Last Ditch Read Online Free PDF Page A

through his
nose and
then wiped his face with his sleeve
    "Bo
Ho," he sputtered. "That's good. Bo Ho."
    Harold
had sold
men's shoes at the Bon Marche and had been a minor functionary in the
Retailers
Union. He used to be taller. Each passing year carved another couple of
pounds
from his gaunt frame, further emphasizing his baseball-sized Adam's
apple and
cab-door ears. He was beginning to look like Mr. Potato Head.
    As
I started
across the grass toward them, Norman
piped in.
    "If
Snoop
Doggy Dogg married Winnie the Pooh, he'd be Snoop Doggy Dogg Pooh.'"
    "Snoop
what? Who the fuck is that?" George demanded.
    "The
rapper, man. You know. 'Gin and Juice.' "
    George
shook
his head. "Rap is crap," he declared.
    Norman rose from the ground,
steadied himself
for a moment and then began to shuffle from side to side. At six foot
seven and
drunk as a skunk, he moved with all the grace of a giraffe on
Rollerblades. He
sang. If that's what you called it.
    Little
or
nothing was known of Nearly Normal Norman's background. When he first
blew into
town about five years ago, I'd inquired as to his family's state of
origin and
had, on successive attempts, been met with answers of Rhode Island, Indiana
and Sri Lanka.
In kinder, gentler times, Norman
would have been wearing paper slippers and crocheting pot holders in a
nice
warm sanitarium somewhere. The miracles of Reaganomics had put him on
the
street.
    Other
than a
nuclear thirst, what kept this particular group of guys together was
their
similar financial status. Normal
had some sort of small trust fund that paid out by the month. The other
three
had managed to work long enough to have earned meager monthly stipends
from
their respective employers. Not a full pension, not enough to make it
alone,
but enough, when you added in the money I paid them, to collectively
keep them
in liquor and mostly out of the rain.
    Norman waved his massive arms and
continued
gyrating wildly.
    George
blinked
twice and pointed my way.
    "Well,
look what we got here," he slurred.
    Ralph
swiveled
his head and then waited for his eyes to catch up.
    "Leo,"
he shouted.
    "Howdy,
fellas," I said.
    "Pull
up
some grass," said Harold.
    George
waved
him off. "Gotta be careful with that kind of talk, Harry," he said.
"Remember, Leo here used to smoke that wacky weed. Doan want him to
relapse or nothin'."
    Harold
grinned.
"I remember. Wasn't a Hostess Cupcake or a Ding Dong safe around the
kid."
    Norman had stopped dancing and
was now patting
his pockets.
    "You
wanna
burn a bowl, Leo? I think I got some real good bud somewhere here on
me."
    I
held up my
hand. "No thanks, Normal.
I've only got a second."
    "Oh,
yeah,"
George groused. "Mr. On Television got no time for the likes of us
riffraff."
    I
sat down on
the damp grass next to George and threw
    an
arm around
his bony shoulders. "On the contrary, my
    good
man,
spending some time with you riffraff is just
    what
I had in
mind."     .    "
    "We
seen
you today ... on the TV down at Steve's Broiler," Ralph said. "Ya
really stuck it to the old judgy wudgy."
    "They're
gonna fry him," Harold offered.
    "Not
in
our lifetimes," I said. "He'll die of old age before he exhausts his
appeals. Either that or some guy he sentenced will punch his ticket for
him and
save the state the trouble."
    "Your
old
man never liked him,'' George said suddenly. He took a short pull and
then
continued. "Always said Dougie was a prisoner of his dick. Wild Bill
never
had any respect for a guy couldn't control himself that way. Figured if
a guy
could be led around by his fly, he wasn't good for nothin' else." He
took
another pull, longer this time, and then thrust his him in my direction.
    I
took it. With
these guys, the act of swillage had attained full-scale religious
significance.
To refuse was the worst sort of heresy. I knew the drill. As far as
they were
concerned, only teetotalers ranked lower on the evolutionary scale than
sippers. I sniffed. Peach schnapps. It could be worse. I brought the
him to