Fair Trade

"I'm losing it baby. I'm going to lose my fucking mind." Jimmy was

pacing back and forth on the living room floor clapping his left hand

to his thigh while taking deep drags off his Marlboro.

"You're going to wear the rug out pacing like that. Walk around in a

square or zig-zag or something." Lila's plump body was wedged into a

worn overstuffed armchair.

"You need to listen to me." Jimmy slid to his knees at Lila's feet.

His hands were shaking, his eyes wild, darting from here to there and

there to here.

Lila raised a chicken leg to her mouth, dug her teeth in and pulled

the meat from the bone chomping with loud wet chews. Grease slid

down the side of her face as Jimmy's head fell into her lap. She

patted his hair with her chicken-hand. Jimmy was weeping now and the

wetness from his tears spread on her pink skirt.

"It's going to be fine." Lila said spitting chunks of chewed chicken

into the air around his head.

"I don't want to go." Jimmy was blubbering now. He looked up at Lila

with pleading eyes.

"But you promised, remember? And we must always keep our promises."

Lila lifted a strawberry shake from nowhere wrapping her lips around

the straw, sucking so hard her cheeks caved in and she looked like

fish wearing a wig with oily bangs.

Gently, Lila reached out to Jimmy's face with both hands and she

tenderly brushed his tears away. Long ropes of snot hung from his

nostrils.

"He's here!" Lila pushed Jimmy down to the floor. A dark figure in

black robes and no face stood over Jimmy. Wafts of the scents of cat

shit and basil filled the air as the figure moved closer to Jimmy.

Lila lifted her skirt revealing an unspeakable forest of hell between

her legs. And then Jimmy was gone. And the cloaked figure was gone.

But Lila remained. A brand new rotisserie chicken now at Lila's feet.