Jack Hall

July, 1995

Biker Girl Gives Swimming Lessons

She wasn't Biker Girl yet, but she was already beginning to suffer uncomprehendingly the consequences of a wildly misspent youth. She had been fired from her waitress position at one of the local topless bars for having refused head to a high-ranking and influential Army officer. She had tried to explain to the Colonel that she was only a waitress and wasn't even allowed to show her tiddies, but the crusty, old closet misogynist exchanged a few quiet words (punctuated by many loud dollars) with her boss, and she was given a choice of either sucking up or walking.

After several scouting expeditions into her chosen field of endeavor, she found that she was not only still unemployed but blacklisted. In desperation, she managed to feign a true interest in childcare and was able to convince a trusting acquaintance of her desire to assist in the raising of the acquaintance's four-year-old daughter in exchange for a place to stay.

The next few weeks were what the soon-to-be motorcycle moll would later recall as the "golden years" of her youth: carefree days of lolling around the pool swilling her "friend's" booze (and watching bemused as the Guatemalan maid did all of the real work), endless nights of prowling the bars seeking new sensations. However, the ominous Law of Murphy worked its inevitable magic as the maid was forced by circumstance to reduce her scheduled hours to two per day and the Gonna-be-a-Biker's-Bitch's free ride was at an end.

A shroud of dark responsibility began to close about the Tough Bitchette's immediate future; not only was she expected to arise from "her" bed before noon, but she also had to suffer the further indignities of washing her own dishes and taking care of "that fuckin' little brat." Her nighttime activities of drinking, dancing and promising pussy in return for drugs were not greatly affected; she just had more of a hangover in the morning and less sleep to cure it with.

After a few days of dealing with the harsh realities of purple dinosaurs, soaps and constant pleas for food, water and attention, an almost-miraculous event occurred--she had an idea.... She would take the little albatross into the backyard pool and teach her how to swim! Then, the still-pretty, erstwhile moll could loll around in the sun all day while the kid played in the water; she could sleep and tan at the same time! She ordered the little girl into a bathing suit and, after several fumbled attempts, opened the childproof lock of the safety fence surrounding the small pool.

Splashing around in the shallow end was fun for a little while, but the party girl's attention span was limited and she grew quickly bored. She tried swimming in the deep end, but every time she left the child alone and swam past the rope, the "little shit" would become hysterical. Because of the near proximity of nosey neighbors, she had to stifle her initial reaction of whacking the child in the ear and try to think of a compromise. She decided to make the small female face her fears by putting the girl-child on her back and swimming around. Everything proceeded smoothly while they stayed in the shallow end, but the moment the proto-Biker Bitch ducked her head under the rope and launched them into the deep water, her trusting "friend's" daughter panicked, squeezed her arms tightly around her nanny's throat and began thrashing violently.

The would-be aquatics instructor had learned to swim in the good, old, time-honored fashion of being tossed from a pier and told to "sink or swim," so her repertoire of life-saving techniques was woefully inadequate for the task at hand. She barely managed to pry the little arms from around her throat before she blacked out, but then, tiny hands grasped fiercely at her hair, keeping her underwater. She reared back and kicked the girl in the chest, feeling two small handfuls of hair being ripped from her head. Deep within her rotting soul, she felt the urge to kick the child again and, because self-denial was never one of her traits, she indulged herself and used the momentum she gained from the pretty, little face to reach the surface of the water. She took a few rasping breaths and felt hands tugging at her feet. She kicked them off, swam to the side of the pool and quickly pulled herself out. She ran to the nearest bottle to calm herself down and, in mid-chug, remembered that she had unfinished business.

She thoughtfully finished the swallow (no sense in wasting good alcohol) and went to the edge of the pool. What she saw there, in the water, almost stayed with her forever....