The Clock is Off.

The sky is illuminated by blue bursts of electrical fire. Rain falls hard, drenching me and the scrawny hooker tittering on the corner in her see through plastic pumps. She looks like a melting wax figure, like she has some hideous cancer. She squawks at me and through the rainy haze and the sound of her voice the she is a he. I press on home streets now have become rivers and sewage outlets spew forth a dry winters worth of back up.

I cut the corner to my trap, soaked to the bones, turn the key and slop my wet shoes into my house. Lights are turned on and I peel my clothes off like a used condom. Stove burns blue flame, water boils and steams, and a cuppa hot coffee is made. I hunker down and watch Eraserhead just to make sure my life isn't that bad. The credits roll and I slip into my bed. Rain always has made me drowsy.

I had a headache, me, and took a handful of aspirin before knocking off for the night.

Poom! Poom! Poom! Somebody is knocking at my door. The clock reads 2:36 a.m. Poom! Poom! Poom! I fling the covers off and reach for my pajama bottoms (I have always slept naked. Can't have it any other way. Wouldn't you?) I pull the front door open to find Jose, a teenage kid from the neighborhood standing on my landing with kind of a glow. His eyes were all pupil and he sniffed constantly. He went into some tirade about how he was in need of money and that his Grandmother was sick and that...Basta! Can't you tell how late it is!? I was sleeping! Some of us hafta work for a living instead of staying up all night taking dope! Don't bother me again! Slam!!

Had a hard time sleeping after that. Put on some Juliee Cruise and she always makes me drift away. So, the alarm goes off, reggaeton blares forth; it is 5:20 a.m. I stagger to the shower and bathe in lukewarm water, dress and hit the dark streets...still wet after last nights storm. I buy two burritos pulpa from the plump smiling lady on the side of the road, traffic whizzes by to the United States, there is black dust in the cracks of her face. I gobble down one burrito before vaulting the turnstile to the International Bridge. A phone call is made and a coworker happily picks me up, stopping first at Starbuck's for a frappaccino mocha. Delish!

Work dragged like a wounded snail and I was nearly comatose by time it was to get off. I hitched another ride back to the border and jet across that long divide. Shriveled shit covered junkies in rags and ponchos, hands outstretched, looking like beat Christ's beg for change down under the bridge. You can hear their pleaful cries...they go unnoticed as all I see in front of me is a wall of fat asses, bouncing ahead of me. An impenetrable wall of flesh.

Stop by Burrito Row, a small street offa Meriscal Avenue that cater to junkie, fag, hooker, and hobo alike. Row after row of metal shacks - twelve of them and the smell of seared meat and stale beans waft through the dusty air. I order a burrito mole with manzana fresca and shoot the shit with Adrian, the hottie that works there. I chomp my mess all the while wondering what'll it take to nail that fine ass. But, I digress...I was still very sleepy and decided to make my way home. Saying adios, I walk through the muggy air - the occasional tsk tsk from the prowling hooker - dodging the kamikaze bus, the suicide taxi. I reach my humble flat and reach for the $150 I stashed under a copy of Edgar Rice Burrough's A Princess of Mars. Next door I pay the rent to the slightly crazed landlady and her oily son watches over me - the old haggish bitch counts the money and miscounts twice before agreeing this is the rent. Heh - crazy ass bitch.

Back at my place, I sit with a Sol Cerveza and switch channels on my big 32inch flat screen telly I had just purchased with my tax return. Nothing but crap, but there was a rap at my front door and was surprised to find Lazo, a self styled street guide for gringos. He tried to impress me with his showmanship the first night we met, but I up'd him one by not only knowing all the dives in Juarez, but ended the night with a jack off competition on my couch whilst watching feelthy porno. Lazo being the straight and narrow and no room for jotos in his life. Still he spurted a lot of jizz onto my tiled floor that night.

Anyhoo, inviting Lazo in he began bleating the same old same old and needed cash and, well, one thing led to another and I found myself sucking that short fat cock of his as the DVD Pick Up Chixxx flickered on screen. The boy, though reluctant at first but when ya need the money well ya need the money, must've been pretty damn horny. Not ten slurps up and down his stiff brown shaft and he was squirting gobs of semen into my mouth; clenching the bed covers with one hand and grabbing the back of my head with the other. He squirmed and grunted as he nutted a mouthful. What can I say, I'm a natural.

Both of us showered, I gave him one hundred pesos and he split. I marched over to the Internet Cafe - the late afternoon streets teeming with life. Fat fag in pinstriped jeans checks me out as I pass the shoe store, smells of mouthwatering chicken are displayed in neon blasted windows with bum pissing onto the outside wall. Small Indian children, snot caked black on their faces, grab my pant leg as I walk by - moanay! moanay! - a clown, a fucking guy dressed as a circus clown DJ's in front of a record shop. My way is clogged by a group of young boys in soccer outfits - they stand laughing talking, I stare at them with broken limitless insect lust. Shoe shine boys call out to shine me leathers as I stroll past blue, yellow, pink adobe houses and buildings erected a hundred years ago. The stores vendors hawk their wares - vying for my attention. The music from various shops is deafening - I cut into the Internet Cafe, order a cappuccino, and bang these words out...