White Trash Whore
“Now I want you to tell me just one thing more. Why do you hate the South?“
‘I don’t hate it,’ Quentin said, quickly, at once, immediately; ‘I don’t hate it,’ he said. I don’t hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, the iron New England dark; I don’t. I don’t!
I don’t hate it! I don’t hate it!”
— William Faulkner, Absalom, Absalom!
I hate the South. I truly hate it. I live here because it’s cheap. I live in the Blue Ridge.
If you ignore the people, I suppose it has its moments.
The South is corrupt. It’s more twisted than a barrel of fishhooks.
I was asleep when the phone call came. It was one of those phone calls that only comes at night.
The moon is down.
I have a raggedy group of boys out there who are doing a series of workshops with street kids, homeless kids, sex work kids, junkies, HIV kids, runaways.
We call it Make Your Own Safe house.
We throw in some sex education because mainly, we have to.
The most popular question we get from this motley group has to do with ‘Can you get AIDS from sucking cock.’
Sex education in the South gives way to some repose.
I trust Trigger’s judgement when he’s not high as the Swiss Alps.
“It’s Bandito.”
We call him that because he steals. Usually everything in sight.
“What now, Trig.”
“We were just walking down Beale.”
This is code for we were having ourselves a very good time in Memphis.
“And…”
“He just throws up all over everything. All over me. All over himself. All over the sidewalk.”
“Memphis will survive. Been there. Done that. Bought the t-shirt. Bandito is from Memphis, you know that, Trig.”
Bad food will put any kid with HIV into big girl trouble, and fast.
“I thought you were going to Hole Foods.”
“We went there. Bought food. Ate it in the car. It’s not the food. We were outside of Honkey Tonk Cafe, and he ran down the street like a hot flash. Turned right. Went in the back of Burrito Blues…”
“I know the one.”
“And threw up some more. Got it all over the air conditioner of Burrito Blues. It’s gonna smell bad in there tonight.”
“And…”
“And then he starts crying and screaming he wants to come home.”
“Put him on.”
The moon is down.
“I wanna come home.”
“Why.”
“I saw him eating in there in the Honkey Tonk Cafe.”
Then, I remembered.
Bandito had been pimped out by some weird slippery sister of the Memphis snakes. A cottonmouth.
That is what Bandito called him.
I do not know the man.
If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow, and which will not, speak.
“I want to come home, please.”
They find these kids at the bus station. Kid gets off the bus, and his life is over.
I never joke around. Shits gets real.
Place to stay. Food. Get out of the rain. It gets fucking cold in Memphis.
You cannot live at the bus station. So you go home with old Cottonmouth.
You know what he wants.
And you’re going to give it to him, too.
It’s a small fucking world, and I do not recall saying go have a Beale Street shazaams while you’re at it. I do not recall saying that.
Beale street can be rough. Tourists see what they want to see. They rarely see all the happy campers two blocks off Beale. Memphis poverty is being broken with the storms of state. Everyone’s best friend is Jack Daniels.
Most bus stations have seen little white trash whores in and out of the toilets.
You will not be turning tricks at the Hyatt. They will throw you back into the coven by pulling you out the door by your gracious ear.
And don’t come back.
You would be the triple pillar of the world transformed into a strumpet’s fool. No worse than some pimp’s whore, and the best of them.
“Put Trigger on.”
“He’s got the shakes and he pissed himself.”
“I do not recall saying, oh, go party down on Beale.”
“We just thought we would go see it. I want to visit Graceland.”
Celebrity is never more admired than by the negligent.
“Put him on the bus. He saw someone who scares him something considerable.”
“Mainly.”
“Mainly. Send him home. He will need clean clothes. They’re in his bag. Make sure he has his meds. Burn the clothes he’s wearing.”
“He will rob everyone on that bus.”
“Probably.”
The moon is down. Just neon blackness.
Walking shadows. Titty bars. Poor players that strut and fret their hour upon the stripper’s stage. And we are heard no more. It is a tale told by a thousand white trash boys and the pimps who love them.
Signifying not a damn thing.
We will be glad to have him back.
Good nite moon.
