The Continuing Saga Of:
Icicle Bill and Tommy Two-Head
By: Dave Babb
Part One
Chapter One: Tommy Meets Molly-the-Midget
When
I first met Tommy Two-Head he was tied to a tree in the desert, left to die
by some bikers. The story goes, the leader of the biker gang, Bumperjack Joe,
is one mean cat. You do not want to cross this hombre. I mean, if there are
two things you never do in life, ...
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Chapter Two: Bill Gets Carjacked
Los
Angeles summers are a killer. The blazing sunlight is relentless and the heat
is stifling. Mornings are tolerable if you get out early. Just after nine the
traffic is lightening up and you can pull into a fast-food drive-thru without
a wait. An egg McMuffin, large coffee extra cream, life is good...
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I
buried Gangster G in the best grave I could manage with a tire-iron shovel under
a Mesquite tree in the most desolate place I’d ever had had the misfortune
of being. I had no ill-feelings towards G, even though our meeting was the result
of a car jacking. He’d done what he’d done for survival, for his
family, for honorable intents...
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Chapter Four: The Tea Leaves Never Lie
I
slipped in and out of a coma like state for what seemed many days. At times
I awoke hazy and unsure of where, or even who I was. I was in a tiny room, perhaps
a small trailer. The windows were mostly covered, at times the only light was
a single candle. There was an exotic looking dark skinned woman...
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Coming out of that hazy dream
I began to regain my senses and my strength. Not so easily, I had to come to
grips with the stark possibility I had killed my psycho-abusive foster father
all those years ago. Was that really how it happened? Had I erased that from
my conscience all these years? What else had I repressed? They say the lives
of all men are dark with many sins, but how much darker is mine going to get?
What kind of monster am I?...
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End Part One
Part Two
Chapter Six: Shadows Cast of Shadows Past
When the shadow of the solitary turkey buzzard washed over the car hood like
a cloud of grim foreboding, Tommy Two-Head trembled noticeably. It was an involuntary
reflex ignited by some long-forgotten childhood memory. Most of Tom's past was
that way, hazy and neglected...in large part by his own choice. When you're
raised by a crack addict, the past is better off left there....
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WHOLE CHAPTER.
Chapter Seven: Murder in Miami
Tommy Two-Head and I were driving through the night with the warm desert air flowing in the open windows, under an endless blanket of
brilliant stars. We were both amped up from the clean air and an adrenaline hangover after both our near death experiences.
Tom had filled me in on his enrapture with the irresistible Molly-the-Midget, which had lead to him being
...
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It seemed like Tom and I had been traveling through the desert for a very long
time. I’d lost track of exactly how many days since I’d been car-jacked
in L.A. and thereby forced into this journey. I hoped I’d buried G deep
enough, there were buzzards out here. I don’t know how many days it had
taken me to recover from those snake bites. How many nights had I stayed with
that mysterious Gypsy woman? Even now I carried the memory of those fathomless
eyes with me. Lucky for me Tom knew enough ...
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Chapter Nine: Bumperjacked Back to Vulture Flats
I was standing in the blazing
desert sun with a can of gas I’d bummed from the old Indian. As the gang
of bikers exited the highway and rumbled toward me, a sick sinking feeling overtook
me. It was easy to figure out. Bumperjack Joe had returned to that Mesquite
tree to check on his victim, when he didn’t find Tommy Two-Head there
anymore, they’d head up the highway and here we were. More appropriate,
here I was. I glanced over towards Tom in the car and he’d disappeared...
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Molly the Midget was extremely interested and suddenly
attentive, ”Who called you Estrano?” It wasn’t so much of
a question as it was a command. My head was spinning. I was tied to a tree,
the heat was stifling, my head was busted open by the impact of her boyfriend’s
bumper jack and I was trying to think rationally. I wasn’t having much
luck with the thinking part. The words were coming out of me but the thoughts
were only formulating as I was speaking.
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End Part Two
Part Three
Chapter Eleven: Big Grizzly & Blinky Mo
Heavy
Griz sat behind the wheel of the pimped out ’63 Chevy low-rider flipping
through the endless clatter of So-Cal. radio stations trying to find something
he could tolerate. He settled on oldies. As the name might indicate, Griz was
a biggie. He’d always been big for his age, a fact that didn’t escape
the eye of the middle school football coach. Unfortunately, after an opposing
player came out of a pile of tacklers during home coming with stab wounds, Griz
was unceremoniously cut from the team. After the coach’s car exploded
into a flaming inferno in the school parking lot a few days later, a cloud of
suspicion...
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Chapter Twelve: G Lu's Last Dance
The crowd enthusiastically applauded
as Gloria Lupino, better known as G Lu, took to the stage. She felt their greedy
eyes on her like hungry wolves stalking a bunny rabbit with a bad leg. She always
got a good response and above average tips when she wore the five inch stilettos,
fishnet stockings, string bikini bottom and now tattered Miss West Covina sash
and tiara. She’d altered the sash to read, ”Miss West Co”(as
in coast). The crowd loved...
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Chapter Thirteen: Showdown At G Lu's
As Bill & Tom stepped from
the terrible Nevada heat into the air-conditioned darkness of Crazy Horse Saloon,
they had no way of knowing what awaited them there. In the moment that it took
for their eyes to adjust to the dim surroundings, doubt crept into Bill’s
mind like a familiar unwanted visitor. He’d taken it upon himself to embark
on the journey to Las Vegas to warn the sister of a guy who’d car-jacked
him, that she might be in danger, and to break the morbid news that he’d
died in the desert...
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Vegas Major Crimes Detective Smith, had a wife, four kids, two mortgages, a
mistress, and a bad case of heartburn. The Chief was breathing down his neck
after one of his patrol officers nearly got killed last night while responding
to an apparent high speed chase. He needed answers and he needed them quick.
”Pederman! Pearson! Get in here!” The junior detectives rushed through
the office door. ”What we got on that incident on the eastside?...
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Chapter Fifteen: Lucky the Lonely
Blinky
Mo and Heavy Griz hit the freeway leaving Las Vegas in a controlled panic. Blinky
made sure he wasn’t speeding, but every opportunity to weave through traffic,
he took. Griz nervously watched the rear for cops, and the sky for helicopters.
When they were safely out of city limits and on open road they both sighed with
relief...
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THE WHOLE CHAPTER.
Chapter Sixteen: Diamonds and Snowflakes
James Fingerelli was a fixer. A guy who got things done, no questions asked.
He possessed all the qualities necessary to accomplish the difficult tasks;
physical strength, mental clarity and none of the troublesome hindrances that
might get in the way, such as remorse, compassion or conscience. He was cold-blooded
and meticulous...
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Chapter Seventeen: Resurrection and Remorse
Detective Smith slammed down
the phone in disgust. ”Damn it!” Another problem to throw on the
pile of crap that was beginning to stink up his life. The wife had finally had
it with his philandering with the delicious Belinda Butluggage and was threatening
divorce. The possibility of a broken home had the kids running wilder than usual
and acting out even worse. Belinda was dissatisfied because he’d cinched
up the wallet strings in fear of a divorce settlement, and now this...
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Chapter Eighteen: Farewell to Innocence
Miles Hurley was a crotchety old broken-down former top-notch
defense attorney, who went from arguing cases before the U.S. Supreme Court,
to now ambulance-chasing any penny ante divorce or worker’s comp case
he could dig up. His office was a rusted out mini-van parked in the back of
a Shell station, two blocks from Las Vegas City Hall...
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Bill was housed in the hospital ward at the Las Vegas City
Jail. They weaned him from the morphine with Demerol, then Tylenol. He learned
firsthand the perils of painkiller addiction. If he hadn’t been locked
in a steel and concrete cage, he didn’t know to what lengths he might’ve
gone to continue the sweet relief that the numbness of morphine provided...
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Chapter Twenty: Bill Gets a Visit
Bill lay awake as the breakfast cart rattled noisily down the
narrow corridor that fronted the row of dark, lonely cells. In awhile, the cute
nurse with big ears would make her rounds. The guys in the medical unit had
a pool going, putting up the cookie from their lunch sack, as to what hairstyle
she’d be wearing that day. It was different each time; pulled back, combed
to the side (left or right), pony tail, bun or loose curls...
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Chapter Twentyone: Deal With The Devil
He’d avoided the thoughts the way a beaver keeps alert
for predators along the riverbanks, busily tending to the day-to-day tasks with
avid industry, hoping that by filling each moment with distractions it might
allow the dark clouds to drift past. Perhaps this time he’d somehow earned
enough positive karma to warrant a pass....
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Chapter Twentytwo: One More Chance
When Bill was released on bail to the custody of Jimmy Fingers,
he knew that meant he was going to have to return to L.A. and face the firm’s
partners and explain why he’d stolen their money. Not only that, he’d
have to return the hundred grand, or pay the consequences. They hadn’t
charged him with embezzlement, so that meant the punishment would be less merciless
than jail time...
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Chapter Twentythree: Desert Harvest
Molly the Midget was getting a little bored and that wasn’t
good for anybody. Once she got it in her head to stir up the dust a bit, everyone
in her vortex would suffer. She didn’t intentionally mean to do harm,
she just liked to reassure herself now and then that she was the one pulling
the strings. She and Bumperjack Joe had been flagged down by a young...
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Chapter Twentyfour: Hell to Pay
Before Bill, Tommy, G Lu and Jimmy Fingers could leave Las
Vegas, for what Bill considered a doomed mission (recovering the hundred-grand
paid out to Blinky Mo and Heavy Griz to ransom G Lu), they stopped off at the
L.V. Police Department. Detective Smith fitted Bill with a tracking device,
securely attached to his ankle. Bill was in the custody of Jimmy Fingers...
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Chapter Twentyfive: The Standoff
Sunrise in the desert is beautiful beyond description. Clean,
fresh air flowing unfettered across nature’s pristine canvas. Golden sand,
sun-bleached sterile landscape not yet tarnished by man’s ceaseless invasion.
Someday, even this most inhospitable and barren wilderness will be overrun with
concrete and clutter and Starbucks and McDonalds. For now, there are...
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Chapter Twentysix: A Grave For G Lu
When Tommy Two-Head woke up this morning,
he realized that the fluffy soft pillows he’d been dreaming about and
sleeping upon belonged to a very warm and inviting Gloria Lupino. He would have
been quite content to lie there another hour or ten, but the rest of them seemed
determined to disturb his comfort. The bizarre attack yesterday freaked him
out pretty bad. He didn’t much care for birds, especially the larger,
carnivorous types...
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The slow, steady tap-tapping of single finger typing filled the small but respectable
office of Niles Hurley. Word had spread that the savvy litigator was back on
his feet after a string of successful court appointed cases had gone his way.
Business had picked up significantly. The new secretary-receptionist couldn't...
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THE WHOLE EPILOGUE.
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Icicle Bill is the creation of Dave Babb. It was first published in the Corcoran Sun, a prison yard paper that features news, entertainment, inmate poetry, art, and humor. For recent issues or to correspond with the author write to:
Dave Babb P-30582 |
