A revised excerpt (or a revised outtake?) from my forever-upcoming novel, Normal Tastes.
●
“My beer tastes funny,” Officer Petrovich says.
“Really?” Officer Chandler says. “Lemme have a sip.”
One sip later:
“Tastes fine to me,” Officer Chandler says.
“Could I have a sip of yours?” Officer Petrovich asks.
“Go ahead.”
Officer Petrovich takes a sip.
“Hmmm. Tastes the same as mine,” he says.
“Must be your palate,” Officer Chandler says.
“Yeah, you always did have a sensitive palate,” Officer Tate says.
“Perhaps you should order something else,” Officer Donovan says.
“Nah,” Officer Petrovich says. “If I did, I might like how it tastes and drink a lot of it.”
“And that’s bad?” Officer Tate says.
“I told my girlfriend I would cut down on my drinking.”
“We tell our girlfriends lots of things,” Officer Wilcox says.
Five white police officers, all male except for Brittany Donovan, sit together wearing their civilian clothes and drinking beer at Sluggerz Sports Bar, one of the most popular social venues in that neighborhood. Framed, autographed items hang on the walls: photos, newspaper front-pages, magazine covers, trading cards, hockey sticks, basketball jerseys, empty Wheaties boxes, and other sports memorabilia pertaining to male athletes, white and black with a few Latinos.
“Maybe I should get drunk, just to celebrate,” Officer Tate says.
“Celebrate what?” Officer Petrovich asks.
“Not giving a dime to my brother. He stopped by my place last night. He only stops by when he wants something, and sure enough, he said he needed new tires for his car. I asked how much. He said ‘Six hundred dollars. I’ll pay you back.’ Bullshit he’ll pay me back. I felt like tossing him out, literally tossing him out as far as I could, head-first. But I was bored, and I wanted to have some fun. So I said ‘Okay, I’ll give you the money. But first—you hafta take out your dick and jerk off right in front of me.’ ”
The table erupts in laughter.
“He laughed too. I said ‘I’m not kidding. If you really want me to pay for those tires, you’ll take out your dick and jerk off right in front of me. And I don’t care what you fantasize about. I don’t really wanna know, actually, just as long as you do what I say. Hell, you shoot a huge load, I’ll throw in an extra ten bucks for free, as a gift.’
“Well, he looked at me. Then he laughed again and said”—Officer Tate points straight ahead and adopts a slightly squeaky voice—“ ‘You’re a real nice guy, you know that?’
“I said ‘Yeah, I’m a real nice guy. Say a word of this to anyone, and I’ll say a million words about that weekend in Fort Lauderdale. I mean it.’
“He laughed some more, said ‘Smell you later,’ and exited the premises.”
“Brotherly love,” Officer Wilcox says. “But what happened in Fort Lauderdale?”
“That’s classified.”
“Pleeease?”
“He drank milk and read the Bible, okay?”
More laughter erupts.
●
“Didjoo write that thing for tomorrow?” Officer Chandler asks.
“Yeah,” Officer Donovan says.
“So did I.”
“Good.”
They stand outside Sluggerz, vaping.
“You look thoughtful,” Officer Chandler says.
“I was thinking about that kid we arrested today for selling pot. At the community college? He wasn’t exactly a rocket scientist, was he?”
“Nope, he wasn’t.”
“It was a bit too easy, arresting him.”
“It was. But I’m not complaining.”
Officer Donovan puffs on her e-cigarette. Menthol blast. Her favorite.
“I used to smoke pot,” she says.
“You did?” Officer Chandler says.
“Uh-huh. When I was a teenager. Me and my best friend, we’d get high in her bedroom whatever chance we could. Once we got so high, we listened to the same song ten times in a row.”
“Which song?”
“Uh, ‘Rude’?”
“Never heard of it.”
“It was real popular back then.”
“I listened to classic rock. Who did that song?”
“A group called MAGIC! Their name was spelled all in caps with an exclamation point at the end. ‘Rude’ was their first and only hit. It was a reggae-rock song about this guy who’s singing to his girlfriend’s father, and the singer asks him for her hand in marriage, but the father says no, so the singer, in the chorus, calls him rude. I thought it was the greatest line ever, with deep layers of meaning in that one word, ruuuude, but of course, I was stoned as hell. Any word would have had deep freaking layers of meaning. When you’re a dumb kid like I was, you need those layers to feel smart, I suppose.”
Officer Donovan takes a drag on her e-cigarette.
“Anyway,” she says, “I haven’t heard that song in years. Nor have I smoked pot in years.”
“I’ve never smoked pot,” Officer Chandler says. “I’ve never done any drugs.”
“Weirdo.”
●
POUND POUND. POUND POUND POUND.
Huh?
POUNDPOUNDPOUNDPOUND.
Some jagoff’s pounding on the front door.
The noise continues as Mike Chandler stumbles out of bed and through the living room, wearing his Skorchin T-shirt and his red-and-white plaid boxers.
He looks through the door window and grimaces. He opens the door.
“Hello,” Denton says.
“What are you doing here?” Mike asks.
“Could I come in?”
“I have to get up early tomorrow.”
“Just for a minute?”
Denton barges past him and sits down on the couch.
Mike pauses a moment, then closes the door.
“How’djoo get here?” he asks.
“I walked,” Denton replies.
“Good. Good thing you didn’t drive in your condition.”
“My condition?”
“You’re a little drunk.”
“I’m a little buzzed.” Denton flaps his arms. “Bzzzzzzz.”
“Sure.”
“I called a couple times, but you didn’t answer. I left a voicemail.”
“Sorry, forgot to check my phone.”
“All night?”
“What do you want, Denton?”
“For starters—where were you?”
“Why do you wanna—”
“Just curious. Where were you?”
“At Sluggerz.”
“With your fellow police officers?”
“Yeah.”
“I didn’t know they served donuts there.”
“If I gave you a drink, wouldjoo leave?”
“Maybe.” Denton notices the e-cigs on the end table. “You’re still vaping? Oh, Mike. You must be pretty popular with the junior-high crowd.”
“Ha ha.”
“If you must suck on something—”
Denton slowly opens his legs.
Mike sighs.
“What? It’s better for you. It doesn’t contain nicotine.”
“Please leave. Now.”
Denton doesn’t budge.
“I said now.”
Denton grins.
“You’re not sexy at all.”
Denton smiles.
Mike sighs again.
He kneels down and unzips Denton’s khakis.
●
Mike and Denton lie naked together on the living-room carpet, navy blue speckled with plain old blue.
“I like your carpet,” Denton says.
“Thanks,” Mike says. “It’s the first thing I bought when I moved into this place. I’ve always hated living rooms that aren’t carpeted. They look, I dunno, primitive?”
Denton reaches over and slides his index finger across Mike’s face, a sensation Mike enjoys, the long soft finger pressing gently into his scratchy cheek.
After their last, uh, get-together, Mike vowed he wouldn’t get reeled in again.
“You doing anything tomorrow night?” he asks.
“I have to work,” Denton says.
“On a Friday night?”
“Cops work on Friday night too.”
“You’re not a cop.”
“I need the money.”
Mike stares into Denton’s eyes.
“I should get going,” Denton says. He stands up and looks around for his white boxer shorts. He finds them hanging from the top edge of the couch.
For some reason, most of the guys Mike has gotten involved with have worn boxer shorts. He’s never asked guys about their underwear beforehand, though, instead preferring a sense of mystery until…the mystery vanishes.
“You could sleep here if you want,” he says.
“I have some stuff to do at home,” Denton says.
“What else is new?”
“I’ll sleep over next time. I’ll even bring a casserole.”
Mike sighs and starts hunting for his own boxer shorts. He sees them lying under the second thing he bought for this place: the seventy-inch widescreen TV hanging on the wall. He slips back into his sleepwear and watches Denton get dressed. Not everyone can pull off the white-polo-shirt-and-khakis look as well as Denton can—not even President Trump on the golf course, ha ha.
“Okay, so, catch you later,” Denton says.
“Yes, definitely,” Mike says.
They kiss, a five-second-or-so kiss with mutual tongue.
Denton leaves.
Mike tries resisting the urge to vape.
Copyright © 2025 by David V. Matthews
2021 (revised January 10-11, 2025)
DAVID V. MATTHEWS 