Urban Legend (3)

“Dude, you’ve got patches of hair growing on your back. Like Bigfoot or something. Eddie the Yeti from the Serengeti. The sasquatch with a watch.”
That’s Benny.
“Huh?”
“On your back. Patches. Like fur stuck on glue or something…like…what the hell?”
“Oh yea? Maybe you shouldn’t watch me get dressed. There’s something not right about that anyway.”
“But the strange thing is…” and he leans in closer, “…they’re only popping up on the left side. Huh. That’s narly. You must have some sort of hormonal disorder thing.”
“Fuck you.”
By the time you finish reading this sentence, Benny’ll ask for a cigarette.
“Dude, can I bum?”
I give him one.
“Fucking menthol? Dude. Please.”
That’s Benny.
“Got any fire?”
I hand him the lighter.
“Keep it.”
He says: “So what time’s this thing happening?”
This thing happening is me and Benny going to see my father. Only he is me and I’m the nephew sliding into college on partial scholarship. Partial. But then there’s books and a food card and monthly parking money. That’s how we play it this time. Before, Benny was the accountant and I was the orderly. I had to change him, my father. He’d pissed all over himself. I had to change him. I was the orderly. And the month before that, Benny was the director of Sunny Vale Assisted Living and I was the liability attorney. Sunny Vale. That’s like that box of raisins, isn’t it?
“When’s this thing happening? Dude. Are you paying attention?”
I pull a fancy polo shirt over my T-shirt. To look collegiate and all. Benny takes a long drag and blue smoke comes out his nose.
“Dude?”
The thing with my father is, he just doesn’t remember. That’s how we fleece him. Today Benny is me and I’m the nephew. I’m never me. I can’t. He’d never give me anything if I told him I was me. If you think I feel shitty about this, maybe you ought to go back to watching TV. Sign into Facebook and poke somebody. Send them a virtual bouquet of flowers. Pluck your eyebrows. I stopped feeling bad about this right around the time my old man put his fist into my eye socket and re-arranged my cheekbone. When I was twelve.
“How much you think, this time Dude?”
“Stop flicking ashes on the floor. Use that can.”
“Dude, I’m still drinking out of that.”
“Fucking…Benny!”
“You want me to put ashes into my beer?”
“Benny!”
Benny’s set. He only comes along because he loves me. All right, that’s bullshit. Let him tell you:
“Dude, all I ever wanted to do was to be an actor. Hoffman. DeNiro. Fucking Olivier. Dude, OLIVIER: STELLA! STELLA!”
“That’s not Olivier.”
“Aww, Dude…how can you say that…”
There you go. Benny may be a first class moron but he’s set. His father invented the Cube Lube back in 1982.
“Fucking eh!”
Fucking eh. No joke. It was some sort of lubricant specially formulated for the Rubik’s Cube. It worked on that pyramid thing too. He incorporated himself into a one man S-corp and called it Bougé Industries, Inc. The way Benny tells it, he meant Bourgeoisie but he was too dense to look it up. It still sounded French with that acute accent and all, so he went with it. He ran his outfit from his garage in New Paltz, New York. Got a P.O. Box where the checks came. Anyway, he made a killing with the Cube Lube. Seems like they all do, don’t they? Clueless Gumps falling backwards into bags of cash. Why couldn’t I think of something like that. Fucking Cube Lube. Instead, I gotta go scheme out my delusional old man at some country club nursing home.
“Assisted living, Dude.”
“Are you listening in on me Benny?”
“Haha.”
And he lights a joint.
He says, “you look mah-velous, you preppy frat fuck.”
I say, “what’d you do with the cigarette butt?”
He says he dropped it into the beer can, only he’s holding it and drinking out of it. And he gives me a smug, stupid smile.
Momos, all of them.
Gumps with boxes of chocolates walking around in bliss.
I say: “Let’s go.”
Benny needs motivation, scene, and time to get into character.
“Who am I supposed to be again, Dude?”