Razor Ray's Last Ride Part One of Four Parts Fiction by Dave "Phantom" Nichols with special thanks to Aaron Smith, whose actual nightmare inspired this story, and to the real-life road devil known as Razor Ray. Razor Ray opened a bloodshot eye and groaned. It wasn't bad enough that his three day-speed binge and Jack Black hangover made his head feel as if the points of a million stilettos were tapping on the inside of his brain pan. It wasn't bad enough that the insides of his eyelids felt as if they were being eaten alive by leeches and his mouth tasted like a used entrenching tool. No, the nightmare had been worse than all that. Ray liked to think of himself as being beyond such petty human emotions as guilt, yet the dream had jerked him about like a marionette with two broken strings. In the dream he was riding off in the sunset on a blood-red Panhead, money in his pocket and a raven-haired bitch on the p-pad behind him. He roared down a flaming highway toward his ol' lady and laughed at her tears, laughed at her loyalty to him, laughed at her pathetic love for an outlaw as he gunned the engine and rode over her whimpering bones. "Fuck!" he wheezed, and slowly swung his legs over the side of the bed. It hurt to turn his head but he did it anyway and stared at Vickie's sweet form only half covered by the thin sheet. Why was he getting an attack of guilt now? He was fully aware that at one time or another in his illustrious career he had burned every bridge and shot every opportunity ever given to him. Yet he always seemed to come out smelling like the proverbial rose. Ray had run the gamut of low-life betrayal during his 36 years. Just off the top of his head, he had sold out solid brothers, stole dope, stole a bro's ol' lady and then cheated on her. He once stabbed a dude in the guts and took his bike just because he didn't like the fucker's looks. He had spent half his adult life in one pen or another for bullshit petty crimes, feeling lucky that he skated on all the heavy beefs. He missed his mom's funeral while in the pen at Chino, and even once kicked a dog to death. Ray had spent his life getting away with murder, so why was his conscience rearing a wagging finger now? Vickie moaned seductively in her sleep. Ray shook his long mane of wavy black hair, heading into the pisser. "Just take the bitch's money and get the fuck out," he said to himself. "So what if the supposed loan she's giving me is every penny she had in her spaced-out little world?" By the time the last drops of Jack Black-smelling urine hit the bowl, thoughts of the dream faded to nothing, like a vampire at dawn. Still, there was something that lingered in the back of his throbbing mind. Why was he fucking over another innocent? He stared vacantly at the prison tattoo on his forearm baring the words "Ladies Love Outlaws." Something was going to happen, something bad; Razor felt it in every cell of his being. The echo of distant screams somewhere behind his eyes receded to purple shadows in the back of his brain and a voice within him muttered..."lost souls." As quickly as the phantom thoughts entered Ray's domain, they flew off again and he found himself searching the crevices of his morning mug in the mirror. "Good morning you handsome devil," he purred. Razor liked to think that whatever dark forces were at work in his life had a bigger purpose for him. He was being saved for something really nasty. Ray stood up tall and examined his muscular six-foot-five physique. There was pride in his sculpted features and dense black beard that called back to his family lineage in Russia's Ukraine. It was a family tree that stretched back to none other than Rasputin the Mad Monk. Razor grinned and stared at the hole where his front tooth used to be. He was even proud of that since it was sacrificed during a brawl defending his club colors. Picking up the partial plate from the sink, Ray admired the silver lightning bolts inset in his false tooth before putting it in his mouth. Thoughts of the bike filled his mind as he made a quick breakfast of frosted flakes mixed with milk and a dollop of JD. Ray couldn't wait to start the Panhead up and hear the blast of its fishtails. It had taken him nearly a month to sell Vickie on the idea of letting him "borrow" the dough he needed to buy THE bike, the ultimate fuckin' chopper! He carefully counted the wad of hundreds one more time, chuckling to himself at how easy it had been to give the girl the puppy dog eyes treatment. "Five thousand smackers," Razor grinned and the silver bolts on his tooth glinted in the morning light. Pulling on his cutoff, he peeled off five one-hundred-dollar bills and hid them in a secret pocket before placing the rest of the money in his chain wallet. Then Ray took the two white pearl-handled straight razors from a bed table and slipped them into the custom pockets on either side of his leather vest designed for quick and lethal access. Vickie was still sleeping off the night of speed, booze, and lurid sex as Razor slammed the screen door. He smelled his finger, recalling where it had been and grinned big. Today was HIS day! Fuck bad dreams and fuck guilt! He had the bitch's money and his new ride awaited him. Cypher's Cycle squatted in the dense heat of the San Fernando Valley like a dog seeking shade. It had existed as long as any of the locals remembered and long before the current crop of border brothers moved in and declared turf. Its metal roof shimmered in the summer sun with a kind of defiance. Now blending in with the gang-torn surroundings of Los Angeles, the shop sat on a graffiti-strewn street marked with sweltering palms that looked like giant baked weeds with drooping shoulders. In the grimy shop's window, the bike of Razor's dreams patiently waited, a 1962 Panhead chop job with a righteous rigid frame, gleaming chrome springer front end, apehangers to the stars, and fishtail pipes that reached to glory. Ray walked toward the shop slowly, his black cowboy boots sizzling on the frying-pan asphalt, savoring every second. He recalled the day weeks earlier when he first set eyes on this two-wheeled wonder. The shop had been full of flies that day. Actually, as Ray remembered it, he didn't actually see any flies but rather heard their incessant buzzing. Cypher's Cycle was piled high with the remains of motorcycles; the skeletons of a few riceburners hung from meat hooks as the carcass of a military WLA stared from socketless headlights. This was a slaughterhouse of deceased bikes and the shop's overweight owner was its lord and master. Razor strolled by a stack of weathered Easyriders magazines from the '70s, picked up a rusty Bendix carburetor, and stroked a flamed Mustang tank on his way to feast his eyes on THE bike. The Panhead danced in the glare of the mid-day sun coming through dust-encrusted windows, bars of shadow cast across it from the burglar bars outside. The paint was dazzling dark red with a shimmering ripple effect that made you feel as though you were drowning. The shop's troll-like owner held court from a destroyed desk near the back of the ragtag display room, looked up from a skin rag called Shaved Nurses, and took a flaccid stogie from his mouth with inhumanly long fingers. He eyed Razor in much the same way that a bird of prey sizes up its next victim. Ray stood respectfully in front of the Panhead and let every glorious curve of its perfect metalwork burn into his brain. The wicked red beast looked like it had just rolled out of some maniac customizer's dream world. A suicide shifter was topped by a gleaming chrome skull, its eyes glinting red rubies. Upon closer inspection, the shimmering dark red paint of the tank, frame, and rear fender was more the color of dried blood and the rippling wave effect was actually an illusion caused by meticulously intricate airbrush work beneath countless layers of clear. Ray's eyes focused deep beneath the outer layer of paint, down ... down past the layers of pearl red to see the unholy visage of hundreds, no thousands, of human faces, each captured in the twisting torment of impossible torture beyond words ... beyond description. "Lost souls" he whispered in a sinister tone, as the mouths seemed to work soundlessly, screaming eternally, screaming relentlessly, screaming for a release that would never come. "I can see you on this bike." The shop owner's words pulled Razor from within the depths of the paint. "Wha...what did you say, man?" Ray felt like he was stoned out of his mind until the man shook his hand. He suddenly felt as though he had a handful of dead dog and let go of the stranger's hand. The shop's owner just grinned and Razor thought he saw the tips of needle-sharp teeth peek from the recesses of the his mouth. "Name's Lou," the shop owner said. "You interested in the Pan? They sure don't make 'em like that anymore, son, and I can tell you'd appreciate a bike like that. Could say you were born to be on that bike." Razor just blinked for a timeless instant and finally found his tongue. "You got that right. How much you askin'?" Lou rubbed his salt and pepper goatee, sizing Ray up one more time. "Five grand and she's all yours." Ray smiled and saw Lou notice the twin bolts on his front tooth. The shop owner's eyes narrowed with a look of appreciation. "Five grand. So tell me Lou," Ray drawled, "how do you stay in business sellin' drop-dead gorgeous rides like this for five grand?" The shop owner picked at his teeth with a very long and sharp fingernail. "Simple my friend," the troll hissed. "I sell in volume." Part Two.... Back to Bandit's Fiction Page.... |
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