Six Inches Thick Read online

  Never Been There: Six Inches Thick

  A Robert Revolver book

  Illustrated by Devon Whitehead

  Edited by James T.B. McCudden

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Amazon Kindle Digital Publishing / August 13, 2019

  Published by Robert Revolver for Revolver Visual Design LLC

  All rights reserved

  Copyright ©2019 Revolver Visual Design LLC

  Cover image by Devon Whitehead

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  SIX INCHES THICK

  Sammy Suze walks barefoot along the street. She’s almost twenty now, but she’s still playing the same mindless game that she’s been playing since she was a little girl. It’s the one where she walks in a perfectly straight line, toe-to-heel, as close to the curb as she can. It’s been a good day for it, too. She’s gone three blocks so far and didn’t even have to stop at the intersections. The whole world feels perfectly still, as if she were the only thing moving. She can hear birds in the distance, but no cars. Even the mild, late-morning sun is feels hot on her back because there is absolutely no wind at all.

  She half-smiles, knowing that her work shift doesn’t start for another couple of hours. God, she hates her job. She would do anything to avoid going there one more fucking day. Better go find a little fun.

  Sammy tips her head down and continues to bop along, looking through the deep crevice between her breasts. She still hasn’t gotten used to their size. It seems like only yesterday they were just two little, uneven lumps. But now, having swollen into every ounce of a full C-cup, they bounce back and forth against each other, echoing the unnatural jerk from her—now adult—game of baby steps. She’s not really sure if she likes them or not but she can’t ignore them. Nobody can. They’re all anyone ever wants from her. Love ‘em or hate ‘em, they’ve quickly become her ticket to anything.

  “Alright, girls. It’s time to do what you do. You gotta do somthin’ to get us all outta goin’ to work today.”

  A tiny laugh pops from her mouth. She stops her feet and pumps her chest out a little further, flexing her tits against the torn slot in her homemade v-neck t-shirt. It’s from a band named, “Swamp Buggy.” She’s never heard of them, but the shirt is pretty cool. It features a hand-painted confederate flag and a headless alligator.

  She looks away and pushes the greasy, long blond hair out of her face, turning her focus to her second-best good luck charm—the little yellow ring on her finger. It was a gift from her daddy. He’s the best stock car driver in the whole county. She looks at it and he appears in her head. He’s always smiling. Maybe he’s smiling really big right now because he just won a huge trophy down in Mississippi. She can’t wait to see it up on top of their TV when he gets home tonight.

  If he comes home tonight, that is.

  Sammy rolls her fingers from side to side, letting a tiny beam of sunlight reflect into her eyes. Daddy gave her the ring almost three years ago to the day, on her sixteenth birthday. "Solid gold," he smiled. “Made from a real carrot!”

  Pulling in a deep breath, she resumes her normal posture just in time to be seen by two boys sitting up ahead…

  “Hey guys.” She calls, her voice sweet and soft, with just a hint of that second hand gravel picked up from her old man. “I’m pretty bored. Got any weed?”

  Neither of them says a word nor offers her even a passing glance. They remain slouched against the curb with their feet straight out in front of them and blocking her path. She shifts her weight across her hips, cutting a curvy shadow across their faces. It catches their attention and their eyes narrow, squinting into the sun directly behind her. They still don’t answer, but they start to stare. She knows these boys and she knows they’ve got some grass. She also knows that they know that she knows that they’ve got some.

  The boy closest to her is half-Mexican and goes by the name, Fetch. Nobody knows if that’s his real name. Nobody really cares, either. He’s always been a real asshole and doesn’t have many friends. The boy next to him is named, Sime, probably short for Simon. He’s known as the poor kid that Fetch drags around because he can. As always, there are black stains all over their clothes and on their elbows, like they both just got done paving roads or roofing a house or something else to make a couple bucks.

  “Who’s askin’?”

  Fetch finally speaks up. He slowly tilts his head and tries his best to sell the notion that he doesn’t give a shit. Sammy lets it float on by and instead, looks over at Sime. Unlike his asshole buddy—Sime’s face beams like a puppy’s at her attention. Her silhouette drapes over him, shadowing the lower half of his face with the shape of her breast. Strictly for her own amusement, she angles herself just an inch to the left, letting the nearly imperceptible rise of her nipple appear across his cheek. She laughs and then he laughs, exposing the large gap between his two front teeth.

  “Hi, Sammy. How’s your dad? He win last night?”

  “Don’t know. He ain’t been home yet.” She smiles. “But I still got the twenty bucks he gave me before he left.” She asks again, remaining fixed on him and continuing to ignore Fetch, even though she knows that he’s the one with the stash.

  Fetch grumbles slightly and pulls his feet in from the street. He slowly stands and looks her sidelong in the eye. The air between them fills with the reek of gasoline and marijuana. “Yeah, but I got a lot more than twenty bucks worth if you want it.”

  His cocky brown eyes remain locked on hers for an entire three seconds before he can resist no longer. They fall to her chest and a smile cracks in the corner of his mouth. Through the corner of her eyes, she watches his lips quiver like a hungry animal, but she still refuses to acknowledge him directly. Sime stands up behind Fetch and looks Sammy in the eye, nodding a few times like he’s listening to dance music on a pair of invisible headphones. She takes the hint and rocks back on her heels, giving her chest a quick little bounce.

  “I only have twenty bucks. What are you guys doing today?” Sammy steps away and breaks out of Fetch’s line of sight. She ignores his sneer and up over their heads at Sime’s house looming across the yard behind them. It’s stuck between a pair of big cypress trees that have grown into the siding. She’s been in there before. Probably won’t go back in though. His daddy’s been a racer for a long time, but nobody likes him down at the track anymore, especially her daddy.

  “Sammy, we was jus’ goin’ over t’dat ol’ elevator. Gonna maybe shoot sum pigeons. Whatchu doin’?” Sime asks, trying to be friendly and slow down Fetch from eye-fucking her chest.

  “Really, I was hoping to get fuckin’ baked and just chill out before work, but sounds like yer buddy here ain’t got any extra for me.”

  Fetch laughs, snapping his head back directly at Sime.

  “Oh, Sime’s got a little extra for ya. Don’tcha, Sime?”

  “Shut up, cocktwat.”

  Fetch’s face tightens at hard as his fists. “What’d you call me?”

  He turns his back to Sammy, tipping his head to the side and getting right in Sime’s face. Sime lets out a deep sigh, which is quickly echoed by hers since they both have seen Fetch show off this way too many times before.

  “Later guys. See ya ‘round.”

  She reverses her steps and turns away, leaving them there staring at the little pink stripe stained into the backside of her jean shorts. She knows they are looking at it. It’s where she sat in some paint last year at the fair. Would have gotten new shorts, bu
t it looked pretty cool and well... New jeans cost more than weed.

  “Stop bein’ like dat, Fetch. She jus’ wanna ta buy sum weed. Why not jus’ sell it to her an’ git over it?”

  “Because, dumb fuck, I got a better idea.”

  She can hear them pushing each other, their feet shuffling off the grass and onto the road. After a few slaps, one of them starts coming closer. She glances over her shoulder and feels her chest shrink back against her ribs. It’s Fetch.

  “Okay, I got it if yer goin’ with us?” He asks, his voice suddenly much friendlier.

  “Not to shoot pigeons I ain’t.”

  “We ain’t just gonna do that. I’ll bring a dime for us, okay?”

  She stops and stares back at him. Down at him. She’s a few inches taller even without her shoes on. She knows it drives him crazy to be shorter than she is. She can almost feel his body scrambling to grow bigger.

  “Gimme some now and I’ll think about it.”

  She puts just enough ultimatum into her voice to push his hand straight into his pocket. He sighs and pulls out a half-smoked joint.

  “All right, here.” He mutters, trying to mask the defeat in his voice. She smiles and reaches for it, but at the last instant he pulls it away again.

  “Ah, ha ha! Not so fast. You take this and yer gonna go with us all the way to the top, right?”

  He smiles at her and tips his head toward Sime. “All the way, right Sime?”

  She does her best to look unimpressed with their joke. While Fetch is turned away, she snatches the joint right out of his hand.

  “Hey!”

  “Fine. Just give me this and let’s go.”

  Fetch once again swallows his pride. He accepts her terms with a snort and pushes past her, walking toward a pinkish-red ‘72, 455 cubic inch, V8 Buick Le Sabre parked across the street. Everyone knows that it’s his mom’s car, but he pretends it’s his.

  Sammy shakes off the shove and begins fiddling with the partial joint in her hands. She pulls out a lighter and puts one end of the paper in her mouth. It’s not much, but it’s enough to get things started.

  * * * * * *

  A half-hour later they are parked way out in the country, surrounded by a field of freshly sprouting wheat that rolls over the horizon in every direction. They are utterly alone.

  But none of them cares about that.

  Before them sits a condemned, decaying old grain elevator. Its weathered, blackened shell looms over them like a huge old gravestone.

  “Look at all them fuckin’ pigeons up there!” Fetch laughs.

  Sammy licks the back of her teeth and does everything she can not to join in Fetch’s excitement. She waits in the backseat for them to get out and pop the trunk before she decides to follow. Glancing through the back window, she sees Fetch pull a small-looking rifle out and use the stock to slam the trunk closed. His eyes are beaming, locked onto the top of the elevator. Sime joins his stare, lifting his hand to block the sun.

  Sammy steps away from the car and pulls in a deep breath of the country air. It feels heavier than it did in town. It smells like earthworms and tastes like rain. Or maybe earthworms taste like rain? Either way, the place smells like a bait shop. She catches a glimpse of her own reflection in the car window. Her eyes are half closed and there’s a mischievous grin stretched across her face. Behind it, her mind is still floating around like a leaf down a lazy creek.

  “Okay, so we gonna…” Her mouth starts moving seemingly by itself. “Gonna shoot ‘em from here or you goin’ up there?”

  Someone answers but she doesn’t care what was said. Instead she remembers their joke. Of course they are. She starts toward the big, mean-looking building and they quickly fall in behind her, still sputtering like excited toddlers. Getting closer, she notices that it isn’t just the building that looks black. Every window has been painted black, too. Some of them are cracked or have been completely shattered. The whole place appears covered in thick soot, like it’s been set on fire a hundred times. In fact, everything about it is totally black, except for the pigeons. In stark contrast, their milky white bodies seem to glow as they soak up the sun.

  “C’mon, let’s go!” Fetch blurts out, jogging forward and passing Sammy on her left. He turns his head back, cocksure and eager to get the shooting started. “‘C’mon pervie, stop checking out yer girlfriend’s ass and hurry up!”

  Sammy turns to find Sime standing a few feet behind her to the right. Just as Fetch alluded to, he’s checking out her backside and doesn’t even bother to look away. His eyes are red and narrow and his smile is so big and cute. If only his teeth weren’t so janked up, maybe Fetch wouldn’t always treat him like shit.

  “Where we goin’, Fetch?” She asks, turning back to him and hiking up her shorts just enough to expose the bottom edge of her butt cheeks.

  “We gotta go all the way up in that big part, there. We can get out on the roof then because there ain’t any wind. From there, we can get some real good shots down on ‘em.”

  She hears Sime start laughing behind her. His tone is filled with unexpected confidence.

  “Lead the way then, hunter.”

  Whoa. Who’s this? Sime’s cocky when he’s high? That’s hot.

  Fetch is predicably irritated, noticeably throwing the rifle strap over his shoulder as they come up to the side of the building. He enters first—of course—ducking down to pass through a small, secret hole hidden behind a clump of tall weeds. Sammy follows next, bending over and climbing through, fully expecting (and hoping, just a little) to be felt up by Sime shuffling in behind her.

  Nope, nothing.

  She enters the building and immediately feels the cool mud ooze up between her toes. Her feet sink to the concrete below and she’s overcome with the reek of old blood and dead animals filling the air. Like the flick of a light switch, her desire to fool around with Sime dries up and she’s left choking on the knot that has suddenly appeared in her throat.

  Oh, god. I should have worn shoes.

  She quickly scouts ahead, locating a dry patch of floor a few feet ahead of Fetch. She tip-toes toward it, sliding her feet out across a rusted piece of steel grating. Bits of the mud peel off her feet and fall through the cracks, making little splashing noises somewhere in the dark depths below.

  “This is really fuckin’ gross, guys.” She frowns, starting to regret coming along. The grime mushing between her toes is grinding on her buzz. She turns away from the floor and looks up at the ceiling. There’s a mishmash of ancient steel beams and ductwork running the entire length of the ceiling. It’s all covered in more black soot. Miles of stuff all dirty and old and broken.

  “Hey, ain’t those some of yer birds right up there.” She says, pointing at a pair of pigeons looking back at her from their perch above the splintered remains of a severed cable. “Can you just shoot those and we can get out of here?

  Fetch immediately starts laughing.

  “Nope. Not in here, you stupid ass. If we spark that old grain it’ll catch on fire.”

  “What fire?” She quips, blissfully ignorant of the rules of grain storage. “That shit’s all wet. It ain’t gonna burn.”

  Fetch stops and begins to turn around. He’s all tensed up.

  “Wanna fuckin’ bet?”

  There’s suddenly a weird, angry sexual tension filling the room. But just as their eyes meet, Sime comes stomping through the muck between them, wearing a feel-good smile and holding his palms open at his sides.

  “Naw, he’s right. We lit this place up a bunch’a times,” he confirms, looking at Fetch first and then swinging his face back to Sammy.

  “Sime, shut up,” Sammy mocks, backing off on her tone but remaining skeptical. “Really? No way. That shit’s all wet.”

  Sime’s red eyes follow her finger to the piles of compost that have leaked out of the giant silo walls all around them. They’re all oozing the rancid juices that they just splashed through to get in here.

  “You telling me
that’s fuckin’ gasoline or something?”

  “Yeah. Kinda,” Sime replies, shrugging his shoulders. “It’s like turning into gas or something, I guess.”

  She shakes her head and returns to Fetch. He’s way up ahead now, ducking into an adjacent room. It’s dark inside and he disappears from view.

  “Hey, wait up.” She calls out, noticing that her body is suddenly pushing her to follow.

  “I ain’t waitin’. C’mon.”

  Sammy creeps through the last of the mud slick, feeling tiny bits of something sharp stab into the bottom of her feet. They sting a little, but she ignores them. Above her a few rays of sunlight break through the cracks in the outside wall. They shine on a pair of pigeons that just watch and twitch like pigeons do. Fetch stands on the inside of a small, square room built around the base of a crude, makeshift ladder Putting her head through the passage, Sammy takes in a few breaths and feels the stinky, humid air settle in her lungs like rotting flesh.

  “You can go first, Sammy?” Sime asks, standing right behind her.

  “Why? So you can keep staring at her ass all the way up?” Fetch laughs, nodding and landing a high-five to himself, somewhere off in asshole world. Sammy crouches through the door and Sime appears a second later, parting his lips and grabbing the first rung of the ladder.

  “Naw, maybe I seen enough. I can go first” He volunteers.

  “Guys, seriously. I’ll go first.” Sammy cuts in, suddenly feeling brave but a little desperate and a little claustrophobic. The roof would at least have fresh air.

  “I don’t mind you lookin’ at me on the way up. Either of you.”

  Fetch’s nostrils flare following a sudden jerk in his pants. Sammy looks away and tests the closest rung on the ladder. It’s a simple painted steel tube protruding from the corner of the concrete room to make a little triangular step. One after another. They feel cold and kind of slimy, but they don’t budge at all under her weight. Her bare feet curl over each rung, and she starts to climb for the top. The air clears quickly and within a few more steps she can breathe. Suddenly she’s thinking about Sime again and yearning for him to make a move on her.