literary-fiction – DAVID V. MATTHEWS

Robbie “Horseface” Doyle’s a guy from your tenth-grade shop class. He says he doesn’t mind that nickname, even telling the other guys “My face ain’t the only thing horselike about me, ha ha ha ha ha,” as he points at his crotch. For whatever reason, though, he’s never talked to you—what a shame, right?

But then one day in shop class, as you stand in line to use the bandsaw, he strolls up and says “Hello.”

“Hi,” you say.

“Wanna know what I did last Friday night?”

You don’t answer.

“Well,” he says, “I went to the mall and met this girl at the arcade, and believe me, she was hot, with boobs out to here,” using both hands to squeeze his own boobs a few times, invisible boobs, double-D’s from the looks of it. “So we got to talking, and I mentioned I took this class, and she told me, she said”—high-pitched voice—“ ‘Wow, I like a guy who builds, like, stuff with, like, tools and stuff.’ So we went to her place and got hammered, ha ha ha ha ha. We drank a bunch of screwdrivers, ha ha ha ha ha. And then I screwed her. I nailed her. I drilled her a couple new holes. And it was pretty easy, getting her to do me. I told her, I said”—grabbing his crotch—“ ‘I got some wood right here, babe! Ha ha ha ha ha!’ ”

You turn around. You bend over slightly.

PBBBPPBBBBT.

You turn back around and use both hands to wave the noxious fumes toward him.

A couple of your classmates laugh. Horseface doesn’t. He strolls off and never speaks to you again. What a damn shame.

■

Late one night, while channel-surfing as you sit alone in your apartment—

“So how many of you have kids?”

Yep, it’s Horseface, right there on your screen. A few years after graduating high school, he moved to New York City and started doing stand-up comedy.

“I have a kid,” he continues. “A seven-year-old son. Great guy, I love him a lot, but—lately, he’s started asking me questions about, uh, the birds and the bees?” The audience laughs. “And it’s not like he wants to know where babies come from. I think he knows that already. Instead, he wants to know about certain details of the process? Even when he doesn’t know they’re certain details? Even when they’re, like, adjacent details?”

Until now, you’ve never seen one of Horseface’s cable-TV specials, because, come on, seriously? But now that your third wife has left you and filed for divorce, a wife you actually loved—well, your life sucks already, so why the hell not watch that geek perform at Carnegie Hall or the Laff Hole or wherever?

“Like, one day he came up to me and asked, he asked”—high-pitched voice, about the same as Horseface’s female voice from shop class—“ ‘Daddy? What’s dick cheese?’ ” The audience roars. Horseface points at the side of his head, his own head, says “PPPBBOOO” as if he’s shot himself, and staggers backwards making a goofy face, the audience laughing and applauding.

You gulp down the rest of your beer.

“So I told him, I said ‘Uhhh, where’d you hear about that type of cheese?’ And he said ‘I heard Uncle Percy talkin’ on the phone? An’ he said that Uncle Jack made the most delicious dick cheese in town.’ ” Huge laughter from the audience. The two Uncles are probably recurring gay characters. Your brother, who’s gay himself, would love them or maybe not.

“ ‘So what is dick cheese, Daddy?’ ‘Uhhhhhhhhhh, you know what? It doesn’t really matter, ’cause you’re allergic to it.’ ‘I am?’ ‘Uh-huh. You can eat any other type of cheese, American cheese, Swiss cheese, Lithuanian cheese, but if someone offers you dick cheese, you should not, under any circumstances, eat it. ’Cause if you do, your face will bloat out like this.’ ” Horseface places his hands on his cheeks. He quickly moves them, his hands, away while saying “AAAAGGGH!” Laughter and applause from the audience. You hope his kid, if he even has one, grows up to blow every interior decorator on Fire Island, that vacation spot your brother visits every summer with his husband. His first husband so far.

You haven’t contacted your brother in months. Perhaps you should, out of familial obligation. Life consists of one obligation after another, sometimes interrupted by something fun, such as, well, let’s see, something fun you’ve done lately, uh—

“Meet my boss,” Horseface says in a deep, authoritative voice, pointing with both hands at his crotch. The audience roars.

Tag: literary-fiction

One Obligation after Another