Trashland a Go-Go (2 page)

Victor squatted low, cupped his hands around the back of her head, cradling it delicately, and lifted from his knees. They grunted and heaved as they carried her out the side entrance and into the alley. When they reached the dumpster, they each fumbled with the palm-sweated plastic to readjust their grip.

“How’d she fly off like that anyways?” Victor wondered aloud.

“That little bitch, Chastity. She went on right before this one here.” He swung Coco by the legs. “They’ve been at each other’s throats since she started here. I think Chastity wiped some Vaseline or something on the pole before she got off the stage. Sneaky bitch. We’ll deal with her tomorrow. Right now we just need to dump this one.”

They counted to three and swung Coco back and forth, creating enough momentum (the same force that caused her demise) to fling her into the dumpster. At
three
, they both let go and launched their black plastic bandaged mummy into the pile of trash. Glass clinked against glass, tin and aluminum cans crunched, and papers rustled.

Coco sank into the quicksand refuse.

Arnie grabbed a few flattened cardboard boxes and tossed them over her in an attempt to hide the human-shaped garbage pile. He slapped Victor’s back and slung an arm around his shoulder. “Now, I don’t know about you, but I need a fucking drink!”

Victor nodded and looked over his shoulder as he walked down the alley. He was surprised at how hidden Coco already was.

She was magic.

Coco woke feeling incredibly warm and a little sweaty.

When she tried to touch her face, she found she could not move her arms at all. She opened her eyes, and more blackness greeted her, the sight of which set panic aflame.

Coco began to breathe heavily and her mouth filled with the slick texture and flavor of plastic. She exhaled. The heat and condensation from her breath lingered around her face. She concentrated on moving her arm, and managed to stretch the cocoon and wriggle her hand free. Coco immediately poked a hole through the plastic over her mouth with a long, polished, acrylic fingernail. She took a deep breath while she stripped off her wrapping.

The stench of hot garbage blasted Coco. She freed her right hand, and with both hands she managed to tear away the layers covering her face and neck. She sat up, feet and legs still bound, and glared out into the bright sunlight.

“The fucking dump?!” she shouted to no one.

Looking around, only able to see as far as her head could turn, Coco was shocked to find herself laying on a bed of discarded potato chip bags, egg shells, cheeseburger wrappers, soda and beer bottles, and who-knew-what-else beneath. It all smelled terrible. And something smelled vaguely singed.

Singed. Burned. Electrified.

It all came back to her; the slickness of the chrome, Chastity’s obnoxious smirk as she exited the stage, and flying into the DJ booth.

“That miserable whore!” shouted Coco with enough force that she toppled over and rolled down the small garbage hill. She sat up and unwound the plastic binding around her feet, knees and thighs, only to realize that underneath the layers of trash bags she wore only her silver g-string. That was when it dawned on her: “Those bastards. They just…threw me away?”

Coco stood and assessed her situation. No matter which direction she looked, all she could see was more trash—an outwardly endless expanse of waste all around her. Flies gathered and landed before departing again. They hopped from one pile of trash to another. The buzzing in the air sounded like faint whispers.

There was no way she could clamber through the landfill in her stilettos. She looked down at them and realized that the buckle of one was burned into the flesh of her ankle. She screamed and swore as she yanked the embedded metal from her skin.

She tore squares of cardboard from a nearby box and wrapped her feet with the strips of the leftover plastic that she had torn away from her legs. Coco looked down at her handiwork and decided that although not as fashionable as her heels, they would be much more functional. Nothing about her current ensemble was fashionable. It was made entirely of trash bags.

After peeling away the layers of plastic from her face and legs, what remained was a strapless number, knotted in the middle, and ending above her knees, paired with plastic-wrapped cardboard-soled shoes.

Coco sighed deeply, “Well, I guess there’s no one out here to impress, anyway.”

She picked a direction, figuring that no matter where she walked, she’d eventually come to the end of the landfill. From there she could convince some stupid man to drive her home where she would press charges against Arnie and Chastity.

Assholes.

Coco was getting tired. Despite the smell of ripeness all around her, she was hungry too. There were miles of food around her, but all of it was beyond spoiled. It seemed to mock her with its presence and inedibility.

She found a relatively smooth surface on one of many hills made of trash, where she could sit and rest. She picked through the pile for small items and tossed them at a nearby row of aluminum cans, knocking them down. Coco was surprised by her good aim. She enjoyed the sound of the items as they hit the cans. A bottle cap:
Tink!
An apple core:
Thump!
An old magic marker:
Plunk!

Coco continued to search for things to throw, pleased that she had found a way to amuse herself. She dug around a bit more, unable to find anything else small enough to toss at the cans. She gave up her game and decided to kick the cans down for closure.

A small black fly zipped out from the mouth of a large can of beer marketed as being Australian, but that was really just disgusting. Out of contempt for that vile tasting beer, Coco smashed the can beneath her cardboard-clad foot and found a mild satisfaction in the sound of something being crushed and broken.

“What the fuck?!” shouted a small, furious voice.

Coco spun in a slow circle, looking for the owner of the voice. There was no one to be seen.

A small black fly landed on the tip of Coco’s nose.

As she went to swat it away she heard the voice again. “That was my fucking house! What the fuck is wrong with you?! Where am I going to live?!”

Coco stared cross-eyed at the fly for a moment in disbelief as it vomited orange liquid all over the tip of her nose.

“Gross!” She squealed and swatted at the insect.

“Gross?!” the fly shouted, buzzing around her head. “I’ll tell you what’s gross! An inconsiderate bitch running around tormenting folks and squashing their homes with her giant barbarian feet!”

Coco was stunned. “My feet are
not
that… This fly
isn’t
really talking to me.” She shook her head vigorously, trying to empty it of the delusions of talking flies.

“The hell I’m not!” the fly spat angrily. He buzzed back and forth from the trampled can and orbited Coco’s head. “What a day! What a fucking day!” said the fly, obviously distressed. “First I find out that I only have a week to live. A
week
! Can you imagine?” he said, buzzing so close to Coco’s face that she found herself cross-eyed again trying to focus on him.

“That’s terrible,” Coco said. She suddenly felt bad for having crushed that can.

“And
now
,” the fly ranted, “now I’ve nowhere to live for that week! What am I going to do?”

The fly landed, and collapsed into the folds of a rotting orange. He began to cry squeaky little sobs, which were probably considered quite large for a creature its size.

Coco sat on a pile of Styrofoam containers beside the rotting orange and its sobbing, sniffling resident. “It can’t be too terribly hard for a
fly
to find a place to live in a
dump
? But I’m sorry.”

She picked up the crinkled can and peered into its mouth. Sure enough there was a mini smashed sofa, a television with a shattered screen and snapped-off antennas and a crumpled end table complete with a destroyed reading lamp and tiny tattered magazines. Some of which were pornographic.

Coco put the can down, blinked feverishly, and shook her head some more. She grabbed the can again and peered back inside. All of its contents were still there, but shaken up to resemble the bits in a kaleidoscope. She turned the can upside down, convinced that what she was seeing was an optical illusion. As an erotic dancer, she knew all about smoke and mirrors—lighting was key. The bits of furniture and miniature magazines rattled. Several articles tumbled out and fell into the trash at Coco’s feet.

The fly, nestled in the decaying fruit, had just started to calm down and breathe evenly. He looked up with sixteen teary lenses in time to see his crushed possessions poured out of his home like the god-awful swill it once held. He dropped his tiny, fuzzy face back into the orange, and began to sob again.

Coco sat atop the pile of to-go containers and put the can down carefully. Sticky bits of mashed French fries coated in thick, congealed remnants of ketchup and mustard stuck to her calves. She flicked it off quickly with her long, dirty acrylic nails. She couldn’t believe what was happening. She thought she must be unconscious.

Perhaps it was just that wavy-looking dream sequence like in the movies. The part where she would eventually awake in a hospital bed must be next. But upon thinking all of these things, Coco realized that she still wasn’t waking up. The fly was bawling his tiny, multi-lensed eyes out into a piece of rotting fruit. The smell of the dump was still absolutely vile and Coco was STILL hungry.