks down at Mara. "Scoot. C'mon. Move over. If you ain't gonna buy my food then at least let me sit down." Mara scoots over as she tosses her ticket book on the table and takes a long drink of water, throws a glance at Mara then, "You alright?" Mara looks confused, not sure how to respond. "Young pretty girl like yourself shows up with a couple of the ugliest son's a bitches I've ever seen. Just checkin' to make sure you're fine."

"I'm fine," Mara says looking to Monkey and Pig. "They're all right."

"Hmph," Darlene looks back and forth between the two. "Don't look all right to me. I've met some ugly motherfuckers in my day, but you two. I mean, there's ugly that makes you wince, there's ugly that makes you feel sorry for the poor bastard, and then there's ugly you can't stop lookin' at. Your type though," she says digging in her apron and pulling out a pack of Marlboro Lights, "only one other man I've known as ugly as you two."

"You know Sand?" Monkey asks excitedly.

"Oh, I know Sand. Doesn't call himself that anymore though. Haven't seen that fucker in six months, so don't know how much help I'm going to be, but there's an easy way to track him down." Pulls out a cigarette, throws her arm over the booth, turns her head and yells, "Sammie! Get that cute little ass of yours over here and bring the papers."

Samantha's head pops up in the kitchen window then disappears, pushes through the swinging door and drops off a stack of papers. Darlene smiles then, "and don't forget to wiggle that thing when you walk away from me." Samantha laughs, then in mock exaggeration wiggles her butt as she walks away. Darlene watches, lights a cigarette with a, "Y'all don't mind do you?" then thumbs through the stack. "Here we go." She drops the 'local' section in front of Monkey then goes through another, folds it and drops a second one, then a third. Monkey looks down and reads through the headlines. 

Florida Man BBQ's Rubber Chicken Goes to Hospital After Getting Stuck on Face.

'Go Back Where you Came From' Florida Man Wrestles Alligator After Getting it Drunk and Driving it to the Zoo. 

Florida Man Drives Car into Starbucks After Barista Spells Name Wrong on Cup. 

'No means No' Florida Man Covered in White Powder Hospitalized After Having Sex with Stop Sign. 

Florida Man Wearing Mickey Mouse Head Poops in Driveway, Revenge for Satanic Spells Cast by Coven of Witches Next Door

"Yup. Not many people outside this small," she uses air quotes, "community, know about our shape-shifting friend." She takes a drag. "Florida Man. What a joke."

Monkey looks through the papers and finds the latest headline dated a week ago, "Florida Man Attacks Drive-Thru Liquor Store Clerk, Gets Stuck in Window". He looks at the top of the paper. The Coconut Telegraph - Big Pine Key. "Is this far?" he asks lifting up the paper.

"Big Pine? Bout as far as you can get. In Florida at least." She takes the paper from Monkey, glances over it, drops it back down on the table. "What do you want with Sand anyway? Owe you money or something?" Takes another drag. "I've seen things hanging out with that man, know what I mean? Things that make you start questioning the nature of reality, if you know what I mean. Had that half-moon weapon he turned into a lamp in our living room." 

"His Demon-Quelling-Staff."

"Whatever. Didn't see that man 'quell any demons' when I was with him. Mostly sat on the couch and drank and told me stories, stories that didn't sound believable until....well...we were together awhile before he ran out on me. Thought he was just another drunk bull shitter. Turns out he was both. Bastard stole my car and my dog. Hated that dog, but still, that little fucker was mine." She puts the other cigarette out in the same glass of water. "How're you planning on getting to Big Pine without any money? Suppose you're hoping I'll help you with that too."

"We're monks," Monkey explains. "We're not allowed to have money so...."

"So you're sayin' I got to do it out of the kindness of my lil' old heart?" she laughs swinging her other arm around so it lays across the top of the booth encircling Mara. "You really think I'm gonna drive your dumb asses all the way down to The Keys?" She laughs again. "I'll tell you what. I AM going to drive you down to The Keys but only so I can tell off that fat fuck of a friar to his face. You hear me?" Monkey nods. "That man. A terror. That's what they said bout him. People cowered when he'd walk in the room. 'Cept me. Only one that could stare him down." She leans closer to Mara, lowers her voice and says, "You know the best thing about living through the worst day of your life? Can't ever get worse than that. Nothing worse than what happened to me on September 3rd 1982, and so when someone gets in my face and starts giving me shit, trying to make me feel like the lowlife sexpot of a waitress I am, well, I just think back to that day and laugh. Can't hurt me worse than that, and anyone that tries is just wasting their time." She gives Mara a hard look. "Any of that get through to you darlin'? There's a strange kinda strength in knowing your pain, and if you figure it out it'll sure save you a lot of suffering in the future. Another one of life's surprises I guess." Darlene doesn't wait for an answer, gets up, slaps her thighs with her hands. "Well, I don't want to be here another god damn second I can tell you that. Sammie!" Samantha pops her head out from the kitchen window again. "I'M LEAVING. Don't fuck things up while I'm gone or I'll put a dent in that pretty little face of yours."

Samantha storms out of the kitchen. "You're leaving AGAIN?! You just got back a few weeks ago. How am I supposed to run this place by myself? I don't know a god damn thing about doing the books and I'm already...." Darlene grabs her by the arm and they head back to the office yelling at each other. 

Mara picks up her coffee and takes a sip. 

"I like her."

Pig nods. 

"Yeah, she's alright."

A horn blares in the parking lot, a second time, then a third. Monkey looks through the window to the parking lot outside and see's

Darlene smoking a cigarette in a
1986 white Chrysler LeBaron
convertible
two pink flamingos
painted on the hood
their necks intertwined
making a heart shape
their tiny awkward feet
touching 
with the word
"Darlene"
scrawled in pink Olde English 
across the side of the car

"I think that's her," Monkey says standing up.

Darlene honks a few more times and throws her hands in the air as if to say, "What the fuck's taking so long?" Pig and Monkey climb in the backseat with Mara in front. Darlene tosses her arm over Mara's headrest and looks back at Monkey and Pig. 

"I gotta find my cousin Bridget and clear some things up then stop by the house to pack. Buckle your seatbelts cause it's the law 'round here and I speed like crazy. You boys smoke?" Monkey and Pig shake their heads. "Too bad." She revs the engine then peels out onto the highway, making sure to give the finger to Samantha who, looking out the window, gives it right back. "I love her," she says weaving around a pickup truck full of scrap metal. She waves as she passes. "That's Sancho. Not sure what his real name is. Everyone calls him that given the fact he's a fat Mexican." She cuts through traffic then takes a right. "Most racist person I've ever met. Man can't stand Cubans. Says they're ruining this great country of ours." She laughs. "I told him he's the one that ruined it first. Then, course, he says that we were the one's that ruined it for the Indians." She slams on her brakes narrowly avoiding flattening three college kids walking out of a gas station with a 24 pack of beer. "Native Americans," she says flicking open the ashtray and putting her cigarette out. "Whatever. They ruined it for the god damn animals that were living here before them, and I suppose the animals ruined it for all those plants and trees and whatnot, so what the fuck, everybody ruins it for everyone else so we might as well enjoy our ruined shit pile of a country together, right?" 

She pulls into a lot and parks. "I'm gonna track down Bridget. You three can...well...you can do whatever you want. Enjoy the beach. It's just down there," she points one long pink fingernail, then hops out and fast walks over to a jet ski rental, mini-golf and tiki bar waving her hands over her head and yelling, "Bridget you low life cunt you better not be hiding from me!" 

The three pile out of the car and head down to the beach. Monkey sits in the sand and watches the waves crash over the tiny bodies in bright yellow and green and blue swim trunks, kids splashing in the waves, building sandcastles, picking up seashells and screaming for their parents who lay under large sagging umbrellas on towels next to coolers, drinking, calling out to Nick or Taleb or Tabitha, telling them to be careful.

Pig looks out over the beach, young women in bikinis, their legs and breasts and arms oiled and shining as they huddle in groups, texting, fiddling with their big black sunglasses, occasionally pulling their bikini bottoms out of their asses. He waddles over a bit closer and lets out a sigh as the waves crash over and the song "Beasts of Burden" blares across the beach.

"I'll never be 
your beast of burden
I've walked for miles 
my feet are hurting
All I want 
for you to make love to me" 

Pig looks back at Monkey, then, not being able to resist, back to the beautiful bodies in the sun. A girl in a yellow top bends over picking up her towel. "I'm such an idiot," Pig says leaning on his rake. 

Mara stands behind them looking off to the bobbing of the waves then turns to a young man wandering over, hat turned backwards, Oakley sunglasses, No Fear swim-trunks holding a Bud Light Lime. He takes two large drunk steps toward her then screams, "WOO! SPRING BREAK!" Before he can lower his arms Mara whips her sword out and sends his head flying like a frisbee into the sand, sunglasses still on, mouth open locked in a silent "Woo". Monkey turns as Mara sheaths her sword. 

"He was sexually harassing me," she says taking his sunglasses and putting them on.

Monkey sighs, looks around then drags the body to a blue and white striped beach chair, goes back for the head and carefully places it on top, then, not knowing what else to do, drapes a towel over him, the feet sticking out nicely displaying an ankle tattoo of an eight ball on fire.

"We have to get out of here," he says tugging on Mara's shirt.

"Oh, so it's fine when she kills people but I get beaten to a pulp for..."

"It's not FINE," Monkey says, "for either of you..."

"Who have you been killing?" Mara says pulling away from Monkey and facing off with Pig. 

"No one. C'mon. Let's go."

They plod up the sandbank back to the parking lot.

"I need a drink," Pig says motioning to the grocery store across the street.

"I'm coming with you then."

"Yeah. Me too." 

Inside Monkey follows Pig to the drinking fountain and waits behind him while Mara disappears down the aisles. A pig takes a long slow drink, lifts his head and goes back for more, wipes his mouth. "So you're just going to follow me around where ever I go now?" Monkey nods as Pig waddles down the main aisle, past a roving band of six-year-olds wide-eyed arms full of spaghetti, past the toilet paper, napkins and BBQ briquettes, past a woman laughing looking at her phone holding it up to get a better angle, past the light bulbs and aluminum pans and tiny battery display, past three men motionlessly leaning against a tower of Natural Light. Monkey stops, takes a few steps down the aisle and see's a red line around each of their necks, a small pool of blood by their shoes and a set of tiny bloody footprints running off toward the ice cream section, all three, mouths agape, sunglasses, a 24 pack of Natural Light by their feet soaking up the blood.

He follows the footprints and finds Mara opening up the fridge pulling out a gallon of Blue Bunny cookies and cream. She hesitates, puts the ice cream back and closes the door. 

"What?"

"You can't just go around killing people."

"They called me a LARPer."

Monkey frowns.

"I don't know what that means."

Pig walks up behind.

"It's like a person who covers a wooden rod with foam and duct tape and hits people."

"No," Mara corrects, "It stands for Live Action Role Playing and..." Two screams ring out. "And, you know...it's too difficult to explain right now."

"It's like calling someone a nerd, but a really specific kind." Pig looks down at Mara. "You know, because she carries around that dumb looking sword."

"It's not dumb looking! You're the one hauling around that ridiculous rake," she says unsheathing her sword. Pig puts both hands on his rake and readies himself taking a few steps back. Monkey steps in between and raises his hands as a police officer pokes his head, looks down the aisles and see's, 

A small girl in golden armor
wielding a six-foot sword
at a monstrous Pig headed man
with a nine pronged rake raised ready to strike
and in the middle
a hideous Monkey with the face of a thunder god
dressed in tiger striped pants
hands raised
eyes wild
all three staring at him
as his radio crackles 
for a response

The cop takes a moment then without breaking his stare pushes the button on his walkie-talkie and says, "We've got a bit of a situation here. I...uh...oh fuck." He pulls out his phone, takes a picture. The faux mechanical click echos down the aisle. "Hi," he says putting it back in his pocket. "My name's Eric...and...I'm going to leave now." His head slowly disappears behind a Hershey's chocolate sauce display.

Monkey leaps, catches him in one hand, reaches in his pocket, pulls out his phone and crushes it. His eyes burn with flames as he looks into his three souls and seven spirits. 

"That was totally uncool," the officer says, "of me." 

Monkey sets him down, grabs Mara and Pig and jumps through the roof smashing a six-foot hole in the ceiling and landing in the parking lot crushing the pavement and caving it in. He scans the jet ski rental store for Darlene, sees her giving a very tan woman with a blond perm a bear hug before walking off with a, "Love ya!" She sees Monkey see her and mockingly waves with excitement then laughs as she walks up and surveys the parking lot damage. "Well, fuck my tits! What happened here?"

"We should go," Monkey implores.

She takes a look at his face, jumps in the car and peels out.

"I know that face," she says weaving in traffic almost clipping a man in flips flops who gives her the finger. She gives it right back not even looking then shifts gear, lights a cigarette and takes a long drag. "Seen that face before. The I-just-done-something-bad-and-it's-gonna-ruin-all-our-lives-but-we-gotta-get-the-fuck-outta-here-as-quick-as-we-can-cause-I-don't-have-time-to-explain kinda face." She cuts off a Jeep Cherokee, then takes a hard right. "What did you do? I was gone five minutes." Takes a turn on two wheels then flattens out. "Bridget says hi by the way. Not that it matters now."

She pulls up in front of a trailer and parks, lowers her sunglasses. "Am I packing for good or for the week?"

"The week." Monkey says looking behind them.

"C'mon in. I'm gonna take my time then."

They pile out as Darlene whips out her keys. She kicks the bottom of the door as she turns the key. They spill into the living room and this is what they see, 

Pink Flamingo shower curtains
staple gunned to the wood paneling
a bamboo couch with 
an elongated white Formica coffee table
mint green doily
with a gold flamingo on top 
stacks of national geographics 
and empty laundry detergent bottles
lean against the walls
next to three different children's playsets
color bleached out 
ashtrays and empty beer cans resting on
every available surface
a 72" television leaning on top of 
a laundry basket full of dirty clothes
cereal on the floor
and in the bedroom
pink flamingo wallpaper
with pink framed pictures of
flamingos
a giant king-sized bed with
flamingo sheets
and sitting on top of the 
flamingo pillows
a stuffed flamingo
its black glass eye
missing
somewhere in the shag carpet 

"Not a word. Not a god damn word," Darlene says digging through one of her piles pulling out three pairs of underwear, a half-used stick of deodorant and toothbrush stuck inside the cover of a People magazine. "If only Brad and Jennifer could've worked things out," she says throwing the magazine across the room. She finishes packing then opens her palm to Monkey. "Lemme see your phone." Monkey doesn't respond, so she moves her outstretched hand over to Pig then Mara. Mara takes her phone out and hands it to her. She quickly dials, puts it to her ear, walks over and flops on the couch.

"Hey! It's me. Yeah. No, I don't have time for your shit right now. Listen. Listen! God damn it. Yes. I'm leaving today. Because. Because! BECAUSE I CAN'T EXPLAIN IT RIGHT NOW. Yes. I know that. I SAID I know. No. NO. Probably just the week. The Keys. I know what you said last night, but... Fine. Yes. Fuck you to." She thrusts the phone back to Mara then lights a half-smoked cigarette stained with lipstick sitting on the edge of a beer can, takes a drag then stares through the smoke, her eyes burning holes through Mara, Pig and Monkey as her foot nervously taps the carpet. "So, c'mon. Out with it. What's going on?" Pig leans his rake against the wall and starts to talk but before he can get anything out, "No No," Darlene says puffing on her cigarette. "I want to hear it from the Monkey man."