She was Turkish, which explains the weird name. Iklil, really? Does that even mean anything? Yeah, she said, it’s Urdu. Muslim. It means crown, or garland. She was tall, unnecessarily. We were at the Kennel. When weren’t we at the Kennel? We drank, snorted speed, and shot pool at the Kennel. There were other places too, like the Storeroom, the Lake Union Pub, Funhouse, Shorty’s, Ernie Steele’s, et fuckin cetera. But we always ended up at the Kennel, probably since they had five pool tables so the wait for a game was shorter. We’d put quarters on every table and wait for someone’s turn to come up then we’d just take over for the rest of the night. We were punks, torn and dirty and rambunctious and some of us smelled pretty rank from sweated-out speed and bad breath and beer spilled all over the clothes from weeks and weeks back. Of course, I was the exception with my natty flannels and chino khakis and spotless Vans slip-ons and hair slicked back and black. Ray-Bans woulda completed the picture but I could never afford Ray-Bans so I sported my usual shitty specs patched up with electrical tape. I had CSS which meant Can’t See Shit. So one night Charles and myself and god knows who else probably Syd and maybe Rejecta were shooting nine-ball drinking Rainier from the pitcher like it was tap water. Smoking like the ruins of war and circling the table like wild lethal predators around injured terrified prey. People crammed into the Kennel so deep maybe it was a Friday night. Hippy music blaring on the old 70s turntable, white trash garbage like Cream or Moody Blues or Electric Flag or some such nostalgic crap. Charles and myself trading glances, our eyes turned up in practiced exasperation. Shoulders shrugging second nature. Wham! Slam! BAM! We hit the balls, pummeling the rails, dulling the cue-tips, ripping, staining the Kelly-green felt with our mere existence. I noticed some people sitting on the absconded pew against the wall under the big mirrors. They were women. Friday night at the Kennel was a parade of flesh and during the scant warm months they’d expose as much creamy pulsating epidermis as possible. I could see they were tall women. They were like trees. Hey Ivan, said Charles, between thunderstick explosions, hey Ivan. Check those two cuties, they’re like scientific specimens of a displaced forest. Fuckin sequoias. Indeed, I drawled, quite. I lined up and let fly. Whap! Smack! CRACK! Fuckin cues, fuckin balls! One of the cuties lengthily articulated a pair of legs and stood. She loomed. She towered. She was the epitome of on high. It was Iklil. Her face was so far up there I could only faintly distinguish her features. You need a stepladder for that one, whispered Charles, a bit loudly, and Syd started cackling, Rejecta slumped nearby, with her shock of electrified red hair, but pensive, withdrawn, subverted. Fuckin Rejecta, wake up ya heroin-chic supermodel wannabe! Charles was on point tonight. We let Iklil and her faceless nameless invert companion partner up for doubles and then commenced to slaughter them. Iklil had a certain appeal, such was her arboreal magnetism, a brooding sort of black hole that seemed to suck everything in, vanishing forever into the void. She moved somewhat awkwardly but possessed all the requisite components of a full-fledged Amazonian. There’s the breasts, I pointed out to Charles, and there’s the ass. It moves, it’s uprooted, it has the power of old-growth pathos, imagine sparring it… You mean sparring with it? Charles feigned a boxer’s pose, like, stick and move? No, dumbass, spar like the top of a tree spar, ya jackass. All this within earshot of Iklil, who smiled benignly. Iklil was Turkish cool, like a Camel straight. Joe Cool cool. But straight. And tall. She was so tall she rested her chin on my shoulder as I waited, poised between shots, poised to shoot, poised for action, foot tap-tappin. But one thing about the Turkish Wonder Woman Iklil. She had acne. And it was bad. Red blotches all over her forehead and face. But her body made up for it. So much body. Miles of it. We cut the games short. So I could experience the heights. Back at the house on Tolkyen we were in my room. Charles couch-surfed on the couch in the dining-nook in the kitchen. Rejecta shared a room with Syd. They were locked in there very likely listening in with their ears glued to the wall. It was a trashy punk commune. Iklil and I wasted zero time getting at it. When you’re drunk and high on speed it’s always pretty much just okay, without a lot of fanfare; I mean you can flush love and intimacy down the toilet when you’re wasted all the time. So we went at it for a month or so. I visited her place once but there were so many spoiled and misshapen cats I started sneezing after ten minutes. Not before I noticed a bi-annual on the bookshelf I had placed a few poems in that’d been released that very same year. I didn’t say a thing but Iklil’s roommate caught me staring. Those are my books, she explained, Iklil can barely read English. The roommate looked at me more closely. The roommate was a short one, a bit pudgy, a bit pasty, but imminently doable. In my perversity of a brain case, at least. I could feel her gaze like a hot iron. Didn’t I see you at the Nova making out with a guy? Oh shit, I thought, as Iklil stared. Busted! So I fessed up. Yeah yeah, sure sure, I was drunk, it was a dude, mind you his face felt like fuckin sandpaper, it might as well’ve been a goat, or a calf, or any number of unwilling livestock specimens. The roommate looked horrified. Bestiality, not up her alley. Whatever. It must have been the warm months, all two and a half of them, since Iklil up and flew off to Istanbul one day. Well that’s that, I told Charles, see ya, wouldn’t want to be ya. Charles chuckled. Charles chuckled a lot. Maybe that’s when I started calling him Chuckles. Chuckles was cooking an omelet with two handfuls of jalapeños he’d five-fingered from the corner Circle K two blocks down the street on Eastlake. I like a hot breakfast for dinner, was Chuckle’s mantra. A week later a letter came in the mail postmarked Istanbul, Turkey. Hey Chuckles, I yelled, I got a letter from Turkey. Rejecta slammed her door shut. Syd laughed. Is it Thanksgiving already? Hardy-har, I said, opening the flimsy blue air-mail envelope. The script was tiny and careful and I didn’t fuckin care so after reading one ridiculously melancholic line I dropped it in the garbage. Chuckles chuckled, face lobster-red from jalapeño overdose. You really don’t give a shit, he observed. I really don’t, I agreed. A couple weeks later I heard Iklil was back in town. I heard she wanted to see me. Well she can see me all she wants, I told nobody in particular, here I am, I’m not exactly going anywhere. I went about my business and it appeared she’d lost interest when out of the blue she appeared one night at the door of the Tolkyen house. Eye to the hole in the door, I balked. But what the hell, hey, she’s a person, I can’t hide forever, I told myself, as if anybody was listening. I opened up. Beyond her head the traffic on I-5 shot past in a whoosh of blurred neon. Oh shit, I thought, it’s madness out there. I let her in. Iklil had a 6-pack of Miller High Life in the 16-oz cans. My favorite domestic champagne. Up in my room I poured us tall glasses ceremoniously. We sat on the edge of the futon bed. She asked me if I got her letter. Yeah, I got it, I said. Well, what did you think? I didn’t think anything, I said, because I didn’t read it. Why not, she asked. Because I dropped it in the trash, I said. You what? I. DROPPED. IT. IN. THE. TRASH, I said, slowly emphasizing each word. Iklil became intent. She eyed me suspiciously. It’s because of my acne, isn’t it. What is? I asked, legitimately stumped. You’re breaking up with me, aren’t you? I thought for a second. I guess I am, I said. Whew. That was easy. What more was there to say? I cracked another tall boy. It’s because of my acne though, isn’t it. Admit it. It’s because of my acne that you’re breaking up with me. No, I said, it’s not, I’m just sick of you, okay? Sick and fuckin tired. NO! IT’S BECAUSE OF MY ACNE, ISN’T IT? ADMIT IT! IT’S BECAUSE OF MY ACNE! For fuck sakes, I thought, this woman is nuts. FINE! I shouted, IT’S BECAUSE OF YOUR ACNE ALREADY! THERE! ARE YOU HAPPY NOW? Iklil smiled. She took her full glass of Miller High Life and hurled it into my face. I sat there, drenched. I knew it, she said. It’s because of my acne. That’s why you’re breaking up with me. Iklil seemed quite satisfied. Then she stood up and was out of there.

Jay Passer’s poetry and prose has appeared in print and online since 1988. He is the author of 13 chapbook collections and his work has been included in several anthologies. His first novel, Squirrel, released in  2022, is available from Alien Buddha Press and Amazon. Passer currently resides in Los Angeles.

email: jp8521984@yahoo.com

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