PDX Airport
I walk back to find Gus smiling impishly while taking a plug off a bottle of Corona.
I sit down in front of another beer bottle on top of my notebook. "What's this?"
Gus gesticulates wildly, then pulls in close enough so I can smell his wino breath between the gaps in his teeth. "It's magic! They ran out of coffees."
"Uh. Huh." I drag out the two beats, skeptically, before taking a sip. He's read my mind. Anything to help me sleep on the plane.
A big, carnie geek chortle from Gus. "Aye. How'd the work call go?"
"Like I sucker-punched myself in the balls. I'm guessing with sick time and a few well-executed excuses like this last one. . ."
Dammit. Lord Humongous and his equally-buffed wife seat themselves at the table next to us and start perusing menus. Has he seen me? I scoot my chair until my back's to them. ". . . two, maybe three weeks, tops?"
"What's done is done, Duck."
"What's so funny?"
I peer down at my Peru notebook:
Fact 6: Macchu Picchu, one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It is the largest tourist attraction with over 2 million visitors annually.
Fact 7: There are over 4,000 native varieties of Peruvian potatoes cultivated in the Andes. Major agricultural products are cotton, sugarcane, coffee, cocoa and rice.
Fact 8: Mining and fishing are the main sources of employment in Peru.
Then, in a wild, jagged scrawl in black magic marker lettering:
Fact 8.5: We just got backs from deepest jungle after my friend got bittened by that big, ugly bat. He is in the baño, bleeding out his eyeballs, and turning into a Pishtaco. Only God saves us all.
"What the fuck?"
Gus spits out a fountain stream of beer between the gaps in his teeth. "¿Qué?"
"What the fuck's a Pishtaco?" I say, wiping beer spray from my face, then holding up the notebook.
"Andean vampire. Carves its victim's fat off with a big knife and eats it. That gabaucho waiter was being all nosy, looking over my shoulders after he takes our order. I had to makes him leave."
"Christ. I thought he looked at me funny when I walked back in."
As I pull back my beer, it foams over, spilling all over my crotch.
Gus flashes his gapped-tooth smile. "JesuCristo, Duck, you is such a gloob."
Shaking my head, I scoot my chair closer to the firepit. "What? You think I did this on purpose like it's some sort of fashion statement?"
Gus chuckles to himself while surrounding customers pretend not to stare at us. "No worries. Passengers pissing themselves is the least of security's problemas. Not after last weeks."
I take the bait, blotting my pants with a paper napkin. "What happened last weeks?"
Gus gulps more beer. "They find the, uh, dead pilot's corpse stuffed in a bathroom's stall."
"Damn."
"Sí. His skins completely peeled off his face and stuffed in a murse filled with bath salts and anus chemicals."
"Anus?" That can't be right? "Heinous?" I sure hope so.
Gus continues. "Yeah, heinous. So this dwarf is--"
"Little person."
"¿Que? Like munchkin?"
"No, they like to be called little people." He watches me scowl as he sips his beer.
"In Spanish they is called enanos."
"That sounds better."
"Okay. This enano is all whacked off his gourd, all sweaty like he's flucking a neanderthal, with a 'SOUTHWEST AIRLINES' pilot's nametag pierced to his bloody left tit, munching on one of Captain Stubing's ears like is a breakfast burrito. They finally captures him pissed out naked on luggage carousel ten."
"Jesus. Sounds like one of my nightmares." The hopeless thoughts are creeping in again.
"Aye. Somethin' to look forward to on your deathbed." Gus probes my scowl and reacts with a huge, sick smile. "I'm telling ya', Duck, this is your lifes exchanging message from God." Gus solemnly looks up while crossing himself. "With vibes like this, how can you not moves to Peru?"
We both sip our beers and ponder what a terribly weird world we live in, before Gus shows off a sinister smile.
"Word is the bath salt dwarf's the head mechanic for one of the major airlines."
My phone rings again. My maybe ex-manager's number. Click.
"Gus, I don't know how you did it, but you did. I just can't afford to sweat the small stuff anymore. Well, until in the future sometime when I die a horrible death, of course."
"Is there any other types of death to die, Duck?"
I hoist up my Corona for a toast. "To Orville Wright. 'The Airplane stays up because it doesn't have time to fall.'"
The beer bottles clink and Gus' eyes light up. "Unless the Bath Salt Dwarf's working on your plane."
Not what I needed.
Gus studies my reaction with a grim smile. "Or is nine-eleven. Or that German flight where the co-pilot gots all depressed and rammed the airliner into a mountain. Or Malaysian Airline Flight 370, which, poof--"
Gus chugs his beer as our favorite waiter walks by us balancing a full tray. He furtively glances our way like he's just seen the ghost of Vic Atiyeh roaming the tarmac, then averts his eyes without breaking stride.
I sit paralyzed, my mind locked in a gedanken thought bummer about suicidal pilots and a fiery crashes at terminal velocity. That's it. No tip.
"--vanished like a fart into the Andaman Sea."
With a hefty wheeze, I sag deeper into my chair. "Thanks. I was feeling so much better."
"De nada. 'Course where you is going, there's Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571."
"How do you know all this stuff?"
"I like the carnage. It relaxes my soul. They crashed into the Andes. The survivors resorts to cannibalism."
I lean back, horrified. "Jesus."
He shrugs and crosses himself. "What can you do? Is a filthy habit."
"That's it." I grab all my stuff and begin awkwardly rolling my luggage to the security check-in point. "Thanks for depressing the shit out of me, Gus," I reply, not looking back.
"Hey, Duck!" His tone cuts through my spine.
Stopping dead in my tracks, I turn around, listening to the sound of my luggage crashing to the floor.
There's Gus staring back, completely carefree, toasting me with my own half-drunk bottle of Corona.
"I hopes you find your pieces of your mind in Peru. And maybe a nice señorita alongs the way."
"You know my luck with that stuff." I stiffly grab my things and turn around. I'm on my way. Nothing can stop me.
Over my shoulder Gus bellows, "Enjoy your flights and remember, Duck, 'Take lots of notes'. We is gonna makes me the next Mario Vargas Llosa!"
"Who?"