Pippen the Griffin

Pippen ate a chocolate ice cream bar, sitting on the side of the street. Some damn police siren wailed in the distance, but this chocolate was good. Yo, this was some good ice cream. Mom was out today. Mom was out more and more, that was true. If he were a chump, he would cry about it, but he wasn't some chump. He was Pippen the Griffin. That's what his buddies called him, Pippen the Griffin. Like a fantasy creature, hooting from its beak, clawing dogs and people up.

Pippen knew things, you got it? 

He saw things perhaps others didn't see. He looked when others didn't. That was Pippen, he weren't no joker. He didn't like those jokes. Pippen was a 6 foot tall, skinny white boy of around 17. His hair was a dirty brown fro cuz he didn't give no damn. That's what a chump would do, sliced his hairs off if they got too far down his head. He wore $200 basketball shoes, bout the only nice thing he owned. He had stringy facial hair. It came in patches along his thin jaw. His shirt said, “Girls and Girls my babes.” 

Pippen ate that ice cream bar. It tasted good.

The town he lived was called Marshall, boring name for a boring place, population 98. His boys were all 10 years older than him, in their late 20's and 30's. He lived on the outskirt of town, if you could call it that, past his and his mom's house there was nothing but corn and weeds.

The street was a wasteland, like God took an erasure and wiped out all the interesting spots--Brown, dead plants blowing on the other side the road, blowing in the absent-minded Nebraska wind. His home creaked and groaned behind him with it.

Pippen the Griffin stood. His boys would already be up to no good, getting drunk and driving cars and talking to sweet Pee and her gals. Pippen wanted to be apart of what was going on. Pippen the Griffin, he chuckled, Pippen the Griffin. That was a good name. Pippen the Griffin liked to kick dogs. He liked to toss dog turds on porches, flaming and smelling. Sometimes he liked to pat dogs on the head, he saw somethin' in those eyes that weren't in no man's eye. Griffin saw things. Griffin saw things.

He flicked the popsicle stick on the pavement, which was corroding away with the wind and the rain.

When he did that, he realized he wasn't alone.

 

In the distance a figure was bopping up and down, up and down, up and down, a speck not growing but millimeters at a time. Pippen could see down the road for miles. It was straight and barren, running through the whole town. And the speck that was bopping up and down, it was a man, Pippen the Griffin knew it. He just couldn't tell who it was yet, that man. The speck grew though, grew into Jerry Hogspickle. Jerry was an old timer, and Pippen had never seen him move like that, ol' Jerry, hairy, on contrary. As he neared him, Pippen noticed the sweat falling in translucent beadies down his bald scalp. He wasn't wearing no pants, only his tighty whitey underwear and green, collard shirt. His fat bulged over his hips. He looked at Pippen, unable to speak, he mouthed, “run” and kept doing that himself. 

“Wait up, Jerry!” Pippen hollered after him.

Pippen sprinted behind, shouting at him to stop, to come back, but Jerry kept going, going, going, going. Jerry looked crazed. He had never seen that look in a man's eye before, but perhaps in that stray he had walloped in the side. It was fear, pain, more than that maybe. Terror. Pippen shook his afro'd head and followed Jerry. He was going fast, too fast for him almost, unnaturally fast. But Pippen, being a younger man, caught up, grabbing that man's arm. “Jerry, darn it! Slow down? Where you going, boy?” Jerry said nothing, shaking him loose.

Pippen didn't know what to do. He couldn't tackle him. Jerry was an old timer. 

Pippen came to a halt, breathing like an exhaust pipe from an old car, his hands resting on his knees.

What the heck? Pippen thought. Where was Jerry's wife, Honey Tots? Did Jerry, the old timer, and Honey Tots, the village mommy, get into a squabble again? Pippen decided he needed to talk to the Sheriff. Sheriff could handle this. Pippen looked back over his shoulder, saw Jerry the speck still going, going, going. Pippen looked down, noticed the blood on the pavement… and the broken Popsicle stick that Jerry's feet had trodden on, bringing it forward a few steps with him. The stick hadn't caused his wounds though, he was bleeding well before that. He could see his trail all along main street, going through Marshall, following him right past this spot. Jerry was well outside of town now. And, it looked to Pippen, had collapsed a mile outside of it. Gotta' go see the sheriff, Pippen thought again. But hadn't he heard the siren go off earlier? Hadn't he disregarded the sound? 

Pippen collected himself. He laughed. Collected himself. Made him think of picking up his nose, belly button, toes, off the decaying pavement. Got to see the sheriff, get to the bottom of this. Jerry could wait out there, sheriff can pick him up in his car, don't think I could carry him back anyway. 

He hesitantly walked back toward town. It was solemn, quiet, but it usually was this time o' day, around noonish, but this was different somehow. There wasn't the sound of a lawn mower, or a dog barking, there was nothing, just the wind, the creaking of buildings. No vehicles were pulled up at the post office, no noise coming from Pete's Bar, no old Lady Margaret in the local grocery, completely empty. Pippen was freaked out now, with the trail of Jerry's blood on the asphalt, it looked like a creep show, like a scary movie he didn't want to be a part of. The sheriff's station was near. It was at the corner of 2^nd and Main. Jerry might have been on to something. Pippen started running like a crazed man too. He wondered where his boys were. Where his mommy was, hoping beyond hope, a phrase his mom liked to use, he was there.

To be continued...