Stories (2011) by Joe R. Lansdale

walking dead man and have been for years.
    I could put the shotgun under my chin and work the trigger
with my toes, or maybe push it with the very pen I'm using to create you, Mr.
Journal. Wouldn't that be neat? Blow my brains to the ceiling and sprinkle you
with my blood.
    But as I said, I loaded the gun because it was something to
do. I'd never use it on myself or Mary.
    You see, I want Mary. I want her to hold Rae and me one last
time like she used to in the park. And she can. There's a way.
    I've drawn all the curtains and made curtains out of
blankets for those spots where there aren't any. It'll be sunup soon and I
don't want that kind of light in here. I'm writing this by candlelight and it
gives the entire room a warm glow. I wish I had wine. I want the atmosphere to
be just right.
    Over on Mary's bunk she's starting to twitch. Her neck is
swollen where the vines have congested and are writhing toward their favorite
morsel, the brain.
    Pretty soon the rose will bloom (I hope she's one of the
bright yellow ones ' yellow was her favorite color and she wore it well) and
Mary will come for me.
    When she does, I'll stand with my naked back to her. The
vines will whip out and cut me before she reaches me, but I can stand it. I'm
used to pain. I'll pretend the thorns are Mary's needles. I'll stand that way
until she folds her dead arms around me and her body pushes up against the
wound she made in my back, the wound that is our daughter Rae. She'll hold me
so the vines and the proboscis can do their work. And while she holds me, I'll
grab her fine hands and push them against my chest, and it will be we three
again, standing against the world, and I'll close my eyes and delight in her
soft, soft hands one last time.

HELL THROUGH A WINDSHIELD
     
    We are drive-in mutants.
     
    We are not like other people.
     
    We are sick.
     
    We are disgusting.
     
    We believe in blood.
     
    In breasts.
     
    And in beasts.
     
    We believe in Kung Fu City.
     
    If life had a vomit meter.
     
    We'd be off the scale.
     
    As long as one single drive-in remains On the planet Earth.
     
    We will party like jungle animals.
     
    We will boogie till we puke.
     
    Heads will roll.
     
    The drive-in will never die.
     
    Amen.
     

THE DRIVE-IN OATH
     
                 
     
    The drive-in theater may have been born in New Jersey, but
it had the good sense to come to Texas to live. Throughout the fifties and
sixties it thrived here like a fungus on teenage lusts and families enticed by
the legendary “ Dollar Night ” or “ Two Dollars A Carload ”.
    And even now--though some say the drive-in has seen its
heyday in the more populated areas, you can drive on in there any night of the
week-particularly Special Nights and Saturday-and witness a sight that
sometimes makes the one on the screen boring on comparison.
    You'll see lawn chairs planted in the backs of pickups, or
next to speakers, with cowboys and cowgirls planted in the chairs, beer cans
growing out of their fists, and there'll be the sputterings of barbecue pits
and the aromas of cooking meats rising up in billows of smoke that slowly melts
into the clear Texas sky.
    Sometimes there'll be folks with tape decks whining away,
even as the movie flickers across the three-story screen and their neighbors
struggle to hear the crackling speaker dialogue over ZZ Top doing "The
Tube Snake Boogie." There'll be lovers sprawled out on blankets spread
between two speaker posts, going at it so hot and heavy they ought to just go
on and charge admission. And there's plenty of action in the cars too. En route
to the concession stand a discerning eye can spot the white moons of un-Levied
butts rising and falling to a steady, rocking rhythm just barely contained by
well-greased shocks and four-ply tires.
    What you're witnessing is a bizarre subculture in action.
One that may in fact be riding the crest of a new wave.
    Or to put it another way: Drive-ins are crazy, but they sure
are fun.
     
    * *