Panhandle Pals, a short story (Part 1)

“I’m a Florida boy

  From the peninsula

   Panhandle on my head

   Tryin’ to be a star

        Me and my brother

         From America

         Red, white, and blue

Belly flop in the pool

We’re so fucking cool.”

Those were the first lyrics out of the mouth of Wayne “WhiteThunder67” Riley after his brother, Buck “AdmiralBuck420” Riley, pressed the “record” button for their latest TikTok. The two twenty-five-year-old twin brothers were busy filming an a cappella poolside freestyle, doing everything in their power to go viral as online music stars. They called themselves the Panhandle Pals. 

This battle had been an uphill one for the boys so far, as neither of them exactly possessed talent ripe to skyrocket them to the top of the music industry. Their voices sounded near-identical, like a chipmunk with a Southern twang and a bit of a head cold. Along with this disadvantage, the brothers’ appearances had gotten them widely mocked on the Internet since they had become moderately well known. They were both chunky and pasty white with scraggly neckbeards, myriad tattoos decorating their entire bodies from their faces all the way down their arms and legs — mostly generic scribble that carried no real meaning — and two-of-a-kind haircuts. They had both gotten their long sandy hair fashioned into the shape of Florida as a token of state pride, with the state’s panhandle poking out the side of their heads and the lower peninsula poking out as a sort of hideous sideburn. On this day, both brothers were shirtless — their typical style — and wearing sagging jean shorts that exposed a generous view of their boxer shorts underneath.

When Wayne had finished unfurling the lyrics he had so masterfully crafted, it was Buck’s turn to deliver the heat. He flipped his iPhone to the front camera and went in for the kill.

“I’m a Florida boy

         White boy, redneck kid

         Wrestling gators

         I want money

         We get all the honeys

         Comin’ in with the slang gang bang

         And we slang cocaine

         Put my cowboy boots on

And I sing this song.”

Buck handed the phone over to his partner in crime before going in for the epic finale he had planned: a cannonball into their apartment complex pool. Unfortunately, Buck failed to consider one small detail: to look where he was going before jumping. He backpedaled toward the edge and stumbled over a little girl of about four years old who was sitting a few feet away, knocking both of them into the six-foot deep end. The brothers burst out into hyena-like cackles, showing no concern for the girl's safety as her middle-aged mother bolted over and wrangled the child from danger, pulling her back to dry land.

“It’s okay, sweetie, let’s get you out of here,” the mother comforted her child, patting her dry with a towel. “Away from these DISGRACEFUL HOODLUMS with their haircuts straight out of a mental institution! You young men should be ashamed of yourselves! Endangering a little girl's life like that!”

“Pft, you’re just salty you and your kid ain’t got no world-class musical talent like we do,” Buck scoffed back at her. “We’re gonna make us a pretty penny and get out of this shithole town. You’ll be seeing these names everywhere you go.”

“Damn right, lady, listen to the man,” Wayne put in. “WhiteThunder67 and AdmiralBuck420 are gonna be on a building somewhere near you very soon, while you’ll still be stuck here in this shitty, miserable pool with your stupid fuckin’ kid! You’ll see! YOU’LL SEE!”

The woman simply scowled back at them in confusion as she dragged her daughter out of the pool area, looking like she had just swallowed a lemon whole.

Being among the most prolific members of their local unemployed community, the Panhandle Pals weren’t paying the rent for the one-bedroom studio apartment that they shared in Flebumpka, Florida, a small town on the state's northern panhandle near Tallahassee. Instead, they were being given a full ride by their parents, Ronald and Tammy Riley, who just wanted them out of the house. Ronald and Tammy had struggled with drug problems for most of their adult lives and didn’t have a whole lot of extra funds lying around, so funding the boys’ rent was a stretch for them to say the least, but the alternative of having to continue living with them was far, far worse. 

A couple of years ago, Wayne and Buck had landed themselves some jail time for a misadventure that had included narcotics possession, public indecency, and public urination. During their brief time in the slammer, they had begun their a cappella rapping venture to pass the time. Despite a chilly reception from their fellow inmates, the Pals decided music was the way forward in their lives. Their parents, however, were soon unable to tolerate another minute of the boys’ creative aspirations on their property. Ronald, a custodian at a local elementary school, and Tammy, a convenience store clerk, had been forced to go on welfare after they started covering the Pals’ rent, but to them, it was well worth it to get them out of the house.

“Yuh, we gettin’ up to some FUCKSHIT on this stream for real for real, boys,” orated WhiteThunder67 on the boys’ latest live stream. The Pals’ stream on Flick — the platform with the loosest creator regulations and most generous ban policies — currently had thirty-two viewers. 

“Damn right, we got some more GENERATIONAL bangers comin’ at y’all here very soon,” AdmiralBuck420 boasted. “But we can’t do it on our own, yo. We some broke bitches out here, on God. So, we are once again asking for your financial support.”

“That’s right, my brother and I are a couple of starving artists out here in these streets,” WhiteThunder67 claimed. “A couple of sugar babies looking for their sugar daddies. Or mamas, if you’re out there.”

“Fo sho, fo sho,” AdmiralBuck420 concurred. “If there’s any MILFs — or hell, even DILFS — out there who want to bless us with their money, we got you. So please, make us feel good — and make yourself feel good — by making a little donation to the cause. Hit that motherfuckin’ ‘donate’ button in the top right corner of your screen and make it rain on us bitches.”

WhiteThunder67 rummaged through a pile of junk on the floor of their shared bedroom until he found the prop he was looking for — a rusted steel kitchen pan. AdmiralBuck420 dug his own cheap pan out of the rubble, and they each held their cooking vessels up the camera, Florida hair flying around ridiculously all over the place and pleading puppy-dog looks in their eyes. Before long, the Internet did its thing and the live-stream chat began roasting them.

“Bruh they literally panhandling right now, I can’t with these two goobers,” read one comment, followed by three crying laughing emojis and three skull emojis.

“They just be lettin anyone be a celeb these days huh"

“God just be making anyone these days. TF IS THAT HAIR,” followed by a vomit emoji.

“It’s a crime against humanity, is what it is.”

“How they be expectin’ us to put money in that pan thru the screen. These gotta be the first mfs ever with a negative IQ.”

“I’m losing brain cells just watching this.”

As usual, the brothers paid no mind to the hate. Any attention on the Internet was good attention. When they were done shaking the empty pans around, they pulled a video up on their laptop and used the camera to record the laptop screen. They had to show off their latest poolside musical masterpiece to the world. As soon as WhiteThunder67 uttered the first “I’m a Florida boy” to start the song, a fresh wave of engagement erupted in the chat.

“Aww it’s so sweet that they let people with down syndrome perform at the pool,” followed by an ironic heart-face emoji.

“Yo this shit goes CRAZY on mute!”

“No AI, no autotune, just straight ASS,” followed by five fire emojis.

“I would like to thank the Panhandle Pals for being my greatest heroes. For thirty years, my beautiful brother was in a coma. I put this song on, and he immediately jumped out of bed to turn it off. You saved his life!!!”

Another comment was an image of a man wearing ear buds that went straight into a trash can. Wayne and Buck looked at each other and shared a brief moment of self-reflection. We’re really not very good at this, are we? They put their brave faces back on and went right back to doomscrolling the comments. The next chat, however, was unexpected, a rare outlier from all the hate to which they were accustomed. It came from a user known as RichGuy69 — who had no profile picture.

“Greetings Pals, I am an eccentric, independently wealthy gentleman in your area and I would like to make you boys a most generous offer. Kiss each other. Kiss each other on camera for five consecutive seconds without stopping, and I will pay you ONE BILLION DOLLARS. Offer is limited to today only, so act fast. I am a man of very specific and exquisite taste, and I have the power to make your lives very sweet indeed.”

The boys turned the camera back around to themselves, then looked into each other’s eyes again. This was so wrong. Everything about it was so wrong. This may have been Florida, but they were still BROTHERS, after all. 

The Pals’ financial situation, however, said this was so right. They looked around at their pathetic wasteland of an apartment, with old crusty pizza boxes, Dorito bags, and drug paraphernalia all over the floor. Their parents would only support this living arrangement for so much longer, and this was a chance to turn things around. Did they really have that much dignity left anyway? Finally, impulsively, they decided to act.

“This is for you, RichGuy69,” AdmiralBuck420 said.

He and WhiteThunder67 proceeded to lock lips and go at it for five straight seconds, then turned away immediately, choking and dry heaving. The Pals’ disgust, however, was nothing compared to the cesspool of utter repulse that was the live chat, now getting inundated with vomit emojis and some serious comments admonishing them for their incestuous actions — but mostly a barrage of people spouting different variations of “GAYYY” and various homophobic slurs.

The boys, however, only cared about the opinion of one person. When the kiss and its aftermath were mercifully over, they stared intently at the chat for about five minutes, taking in all the hate but mostly hoping and praying for RichGuy695 to get back to them. One billion dollars would go a long way in this economy, after all. Wayne and Buck were hopeful that the offer was legitimate, but their optimism slowly started to wane. Could it have all been for nothing?

“Tf are you goofballs staring at”

“You waitin for that rich guy? Yeah he saw what he wanted to see, ain’t no billion dollars comin your way.”

“Y’all really made out with each other for nothing lmao bruh some ppl so stupid it’s dangerous,” followed by three crying laughing emojis.

"Hey, here's a fun fact. You made out with your brother!"

Wayne and Buck looked at each other with sadness in their eyes. It had been an act of pure desperation, degenerate desperation that had forced them to sink to their lowest ever low. The glimmer of hope that had come from the mysterious chat seemed to be fading, and fading fast. They had no actual talent, after all. Their only chance of making it big had been as laughingstocks, at least before the opportunity arose to become the playthings of a wealthy pervert. Now, heartbreakingly, it appeared the pervert's wealth may have been greatly overexaggerated.

“Man, this fucking sucks, bro,” Wayne muttered, and Buck could barely mumble a response. They both crossed their arms and looked down at the ground in pure shame, not knowing what to say or do as viewers began to drop off the stream. Just then, they heard the ping of a private message coming into their Flick inbox, a sound that was oddly hopeful. It was, in fact, from RichGuy69.

“My god, that Kiss. THAT KISS. It was wildly dangerous and so, so wrong, and the wrongness made it even more gloriously delicious. I have been deeply, deeply satisfied, and I intend to keep my promise to pay you two ONE BILLION DOLLARS for blessing me with such a splendid gift. Meet me in the alley behind the Wal-Mart on South Main Street in downtown Flebumpka. 3 a.m. sharp tomorrow morning. You may refer to me as The Pleasurer. You boys are something truly special. ;)”

The brothers looked at each other again, but this time, their eyes glimmered with excitement and hope.

“I was gonna go to that Wal-Mart at 3 a.m. anyway to meet Kyle,” Buck said. “I’m SO fucking in, homie. We ‘bouta get that BAG, cuz!”

Buck and Wayne high-fived each other and chest-bumped giddily, overcome with anticipation of the future that awaited them.

“Yo, Thunder, where this dude at?” Buck huffed in frustration, crossing his arms like a child who’d had his toy taken away.

It was 3:15 a.m. in the dark alley behind the Flebumpka Wal-Mart, and Buck had just finished up a deal for some weed and lean with his drug dealer, Kyle, before Kyle had to go take care of some important business in a nearby Applebee’s restroom. Buck had already started downing the purple drank, but was getting impatient as he waited for the main man to arrive.

“Bruh, I don’t think this gonna happen, Admiral, for real,” Wayne said drowsily in defeat. “Dude was fuckin’ bluffin’.”

Wayne pulled a small, empty whipped cream can out of his pocket and sprayed the air into his mouth, a trick that always seemed to help calm him down.

“Man, you gotta fuckin’ BELIEVE, Thunder!” Buck admonished him. “Just sittin’ here doin’ whip-its like a fuckin’ loser. That’s not what the real rappers do. The real rappers take LEAN, bro. On God. They leaned out.”

“Oh, whatever you say, Admiral,” Wayne slurred. “Have fun when the fuckin’ cops come … to get you.”

He faded and slumped to the ground, completely out of it. At that moment, the boys were snapped out of their hazes by an unexpected sight: a sleek red 2026 Rolls-Royce Droptail La Rose Noire, squeezing into the pitch-black alley and pulling right up to them. The ultra-luxury vehicle instantly grabbed their attention, and the driver’s side window slowly rolled down.

The man it revealed looked to be about sixty, but he looked good for his age, like a classical silver fox. His gray hair was slicked back in a chic style, and he wore a black leather jacket over a white shirt and tie, expensive-looking sunglasses that obscured much of his face, and puffed on a fancy cigarette with the elegance of a 1950s movie star. He lowered his shades and took a long look at Buck and Wayne, gazing at their bodies up and down and studying every inch of them.

“Ah, yes indeed,” the man said in a silky smooth voice, the voice of a Casanova clearly experienced in the art of seduction. “These are just the boys I was looking for. The Panhandle Pals. How dashing you two gentlemen are, and what a lovely, erotic display you allowed me to experience earlier. Magical. Truly MAGICAL.”

The Pals were still in their outfits from the pool earlier, not having changed despite how wet they had gotten. Their cargo shorts sagged halfway down their legs to reveal their boxers, and they still hadn’t bothered to put on shirts.

“Uh, thanks bro, I guess,” Buck offered uncomfortably. “So you’re RichGuy69?”

The man threw his head back and laughed, leaving the boys in confusion. “I am indeed RichGuy69, if that’s how you choose to refer to me. I personally like to refer to myself as … The Pleasurer.”

The drugged-out Pals looked at each other and scoffed. 

“Okay, ‘Pleasurer,’” Wayne slurred, making air quotes. “That’s kinda fucking gay.” The two burst out laughing and stumbled into each other, nearly falling to the ground.

“So do we get our money?” Buck asked him, becoming a little more lucid. “The one billion dollars, where’s that at?”

“Yes, I will in fact be delivering on the funds I promised to you boys,” The Pleasurer assured them. 

He pulled a black briefcase from his passenger seat and opened it to show them the spoils: stacks upon stacks of $100 bills, many a Benjamin Franklin gazing out enticingly at the brothers. Their eyes widened and they became short of breath. A little bit of drool collected in the corner of Wayne’s mouth.

“Now before I give you this money, I want you to promise me one thing,” The Pleasurer continued, index finger gesturing charismatically in the air. “You can treat yourselves a little bit, sure. Buy yourselves a few nice things. Be comfortable. That’s all fine and dandy. But above all, I want you boys to do great things with this money. Change the world. Donate it to causes you really, truly believe in, that you think will advance our society to the utmost degree. You can be philanthropists. You can be heroes. You can be LEGENDS.”

The boys looked at each other blankly, not knowing what to think, then turned back to him.

“We promise,” they said quickly and in unison.

The corners of The Pleasurer’s mouth turned up in a smile. “Very well then. Guillermo!” 

He gestured out the Rolls-Royce window for the assistant he had hired to help him. From the front of the Wal-Mart, a massive U-Haul truck pulled around — the biggest one that was offered — and the middle-aged Mexican man driving it pulled to a stop and stepped out.

“Here’s your money, boys,” Guillermo said with a smile. “One billion dollars. Cold, hard cash.”

Wayne and Buck had failed to register the fact that one billion dollars couldn’t possibly fit into one briefcase. As they took the sample briefcase from The Pleasurer and entered the gargantuan U-Haul, they saw that the money in the truck was loose and floating around in stacks of Benjamins — far, far more Benjamins than they thought they would ever see in their lifetimes. Overcome with intoxicated greed and only half understanding what was going on, the tweaking twins collapsed into the wonderland of racks and began waving their arms and legs back and forth on the ground — celebrating their new fortune by making money angels.

“Ah, you boys are certainly having fun already,” The Pleasurer said with the tone of a proud parent. He had entered the truck and was now standing over them, lowering his sunglasses to reveal his eyes. “Again, make sure you use that money responsibly. And this doesn’t have to be goodbye, by the way. I have a little … island vacation coming up very soon. We’re hosting some very prestigious parties, and I think you two would be a most wonderful fit for the festivities we have in mind.”

He shot them a wink, and a bit of a chill went down the Pals’ spines. 

“Uh, no thanks, bro, that’s a little weird,” Buck scoffed.

“Yeah, I’m good on that, sounds kinda like some of that creepy rich-people cult shit,” Wayne insulted him. “Thanks for the money, though! You a real homie for that, I’ll tell ya that!”

The Pleasurer smiled wryly. “Well, hopefully you’ll come around someday. It really is a most marvelous time that we have together. Anyway, I'm glad I could be a real ‘homie’ to you two gentlemen. The truck is all yours.”

He lowered his shades and stepped out of the U-Haul, walking back out into the darkness and taking Guillermo with him out of the Pals’ lives.

To be continued ...

Part 2: Find out what the Pals do with their newfound fortune