A Hardboiled Story in Black and White

"

It was a $50 cab ride back from the strip joint to the relative safety of my home, which was beginning to seem like a stranger's of late. As I sat there with a silent driver named Muhommad, I tried to recount the evening. Sultry jazz played over the flashback in my mind, punctuated by smoke and aftershave. Hardboiled and on a quest, I tried to work out whether I had been successful.

The streets had glistened that night. Maybe it was a hangover from the day's rain and maybe the streets were still drunk. I was beginning to confuse the two myself. Whatever, my mission was clear. I was to imbibe as much of the black liquid that this old body could handle before collapsing into the arms of a stranger. And she would stroke my hair and make sure that the bad dreams would go away. At least until that bastard sunlight attacked my senses, sending me tumbling back to the Hell that the Earth was.

It was some party at a place that feigned comfort and class but underneath was made up of the same bile and insect feed that permeated the very souls of the people inside. Arriving late, I navigated my way through the scores of common folk I had known in a past life. If they recognised me, it was to their credit that they kept that information to themselves. The only thing on my mind was the soothing liquor that could temporarily wash the discomfort away. Through the sea of hopeless and irritating patrons there were life buoys of interest: people who didn't make me want to kill myself with drink after every sentence that defecated out of their vacuous, lipsticked mouths. I floated with them until it was time to move on.

I left the lounge and made my way to a place where the downstairs made the upstairs seem more heavenly than it actually was, such was its idiocy. Metal music, they call it. It provided me some solice while my gut was filling up, but not as quickly as I might have hoped. There was walking, but my legs moved to a different tune to that of my head.

The third venue of the night was like an old friend after the bourgeois nature of the first. There was an older crowd, my kind of people, and two acoustic guitars playing hit songs that are only remembered because people on acoustic guitars play them. I wasn't familiar with them all, having long ago decided social congruency wasn't worth the price if I had to forfeit good taste.

So I question this dame beside me, "What is this song?" She is aghast that I don't know the entire Jon Stevens catalogue. The only thing I have as a reference is Jesus Christ Superstar. Jesus Christ, this woman was a wonderful lady once upon a more naive time - when her good looks weren't corrupted by a sadness so clear in her eyes.

We get to talking and she's embarrassed at her age. She's 32. Hey, we've all got to go sometime. Tracey, she calls herself. With an E. She was sad, I could tell. The dame's confidence had been rattled by years of abusive men and had become suspicious of everyone as a result, I was sure. It was all in her eyes. It was the reason why she couldn't let herself have a little fun. She was guarded and outgoing at the same time. She was no longer at ease with the idea of being able to trust a total stranger, if she ever had been.

She told me where she was going next - a place of retro kitsch, where she could feel alive - hinting that I should come too. However, her inner contradictions bubbled away, meaning her implied invitation was quickly dashed at the explicit suggestion of accompanying these lovely older dames.
"I'm ten years older than you!" she said.
"Eleven", I corrected her.

My world and hers could have collided for a few short moments but the animals I had aligned myself with were keen to exit. I gave her a choice and spelled it out with my fingers. One, two.
"Either you never seen me again or you give me your email"
Her conflicted and drunken mind gave a confused shake of the head. The poor dame was done for. I left with a whimsy and melancholy usually reserved for people only equally as important as myself.

Venue four bears little description. It was the kind of place I imagine looks like the display screen of a colonoscopy if only I had enough tolerance to actually get inside. I told my moron companions that this detective wanted to leave. The wait was too cold and long for anything in there to be more than a victory the size of their testicles in the grand scheme of things. They had no business here, unless all they wanted was to add to the culture of exclusivity and stupidity.

I could no longer abide it. My bladder was full and I was fed up. My fellow private eyes weren't interesting anymore. They Baa-ed at me to leave if I wasn't completely into the idea of sucking the Big Black Cock of Satan and entering the haunt of the damned. I left without goodbyes and found a carpark stairwell to expel liquid into. I checked for situational crime prevention mechanisms like security cameras - years on the job had taught me that - but there was nothing. Clearly nobody much cared for the cold concrete floor and what might spill onto it.

A cab ride later and I was inside a strip joint, looking to find somebody I had known back when dames were only after one thing. I had hoped she was still only after this one thing, but the smell in the air was one of defeat. I made my way to another in the series and met Saint Lazarus and a fat guy who was kicked off a party bus. She wasn't there either. Not the same She, but weren't they all the same anyway?

So there I sat, with a man who was probably a doctor in Ethiopia, driving to my current humble - though charmed - abode. The mission wasn't quite a success, but it could be learnt from. Hell, I wasn't even that drunk.

"