Losers and Sinners

By Michael Proud

A man who is a career criminal, a womanizer, and a drug addict had come to Las Vegas . . . not to seek money, women, or drugs . . . but redemption, and this is his story . . . . Losers and Sinners Written by Michael B. Proud

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Nov 20, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329687028

Book preview

Losers and Sinners

LOSERS AND SINNERS

A novel

ISBN 978-1-329-68702-8

Copyright 2015, 2017 Michael B. Proud.  All rights reserved.

I

I just snorted my last line of coke off a pro’s ass.  Most of the cathouses in Nevada work clean, but not all of the girls do, and everyone has their price.  Her rate is one-fifty per hour.  She also wanted a couple of lines to bang.  She and the sky have me low on bread, which is very bad seeing how I am still far from Vegas.  It would probably be a three-day walk there, if I march all day, all three days.  I have money for flophouses and little else.  Of course, am I really going to spend that money on a place to sleep?  No.  In my usual fashion, I am going to blow it on fast women and fast hamburgers.

I roll out of her bed and give my arms a stretch and start putting my clothes back on.  I do it slowly because I don’t want to leave, though it is inevitable.  I need to get my ass to Las Vegas and she has more tricks to turn.  I feel safe here . . . I feel good here and that is why I don’t want to leave.  Somewhat sad that a thing that makes me feel safe is a whorehouse and the things that make me feel good are hookers and cocaine.  Fully dressed, I hug her good-bye and kiss her right cheek . . . and that would be the cheek of her face, not of her ass, thank her for draining my nuts, and embark.

When I get outside, I pull out my pack of reds; only two left.  I have been meaning to quit and now it seems that I’ll be forced to.  Feeling like there is no time like the present, I don’t even bother sparking one up.  I smush the pack and toss it to the ground and continue onward.

I feel like I have walked for a while now even though I haven’t and the Southwestern sun is really beating me up; I might throw a thumb up soon.  I wouldn’t pick me up though.  You take one look at me and you can figure out whom I am.  A deplorable junkie.  A bitter ex-con.  A persuaded racist.  A guy who will do whatever he needs to do so someday he can disappear from everyone and everything.  That’s who I am and they all know it.  And that’s why even if I choose to hitchhike, I’ll just be walking with a thumb up.  I didn’t want a coke problem; I just liked to get high.  I didn’t want a life of crime; I just happened to admire the criminals.  I didn’t want to hate the blacks and the Mexicans that were doing time with me; I just wanted the white supremacists to leave me the Hell alone.  But my life is what it is, and I deal with it, the best any addict criminal bigot can.

My high is starting to wear off and I’m thirsty so beer is the logical choice; two birds one stone sort of thing.  All these tiny jerkwater desert towns have saloons littered to and fro so I will find one and plunk down for some suds.

There’s a sign in the distance: The Last Chance.  It must be my lucky day finding a bar this quick.  I find a real dump when I approach; one that looks like it’s a day away from closing.  An unkempt parking lot is covered in cigarette butts and oil spots.  Weeds are springing up from the cracks in the pavement.  Most of the building’s beige paint has peeled or is peeling, with the other spots fading.  Neon signs advertising various domestic beers hang in dirty windows.  The signs have old logos, as if they were made in the nineties or even before that.  Ha, a real fucking dive all right.

I walk in and the inside is much like the outside except there is much more sand on the floor in here than scattered over the parking lot.  It is very dark in here, sans the florescent light over the pool table that is in the back corner and the glow from a television that hangs high on the wall behind the bar.  There’s only one patron here, omitting myself.  He is an old man, sitting at the very end of the bar, looking depressed, and staring into oblivion.  I think I’ll sit at the opposite end so I don’t have to listen to this guy’s sob story as he cries into his beer or have some of his depression pass on along to me.  The bartender wears a tight low-cut shirt and is probably in her forties, but even though MILFs aren’t my thing, I stare anyways because she has a nice set of tits hanging out.  Pussy is pussy, and you learn that in the slammer the hard way.  You will want to fuck the first woman you see the day you step foot outside prison and the desperate women know that so they are always somewhere nearby the big house, waiting to sink their claws in.  This one, she puts them out there because she is not about to get tips on her bartending skills.  Probably whores on the side.  She shoots me a smile.  Before she can ask what I’ll have, I let her know.

I want a shot of rye, a rough but cold one to chase it, and a small bag of snort, or at least the phone number of a dirtbag who can get me some.

She hustles to get my order done fast.  It’s not as if she had something else to do.

Here’s the whisky, the beer and I’ll get you a phone number.  It’s for a guy named Tony, some badass Mexican, or at least he thinks he’s badass.  My daughter’s friend used to date him, so I know him and how he earns his income.  Just don’t deal in the bar okay?

I wouldn’t think of disturbing the booming business here.  What keeps this place alive anyway?

We have a gang of rashers who do a run up the road once a week.  The ones who don’t die or wreck their bikes spend their prize money here.

I tend back to my beer while she places a call to whomever she needs to in order to get Tony’s number.  She jots it down and brings it back to me.  As I look at her, that small smile on her face turns back on.

I couldn’t help but notice you looking me up and down since you walked in.  Do you like what you see?

I really know people.

How much?

No small talk first? . . .  All right.  Sixty for a blowjob.  Anything more is gonna cost you big.

I double-checked my wallet.  Why do I feel the need to do this much drugs and come so much?

Twenty for a blowjob and you lick my load off your tits.

Forty.

Twenty.  It’s all I can spare.

. . . I don’t know you mister, but I like you.  Come to the back.

She leads me to a tiny room behind the bar where they must do the bean counting.  In this office, there’s a fancy office chair behind a small metal desk, random binders and papers everywhere in stacks.  An old, beat-up desk fan oscillates, wafting the leaves of a dying plant.  She moves the chair against the back wall to give us some space.  She grabs the cushioned seat off the chair to place under her knees for when she sucks me off.  She obviously does this a lot with the cushion on call but that fact does not deter me.  She shuts the door so it is just us; not that the old man sitting at the bar would have looked.  He is way too busy gazing into the abyss, hoping the abyss will gaze back into him.  She took her shirt and bra off and tossed them aside.

Like these?

Everything I thought they’d be.

I grabbed an Andy Jackson from my wallet and threw it at her chest.  It grazed one of her nipples and drifted to the floor where she promptly snatched it up and slipped it into her front pocket.  She unzipped me and went to work.  It went just as how we arranged.

I want to fuck!  You got two-hundred baby?

Two-hundred‽  Are you a porn star‽  Besides, I don’t think there’s enough room in here for that!

How about one?  You got one-hundred?

No.  Let’s go for free.

Sorry but you don’t get my pussy for free.  Don’t you wanna fuck baby?

Yes, but your wetness comes at a high price that I’m just not willing to pay.

No . . . .  Maybe some other time then?

If I ever come back around these parts.

Don’t be a stranger.

Sorry but that’s my plan in life.

I don’t think she understood what that meant, but I like to keep a little mystique about me.

I used the pay phone they have here to give this Tony guy a ring.  We will deal in the lot.

Hello?

Is this Tony?

Who wants to know?

I hear you’re the main man in these parts to get blow.  Was I lied to?

No way holmes!  I’m your man!  How much you need man?

Enough to keep me high for the next three days.

It sounds like you need an 8 ball, if you keep it at a gram a day.  Where are you?

The Last Chance.

You got the money holmes?

Would I call you otherwise?

Just making sure.  I kill those who don’t pay!

I’m sure you do, just get here quick.  I need to get to Vegas as soon as possible.

I’m on my way.  I’ll be there in fifteen minutes, tops.

I’ll be waiting.

While I am throwing away money, let’s see what a water will cost me.  I need something to beat the heat with while I wait for this rattlesnake.

How much for a water?

Bottle or tap?

Whichever is cheaper and tap’s my guess.

I’ll give you a bottle of the good stough and don’t worry; this one is on the house . . . .  You know what?  I didn’t even find out your name . . . .  Well, what is it‽

You never asked me!

Well I’m askin’ now!

It’s . . . No-Name.

No-Name?  All right, guess you want to be a real stranger to me.  That’s cool.

. . . It’s Tommy.

I expected a flashier name from a guy like you.

If you hate it, sue my parents!

No, it’s okay.  Better than Mortimer or Randall or something like that.

What’s your name sweetheart?

Martha.

You are no Martha!  What is it?

It is Martha!

Hmmm . . . I like it.  It’s feminine, pretty, classic, and easy to say.

That is the nicest thing anybody has ever said about my name!  Actually, that is the only time anybody has ever said anything nice about my name.  Are you trying to get into my pants for free with some smooth-talk?

Ha, sounds like a move I’d make but no.  I do like it.

What brought you out here Tommy?  No one comes out to the middle of nowhere for no reason.

Why do you whore?  For the same reason anybody does anything.  Money.  Everybody comes Vegas-way for the money.

Are you a hooker or a high roller?  That’s the only two people who come to Vegas.

I hear different.

What did you hear?

I hear the two people who come to Vegas are losers and sinners.

Don’t you mean losers and winners?

No, I do not mean losers and winners.  Nobody wins in Vegas.  It’s not in the formula.  You have people who lose, and you have people who sin, and sometimes they are one in the same.

Which one are you Tommy?

. . . Both.

I feel like a loser and a sinner.  I am sure time will prove me right.

If the two people who come to Vegas were hookers and high rollers, which one would you be?

A hooker.  I whore myself out to whoever pays the most for my services.  Everybody in Vegas is a hooker.  We do the things we once loved for money, only at some point coming to hate those very things.  Sex is one of those things, gambling is another.  Therefore, I’m a hooker, just not in its dictionary definition.  I’m a career criminal, and I used to like crime, but I got caught and convicted and sentenced.  A stint in prison left me a bit disenchanted with that life . . . the life of crime.  As luck would have it, the cellmate I had before my release was in the Mafia.  We talked a lot those last months and he was able to change my thinking, and I got roped right back into crime.

What did he say to you that changed your thinking?

I am going back to what you spoke of on the lack of careers Vegas offers.  He didn’t offer me gigolo as a job, and he didn’t offer me gaming either.  He offered me the third job in Vegas.

There’s a third job in Las Vegas?

Yes, organized crime.  I am trying my hand at some organized crime again.  It was my occupation in California . . . in fact, I had a sweet deal in Cali, but the man who pulls the strings did so from Northern California, and I swore fealty to So Cal, not the marionettist, so things didn’t work out.  I think I will like Vegas, and a syndicate is out there, so I’m on my way to Vegas to help the Mafia take it back over.  The Mafia got pushed underground and now they want their city back.  Can we pull it off?  No, but we’re going to try.  Sammy, my cellmate, gave me a family name and an address and hopefully a job.  And it’s no different from what you do.  People tell me to do something illegal and pay me a lot to do it.  I just wonder why you turn tricks.  You don’t look like a junkie; in fact, you’re pretty good looking for your age.  Why do you do it?

. . . How old do you think I am?

Forty?

Ha!  No!

I am right.

. . . What were we talking about? . . .  I don’t feel comfortable discussing my past, but what’s happening present is this bar is struggling and I need to put food on the table for my daughter and she needs a cell phone and she needs certain clothes to be popular and she needs this, and she needs that, and so I fuck any guy that walks through the door with the money for it.  I enjoy having sex so why not get paid for it too?

She doesn’t enjoy it anymore, but she is going to pretend that she still does; whatever gets her to the next day.

You make a good point and you have a good reason.  Most would say they do it for the large stacks they can rake in but you do it just to sustain yourself and your kid.  Stay safe is all I can suggest.

As safe as I can.  There is nothing all that safe in Jean.

She doesn’t want to talk about her past because she used to fuck everybody for free.  I wouldn’t want to talk about my past if my past was being the biggest slut in town.  Nevertheless, it is as I had said before; good to see a slut making a wage of her whoring to take care of herself and her daughter.  We chatted a little bit more trading yarns and small giggles but the conversation slowly fell off after some minutes of that, when a man approached the door.

A real slick character walks in, with a toothpick in his mouth, his hair greased back, wearing a sweat-drenched wifebeater that is so raggedy that its best days are far behind it.  This must be the guy; a very stereotypical Mexican, as you would see in a movie.  He walks up to me and stares real close.  He is on something . . . I’m guessing he is on speed from how quick his movements have been since he walked in.

You the guy holmes?

I must be; there’s really nobody else here.  You got the snort?

Come with me and see for yourself.

I’ll see you again sometime Martha.

Looking forward to it Tommy.

I saunter real slow outside while he hurries out the door and over to his car.  He rolls around in an old and battered baby blue Cadillac splashed with rust spots and mangled chrome.  I don’t know what’s more suspicious for a criminal’s ride; a huge, beat-up jalopy or a flashy Italian rocket.

Have a seat man and be comfortable.

Yeah, why not?  I should take it easy today because of all that walking I have done and all the walking I have ahead of me.  He’s got switches; why am I not surprised.  Seems like every Mexican I ever knew had hydraulics or was working on a way to acquire some.  It is what makes you a man in their culture.  We all have our rights of passage.  For instance, an Italian’s manhood starts with joining the Camorra; a Mexican’s manhood starts at three-wheel motion.  I think it’s for the birds but it does not matter what I think.  Low riders will keep rolling along.

I keep my drugs in another spot.  I’ll drive you there and you can leave from there after you buy.

You can go there, pick them up, and bring them back here and I give you the money and this never happened comprende?

You want the coke hombre‽  Don’t waste my fucking time holmes!  Let’s go‼

I really do want this sky.

All right.  We’ll do it your way.

I am nervous.  I worry if something bad is about to go down.  He seems calmer than when at the bar, which only makes me feel even more nervous.  He got off the main road through town so wherever he is taking me is real remote.  I see no buildings, just lots and lots of desert.  He starts slowing down as the trail starts running out.  He throws the car in park and turns toward me.  I’ve been set-up.

End of the line vato.

He pulls out a butterfly knife and twirls it open.

Pull out your money and anything else valuable and leave it on the floor then get out!

Okay!  I’m going to do what you say!  Just take it easy!

Oh, I’ll pull out something all right!

BANG!

Way to bring a knife to a gunfight dumbass!

That is just like a Mexican.  They either have a knife or twenty of their friends ready to jump in for a fight; it’s all I remember growing up in So Cal.  Glad he used the first option because I don’t have twenty-one rounds.  Also glad I own a Glock 22.  He is starting to cry but I don’t feel bad.

Now, how about you pull out your cash and your blow and leave it on the seat as you crawl the fuck out of your car so I can also take that and drive the Hell out of this place!

F-fuck you asshole!

He is still crying.  He’s oozing out; I shot him in the gut so he doesn’t have much time.  I pick up his knife to speed up the process.

You have ‘til three or this comes into play!  One!  Two!  Three!

He doesn’t comply.  With both hands I raise the knife upward, just to swing it downward into his thigh.  I twist it a little to make sure it really hurts.  I pull it back out and fold it back up.  I have to keep it with me until I can ditch it far away; it now has my prints on it.

Fuck you holmes!  You ain’t shit‼

He can rant all he wants, because I’m about to leave him here to die.