Peter Learn's Blog
December 28, 2013
Midget With a Gun
Chapter 1
It was a cold day, the type of day that made you want to stay in bed with a Mickey. Spillane that is. It was the kind of early autumn day where the snow that had fallen virgin white and covered the street’s sins was melting under the hot sun, and was now a tainted grey-brown sludge. ‘Good riddance,’ I thought as I watched it and the chronicles it carried flow into the sewer. I knew too many secrets anyways, some shabby, the others sordid, and every one of them I could do without.
I sloshed through the mess, tapped a Lucky from the deck, took a few draws, flicked the butt, and watched it turn a graceful arc before fizzing out in the slush. I fought for the sidewalk, the sidewalk I once called my own, the sidewalk now blocked by tourists not knowing left from right, families in bunches, locals in shorts their dog off leash chai lattes in metal containers, spoiled rich kids nothing smaller than a platinum credit card in their pockets, backpack kids dreads flowing dancing to songs the drugs in their heads carried.
It was a cold day, the type of day that made you want to stay in bed with a Mickey. Spillane that is. It was the kind of early autumn day where the snow that had fallen virgin white and covered the street’s sins was melting under the hot sun, and was now a tainted grey-brown sludge. ‘Good riddance,’ I thought as I watched it and the chronicles it carried flow into the sewer. I knew too many secrets anyways, some shabby, the others sordid, and every one of them I could do without.
I sloshed through the mess, tapped a Lucky from the deck, took a few draws, flicked the butt, and watched it turn a graceful arc before fizzing out in the slush. I fought for the sidewalk, the sidewalk I once called my own, the sidewalk now blocked by tourists not knowing left from right, families in bunches, locals in shorts their dog off leash chai lattes in metal containers, spoiled rich kids nothing smaller than a platinum credit card in their pockets, backpack kids dreads flowing dancing to songs the drugs in their heads carried.
