"So long, mister."

I looked at a butt. It was a butt I once enjoyed. Now this butt was like a sagging wedding cake. Spongy, stale and expensive. Jeans covered the butt like sloppy frosting - too thin in some areas, bulging out in others.

"This is not a good butt," I said.

The butt’s owner looked at the ground, his gaze fixed on a trampled cupcake wrapper. I had eaten that cupcake and thrown the wrapper on the floor. Fuck janitors, I remember thinking to myself.

"What do you have to say for yourself? For your butt?" I asked him.

His eyes still clawed at the empty space between his head and the wrapper. He was silent other than the heavy breaths escaping his mouth.

"Why are you still here? You’re not good enough to be in the cowboy butt contest. You won’t even tell me why your butt is so bad," I said.

His head eased up like a rusty cellar door. He focused on a spot of air two inches away from my head.

"I’ve always wanted to be a cowboy. But I can’t rope. I can’t sing a sad song. I can’t shoot straight. Horses don’t like me. So, mister, what I figure is that this ol’ cowboy butt is all I’ve got left," he said in a mournful yodel.

"As far as butts go, it’s an abomination," I replied. "If I ever hear of a terrible butts contest I’ll call you up. But there’s no such thing and I’d never call you. For any reason."

With a tip of his white, crusty hat he turned around.

"So long, mister," he said.

His boots sounded like a forlorn train on the linoleum floor as he left. The screen dour bounced shut after his escape.
"There goes the finest cowboy I ever met," I stated with a grin.