Waterfront Hotel, Oakland, California

18 months ago, when the white devil came to Oakland, he almost immediately sought out salty snacks and whiskey. The young, just off the boat Korean gal behind the counter, looked at his beard of white from behind his mask and asked him if he was “vaccinate?”

Her English was very rudimentary.

He explained that he had been living in the mountains for the winter and was not up on the latest hysteria. She seemed to glean a vague understanding that he had come in out of some wild yeti haunt.

When he informed her that he was not vaϲϲinated, she exclaimed, “But it free for you—you old! Why no medicine for you?”

Taken in by her spirit, her dark eyes and long hair, and shapely form, and noting that they were alone, the silver-backed white hoodrat thought back to the Hennesey whiskey billboards in Baltimore, that always depicted a brother between a light-skinned bitch and an Asian babe; recalling also that he was culturally, possibly the blackest man on the West Coast. The triangulation complete, he winked, pointed to the Henessey half pints behind the counter and said, “My medicine.”

Her pretty mouth formed in an‘0’of surprise and then creased in a devilish grin as she hissed with widening eyes, “Real man medicine!”

Taken with the rising power of years, he grinned and raised two fingers and her eyes widened, “Two? Oh you real man. You need help to drink?” and the eyes batted seductively and the rest was history...

There ensued nearly two years of transitory bliss, in which the ancient hoodrat’s white chest pelt was petted like he were a Siberian tiger in a Seoul zoo, and few words other then “Oh,” “more,” and “Yes!” ever passed from her darling lips on the seasonal week long sojourns in SaySay’s adopted town of Oakland.

Well, perfection never lasts for long. Her form has improved, the American diet adding more cushion to butt and more jut to breast, which does appeal to his paleolithic beauty standard. But, you know what they say about them Asian folk—they’re notoriously smart and hard working two. This has resulted in SaySay expanding her English vocabulary from the mere 100 word just-off-the-boat lexicon to something approaching the 300 word dialect of Baltimore. And nothing endangers a perfect mated pair more than speaking the same language.

Curious about his writing, and her darling head barely taller on her feet behind him than his runty form seated in that cushioned chair, SaySay read over his shoulder some Crackpot Mailbox queries from young men readers. When he realized that she could read English, an ominous chill ran down his spine as her hair draped his shoulders.

She then stated, “Me Mingus [1] ‘appy. Why dem men write in no ‘appy?”

He turned in the chair and looked at her black hair brushing his shrinking shoulders and her soft flesh pressing his still hard arm and grinned. Thus she smiled, and bobbled her relatively large head over her lush little shoulders and quirked, “Oh ‘cause dey no got no SaySay!”

He then summarized that these young men of his kind had no real prospects in life, with those inclined to work displaced by men from Asia, Latin America and elsewhere and women of their own kind enamored of Africans or whoring themselves to the likes of Brill Yates.

She then smiled and chirped, with hands on hips, “ ‘Cause dey no got no SaySay!”

As he grinned wolfishly, she seemed to think a little deeper, placed a darling finger upon her pouty lips and mused, “If dey no got no SaySay—no Baybee you call me—den why dey not kill dis Yates?—a stab him good!?! If dey no faɡɡot, den dey shoul’ kill dat faɡɡot Yates!”

“How so, Baby?” he asked, moving her hair back behind her shoulder with the back of his hand, and pulling her closer by the shoulder with his gently cupped palm, noting absently that the budding violent line of inquiry was perking out her nipples.

“Oh, dey compooter, he compooter—he faɡɡot, lot of faɡɡot in Merica…”

He was mazed at her diabolic determinism as he saw the abacus of malice slide its keys in her darling head and she continued, “Get compooter job, butt kiss job, door open job—den one day, ‘Oops Bossman Yates fall down stair!’—do us all big fava!”

“Wow, Baby,” said he, “if only I made some real money, I think I’d live in this hotel.”

She sunk her head under his goat-haired chin and he felt her pressing her little ear and listening to the heart sluggishly beat within his sunken chest.

“SaySay gonna miss you, My Mingus.”

…

Notes

-1. SaySay’s pet name for the ancient hoodrat.