I might be poor as dirt, but my home has a hundred bedrooms and I sleep in a different one each night.
Well. Not quite. Truth is, I live in an abandoned wrecking yard. Have done since I became homeless. There’s no buildings inside these chain-wire fences, so I sleep in the wrecks. One’s as good as another to me.
I spend my days poking around the stacks of rusting vehicles. It’s unbelievable how much stuff you can find here. Jewellery, electric knick-knacks, and boxed-up thing-a-me-jigs. Sometimes an old wallet. There’s a pawnshop and a liquor joint nearby that ain’t too fussy to deal with a hobo like me.
Share the place with a mean ol’ junkyard dog – big pit bull. We mostly steer clear of each other. Leroy, I call him. Reckon when the owners left, he didn’t wanna go and they didn’t wanna argue. Kids sneak in here sometimes, but once they see him, they don’t come back. That beast ain’t got patience nor compassion.
I leave food out for Leroy when I can – to keep the peace. And sometimes I’ll wake up on a rainy night and find him curled against me, but that’s pretty rare. Soon as I move a muscle, he’s away – hackles up, snarlin’ and growlin’ like I was the one sneaked up next to him, haha.
Anyway, one fine evening I’m sitting in a rusted-out VW, drinking and musing on how the world’s a cruel and messed up place when I hear a hootin’ and a hollering coming from the far side of the yard. I ignored it at first, cuz it’s usually just some kids and they’ll scoot right quick when they see ol’ Leroy coming out the shadows. But then, things get louder and I hear metal banging, snarling and barking, and then a strangled yelp.
Now I ain’t no great animal lover, nor am I brave or noble. But me and Leroy have roommates for a long time, so I figured I should at least get off my butt and have a look-see. I was about half past drunk and the only shape I was in was that of a soggy doughnut, so there weren’t many options for my good intentions. But I just happened to walk past a decrepit ol’ truck and saw a rusty shotgun on the tray. Didn’t have no shells, but hell if I didn’t feel safer with that in my hands.
I peeked around a row of rusted car bodies, stacked up into the starry sky.
Two big fellows in biker jackets had Leroy snared with long poles attached to thick chains, and whenever he tried to move, they’d drag him sideways, scuffling into the dirt.
“Hell you think you’re doing?” I tried to sound intimidating, but the words came out all wheezy and thin.
“Stand back old feller. This mongrel is gonna make us rich when we put him in the ring.”
I waved my boomstick in their direction. “You let Leroy go and you can leave without no holes.”
One of them let go of his pole. Leroy just lay on the ground looking beat, while the other guy leaned on his pole. “Alright, don’t do nothing stupid.” They were both ornery-looking biker dudes, but the guy bearing down on me was the largest man I’d ever seen. “That thing’s not even loaded, is it?” He grinned like the reaper. “Even so, you gotta lock the chamber.”
He came at me faster than I could shit my pants.
Then a buncha things happened, all at once. There was a great boom and I flew back. That biker’s head burst open like a rotten melon. And I hit the ground and lay on my back in the dirt and looked up at the big, beautiful moon.
I was smiling, because I’m a happy drunk and I love the moon.
Then my ears stopped ringing and I heard a howlin’ and a snarlin’ and a screamin’ and a yellin’.
When I sat up, the other biker was dragging himself over the rusty chain fence. Leroy had his leg and I seen him take a piece as the guy pulled free. Poor idiot made it clear of the fence and into the road just as a lorry came roaring by. Last I ever seen of him. Truck didn’t even slow down.
And his friend? Well, I don’t know where Leroy buries his bones and I don’t reckon it’s none of my business neither.