Going Insane in America

She turned and emitted a bellow like a Town Crier: ‘Gabby, get ass out here!’ Well, I’d have obeyed that instruction with as much alacrity as possible and her son was no exception. A scrawny youth of about sixteen appeared looking scared. She grabbed him by the hair and pulled his face right up to hers.

‘You steal bikes again?’ she howled. ‘I tell you ‘bout running with them boys.’ She was making the most incredible amount of noise so the denials and the pleas of her son went completely unheard. ‘You li’ bastard!’ she shrieked and obviously considering that corporal punishment was an option to be pursued in this case she brought her fist around in a massive blow that crumpled the poor sod up like a dandelion clock in a thunderstorm. She changed to Spanish and found she could express herself even more volubly and, although I wouldn’t have thought it possible, her voice reached a new level. She reached down and dragged him upright by the hair and now she started to slap him around like he was an ill-behaved cart horse. It sounded just like when your tyre gets ripped off when you are doing about eighty: Flump! Flump! Flump! Flump!

‘Madam, please,’ I interjected, for as prejudiced as I was against this young man this was getting too much. She turned to look at me as though she had never seen me before in her life: ‘You fuck off!’ she said then she slammed the door in my face like an executioner locking the gas chamber for the final time. The howling and slapping sounds started up again from behind the thick metal. Oh well!

‘What we had there,’ I said, ‘was a failure to communicate.’