Gum Stunner: Chapter 1
I’ve got to give it to Biff. He knows people. More importantly, he knows how to read them. He’s a great judge of character who knows a sucker when he sees one. For an ex-junkie who’s lost everything, he’s still got confidence. Then again, no confidence means no scam, so he needs it. There he is now, walking out of a jewellery store with God knows how much cash when he walked in with only a fake passport.
It’s a pretty brilliant plan when you think about it. Biff followed some rich boy who bought some crack off of him home one day. Biff sells in public parks – not from our house. It’s ballsy, but at least no one knows where we live. The kid lived with his parents and thought he was a bit of a bad ass. See, every first timer that comes to score off Biff gets the good stuff so they come back. The kid probably thought he was hot shit, scoring grade A rocks then showing it all off to his mates. What the kid didn’t realise is that the best dealers know tricks you’ve got no clue about. You might think your friendly neighbourhood crack-man is as fucked up as the homeless loser you see on the street – but Biff doesn’t smoke crack, he just sells it.
So the second time the kid comes to buy, Biff has a chat to him. The kid’s got a girlfriend who he wants to buy fancy necklace for. Biff tells him where the good jewellery stores are (ones that we haven’t hit before so they don’t know our faces), and that if you take cash in to pay, you get shit cheaper. And all this kid wants to do is be cool like Biff, since kids all think drug dealers are the coolest people in the world.
Thank you Gangsta rap for making kings of addicts.
So anyway, Biff tells the kid he likes him and gives him a free wallet. The kid loves it. Three days later and a whole lot of scoping and stalking, me and Biff see the kid walk into the jewellery store.
“Ready dude?” He says with that much confidence, I’m sure he could fucking fly if he wanted to.
“Alright man, close your eyes.” I tell him.
I punch him hard in the side of the face, cutting him with my ring. We scuff up his stolen suit so the scam looks legit. A bit of dirt and blood on the Armani and we’re good to go.
Biff runs into the jewellery store, yelling that the kid mugged him earlier that day and stole his wallet. The kid’s fucking dumbstruck, I can see through the glass from across the road. The security guard takes the kid down, and the poor boy is balling his eyes out. He’s trying to tell them the truth, but it’s no use. Biff tells the staff what the wallet looks like, and there’s a secret compartment in it with a drivers license that belongs to a “Michael Slater”. Sure enough, there it is in the wallet. Biff, or should I say, Michael Slater, pulls out his passport that “the young hooligan must not have wanted to take”.
The security guard gives Biff the wallet. The kid’s crying and making no sense. Biff says he’s “shaken up” and needs to go outside for a cigarette while that staff call the police so “Michael Slater” can make his statement. Biff walks calmly until he’s outside, and disappears in the blink of an eye.
God, he’s fast.
We meet half an hour later at our run down studio apartment in the middle of town. We count up the money, and there’s nearly seven grand. We’re both fucking stunned.
“Jesus Biff, who the fuck was that kid?”
“Who fuckin’ cares? Look at this cash man, we’re fuckin’ loaded! It’s fuckin’ party time hombre!”
“Yeah, but…” I bite my tongue. That kid must’ve had politician parents or some shit if he’s carrying that much cash, so he’s probably got connections. That’s something we’ve learnt since pulling these scams – rich people know powerful people. But if I bring Biff back to reality, he’ll get paranoid and want to skip town again. All I can think about is the cops and the repercussions – but that’s my job to think about. Biff comes up with the scams and I get us out of them. And we’ll deal with that tomorrow. Right now, Biff’s got a point – it is fuckin’ party time.
So we round up the crew and get things started. Our own little motley bunch that all celebrate when we get a good haul like the one we just did. Our little family. There’s Skeeter (a gay teenage prostitute), Axl (a busking black midget), Dianna and Trinny (lesbian dominatrix’s that work the business world), Don (a Scottish war vet) and of course, Temille (Biff’s wife).
They’re so beautiful, Biff and Temille. It’s the most passionate love I’ve ever seen. You might think love’s not as strong when it’s held by trash like us. You might think that you need presents and dinners and roses and fucking Matthew McConaughey for true love. And while I don’t want to upset or distort your vision of what you may think makes up a perfect relationship, believe me when I tell you that those things aren’t what real love is about. I don’t buy into the whole soul mate shit. I don’t believe in fate or paths or any spiritual thing like that. But when you see something like these two together, you’ll see the most intense bond possible. You’ll feel happier for knowing that two people care for one another like they do, and you’ll do nothing but smile when you think of them at any time after that. And the fact that this beautiful duo are happy with what they have, and that they share what they have when they have it… it seems to make them seem that much more special. I’d be jealous if I didn’t care for them so much.
So later, a good three hours of drinking, smoking, snorting, popping, dropping and some injecting, the clock hits midnight and we plan our next bust. Skeeter said he got some information out of a closet-case politician he blew and then blackmailed about some environmental legislation case that we could sell to the papers. Problem is, that’s a little too public and we generally try to keep our faces hidden.
Biff shoots him down. “We’re not world savers Skeet.”
Skeeter’s always had a bit of a crush on Biff, but it’s more of a father figure thing. The young queer little man whore whose bigoted dad kicked him out of home was sucking dick in alleyways for a good year or so before Biff and Temille rescued him from being stabbed by a famous film director. Temille blackmailed the guy and got a couple grand from it – after Biff broke his elbow.
It’s got to be hard holding a camera when you can’t even move your forearm.
Axl, as always, comes up with the idea of kidnapping. And as always, we say no. God knows what goes on in that mind of his – we really only invite him along since we feel so damn sorry for him. He’s a nice enough guy, but a little retarded. He’s been homeless for as long as anyone has known him, and pretty much nobody has any idea how he’s survived for so long. Maybe Jesus is on his side, maybe Thor’s on his side, maybe he’s just lucky. Truth is, he’s probably a little cleverer than we give him credit for.
Dianna and Trinny are happy working the skyscrapers – they actually get paid on a regular basis and don’t need to pull scams or even hang out with denim and leather clad junkie trash like us, but they’re old friends with Temille. Dianna’s your real stereotypical butch dyke – thinks anyone with a dick is a masochist pig and out to rape women. An angry middle-aged balding overweight wrinkly faced lezzo with a penchant for hurting men – so what better occupation than a dominatrix, right?
Trinny on the other hand, is a beautiful, sweet young girl who could have any man she wanted. No clue as to why she’s a lipstick lesbian, but I’d say it’s something to do with daddy. That’s not me saying dykes aren’t really dykes, that’s just a judgement call. That and the fact I’ve fucked her a couple of times, which really gets Dianna’s fair-trade hemp panties in a twist.
Finally, Don speaks up. The fact he’s lost his mind always means there’s a lot of interpretation to his dialogue, but he’s got ideas. It’s something about cops and hookers, but that’s all we really get out of him. I hazard a guess.
“So we follow the cops who are following the hookers then follow them to the bank? That what you mean Don?”
“Nae yeh fookin’ eejit, che hoors er baing fookd bai em asses in a plang clothes! In alla plang clothes gottem a famly so thurs a miny miny chantses yeh fook! In yous fookin shites gon ‘n pult wun ovran on Laydee Vivyin, now yir fookin dead!”
Now while that may not make much sense, there were two words all of us heard in that spiel of nonsensical garbage – Lady Vivienne.
Lady Vivienne brings in slave girls from third world countries, promising them freedom. When they get here, they get whored out by Lady Vivienne to the highest bidder for whatever reason they might have. You never know this shit goes on until you’ve actually known someone who it’s happened to, which we do. None of us have ever had any clue as to how she does it all, but then again, what do a bunch of idiots like us know about that anyway. And as Biff told Skeeter – we’re not world savers. And while we might try and take in or look after a lost cause like Skeeter every once in a while, it’s the cops job to fix all that sort of high class slave trade shit.
So when Don starts telling us that we’ve pulled one over on Lady Vivienne, we start freaking. Biff tries to get some answers out of Don, but he’s making even less sense now that he’s worked up.
“Don, how did we fuck over Lady Vivienne – what did we do? Why didn’t you tell us before?”
“Ees yah fookin fas un on teh weein yeh jackass! Yeh fookd Vivyins weein!”
That’s when we get it. That’s why the kid had so much money. While Lady Vivienne does what she does, what she doesn’t do is open up shop anywhere. Her ex-husband, Mikael Karovivichnakov or some stereotypical bullshit name, he used to be one of the biggest drug lords in the country. But as drug lords do, he got caught and faced a whole lot of jail time. He never got locked up and no one’s ever known what happened to him. The rumour is Vivienne killed him, took over and changed the business from there.
Don tells us that it was her kid that we ripped off at the jewellery store. Axl doesn’t buy it, but the rest of us don’t want to take any chances. Even though seven grand is probably nothing to her, we’re pretty certain that she’ll be gunning for whoever it was that fucked her son over.
Temille tells everyone to leave, and makes them promise not to tell anybody else about what we know. Dianna goes absolutely nuts at Biff, saying he’s put Temille’s life in danger.
“You know how close she is to that Russian cow already! You know they’ve got history, and you go and bring that all back up with your fucking get rich quick schemes! Stick to drug dealing you fucking scumbag, and leave my fucking friend alone!”
“She’s my fucking wife, you fat fucking psycho! You think I wanted to do this? Get the fuck out of my house before I throw your 300 pound ass out the window. Last thing anybody wants is a fucking earthquake caused by a whale hitting the fucking ground!” He fires back at her, which needless to say she doesn’t take well.
One giant bitch slap to the face later, Temille steps in before Biff can prove his namesake.
“That’s enough, Dianna. Biff didn’t know. We’ll be fine, I promise. Just go home and I’ll call you later honey.”
I keep my mouth shut and my fists by my side. I’m no woman beater, but I’d absolutely love any reason to take that whale down.
“Get the fuck out of my way you junkie,” she says as she pushes me aside, “You’re no better than your trash fucking friend.”
Trinny walks out following her, keeping her head down and avoiding eye contact. Axl follows them, saying that the whole thing’s a crock of shit and there’s no way that the kid was Lady Vivienne’s son. Don makes his way out slowly, now making no sense at all. Skeeter wants to stay with us and talk through it. He wants to help, he tells us.
“Whatever you guys do, I’ll be a part of it, okay? Whatever happens, I’m with you.”
“Thanks Skeet. We’ll be fine dude. Just go home. We’ll sort it.” Biff tells him, now calmer than lake in a Disney film since Dianna’s gone.
We wait for a couple of minutes before saying anything. Temille goes first.
“Okay boys, what do we do? If this is true, and I’m not saying it is, but… if it’s true, there’s no way I can face her. You guys know this.”
“I swear babe, I’ll find a way out of this.” Biff tells her confidently. “I promise you, we’ll be okay.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do. We’ll… we’ll move. We’ll find out if it’s true, and if it is, we’ll move. We’ve moved before, we’ll move again. We’ve been here for over three years anyway. It’s time we started over again.”
“I don’t want to start over again!” Temille yells, starting to lose her cool. “I’ve got friends here!”
“Who, that fat fucking bitch Dianna?” Biff says, not so wisely.
“Yes. That fat bitch Dianna, who got me away from Lady Vivienne in the first place. That fat bitch Dianna, who saved me from getting fucked by ten different guys a night. That fat bitch Dianna, who saved my fucking life!” Temille fires back, starting to cry.
I finally say something.
“We kill him.”
