GILBERT

"Here's an awesome joke." I'm looking down at my tray of surgical instruments. Oh, yeah, I'm a doctor tonight. Good thing I'm not one of those sadists who jack off to their murders. Shit, that'd be a good one. What's up, doc? My dick, 'cause I'm slicing your goddamn face off. Hilarious, ja? I kill me. Anyway.

The guy is one of those who think they're strong and want the world to think it, too, but the guy and the world both know who the pussy is, and it's sure as hell not the world. Have you seen the world? Chews people up and spits 'em back out like those health-food assholes with the pomegranates. Ever see them? Wiggling their lips to suck off all the juicy sour bits, then they pucker up and spew the seeds out like they ain't important. Seeds are totally important. Shit grows from seeds, you know.

Any-fucking-way.

The guy's tied to a chair, and he's glaring at me like he's gonna challenge me. Like he's got dignity. Here's some advice: dignity ain't something to advertise. Good way to fuckin' lose it.

"So, this guy gets this job pushing drugs." I inspect one of the knives, this serrated one you could file your nails with, then put it back down. "The deal is, he handles the deals. The boss gets him the supply, and he gives it to people in exchange for money, and all of that money goes back to the boss."

In my peripheral, I see his mouth open, so I turn and hook my fist into his jaw. His head snaps back satisfyingly, and I scream, "SHUT THE FUCK UP!"

He stares at me. Ah, there's the pussy fear I've been waiting for. Nobody's fooled now. His hazel eyes have white rings around them. What a shitty color hazel is. Could have been green, but they had to drag it through the mud. What I'd give for a good pair of goddamn green eyes. Jesus.

"Do you know how rude it is to fucking interrupt?" I inquire. "I'm telling a joke. If you ruin the punch line, that is very not awesome. Comprende?"

He nods, with a flicker of recognition in those shitty eyes. He knows that I know he's Spanish. He knows that I know everything.

"Right. So where was I." I return my attention to my scalpels. "Right. All the money goes to the boss. All. A-L-L. Not some, not most, not seventy-fucking-five-damn-percent. All of it. And then, from that money, the dealer guy is paid a percentage depending on what he earned."

I select a knife about the length of my cock—it's a sizeable knife—and turn to face the Spaniard again. "But then this guy thinks to himself, Well here's a good idea-clit. Lemme rub it and see what comes squirtin' outta the fate-vag." I can tell I'm losing him with this philosophical stuff. I stand close beside him and lay my leg over his thighs, like we're bosom buddies. "Well, lemme tell ya. Just rubbin' the clit won't make her squirt. Life's a bitch like that." I tap the tip of the knife against the freckled bridge of his nose. He winces, but meets my gaze, bless his heart. "So here's the funny part of my awesome joke. The guy's plan was to keep some of the money for himself and not tell his boss. That is a lie of omission, and that is theft."

I pause here, like they do in sitcoms. The Spaniard just keeps staring at me. So I shove the knife between his ribs.

"Why are you not laughing," I say through his agonized wails. "Do you not find it fucking hilarious that he thought he could get away with that?"

He quiets, but his face is twisted with pain. I return to my tray, come back with a smaller scalpel. "Your boss hired me to tell you that he was very disappointed with your work. He will not be giving you a reference for your résumé."

"Please do not kill me, Señor," he says, uneven on account of the knife in his lung. "I have a family."

"Yes, I know you have a family, Antonio Carriedo," I reply as I lovingly stroke his jaw with my scalpel. "A beautiful wife and two kids, and a dog with a curly tail. Probably have the white picket fence, too, if slums had white picket fences."

Breathing's getting hard for him. "I did it for them. They will starve without me to provide—"

"Hush lovey," I say, slipping the scalpel between his lips. His eyes widen in alarm, but I haven't cut him. Not there. Not yet. "Hush hush little lovey bird." I sit on his lap now, put an arm around his shoulders, and whisper into his ear. "Let me tell you a secret. Shhh, shhh. Hush now, and listen, my sweet: I DON'T GIVE A FUCK!"

The thrill of feeling him jump when I shout at the top of my lungs gets me all riled up, so I stick the scalpel into his neck, but then I kinda get indecisive and pull it back out again, and the blood spurts out and I, well, I just get a little carried away sometimes, you know, don't we all?

My ass pocket starts to loudly play wonky organ and harmonica sounds, then drums! A lilting voice sings creepily, For the benefit of Mr. Kite, a show will go on tonight—

I stagger back from the bloody mess I've been straddling and, still panting a little, answer my phone. "The fuck?"

"Are you done?" Low, rolling Russian accent. Monotone. Trying to be intimidating. Succeeding quite well.

"Yeah, he's dead, if that's what you mean. Me, I've been done for the past nine and a half years." I tug the scalpels out of the Spanish corpse and walk to the sink on the far wall. I rinse them, holding the phone with my shoulder because I'm just that awesome. "Did you know he had kids?"

"Eh." There's the most indifferent sound I've ever heard. Gotta love it.

"So, still with the same plan?"

"Da, as you were instructed when you were paid. Is there a problem?"

"Nope. Did you want something? I'm working." I roll the dead Spaniard over with my boot and untie him from yet another ruined chair. Sometimes I wish blood didn't stain so much. But usually I don't give a shit.

"You have another job offer. The time and location is open to your choosing. I will send you the other details tomorrow."

Job offer, like I have a choice. "Thanks. Sleep tight, baby cakes."

"Watch yourself." He hangs up. Ooooh.

I put my phone back in my ass, put away my surgical instruments, wrap up my dead guy in a tarp, and heft him onto my shoulder. "Jesus shit," I mutter under his weight as I lug him up out of my basement, out to my car. "No more quesadillas for you, asshole." The trunk slams like it's the end of the of the world. What a fuckin' drama queen.

I leave Mr. Carriedo propped up against his front door, a bottle of beer in his hand and a note taped to his forehead. Dawn peeks over the horizon as I slam the trunk again, making the curly-tailed dog start yapping in the shitty Spanish slum house. Just as I get in the car, an upstairs window lights up. I don't stay to watch the discovery, though; dawn is coming, so I roar away fast enough to wake up the rest of the street and read my note aloud, just to my awesome self.

"The Prussian was here."