Free I Just Want My Pants Back by David Rosen

considered employing them to sonically shoot down enemy missiles from the sky.
    “What did I tell you, Charlemagne? Do you want to watch Toy Story later or not?”
    “Brooklyn! Stop touching that girl!”
    “Magellan, you do as that man says or I’m telling Daddy!”
    All of the kids had ridiculous names like that, soap-opera-character names. There were Dakota and Blaze and Kash and Sodapop (“We both really loved The Outsiders !”) and D’Artagnan and Chynna and Pacifica and Charisma. Charisma—what the fuck, why not just name your kid Personality Plus? And, of course, all of the moms wanted me to know they were more than mere moms, they were also actresses. As they each approached me, their shrill commanding voices instantly softened, their thin frowns were replaced by flirty smiles and batting eyelashes. “Chynna shines when we are in scenes together. It really saves the directors a lot of time.” A sudden blast of authority. “Chynna! Quiet! Mommy’s talking!” Then back to flirty. “So”(hair-flip, stomach-in, boobs-out) “can I give you my head shot?”
    The place smelled of forty kinds of fecal matter. There was a puddle in the corner and I was pretty sure it didn’t come from a juice box. A rotund ten-year-old with bushy hair sat against the far wall, away from the action. He was chain-eating mini Snickers bars from a Halloween-sized bag, waiting for his mom and younger sibling. I got the sick feeling his folks kept him obese; he was a shoo-in for any “fat kid” role.
    The only thing the toddlers had to do was smile to the camera and say “soft.” Maybe one had actually done that, the rest just started babbling or playing with the only toy we had at JB’s for sessions like these, a Fisher-Price xylophone. Cling clang clang! Cling clang clang! I was ready to shoot heroin directly into my eyes.

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    T he day and the week finally came to a close, and I headed home. I stood among the zombies on a rumbling subway car that smelled of human rot. I looked around and saw the cause. A sleeping homeless man, filthy, sprawled in a seat, an open Styrofoam container filled with lo mein on his lap. The stench was awful, as if he were decomposing in front of us. He might have been, too. But no one complained. Or, for that matter, attempted to see if he needed help. We held our breath and waited for our stops, the homeless man finally snorting and coughing in his slumber, proving he was alive, probably spewing an invisible plague onto us all.
    I emerged from the Germ Express and power-walked toward home. I got to my apartment, turned on an old Hank Williams album, and plopped down on my shitty green couch. Hank sang, “Yeah, my bucket’s got a hole in it. My bucket’s got a hole in it.” It was the kind of music you could make love to, or curl up in the fetal position alone and cry to. I had a lot of records like that. Ones that made you feel like you were in a movie somehow when you listened to them, like every move you made had meaning.
    Back in St. Louis, my house had been a short bike ride away from the local hip used-record store/head shop, Vintage Vinyl. It became the place where I spent the majority of my allowance and where I learned all about “rock and fucking roll, dude.” It was intimidating to go in there; the music was blasting, it smelled like clove cigarettes, and there were a lot of Iron Maiden–type posters up replete with skulls and axes, all of which were frightening to a thirteen-year-old.
    The first time I went in, after about ten minutes of wandering around not knowing what to look for, I placed Styx’s Cornerstone on the counter. I knew nothing about the band—or any band for that matter. I picked it solely based on the NICE PRICE sticker, the cool Styx logo, and the simple fact that I had been in the S section, seeing if there were any “Striders.” The cashier, wearing a skinny tie and a handful of pins on his shirt, snickered as he bagged it. I went back a