He Did Not Want Any Consequences - Bonnie Smetts

He did not want any consequences. Yeah, right. Well then he shouldn’t have shot Blueboy’s dog. Blueboy’s not the one to mess with, not here, not anywhere along the Panhandle. But now Roy is shaking and having trouble holding down his meals and sayng it didn’. All ‘cause he shot the dog. I can say that I’m relieved the dog lived and all but why the hell did he shoot the dog? The dog wasn’t even doing anything he normally didn’t do. Yeah, he’s a marker. Lift the leg here, lift the leg there. The damn dog’s gotta be a desert inside, he pees so much. But then he went and peed right on Roy’s truck tire. Yeah, that’s the problem. Roy’s beloved, goddam truck tire. He’d sleep with that shiny truck if he could. He almost does, he falls asleep in it so often, he may as well give up his apartment. He never uses the bed there except the few times he manages to get some girl home after a long night at the Barnacle Hut. And I’ve seen those girls. They probably would have rather done it right there in the truck. And be gone. I hope they’re charging cause I can’t imagine getting anything else outta sleeping with Roy. Especially after a night at the Barnacle. Don’t really want to even think about that.

But why the hell he shot the dog, don’t know. The dog lifted his leg, but the dog was always lifting his leg. But last Tuesday, he lifted once too often in front of Roy, I guess. And Roy was feeling ornery after all that drinking, not that he’s never not drinking. Not that’s he’s never not ornery. But he just flipped. Now everyone’s worried he’s gonna flip and shoot someone else. Maybe one of those girls who say no, or maybe he’ll forget he’s even just slept with her and wanna shoot her. That’s the problem when you get to a point with the drinking. You just forget and you get really ugly inside. Your soul just gets too wet to care about anything anymore. That’s what we’re all thinking is going on inside of Roy. He’s not the Roy we knew when we were coming up to being adults. God, he’s only twenty-five and he’s as gone as anybody can be.

And I don’t see him going into to AA or something. God give me the grace, or whatever it is they say. Turning your life to god. No, Roy’s never gonna be turning his life over to God. Maybe he’ll be begging God to save his life ‘cause he shot Blueboy’s dog. Nothing else is gonna save him now. Maybe God can, but maybe that’s even more than God can do for Roy. Why in God’s name did he shoot that goddam dog?