luckily none at all to cough.
“This is ridiculous!” Durgan cried. “How long can it take to smoke a cigarette? You have to finish that damn thing eventually and I’m going to make you pay for delaying the inevitable.”
“Worse than death? You twit,” Mrs. Deneaux said.
“I’ll kill you just for fun you old hag,” Durgan said to her, pointing his finger.
Never skipping a beat Deneaux answered. “Worse than you have tried. Give it your best shot.”
“All of a sudden I like you,” I told Mrs. Deneaux as I gingerly crushed the cigarette under foot. If it had offered even the least resistance I would have toppled over.
“Michael, you don’t look well,” Tomas said.
‘Thanks!’ I wanted to yell at him.
“Nothing a case of the deads won’t cure,” Durgan said.
“The deads?” I asked.
“Make the black man move,” Durgan said as he approached steadily, fists clenched by his sides.
Halfway to me and BT had not yet let go. I could feel him fighting within himself to throw me to the side and fight Durgan. It would be an awesome spectacle, just like when I was ten and my friend and I would watch Creature Double Feature on the UHF channel (if you don’t know what UHF is, it’s a dark time in our planet’s history, when we only had about five or six channels to choose from; it was hideous. No 24/7 cartoons, sports or comedy. I shudder to remember the days.) Godzilla versus King Kong, it would have been awesome.
“Michael, if BT does not move, we are done here,” Eliza said evenly.
“BT,” I said.
“I can’t man, he’s going to kill you.”
“What about that whole thing about death not having the right size for me and all.”
“Oh, I was just saying that.”
“You really suck man, now let me go.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.” ‘No.’
“This is going to hurt you way more than me.” Durgan said smiling.
“How are you walking so well?” I asked truly wondering not just stalling this time.
“I’m cured man!” Durgan shouted.
“How do you get ‘cured’ from an amputated leg?” Now I was really curious.
“Eliza…” Durgan was cut short as Eliza yelled at him to finish me.
Well that one name pretty much answered my question irregardless that it was a cut short answer.
For each step back that BT took, Durgan took two forward. I swayed back and forth like a tall reed in a soft summer breeze. The best thing that I could ask to happen was that I would be on the back bend when Durgan swung. The audible crack as my jaw burst echoed throughout my skull, the reverberations finally ending in my left pinkie toe, and no I do not know why.
I could vaguely hear Durgan screaming at me to get up so that he could finish me off. It was much more comfortable where I was. I could hear Tracy and Gary, pretty much everyone urging me up, their urgent cries ringing in my ears. But I was falling deeper; the red of pain was rapidly becoming the black of unconsciousness.
It was them that I held on for. Durgan would only wait so long to get from me what he felt I owed him. If I were to pass out, he would still finish me off, most likely starting with a few rib crushing kicks followed by some face pummeling blows, capped off with my head in his hands as he cracked my neck. I might not experience any of the pain involved, but my family and friends surely would.
My jaw rattled in my head, teeth grinding against teeth as I turned over trying to get leverage with arms that couldn’t support Gumby. A fresh wave of nausea and pinpointing blackness threatened to thwart my best efforts as my arms gave. I collapsed, jaw first, onto the tarred roof.
“That’s right, you piece of dung. Get up!” Durgan yelled, “What? No witty comeback you shithead?” His spittle rained down on me.
The thought of uttering anything more than a throaty moan made me wish for my mother, and I hadn’t done that since I was six.
“If you don’t get up in the next minute I’m going to start teaching your wife what it means to be with a real man,” Durgan boasted.
“You even look at her funny and you’ll be licking your own asshole!” BT yelled.
“You’re welcome,” BT said as I gave him the thumbs up sign, my face still buried in the roof.
Henry charged at Durgan. If I could have screamed at him to stop, I would have. Not that he would have listened. That’s the sort of relationship we have, I give him cookies, he does as he pleases. Henry wrapped his muzzle around Durgan’s lower leg. He must have put all his strength into it because Durgan screamed to the heavens, although they would have turned a blind eye to him as they had to me. He shook his leg violently and swatted Henry away. Henry yelped as he went tumbling twenty feet away. I was thankful to whatever was watching over me now that Durgan was only able to land a glancing blow. Henry came to a stop by the edge of the roof. I could tell his head was reeling as he looked up, eyes not focused on anything, but he’d be all right. More than I could say for me.
The pain in my jaw had begun to ebb. I attributed it to the high octane adrenaline injection from Durgan’s threat. To threaten me was one thing, my family? Well, that takes on a whole new level, and to top it off the asshole hurt my dog!
“You don’t understand now, Lawrence,” Durgan sneered. “I can kill you too, just as easily as I can kill him,” he said pointing over to my mostly prone body.
“He’s not quite dead yet,” Gary said, quoting Monty Python as I struggled to gain vertical-ability.
“Did you really just do that Uncle Gary?” Travis asked.
Gary smiled diffidently.
Durgan turned to see me. I was now resting on my knees. I probably could have stood at this point, but I was busy listening to the knitting of the bones in my mouth. It was disturbing. The grinding as molar scraped across canine was akin to biting down hard on fork tines.
Durgan looked at me in alarm as color began to wash back into my face, from winter pale to spring hale. He gave a quick glance to Eliza as if expecting direction, but none was forthcoming.
I put my left foot under me and stood up shakily. I wouldn’t be scaring a Girl Scout, but Durgan looked like he was having second thoughts.
“I broke your jaw, Talbot. Now I’m going to break your spine,” he said as he advanced again.
It hurt like hell to say it but it was worth every snap and pop as I moved my still healing facial bones. “Bring it,” I said as I put my hands up in the old school boxing fashion, fists upside down and all.
I tried to dance around like Muhammad Ali, but I think I looked more like Whitney Houston (you know… can’t dance).
Durgan bull rushed me. I was still operating on something close to seventy-five percent of the old Talbot, but it was way more than he was expecting. So when I side stepped his advance and put everything I could muster into his kidney, his heavy expulsion of air was all I needed to know that I had surprised him and potentially inflicted an iota of damage.
“You should have just stayed down,” Durgan said as he turned. His eyes glowed with a festering
