Hialeah Drive was fucked.
As kids, we all had our own version of what went down on that small street. What happened to Hialeah Drive became our own urban legend. We spread rumors: The people living there were swingers, were messed up with kiddie porn syndicates, were cult members with secret families trapped in the basement. In reality, we never witnessed any evidence of orgies or demonic happenings. At most, we saw a consistent rotation of unfamiliar cars parked out front and boarded up windows that sealed Hialeah’s inhabitants from us. In my opinion, the demise was a result of what happens to lonely, bored people and to families that never should have been. |
I was alone, walking home down a dirt road from where the school bus dropped me off. The afternoon was sweltering, so I had my shirt stuffed into my backpack. Despite my town’s notoriety for not being especially friendly, a few strangers would occasionally pull over to ask if I needed a ride home. The men probably had no interest in raping and killing me, but, as a rule, I always said no. A white Honda Civic pulled up beside me. The driver was a woman in her late 30s with a deflated sandy brown perm. She excused herself for creeping up and said, “Hey hun, you’re gonna burn up walking around like that. Need a ride home?”
She introduced herself as Hailey and because she was a woman with a nasally voice that reminded of my television dream girl Peg Bundy, I accepted the ride. |
| I knew that there really wasn’t much to her, aside from having a nice ass with pouty lips that seemed out of character on her narrow face. I remember thinking she wasn’t especially sexy, just another mommy type, possibly MILF status. |
| Inside Hailey’s car, the air conditioner was on high, fusing the smell of berry bubble gum and cigarette smoke to the seats. |
Throughout the short ride I starred blankly ahead while sneaking obvious glimpses at her body. She was wearing an aqua blue hospital scrub, beige leggings and a white linen skirt that was hiked up mid-thigh from driving. She looked like a clinic receptionist and for some reason that made my mouth water. |
She took a lot of deep breathes, continually reassuring herself that she shouldn’t feel weird about helping a neighbor, that everything was fine and that I shouldn’t worry.
I wasn’t worried. |
| She dropped me off at my door without any kind of weirdness. |
For weeks after, I cut class to compulsively jack off to Hailey in the handicap stall. I couldn’t explain it. She was by no means hotter than the girls at school -who I didn’t speak to- and it wasn’t like she came onto me. Maybe it was because I was a shy kid alone with woman who wasn’t my mom or an aunt or a teacher. Maybe I was just 14 and horny. Regardless, after that ride, I walked down that same dirt road every day, slower than usual, looking for a white Civic.Three years later, I was 17 and finally able to drive myself. I considered this to be a radical demarcation between watching the scenery and actively participating in life. I loved the freedom to disappear. |
It was a Friday night and I had been guilt tripped into chartering my sometimes-skinhead friend Lee to meet two girls from a ska show I had previously refused to attend. Their names were Shianne and Rainey. We went to Rainey’s house on Hialeah, which smelled like cedar chips and urinal cakes because of her pet ferret. |
Shianne’s skin looked pockmarked then sandblasted. She was both pale and ruddy. Her hair was partially shaved into a Chelsea cut and she had on baggy Jncos, two of the most unflattering looks on a girl. Rainey was a fat Goth. Beneath layers of candy bracelets, her wrists were corrugated with scars. They were both cutters. I imagined it started as an act of self-control or self-loathing, then bled over to bonding and boredom. There was something parasitic about their interactions with one another. It was as if they were one of the same, a two-headed pig that headbutted itself to feel alive. I could hardly look at them. Lee wanted to fuck the fat one. |
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