================================================================= BASTARDS WHO FUCKED OVER ME ================================================================= 15 Us boys under the tree out by Camino de los Winos with the hydraulic therapy. ================================================================= At the dead end of the main street through the Golden Gardens tract was the National Guard armory, and on the way were two other tourist attractions. One was the city jail annex and the other was across the road from it, a stand of ancient and enormous cottonwood trees whose limbs bent to the ground. The drive into the jail complex, and by extension the old track into the farm parcel across from it, was called Camino de los Winos in honor of the majority of jail residents. The grove stood in the center of a 30-acre parcel which still bore the marks of having been plowed and sewn for some crop many years ago. The plot had a large and important irrigation lateral passing through it. This small canal still fed water to Golden Gardens into smaller ditches made in alleys. At certain times of the month, each land owner was permitted to let water flow into his yard or acreage. The stand of trees and their shade made a wonderful play area for the kids in the east end of the neighborhood. The big ditch close by was just deep enough for swimming when fully charged. The Salt River Project had a constant campaign in newspapers, radio and television warning all and sundry of the dangers of swimming in their properties. Those who were so inclined did it anyway. The nearest public pool was miles away and cost money besides. I rarely ventured out that far east, preferring my haunts in the river bed to the west where there was a group of small gravel pits which had taken on water both from airport drainage and from underground sources. These pits were a bit treacherous because most of them had steep sides. Once in, climbing out was difficult. The banks were thick with stands of bullrushes and other semi-aquatic plants. Dragon flies were thick at certain times of the day, and bull frogs sang to their mates in the warm evenings. Some of the kids fished the waters for carp. But almost nobody swam in these waters because there were rumors about water mocassins. One summer day I decided to go out toward the National Guard armory to look for junk. The edge of the river bed was illegally used by many people and businesses as a dump. I found some neat things there. For a whole year I kept myself in scratch paper by using the backs of invoice copies dumped by the P & M Foods Company. I found everything from old radios to fix up to embarrassing items of personal hygiene. I found two Atwater Kent receivers which only required tubes to have running again. Another find was a watertight radio transmitter to be used in some sort of search and rescue. It was yellow, big, and heavy. It had a handle on it inside a screw-off cover. Larry and I turned the handle to see what would happen. There was another port with a spool of wire in it. We decided to unwrap all the wire and see how long it was -- about 50 feet. Then we decided to crank some more. As we cranked, we heard clicking noises from inside the box. Pretty soon here came a couple of weekend warriors in a National Guard truck. They stopped and asked us who we were and where we got that yellow box. Turned out the box was in working order, should not have been thrown out, and we were transmitting an SOS message by cranking it! They just took it away from us and told us to mind our own business. Among the finds in personal garbage was a batch left by some folks who must have been having an awfully good time in the bedroom. There were condoms strewn about, some used, some not. I wondered what "vaginal jelly" was. Then I thought about it and Larry shrieked, Omigod! Don't you know what a vagina is? He continued, That's stuff ladies put in their pussy for when they fuck. It prevents babies, too. I wondered how it did that. Larry opined that it must destroy the jizz some way. I couldn't throw it down fast enough. We gathered up some of the best tasteless finds into a cardboard box. Some of the wierder things we wouldn't touch with our hands. We picked them up with pieces of newspaper. We found some kitchen utensils I have no idea what we would ever do with, but we thought they were too neat to let lie. We even found a bulb thing you could use to put water into storage batteries without getting it all over. I was going to give that to my dad because he was always having to put water in the car battery and he did it from a jug and made a mess. On our way back to our houses with our finds, we passed the lot with the grove of cottonwoods. There were a bunch of boys horsing around under the trees who hailed to us. I guess they wanted to see what we found. We went over and showed them the stuff. The oldest one was named Gene. He and Larry were good friends but I only knew him by sight. Gene had three brothers, all of them hanging out together here in the shade. They'd been in swimming. Nude. Everybody had their pants back on, dammit, except for next oldest brother Gordon who was running around butt nekkid. We were all sitting or leaning against low limbs of the trees shooting the breeze. Gene took great delight in embarrassing Gordon by telling Larry and me that Gordon got shit on his pants. We razzed Gordon, Like don't you know by now not to shit your pants? Gordon said he wouldn't've shit his pants if Gene hadn't tried to cornhole him. Larry busted out laughing and I was dumbstruck. Is this why Larry and Gene are such good friends? Is Gene porking Larry and Larry is playing Little Miss Innocent? And, if so, why would Gene want to fuck his own little brother? Larry looked at me, and I wagged my head No. I wasn't going to volunteer to help Gene out. I don't go for public scenes, but if Gene was going to give us a show I sure as hell would watch! Larry rooted around in our box of treasures and came up with the water bulb. He told Gene, You could fill this up and clean out Gordon. Gene thought that was a good idea. He ran over to the lateral and filled the bulb with sun-warmed water. When Gordon saw what was planned for him, he tried to take off but remembered he didn't have any clothes on. The two smaller brothers laid him out in the dust with a thump. I guess they were anxious to see their elder "get the business" for a change. Gene knelt down next to Gordon's butt and squirted the water into his butt, pressing the bulb flat. Gordon said, You bastard, that's cold! Gene said, Shut up and take it like a girl. Gene ran back to the lateral to reload and gave Gordon another squirt. Then Gene told him to go behind this particular tree where they had a hole dug for a latrine. Gordon made his squat and then jumped in the lateral to wash off. Why do I think these boys were plenty into it? Because Gordon didn't have anything more to say. He laid over a low branch and let Gene come at him. The two smaller brothers stood around watching and playing with their own hairless dicks. Larry and I kept a respectable distance -- not that we couldn't see clearly what was going on -- and stayed out of it. After Gene finished using his brother, we made some pleasantries and worked into saying how we had to get back home or our mothers would kill us blah blah blah. Both Larry and I were pretty uneasy after seeing this demented display of brotherly love. We left the squirt bulb with them, figuring they might need it more than our car batteries. I heard a couple years after I moved away from home that Gordon got roaring drunk and shot Gene flat dead.