Texts from Bennett (30 page)

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Authors: Mac Lethal

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BENNETT:
o also da smell of colon makes girls not wana fucc so dont where N E

ME:
The smell of colon?

BENNETT:
ya colon! its expencive and masks ur farramones

BENNETT:
dogs smell eachother butt bcuz theirs farramones dat make dem wanna fucc and da smell of colon wud ruin it

ME:
Lol. Not trying to laugh, I’m just a little confused. There’s no real difference between a dog’s butt and a dog’s colon.

BENNETT:
wat.?

BENNETT:
dogs dont have colon idiet..only people spray dat stuff

ME:
LMAO. Nah, dude, not “colon.” The word you’re looking for is “cologne.”

BENNETT:
ahh

BENNETT:
O. . . .my falt. ya

BENNETT:
cologne yep..man i no i aint da best typer but dis hole silent g shit is confussing 2 me

BENNETT:
maybe u cud show me how 2 be a betta writer next

ME:
Yeah? You really want me to?

BENNETT:
hell ya i wanna b gud wit words like u

ME:
I thought you hated my writing/rapping?

BENNETT:
ehh. Ur rapin is purdy gud to be honess

BENNETT:
i dont hate ur rapin. i jus wish i cud under stand it betta . . . u use crazzy words and shit when u b rapin dat i cant evan folow it

BENNETT:
i jus feel kinda dum when i here u

BENNETT:
maybe u cud show me how 2 be a betta raper which cud make ur shit easy 2 follow

ME:
It would be a pleasure, dude. Especially because you taught me not to smell like colon when I take a girl out.

BENNETT:
haha.Poop! insted of Joop! LoL

ME:
Tip #1. Is use 2 p’s when referring to rapping or being a rapper.

BENNETT:
ok im not dat gud at spellin but ill try

ME:
It’s just because being a RAPER or good at RAPING has to do with hurting women, not making music.

ME:
You following me? As in “rape?”

BENNETT:
oooo man FUCC dat. i fuccin hate rape.

BENNETT:
ill kill sum 1 who is gud at raping.

ME:
Me too, Bennett, me too.

BENNETT:
K so da g is for gwap

BENNETT:
gwap is money cha ching $$$

BENNETT:
chix git called gold diggaz alot which i think is stupid

BENNETT:
bcuz they like niggaz wit $$

BENNETT:
well so wat

BENNETT:
chix want life to feel gud and EZ. a girl wanna no dat she aint gunna be payen 4 da movie ticcets all da time.she wanna no dat if u guyz wanna smoke weed she dont gadda spend her hole alowence on da sacc of herb

ME:
Haha. True, but some girls are obsessed with finding a dude with money.

BENNETT:
so wat sum dudes R obsesed with findin a chicc wit a nice booty.sum dudes only go stedy wit mexican chiccs.u cant be mad at sum1 for noing wat dey want

BENNETT:
jus make sure u got ur own $. dont spend it tryen 2 make her happy. dont buy her a xtra slice of pizza at skool evary day at lunch . . . especily if U aint fuccin her

BENNETT:
but jus in case she likes u its gud 2 have gwap u can spend on fun shit

ME:
Makes sense.

ME:
Keep it coming. I love this and really appreciate it.

BENNETT:
L is lanry

BENNETT:
Landry

BENNETT:
u have gud style as it is..so dis aint dat serias.but jus to say it so i dont 4get nuthin.. chix luv a guy who can dress fly.dont dress like a jocc.dont dress like a prep..have ur own style..

ME:
Bennett you wear all navy-blue boots, blue bandanas, Dickies outfits, and sunglasses indoors. You have gold teeth.

ME:
Girls like that?

BENNETT:
ya bcuz they C it and think damn dis lil nigga is a gangsta

BENNETT:
dey go oh dam he got dat thug dicc

BENNETT:
but dats da getto chix dat i like..

BENNETT:
if its a rich prepy girl i jus pull my pantz up and try 2 talk like im a rich kid named Jeffry who no how to play tennis

ME:
What the Hell is the letter I? Itcherz? Huh?

BENNETT:
O. yea itcherz. finger nails.. dont be leavin da house with dirty ass finger nails man chix hate dat shit..shower an wash em

ME:
Yeah, I know.

BENNETT:
also clip em short so u dont cut ur girl’s vajina at da movies

BENNETT:
F is for feet.. man dont wear dirty shoes.. u got tons of nice shoes witch is gud chix Luv nice shoes.. make sure dey clean and make a statmint..

BENNETT:
no spots or dirt on em.. if u cant clean em gud enuf jus git new ones.. u cud have da dopest outfit on but if ur shoes are lame or dirty ur pretty much a big skrub and no cute chix will git w u

ME:
I agree.

BENNETT:
dats like havin a lambergeeny with bicycle wheelz

BENNETT:
E is for Erb..

BENNETT:
hoez luv a nigga who got gud da erb 2 smoke

ME:
Girls my age don’t smoke as much as girls your age. The type of women I like think smoking too much pot makes you lazy.

BENNETT:
well maybe u shud date chix dat R my age den bcuz i cud neva go out wit a girl who didnt smoke da heavanly green leaf omg fucc no

ME:
Yeah, uh. Dating girls your age is illegal for me, bro.

BENNETT:
crossin da street when da yelow hand is up is illegal 2 nigga but u still do it all da time.. sumtimes breaken stupid laws makes life a funner place

ME:
Ok . . . so T.H.U.G.L.I.F.E. it is. I get it. Thank you. Makes a lot of sense.

32
#5. Always Take a Shit Before Macking on Hos

ME:
Okay, now how about #6 KILL DA HATERZ BY SHOWING EM LOVE

BENNETT:
aint it numba 5 doe ?

ME:
Nah that’s the TAKE A SHIT BEFORE GOING OUT one. You already told me that one.

BENNETT:
my boss iz yellen at me so i cant respond for a bit.but dont think u done.. u aint a sammer eye waroir yet da lessens iz jus starten

BENNETT:
ill txt u bacc in a littel bit i gadda go help stocc sum shit in da bacc

33
Hydra

I felt a certain sense of euphoria while reading Bennett’s dating tactics. Part of it was from enjoying merely talking to my cousin and being fascinated by his logic. The other part of it was from feeling the first sliver of optimism I’d felt in several anguishing weeks.

Despite the long drive and our run-in with the soggy meth head, I couldn’t sleep until I put my phone down and inadvertently closed my eyes while waiting for Bennett to text me back on number six. I ended up having weird dreams about Katt Williams selling tilapia fillets in televised infomercials, and the strangest thoughts.

Bennett had his own extremely developed level of intelligence. And sharing with me his theories and strategies on getting girls, while also displaying his humility and interest in developing his writing skills, not only made me realize that he was just as bright as anyone I’d ever met, but it brought me closer to him than ever.


I woke up damp with clammy sweat when I heard the front door slam at 6:19 p.m.

I checked my phone. I had two missed texts. Both from my friend Seven, both about throwing back a few beers tonight. Seven was responsible for all of the beats I recorded my songs to and was married. But he was always fun to go out with and grab a table with at a local microbrewery, so I texted him to invite JoJo and Alvie too.

A NOTE FOR CREATIONISTS

The human species is the most evolved species on our planet because of one specific reason: our ability to communicate abstract thought and complex emotion with each other. We have a deeper understanding and appreciation for each other than (most) other animals are capable of. This is largely due to our supreme intellect when it comes to communicating and our ability to create memories based on profound, emotional exchanges. Good or bad. I’m not suggesting other animals are shitty. I’m just saying we are better. Fact.

How did we become Earth’s finest species? It’s hypothesized that 7 million years ago, our distant Hominid ancestors had hit the evolutionary ceiling and were not advancing at a very rapid pace. In fact, other animals were kicking our asses. We needed a solution. That solution came from our brains.

One poor ape accidentally ate psilocybin mushrooms (that I’m guessing were picked right off a pile of cow shit) and began imagining bizarre concepts of problem solving and nuanced communication. Since there was no moralist society afflicting its citizens with egregious rules at this time, the hominid ape and its Hominidae relatives began eating these psychoactive mushrooms
all the time
.

The more psychoactive mushrooms these apes ate, the more they pursued these weird, trip-induced ideas. Making noises to represent feelings, carving shapes into the walls of caves to tell stories, and using their fingertips to draw symbols in the sand that represented letters and eventually words. Thus, speaking, drawing, and writing were born. I imagine these three prime forms of communicating were quite simplistic in their initial incarnations. But over the course of seven million years, they have not only developed and become much more sophisticated in their engineering, but they have also considerably expanded our ability to understand and adapt to our surroundings.

Humans are equal parts brilliant as we are gullible. We’re brilliant enough to create an entire grid of numbers that are infallible in problem solving, organization, and counting. Yet we’re gullible enough to believe there’s a significance to things that happen within these numbers that we created ourselves.

Once the simple concept of mathematics was developed, we were off to the races.

Example: every 10, 100, 1,000 and (I’m guessing) 10,000 years, a chunk of Earth’s general population begins to worry that the Universe is going to abruptly end. How could the year 2000 have been birthed without rampageous dragons spewing fire and vomiting goat blood all over Los Angeles? I mean, 10 is the first double digit, after all, right? And 10 times 10 times 10 is 1,000. And 1,000 years is a millennium. And 2,000 years is two millennia. How could someone be dumb enough to not see significance in that?

Simple: the year 2000 wasn’t significant. The year 3000 won’t be either. Why? Because numbers in the multiples of 10 aren’t significant. Why? Because numbers aren’t significant. Why? Because humans created numbers, and when humans created numbers we based them on how many fingers we had: 10. That’s as high as we could count at that point. Well, I guess 20 if we removed our shoes. If we had 12 fingers, our number grid would be based on quantities in the multiples of 12, 144, 1,728, etc.

But what fun is that? What fun is realizing all the fear, mystery, destruction, and chaos that humans are enraptured in is nothing more than the by-product of a few apes who had a revolutionary idea on ’shrooms? What fun is considering the idea that our current world’s civilization of humans, mutated life-forms, and soccer moms, is the second one this Earth has permitted to live here? What fun is entertaining the idea that our current civilization has only been present for about 0.000005 percent of Earth’s existence.

My point in all of this is our level of intelligence has nothing to do with how many expensive words we know, or how well we speak. Our level of intelligence doesn’t revolve around how well we can do calculus. (Well, unless you’re Isaac Newton, who created calculus in six weeks when he was twenty-five. That’s a motherfucker who just . . .
got it.
Sorry, Leibniz. I’m rolling with Big Isaac.) Those are all things that can be learned with enough practice and memorizing.

Bennett wasn’t the most eloquent person. Showing him a function of differential calculus and wanting him to understand it was really no different than showing a dalmatian a page of Chopin’s sheet music and expecting him to understand it. (Yes, the dalmatian puppy is a boy, you fuckin’ feminazi.)

I rose and walked to the edge of the stairs to see who had come in.

Bennett was standing at the coatrack, on one foot, removing his navy-blue Dr. Martens combat boots. He stopped and looked up at me, exhausted from pulling the double.

He stared at me for a few seconds. “My phone died,” he eventually said.

“Oh, it’s all good man. I needed to sleep anyway.”

I walked down the stairs, yawning, stretching, and feeling my tingling body start to fluctuate and reengage. I gave Bennett a handshake-turned-hug.

It was quiet in the house and when I walked into the living room, Aunt Lillian was sitting at an angle, nodding out as usual. Apparently sensing my presence, she opened her eyes and smiled.

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