My evening with Matt Pinfield

I don't know how I wound up riding shotgun in a beat up sedan with Matt Pinfield behind the wheel, the soundtrack of Mudhoney raging on the tinny speakers of his beat up car, a junkyard of crunched up paper fast food bags and stepped on cans of diet soda, the cold wind raging against my face from a broken window that would only roll three quarters the way up while the rain of the four AM spit like some lisped God beckoning me toward a dark unknown field of my soul I never traveled.

Frank in the backseat said something like, "I think we missed our exit. I think we are going the wrong way."

"It doesn't matter," Matter Pinfield said. "We go where the night takes us."

And where would this night take us I wondered? I thought about my mother at home, about the girl I met that night, soft and beautiful ready to take me anywhere but here, anywhere but Matt Pinfield's car cruising at speeds well over a hundred miles per hour down the Garden State Parkway to a destination I couldn't fathom. A fear sept in. I looked into the back seat to my friend. His eyes were empty with the knowledge that we were embarked on a journey from which there was no return.

"Reach into the glove box," Matt Pinfield said. "Lets do some coke."

I reached into the glove compartment.

"This is alot of coke Matt."

"Hell yeah it's a lot of coke! You boys are driving with Matt Pinfield now!" Sweat beads like melting snow formed on his reddening face. "There's a Coldplay cd on the floor break it up on there."

I took the massive bag of coke from the dashboard.

"Is that a gun, Matt?"

Frank muttered something in the back. The ecstacy pills Matt Pinfield had given us were kicking in. I held the gun in my hand. Cold, cold steel. I worried about fingerprints too late. Something in my mind grabbed me and screamed, Jump out the car, it may be going fast, but its a chance you'd be better off taking. I looked at the handle. I looked at the speedometer. One hundred and seven miles per hour. No, there would be no jumping out at this speed.

"Put that fucking gun down are you crazy?" Matt Pinfield slapped me upside the head hard and I held back hot steaming yearning tears. Where was I? How did this happen? Just hours ago I was performing to a mediocre crowd at the Harrison Green Room, now I was on a trip into the hidden bowels of the night with the host of 120 Minutes. How many minutes would I have left now? 120? Less?

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" I put the gun back into the dashboard. Why did Matt Pinfield have a gun?

"When I was on MTV do you know how much fucking ass I got? Do you?"

Frank mumbled in the back.

"Jesus," Matt screamed, "get a hold of yourself, we've got a lot more to do before this night is over! Did you know I saw Kennedy naked? Sniff this coke!"

I looked at the mountain of white devilish powder piled high on the Coldplay CD.

"Maybe I shouldn't just yet," I whispered.

"Maybe you should stop being such a goddamn pussy! I chilled with Axl Rose, now that man could do coke!" And with that he suddenly took his hands from the steering wheel and forcefully shoved my face into the mountain of cocaine I'd help build. I tried to hold my breath but I was suffocating. Finally I had to breath and with that breath came a burning shower of drug that ran into my sinuses and sparked every nueron of my brain.

"God damn," I shouted and Matt Pinfield laughed in approval.

"You ever kill a hooker?" He said.

"What?" I asked.

"Nothing, give your friend some coke."

I passed the ice capped mountain to Frank in the back seat and he slouched into it face first coming up with his face painted white like some sad mime. Matt Pinfield laughed harder. I felt like I was dying.

"You boys love to party! After my own heart. Now, Listen, I'm going to take you to a special place right now and you can't tell anybody about it!"

Frank mumbled in the backseat, "I want to go home."

"Whats wrong with your friend? Is he a fucking Nark?"

"No," I said, "Not Frank, he's above the table."

Somewhere down the road we passed an a bad accident. A car had flipped atop another and a young girl bleeding was wondering into traffic. Matt Pinfield aimed at her and she flew in a sickening thud onto the hood flipping high into the air and smacking on the pavement as we drove past dying into the night ahead of her. Pearl Jam came on the play list and Matt Pinfield punched my shoulder and told me to turn it up, which I did holding back tears.

"I used to be something," he said and scrounged through his pocket. He brought out a small pill. "Take this, it's mescaline."

"I don't think I feel up to it Matt," I said weakly and he punched me in my face until I took it from his palm and swallowed. Soon, through the darkness of our late night drive colors and patterns emerged. A moon of deathly red rested low on the horizon before us and spoke my name over and over, beside me Matt Pinfield was unbuttoning and pulling down his pants.

"I feel better driving pantsless." It all made sense. Why would you want to be restricted by such garments flying this fast down the Garden State Parkway.

He looked at me. "Do you know Kurt Cobain was an alien?"
"Do you know Billy Corgan used to speak to the ghost of Lincoln?"
"Do you know I am god?"

"Matt Pinfield," I said, "I think Frank is in trouble."

Behind me Frank was expanding, he couldn't even fit in the back seat anymore. His bones were growing too fast and his flesh was stretching and make sick tearing sounds. He opened his mouth and a lazer beam projected from his tonsils and lit the car with strange red light.

"I've seen this before," Matt Pinfield said and swerved to the shoulder. He parked and jumped out of the car and together we pulled frank from the backseat to the grass beside the road. His body moved and quaked.

"Open the trunk," Matt Pinfield said and tossed me the keys.

"Jesus Christ, Matt," I shouted, "There are at least seven bodies in here!"

"We just need one, pick!"

I grudgingly dragged the carcass of a small asian woman from the trunk and rested it beside frank who was speaking in strange gibberish. Matt pulled a knife from his belt and began carving strange symbols into the corpses rotting remains and screaming incomprehensible chants. Somewhere far off a dog cried. In China a newborn infant spontaneously combusted and far south in Louisiana an elderly woman died of a heart attack in her sleep.

Frank rolled on his side and began to vomit dark steaming piles of maggots. I tried to hold his hand but it had grown to such a size that its mere touch crushed the tender bones beneath my flesh and I recoiled in pain.

"I need more drugs," Matt Pinfield cried. "Or this will never work!"

So much sooner before I was performing rap music at a small bar in Harrison and had no idea where my night would end up. Above us a vortex opened and two angels descended. Matt Pinfield couldn't see them. They were beautiful. They pulled me aside and their golden wings embraced me.

The first angel spoke: "The Devil has come and he will Ride a Pale Sedan. His Name will be Matt Pinfield."

The second angel spoke: "If you do not destroy him now the end will rise as the morning. Take this long sword and slay him."

A shining sword was given unto me and I held it and knew it was power. Frank wretched a cloud of smoke from his lungs and Matt Pinfield moved close to his neck and sunk his teeth deep in his veins. He was feeding on my friend.

I took the long sword in my hand and thrust it deep between the shoulder blades of Matt Pinfield and a banshee scream erupted from his body that cause three million birds to fall from flight. Suddenly, impaled by my heavenly sword he turned to me.

"Before I die," he spoke," May I have one last key bump?"

I dug my keys into his massive stash and held it before him and he sniffed and died.

Then I went home and made a cool song I'm gonna post on the internet soon.