Ricky Still Smokes

Did you come back to find out
If Ricky still smokes?

Because Ricky still smokes
If that's what you wanted to know

You could have called
And found that out

So maybe that's not why
You hopped a flight back here

And are you planning on staying
Or only staying long enough
To remember why you left?

Because we don't throw going away parties around here anymore
And we sure as hell don't throw the same one twice

Did you come back to see
If Benny got off the drugs?

He didn't

Did you come back to see
If Trish still bartends at Barbabos?

Because she doesn't
She strips instead
Or sometimes she fucks for money
And Barbabos isn't even there anymore

There, do you feel better now?

Now that you're all caught up?

My Mom?

She's got lung cancer
Probably got six months left
There, I saved you a phone call

How much do those cost nowadays?

My Dad?

He busted Frank Natti's head in
In a brawl outside Mickey's
And now he's in jail

My brother's got a baby girl
That he doesn't talk about
And a motorcycle he won't shut up about

My sister married a prick
Who beats the shit out of her
About as often as he buys her jewelry
So now she's got bracelets to distract
From the bruises on her wrists

And rather than interfere
Or because we're all too fucked up ourselves to take on her case
My entire family just keeps praying
Her dickhead of a husband won't start beating on my niece
Because then I'd have to let my dad know
And two days later they'd find my brother-in-law's nuts
Taped up outside his mother's front door

Because that's just how my Dad is

But you already knew that, didn't you?

This ain't a book you haven't read before
And just like a book
The ending's the same
Every time you read it

See when you left you weren't sure
You thought maybe you were leaving in the middle
Maybe there was still some life and story left
In this fucked up little story of ours

But there is no story here
Not at all

There's sure as fuck no beginnings, new or old
I'll tell you that much

We're all just spinning around on the head of a top
Waiting to see when it'll go down
So we can all rest in peace

And if you wanna know what we need
What we need is to have people like you
Stop stopping by to find out
If they have to feel guilty
For taking off when they did
Or how they did
Or why they did

Oh, but let me guess

No good jobs down south either?
No better people in Seattle?
Nothing much more to do in Santa Fe?
Everything look the same everywhere else
As it does here

That's because no matter where you go
You're still looking at everything
Through the same damn eyes

At least around here we know what we're seeing

And at least when you left
We had one less blind kid in the neighborhood
We had to look out for

See, Nicky, he still gets in fights
But he's older now
So he loses more often

Paul's still the handsome fuck he always was
But now there are younger guys
Who can get the type of girls he used to like
So instead he buys time with Trish
And they reminisce about when they were both hot shit

That's our favorite thing to do around here
Sit around and remember

Billy remembers his football career
Right before he got Nina knocked up
And had to take over his father's car shop

You never saw a mechanic try so hard
To rub the grease on his pants
Before he shakes hands with you

Like he's saying 'this ain't who I am'
This is only temporary

We got a lot of temporary around here
Even more than before you left

Everybody's moving
As soon as they find a van big enough
To fit all their shit in

Me?

There ain't a van big enough
That I know

That I do know

As for Ricky, he still smokes

And drinks
And shoots up
And swears
And fucks
And licks his chops
And gambles on which side of the pie will taste better
And makes up stories about himself
Like we all haven't known him all his life

Must be horrible when your life sucks
And you can't even dress it up a little

Is that what you do back where you live now?

Do you dress all this up?

Make it look better?
Make it look worse?

Make it a mansion
Or a novel people can read
So they can see how brave you are
That you escaped from it?

Fuck you

Nobody needs you here

And if you're smarter
Good for you

And if you're nicer
Bravo

And if you're a better person
I'll go find a crowd
To clap for you
And a governor to give you a medal

But once that's done
Why don't you take off
And let the rest of us
Keep going?

Yeah, Ricky's still smoking

And I got more respect for him
Than I do for you
Because at least he knew
That he'd be smoking as much anywhere else
As he does here

I can still hear your little girl standing out in front of your old house
Asking me when you were coming back
Right before your mother made her go inside

If there was a rope tying you here
And you thought you were being strangled
Then you should have told me
And I would have undid that rope for you

I would have held onto it for me
While you got your shit together
And I would have tied it around me
And let you walk as far as you could
Until you realized that here is where you needed to be

But instead you took out a knife
And cut right through it

That rope was all you had that connected you to here
So don't try coming back
Because you couldn't find your way back here
If I drew you a map

So yeah, Ricky still smokes
And I still paint houses
When there's houses to paint
And your little girl still thinks you went off to be a movie star
Because we all told her that's what you do
So she wouldn't hate you

And you still can't look me in the eye
When I'm telling you the truth

So see?

Nothing's changed at all