Three detectives just left my apartment. Betty Lou busted out of the looney bin last night.
That explains the eviscerated rat in the day-glow orange, knit wool hat I found on my pillow this morning. The rat came with a gift card. It read, “Gary Kraft? That’s the kind of name look real good on a tombstone.”
Good thing I had been in Madison, enjoying my first vacation since Covid, attending not just one, but two conventions; comic books & cheddar cheese.
Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than extra-sharp.
Now, my first, and foremost thought is that this would be a good time for leaving town. My 2nd thought as a desperate man would be to request lawyers, guns and money as the shit had hit the fan.
I hadn’t even unpacked from Wisconsin. I could go right back to the airport.
Betty Lou won’t be able to find me, not even if she manages to flee the country with everybody Tommy Lee Jonesing her.
Anyway, they’ll probably catch her. Except this time, they’ll have to do it without me.
Shit! Who am I kidding? Dead man typing. I’m going to get Crystal in the Lake’d.
Why? Fair question.
You see; I dropped a dime on Betty Lou. She did not take it well.
“I’ll get you Gary Kraft.” Betty Lou seethed through clenched teeth and snotted nose.
“I’ll get you if it’s the last thing I do!”
Snot and spittle had erupted from her nose and mouth to tango furiously as she wished me dead. Her mucous membrane sonata continued unabated, even as two burly cops led her away forcibly. Betty Lou strained against the cuffs all the way to a waiting SUV, her short muscular legs, honed over years playing rugby in the Ivy League, furiously kicking.
“The fucking stench!?! What the fuck!?!?!” bellowed one of the cops.
“Maybe it’s your fuckin’ upper lip, pig? Ever think of that,” Betty Lou bellowed back redoubling her efforts to bust loose.
The SUV’s lights steadily flashed red, red as the eyes of the betrayed; white doors suddenly swung open wider than a shark’s maw at supper time.
And then? Then Betty Lou was gone along with the stench of corruption and gardening.
That was last June.
Last June under the Flower Moon she warned me of ruin.
I met her on a dating app in the fall of ‘22. She was divorced. A good looking brunette in her 40s. Nice picture of her singing karaoke. She looked bubbly and attractive.
A couple of meetups for drinks? Why not?
Each meeting short & sweet as Betty Lou seemed.
Betty Lou had kids at home with their babysitter. Each of the meetups ending with an electric kiss before her Citibike. I would watch her riding off in her flowing and flowery long dresses feeling something I couldn’t quite describe.
Each meetup was followed by a text that read, “Thanks for being such a gentleman.”
Third Date:
Met for drinks outside in Caroll Gardens.
Witty banter; on my part anyway. Betty Lou had a way of being ever so slightly provocative. Sideways glances on her part. Odd conversation with our waitress. An ever so odd comment to the newlywed couple at the next table.
It was unseasonably warm September weather and I felt I was being set up like a bowling pin. But, I was at loose ends and hers was tight.
“That shirt looks good on you,” Betty Lou said.
“Want to come back to my place?” she asked.
I looked in Betty Lou’s black mischievous eyes.
I said, “While my mother tried to raise a moron, alas, she failed miserably.”
That night pure animal lust was exhibited by yours truly and enabled by Betty Lou. She seemed to wear a Cheshire Cat grin the entire time. As if she was confirming something to herself.
The next morning she said two things to me:
Things Betty Lou said:
I gave her a hug and kiss and wished her a happy birthday.
That was the beginning of my descent into hell. Everything all happened in a blur of the fall and Christmas of 2022.
Things that happened in a blur:
Betty Lou shared custody of her two kids with her ex. I mostly saw her every other weekend and during the week when her kids were at her ex’s. She worked for the city and often joked that if she could only find a way to get fucked up without getting too fucked up she could get disability and live the life.
I mostly ignored these remarks. I mean I knew they were red flags. It’s not like I fell off a turnip truck last Thursday. But the sex was fire.
Then something changed after Thanksgiving and before Christmas. Betty Lou grew increasingly distant and secretive. So, I did what I always did. I gave her space and made a joke about her being like Jennifer Garner in Alias. She never saw Alias so I had to explain it to her. Her silence made me uneasy but I let that sleeping dog lie.
Then I got a text late one Thursday night.
“Is it okay if I come over?”
“Sure,” I replied.
It was a wham bam thank you ma’am sex attack. Betty Lou pulled up her pants, called a Lyft and disappeared into the night explaining she had a presentation the next morning.
That was a first. Not that I minded. But I minded. If you catch my drift.
Then I got the flu before Christmas. Betty Lou seemed upset with me.
“How do you think you got the flu, Gary?”
“I don’t know,” I responded.
Betty Lou gave me a skeptical look that I let slide.
On New Years Eve I came over to give Betty Lou her Christmas gifts belatedly in a big stocking. We put on a movie. Nick Cage in Moonstruck. I had never seen it.
Betty Lou was in her pajamas and a do rag. She had dark black circles under her eyes and she seemed unnaturally excited. She went into her bedroom then came out with her hands behind her back.
“Close your eyes,” she said.
I obliged and felt something warm and soft cover my bald head.
“You can open them now,” she said.
I did and smiled. I reached up and removed the warm soft material from my head and examined it in my hands. It was a soft Afghan wool hat in a dark tone of orange.
“It’s beautiful. Thank you,” I said and gave her a kiss.
She smiled and said, “I made it especially para tu.”
“Gracias,” I replied, still smiling.
Eating her Christmas cookies, looking mischievous, Betty Lou swallowed some cookie and said, “Would you let another guy suck you off?”
I did a triple take. For those of you unfamiliar with the triple take; don’t try it at home. You can seriously hurt your neck bones.
“No,” was all I could muster. Gary Kraft, master of the clever come back.
“But why? It feels good, right?”
NYE was not looking good for me all of a sudden, though, on the bright side, Moonstruck is now one of my favorite all-time movies if I live to see it again.
Nick: I lost my hand and he gets a wife!
Back to my story…
Later that night Betty Lou drove us to the karaoke bar that seemed to be the one from her dating app profile pictures. Her friend joined us dressed like a lady of the evening. Short shorts and pancake makeup and a tube top; you don’t see too many of those anymore. There was small talk.
Betty Lou: “We saw Moonstruck.”
Me: Smile and nod pleasantly.
Short Shorts Chick: “So, what? Now you’re gonna quote Moonstruck all night?!?”
Me: “I suppose I will not.”
Somebody screamed contrived NYE cheer boisterously.
Then Betty Lou hopped off her barstool and ran off down the bar to demonstrate her karaoke skills. Short shorts tagged along leaving me alone with Johnnie Walker, black; no ice. I took a sip.
Suddenly I felt a gorilla paw clench my forearm.
I swiveled around to survey the situation. There was a hand and it belonged to a woman. A woman who looked exactly like Large Marge.
“What’s your name?” she asked/demanded. I suppose it was what passed for flirtation in these parts.
Say. You do know Large Marge, right? The trucker lady who picked up hitchhiking Pee Wee Herman. The one with the koogly eyes that says, “Tell ‘em Large Marge sent ya!?!”
I moved my arm gently away from her gorilla hand.
Unhand me you ape I thought.
I said, “I need to watch my friend perform.”
Large Marge said, “I understand. Sorry.”
I smiled and swiveled my back to Marge.
Down front Betty Lou was drunkard deep in an insipid performance of Pat Benatar’s, Treat Me Right. And then, out of nowhere, Short Shorts appeared holding a large red drink in a plastic cup with ice. Her eyes looked like a freshly glazed donut. Short Shorts put her hand on my mid-thigh. She looked me in the eye.
“I have no inhibitions!” she said loudly over the NYE bar noise.
I swiveled back to my drink in the direction of Large Marge. Clowns to the left of me. Whores to the right. I took a sip of my scotch. I swiveled back to Short Shorts.
“Ah, don’t worry,” I reassured her. “I got plenty of inhibitions. As a matter of fact I’m giving them away free,” I said.
Short shorts shot me a puzzled frown. It melted into a disappointed look. Then, as if an invisible cartoon bulb appeared above her head, she smiled and frolicked off. And then, everybody screamed and it was 2023. Then Betty Lou appeared, smiling vapidly as if from a dream and gave me what felt like the kiss of death.
After NYE, Betty Lou didn’t really pay much attention to me and did not seem to want me to pay attention to her. So, I did not.
On MLK, Jr. day she suddenly shot me a text.
“Off today?”
“Yes.”
“Can I come over?”
“Sure.”
And for one afternoon it was like the first time. Sheets on fire. Ecstasy. And then she was gone. And when I texted her a link to Rosemary Clooney’s, Come Over To My House, she replied, “You’re texting me too much. Thank you.”
I ignored Betty Lou the next week.
On Sunday, January 22nd I got a text.
“Meet in the middle? Dinner?” it asked.
“Sure.”
“Ramen?”
“Sure.”
“8pm?”
That night a cold rain fell steady on the Brooklyn streets casting a muted glow from the streetlights and headlights of the cars that hissed past. I felt my phone vibrate.
I took a look.
“Fair warning. I’m gonna get into my feelings.”
“Duly noted,” I texted back and thought the night was showing signs of not working out well for me.
I arrived at my destination. Inside, I took a look around the jam-packed ramen shop. It was a bitter cold, rainy, Sunday night in January, and here I was about to get into someone’s feelings.
But Naruto was the best ramen spot in Park Slope. Somewhere, someone must have just opened a window. A blast of icy cold air hustled against the ambiance of the soup steam; logarithmic spirals of steam rising then suddenly freaking out; disturbed by the extreme temperature differential. The steam formed shambolic shapes that quickly dispersed into nothingness.
Betty Lou arrived looking around for me. Our eyes met and we were soon seated by a hostess. At our table, I said, “If you want to talk about your feelings or something-“.
Betty Lou put up her hand and shook her head as if to say, no. I said, “Okay.”
Dinner was not fun. As we ate Betty Lou behaved oddly, asked me if I had considered Lasik surgery. Then she asked me if I ever thought about getting a hobby. Then she babbled something about the Zombie Apocalypse. Her hands made spastic gestures. I feared for the lady sitting to her right.
As we neared the end of our absolutely unlovely dinner Betty Lou said, “There’s something that’s really bothering me. Are we still having a, ‘casual and low key’…,” her hand made a vague Italian gesture that came a little too close to the lady to her right’s face. I winced.
“It just got so fucking cold all of a sudden,” I said forcing a grin. “Oh, but wait, I have an indoor hat!”
I reached across the table and grabbed the wool hat Betty Lou had knitted me for Christmas.
I put the hat over my head and smiled, “That’s a bit better,” I said.
Betty Lou’s pretty long black hair looked freshly cut. She was busy knitting something that appeared to be the beginnings of a scarf. Betty Lou looked up from the empty ramen bowl at me. She kept knitting.
“Did you hear what I said?” she asked sharply. “I don’t really like talking about this stuff.”
“Yes, it’s still casual and low key. But it sounds like you want to fuck other guys.”
Betty Lou sat up a little straighter. She stopped knitting a moment. Her freshly threaded brow furrowed like a wilted Easter lily.
“I don’t think I can be monogamous.”
I let that hang in the steamy noodle air. Betty Lou resumed knitting. I continued to say nothing. For all the background chatter in the shop I could have heard a cockroach stroke out. Now, I really did feel cold as ice.
I said, “It’s fucking cold as ice,” while I took off the beanie Betty Lou had knitted me and put on my new Indiana Jones chestnut brown fedora I bought on Amazon.
I was drinking Asahi beer. I took a pull.
“Well, then I don’t think you should be monogamous.”
And then I heard a voice say, in my left ear, “She got the devil in Mrs. Jones, dude.” I looked around but it was only my imagination just running away with me.
Betty Lou paused and drank some J-Pop.
“I can’t be with just one person for the rest of my life,” she said in a somewhat irritated voice.
“Then you shouldn’t be,” I said in what I hoped came out as a neutral tone.
Betty Lou’s knitting continued unabated. She said, “This is New York. You’re supposed to tell the other person if you get feelings!”
I took another sip of my beer. I frowned. Somewhere I heard a plate drop and break.
“I’m pretty sure I made it clear I liked you from the first, first date,” I said.
She started to say nothing then changed her mind.
“We could still see each other. It doesn’t have to change anything…” she said plaintively before looking up at me for a moment. The knitting resumed.
The lady at the next table seemed to notice our conversation. I looked at her. She put her hand over her face trying to appear disinterested in Betty Lou & I and tried to appear interested in her soup. Her companion, an attractive woman with red hair returned from the bathroom along with the waitress from the kitchen with their ramen. They ordered another round of drinks and their waitress disappeared.
I adjusted my fedora slightly. I took another pull of my beer then put it down holding it in both hands. I rotated the bottle clockwise, then counter-clockwise before nodding my head and saying, “No.”
“No, we can’t see each other, or No, it doesn’t change anything?”, she asked.
I watched Betty Lou knit for a moment then said, “No, I don’t want to see you again.”
“Even if I still want to see you?”
“That’s right,” I said.
“But why?” she asked.
“Well, if you’re seeing other, erm, people, then you aren’t really very attracted to me, are you? And if you’re seeing other, erm, people, and thinking of me then that’s above my pay grade.”
Betty Lou was quiet. Finally, she said, “I respect that.”
The demonic voice, whispered in my ear, loud, like a stage whisper, one word. BULLSHIT.
This time I knew it was an hallucination brought on by being cursed by a demon named Hubert at least two lifetimes ago.
Betty Lou and I were both quiet.
“Why wouldn’t you want to have me and other women if you could?” Betty Lou finally asked.
I took a pull of beer and thought a moment before saying, “Why go out for hamburger when you can stay home and have steak?”
Betty Lou appeared to think a moment then nodded reluctantly.
“You know you should have said something if you were getting feelings,” she said again.
“I don’t think there’s anything to be upset about. You can go see whoever you want now without stressing.”
She knitted some more. The lady at the next table made slurping noises. “Mmmmmmm. Sssooooo goooood,” she cooed, just a-slurp-slurp-slurping away.
Betty Lou seemed to be searching for the waitress.
I said, “It’s been a long day. I’ll get dinner and you can just get your coat on and I’ll give you a hug goodbye.”
Betty Lou wrinkled her brow. She stared at me quizzically.
“No. I’ll pay for dinner.” She looked around hard for the waitress, but she was not there.
“It’s okay. I’ll pay,” I said. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Why do you want to pay for dinner?” she asked.
I finished my beer and put it next to it’s empty sibling.
“I suppose it has to do with propriety.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked hard.
I let out a slow sigh. It felt heavy like a broken heart.
“It means doing what’s appropriate, I suppose.”
Betty Lou stopped knitting and appeared to be trying to decide something in her head. Finally, she nodded then abruptly stood up. She handed me a recyclable shopping bag with pictures of vegetables and fruits all over it. I looked inside and pulled out a neatly folded black wife beater and a black tee I had left at Betty Lou’s apartment last time I had been there. I put the clothing articles back in the bag then put the bag down next to the empty bowls knocking a chopstick to the floor in the process. I let it lay.
Betty Lou finished buttoning her coat. She pulled from her coat pocket a sky blue ski hat. Embroidered across the front in gold it read, “Brooklyn vs. Everybody”. I had given it to her the past Halloween.
I stood up. Betty Lou skooched out between the tables brushing against her neighbor’s arm. The lady looked up, our eyes met and I smiled kindly. She half-smiled and went back to her soup.
I put out my arms and Betty Lou stepped into them. We hugged.
“For what it’s worth I still think you’re the bee’s knees,” she said in a eulogistic tone.
I looked at her and said, “I’m not dead.”
I unwrapped Betty Lou and stepped back. She turned hard and fast and made her way through the steam and the tables and out into the night. I sat back down.
The waitress appeared and I asked for the check. She nodded and disappeared.
I took a deep breath and removed my glasses from my face. I rubbed my eye with the cuff of my shirt then said, “Jesus fucking Christ…” softly to myself.
The woman who had half-smiled looked at me again. I smiled.
“How’d you like the food?” she asked. Her dinner companion with the red hair looked at me funny.
“It was great. How about you?” I asked.
“Really good,” she said and smiled.
The waitress returned and then I tapped for dinner. The waitress thanked me and disappeared again.
I put on my raincoat and buttoned it up to my neck then turned up the collar. I adjusted my fedora and said, “Have a good night,” to the nice lady.
“You too,” she said.
That night I walked home doing my crying in the rain. I was done. Let it be.
2023 droned on with root canals, workplace harassment, Canadian wildfires turning the skies of NYC unnatural apocalyptic colors and that is where things became downright terrifying.
Last June on a Sunday morning:
I got an email from Betty Lou. It was a forwarded mass email from her neighborhood’s community garden group. Betty Lou had FWD’d it to me just before midnight. It read: