Barry and Levon Save The World
Or, at least America
Part One
Barry took a drag from his cigarette. He only smoked when he got high. But he got high quite a lot so do with that information what you will. He sat up in his armchair, exhaled and said to Levon, “can you believe this puto Vance? That fucker says that ICE has ‘absolute immunity’ after killing that white girl.”
Levon scowled, “what’s that mean?”
“It means ICE can do whatever the fuck they want. They can kill you and ain’t shit your mama could do about it.”
“Damn. My moms prolly wouldn’t even care though -”
“That’s not the point!”
“Well, then what is the point?” Levon asked
Barry took another drag off his smoke and held it while he thought. He let out a long, exaggerated exhale and said in a low voice, “the point is that now they can hunt us like dogs whenever they want.”
Those words hung in the air for a moment longer than Levon was comfortable. Half joking he said, “maybe we should join up and hunt those fuckers,” and fell out laughing like he was Richard Fucking Prior.
Barry chuckled and sat back into his chair. It was a ridiculous idea, Barry thought, but pinche cabron, we could do it. Right?
They didn’t set out to become heroes. Hell, in hindsight, they don’t even see themselves that way. They see themselves as two pendejos who had a crazy idea they thought could never possibly work. Now they’re in history books.
This is their story.
The year was 2026 and it was a shit time to be a melanated American. You see, the country had gone and elected itself a racist assclown. Which is ironic considering he chose to present as an Orange Troglodyte.
The next morning Barry stood in his kitchen in nothing but his calzones - tighty whities for my white readers - and a coffee cup. He’d been recently laid off of his job at the container company due to ‘fiscal realties on the ground changing,’ Translation: tariffs caused shipping requests to drop which cut which resulted in a drop in demand for cardboard boxes.
Barry took his coffee into the bedroom to find last night’s tee shirt. He gave it the sniff test - it passed - so he put it back on before. He looked down, past his coffee cup where his eyes settled on his pansa - belly for my white readers - did my shirt shrink, he wondered before reality set in. Two months without work, sitting around with Levon drinking, scheming was not good for his waistline. He grabbed his phone off the night stand and dialed.
“Hey fool, wake up, I’m coming over.”
Levon rolled out of bed. He slept in pajama pants with the waist cinched tight. His ex used to make fun of him for being so anal about it, but he had his reasons. Reasons you talk about in latino households.
He stood up, walked to the restroom and took stock. Those droopy sacks under his eyes had him feeling like a pinche viejo even though he was only thirty-six years old.
You’re going to have to start using context clues, white people.
He sighed, opened the medicine cabinet and got his toothbrush and toothpaste. He was mid-rinse when he heard the knock on his apartment door.
“You wake me up and can’t even bring donuts, fool?”
“What? Shut up, we need to talk about something serious. And put on a damn shirt,” Barry said. Levon yawned, ignored Barry’s request and skittered to the kitchen for some coffee. “Alright, so talk,” he said as he put the coffee pot under the spigot to fill.
“We should join ICE.”
Levon turned off the faucet.
“It ain’t full, fool,” Barry said.
“I know you’re hurting for work, but damn, you ain’t a traitor like that.”
Barry expected some resistance so this was no surprise. He was prepared. “No, man, it ain’t like that. Have you seen the news? These fuckers are ruthless. They’re don’t give a fuck if someone has papers or was born here. They see a brown person and they jump and nobody is doing shit!”
“What? So you think some bullshit we said when we were high -”
“YOU said! Shit YOU said when we were high,” Barry reminded him.
“Fine, whatever; you think that some shit I said when we were high is legit? What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Why not?”
“Because we were high as fuck and it was stupid!”
“Mira, we lost our jobs because this tariff bullshit and now they target us because what? We have brown skin and can speak spanish? Fuck that! They’re fucking with kids, abuelitas, the fucking tamale lady, everyone and we ain’t doing shit!”
“Lookit, Barry, I get that you’re fucking pissed off at these pinche motherfuckers, but what you want to do is fucking crazy!”
Barry was silent for a moment. He wanted to get these next words exactly right. “I don’t really know what I want to do. Not exactly. I just know that if we’re inside that puts us in the best place to help our people. Maybe we can delete some files or paperwork; or maybe we can get to a place before the rest of ICE shows up and warn our people to get the fuck out, I don’t know! I just know I’m sick of doing nothing while our gente have this fucking target on our backs, you know?”
“Why it gotta be us, Barry? We already did our time serving this thankless country.”
“Because this ain’t for our country, Levon, it’s for our people.”
oh yes!