Last Tango in the Old Pueblo & Pushin' da Pushbroom

By Kirk Alex

Last Tango in the Old Pueblo

Some insane lunacy is taking place at the New Pueblo Funeral Home & Chapel. Drifter Ray Zook is about to regret he ever set foot in Tucson, let alone allow himself to get hired on as the night man, answering the phone & hauling decedents.

 

Pushin' da Pushbroom

Just what it says: working another McJob pushing a broom in a Tucson warehouse the size of a couple of football fields. It also goes into my two close encounters with Bukowski back in the 80s when I drove a cab in L.A.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tucumcari Press
• Release date: Oct 19, 2022
• ISBN: 9780939122400

Kirk Alex

Instead of boring you with a bunch of dull background info, how about if I mention a few films/singers/musicians and books/authors I have enjoyed over the years.Am an Elvis Presley fan from way back. Always liked James Brown, Motown, Carmen McRae, Eva Cassidy, Meat Loaf, Booker T. & the MGs, CCR. Doors are also a favorite.Some novels that rate high on my list: A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole; Hunger by Knut Hamsun; Street Players by Donald Goines (a street noir masterpiece, a work of art, & other novels by the late awesome Goines); If He Hollers Let Him Go by the incredible Chester Himes. (Note: Himes at his best was as good as Hemingway at his best. But of course, due to racism in the great US of A, he was given short-shrift. Had to move to France to be treated with respect. Kind of sad.Am white by the way, but injustice is injustice & I feel a need to point it out. There were so many geniuses of color who were mistreated and taken advantage of. Breaks your effing heart. I have done what I have been able to support talent (no matter what the artists skin color was/is) over the years by purchasing records & books by talented folks, be they white/black/Hispanic/Asian, whatever. Like I said: Talent is talent, is the way I have always felt. The arts (in all their forms) keep us as humans civilized, hopefully). Anyway, I need to get off the soap box.Most of the novels by Mark SaFranko (like Lounge Lizard and Hating Olivia; his God Bless America is one of the best memoirs I have ever read, up there with Ham on Rye by Buk);The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway; A Farewell to Arms also by Ernie; Mooch by Dan Fante (& other novels of his); Post Office by Charles Bukowski; The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath; the great plays of Eugene O., like Iceman Cometh, Long Days––this system has a problem with the apostrophe, so will leave it out––Journey Into Night, Touch of the Poet; Journey to the End of the Night by Ferdinand Celine (not to be confused by the Eugene O. play); Postman Only Rings Twice by James M. Cain; the factory crime novels of Derek Raymond (superior to the overrated Raymond Chandler & his tiresome similes & metaphors any day of the week; Jack Ketchum; Edgar Allan Poe; The Reader by Bernhard Schlink; Nobody/s Angel by Jack Clark; The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester, et al.Filmmakers: Akira Kurosawa (Ihiru; Yojimbo); John Ford (almost anything by him); horror flicks: Maniac by William Lustig and Joe Spinnell; original Night of the Living Dead; original Texas Chainsaw Massacre; original When a Stranger Calls; The 400 Blows by Francois T.; the thrillers of Claude Chabrol; A Man Escaped by Bresson; the Japanese Zatoichi films;Tokyo Story by Ozu . . . and many other books, films and jazz musicians like the amazing tenor sax player Gene Ammons; Sonny Rollins, Chet Baker, Jack Sheldon, Stan Getz, Paul Desmond; singers like the incomparable Sarah Vaughan, Shirley Horn, Dion Warwick; Al Green, Elmore James, Lightnin Hopkins . . . to give you some idea.However, these days though, tv does not exist at all for me, nor do I care for most movies, in that I would much rather pick up a well-written book. I get more of a kick from reading than I do watching some actor pretend to be something he is not.Having said that, I confess that as a young man I did my share of wasting time watching the idiot box and spent my share of money going to the flicks. But those days are long gone, in that there is no interest in movies (be they cranked out by the Hollywood machine, or elsewhere).Final conclusion when it comes to celluloid? Movies are nothing more than a big waste of time (no matter who makes them). Reading feeds the brain, while movies puts the brain to sleep. There it is.

Book preview

High Praise for Kirk Alex

Hard Noir Holiday — Book #4

I am not into long books. I lose interest easily. But this one is well written and kept my attention all throughout. My husband is glad it is over. I couldn't keep from telling him what happened next. So disgusting, so entertaining.

—BookBub

Love is the Coldest Whore of All

Selected Free Verse for Peeps Like Me

(Who Hate Poetry)

1976 — 1996

Reading Kirk Alex is like listening to your best friend, your oldest friend, confide in you after you haven’t seen him in a long, long time. It’s that honest; it’s that intimate. And from the Nam to Sunset Boulevard, he knows a lot about the world and life. All you have to do is sit back and take it all in.

—Mark SaFranko, author: Nowhere Near Hollywood

Hush-Hush Holiday

Good read.

—Hidden Gems

Lustmord: Anatomy of a Serial Butcher

Great book. Dark—yes. Grotesque—certainly. Sexually explicit—without a doubt. And the writing is excellent. Character & dialogue, is as real as it gets. A terrifying, non-putdownable horror.

—Jeff Bennington, Kindle Book Review

Zook

"Zook was a zoo ride! All of the characters were well written and you find yourself unable to put the book down! You might even find it a little sad. ***** out of 5 stars."

—NetGalley

Ziggy Popper at Large:

14 Tales of General Degeneracy, of Mayhem

& Debauchery – for the Morally Conflicted

& Borderline Criminal

Gruesome, violent, awesome! I absolutely LOOOVEEE Kirk Alex. I am always ready for his next book!! Extremely entertaining. A whole lot of violent, and just what I was looking for. Private detective Felix Choo-Choo Buschitsky and Ziggy Popper are now my two favorite characters. ***** out of 5 stars.

—NetGalley

by Kirk Alex

Crime Fiction:

Throwback: Love, Lust & Murder – Book One

Backlash: Love, Lust & Murder – Book Two

Whacky Tales:

Troubled Diva with a Tote Bag — Stories

Last Tango in the Old Pueblo & Pushin’ da Pushbroom — 2 Long-Shorts

Ziggy Popper at Large – 14 Tales of General Degeneracy, of Mayhem & Debauchery – for the Morally Conflicted & Borderline Criminal

Horror:

Lustmord: Anatomy of a Serial Butcher

Zook

Chance Cash Register Tucson Working Stiff Series:

Paycheck to Paycheck

Loopy Soupy’s Motley Crew

Journey to the End of the Week

A Confederacy of Mooks

nonentity

You’re Gonna Have Trouble

L.A. Cab Exploits:

Working the Hard Side of the Street – Selected Stories/Poems/Screams

Blood, Sweat & Chump Change – L.A. Taxi Tales & Vignettes

Eddie Doc Holiday Contemporary Mystery Series:

Hush-Hush Holiday #1

Hubba-Hubba Holiday #2

Hollow-Point Holiday #3

Hard Noir Holiday #4

Hammer-Slammer Holiday #5

Free Verse:

Ballad of the Red Bag Man

Love is the Coldest Whore of All

Overlapping Contradictions

Last Tango in

the Old Pueblo

&

Pushin’ da Pushbroom

— 2 Long-Shorts —

Kirk Alex

Tucumcari Press

Image1

Tucson – 2022

Copyright © 2016 Hugger-Mugger, Dagnabbit and Toxic LipLock (as part of Zook), a novel by Kirk Alex

Copyright © 2021 Pushin’ da Pushbroom (as part of You’re Gonna Have Trouble) by Kirk Alex

All rights reserved.

Hugger-Mugger, Dagnabbit and Toxic LipLock are excerpted from Zook, a whacky novel dealing with hair-raising/twisted shenanigans at a funeral parlor operated by a truly certifiable crew. (Tucumcari Press, 2016).

The 18,000-word Pushin’ da Pushbroom is presented here for the very first time.

ISBN: 978-0-939122-40-0 6x9 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-0-939122-41-7 (ePUB)

Hugger-Mugger

I had a bottle of hooch in a paper sack and had been taking the occasional pull all the way from Southern California. The idea was to stay on the Greyhound to Tucson, hang in the Old Pueblo long enough to beef up the roll and continue on to Ft. Worth. The ex had family there. I didn't have a need to connect with her. It came down to my kid. In her early teens by now. Hadn't seen her in years. I'd been to LaFayette, Indiana; Bowling Green, Kentucky; Abilene, Kansas, and a few other towns, large and small. I stayed on the move; perpetual motion seemed to keep the demons at bay. At least I had myself convinced of it. I had war-related nightmares I couldn't shake, and some other things I was trying to live down. . . . Staying active seemed to be the answer. . . . Only how in hell do you get away from yourself? I’d been given the boot by more apartment managers and motel desk clerks for kicking the floor and walls in my sleep than I cared to remember.

It was usually some indiscriminate setting: me unarmed, being chased by the enemy in some far-off land. Commies? Mid-East zealots? Your run-of-the-mill America-haters? Who knew? Or maybe I was in denial. Unwilling to face my demons. It took a lot to deal with that shit.

Phoenix is where they got on. The young one, with the dishwater hair, was in her 20s or so, couldn't tell. Didn't look half bad in tight jeans, pink blouse, although the heavy one with the indigo butch cut made me want to retch. This was one unappealing broad. All in leather and chains, tats and nose ring. I hated that shit. Yeah, I know, looked like hell myself. Don’t matter. Because this dozer was scary.

And wouldn't you know it, it was the repulsive one who dropped her sweaty, mean ass in the seat next to mine. Wanted a hit. I told her to piss off. Took the occasional pull from the bottle, drew the blanket up to about my collar, craving sleep and hoped to get some. I had no idea how long I'd be staying in Tucson. Didn’t have friends here, not that I had friends anywhere. It was just a place to drift through, or maybe spend a week in, sniff around. Been in the Old Pueblo before. Worked as a dishwasher at a sports bar some years back, did a bit of panhandling. This was the sort of thing I’d do as a last resort. But, man, I hated it. Hated what I’d become. It was tough to admit you were just another worm and that it was only a matter of time when you got chewed-up by the falcon of life and promptly shat out.

Hey, it went for the rich and famous, just as it did for chumps like me. No way around it. You’ve seen it: presidents got whacked and buried. Didn’t matter who you thought you were and how valuable you had yourself convinced you were to the world, because, friend, we all got ripped to shreds sooner or later. Every damned one of us. Fucked. Yet we clung to hope. Hope was a bitch to let go of.

What nudged me awake was the two of them switching seats. Now the one in the tight jeans and hangers was sitting next to me. Before the obese one gave up her seat, she whispered in my ear:

My cousin gives great head.

How much?

Forty bucks, she said.

I told her to get lost.

They had switched seats, and before I new it, cousin had her hand under my blanket. Inched it slowly toward my crotch and was rubbing, just running her fingers gently over it. My groin didn’t object one bit and began to stir. All that vino, and there I was: getting wood. She proceeded to unzip my fly. I let her; pretended I was asleep, and let her do what she wanted. I figured if I acted like I was zoned out, they wouldn't be able to claim I owed them money later, the young cunt and the beast she was with.

She had it out, stroking, slowly, taking her time. Then she ducked her head under the blanket. I let her. Of course, I let her. It had been a while. No love, no sex. Traveling the country on buses, when the money was there, hitching when it wasn't.

She had her tongue on it, licking; then she had the shaft inside, all of it. I didn't have a tremendous whole lot, but it was all right; there were some poor bastards who envied what I did have. You lived with the hand the Dealer laid on you—and this time the Dealer had shown me some kindness, I thought, with this hot bitch being nice to me in this fashion.

That head of hers bobbed, not fast, gently, gradually, taking her time. And the fact it was night provided adequate cover. Passengers were out, asleep or trying, with the exception of some punk in his late teens, across the aisle, stealing glances out of the corner of his right eye. Let him. Probably wished he was me: big shot, getting his nuts off on a coach to nowhere.

The licking went on. She played with the head, flicking it thoroughly. This chick had been around, knew her business. It had been such a long time, too. Probably did this to get by: got strangers off for whatever they could pick up. Who knew? Did it matter? Only I'd had too much wine. Couldn't make it. It was no good. Wine and sex don't mix, not for me.

She lifted her head. I pulled out my wallet. Extracted a tenner for her effort. She did what she could. Not her fault. Before the young hooker had had a chance to even take a glance at it, the beast, her freakish relation, stuck her hand in and snatched the sawbuck. She sniffed it. Looked it over. She was not pleased. Tough, I thought. That was a ten-dollar try.

"Last time I looked at my license the name Bill Gates was not on it and I don't own Microsoft. Besides, I never got rocks."

You're lying, she said. Yanked her young cousin out of the seat, and lowered that wide posterior next to me.

We agreed on forty, she snorted.

Like hell we did.

"That was a forty-dollar BJ, she said. You never had nothin’ that good in your life."

How would you know? I countered. Maybe I had better.

Once. Only my ex-wives wanted nothing to do with me, especially the last one. I had no idea where she was. She’d taken the kid and disappeared off the face of the earth. Could explain the roaming. If I admitted it to myself. I didn't need the exes back, only ached to see the kid. A girl. Must have been six years ago I saw her last. I didn't blame the wife for leaving me. Couldn’t take the screaming in the middle of the night, the kicking at the floor with my feet; the times I was stationed out of the country, or stuck in some bug bin here in the states. I drank to fight the demons. Only made everything worse. They had me on Prozac, then Paxil, at the VA. While I was in the whack ward the wife dropped the bomb: wanted out. I couldn't stop her, didn't try. She got custody. I was in no shape to take care of a kid, couldn't even take care of myself. I let it go, let them both go. The ex had a man, in fact, had been shagging a neighbor while I was stationed overseas. The way it usually went. I'd had it done to me once before. Kid could be his, biologically. Probably. Don't matter. I treated her like she was my own. You get emotionally attached. Kids are all right. Always wanted a family. Always did. Things kept going wrong somehow. Something would always happen to turn things upside down.

This was divorce number three. You know what they say: three-strikes and you're fucked. Three marriages, three divorces. I was defective, a loser. Something was seriously the matter with me. It was the war; it was other things.

I doubt it. She looked at me. Not with that nose and those teeth.

My nose was bent, both ways, in bar brawls that I usually started and lost, so were my teeth. Born with them that way. The ones still there. Black. Yellow. Of the uppers in front, I had but one left. In the middle.

I pulled the blanket up, and pretended to zone out. Only she wouldn't let me.

Thirty bucks, she said. "You can't deny that was worth thirty bucks."

You got what it was worth, I said. And that's the end of it. I never got rocks. You bitches came on to me. Before I knew what was going on, your nympho girlfriend was molesting my privates.

You owe us money.

Get lost, I said. Or I go to the driver.

He's our friend, she said. That wouldn't get you anywhere.

"What does he pay for it?" I asked, out of curiosity.

That's a different case. He gets a discount. Has nothing to do with you.

"I feel drained for some strange reason and