Spider, here.

It’s started.  Already.  I’m gettin’ the calls for St. Patrick’s Day ink requests and I’ll be the only one workin’.  Man, I hate that day. Now, don’t go thinking I got a problem with the Irish, or those that think they’re Irish, or those that wish they could think they’re Irish. I don’t. I just don’t wanna have to do any fuckin’ four leaf clovers.

I swear, as soon as New Years is over, every fucker who wants a tat suddenly decides he’s fuckin’ Irish.  The closer to March 17, the more likely it is the dude’ll be too pissed to see straight, demanding I give ’em a shamrock on the balls or somethin’. Try tellin’ a drunk fuck you can’t do his ink because his blood’s thin and he’ll bleed all over the fuckin’ floor. The next thing you know, you’re rollin’ on the tiles as the dickhead screams about you denyin’ his heritage. Then, there’s blood on the floor anyways. And it sure as shit ain’t mine. Still don’t make it any more fun to clean up.

I tried switchin’ shifts early this year, but Trey’s already planned to be drunk in anticipation of sitting his black ass down and celebrating his “Irish” heritage proper, and my boss is the one who handed me the shit gig in the first place. So it’s gonna be me and the piercing chick (whatever her name is, piercing chick #7, I guess; they come and go like there’s a revolvin’ door) and I don’t think she’s gonna be much help.

I’m gonna tell ’em they gotta take a breathalyzer test by law and the machine’s broke.

I’m gonna lock the fucking door and make ’em show me what they want before I let ’em in. 

I’m gonna tell ’em I’m out of green ink. 

Fuck it. I’m gonna do the four leaf clovers. I’m just gonna charge ’em triple. They’ll all be too wasted to notice.

So, call to check my schedule.  I’ll give you a discount if you don’t want nothin’ Irish (no shamrocks, no Celtic, druid or pagan crap, no leprechauns, not even one of those ugly ass setter dogs). 

If want any of the above, you’d best be ready to pay, and feel some pain.

Spider, here.

When I was a kid, I thought a monster was under my bed. I could hear him hissin’ and growlin’ under there. My ma told me it was the radiator and stop being such a retard. Didn’t convince me, tho. I knew. It was down there, waitin’. The next time it started hissin’, I yelled again. This time my ma came in with a baseball bat. She told me to shut up ’cause she was busy and if the thing came creepin’ up the foot of my bed like i said it was, to hit it in the damn head. I held that chunk of wood and knew there wouldn’t be any more noises after that. Just like I believed in the monster, I believed in that bat.

Later on, when birdie powder and bad boyfriends made my ma more likely to hit me with a bat than gimme one, my beliefs still were about that bat. It was solid. It would deliver pain–and sometimes save me from it. I did some things with that bat most of you’d turn away from. I did some things all of you would say I’m a bad person for. If I am or not, well, that’s not part of this, so I ain’t gonna get into it. It’d end up a big circle of a talk with no answer at the end, anyways. Might as well leave it.

In high school, right about when that bat started gettin’ me into too much shit, I found something else to believe in. A new student from Bal’more named Resonance. She looked to me like this surly girl who’d just as much kick you in the teeth as say somethin’, but the funny thing ’bout her was she liked to pretend she was invisible most of the time. She’d slink around the halls, duckin’ past whatever was in her way, makin’ sure she didn’t have to look at no one. But, every once in a while, someone would do somethin’ she couldn’t overlook and she’d pop out of the shadows and it was all fangs and fury for a good thirty seconds. Then, she’d disappear again.

She still likes to think I didn’t see her, didn’t notice her until she noticed me. That ain’t the truth. I saw her. I watched her, waited to see if she’d ever drop the invisible shit and just be, you know? Then I pulled some shit in class one day and she just–exploded. Not in a crazy, gun-toting, school-burning way, or anythin’. You know that Wizard of Oz movie, where everything is black and white, and then the chick in the house lands and, boom, it’s all color? That’s what it was. She turned to color. And everthin’ around her did the same.

After that, I didn’t need that bat. Life was alive ’cause she was. The walls were colored for her. Music was there so she could pull me into the pit and thrash around like we were forged from anger itself. The air was there just so her mouth could go on lettin’ out whatever the fuck it was she felt like sayin’. 

When the stepdad from hell started layin’ in on me, she’d tell me it’d be okay someday soon. And it was like I finally understood those people who stuffed themselves into their good clothes to pack the churches on Sunday. She spoke. I believed. She became my church. My religion. 

Now the church is empty. And I can’t go back. That bat’s just a hunk of wood. Even that monster can’t get ahold of me, now. My beliefs changed and all that lived before she walked in on my life has washed down the drain like dirty water. I’m clean. Born again. I embraced the color and then the world went all gray again. I saw the light, then the light upped and split.

Shit.