A Short Song from The Yellow Rose

From “Welcome to The Yellow Rose Diner and Fill Station”:

“Why do you always pick these places?” Shelby asked.

Arnold severed a portion of his fried steak and forked a piece into his mouth. He chewed the question as well as the food. Shelby sat across from him, shit-eating grin all but carving itself into his pallid face.

“Better sort of people,” Arnold said.

“Better?”

“More interesting, I should say. Yeah, that’s more appropriate.” Arnold swallowed and chased it with coffee. “Banks are too controlled. Rigid. Liquor stores are just depressing. But here, well, you’ve got all kinds of humanity here.”

“Shit.” Shelby chuckled. “Yeah, you definitely got some interesting humanity here. Some serious wading at the shallow end of the gene pool.” He pointed across the diner with his fork. “Like that waitress over there. Christ, I wouldn’t fuck her with your dick.”

“Not everyone’s pretty.” But when he turned, the repulsiveness of the waitress caught Arnold by surprise.

“Did you see her name?”

Arnold shook his head.

“Piper. Can you believe that?”

“I don’t follow.”

“Hell, that’s a cute girl’s name. Piper. Kind of girl who’s all sweet and innocent on the outside but will suck your ball sack while slipping a finger in your ass the moment you get her behind a closed door and in the dark.”

“I’ll remember that the next time I meet a cute girl named Piper.” Except Arnold figured any future encounter with the same name would be seriously ruined after seeing this Piper.

“Leper would be a better name for her,” Shelby said. “No false advertisement, that’s for sure. Just glad she ain’t our waitress. I’d be puking bacon cheeseburger all the way to Amarillo. There should be laws against walking corpses working in the service industry.”

“I’d venture to say most of the people in here right now are ugly.” Arnold didn’t mean it. It was simply a way to change the conversation. As unpredictable as his partner had become lately, it was best to not let him fixate on anything too long. That always ended with trouble.

Shelby looked around the diner. “Nah, they’re decent enough looking people.”

“On the outside. I bet on the inside, their souls are as ugly as Leper over there.”

“Pretty morbid, Arnold.”

“Places like this are magnets for the miserable.” Arnold shrugged. “You know that saying about being nice to people because you never know when angels are among you, or some shit like that?”

Shelby nodded, but it was obvious he didn’t understand.

“Same probably holds true for demons, too,” Arnold said.

“That you should be nice to them?”
“No, dummy, that you never know when they’re among you.”

“Shit,” Shelby said, shaking his head. “Getting a little deep in here. Even for you.”

“That’s the reality of it, though.”

Shelby picked up another greasy French fry. “Maybe you need to turn that mirror on yourself.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Just that a guy like you, Arnold, you look at me like I’m down in the fucking ditch and you ain’t. But you’ve done plenty of terrible things yourself.”

“Me?” Arnold said, smiling to hide the hint of anxiety gnawing at him. Too often lately, Shelby seemed to find faults with Arnold. “Hell, I’m one of the angels.”

“The fuck you are,” Shelby wagged his finger to emphasize his point. “Tell me, what’s the worst thing you’ve done?”

“Hell, lots of bad shit’s happened to me.”

“No, no.” Shelby wagged his finger some more. “Not the worst thing that’s happened to you. What’s the worst thing you’ve done…