Pam Benjamin dives into the lives of four bike messengers who kill corporate people for money. An episodic journey reads like a television series with vivid images and strikingly graphic dialogue

 


Pam Benjamin, The Pigeon Chronicles or Bike Messenger Assassins, Ink., 2010.


THE PIGEON CHRONICLES OR BIKE MESSENGER ASSASSINS dives into the lives of four bike messengers who kill corporate people for money. Realistically set in the streets and bars of San Francisco, Benjamin's episodic journey reads like a television series with vivid images and strikingly graphic dialogue. Each of the 18 episodes follow an individual arc that fits into the larger plot lines while keeping the story moving at pace with the messengers, fast. Read how Retch, Bucket, Condor and Carrier entangle themselves in love, betrayal, death and well rum at 6 am.

Excerpt from Pam Benjamin’s “The Pigeon Chronicles or Bike Messenger Assassins”

November 30th, 2010 “Fuck man, I haven’t had a solid shit in three weeks.” Bucket fell out of the bar bathroom steadying him self with the chewed and beaten booth. He had an unlit joint between his lips. “Whiskey shits are the shit.” He meant “the shit” as a positive thing.
“Three weeks? High class problems you got there. I’m going on three years.” Condor spun his back field plastic men in red before throwing the little white ball wildly into the slot.
Bucket scored from his goalie, again. “That’s me. All class. I’m one classy son of a shit.”
“Yeah, ass butter, man. That’s what I’m talking about. Any shit is a satisfying one.” Condor tried to throw the white ball back in the slot and missed the table horribly sending it flying to the frowning morning tender. He began to sing to a vague Cat Steven’s tune, “Morning ass-plosion, my tummy’s warning…” He even warbled a sort of vibrato on “warning”.
“Yo, Streisand, I got your jazz hands and fake lashes in my bag if you wanna drag queen us outa here.” Retch chuckled low at his own joke. “You dicks need to eat some fucking bird seed. Get some god-damned fiber in your diet and stop your bitchin’. You gonna start the fucking game or what?”

Episode 3

Carrier was officially drunk now. He’d forgotten about the game with Bucket to hear the Muni story that he was so concerned about an hour previous. It was seven in the morning now, light streamed in through the window next of the closed swinging half door creating a bright little square on the black floor. They all carried a 16 oz. Bud Light and empty shot glasses littered the small leaning table. They did shots of well-rum as it seemed the most perverse thing to do when walking into a bar at six a.m. Carrier’d been on the sauce since seven the night previous. “Does anyone have work today?” He mumbled absently.
“What day is it?” Bucket boomed to no one in particular.
It was Tuesday. In less than two hours they would be speeding around the city on bikes attempting to avoid hangovers with bottles of water and un-brushed teeth. The Pigeon’s had a serious mission today. Orders came down from the Fat Cats on high last Friday.
“You wanna know the Muni story? I’ll fucking tell you. Fuck this game!” Bucket spun his three plastic half-backs and slapped his palms on the table in front of Carrier. “We kill people for money. Shhhh. Don’t tell anyone.” Bucket veered and tilted like a broken metronome as he spoke. He held himself upright with one hand and bobble pointed somewhere near Carrier’s face. He was getting serious. “We orchestrate death with bikes.”
Retch chimed in, “What my esteemed drunken asshole is trying to tell you is that I threw the smoothie at the baby stroller. The lady freaked and yelled at the Asian tourists who confused the streets with camera flash. Condor swooped…”
“Like a hawk I swoop down and take out my prey with piano wire!” Condor broken-winged flew in front of Carrier at the table. They looked like some huge three beaked squawking chorus of drunken pigeons all trying to out story one another.
“The Target always got a mocha-frappa-fuck-soy-latte-shit at that Fuck-bucks on Market. Every fucking day, four fifty. You know what I do with four-fifty?” Bucket spewed from his mini soap box.
“That’s two PBR’s and a shitty tip.” Carrier agreed.
The Pigeons sped on overlapping one another with quickened excitement. “So we knew where he’d be, right? And Retch knows the Muni dude who drives the day time Seven line…”
“And Condor hid behind the parked car…”
“And the tourists forced him off the sidewalk after the smoothie incident, and he was so fucking worried about spilling his god-damned latte…”
“And I was weaving like a maniac down the sidewalk so he couldn’t get back up on that brick…”“And ooops. Seven in the face.” Retch finished, “My Muni boy took the fall and didn’t say a word, and for a piddily ten percent.”
“Ten percent of what?” Carrier’s eyes bulged. These guys couldn’t be serious. This was some tossed mid-morning prank. There was a hidden camera somewhere in the room and a reality T.V. host was bound to pop out from behind the bar and call it Survivor.
“One hundred large. Muni got ten. We all got thirty.” Bucket finally lit the joint that had built a summer cottage in his mouth during the last diatribe.
“Uh, Really?” The morning tender shook his face with palms up. “You can’t smoke in here, douche-bags. Get the fuck out.”
“We got work to do anyway. We’ll just smoke this baby outside.” Bucket pointed finger guns and sauntered to the door squinting at the new morning light, “You with us?”
Carrier was suddenly sober. “Yeah. Yeah. I’m in. This ain’t cowboy’s first rodeo.”






Pam Benjamin, Voices [Kindle Edition]
    If Grant doesn't listen to the Voices, bad things happen to good people and bad people, and dogs and rodents and cafeteria trays. With the help of his mental roommate, who only speaks in musical quotes, and his Voices, Grant plans to escape "Horizon Dawn" to save his daughter from his ex-wife's new psycho boyfriend.   VOICES: Grant is a patient in Horizon Dawn, a mental institution, because he hears voices, but the voices are correct. With the help of his roommate, who only speaks in song lyrics, a sexy therapist, and of course the Voices, Grant must escape Horizon Dawn to save his daughter's life. Voices is the forthcoming first book published by Ink. Voices is an episodic journey by Pam Benjamin. She is a writer living in San Francisco. She was awarded an MA in Fiction from San Francisco State University and is working on her MFA in Poetry. She co-hosts "Common Threads with Diamond Dave" on Pirate Cat Radio where she has read her other episodic journeys: The Pigeon Chronicles or Bike Messenger Assassins, Dottie and Bree, Hijo Perdito, The Soon To Be Legend of Farmer Keef, and Polly's Escape. - ink-reviewed.blogspot.com     



Sex Worker #3


He likes stainless steel
things clean and untarnished.
His kitchen gleams with stainless fixtures:
fridge, toaster, stove, me.

I am paid to cook naked.
I leave no prints.
I chop flat leaf parsley on the stainless table:
silver chef knife, mise en place, shiny bowls.

I have little cups:
Herbs, onions, eggs, cheese.
No non-stick to mar the illusion of silver
making omelettes difficult.

He needs perfect omelettes:
tri-folded, cheese perfectly melted.
I insert a small silver thermometer.
He stops eating when the temperature dips under 120.

I clean the pans without scrubbing.
Abrasive materials swirl the stainless finish.
He threw away three pans on our first date.
I was punished on cold prep table.

He covered my face with a stainless bowl,
placed the ruined pans on my chest,
jacked off in the corner of the kitchen.
I have learned his quirks.

He’s never going to fuck me.
I’m not clean enough.
Fingers don’t leave prints in flesh.
He is scared of the mess.

This week he gave me a present:
hospital booties, plastic gloves.
“You have to put these on.
I can’t have prints today.”

“I want you to sit here.”
He pointed to a sheet of stainless,
“The edges are sharp.
Watch the blood.”

“I’m not up for this, today.”
I started for the door.
“When can you come back?”
He followed down the stairs.

He opened the door.
“You have my booties.
I need those for the next girl.”
His voice was colder than steel.

He threw me a hundred
and shut the silver door.


Sex Worker #4


He pokes at my mouth with a wooden skewer,
“You don’t have any cavities, do you?”

“Insurance pays 80% on white fillings,”
I mumble through the stick.

“They look good. Close please.”
He is not a dentist. He likes teeth.

Teeth and drills and open mouths,
I had passed the test.

We agreed on $250:
My teeth brushed with gold Listerine
I would open my mouth
lie down on the couch
and he would floss me gently
while we watched dental video of drilling.

Dr. Morrow would be so pleased
with me flossing once a week.

Watching drilling video
is surprisingly sexual,

a pretty blonde with dental dam
secured lips open surrounding teeth

squirming and moaning
with the whirring of the tool.

Her eyes flitted side to side
and hands white knuckle gripped.

“Tell me if I hurt you,”
over the drilling from the TV.

The powdery latex pushed my tongue aside;
he forced ribbons between my teeth,

“a girl with wisdom teeth intact,
and they don’t even crowd your bicuspids.”

He continued his work
while I was getting wet.
A cotton ball to swab excess spit
“You’re a juicy one, aren’t you?”

I barely shook my head “yes”.
He was still orally wedged.

I wiped my mouth and collected $250,
and ran my tongue over my plaqueless teeth.


Sex Worker # 12:


Baby man is easy
$250: bottle, burp, bed.
No dirty diapers.

Baby man likes breast milk.
won’t drink formula or warmed whole;
he’s a connoisseur.

His refrigerator is a shelf of thick, cream goop
in plastic bottle nipples ready to be warmed
by boiling water on the stove: no microwaves.

In my sweet mommy voice,
“Little Davey wavy is nutsy wutsy isn’t he?”
I wipe his baby burble bubbles of viscous yellow.
He’s a six week old with wobble head.
His arms waggle, mouth roots for more bottle.
Babyman is authentic.

I lay him down in his oversized crib
king bed fluffy baby bumpers: jungle themed.
He loves his rhino pillow.

I tip toe into the kitchen and get my $250
second drawer next to the dishwasher
and let myself out.




Interview at Fashion for Collapse