Life As It Is by Dale Patrick Smrekar

Life As It Is by Dale Patrick Smrekar

Americus sat on an old apartment building’s front steps curling an ancient, rusted metal twenty-pound hand weight again and again, in time with a famous rap song. Something about jumping and sung by some smart-ass kids who wore their clothes backwards. The music was coming from a hopped-up Mustang idling on the street across the way. Someone was waiting to pick up a friend or something. Probably that busty little Black girl who seemed to generate a lot of attention among the young Black guys hanging in the area. The music reminded the young, skinny nineteen-year-old of better times, when a young white Italian teenager from the wrong side of the tracks didn’t have to worry about paying bills. A time when his momma and older brother were still footing the bills.

Momma had stopped paying the bills and headed out like many middle-aged rural junkies. No, she hadn’t abandoned them or wound up in jail. She drove off in a cheap overdose of drugs. Either opioids, or the needle. Americus didn’t know which. He had just turned fifteen. He would hear the rumors of the nature of her death. But his older, gainfully employed brother, Apollo, wouldn’t talk about it. Said she was history, the past and they needed to move on. Apollo was twenty-two.

Neither Americus nor Apollo would ever know their dads. They were hidden by the numbers. Momentary lovers that docked in mamma’s port, then left. Momma was quite a cargo container. An attractive, thin but busty, bleach blond, good time party girl who never met an evening of drinking she didn’t want to encourage. But the lovers helped pay the bills and bought whatever she was using.  Life was pretty stable for the boys, if one calls living with a junkie mother stable. That stability ended one bright summer afternoon when Sally, their next-door neighbor, found momma choaking to death on her own vomit.

The small-town ambulance service had two calls ahead of hers. They even had time for an RC Cola and moon pie stop. Speed was never of the essence for a junkie call. One less junkie was a blessing in their small rural community. Besides, it wasn’t the first time they visited momma.

Americus found out about momma when Apollo picked him up from school. With cold steely eyes, Apollo said, “Momma’s dead, little brother.”

Initially Americus said nothing, just stared into the abyss of bad news. A minute or two passed before he could look over at Apollo. Apollo seemed distant, showed no emotion, just shifted his car into gear and squealed out, fishtailing as he left the pickup area. Crossing guards screamed at them as they drove off.

“How… how’d she die?” he asked Apollo, as the shock wore off and tears started trickling down his cheeks. He wiped them with the back of his shirt sleeve.

“She just died, that all you need to know. It’s you and me from now on and we’re going home, packing our shit and heading out. Just don’t go in momma’s room, that’s where she died.”

“Is she still there?”

“Ambulance took her away. She was pretty much dead when they arrived.”

“Oh…” Americus choaked back some tears, then stabilized his emotions. Living with a junkie does that.

“But, where we headed?”

The big city, little bro.”

“What about momma’s burial?

“Ha, she had no money. What she had, I stopped by the house and gathered up, then withdrew the pitiful contents of her account from the ATM machine with her ATM card. It wasn’t much, just a few hundred dollars. That would’na have covered her cremation, much less a burial. We can use her money more than the damned funeral home.”

But… but how we gonna live?”

“I got a few thousand, enough to get us a place in the city. I’m a delivery guy. Those jobs are easy to find.”

“Delivering what?”

“Just stuff.”

Apollo drove out of that small town and found a place in nearby Atlanta that late afternoon. It wasn’t much of a place, but it had windows, a stove, one bath, heat and air conditioning that worked, and doors that locked. It was furnished with junk furniture, but it had a TV. A real loser pad.

It fit. When you’re the sons of a junkie cargo container who services the world, the loser label gets transferred automatically. The boys needed a fresh start. Their fresh start ended three years later, when Apollo stepped in front of a large caliber bullet on a delivery.

Apollo got what his momma got, an indigent county burial. Proper burials had never been a Rossi family tradition. The street found him shortly after that. Exercise was now his primary shelter from life’s vengeance.

He paused, sniffed his armpits. He smelled like dead animals. Maybe he wasn’t really alive. The street before him seemed alive. Trees, bugs, broken pavement, potholes, an occasional stray animal or human walked by. The broken-down car before him sitting up on blocks with blown out windows seemed oddly alive. A bunch of paper wasps had built a gigantic wasp nest up underneath the interior roof line. The old car was literally alive because the wasps were flying in and out all day long. It used to be a shelter for the homeless before the bums started using it for an outhouse. The wasps claimed it shortly afterwards. No one objected, it was theirs.

The hookers on the street corner on this windy Monday afternoon seemed alive… and unusually yappy. A tall skanky blond hooker yelled out to him, “Americus…      Americus… you gonna take that job Joey offered you?”

He had tried to ignore Miranda, but she wasn’t having any of it. In an instant, a pink haired, spider eye lashed white blur stood before him, spread legged in that barely legal skirt which was cut up way to close to her ass. At times it didn’t hide everything, leaving her humanity sticking out. Miranda had stork stick legs and a flat contour, but she always smelled nice. Americus ignored her and continued curling his arm weight.

“Hey boy, you paying attention to me?”

Silence.

“Hey, just cause you’ve got them wings on your ankles doesn’t mean you can just ignore me. You’re just a man with wings on your ankles.” She placed her hands on her skinny assed flat board-like hips and leaned down to stare at him.

Americus waved her away. She didn’t move. He looked down at his ankles then fingered one of the shiny wings bound around his ankles. The silk was smooth to the touch. He liked their almost florescent colors. They shimmered pink, orange and silver in the fading afternoon sun. They weren’t real, just stage accessories for his busker street side unicycle act. Americus was a unicycle juggler who twirled colorful little balls in the air, passing them around and around, flipping off jumps and catching them in impossible positions.  A real acrobat in a world that wasn’t real anymore. Problem was, it didn’t pay the bills. It hadn’t paid him a single dime in weeks. Either money was tight, or no one appreciated his skills, He was too shy to ask.

His unicycle? It was stored inside the old apartment building, out of the rain and snow. He didn’t have to worry about someone stealing it. Hell, no one could ride the damn thing. One stupid bum tried to ride off with it a few months ago. He ended up face down on the sidewalk. His face all cracked up and bleeding. It was a hard nose-first fall. If Miranda hadn’t called 911, he would have remained there on the cold, snowy sidewalk until he bled out. That evening, the  frozen sidewalk became a slushy, red color snow cone thanks to his blood.

For fun, Miranda and her street corner friends traced the outline of a body in the slushy snow after the ambulance picked up the old bum. The outline remained until the next rain. But the bum never returned, so Americus figured the bum had died. No one ever messed with his unicycle after that. Everyone assumed that he, rather than the unicycle, had crushed the old bum’s face.

Miranda was always in everyone’s business. It’s what yappy prostitutes do.

“Boy, you gonna talk to me?” Miranda asked. “Joey’s gonna want an answer.” She stood up, tugged her short skirt down to cover her business tools and glared at him.

“Why you so interested in what I do, Miranda?”

“Sharon and Hazel over there are worried about you. You’re becoming skin and bones. Wasting away right in front of us”

“I eat.”

“What? None of us have seen you eat anything all weekend. You just sit day and night on these steps. The only time you leave them is to go inside to take a crap. At least we think you’re taking a crap.”

“They’re serving steaks inside.”

Miranda laughed. “Like hell they are. There’s no they inside. That empty apartment building is condemned like that junker wasp nest car sitting in front of you. That’s a damn shame too. I used to use it to service my johns before the bums shit in it and the wasps claimed it. Now I’m a front seat sally for the local businessmen looking for a good time before they go home to their beautiful wife and family. It’s a living.”

“Why do you care about what I do or don’t do?”

He placed the hand weight down beside him.

I just don’t want you to smell up the place when you die of starvation. It’ll ruin my business.”

“You can take it down the block if I’m stinking up the place.”

“No, I can’t. This is the last street corner in the area not owned by the City Hall cartel. You know those guys in City Hall and their money-grubbing cops. It’s the last days of Rome around here.

Miranda turned her head and sniffed the air. Her lips curled. There’s something dead around here.”

“That’s me,” Americus said. “I’m past my best sale date or something.”

“If that’s really you. You’re already dead.”

She leaned in to take a closer sniff. “You stink, but I don’t think that’s you. Must be a dead rat somewhere nearby. Anyway’s, once the City Hall cartel gets enough hookers to fill my corner, me and the girls are out of business. The last, reasonably priced, honest hookers gone. We independent girls get a lot of business cause the City Hall girls charge so much. Can you imagine a hundred dollars for a blow job. Hell, they better be inventing new hydraulics or something to charge that much. A blow job is a blow job… you know what I’m saying.”

“I didn’t ask for a detailed discussion of your business practices,” Americus replied.

“Are you gonna take that job Joey offered you?”

“Joey’s a crook. Runs a protection business,” Americus said.

“Joey ain’t never been convicted of anything. Arrested a few times, but never convicted,” Miranda said. “That just makes him a good citizen.

“The last arrest was for some kind of COVID relief fraud. A lot of money. I heard it was a million plus dollars.”

“They’re dropping charges, honey.” Miranda, said as she stepped away. “He’s getting away, free and clear. Did you know it’s gotta be ten million or so before the feds prosecute a fraud case. They want headlines and a mil or two is just too small to make headlines. They leave those cases for the locals. And in Joey’s case he’s got protection. Friends in high places who threaten and fire those who try to investigate an honest man just trying to get ahead. It’s a new America hon. Everyone’s on the take now days.” 

Americus just smiled

“I’m asking you one more time, you gonna take that job Joey’s offering you?” Miranda paced back and forth waiting for his slow-a-coming reply. 

“Joey, ain’t honest. He’s a hood. If he’s such a good guy, why isn’t he providing you girls protection. Giving you your own corner, free and clear of the cartel?”

“It don’t work that way,” Miranda says. Joey’s got his protection business and someone else got the whoring business. The two co-exist along with some other mildly criminal enterprises which I’m likely unfamiliar with, but they do exist. Joey ain’t ever gonna offer us protection, cause no one fucks with another man or woman’s business. That’s dangerous and stupid and Joey’s smarter than that.

“But the cartel is gonna fuck with your business when they run you girls off your corner,” Americus says.

Miranda doesn’t pay attention. A long pink and silver low rider car rolls slowly by. Booming a white boy rap song, announcing its presence. It’s a pretty car, pink front fenders and hood slowly fading to silver all the way back to the fiberglass rear bumper. Someone spent some money. She turns gives them a finger then looks back at Americus. A blackened window rides up shielding the passengers from the full force of her finger.

“That asshole didn’t pay for his last servicing. Has the gall to do a ride by looking for more free stuff.”

It stops down by Sharon and Hazel. They just turn their back on it. The low rider rolls on for greener pastures.

“Men! Always thinking they should get it for free. It’s a capitalist society. No one gets anything for free. Maybe buy one, get one free. But money gotta be exchanged somewhere in the process.”

Americus nods his head.

“Where was I? Oh yeah. Corner time. We good until they find more girls. And that’ll be a while. The turnover in this business is outrageous. Girls quit constantly. Cause they don’t like the clientele. Have to do shit they don’t want to do. Sometimes their old man at home gets tired waiting for his turn to come around. Not to mention bad pimps and customers who don’t pay, like that jerk in the pink and silver car. It’s a tough way to make money. Lots of girls leave the street side business all the time. For me, it’s a money maker. Believe it or not, I started as a high-priced call girl, but I ran into way too many fists.”

Americus just nodded in response. He could believe it. Despite a few years on her, she still had that gorgeous, high cheekbone face. Thin as a rail, but she should have been a model if life had been a little more fair.

“Now that Pretty Woman movie? That was a bunch of hopped-up bullshit,” Miranda hollered out with arms waving around to accent her bullshit statement. “It don’t work that way. Sooner or later violence and danger always gets mixed in with the money. And it always happens on a boat or some weird guy’s mansion where you’re sure it’s your last moments on Earth. You had better be a damn good swimmer or be able to navigate through the bushes at three a.m. Otherwise you’re a missing person’s report. It’s better down here on the corner. Money isn’t great, but if you work hard, you make good money. And the best part…hardly anyone hits you sitting in their car or doing it down an alley.”                                                             

“So why do you do it?” Americus asked.

“I’m living the American dream. Running my own ass, or should I say business. We three girls don’t have no pimp, we’re real entrepreneurs. Selling services and making money.” she says.

“Until they find more girls,” Americus says.

“Yeah, until they find more girls. But this is year three for us. Could be a while. Nice thing is we don’t pay any taxes. Just collect and spend the money. We girls have an apartment we share. Nothing great, but it’s home. A roof over our head, and food in the cabinets. It’s warm in the winter and cool during the summer. Can’t ask for more. You’re avoiding my original question Americus. Got me yapping and yapping about my enterprise. You gonna take that job Joey offered you?”  

“Be his delivery man? No way. My brother did that, and he wound up with a bullet in the back of his head.”

“That’s cause he didn’t work for Joey.”

“How you know that?”

“I’m a hooker. Everyone tells us stuff. Brag about their exploits, tells us what a big man they are. Fuck, we hookers could bring down a lot of people if the Feds ever came a calling. But they don’t. None of our information adds up to ten-million-dollars.” She shimmied her dress down, once again as she felt the warm breeze in her nether regions.                                                 

“Then you know who executed my brother?”

“No, I just know he didn’t work for Joey. He worked from some other shyster, but I don’t know names.”
“Or you don’t want to reveal names.”

“This is getting kind of personal, Americus.”

“You know!” Americus said, as he pointed his finger at her.

“Settle down. I don’t. I just know he got offed. Your brother was a nice, good-looking guy. I serviced him a few times. A real gentleman. Always left a tip.”

“You knew Apollo? You don’t look his type.”

“Type? What’s that supposed to mean?” Miranda’s eye squinted, her fists clinched, then relaxed, then clinched once again. She didn’t like his labeling words.

Americus backtracked. “He had a thing for Hispanic girls. That’s what I’m saying.”

“Well, he also had a thing for me. Four or five times, if my count’s right. He stopped coming around and I started asking around. I like good tippers. That’s how I know he got offed. The street’s got ears. Information flows. You’d know that if you participated in life around you. Instead, all you do is unicycle around, juggle some balls and keep to yourself. Joey’s giving you a lifeline to humanity and you’re just wasting away.”

“Don’t like people.”                                                                                        

“No kidding. Well, sometimes I don’t either. But I still participate. Hey, tell you what. Business is slow, let’s go inside this broken-down old apartment building. I’ll give you a free one in honor of your brother. Anything you like. Around the world, whatever. And then you take that job with Joey.”

Americus shook his head no. “I’m not taking no job with Joey.”

“But you’d take the free one?”

Americus blushed, wiped his face with a hand, then said, “Maybe.” A little grin flashed across his lips then vanished.

“You’re a virgin, aren’t you?” Miranda said.

“No, I’ve done it.”

Miranda knew that wasn’t true. She could spot a virgin from a mile away. “I’ll be real sweet and tender with you. I’ll even take you home and bed you properly in my own bed.”

‘Thanks, but there’s no reason for that. I’m just gonna sit here and wait for things to get better.”

“You’re a sad boy, Americus,” she said as she walked away. He could hear her yell out to her corner mates. “He don’t want the job. Hell, he don’t even want a piece of me in my nice clean old bed. He just wants to sit there like a loser.”                                                        

“Forget him,” heavy set, Black Hazel yelled back.                                                                             

Americus closed his eyes. When he opened them, summer had been replaced by a cooling northern wind. Where’s summer? He thought. He looked around with new eyes. Miranda and her girls on the corner were gone, replaced by City Hall cartel hookers. The wasp nest car remained. The damn bugs were still flying in and out of the busted-out windows. The street was alive. A couple of bums stumbled by. They seemingly looked right through him. He knew them both. But they never responded to his hand wave and nod. Someone’s souped up ride boomed a rap song as it drove on down the street. A stiff breeze blew brown, red and gold leaves across the sidewalks piling them up against a line of garbage cans waiting their turn with the garbage truck. It was fall in slum city.

Americus fumbled with the wings on his ankles. They were strangely different. Real feathers and they flapped on their own.  One of the doors of the old apartment building creaked open and closed loudly. He turned his head. It was Miranda. She had those same wings on her ankles too.

That’s the problem with residual memories for the dead, Americus realized. Your life feels like it just happened a minute ago.

“Like my pretty new wings,” Miranda said.

* * * * THE END * * * *
Copyright Dale Patrick Smrekar 2026

Image Source: Andrew Amistad from Unsplash.com