So I was crying in a corner, just minding my own business when the FedEx guy delivered a letter.
“Have a good day sir,” he said.
“Fuck off”
I opened the letter. It was from Bob Oglesby, Head of Productions at Trainwreck Studios. It read:
“Dear Mr. Less
We read your screenplay ‘The Virtues of Drinking Bleach’ and have a few notes. Please reach out to your agent Pablo Dunbar to set up a meeting. We are having trouble reaching him.
Best Regards,
Bill”
So I finished crying and called Pablo. When he answered the phone, I heard some screaming followed by gunshots. Then silence.
“This is Pablo,” he said.
“Hey! Bob Oglesby has been trying to reach you. Where the hell have you been?”
“Sorry I’ve been in Thailand on the set of the new Paul Schrader film. I’ll reach out to Bob soon.”
That week, Pablo and me drove out to Burbank. When we arrived at the studio, the doors were locked. Out of the third story window, Bob yelled: “Sorry, I’m the only one here. Everyone has COVID.”
Bob threw down a rope and we climbed up. Then he offered us a Bloody Mary.
“No thanks,” I said. “I just got my one month chip.”
Bob shrugged and downed the drink himself.
“Now boys,” Bob said as he sat down behind his desk. “Let’s get down to brass tacks. We all want to make money. A fuck ton of money. And the only way to do that is to give the audience what they want. And they want sex. They want violence. They want full on sexual penetration. They want erect penises. They want sopping wet vaginas. They want tits. They want ass. They want to see EVERYTHING.
Unfortunately we can’t give that to them. We have to abide by what they call ‘rules’. Plus we have to consider the Chinese market. So we looked at your screenplay and said that this is the next best thing. Therefore, after all the sexual harassment lawsuits are settled, we are fully prepared to give this thing the green light. What do you boys think about that?”
Pablo and me looked at each other.
“Sounds good?”
“Good,” Bob said. “But we have a few notes for you. First, gay sex. There’s a lot of it.”
“I assure you that it’s all in service to the plot,” I replied.
“Oh yes, I noticed,” Bob said. “What I mean is that I want more of it.”
“For the film?”
“Yes”
“So you want more gay sex in a martial arts film set in outer space?”
“Yes”
“Anything else?” I asked.
Bob stood up from his desk and looked out the window. “Boys,” he said, “Hollywood is dying. Too many kids on YouTube drinking cat piss for a laugh. Too much internet pornography. Too much competition from the streaming services. The days of good storytelling, of compelling performances, of sweeping scores, of looking at the silver screen in awe and wonder…they are coming to a close.”
Bob paused and looked me in the eye.
“I’m counting on you to save my job,” he said.
I looked over to Pablo, then back at Bob.
“In that case,” I said. “I’ll have that Bloody Mary.”
So I packed too much Copenhagen into my lip and started throwing up profusely.
A woman knocked on the bathroom door and asked “are you alright?”
I said “who the fuck are you?”
She said “I’m your wife, I haven’t seen you in four years and I need child support.”
I said “क्षमा करें मुझे अंग्रेजी नहीं आती”
She said “your son’s here. He wants to talk to you.”
“Which son?” I asked.
She said “Flavio Briatore Alexandro McFinny.”
So I put my ear up to the door and asked “Flavio, is that you?”
“Yes dad,” he answered. “Why don’t you come home? It’s been too long. I miss our time together. You’ve missed too much. I’m getting married this summer. You have a beautiful grandchild on the way.”
“Flavio, I wish it were that easy,” I replied.
“We forgive you,” he said. “All I’ve ever wanted is to be a family. I want you to know your grandchildren. I want us to get to know one another, to make up for lost time. There’s nothing in your past that can’t be forgiven. You just need to forgive yourself.”
Could it be true? Have I been too selfish? Have I been wallowing in my self-loathing for far too long that I’ve missed the important things in life?
“Flavio?” I asked. “What are you going to name your child?”
“Arianna Francesca”
I emptied out all the contents in my pockets: the uppers, the downers, the benzodiazepines, the methamphetamines, the methylenedioxymethamphetamines, the oxycodones, the lysergic acid diethyliamides, the sildenafils, the simvastatins, and my trusty Derringer. I took a deep breath and opened the door.
“You’re under arrest for the possession of narcotics, solicitation, and public indecency. You have the right to remain silent….” the officer said.
Dale and I were found outside of Palm Springs buck naked. We were bound together and gagged. It took awhile for the police to realize we were victims and not nudists.
We were taken to the hospital where I was treated for massive scrotal damage. Dale was alright.
“Aye, don’t worry lad. We’ll get your wee workin again. You watch,” Dick (my Scottish roommate) said.
“Never mind that. I need you to find Honda. It isn’t over between us,” I instructed Dick.
“Aye”
Dick quickly left the hospital room to begin work. Dale spoke up.
“I’m just glad that we all made it out alive,” he said.
“No one asked you anything,” I said.
Anthrax also came to visit. After Dale and Dick exited, she came to my bedside.
“I need you to tell me everything you know about Honda,” she inquired.
“She seems to possess extraordinary strength. I don’t think she’s human anymore, Anthrax. I think she’s a cyborg. Who the fuck would do that to her? Randy’s a dumbass, there’s no way he could’ve done something like that,” I told her.
“I think I know who.”
“Who? That stupid ass crime syndicate? Honda said that they didn’t want her anymore. That’s why she’s riding around with those dorks like she’s Peter fuckin Fonda,” I replied.
“It’s not Randy. It’s not the syndicate,” Anthrax said.
“Alright. This is getting too complicated and contrived. But if you or Dick find Honda, tell her I’m coming after her,” I said.
“I’ll find her. But please, before you do anything, I need to know if there’s at least an ounce of humanity in her. If there is, I know that I can save her. Please James.”
I agreed.
As Anthrax began to leave, I grabbed her by the hand.
“I learned from a James Bond movie that before one seeks vengeance, they must first dig two graves,” I said.
“But I’m not seeking vengeance,” Anthrax replied.
“Oh yeah, I am. I mean….please be careful.”
Anthrax gave a faint smile then departed. I laid in the hospital bed bored and feeling awkward for not feeling like I have to compulsively masturbate.
“Your mother is on the phone,” a nurse told me.
I reluctantly took the call.
“Ohh my poor Tony,” mom said. “I heard that you were in the hospital!”
“This is James, ma. Who the hell is Tony?”
“What do you mean? I don’t have dementia,” she said. “How’s my sweetheart doing?”
“I’m alright. Is something wrong? I’ve been to the hospital hundreds of times and you’ve never called.”
“I’m just checking up on my favorite son. What are you, a moron?”
“I’m your only son Ma,” I said. “Anyway, are you sure Nicky is not my father?”
“Did you not read your birth certificate?”
“You put down Lou Diamond Phillips. Is there anything you can tell me about my father?”
“He was a tall glass of water. He could send shivers up and down my body with one touch. He was smooth, suave, with a voice of gold like Sinatra in a younger day. You don’t remind me of him at all,” Ma replied.
I shot up on some ‘roids to help with my low T when I got pissed off.
“That mother fucker,” I though. “He borrowed $15 from me ten years ago and never paid me back.”
I was of course thinking of Nicky Wallz, a bouncer at a strip club I once frequented. I lost touch with him after the joint got shot up in a disastrous FBI raid.
“I’m gonna beat his ass,” I thought. But I didn’t know where to find him.
Dick was sitting there, cutting away a slice of deer meat with his sawtooth Bowie, when I asked him: “I need you to find me a Nicky Wallz.”
“Aye mate,” he replied. “The price es steep though lad. Ya donnae have a penny to yur name. I just a might be callin n a favour from ya.”
“Just find him.”
Weeks went by. In my restlessness, I began bulking and sculpting. I fought every shit heel in the bar that wanted some, smashing glass and busting heads…all in preparation for my showdown with Nicky Wallz. But Dick was dragging his ass.
“Hey Dick!” I yelled. “What’s the word on Nicky? I told you to find him seven weeks ago. You better not be cruising the the rest stops again.”
“Oy mate, I see ya lookin’ fit lad. But donnae talk to me like tha again. Or else I’ll stab ya in the scrote,” he replied.
“Oh you want some of this?”
“Aye I do.”
We both removed our shirts, displaying our perfectly sculpted abs and chest. Before we fought, we rubbed each other in oil…down our arms, down our legs…before removing our underwear, where I used the oil to rub his magnificent c—…..
Anyways, after venting my frustrations, Dick asked me, “Aye mate, why you bein such a snoot lately? What is it with this Nicky fella?”
I didn’t know how to answer.
“Perhaps I just haven’t noticed how the time has passed,” I said. “I’m getting older. I’m losing friends, acquaintances. Maybe they’ve moved on and I haven’t. I just feel like I’ve learned nothing. Nothing of importance. Nothing about myself.”
We sat in silence for a few moments.
Dick spoke up. “Well lad, I found him weeks ago but didnae wanna tell ya. Maybe let sleepin’ dogs lie yeah?”
Maybe he was right. Nevertheless…
“Where is he?” I asked.
Dick and I went down to the Los Angeles County Hospital, Psych Ward B. The doctor warned us to handle Nicky with utmost care. The nurses were handing out meals to the patients when I walked up to Nicky and slapped the trey out of his hands.
“Recognize me asshole!” I said.
Amazed, Nicky said, “James, you’re alive old friend?”
“Still?! Old friend?!” I said. “Where’s my $15 you piece of shit?”
“Is that what this is about? Money? Nothing else?” he replied.
“What do you mean?”
“James, when I was 15, I was homeless and sleeping under a car. An older woman found me and took me in. She fed me. Clothed me. And gave me an education. We were close. Too close. We began a forbidden love affair. It was wrong, we both knew that. We tried to hide it, but the authorities found out. They took her away but not before we sired a child. That woman was Jenny, your mother.”
“Horseshit,” I said.
“Not horseshit. My only regret is never having the heart to tell you. After that strip club got shot up to absolute shreds, I never recovered. That’s why I’m here, because I just can’t bear the guilt of knowing who I am.”
Dick and me left the hospital in quiet contemplation. Could it be true? How could my mother have hid this from me?
We wandered back to the car then I pulled out a cigarette. I said to Dick:
The Internet Ruined Everything 