Seven Demons by Aidan Truhen (best motivational books for students TXT) 📕

“No.”

“No?”

“I say no to crime testes Price I am drawing a line. In fact I am actually drawing a line. Here—”

Doc writes a little column in black along one side of the HOMER board with no at the top and writes crime vagina and crime testes and then crime with square brackets and a variable n to mean any sexual or reproductive body part metaphorically invoked to indicate an instinctive reaction.

“Yeah Doc that’s fair okay okay but I feel a plan.”

“Good. Now re: exploding Sharkey—Calvanese will be unhappy—”

“I know yes there will be consequences but we will make nice later. But you see where—”

“I do, Jack.”

“We dump the dead guy and we let him be found as if we did not mean him to be found. Jack Price bled out and died. I am now BANJO TELEMARK—”

“O God—”

“No Doc it is genius do you not see the fog of crime the vistas of possibility the Kircheisen Art Fair the strategies and tactics of disguise the sheer brutal invitation to chaos Doc it is all there I AM BANJO AND HE IS ME AND WE ARE—”

“I will get you a dead guy.”

“Cool.”

“I wish to register my dismay.”

“Noted. Can you—can you make it look right?”

“Of course I can.”

Of course she can.

I am dating a woman who can.

Who can do anything.

Who will do anything.

Anything at all.

So that is all great but we are of course living in someone else’s house and at a certain point she was always going to come home.

—

“WHAT THE SHIT ARE YOU DOING HERE BITCH?”

Charlie says: “Oh fffudge.”

I am a little surprised by fffudge but okay.

“BITCH I WILL RIP OFF YOUR BITCH HEAD AND STICK IT IN YOUR SKINNY ASS! AND THEN I WILL FEED YOU TO MY FUCKING GOATS IN FUCKING PIECES AND THEN I WILL SELL THE GOATS TO FUCKING OLIGARCHS FOR TUSCAN-STYLE SHIN MEAT AND THEY WILL EAT YOU AND YOU WILL GO INTO THE SOIL SHAT OUT BY THE EXPLOITERS AND THE SLAVE OWNERS YOU FUCKING WHORE OF THE PATRIARCHY—”

The woman is tiny and skinny like that statue by Canova that is totally indecent they should not show it to the youth. She has black hair tied in a topknot and sprayed solid so that it looks like a Venetian chandelier resting on its back. I do not think she is pleased to see us but to be honest no one is these days and it is starting to drag on my bonhomie but even so—

“Um well hi I am Banjo may I know your—”

CLICKCLUNK

The gun is—honestly how does everyone have these things? They are like these cool bespoke firearm situations even Lucille had a gold-plated gigantagun one time before I threw it away and I—I just I guess I don’t really like the idea of having a signature gun it feels needy. Like I am the king of openhanded chaos I do not want that shit. But at the same time undeniably you cannot get openhanded chaos out and wave it at people to make them shut up and in my life right now everyone but everyone seems to do this.

The artisanal firearm right now being used as punctuation is called a Donnerbüchse, which is to say a thunder gun, and it is basically a weaponized recycler. It is a cone with bang bang at the back and an open mouth at the front and you put any old crap you happen to have in and then pull the trigger and all your chicken bones or nails fly out and rip pieces off whoever is in your way. Many people who are shot with one of these things who do not sustain fatal initial damage are killed by the very many fucked-up infections they contract in unexpected body parts because that is what happens when you get shot with a chicken carcass and a bag of nails. Another way of thinking about a Donnerbüchse is that it is a handheld unidirectional pipe bomb.

“Fuck you Flavia,” Charlie says which is not helpful.

“Charlie I will ask you to refrain from offering conflict resolution at this time and maybe just make nice.”

Charlie says: “Sorry I meant to say hi Flavia.”

The lady with the thunder gun is called Flavia.

“Fuck you Charlie what the fuck are you doing here?”

“I am here with Banjo he is making art.”

“Fuck Banjo and his art. The banjo is an instrument of oppression, a blackface parody.”

“In fact that is not accurate it was popularized in the U.S. largely by a blackface act but it owes its origin to a wholly non-European heritage and it is authentically—”

“Shut up you talkative asshole or I will blow your fat face out of the fucking roof of my house.”

“Yes ma’am wait fat?”

“Sure you don’t like me calling you fat face. That’s your fat-face problem whatever. Now Charlie take your friend and fuck off out of the Black House—”

“I think I’ll talk to—”

“You will not fucking talk to him Charlie or I will fuck you in the mouth with this and then I will pull the—”

A voice that can only be described as big says: “CHARLIE?!”

Flavia says: “Schafscheiße.”

Charlie says: “Eat me Flavia.”

A guy comes through the door of the Black House lounge area who is bigger than the voice. He’s even bigger than the Donnerbüchse.

Charlie flies across the room and lands on his chest like a limpet. Not like a sex limpet, like a little kid, like a BFF, and then they start howling like wolves and shouting.

“ARROOO!”

“ARRROOOOOO!”

“BARROOOOO!”

“ARROOOOO!!!”

“BARRRUUUUUUNOOOO!”

“CHARLEEEEEE!”

“BRUNO!”

“CHARLIE!”

“BRUNO!”

“CHARLIE!”

“BIG GUY! What are you DOING right now I heard you were all up in the Fascists’ face, man?”

“We are ECO-WARRIORS Charlie! We have found the religion of the living earth! We are the Class Army for Nature we are plugging polluters in the river like factories and chemical plants it is FANFUCKINGTASTIC. They vent shit and we catch them at it! But do we engage in snitching? NO OF COURSE NOT THE POLICE ARE THE DOGS OF THE CAPITALIST APPARAT! No! We plug the outflow with Z-Vat