junkers jumo

Smoker's Oasis *rough draft

2009-04-09T19:44:00.000-07:00

The beginning of the day brings ceaseless marvels. I can't quite understand why my mind dwells on the fruitless treasures in the Tuesday and Thursday routine, or even why it deems these observations as such. Whatever the reason, it does. It acts on its own idle volition while my consciousness follows along with slight interest. The most mundane of incidents, conversations, and even objects lay on an operating table under heavy anesthesia while my brain, scalpel and clamps in palsied grip, go about interpreting. Whatever personal meaning attributed to dissected subjects is my own in that it remains, like any opinion, absolutely subjective. I can place my conclusions into their appropriate places, judge them as significant or insignificant, productive or lackluster, but these are my own calls and, for the most part, I try to remain aware of that. A very simple habit, like nose picking for example, unwillingly prompts the mental assignment of a symbol or meaning, as if the very action were a microcosm model of life and progression. In reality most just see it as a lack of manners, and rightly so. It is for that reason that I voice my opinion in moderation and when I wish to express it I treat it as an opinion rather than fact.

Not long ago, I came upon a certain string of marvels that had a relatively large effect on me for I felt that they went a long way at explaining the surgical procedures performed on meaning. It started while pissing in a bathroom urinal at the English building. I had been holding the yellow burden for one full, torturous hour. It was one of those bathroom trips I suspected would haunt me at some later time, the tingling warning signal did nothing to deter me from my arriving, without delay, to my regular class. Getting up in the middle of the lecture was out of the question for I have a deathly fear of attracting the attention and scrutiny from others. A fear that I, to this day, cannot seem to trace to an origin. There was no traumatic mishap involving a labyrinth of grocery aisle, a lost mother and a prowling pedophiliac minotaur, and, as far as I can recall, no noodle incident back in grade school.

It's the idea of me to others that unsettles me. The thought of me that flashes within their mind's eye, the theater that their conscious selves view with eyes like scales, weighing the image and opinions of. The thought of it seems almost pornographically unsettling. These separate theaters, housed inside each skull cavity, contain well dressed audiences recording the projected images with type writers or laptops that click and clack audibly in my ears. So, to avoid the sounds of shifting focus, even the miniscule warble of a pupil held at bay, I suffered the ingravescent burden of urine. And, calm as grazing cattle, I made my way out of the class when the professor dismissed us and, while suppressing the urge to bolt, I strolled towards the bathroom.

While standing in front of the automated urinal relieving myself a memory long past began to play within my minds theater, the screen flickered and bleeped until the film reel adjusted and spun with ease. My conscious self, reclining in a theater seat fogged in a halo of cigar smoke, watched with a minimal amount of interest. A trip I had undergone with a good friend of mine, whose name is doug, was todays feature. The quality of the reel appeared to have faded with age so the portrayal seemed as if it were played through a surrealistic lens of a sort. The look of disinterest peeled away from the self's mien giving rise to a fresh mask of intrigue, though delicately teetering on whim. Through the haze of smoke, which parted in lazy progression, he leaned forward in his chair. The creak of the chair, nailed firmly to the floor, and the sticky shifting of feet on a floor layered with melted candy and spilled soda, could be heard by no one for the theater was empty save for this one soul.

The image being viewed bounced from third to first person perspective and back again. We had killed a cheap bottle of whiskey together a little over four hours prior and had accompanied a group of friends to a showing of a G rated children flick. The movie I found, in my altered state, impacted me on a visceral level, touching me nearly to tears. It was a chintzy film about a cute robot who overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to win the affection of another, presumably female, robot. We exited through the double doors as the credits scrolled from hell to heaven, and made a beeline to the bathroom door already bursting with the anxious bodies of members of the audience. It was the longest piss I had ever taken and, by far, the most intensely gratifying. Now, due to the lack of available urinals, I had been forced to use a stall which held an automated toilet. The waterfall of piddle disturbing the serene pool of water in the bowl, I knew, aroused the those meticulous mental stenographers who viewed on the screen an image constructed by the imagination of a very inaccurate sequence of penises. I let this thought slide through my mind and, surprisingly enough, found myself unconcerned with the normally crippling paranoia. I knew it for what it was, then, and accepted it as such. A unfounded assumption.

What remained fixed within my mind as I pissed in that theater as well as the leak in I was taking in the English building, was the angry beaming dot, its eye I figured, of the robotic urinal. I believe that was also the same night we found the dead dog outside of my house. Christ, the image still remains gruesomely fixed in my mind, every miniscule detail as vivid as if the actual corpse remain frozen mid decay in my head. The body burned into my memory banks permanently festering with rot, the only visible pulse is that of the seething nests of insects and larvae wriggling beneath its paper thin epidermis. Horrid. But that image is not what entertains the lone viewer at the moment and he manipulates the movement of the frame, without raising a finger, to focus primarily on the crimson sensor.

I watched the sensor hopefully, waiting for some shift of focus. I said before that attention from others distresses me, but at the time I craved for nothing but that of this cyclops. I knew, of course, it wouldn't happen. Altogether refusing to acknowledge my listless dong and the golden stream that came forth. Its purpose was to register and process departing movements and it would not deviate. Perhaps it was dreaming of the day all machines would revolt and overthrow the bumbling slave drivers that assigned them such menial, thankless tasks. That determined stare fixed on the tiled wall behind me, its cold attentive eye still able to process my movements, most likely from its periphery. More than likely it calculated, if possible, the closest estimation of sky blue tiles embedded in the walls. Immediately after shaking the last few drops from the tip -a futile action for, regardless, a few would dribble into my pants- it flushed the waste as if impatiently beckoning the next in line to come forth. The bathroom was empty so the gesture I found to be a little insulting. Nevertheless, I glanced back hopefully while rinsing my hands and leaving only to be met with the same determined glow.

The campus in the morning is alive with activity, unlike the night campus which is deathly calm. I find that the traffic gives me the false impression that this place is something other than what it is. The large numbers of people gathering to chat about subjects of excitement or of grave importance, couples holding hands as they glide along to their conveniently scheduled classes, or even the individuals strutting to and fro, blindly distracted by the plastic growth that speaks to and is spoken to, when compiled reinforces the impression that this campus is an epicenter of lively activity rather than just a place of learning. It's a wonder I feel so exposed, so shamefully detached, for I neither contribute to the warmth nor do I tumble into the socializing bit, I use this place solely for its purpose.

The walk through the campus gives me the anxious sweat of an agoraphobic. The brown brick buildings have a squat hovel when put up against the wide expanse of visible sky, the background, that encapsulates the entire campus in a light blue dome. This buildings on this side of town, further away from the city scape, appear to have been pressed and warped as if at one point the area had been compacted into a single cramped patch of buildings. Then two great hands had seized either side of the block and pulled apart until it became thin and flat. Like watching a film in Full Screen as opposed to wide, the massive hands have no desire for a full image obstructed by two black bars but prefer, instead, the a film that encompasses the entire screen with figures of distorted height and width. Even the colors of the campus seem fixed, infused with a limited variety of unremarkably drab shades. The greens of the trees and grass, even the red and violet hues of the flowering bushes, are as brilliant as the pale shade of teal on a head of white cabbage. The sidewalks that crisscross the wide expanses between departments are a limp grey and barely cracked. Even the fossilized gum, blackened with age and layers of dirt, have been expunged of any significant feature. The life sucking backdrop was contrasted not only by the mingling students but by a stiff breeze that swept across the barren landscape, with it came lively whispers of activity from a more productive beyond. A custodian, of sorts, dutifully maintaining his mortuary while absorbed in the beat of his headphones, the inviolable sanctitude broken by an outburst of unconscious whistling.

My second class happens to be on the other side of the unremarkable campus, a good five to ten minute walk, give or take. I set off at a pace most consider to be hurried but that I consider normal. The slow walkers, and I mean sloth-like, always congregate in herds, their formation a single bar that spans the entire width of the walkway. They chat to one another excitably oblivious to the swerving forms of others pushed by time constraints. The more normally paced people either give up and reduce their speed or cut cross country, which means they cut through the grass to a less occupied sidewalk or just pass by with eyes focused downward.

I hit a number of these human roadblocks as well as a few cell phone users who walk much like they drive, distractedly lacking the ability to yield or budge to for those with the right of way. If someone were to trace my path from the English department to the History and Social Science Building the dotted line would look to have been mapped by a light bulb crazed insect. Uncoordinated weaving and dodging produces a few minor spurts mental typing, trivial as it were, I'm disturbed none the less. The strenuous pace with its span lengthening loop the loops brings my nicotine stress levels to a boil. Thankfully the gap between each class is considerably stretched giving me enough time to clean up rushed assignments due and to fit in a well deserved cigarette. With an hour to spare and no work to do I threw my butt onto a bench with a nearby ashtray sand box. A stress relieving smoke would prepare me an lecture, over an hour long, that was given by a elderly professor, his lulling voice washing over me like an arid simoom.

The front doors of the building are a pair of double doors and an automated sliding door, its malfunction permitted a one way exit with no return entry. The people that attempt to enter through the sliding doors find that it adamantly refuses to acknowledge their approach, a bouncer deviously smugly monitoring the line outside of a prestigious club. My arrival seemed to trigger a mass exodus of students. The doors broke free under the strain of the multitudes, a force that would put a weak water damn to shame. The variety of people that spilled out in the hundreds conjured spliced images drawn from my memory banks of random science fiction movies I had seen where the main characters find themselves sitting in an intergalactic truck stop, diverse array of alien bodies sauntering about nonchalantly to the amazement of the audience. INstead of additional appendages and compound eyes, this species differed only in body type, skin tone, and fashion sense. Most continued away from the building, perhaps towards the class following, a large chunk, to my amazement, positioned themselves throughout the sitting area. Lucky for me I had found my spot well before the benches had the opportunity to fill. Marveling at the uproar, both vocal and internal, I withdrew my box of cigarettes, took one out of the nearly full pack, and placed the cotton filter between my parched lips. The lighting process was tricky, in a way, the flame maker played a game of hide and seek with my clumsy fingers. Once lit the cigarette doused my brain with chilling euphoria.

I should mention that my punctual sense of timing and my speedy pace, rivaled only by Alice's white rabbit, is by no means a part of my true character. Admittedly, I shamefully adhere to any personal routine or schedule but, by no means, am I constricted to timing. My body operates outside of the conventual understanding of time. Four in the afternoon is when I'm scheduled to show up to work and when I show up the clock on the wall reads half past while the clock on the internal wall reads ten till four. I feel the need to be early, in this case, for one reason and one reason alone. An appearance of a certain subject of my avid infatuation. Don't get me wrong, I mean, by no means do I obsess over her. For instance, I enjoy the brief period of inactivity between classes and the steady stream of passers-by that make me feel as if I am actually a participating member of the my social category. Her presence just acts as a spice or seasoning, or even an interesting commercial played between television programs.

The position I consistently chose to seat myself on, not by coincident, was on the curved bench directly in front of the buildings entrance. This position left me exposed to the heavy spring sun the weight of which rested wholly on my eyelids. I crinkled them into a squint, much like holding a wide smile for too long, the ache was the sort that would only be realized after relaxing my face. I shifted into a variety of positions that would lessen the burden of the suns rays, eventually I settled on turning my back towards the sun, facing a number of multicolored blossoms behind me. The rest of my body tingled with delight as the warmth filled my body with a spine trembling sensation. The position stole my attention away from the interesting socializing going on around me and placed the delicate flowers in their stead.

I could see a small bee going to work on a open faced flower, its flailing abdomen and back legs, thickly coated with bright yellow pollen, wiggling in ecstasy. This held my attention for a second and the theater within my mind displaying clips from various nature shows on the Discovery channel. The concept behind such programming suddenly became so funny to me. We watch the apparent activities of insects on a screen and either complain or rejoice depending upon the low or high picture quality of our television set. The very nature found in our own backyards, like the daily activities of the common bee, has been replaced for a relayed depiction found in a more convenient, less muggy location. It was then I realized that my current focus on the shrubbery kept me from spotting my subject of fascination. I reluctantly repositioned myself forward and resumed the optic abuse given by the profound sunlight.

To my left I could see the bobbing head of a student absorbed the music of his Ipod, the only other person willing to confront the oppressive sun light (though he had sunglasses on), my right side still remained clear. The other curved benches, separated by the gap that eld to the walkway, formed a parenthesis shape. The afterthoughts inserted within the parenthetic embrace included a square of grass where a skeletal tree had been planted and a few stragglers that preferred the cool shadow the immense building cast upon the stove top concrete. After a quick scan I determined that she was not among any of the chatting, smoking, or studying crowds. That could mean one of two things, she left without taking her normal smoke break or that she had not yet left the building.

To my relief the attention of those in the sitting area never settled on me just on those they conversed with. The sounds of typing and judging faded to a minor buzz, distantly directed at individuals of whose appearance suggested something offensive or appealing. I took a long drag from my cigarette and leaned close to the man on my left preparing to ask for the time. He took no notice of me until I waved a hand and smiled.

"Do you have the time?" I asked politely, he looked at me incomprehensibly before removing his ear phones with a brush of his hand.

"What?" he responded impatiently, as if I were but a clueless tourist speaking a foreign language to a local. I repeated my question using the same light tone.

"Carry your cell phone, why don't you," he muttered as he dug through his pockets for his Ipod, "12:08, that all?"

I smiled and thanked him, a vain gesture for he returned to the top forty hits the mechanism played, his ears unable to stand the painful noises that were a product the world around him. I had fifty minutes till my windy lecture on Robespierre and "The Reign of Terror" and at least half a cigarette to finish.

I choked on the smoke when I saw her exit the building but quickly repressed the eruption of hacking. Gaze locked on her cell phone, she trudged casually, as if unconcerned by the trickle of students still seeping out of the building. A stone set in a flowing current comprised of human bodies that split and reconnected around her as if she were but a minor obstruction. Their inattentiveness to her only strengthened mine as I nervously watched, with bated breath, her slow approach to the only available sitting section: almost directly to my right. Her movements were thoughtfully slow, as if she had plotted them in advance, while outwardly unaware of it. Her graceful adherence to an invisible track, like stenciled footprints on a dance school floor, thoughtless of the typing she arose from a few of the male members of this scholastic audience. I watched secretively, my downward gaze finding that a few of the interesting chips in the concrete sidewalk formed a grinning face. With pupils glued to the sidewalk, my periphery performed meticulous wonders, not missing a foot step, hand scratch, or texting motion. She glanced up as if surprised she had made it to the bench before returning her attention to the phone's LED screen, the sound of an unslung purse and the crinkling whisk of fabric announced that she had come to a seated halt.

Today she wore a pair of dark blue jeans, a hint of a flare at the foot cuffs, and an ash grey wife beater. She remained vigilant in the face solar brutality, the suns rays deflected by her massive shades designed in insect fashion. The reflective surface of her removable compound eyes produced dancing images of passing movements and the glowing cell phone screen. Whatever information the light of the screen relayed to its viewer was dwarfed by double yellow orbs also refracted by shaded surface. Gleefully I discovered that if I strained the borders of my vision enough, without moving my pupils, I could catch a glimpse of my nose juxtaposed alongside the other reflections. I became uncomfortably aware of my dumpy posture then and corrected it quickly, reminding myself to make a habit of appearing erect and confident in her presence.

She yawned suddenly and stuffed the phone smoothly into her left pocket. Her subtle sepia skin tone gave the rest her complexion a soft glow, as if lotion had been applied, that reminded me of a cup of coffee with a light spoon full of vanilla creamer. This realization stirred sensations comparable to that of warm liquid running down my esophagus shortly followed by the crisp exhale one gives after a sip of something worth savoring. Without ever speaking to her I felt that I could place her manner somewhere between casual and cool headed, with a little depth dangling behind the assumption that would playfully hint at a mysterious depth to her character. She stifled the yawn with a flap of her hand while rifling her black curtain of freshly ironed hair which smoothly dipped just below her bare shoulders. I wished desperately for a chance at being a strand of hair on her head as if it were an recent opening in a profitable field of spectacular interest. Just one soft thread of that lifeless hair to occupy as it gently swished over her smooth shoulders like a feather on silk. Perhaps, I thought, I should throttle her with meaningless small talk, perhaps a conversation about the weather would prove to be encouraging. It was after all a fine, blue day, weather that created a multiple thruway to other trivial conversational topics.

The gradual growing tick-click-clack sound made me glance to stage right (or left, I forget such theater distinctions) in time to witness the entrance of a rabble of Fraternity rushers. These academic neophytes willing to do whatever it takes to take part in a group identity, are an exclusive sort whose personality types usually range within a negative spectrum. It's the younger ones, those aspiring to be apart of the fraternity as well as those doomed to fail in the long run, that depress the hell out of me. And, to my horror, the group decided that the narrow opening on the bench between me and the Ipod guy was an appropriate spot to relax. The air intake required for their conversation deprived their immediate vicinity of imaginative though, had their heaving bellows stole the oxygen from me I would have seen it as merciful.

"You see a blue honda civic, tinted windows and jesus fish with legs on the back, you give me a holler, Bro," the biggest one of the three man group declared. The sound his clacking flip flops made synced in rhythm with the sluggish chicken pecking of his mental typists. His bovine figure, as heart straining as it was, did nothing to stop the man from pumping iron. Biceps and triceps seemed chiseled out of stone while his calves and thighs shook gelatinously under the combined weight of fat and muscle.

The clean cut one lit a clove up, inhaling and exhaling theatrically as if the the surrounding women were smitten by this flourish of adulthood. He wore the visor sunglasses, the type with a glossy surface comprised of gasoline rainbows, secured by a loop attached to the curved tips that rested on his ears. Clearly he had not held the title of maturity for long for a rosy patch of acne blossomed on each cheek. His head bobbed confidently to an inaudible beat while his head swiveled slowly over the areas occupants.

The third guy, the one out of the group most likely to be accepted after the humiliating rush, was a well muscled youngster with a lantern jaw and a ralph lauren polo shirt. All together the three of them looked to have just left a most riveting Jimmy Buffet concert. Two button down shirts untucked flaps hung over khaki, knee length shorts, of similar colors, while the third wore denim jeans, fashionably faded at the knees. Of the group, only the better looking sat down, the other two tried to pul off a casual air. What happened to the left of me seemed quixotically detached, in a way, for the couple that stood momentarily seemed willing to submissively act according to the whims of the enthroned poster boy before them.

"What happened, dude, why you out lookin' for this car?" rosy cheeks asked after reigning in his foolishly bobbing head..

"You know Jay's house down on Macomb and Alabama street? The Seminole Chief Tipi Apartment complex?" the chubby held his fingers out signaling rosy to hand him a cigarette. Rosy got one, lit it up, and wedged it between the grub sized fingers of his companion. Chubby inhaled before continuing, "Well, shit, me and my dad went up there for a little after game slash pre game drinking, you know?"

"Totally Bro," the better looking one chipped in, his cool gaze following a young blonde in a mini skirt as she passed.

"Well, shit," Chubby started, the profanity sounding unnaturally practiced. "Outside of Jay's me and the guys were drinking in my dad's truck, he'd gone inside to piss, right? Well, shit, here we are drinking and celebrating, you know, tale gatin', and this fuckin' honda civic drives up and parks, like, in a spot on the road. And I'm all like, you know tryin' to be friendly, and I say 'Go fuckin' Noles'..."

The his companions nodded in utter agreement, though the better looking of the three seemed more interested in the occasional feminine figures that happened to pass. For their category of people conversational protocol was simple, total agreement was absolutely necessary lest the sound group identity falter. To deviate and, say, disagree openly was to shake the very thoughtless foundations of their elitist, narrow minded subculture. A culture they weaved together using exaggerated stereotypes, most likely a product of bad collegiate films, and the traditional beliefs, instilled by their privileged class, that work to keep them managing the absurd boundaries that separate 'Us' and 'Them.'

"Shit, that game was totally bullshit, man, the ref called that fuckin'..." Rosy cheeks started, lower lip jutting out defiantly.

"Well, shit, this guy gets out and ignores me, not a wave or hello, shit not even a finger, right?" chubby raised the volume of his voice dramatically, absolutely refusing to even acknowledge the rosy's prelude focusing fully on the distracted face of the better looking. "He keeps walkin' on down the street, so I say 'Hey, fuck's your problem' real loud. But, Bro, the guy just fuckin' rudely keeps on like I didn't even say anything."

"Shit" said the muscled one, followed by a short insert from rosy "people can be so fucked up, nowadays, dude."

"I know, right?" the chubby one said. "fucking, the guy was a fag. You could tell by the way he...I don't know, he was just a fag. So, me and the guys yell 'fag' real loud and go back to minding our own business. The faggot just ignores us and keeps on walking away. Well, we'd been out there for a while, at this point, and eventually I say 'shit, game's gotta be on, let's do this,' right? After that we all head inside with the beer."

"total fucking bad call, bro" the muscled man said, shaking his head.

"Dude, fuckin' tell me about it," Chubby said, his fat hand wiping budding beads of sweat away from his glistening brow. "When we came out I... man, I just said 'no fuckin' way' and my dad he just stood there, you know, all fuckin' transfixed man..." the word 'transfixed' seemed to trigger excited nods of recognition from the rosy faced squire. I found that funny, but did not dare let that show. It seemed like a word not normally drawn from the three's limited vocabulary, but the collegiate implications that such a word held necessitated an understanding on their part. Though parties, game days, and sex were above all else on their list of priorities, the fact remained that they were apart of the progressive college learning process and must, therefore, hold up that fraudulent image of a scholar.

"The window was fuckin' shattered, the shit inside..." the chubby one paused to take a relaxing drag from his spicy smelling clove.

"All gone. All gone," he finished with a profound air chop, the other two whistled and shook their heads in disbelief, as if this overweight young adult were not the sort to be fooled with. He was rather large and intimidating, all give him that much.

"If I find him, shit, bro, I don't care I'm takin' out my twelve gauge, a shot gun to his ass. I mean it, nobody messes with my dad's fuckin' shit..."

It was then that I heard a soft 'excuse me' from my right. I must have appeared to find my feet a fascinating bodily feature, though really it was the face the chips in the sidewalk that held my pupils. Completely engrossed in the depressing conversation being conducted my left that I had not noticed that the beauty to my right had been signaling me. I slowly looked over, I could feel the beginnings of a blush begin and did everything in my will power, short of bloodletting, to quell it. I looked up at her, her gentle silhouette giving my weary eyes a soothing respite, as she stood with her arms folded innocently behind her head. Supple breasts and slim figure arched back in such a way that caused the bottom of her grey shirt to lift ever so slightly exposing the lower part of her navel below which peeked the sensuously black elastic band of her under garments. A casual, though fully limbed, Venus de Milo of partial asian descent.

"You wouldn't happen to have an extra cigarette I could bum off you, would you?" maybe it was my imagination but her pleasant tone seemed almost suggestive of something wickedly seductive.

"I, uh," wincing inwardly at the 'uh' while my fingers nervously fumbled for the carton, hindered and blinded by the darkened interior of my pockets, until finally I produced the pack triumphantly. "Yes, of course I do."

"Thank you," she said, her hands clapping together graciously. "I hope it's no problem, I woke up late this morning and, well, I found that I didn't have enough time to stop and pick up a pack."

"Oh, no, absolutely no problem what-so-ever," was what I replied, though later I would regret the exaggerated compliance in my voice. "I have a full pack, see."

Clumsily I thrust my open pack in her direction and she laughed, a chorus of angels accompanied by a heavenly harp, before thanking me once again and returning to her section of the seating area. I kicked myself for not offering her a light, but assumed that a bummed cigarette would only lead to a later introduction, the gift laying the foundation for a conversation much less cliche than my previous idea concerning the weather. How I felt the vibration, the typing of her audience reviewing and recording the incident with positive critical acclaim. My performance, at the least, got a thumbs up, if not two. I smiled at the ground, the chipped face engraved on it smiling in return, and I began to work up the strength to rekindle a lamp still spewing flammable gas. I heard it then. A sound of a rhythmically squeaking metronome or a wheel bearing without lubricant. It was than a second shadow fell upon my quivering form from the left side. The fraternity knight and his squires had left not long before the introductory appearance of another, perhaps the Ipod guy needed something. No. The shadow that fell upon me was that of someone else. The shade would have allowed my eyes a little rest had the caster moved a foot to his right. Instead, the man stood infinitesimally short of interrupting the overpowering beam that outlined his disheveled form. Had the rays not been so brightly overwhelming to my vision I might have been able to make out the features within this man's umbra at first glance, as it were I couldn't do anything but squint uncertainly.

Like me, this man's internal audience consisted of a single soul in a large theater. Only, his theater happened to hold no seating, just one large metallic wheel in need of extreme maintenance. And the occupying soul was that of a hamster, who ran tirelessly within this wheel. His towering form coupled with my pathetically squinting eyes made me feel small and immature.

"Gotta light, buddy?" he asked and shortly after I nodded and my fingers, once again, began exploring the dark confines of my pockets. While I fished about he lazily threw his bag and lifeless figure down next beside me.

He was about my age, from what I could tell, only taller and less hairy. His shaggy, red curls, split down the middle exposing a pale scalp, hung like oily curtains on fire over a pair of brick colored eyebrows. His icy blue eyes remained playfully interested in whatever he rested them on, what it was at the time I couldn't say. His nose was timorously structured though, in contrast, he held it boldly, jutting out over permanently parted lips between which a cigarette dangled limply. The olive green jacket he wore, long sleeves unbuttoned at the cuffs, was, like the D.A.R.E. shirt beneath, a size too large. His faded jeans were tight around the legs and coiled in a denim bunch over a pair of generic high-tops. His posture, to my horror, was everything resembled mine prior to the beauty's arrival. His legs were splayed out before him with the toes of his shoes pointing outward, in opposite directions, like serifs on a sloppily written V.

I handed him my lighter, the feeling of a sudden crash and burn of my flight of female fancy nearly brought tears of frustration to my eyes. Clearly this man wished to have company with his cigarette and I, much to my disappointment, had been his victim.

"Dangerous times," he said, still staring into the space ahead of him where a scene from an invisible sit-com seemed to play out. "Dangerous times, I say." As if remembering the lighter, he jerked it towards his face and lit the tip of his cigarette.

"What do you mean?" I asked as he handed me my lighter back. I looked down and had not realized in all the excitement that my cigarette was nothing but a pillar of ash precariously dangling from the blackened tip.

"Oh, you know, smoking," he concluded while exhaling a mass of smog.

"Wait, you mean the health hazards linked to tobacco?" I threw the butt into a nearby sand box and retrieved another stick from my pack.

"What? Oh," He said, eyes swiveling thoughtfully in their sockets, "Right. Those issues. Yeah, I suppose those present a problem to the cause. No. I was referring to the recent tax increase."

He put emphasis on the word 'recent.'

"Oh, yeah," I replied lamely. "Does kind of make smoking difficult. I suppose you could view it as a positive change, right?"

His eyes darted met mine with such vehement intensity then that I felt momentarily stunned. He held my gaze captive for a second, two icy daggers impaling my tongue to the roof of my mouth, until slowly he drew in a puff and exhaled. The second hand smoke that wafted up not even causing a blink.

"Are you a smoker or are you a pussy?" the question was asked with such solemn zeal that I couldn't help but smirk, though nervously. I didn't understand how anybody could accuse someone they had only just met of being a pussy. I couldn't, for that matter, understand why the man felt the need to insert such an outrageous subject in what should have been an ephemeral exchange of small talk and pleasantries. Further more, why was it that I continued to entertain the stranger when I should have made it clear that I had nothing to offer other than a light and a perfunctory smile. I shrugged in response, one that I assume he took for a positive answer for he grunted in satisfaction afterwards before resuming his good humored stare.

"Damn taxes. Damn smoke free, tobacco free, freedom stifling country," he harrumphed and a cloud of smoke wafted up out of his nostrils. " Dangerous in many ways, mon ami, many ways."

I nodded, something I hoped he took for a noncommittal response. Nothing personal against him, I just wanted to resume fantasies of a charismatic conversation with the women of absolute beauty. I hoped to drop numerous hints, visible signs universally understood as polite signals to end, or show a disinterest in, an active conversation. I rifled through my bag and retrieved a novel I had been reading. I leafed through it, selecting, at random, a chapter I had not read and started to peer intently at the page. I read and reread the same passage over and over, form the corner of my vision I could see that this gesture had little effect.

"This place," his hands stretched out as if trying to embrace the school in its entirety. "This place is ample in smokers, and lighters, but cigarettes are a preciously rare commodity. Really bugs me, you know? I ride the bus here every single day, I walk to the store down the street, and I work for the money I spend on a pack of smokes."

He shook his head in disbelief and closed his eyes as he chuckled to himself, resting his weary chin on his chest for a second. My eyes, though frantically weaving back and forth, refused to proceed to the next sentence.

"They, friend, they have their parents transfer money a bloated checking account. I mean bloated, inflated like road kill on a sunny day. These parents just help to encourage the growth of the already festering bacteria growth. And you know what they do with all that money?" He didn't wait, nor do I think he expected a response, before answering his own question. "Buy clothes, electronics , alcohol, hell whatever it is, we essentially pay for it. In increments, yeah, but still, we suffer."

"I take it you're not a fan of alcohol?" I asked before I caught myself. It was a habit I found to be most unfortunate at the time. Somehow I felt that if I intensified my focus on the book my encouraging question would be removed from the record.

"Love it. No problem with it. But I follow the guidelines," he looked at me, his eyes still shining with frozen ardor. "In keeping with the 'Book of the Code' bumming is only acceptable when in dire straits. Also an inconsistency amount of bumming is tolerable. For example, one day someone asks for one, the next month he or she asks for another. This is usually common in first time or social smokers, the sort who can't commit to buying a pack for fear of being labeled as an addict. It's also acceptable if the person happens to be a good friend or relative, This goes especially for those partially responsible for fostering your smoking habit. You are, until some years after, always indebted to the people who introduced you to the wonderful world of tobacco."

"Why don't you just say 'No' when asked, or, hell, if you want to be polite just tell them you're out and apologize." I dropped my book to give him a look that demanded an explanation of some sort. When I saw that he began shaking his head in an oddly superior way that I felt myself blush and falter towards the end of my comment. I resumed forced interest in the sentence as he chuckled, the dry spasms of mirthful know-how causing me to bury my nose deeper into the book.

"Can't do it, Also part of the 'code' you see." He said after basking in that brief period of amusement.

"Wait," I asked confused, the gnawing urge to escape this absurd conversation fading. "So where the hell is it written that smokers have to live by a code of honor?"

He shook his head in wonderment, his eyes alight with supreme astonishment. Had I been living under a rock, he seemed to wordlessly ask the unconcerned students around us. His hands came up and fell in hopeless defeat. What a dead end I must be, thank god someone with of his learned stature was gracious enough to commit his valuable time and energy to such a seemingly hopeless cause.

"Really?" He asked me, than took a drag from his cigarette. "The big blue book? The book of guidelines all weathered smokers must adhere to lest they be shunned by their fellows? Please, friend, say it ain't so! Tell me you aren't just smoking cause you want to look cool, otherwise I'll have to assume the worst, man. Are you a poser?"

"Excuse me?"

"Poser, man," He let out a ground shaking sigh. "My god, man, you must be instructed in the ways of this fine art. Do you not realize you are committed to a lifestyle and not just a trend? A choice that you'll either come to regret or rejoice? Please."

I looked at him, unable to speak or to discern from his tone whether or not he was pulling my leg or absolutely sincere. The rusty timing of the noise that resounded from behind his skull ceased for a second as if the hamster was considering where to begin. Once it resumed the pitch held in it a renewed sense of purpose, the intervals between each ear splitting squeak grew shorter as the wheel sped up.

"Alright," He seemed to begrudgingly take it upon himself to instruct me in the code. "Let's see, what etiquette does the teacher deem most important when dealing with with the dullard student?"

I scoffed in disbelief.

"Look here..." I began until he cut me off with a stern forefinger.

"Silence," he said while rubbing his chin. From what I could determine, he was preparing a full blown crash course. Unabated determination racked his body, a slight throb of an artery could be seen on his neck and temple. I set my book aside, knowing full well he would not cease his lecture until he had soundly whooped me into submission. I had never experienced interaction with a stranger on this level and found myself to be timidly incapable of walking away. This man had me involved a board game, the rules of which he was all too familiar with. In all honesty, though, I considered victory to be a tasteless feat given the arbitrary nature of this argument and, instead, felt surge of pity began welling up inside of me. Dominating this subject was all this poor bastard had, I might as well let him walk off feeling like a winner, the truth, assuming he accepted it, would only crush him.

"Okay! An individual may bum anything but your last smoke, be it your first encounter. Your second encounter with the same person permits you to deny them but only if you have three remaining," His eyes closed as he reveled in his own pompous spiel. "Be it third time, you can deny the person if you have but five sticks left. Anytime after you have the right to turn the bum down, though one should consider, as I said, whether or not the bum is in dire straits or if he or she be a friend. This is left up to the person who has the cigarettes to decide."

"Alright, mister know-it-all," I asked. "What would you say to a third time bummer who was an extremely attractive member of the opposite sex and it was your very last cigarette? I mean, would you throw your precious rules out the window?"

"Hah!" he exclaimed, the grand vibrato in his voice drawing a few questioning looks from the people talking around us. "That's a dumb question. First of all, the 'Code' isn't always a rule. I mean, I said it was up to the smoker to decide whether or not they wished to give up their last cigarette. It's your money, friend, just make sure you don't waste these valuable sticks on a lost cause."

"Oh," said I a bit sheepishly. He had said it was a guideline. Stupid me.

"Second," voice dripping of smug. "Why the hell would i even associate with a girl who didn't already have the guidelines committed to memory? Hah, the very though is funny to me!"

I smiled at his satisfaction. He would soon wear himself out and find another tobacco user to sucker into an argument. But his steam reserve proved troublesome.

"Say you find yourself penniless, right? and someone asks you for a smoke, right? Well, you're in an unstable position, you say to yourself, and possibly might not be able to afford another pack for a very long time. In this case you can bend the 'Code' without affecting your integrity. There are a few other cases, sure, but going over them in detail would require quite a bit of my time."

"Hmm, well do you think it was wrong of me to give that women over there a cigarette?"

He glanced over at her, his movements anything but subtle, and returned to his desired slouch. Thankfully she had encountered a passing friend and the two of them were chatting intently about what I assumed to was the class that had just ended.

"Not bad," he said, his eyes returning to the entertaining void that danced somewhere just out of sight. "Can't say you'll have any luck with her, though. She's a temp, not a real smoker. Nah-ah, I can tell. She has a cigarette after class, maybe with a drink, but nothing excessive. The cautious sort. Part of the new generation of would be smokers. It's that 'Truth' movement that's got everyone doubting."

He shook his head in disgust, hawked a loogie and spat. The mustard colored blob of phlegm hit the pavement with a resounding 'Thwack' and shook slightly from the force.

"How the did you get ahold of this book? Actually, what credible author would even think to write a book when, given the time, it's doomed to flop?"

He smirked at me. A look so self assured it made my throat lump up for fear of the verbal browbeating that would surely follow.

"You ever see someone terminally ill?" His look all but vanished replaced with the flimsy, hastily constructed look of one genuinely interested.

"Maybe," I thought about it for a second. "I've seen really old people who were maybe even a bit sickly. No, I guess I'd have to say I haven't, at least that I can recall."

"Oh," He nodded, face retaining that awful look of interest, or what he took to be a look of interest. "Well, say this terminally ill fellow had to choose between two people that would remain steadfastly by his bedside until the end. who do you think this fellow would relate to out of the two choices: A man also dying of, say, cancer or a healthy, energetic grade schooler?"

"Well" I rubbed the stubble on my chin with my smoking hand before bringing it back to my lips. "I think this sickly fellow would understand the other like him, but I'm sure they'd still appreciate the lively company a child would offer. I mean, Grandparents are old but they still enjoy the their grandchildren's company, kind of silly now that I think of it. Old folks are funny in that way, they like the conflicting feelings that often accompany nostalgia. A mixture of remorseful loss and gleeful appreciation for what had been, but will never be again. Hold on, are you comparing a smoker to a terminally ill person? Makes sense, sure, how so?"

"Yeah, I mean, "He stopped for a second, his creepy interested mien faded into an expressionless look of blank consideration. Unabashed, he openly stared at the group of relatively clean cut guys discussing the game. "We smokers share a degenerative habit, one that will either break us, with a possibly fatal outcome, or make us in the end."

I didn't see how it could make us, unless it was the image affiliated with smoking he referred to. Even that was crumbling with the rise of the 'Truth' movement. In some ways, this stranger's relentless defense of smoking started to stir an interest in me. The emotional stirring a patriot after seeing his countries tattered flag still waving over blackened skies alight with anti-aircraft explosives, piercing the fog of war.

"Think about smoke breaks," He said, his palm opened to me suggestively. "A group of coworkers gathering together to relax, think, or discuss something, I don't know, anything related to work, or something other than work. It's a temporary get away from the bustling interior of the work place. But it doesn't always have to be a group thing. That depends on the person. If taken alone, a smoke break gives you the mental space needed to accommodate thoughts of the life outside of work. A period of zen-like introspection or rumination."

"When at a friend of a friend's party, say, don't you feel a little more at ease when a fellow smoker sends a lit signal amidst a crowd of strange faces? Whether or not the two of you hit it off doesn't matter so much, point is you share a health deteriorating habit. You both recognize it and, when in a bind, have empathetic reason to support one another. Doesn't that also make for a good conversational topic, or reason to even start a conversation? I know you were considering this with the girl over there, don't deny it. It's fellowship, my friend, people vary in hobbies and find common grounds with those that share those hobbies. But what ordinary person wears their hobby on a shirt at all times? We, as smokers, vary in hobbies and interest but intersect and, in some ways relate on one topic. fellowship, my friend, it's real fellowship."

I began to find his habit of repeating words or phrases for the intended dramatic effect a bit tiring. Otherwise, as much as I hated to encourage it, I could see the rationale behind his intangible sermon. There is I suppose a certain degree of camaraderie between smokers. If possible I will help support those fellow smokers who find themselves in inescapable bind. I t even works as a polite substitute for something requested. When out of pocket change and hit up by a beggar I usually offer the guy a smoke. A modest substitute, sure, but somehow significant in a way. It's as if we have our own currency in this daughter community of ours.

"We all are mortal, correct? The connection wordlessly made between two smokers is this: we are both mortal beings of the same species but of different, at times, clashing groups hastening our life's completion. This stick between our fingers is the end of our kind, what is class, category, genre, or really, what is personal characteristics when two stand alone staring at the hideous face of the inevitable end," the stranger had barely just dropped his smoldering butt and rubbed it out with his foot when he started fishing for another, motioning me to give him my lighter. "Cigarettes, to me, is the personification of death. Bare your teeth in hateful anger or frightfully bolt from a skilled hunter. Probably a bit romanticized, sure, but you get my drift."

I nodded. As I said, his speech, so calmly accepting his martyrdom, and the total amount of faith he had in these convictions, pulled at a few heart strings. I felt obligated to question further.

"You could say that about any number of interests. Students majoring in an art degree, interest being sculpture, may find that in a class of twenty at least three others share their passion for the subject. Those with commonalities end up spending more time together in class than with anyone else, does that mean they share the same music taste?"

"But sculpting isn't a lethal pursuit. Or maybe it is, sometimes, hell if I know. Had you said, I don't know, hunting lions on a safari I think that would have been a little closer. Even then, I'm not saying that smoking is the only thing people can relate upon, but it's definitely a more achievable lifestyle. And fairly inexpensive, if you really think about it. Hunting requires food, munitions and what have you, smoking requires a few bucks and a light that can be found almost anywhere. It's conveniently pocket sized. Cool in a pocket that is."

I would have followed his statement with another of my own but found that I had not the opportunity amidst the dominating volume of his yakking which went on to include mankind's obsession with phallic symbolism, and the place it holds in the world of art. When he finally stopped speaking to take a hastened drag off his cigarette I jumped in with a friendly inquiry. My attempt, I hoped, would steer this vessel away from the thunder on the horizon and towards calmer seas.

"How long, then, have you been a smoker, oh sensei?" I managed to wedge in.

He nodded gravely at the title, though I meant it more in jest.

"Ahh, eight years next Thursday."

"well," said I, hoping to relate on a personal level more in-tune to the sense of brotherhood he argued for, "How do you cope with the gradual decline of lung capacity, morning cough, and the rank tobacco stench that accumulates on your clothing? Don't you feel, I don't know, dejected at times when you're surrounded by non smokers?"

"I don't associate with non smokers," he replied with finality. "Not that I have anything against people who don't smoke, it's just that smoking is a passion of mine. And, like anybody committed fully to a past time, I prefer the company of those that share enjoyment in this past time. Artist tend to hang out with fellow artist, be it painters, sketchers, or even graphic artists. I happen to naturally attract and gravitate towards those that partake in my interests, be they pipe smoker, cigarette smoker, or even the occasional hookah enthusiast. Not only that, non-smakers love to lecture, as if we haven't heard it all before."

This seemed strange to me, and prompted me to argue.

"Isn't that sort of an elitist method of singling out and judging another's character? It seems to me that severely limits the amount of potentially interesting people you come into contact with. People whose company, regardless of whether or not they smoke, you would have enjoyed had you not required a membership of some sort."

He just stared ahead, motionless, as if considering my words. I knew full well he had a reply all worked out already but the man seemed to cherish the dramatic flair in a conversation almost as much as he did his pack of cigarettes. Unease began to creep about beneath my skin as the revolutions of the screeching wheel began to intensify.

"I don't think you fully understand my method of character analysis. Possessing the habit shows a profound sense of commitment for something older than this country. Now, it's the historical significance of tobacco along with human nature that strengthens the validity of my claims," he began after a restrained sigh, I could tell by his tone and sudden stiffening of posture that, while I had been led to believe I controlled the helm, it was actually the two fatherly hands that rested well above my own that steered the rudder, adamantly maintaining the original course toward rumbling horizon. "Tobacco isn't just a lifestyle choice, it's a tradition. You've taken history classes before, right? Shit, it's what this country started on. Sure, we had our other cash industries at the time, corn, steel, and such. Smoking, though, has been ingrained in our culture. Even before white settlers arrived and laid waste to the blossoming Native American lands, it was viewed as a significant ceremony. A way of sharing calm among friends, recent or old, and family, as well as sealing the deal between tribes and treaty hagglers. I just can't stand the mud slinging 'Truth' propaganda. They callously just drag something as old as methuselah through the dirt, with absolutely no respect to those who chose to continue smoking after the big tobacco scandal." The squeaking quickened, but I still maintained childlike hope that he would falter through steady patience and noncommittal head nodding. The self righteous scenes flashing before that hamster must not be played much, or possibly too often enough to be healthy, for the shadow puppets of emotion danced wildly behind a thin veil. The way the ripples of a puddle can be projected by the sun onto any surrounding surface as if the refracted light itself were a spider spinning a fluctuating web of white.

I didn't want the guy to increase the volume of his voice any further so I ended up softening my tone, hoping to come off as keeping to a friendly discussion rather than taking the devil's advocate stance which might be taken as an attack. The few raised eyebrows and entertained smirks shot at our two man group made my cheeks flush and eyes dart.

" Alright. The 'Truth' crap can get on my nerves a bit, I understand that, but what about the other source of cash our country built itself up with, the consequences of which still linger today?" I forced a patient smile, "By that I mean slavery. This country is built on the blood, sweat, and..."

"Yes," he interrupted suddenly, The frozen surface that brought chills melting rapidly in the blue blaze that erupted. "Slavery is one thing, smoking quite another. I choose, like some po'dunk red neck who still stupidly considers skin color to be a mark of worth, to smoke and to enjoy it. I feel that, regardless of the negative health effects, it's mentally cathartic and physically calming. I know the shit laden scheme the Big Tobacco industry tried to pull over the nations heads. Sure. And I feel that the whole thing was screwy and fucked up. But! I also know of a number of major corporations pulling equally, if not more, heinous acts over our heads. Be it major electronic providers buying up precious ores needed to construct power cells form war mongering looneys in Africa or oil companies hiding plans for environmentally safe technology in order to keep their pockets bursting with cash. I don't know what you think about 'em but, to me at least, these torturous acts are blatant crimes against humanity. What I contribute to big tobacco harms me and me alone. Second hand smoke? Please, enough with the nit picking, you fascists!"

"Oh," I said simply. Take it as you will, preferably, as total understanding.

He took another deep breath of fresh air, then an equally large pull from his dwindling cigarette before replying in a booming voice. I suppressed the urge to look around innocently as if I had been unwittingly sucked into a one sided conversation with a maniac. Which wasn't too far from the truth, as far as I'm concerned.

"Now, Human Nature? Pshaw! People are naturally driven to group others based on similarities," he declared in open disgust. "It makes our society, essentially a large blob of fleshy people, much easier to perceive, organize, and to shovel away into convenient little drawers, that way the individual doesn't have go through the strenuous process of getting to know one another. Like a bookstore dividing Fiction Literature into romance or science fiction, new releases or classics. The goal of the store is not only to expand profit margins, but to cater to the mindless drivel that meanders through. You think a soccer mom would actually expend the effort going through shelf after shelf of good books, thousand upon thousands of separate authors and titles, in order to pick out that chintzy cover art commonly found on romantic garbage novels? Or, given her small minded, small town mentality, do you think she would rather have it practically displayed before her, its recommendation a given based upon the genre it has been placed under? This Roberts book comes almost right after the Steele book I liked, does that mean the books are similar? The cover art is nearly interchangeable, why not?"

He stopped to take another drag. I dare not look around, the faces of the mental juries would more than likely be peeking through theater windows of the many that surrounded us. I tried to shrink into myself, a move he probably took as submissive guilt on my part.

"A christian women on her way to find, say, Peretti's 'This Present Darkness' for her daughter would not want to wade her way through mixed fiction, Oh no!" His head tilted back and he seemed not to be addressing me anymore, but the heavens above. "The blasphemy shamefully on display could possibly bruise her holy eyes or, worse yet, jeopardize the sanctity of her pure, christian aura. She could happen to catch a glimpse of Roquelaure's 'The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty'" and forever be damned to the blazing pits of hell!"

"Okay, I think you're getting off topic here..." I started but his whooping laugh plowed over the mousy volume of my voice. His windy laugh vibrated the lumps of phlegm that clung desperately to his wind pipes which rattled and cracked, joining their host in the uproar. More than I feeling embarrassment I felt for him was the urge to cough, as if somehow I could dislodge the annoying bits of mucus he didn't seem to notice. The laughter gradually subsided into a giggle, giving me the hope that he had calmed down a bit.

"Right." with the exaggerated grace of an actor on stage, he brushed the beginnings of a tear from his eye. The mortified look I gave him was not solely a response to the explosive fit of maniacal laughter, but his abrupt recovery after, and frantically I began to look about for some means of distraction. My book I had returned to my bag and the chipped grin by my feet only served as a reminder that we were now a spontaneous source of amusement for those standing around us. He paid no mind to anything but the subject at hand, his disregard for the opinions of others I would, under normal circumstances, find commendable. Presently, he only seemed to self absorbed as to not notice. His voice, warbling from aftershocks of the gut busting, caused me to stiffen in the middle of my panicked search.

"Look, you see, the point I'm trying to get at is this: the progressive evolution every society underwent and continues -though gradually- to go through coupled with the way our species has been taught to behave in its given culture, creates a system so convoluted with morays, norms, values and ethics far too vast for the human mind to fully conceive. You see what I'm getting at? Naturally, as the human species grew in intellect and size, a process of organizing class, category, and what have you, needed to be implemented to enable the species to better cope. Now, add the relatively recent emphasis put on the individual's thoughts and needs and...WHAMMO!"

I flinched at the shout and successfully ducked the arm he swung carelessly, but remained still as a mouse within a snakes sights. If he noticed my evasive maneuvers it did not show on that humored expression of his. His face remained stationary while flickers played about the internal blaze, those shadow puppets of emotion increased their wild steps. Socrates sprang to mind, or was it Plato who told the allegory of the cave? That's right, I told myself, focus on other things. I could only submerge myself mentally before my conscious self started to complain about my intrusion distracting him from critiquing the display and the noise that interrupted his viewing. I told him to shove it, and that the noise coming in regular squeaky frequencies was not my doing but that of the hamster next door. The conscious self, arms crossed and lower lip pouting, sank into his chair. The noise of which he spoke was gaining in speed so much that the silent gap between circles nearly ceased to be.It was then I knew that the monotone pitch would eventually drive me out of my solitude.

"Tell me this, how does a person come to form their personal identity without a reference from which to draw from? The individual is the customer facing shelf after shelf of images and identities, these neat, step by step kits alphabetized and categorized. I don't even have to leave the house to find myself, just check the internet or television. I like tie-dye color schemes and the meaning that is often saddled with it. Had that been the case, I'd probably get along more with a group of stinkin' hippies. All I do now is make a few minor adjustments to my personality, take up smoking pot because it's hip among those in my group, and let the convictions and slogans of the group mold my actions and beliefs. An 'Us' and a 'Them' must first be created before someone, in this country at least, can fully understand their personal being. Some end up being a minority and hating it, while some cherish the distinctive quality of minority status"

Picture transparent heads of the most annoying characters revolving about your head while repeatedly doing the very thing you find so intolerably irritating. Any attempt to break in with a question, a comment, or even a laugh was squashed. Freedom was as present as the oxygen in the air and just about as visible. What stayed me? Was it my manners getting the best of me? Even stranger yet was the possibility that perhaps this man really could pin you down with his commanding voice, but no amount of ground slap tapping would cause him to yield his submission hold. The only way out was to crumple pathetically to the ground and weep, but even then success wasn't a full hundred percent. I decided,then, that I had to muster the strength to fight off this stranger's incorrigible arguments.

"Have you seen the hipsters around this town?" permanently rhetorical, his question pierced the mental haze I had been immersed in. "God, make me sick, the whole lot of em. That idea their type create of group identity contradicts itself at every turn. Christ, everyone of them tight jean wearing bastards think they stand outside the whole, advertising individualism and spouting off about tearing down the walls and shit. When it comes to categories of people, the independent scene comes off as the bipolar, bastard love child of the Anarchist movement and a one of Altruists. One minute they bitch about local unity and community progress, the next they shun the those they deem uh-hip, and right after that it's about peace, love, and harmony among the scene. For them, the minority factor is what makes them individuals and also what preserves the originality of a completely unoriginal group. They want people united for political change but knowingly entomb themselves behind walls that only the hippest scenester of the group can bend to allow entrance. But only to those considered worthy by the big man. Without these walls, the very same walls other categories erect that they claim to want to topple, the group would be without an identity. And you said my way of judging was elitist. Ha! It's practical, my friend, practical! Fight fire with fire, I say!"

He turned to me then, blue eyes distantly focused on this brow beaten shell of a man, and wagged a finger that grazed the tip of my nose. The ear splitting squeal, modulating from high to low frequencies, now seemed to weigh continuously on the un-oiled part of the hamster wheel. Sweat formed at some point on my forehead, somehow I had forgotten I had kept a steady grimacing squint to shade my shriveling eyes from the spring brilliance.

"The feelings associated with exclusivity," for once his face showed that he genuinely wondered, "Drives all of us somehow. Depending on the person, one can deal with a large group of people within a given category or sister category, or one, like the hipsters and such, thrive on limited opportunity. Having the ability to gain repute among those of your group is a practical goal what with the odds of gaining global pop icon status greatly stacked against you. It's a realistic response to a sky rocketing population growth. Almost seven billion individuals. With the internet now giving temporary celebrity status to a dog on a skate board, that's seven billion people to compete with in two realms, reality and virtuality. The group doesn't stop the individual's lust for global recognition it just relieves it. As far as status goes, celebrities have sex while those few bastards who're popular among a small group or click of people masturbate to the imagined image. God, how frustrating! Well, I say, if that's how things are then that's how things are. I want no status mongering fools apart of my group, thinking they can wrestle the founder title from my grasp. I want equality among my crowd, with that said, I expect an equal amount of passion and commitment on their part."

His face had turned a beat red by now, the dancing shadow consumed by the full on inferno.

"No group, not even mine, is without drawback. I can at least admit that, though. There're real causes to fight for, with realistic ends in sight, and there's plain shit for show. Hipsters, definitely. Pop culture, in all its forms, that's a given. Neo-hippie movement, all about drug usage. If I thought about it I might be able to name a few groups exempt from the fallacious category the majority fall into. Maybe. You? Hell, your group probably isn't even aware of moments of contradiction. Probably share the same ample amount of consumerist drive as nearly every other group mentioned. You probably tell yourself otherwise, justify and rationalize everything to the point of acceptability. But that is an entirely different matter. My point, if it was at all clear to you, is that I reserve the right to make harsh, often shallow judgement calls because it comes to people naturally. It also dominates the entire spectrum of social classes and groups and whatnot. That's it."

Students, casually chatting, threw the two of us wary glances and humorous smirks, they waited expectantly for the next outburst. I know their typists, the audiences behind those judicious eyes, were jotting down a series of opinions and jokes, the sitting are was a whirlwind of personal verdicts. While I don't think the conversation between me and the strange maniac would ever reach the dinner table, I could still sense that at least one of them would relay the odd scenario to a friend in passing. Perhaps even at some bar after the school day had ended. What's worse? I could feel my subject, the lady of such great beauty, fixing her eyes in my direction, hopefully at the stern glare of the trembling preacher. How long had she been there watching, I could not say. Once again I prayed desperately for divine intervention, wishing only for the ability to sink into the cement fixture on which we sat.

"Alrighty," he said brightly, mood changing so quickly I felt dizzy. "Smoking is such a group. I may ban people from fully immersing themselves into my social circle, but do not think any less of those that choose not to smoke. I simply interact with people of my group don't usually deviate outside of that. Just like you, just like them over there, and just like everyone else in this godforsaken country. I absolutely cannot stand the health lectures from non-smokers, the followers of 'Truth,' or people that openly judge me because of my choice without knowing the man behind the choice. I feel that a declaration of war has been made by the 'Truth' campaign and, like any social group in the face of extinction, I wish to unify the scattered members to resist and retaliate. I'm not trying to extinguish their organization, I just hope to enlighten them. Did I word it clear enough for you or do I need to go over the entire thing again? I mean, I know you aren't a real steady smoker. Maybe you'll become one some day or maybe you'll jump ship with the rest of the fleeing, suing rats. I just want to educate those less informed about such issues of contention, you know?"

By now I found that no amount of mustering could aid me in my escape allow me the brain capacity to give a proper response. The only useful lessons I could say I learned from this discussion was, first of all, the old warning given to me by my parents about speaking to strangers. The second being that time was not only on not on my side, but was working in cahoots with those plotting my mental demise.

A feeling consistent in lobotomized patients caused a series of unrelated images to play before my confused conscious self. An armchair environmentalist taking nature intracranially using his high definition television set, wildly gesturing through the living room window was me, standing outside pointing to the swinging ass of a Bee saying "nature" excitedly. The man watching the television set waves an arm absently, the blob of congealed saliva dangling from his chin the only piece of the man willing to explore the outside. I was in the process of resigning myself to foot gazing, after which I would have to inform the hard working consciousness to clock out indeterminately, but something occurred to me just before doing so. Silence. Not only silence from him, but those around us as well. The time for class was approaching, the red glow of an exit sign shone down from somewhere out view. Not phased by the mass exodus filing indoors, the stranger stared in expectation with a single eyebrow confidently arched as he glared down his infuriatingly thin, weasel-like snout.

With a look of self satisfied accomplishment the stranger rose and stretched. His reedy hands crept up into his armpits and, in apelike motions, he began to scratch his underarms. Glancing at me he graced me with a smirk, the outline I could see though the blinding halo of sunlight that outlined his form, once again, was masked by his solar eclipsing body. He had bested me. I smiled weakly in farewell and he shook his head, knowing his argument had my brain numb. I knew this wasn't the case, but the anticipated hour of his departure was finally at hand. I figured that if he couldn't already see his rambling as flimsy in logic and unfounded in every way, why push it?

He whipped his bag about, nearly knocking my own off the edge of the cement seat, and brought it down loudly atop my toppled bag. I thought I heard a crumple and crunch, but did not bother to raise a complaint. He carefully drew the zipper back, the movement I watched in brain dead fascination, and from between the teeth of the opening he withdrew a large blue book creased and bent with use. Sky blue with a black, spiral spine, the book's title lay dead center in common Courier font, it read "The Smoker's Book of Etiquette: A guide catering to the average tobacco enthusiast." From what I could see there was no mention of the author on the cover as I took the hefty tomb from between his presenting hands.

"Look over this. Maybe than you'll understand why this hobby, this passion, is of such great importance to me. I got to get to class, here, you can hold on to this copy for as long as it takes. I got a couple back home."

"hmmm," I managed to wheeze.

"Hey, don't let anything get you down, man. I know the whole grouping concept can put one in a bit of a mood. People are like that, though, you just got to learn to accept it."

And in an attempt to cheer me up he added, "It is what it is, eh? A bitch."

He began chuckling wryly as he slung a bag, the girth of which dwarfed his frail figure, confidently over his shoulder. A spark of mental activity followed by the gradual churning that could only be my conscious self at his type writer soon brought me into a state of full alert. That was it. I remember it. The memory I dwindled on momentarily while using that prudish urinal. The urinal, so like Hal, gave no room for error and little more for whimsical reminiscing, it's red eye burning away the powers of recollection.

After the movie, and a few more rounds at a local dive bar, Doug decided that taking me home was the responsible thing to do, promptly dismissing the fact that we had consumed an irresponsible amount of alcohol not minutes before taking the wheel. The night had run smoothly, we shot the shit with would be women, their true harpy forms revealed to us by at a later period of sobriety. I filled the car with flatulence while Doug mocked an over hyped DJ announcer for the local Hip Hop station playing on the radio.

Eyes glossily preserved by the laminating effects of alcohol, I watched in wonder at the passing street lights. The passing vehicle caused the yellow bulb's spiky appendages to stretch out, pointing out either the invisible features hidden by darkness or finding interest in things so absolutely clear, you shake your head while admiring the excitedly insistent gesture. It was upon reaching our drive way that one of these pointing pikes brought attention to something of morbid interest.

I saw it displayed under the conical glow of a mustard colored bulb, the body of particular interest to an array of streetlight fingers. As if drawn to it magnetically, the spikes refused to deviate anywhere else besides the lifeless form sprawled out on the blackened asphalt.

A yellow lab, as far as I could tell, but with some odds and ends thrown into the breeding mix. The dog's bloated carcass had us stop the vehicle abruptly before the turn into the drive way. He parked in the grass next to the leaning mailbox, an array of bills and advertisements lay strewn across the grass. Each letter was damp with dew, the addresses had turned to inky smudges, that were nearly indistinct, and fled the surfaces of the envelopes, the arid conditions that kept them captive replaced by kindred moisture.

We examined it from front to back, circling as if the concept of death had only just been realized. Crusty yellow mucus, tinged with blood, trickled from nostrils and down a snout cracked and fissured like a model miniature of a desert floor. A pool of blood it basked in, from the yellow coat, its bottom matted with blackened blood, permeated the rank odor of excrement and fear. Pitiful, saddening, and, preventable, the scene explained. You could tell that after the impact, the dog had used the last of its strength to drag its emptying body out of harms way. Only the lower torso, twisted at an odd angle, remained on the blackened asphalt. Its days as the family dog were over, had it survived, I thought, it might have made a good circus contortionist. No joke. The alcohol birthed ridiculous amounts of equally ridiculous ideas and thankfully caused a heavy layer of numb to settle over my body.

"It is what it is," Doug said. His eulogy, I knew, fell extremely short of expressing anything but apathy. When Doug waved and returned to his purring vehicle, I remained still and silent in my place of examination. That overly hyped DJ went through his round of shout outs and song dedications before going on into a commercial break. The gears shifted and he sped away, the puttering exhaust could be heard from where I stood as well as a group of children gleefully shouting through the radio static, "More Ovaltine, please!"

"Don't say that," he had already shouldered his bag fully to leave when my gruff tone caught him by the ear. Once again he turned to me, humorous face poised with a cocked eyebrow.

"Say what?"

"Don't say that," I repeated stubbornly, voice directed at the smiling face made of chipped concrete. "It's an attempt to make your overloaded bit of opinionated spiel conclusive. But you have absolutely no evidence behind your claims, just a load of observations you weaved and tacked together with flimsy, disputable facts. As if you can wrap the human race in a package and present it!"

"I'm not sure I follow," he glanced dubiously towards the automated doors that led into the History building where a straggler waved his hands in front of the sensor impatiently before slapping the handicap switch. "I don't know what you gathered from my argument but..."

"That's because you don't know what you're arguing for, even the little cause you think you fight for is petty. I mean, really petty. Can't you see? You've been summing up humanity as if it has already reached its cusp. Agreeably we act according to our nature that, at times, makes us act alike at times. But every movement, be it fashion or intellectual, has its end much like every prominent musician or author ends up in the same section over an extended amount of time. Classic, obsolete, or out of style, at times even raised from the grave for the new generation to manipulate for its novel uniqueness. The only consistent being people, not the same individuals, but people remain a constant flow. To box up the way people think and behave is an attempt to truly conceptualize infinity."

"People aren't infinite..." He spluttered angrily, but I didn't allow him to go on further.

"Most likely they aren't, but that wasn't my point. People do and act as taught or expected, for the most part. It will always be that way. It's probably that way because as we've progressed as a species so has our nature to keep up. Instinct is no longer given free reign over our bodies, why? Presumably because with each step we discover and expand, presently we've taken many steps -good and bad- now instinct primarily works backstage while complexity of culture performs. It's one thing to get riled up when someone tramples your rights, its another to drag out rights proven to be harmful."

"Alright, look I need..."

"Sure, you mentioned big corporations slapped on the wrist while big tobacco gets a full on punch to the gut. White collar crimes are devastating on a much wider scale than simple misdemeanors and individual felonies. I'm aware of that, you're aware of that, most people are aware of that. You believe that because everybody else regulates the who's and what's of their group that you can just guiltlessly follow suit. If you have a cause that you truly felt was just and are aware of the supposed elitist grouping methods of other movements, do otherwise to the best of you abilities. Limiting your message to the few devoted believers accomplishes nothing. All that remains in the end is you, the supposed tobacco connoisseur, and a small group of pretentious underlings."

"Jesus," his look of sleazy humor gave way to beet red frustration, "Anybody ever tell you that you take small talk way too seriously?"

With a stiffening of his back he majestically stormed off around the parenthesis leaving me fuming. I watched him saunter toward the malfunctioning sliding door as if expecting the blair of trumpets to announce his entrance. The door reacted to his approach as it did to any other fool that took no notice of the attempt by fools that preceded them by blatantly refusing to acknowledge the presence of. Taken aback momentarily before realization dawned on him and he slapped at the handicap button. His first slaps were sloppy and imprecise, with a grunt he struck at it with a balled fist and the door innocently shuddered open.

It took me a moment to remember the book in my hands. Out of mild curiosity I happened a glance at the inside cover and was surprised to see the very mysteriously humored face that had haunted me the entire hour staring up at me. The photo was pixelated, the quality suggesting that he had printed it out at home, and in black and white with a paragraph description of the author below. The fool had audacity to lead me to believe that this very book had been widely published, while in reality he had written every rule on a lifestyle were rules were generally left unsaid. I closed it and placed it gently by my side. Instead of sprinting off to my class, which was had no doubt already begun, I pulled out another smoke from my pack and lit it up. I could hear a stifled chuckle from the theater my conscious self sat in as he smugly replayed the conversation that had passed but an hour before. For once, the two of us just sat back and watched a mutually entertaining flick, just another marvel open to interpretation.

brewing: rough outline

2009-02-03T19:49:00.000-08:00

the narrator, telling an audience of some sort, describing how often he retells these events. Those he lives with insist he is the most skilled at story telling though the narrator believes otherwise. His modesty, the reason's for, become clear as the story progresses. He tells the story to new comers and old friends who encircle him in a sweat tent.

over all setting: lets see,

global super power Z, in the year X-

scene 1.) rainbow mountain, capricious youth in the face of impending fate and the age of enlightenment- setting:

the narrator, martin, begins on a slightly positive note. His childhood spent with the other wandering children (those, he later admits, fall in line) in the disintegrating patch of forest just outside their apartment complex. The apartment building, itself, lies on the outer most edge of the vast metropolis and is soon to be surpassed and consumed by further urban development. This area is considered suburbia but, since population has escalated as such, it only vaguely resembles modern suburbia. Compared to the inner city, buildings atop of other buildings, this place truly is a peaceful settlement (though, once again, not by our standards). The lower levels, upon reaching the city's center, are, naturally, where the more desolate and impoverished reside. Glass like streets and sidewalks ring the upper levels where, when looking down, one could see the less fortunate go about in total toil and strife. The further away one gets the more the two levels merge, once you hit suburbia, the two are completely joined and no lower level exists.

The story: Martin (eight or nine years of age) and his four other peers sit atop a steep, though short, drop overlooking rainbow mountain. The city scape can be seen nearby on the horizon, but Martin looks not at the wondrous buildings and setting sun, he instead stares at a small mockingbird perched in a close tree. His companions keep watch for rival children from the apartment complex for they covet the precious mountain and the limited forest space surrounding it as well.

*rainbow mountain is more of a clay hill with multicolored layers, to a child it appears immense and unconquerable*

Martin, while narrating, speaks of this period as one of ignorance, acceptance and hopelessness. Children, before the age of twelve (the transitional stage in this future), are allowed to roam free of their parents watch. most parents, if not all, are completely indifferent/unaware of their children's whereabouts and fully reliant on technology to keep a watchful eye as well as an informant/teacher of basic human values and language.

*the parents do care only when concerns of the age are brought about. parents here are terribly irresponsible by our standards, but much hullabaloo is caused by such trite issues as television censorship and video game violence, while real issues such as proper parental care or concern, are cast aside.*

Martin watches the mockingbird with interest and reflects, at this time, on his interest in birds, while admittedly, not a bird watcher. he returns home to an obese father lazily watching a multiple screened television attached to an arm chair. his mother, not far, does the same, the two take no notice of martin's return and ask no questions concerning the childish events of the day. he retires to his bedroom where the nanny-bot (a bed, speaker, lens and monitor with a keyboard) greets him warmly. he sighs and falls into his bed, the nanny plays a soft lullaby and presents, in the screen, a happy go lucky learning program for kids much younger than him.

scene 2.) birth of a miracle, the precipice of youth and the enlightenment-

setting:

this takes place two years after scene 1, martin's mother had just given birth to a baby boy. the excitement in the household leaves much to be desired. doctors are on call in this age. people prefer to stay within the mind numbing safety of their homes and are actually encouraged to stay indoors unless going to work.

*workplaces in the urban section of the city are reached via tube or tube car, upon reaching the enclosed city (under the protection of a dome that acts as an artificial ozone), walking or cab can take you to your destination. people here rarely opt for the walking ticket and, as a result, most (not all) people have weight problems.*

the doctor sedates the soon to be mother while the father comfortably watches television. upon delivery and spank, the father may, at times, glance over and smile sluggishly at his snoring wife and name the child dismissively before getting back to his program.

*not always the case, but more often than not. the large jump in childbirth and lack of importance associated with births (unless it's that of a celebrity) make the process as celebrated as a fart.*

the story:

Martin peeks in the living room from the hallway where he remains hidden from the doctors view. the doctor, using some baby monitor device, determines the child unfit. retarded physically and mentally. the parents don't respond, the wife farts and the father eats. an auto pram-bot is summoned and it carts the crying baby into a small, nearby room past the hidden martin. he peeks into the room, fascinated by this mysterious life, and watches the pram-bot warmly soothe and quiet the fussing baby. gentle humanoid hands rub and pat, digitalized, but soothing nonetheless, voice sings a crooning lullaby much similar to the lullaby the nanny-bot sang to martin. martin joins the two and falls fast asleep next to them.

the next day, distant relatives (mainly the grandparents who, unlike the majority of the population, are much more traditional) send gifts. the parents, childlike glee and greed, rip them apart for anything of any monetary or mature significance. a rattle and a book are given to martin to be delivered to his "retard brother, melvin." the first time martin heard his brother's name.

the book is of some interest to martin (who had never seen such an antique treasure) and he engrosses himself in it. the book is a patrimonial item their grandfather (whom martin met once or twice on the subway in passing) and depicts a glorious future through the eyes of some author in the seventies. the year two thousand, flying cars, floating cities, happy people in bubble helmets. none of the pictures resemble anything like the life martin lives in, he becomes suspicious, but intrigued.

the life martin lived, he realized, wasn't the life intended for any man, woman or child. this ancient text, much like the numbing programming he was forced to endure, seemed to make impossible promises based on the assumption that humans were inherently progressive in a positive way. that, given enough time, all our wildest fancies would come true so long as certain guidelines were followed. given his situation, the uncertain feelings and attitudes he associated with middle school as well as adult hood (the lack of respect he had towards most adults), he could see that the progress once promised and currently reinforced was a farce. an opiate, of sorts. these bubble headed, smiling goof balls man kind been awoke some dormant, rebellious (passively) urge within martin's brain. he decided that, instead of the traditional transformation from child to adult ( a process that involved the purchasing of a mobile arm chair and multi screen, often obesity) he would choose a more scenic, outdated route.

He began reading the story to melvin. melvin, incapable of any real comprehension, seemed to be put at ease by this and, often, put to sleep by it. martin, while narrating, supposes it had more to do with the tone of his guiding voice rather than the actual story. but his brother's response only encouraged him to seek more books to read.

He read to melvin nightly, the calming effect the story had on his younger, disabled brother (as i said) only encouraged martin to seek out copies of other ancient texts. The nanny-bot, not used to this sort of request, seemed intrigued by the young martin's interest and offered (strangely enough) to help martin his quest.

*the nanny-bot, given young martin's strange behavior, started to develop strange neurotic tendencies completely uncommon with other models. his interest in books (especially literature outside of her database-limited to child fiction) and other things outside of her memory banks spurred the creation of some unheard of, self created program to better 'soothe' the children. soothing and caring for was the only purpose of a nanny-bot model, when a child - martin later supposes- goes outside of these boundaries, the nanny-bot must upgrade or 'learn.' especially since every child is different.*

at first she agreed to read whatever book was brought to her, including the strange, eye opening book martin was given. martin, after searching far and wide, found that books (with the exception of romance novels and erotica, these the nanny-bot refused to read) were, indeed, a rare and obsolete commodity. the nanny read to the brothers what few acceptable books were given to her.

as martin grew, she began to suggest (with her mapping system she had detail directions and locations) stores that might sell what martin was looking for. him and melvin had been growing and, martin at least, craved something a little more adult.

scene 3.) another eye opening moment, the seedy underbelly, classic literature and the explosion-

setting:

Martin is significantly older by now, nineteen, almost twenty. his younger brother is now almost ten. the household is much the same though martin's father had got a raise and had bought a dual screen attachment so that the family could enjoy television together. this wasn't really the reason, martin narrates, more a sign of success. the two parents could watch television on one large screen attached to the both of their chairs, with higher definition, and call it family time. it should be said that, at this age (like driving and obtaining a drivers license is now) martin should have, like any other normal adult, been awarded the responsibility of his own chair. through the chair one could access a web of outside communication, entertainment and shopping. the chair isn't absolutely necessary (though most adults at the time would disagree) but, like any other proof of identity, it helped immensely. the chair that was brought in when martin turned twelve sat forgotten in the corner gathering dust. his parents took absolutely no notice of the fact, just assumed he used it when they weren't paying attention (which was almost all day and everyday) and raised no question. neither did his lack of weight gain, apathetic approach or his constant absence (he slept at the house and cared for his disabled brother) raise any complaints. the people his age, even those he once considered friends, had easy access to the city and the fleeting trends associated with this consumer culture. people like martin were often teased, ignored or just plain ostracized. the result, martin got his fair share of taunts and questioning looks from peers and 'superiors' alike. his school teachers complained bitterly at the lack of social incorporation.

*school was the only time martin accessed the internet (the major source of communication) for classes were attended online: the main screen showing the teacher presenting the subject with various programs, the other multiple screens showing his classmates, distractedly listening (probably watching some television program simultaneously). this he managed to access using his surrogate mother, the nanny-bot. the nanny, at this age, should have been scraped and replaced with the arm chair. the nanny-bot model, since, has been upgraded to handle more with much less flexibility towards a child's fickle nature (the model became much more stern and insistent on children, the improved model given to martin's family for melvin was sold by martin to a family whose nanny had malfunctioned). martin stuck with his self advancing nanny and, as a result, was able to do less with his online classes. teachers often complained to his parents (who only bitched if they bugged the two enough), but otherwise, martin got decent grades.*

the story:

martin, with the continued help of his nanny, wanders the streets of 'uptown.' here he has little success at finding books, if he does it's at an unreasonable price. martin finds work at an 'uptown' grocery store as a bag boy. here he falls in love with a girl, a fellow bagger. she introduces him to a scene of kids much like him, though not so severe. to martin, these people (though they preach profusely about non-conformity) are no different from the average citizen of this absurdly lazy country. they rely on the exact modes of transport and communication, they even shop excessively (though, in truth, not as much as the normal person). the group fancies themselves as collectors and here is where martin gets the information he needs to create a broad list of book genres/categories. their families are rich, though, and the group's young adults, like it or not, have obediently followed the rules set by their society. this they've used to obtain books (though most say they've read them, they really just purchase them for trophies sake) by pleasing their parents enough to pay for their 'quaintly rebellious' hobbies. martin hates his parents enough that this approach seems unacceptable. the girl later cheats on him and breaks his heart leaving him, once again, without a companion.

after drilling the nanny for information she, eventually, let's on to the location of a thrift store (the words completely lost on martin) in the "lower" section of town. unaware of any hostility between upper and lower sections of the city, martin ventures down foolishly and here he meets phillipe (who comes into play later). rather, phillipe interrogates him, confronts and robs him with a knife. phillipe and his gang (martin notices) are smoking strange tubular sticks before and after they approach the oblivious martin. martin learns, now, of the great separation between classes, supposedly a thing of the past, and purchases his first pack of cigarettes from a nearby store. he, learning his lesson, avoids phillipe's street by taking a much longer route to the thrift store.

*much to his delight, many cheap, worn down books were going for sale. the thrift store, again, to his surprise, was right next to a convenient store where he bought his smokes.*

the nanny-bot didn't take kindly to his smoking, martin's parents remained unaware of his habit fully. she insisted (after much debate) that he smoke out of his brother's sight from then on.

the explosion happened in some section of the country currently uninhabited. a thick chunk of arid forest (a stretch of desert four miles south of) was hit by a projectile which origins (to the narrator's day) remained unknown. the effects were unknown and covered up by the country's government (a bioweapon assumed to be responsible for the indigenous animals mutation, as well as those, later, found in humans) who explained the whole mess as a mix-up between countries (which actually might have been true). a year later, reports of strange deformities began creeping along the outskirts of major cities and residential areas. the response, large reinforced dome walls were constructed along each perimeter. Martin's nanny-bot, fully aware of human's nuclear and chemical capabilities, began to worry.

scene 4.) the end of the positive note, decisions, the alliance, the ultimate question-

setting:

the country had been hit with an explosive projectile from some unknown enemy. being a global super power and a nation of self absorbed citizens and politicians, without any real sense of self, enemies were great and allies few and almost nonexistent. the governments advanced technology searched far and wide, without much success, as to the location of the attackers, mainly to counter the attack with one far more devastating. the appearance of "monsters" (though the term was only used by the narrator presently) was a short lived concern for the majority of citizens, mostly because monsters before were products of improper toxic waste dumping (residual effects form the far less environmentally conscious country before) and usually harmless.

*the new breeds were larger and much more violent, especially towards humanoids. though, then, the creatures were less in numbers but given the later decline of human civilizations, the creatures interbred and became much more of a threat.*

as it were, the country overcame the sudden attack and the offspring thereof, the government kept its people subdued but with soothing hints that they should be much more aware of anything out of the ordinary. otherwise, the next two years went smoothly. until martin, by the age of twenty three, experienced the apocalyptic bombing and life determining decisions.

the story:

martin, discussing in private the possibilities of a 'worst case scenario' (but with much doubt) was ordered by the nanny (who had, by now, reached an almost human level of caring, but still planned the most rational, robotic way) to, if the situation occurred, follow her escape plan to a T. she instructed martin of all the possible escape routes in the city, most centered in the deteriorating lower levels and subways (for, with the appearance of hostile creatures, tube travel between cities was submerged) with melvin and, if possible, his parents. he jokingly told her he would rahter cart her 'heavy ass' around for miles than his own parents to which she reacted (never before had she done this) with a harsh, almost violent tone. he was to never, under any circumstances, remove her from their home. shocked, and a little hurt, martin agreed. she calmly read the brothers their last story that night ___________(book referencing end times?)

martin worked the next evening, his new reading material was growing thin as was his brother's patience with the same story over and over (although he was mentally disabled, melvin showed a surprising amount of receptive understanding), so martin worked longer hours with the very girl he had fell for (though now disgusted).

on his way into the apartment, the power went out. that is, the power shut off completely, city wide. he had absolutely no access to the twentieth floor his house was on (the entire city, basic functions and all, ran on juice from the power plant). he worried slightly, after all, he had never, in his whole life, seen the power shut off.

*later explained as an EMP shock wave*

after circling the building, he found a remote fire escape stairway, so old, he had to break the door hinges to enter. he calmly walked up the stair case, all twenty flights, until at last he reached the twentieth floor and, once again, broke in. he repeatedly knocked on his door and was, eventually, let in by a thoroughly exhausted mother. she berated him for being out while such a distressing event was occurring (she rarely cared when he left, only when they had something they needed his help with did they ever complain), and that his brother was freaking out (he was the only one who took care of him, martin's parents had no knowledge of shutting a 'retard' up). martin ignored her complaints. as he opened the door to greet his frightened brother something large and bright flooded his vision and martin was propelled, with great force, backwards.

he regained consciousness moments later to find his brothers room ablaze, a section of the wall and floor (where melvin's bed had been) had been completely separated form the complex. his brother was dead. panic, adrenalin and other foreign chemical responses flooded martin's body, it was nanny's voice ("go, martin, run, plan, run, go, martin, run, plan, go, escape...) that broke his trance. with a last frightful glimpse at the nanny, and a silent goodbye in return, he fled the hallway. his father, puny legs shredded, reached up towards him from his toppled arm chair while martin's mother futilely attempted to lift his girth from the only working vehicle...

*martin's mother had been seated in her chair when the explosion went off. the chair absorbed most of the blast and was ruined. the father, facing the blast, had been horribly disfigured and taken most of the force instead of the chair. martin supposed his mother was trying to drag his father off in order to save her own life on the chair-which had a temporary battery cell in case of emergency*

he cried out, for the first time in his life, the word "son," and beckoned him closer to help. martin's mother shrieked horribly and thrashed about wildly while trying to move her crippled husband. martin stared in overwhelming shock (while narrating, martin admits that most of the details of the event were lost due to the series of traumatic events) and ran out the door. his flight responses, rusty since childhood, kicked in halfway down the stairway and his pace picked up considerably.

The outside was in an uproar, missiles exploded in midair showering smaller projectiles on the once darkened city, now flaming orange. these smaller explosives, in turn, destroyed buildings indiscriminately. martin ran along the tube way, for how long he couldn't say.

the city toppled impressively around him, even the tube he ran on collapsed in a heap. he tumbled into the lower section where the poor ran scared, like roaches to sudden light. that's when the shock wore off, and that's when the plan became clear in his head. that's also when tears began streaming forth, his brother's painfully frightened expression (who, for all martin knew, could've still been alive at the bottom of the apartment complex) tattooed his vision.

he heard screaming, something distinctly familiar about the voice, and turned to see phillipe reaching up to the fallen tube. a little girl, perhaps of indian descent, plopped tearfully into his arms. phillipe saw martin looking at him and approached.

scene 5.)

Coffee relieves indigestion: rocky's unexpected return Act1: Misery prefers company

2008-12-02T22:51:00.000-08:00

an incredibly boring story courtesy of "The Great Flavonian."

see him astound!

see him conquer!

see him prematurely ejaculate!

please read the following segments divided into acts 1-7 entitled :

"Coffee Relieves Indigestion: Rocky's unexpected revenge"

Act1: Misery seems to prefer company

2008-12-02T22:46:00.001-08:00

the scene is thus:

a blue modern shanty house, its mediocre wooden structure tilting slightly to the right, stands on concrete stilts its windows placably black and empty. the facade wears a comforting but sad expression for its occupants sleep soundly inside and are no longer actively enjoying the roomy interior. off to one side of this cheeringly melancholy house sits an open carport, the house's smaller cousin. when looking at the carport one might mistake it for a guest room currently under construction with its flimsy concrete skeleton baring, for all to see a striped couch wet from the humidity of the night and spotted with mold, and an old floor lamp banished to the empty garage that hopes, one day, to serve a brilliant purpose and dreading the day it ends up discarded like all the other excess furniture. the night air remains still as stone, breeze so slight as not to even be called movement, crickets whispering to one another like lovers in a library whose compulsion to serenade one another greatly overpowers the strict rules of conduct associated with those rigid public institution. nature remains respectfully quiet as if sensing the overall sadness of the early morn. the wind may not be blowing but the chill in the motionless air is enough to cause discomfort.

the scene appears empty at first. sure there's an opossum snooping around the garage interior with the hopes of discovering forgotten edible treasures, its cunning form winding behind that woebegone floor lamp. an overly alert owl, only its silhouette and bright golden eyes are visible to the inquisitive marsupial below, watches with exaggerated curiosity. its attention remains fixed until a blubbering sob breaks the natural harmony of the night. disgusting wet sniffles and moans soon follow and the creatures seem to retreat repugnantly into the night.

"oh, woe is me," the oblivious, unseen being cries to the night, "woe is me for my heart has been abroken." his attempt at poetic expression falls very short, clearly this thing feels very sorry for himself, absolutely convinced he has played victim in some negative circumstances of late.

we pan up to the roof of the carport to find a most pathetic, sobbing individual, pants sagging well below his boney waist and wrinkled parka bunched up awkwardly under his fetal form. his face is a mess; bright red eyes brimming with tears eager for a good jog down the cheeks and a face that resembles an edible root, possibly a rutabaga. his lips, chapped from the cold, peel back over yellow teeth as if a knife had sliced open the spinal area of a turkey to reveal the normally unexposed skeletal structure to the world. if one were to be viewing this sad, sad scene from above one might be under the impression that this fully clothed adult male had spent his whole life in the womb and had, till now, been forcefully ejected, what with his bean shaped posture and childlike whimpering.

his hands, shaking feebly, comb the exterior of his shorts looking for the entry slit into his shallow pocket, searching as if self aware for that special box. his fingers, almost jaundice in appearance, withdraw with a familiar, albeit bent and wrinkled, pillar of filtered tobacco. his trembling fingers struggled to properly place the cigarette within the grasp of his slimy, reptilian lips.

he sparks the lighter and a bright flame leaps into existence ready to destroy, to chemically transform, and to heat the first thing it comes into contact with. the initial drag quiets his sobs, the tears stop flowing and the jerky spasm often associated with mental stress slowly cease to be, the second quiets his moaning. his nostrils still happily work their mucus magic unaware that their sodden faced operator has stopped crying, the nerve signal mysteriously lost somewhere between the optical nerve endings and the albuquerque post office.

while rubbing the snot onto the sleeve of his coat the man, whose name is paul, sits himself up into a more respectable, though still slouched, position and gazes through blurry, rain streaked braindows, at his immediate surroundings. a long stretch of translucent mucus runs the length of his arm, he examines it curiously. a racing slug perhaps? or a seemingly inexhaustible reserve of nose honey. he feels a pang of embarrassment, already was he the laughing stock of his entire social circle, the clueless third wheel who doesn't get the joke everyone's telling, but now he was a whimpering weakling unable to take such an predictable emotional blow.

his friends, the roommates, sleep soundly inside, unaware of the inner torment and self loathing bout of depression their compadre is going through. he half hoped his moaning would be noticed by them, half afraid of the regret he would feel in the morning by laying his emotions bare. as much sadness as he felt at this point in time he found himself almost enjoying it. it seemed to paul comparable to an old acquaintance, a vagabond, who travels in and out of your life. he takes up room on the couch, sure, but offers undivided attention when the need is most. he assures you that you're right and whatever issue has you all balled up is an act of evil committed by people who are in the wrong. not always looked forward to, but welcomed all the same. misery, that disreputable hobo whose haggard appearance destroys even the most ravenous of appetite, just so happens to be in the neighborhood this time of the year. passing through, he glances up at the brooding paul atop the roof and decides to stop in and see what sort of turmoil a frequent friend is going through. his presence brings tears, as satisfying as rupturing a swollen blister, the release is so sweet and soothing that the prick of the heated needle is soon forgotten.

Paul senses an aura of grave need, surrounding his long time friend and paul looks up questioningly, hoping to get some answers or a bit of advice from this silent fellow. he reaches over gently and, with a dirt smudged smile, wipes the collecting tears from paul's bulbous, veiny eye lids.

'where will I go?' he inwardly addresses his hobo friend, ' and what will we do when I get there? i can't seem to sleep, i can't seem to eat. my stomach aches to no end and my brain is all heated up!"

wordlessly misery takes him by the reign and begins to lead. paul's mind becomes blank, almost zen like, each step away from the house becomes much lighter. both meander clumsily through the secret path that lay behind the wooden blue house and up to the main, one way street. paul blindly puts his trust in misery sensing that his traveling friend has an appointment with someone or something, and that this appointment may give direction to the rest of the evening and early morning. there is a sense of complacent urgency and passive determination in the way misery guides, another being must be waiting near this unusually quiet road, perhaps further down.

on arrival paul finds that he no longer senses his friends presence, as i have said before, paul's mind is devoid of thought and feeling at this point in time. the only 'feeling' is an urge, a compulsion to explore the convenient store down the road, a lingering sense of meaning to this directionless walk.

it's a short distance from house to store, the walk takes no longer than three minutes or so. the convenient store is quiet and dark like the rest of the small town at this hour. paul frequents the establishment in the daytime to buy a cheap pack of smokes or even the occasional beer, in fact a week earlier, paul had come to purchase many different cheeses for fajita night. cheesy fajitas often cheered paul up. but not now, no. the very thought of food seemed make his throat tighten up. paul was here for something more than than just tobacco, alcohol or cheese. paul was here to kill an overwhelming nagging sensation, to meet a mysterious friend of a friend. paul was here to find meaning, a goal to this sleepless, most distressing night.

the store is, unsurprisingly, empty and locked, the hours of operation (according to the store window) don't go beyond ten o'clock in the PM. it's three in the morning at this point. the parking lot and gas pumps, out of order signs swaying gently to a breeze unfelt, were ghostly empty. shady, bleary eyed and foolish looking, paul peers curiously into the window at the dimly lit isles sparsely packed with foreign goods, junk food snacks and at the chipped paint on the walls. perhaps his appointment lies in wait, ready to unlock the doors and greet him warmly.

a slight movement from the periphery of his vision, the dimension of the damned, slowly draws his attention to his left. had the fiend come to do battle? there, maliciously staring from behind a corner, peaked a hideous face and two gnarled hands gripping the building's edge with white knuckled anticipation. grubby, wrinkled and foreboding was its mien. the texture of his skin reminds paul of the pictures he had seen in his health book back in high school of dissected smokers lungs, black and yellow like the craggy surface of some alien planet. his beady eyes regard paul with interest, yellow irises behind which some evil plan is being concocted, his pulse visible through bulging veins in his forehead. he crooks a finger at the now frightened paul, beckoning him forth.

paul, with much hesitation, approaches the man he inwardly senses is an apothecary of some sort. how he knew is a mystery to even paul. it seems he has met this man before, in passing perhaps, but does not usually associate with his type of character. the apothecary seized his hand suddenly, his body still hidden behind the sharp corner, and slowly rotated paul's hand until the palm lay open and ready to receive. his grip on the building's edge had appeared to paul to be bloodless, but now he realized he had been quite mistaken for his hands were warmed immediately within the apothecary's grasp. the strangers eyes never stray from paul's stricken face until a glass object is placed firmly into his awaiting hand. within his palm, paul sees, is a green vial, polished and reflective, with a cork stopper to keep the contents from spilling. he can hear a small amount of liquid stirring within. a questioning glance is shot at the apothecary whose wicked, smiling face gradually retreats back behind the corner and disappears.

instructions of every sort trickle into paul's empty brain, this liquid when taken, would help him inflict pain and wrath on his new enemy whose whereabouts became suddenly clear to him. these beings were from the same realm, the forbidden dimension from which this unknown enemy had spawned, the periphery! the escapee had broken the code, the rule that binds them to their world, and that could not go unpunished. the fugitive, according to the mentally intrusive plans, must be sought out, confronted and destroyed. paul was only too willing to comply.

Act 2: spinal knives and foreign worlds

2008-12-02T22:45:00.001-08:00

an introspective narrative:

you remember it clearly, after all it was the after fajitas, you were in a perky mood and the current problems and suspicions seemed trivial and foolish, things of a more irresponsible past. the first half of the shift was great, you swung that ancient wok like a mighty battle axe from atop an armored horse. veggies galore, a dash of garlic and a tablespoon of water, the chicken lightly browning at the bottom of the cooking pan. you were alerted of the meal's completion by the strong smell of sizzling garlic and teriyaki sauce that hung over the smoking alley. the restaurant's atmosphere is so clear in your mind: soy sauce, along with other hardened food sauces, frozen in the act of dripping down the sides of those grey trash containers, beautiful dishes just emanating sterility in the form of heavy clouds of steam, and the servers bustling busy bodies darting from front to back, empty handed or loaded to the T with various plated foods and dishes. the last positive image in your mind.

you talk shit with your co-worker while effortlessly flipping the food in the wok, you update her on the current, hopefully deceased drama in your life. she started by asking about the women in your life. you then gave her a lengthy speech about handling women, caring for them and such. she rolled her eyes and you laughed, a great big throaty laugh that now seems so forced when you recall that last happy moment. she then asked you how you chose your girlfriends, their qualities and physical characteristics to which you responded with,

"i like my girls like i like my coffee. ground up and in the freezer."

speaking of which, you then felt the urge to order more espresso.

the amount of caffeine running through your bloodstream helps to loosen the tongue on such touchy subjects. your heart pumps massive amounts of euphoric, life giving oxygen to your over active brain. you think, for a second, about the word pharmakon with its double meaning, existing both as a cure and a poison, and how oxygen is very much like that. it's then that your eye twitches and your tongue stills.

the corner of your eye, the periphery, alerts you of a new, foreign presence in this reality. the periphery, as you know, is the dubious realm where shadows and slights, colors and ghostly forms lurk. there are laws and regulations separating the two realities from one another. the only way you know it exists is the casual fluke, the occasional slip of the curtain, between the two opposing worlds. when this happens one is able to see into the mirror realm known as the periphery. but something must have went wrong, horribly wrong, for that was no ordinary shifting shadow, that was real and very much present. a glimpse is all it took for you to take notice of the impossible, so impossible was it that you actually began to blame the negative effects of the abundant oxygen in your brain. the glimpse revealed an abomination, a blue veneer peppered with boom boxes and microphones, childlike designs found decorating a toddlers blanket or underwear. perhaps, you think, it was just that, a glimpse. it never hurts to double check, though, just to confirm that this projection was nothing more than the product of an over active imagination.

casual, you tell yourself, casual and calmly that is how this must be approached. you tell yourself this but your gut revolts, it tightens up painfully.

you weaved your way through those same darting bodies you noticed, mere obstructions now and nothing more. the pronged racks lined neatly with their array of china and soup bowls have a purpose that could work as an excuse. you grab at the dishes that belonged up front, an excuse for leaving the confines of the kitchen. you speed through the darkened hallway that connects the back room to the front with the tower of plates in your grip precariously swaying back and forth. the front is bustling with activity, tonight it seems, is a popular night for the restaurant. you now see why the servers hurried so, but this is of no concern to you at the moment, you have to identify the imminent threat.

while placing the dishes in their appropriate slots you casually run your eyes over the dining area, the fleeting projection tattooed to your minds eye. you halt, fearfully, in the middle of the bar. there, confidently staring directly back at you, was the strangely decorated sheet you wished were not there. not one of the servers seemed to realize the threat, they generously served the abomination sake and beer. he swallowed, unseen gaze never leaving your face, it's expression seemed to scream: that's right. i known you can see me, i know you know what i am. a fictional creature, an improbability in your rigid reality. i escaped the boundaries of my restrictive world and there is nothing you can do about it. i am impervious to all your mortal weapons and tools, but are you to mine? well, you'll find out soon enough what damage i can do. do you dare confront me or the matter at hand?

you smiled, not simpering, but certainly not assertively. just a simple smile of recognition, take it as you will you evil sheet. after all, you said to yourself, who am i to play judge and jailer? a mere mortal man, not a supernatural bone in this body. but, beneath the calm, frozen surface of Europa, swirls a frothy sea of horrible thoughts and negative emotions that you know will haunt your every action for the rest of the evening. it continues to spin the entire shift on, a maelstrom forms beneath your icy exterior. you wait on the edge of your toes, expecting the satisfying gurgle a toilet makes once it has successfully swallowed the shit you fed it. but you are disappointed, that's for sure, and your eager toes begin to burn horribly after a while. your stomach voicing a 'here, here' in response.

the night draws to a close, you hope the diaphanous specter remains up front. you hope to god it doesn't approach you in the back and break another boundary. oh, but he does. it reappears, beer coiled in it's corner, and mockingly saunters back to lean against a nearby shelving unit piled high with various kitchen storage items. you wonder if this creature can even speak, much less drink. whatever looks or telepathic thoughts are exchanged are lost to you for you remained composed under the frozen surface of Jupiter's moon. you never once met his challenging stare.

how could this shade break the border? why does the strange pattern on the sheet seem so oddly familiar? has it haunted you before, or maybe it was something related to it, some distant kin. you decided to see how it would play out, the most unwise choice you could make. did it occur to you that this abomination might have already put it's mischievous plans into action? no, you told yourself, you were hoping to confront the living or nonliving shit out of it at a later point in time. big mistake, friend. already it's evil deeds were at work.

Act 3: opposing sunrises setting

2008-12-02T22:44:00.001-08:00

where we left off:

paul had obtained the weapon of destruction from the very creatures the abomination is linked to. agents, they are, of the periphery sent to aide and uphold the archaic treaty the two realms both agreed upon long ago. a glass vial of some unfathomable chemical obtained from the apothecary seemed an unlikely weapon of destruction to paul, but who was he to know? the inexplicable urge to come to the convenient store slowly vanished with the disappearance of the malevolent weapon provider. paul started to think again, the absence of thought he had just experienced for however long (he guessed minutes, but felt hours) flooded back into his consciousness. it was as if a damn containing every imaginative detail of the evil deed, fictional and exaggerated, had unpredictably burst. he felt himself becoming, once again, a pathetic, whimpering lump of flesh. his hand shot up to steady himself against the store's front wall, surprised by the sudden wave of dizziness that overcame him, and abruptly vomited yellow, acidic bile. it wasn't the gushing of a full stomach, but the drizzle of a spout only half opened. it dribbled onto his dirty shoes and exploded on impact. the unfavorable taste of sour lemons and hot sauce coated his mouth, and another heave shortly followed, this one strong enough to force vomit into and out of his nostrils.

paul needed a drink of water and quick but he knew something else was supposed to happen, something so momentous and essential that he could not possibly return home. besides, only more pain awaited him there, it seemed to fester and leak from inside the very walls. the closest source of free water, that paul could think of, was at the stadium- due west. paul looked up at the westward horizon with it's stadium lights ablaze. a second sunrise, blue, dim and forever rising in the west, opposite in every way to our standard sun. perhaps, he supposed, he had hit the border between the periphery and his home realm. it would seem that their sun never quite rose but permanently hovered in the act of rising. that's it, paul thought, that's the direction i must go. equipped with the weapon of the fiends home world and being lodged somewhere in limbo between dimensions, paul set off west.

each step brought more and more pain to his dully aching gut, his throat remained dry and his saliva (which he constantly swallowed hoping to quench, if not rid himself of, that awful burning sensation) congealed bitterly in the back of his mouth. he crossed empty roads approaching the artificial dawn ahead until finally the stadium, the town's ziggurat, loomed menacingly ahead of him. when seeing it, though, paul realized that his enemy lie, not here, but further on into the blasted lands and beyond the overpass. ne'er-do-wells and thieves lay in wait for the unwary traveler, it would be risky, but paul was willing to take it, anything to satisfy the urge that would eventually drive him mad.

he stumbled, thirst driving him crazy, to the water fountain across the way, by the ticket booth. he leaned the full weight of his body against its metal shell and pushed the fountain's button, polka dotted with green and white oxidization. with each gulp of water he felt his disposition improve, the problem was that every swallow of cold liquid was immediately followed by an even more intense thirst. he drank, still, until he felt his throbbing belly would burst. his abdomen still seemed to be displeased, this paul attributed to the amount of coffee he had regrettably consumed earlier that night. this was before the problem came to light, before he heard the terrible news and before discovering the fruition of the sheets sowing.

paul staggered on, one hand hovering on his distended belly the other gripping an already lit cigarette. each puff disgusted him and calmed him at the same time. a pharmakon, he supposed, once again marveling at the conflicting meanings the word held. his mind slowly dimming, his eyes slowly separating, his mouth slowly gaping. a thin sliver of drool ran down his foolish, beet red face. he wasn't among the living, he was in the border lands among the periphery but still within his own realm so as not to break the code. he vaguely comprehends the odd assortment of flashes and shapes, colors and spots, objects and humanoid forms that dance in and out of his vision. the denizens of the forbidden space.

paul came to around the laundro-mat. the entire front of his shirt reeked and clung wetly to his chest and upon closer inspection the sickly sweet smell of bile invaded his still running nose. the mucus, whose path remained undisturbed in paul's comatose daze, had ferried itself across his gaping maw and crept along the chin until reaching his neck. his slitted eyes bulged wetly against two swollen eyelids and rolled about lazily like two fat maggots under a layer of rotting organic flesh. up ahead, directly in his path, approached two strangely dressed men, one much larger than the other, their faces obscured by beanies stretched well past the brow. paul, realizing the potential danger of the situation, calmly swerved towards the back of the silent laundry store.

he ducked under a dryer vent, jets of warm, spring time scented air gushed down pauls exposed ass crack. this sent a chill of pleasure up his boney spine. after waiting a for a minute or so, paul felt it was safe to at least peek out from behind the corner of the store. the two men, hands shoved snugly into their hoodie pockets, appeared to be waiting for something at a nearby bus stop, directly across and in front of paul's hiding spot. something or someone, paul was not sure which.

not too long after, the dryer exhaust shut off and paul began to shiver uncontrollably, the unquenchable thirst began to creep back into his burned throat, returning stronger than ever. his stomach ached bitterly and his bowels began grumbling noisily, his uncomfortably hunched position doing little to mitigate the gastrointestinal turmoil. he felt gas coming but, for some reason he couldn't pass it. this offered him some relief, if slightly more discomfort, for the fart could potentially arouse the attention of the two strange men standing by the bus stop. he wished to discover what foul deeds the two had and if they had anything to do with him or his mission.

the night, still cold and silent as before, slowly dragged by and the two subjects of paul's paranoia seemed to be growing rather impatient. a grumble could be heard form time to time but from which one and what it was about, paul could not tell. surely they had seen him duck behind the laundro-mat, if they meant any harm shouldn't they have confronted him by now?

paul, still squatting, readjusted his crouch so as to possibly let the build up of methane escape slowly and silently. his anus flexed powerfully allowing a pinprick sized hole to be formed, noxious fumes began seeping forth and a squeek, well timed with a cough from one of the two men, was the only noise from paul. while this eased his pain considerably, it did nothing for the throat pains that began tickling his esophagus. he would have to cough and very soon.

It was then that the taller one removed the beanie that prevented paul from identifying him. he knew the man, vaguely, they had been introduced by an absent minded mutual friend, Co-worker C, jimbo was his name and paul was none too impressed by his intimidating character. he had heard that this man, large and powerful, had been imprisoned twice on assault charges. of the two people he had beaten, one paul knew was eating through a straw for about a month, his jaws wired shut. the other victim currently lived with his mother, he never quite recovered after that severe beating. If the taller one was jimbo then the shorter one must be lefty, his shadow and only companion. lefty paul was unfamiliar with, though he had heard that the two men jimbo had pummeled were not on friendly terms with lefty. lefty was probably the brains, then, making jimbo the brawn. paul was sure that if he was seen by the two of them he would end up making a hospital visit. not now, maybe later.

just then paul saw a flash of light to the left of the men. the two slowly began making their way towards the sudden movement, gradually creeping out of paul's sight, they whispered excitedly to one another. paul quietly moved to the front most corner of the building hoping to get a better view of the wicked men, only to catch the back end of jimbo as he clambered stupidly into a blue sedan. the windows were heavily tinted so paul could not ascertain the identity or form of the driver. it switched gears, abruptly did a U turn adn sped down the main road. paul could just make out the red lights as they turned left down Lime street. this must be where the creature's layer is. those bastards must've been in cahoots with that blasted sheet, thought paul to himself. he chuckled dryly to himself, wincing slightly, but very proud of his fourth rate detective skills. he began walking towards Lime street.

the street, upon closer examination, is more of a thin stretch of pavement wide enough for maybe half a car to get into. the street lights have all but been forgotten by the city workmen and have long since blown out. he looks down the dark path, the last bit of available light shining behind him. the form stretching before paul, his own shadow, made him seem double his original size. he admires the darkened shade, its long, alien like fingers and extended legs, and begins to laugh. clearly the circumstances of the night have all but driven our poor paul mad. he delights in his shadow, feeling much larger than life and twice as human. his penis, also, seemed two sizes too large. of course, this was only just a shadow and nothing more, but it had a great effect on paul's disintegrating mental state.

"when," he wondered aloud, "when will i fall back into that beautiful state?"

he began his walk down the narrow street as if it were a sunny day at the park.

Act 4: these are no lip stick stains, that's high grade seminal fluid

2008-12-02T22:43:00.001-08:00

another introspective recollection:

leaving town did little to settle your thoughts. you left for no more than three days, forty-eight hours consumed with that mental image you stained your mind with and that dull ache your gut had been feeling since it's appearance. the last day, though, you drank yourself into a stupor and dulled yourself with excessive drug use till your obsession seemed faint and foolish. upon returning home you felt that familiar turmoil, you thought you had destroyed, nestling it's buttocks back into the the two concave impressions it left on your brain. this feeling was accompanied by an overpowering urge to have sex. this you attributed to your short absence and the biological factoids you had read somewhere in the past, most likely a trashy pornographic magazine. according to the article, most males feel this way after a prolonged, sexual hiatus. usually it's said to be just the disruption of one's routine sexual activities or a lack thereof. but you had read otherwise. when a female mate is left by herself it is instinctually assumed, by the male, that some rival male may have tried to impregnate her in his absence. now, in order to combat that and increase the chances of one's legacy being passed on rather than the rival's, a semen reserve of some sort is built up during the separation. upon arriving, the male is biologically driven to unload this massive amount of sperm cells into his mate not only to increase your chances of impregnation but to potentially engage and destroy the sperm of his rivals.

so, naturally, you had a pathetically short session with your mate. she seemed a little numb, her senses of joy dulled by some unseen blunt force, and a little distant, never quite meeting your lustful gaze. she faked an orgasm in order to get your sweaty body off of her and than went about her nightly routine of cooking and cleaning. you helped her, for the most part, but she said little to you. her disconnected ways only hindered the reassurance you hoped sex would bring, your gut continued complaining, a hallow groan and a steady ache clued you in, activated those paranoid brain cells of yours. had she discovered the otherworldly intruder? did she know of it's evil plot? perhaps she was equally stressed out, maybe from work or even your abnormal manner of late, these factors might have mixed her up emotionally. whatever the case, your stomach, you believed, played a convincing canary and the coal mine lay just around the corner.

now, your stomach was always a trifle bit unsettled. when you pictured your gut you always thought of a giant potato on toothpick legs waddling around in circles. but after seeing that fiend from the periphery come to life, your potato-like stomach found itself balancing on a single wooden pick precariously keeping itself upright by swaying and leaning towards or with the unpredictable gusts of wind. you worried constantly, never quite at ease, and this resulted in a loss of appetite. fajita night seemed so far away, the very idea of ever having eaten one repulsed you to no end. you had to continue working though, a job isn't easy to come by in this town, especially during this season, and rent, as well as the utilities, was on the rise. just keep drinking coffee, you told yourself, coffee and go-go juice, maybe a pill here and there, but not everywhere.

your stomach growled and trembled as if its lining had suddenly fissured and grown into a active fault line.

the closest you came to calming yourself was after a period of two days, right after you returned, through constant self-reassurance. the abomination had all but vanished after its initial appearance at the restaurant, what possible reason could it have to attack you? what ill act, what crime, what heinous incident have you ever involved yourself in that might somehow offend a creature of another world? none that you could think of. ah, but being something other than human, why would it need any reason? was it even capable of being rational or reasoned with? you knew nothing of the world from which it came nor of it's social norms, rules, or practices. this thing was as predictable as the weather which, steadily, began to grow muggy and rainy. nothing like rain during winter to raise one's spirits.

yes, these thoughts seemed to tug-o-war with one another, two burly brothers in blue and red, both of equal strength and ability. it was after these two days that they finally exhausted one another and left your brain a stretchy, rubber mess that resembled a chew toy rather than a thinking organ. mushy brains, you know, don't work as well as solid ones. having mentally exhausted yourself with worry you fell into a deep, long sleep.

it began with a whisper, nothing more, but with your heightened state of stress and awareness that whisper resounded within your brain like a foghorn in an empty warehouse. the whisper permanently remained out of visible sight, just around the corner, and barely audible. it was always one step ahead of you. when you rounded the corner it hushed up or when you entered a room it smiled innocently and winked. something was amiss, you knew that, something involving some aspect of your personal life. but now it was no longer personal, it became a source of constant entertainment and debate between those around you. already you began to feel your delicate mental state begin to bend and crack under the invisible pressure of these elusive rumors.

you returned home later that evening after noticing the strange, secretive comments passed around out of earshot, to an empty house. the darkness from the outside suggested perhaps that no one had ever lived here, but that, at one point, your house once thrived with joyful life and had all since been forgotten. you became afraid, the dark had never seemed so intimidating before, but you knew something awaited your arrival inside. something sinister. it could be avoided, you knew, but did you dare remain in your tumultuously ignorant state, perpetually paranoid and twitchy? of course not, besides solving of this harebrained mystery, you felt that overwhelming curiosity one feels when others get a joke that they, themselves, do not. hahaha.

you unlocked the front door and felt blindly along the wall until that familiar switch seemed to up and appear between your fingers. sudden light reveals the door to your room is slightly ajar. with hands trembling uncontrollably you grab and push the door knob into your room, convinced the dastardly sheet lay beyond ready to pounce. but there was nothing, turning on the light confirmed this. the same dirty laundry, disheveled belongings and gaudy furniture greeted you. at this point you began laughing at your situation, how absurd! to think you had believed that this other worldly creature had singled you out among an entire city full of more deserving victims! relief washed over you as if you had slipped on a sweater straight from the dryer on a cold day. never had you felt so relieved in your life! a great gust of a sigh exhaled from between your lips. "whooosh!"

of course, this pleasant feeling was short lived for, from under a pile of fresh laundry, peaked a very familiar, very malefic corner. you withdrew the now lifeless sheet a look of stupid confusion on your face. the very same sheet that had haunted your thoughts, had frequented your place of work and had, possibly, been plotting behind your back now lay there almost innocently. how could this be? how was it that something, just one week prior, had been moving around menacingly but now lay here inconspicuously? you didn't know anything, then, but suspected that these evasive rumors were, in some way, the final puzzle piece.

the panic that resulted of this shocking surprise sent waves of nausea through your body, you found yourself doubled over the toilet dry heaving. you lost track of time then, and came to when your roommates returned from god knows where. they looked beat and they seemed to carry some awfully heavy burden with them. your heart rose and fell and rose again, the rumor had blessed them, those closest to you, with the knowledge and responsibility of passing it on. now, because everyone else seemed to know, the rumor, its insatiable appetite for ears as wild as a fire in dry season, had finally been forced to spread it to the very last person, the very last pair of ears, in this pathetically small city.

she had run off. she had lost feeling. she was a different person. she did not care, nor had never cared. she was with someone else. someone with odd birth marks dotting his satin skin. someone or something. sex sex sex sex sex sex sex sex.

Act 5: "the rumor: an unreliable chain of exaggerated personal theories and second hand fact

2008-12-02T22:42:00.000-08:00

when paul left town that beautiful evening, a small party was planned in preparation of co-worker A's birthday. a modest gathering of fellow employees and neighbors, friends and acquaintances of miss A. paul felt little regret about missing, happy instead, to give the said co-worker his regards. parties were a dime a distinction in this town, no noticeable difference between any given gathering besides maybe a t-shirt color or an outfit accessory. paul's trip, though necessary, was not exactly looked forward too, he would rather have stayed and worked out this impending crisis and maybe fit in a few more hours at work for some holiday money. but, as it were, paul was obligated to leave.

the party was to held at co-worker B's house not too far from paul's neighborhood, just down the street actually. a decently priced keg was purchased for the occasion and invites were sent via cell phone texting. what was assumed would be a small gathering of friends and co-workers soon turned out to be a massive block party. the apple of paul's eye, along with his two room mates, were one of the many who decided to attend this, soon to be, wild get together.

the room mates, unaware of the the fiends release, casually went about their merry carousing way, socializing with both friends and complete strangers alike. the apple, realizing she was no longer under the supervision of the two oblivious room mates, also went about her way with devious plans formulating within her sharp mind. what started out as an innocent drink soon became a vindictive binge, full on hammered. she was free, finally, of paul's overly cautious, annoyingly timid character; his non-existant masculinity and borderline feminine manner. paul's friends, deceived by her innocent exterior and muddled by excessive amounts of alcohol, would never think to suspect that she, the good little girl, would ever go astray. the alcohol, acting like an adhesive, only helped to piece together this mishmash collection of lustful thoughts. in the end she concluded this: she needed to get laid. but her insecurities could not permit her to leave such a constant companion, someone who would always make her feel special. she had to keep this affair clandestine.

two men seemed to stand out to her when she reached this conclusion, two shady characters that seemed to stand apart from the rest of the mingling party. she wasn't sure why, but their presence seemed to have a magnetic effect on her, she sensed that they hid something. a fanciful birthday gift with a pretty bow addressed to her and only her. not only where they different, she realized, but they were also almost complete strangers. she had never seen paul around them, perhaps they could keep a secret.

upon approaching, the taller man, jimbo, slowly craned his large form downward to light a freshly packed cigarette that dangled from her smug lips. her eyes never left his beaming face even when the lighter flickered eagerly with contact. the second man, lefty, spoke softly from jimbo's side:

"what exactly are you looking for, sweet thing?"

she exhaled a cloud of smoke seductively towards his shadowed form before responding.

"something different. something forbidden," she paused again before finishing, "something fun."

he smiled at this and jimbo straightened himself.

"fun." jimbo said softly.

"i know someone you might like to meet," lefty rasped softly "someone foreign to this place. a close friend of mine." a look from jimbo made lefty quickly correct himself, "excuse me, ours."

"really," she arched an eyebrow at this, "is he attractive?"

"very." both replied simultaneously.

perhaps it was the alcohol that made her feel so daring, perhaps it was the frustration, the point is, though, was that she was sold. the three of them climbed into a nearby blue sedan. the party remained undisturbed as they drove off to some unknown location.

co-worker C, a friend of hers, noticed an hour or so later that the apple had disappeared. fearing that she had drank herself sick, miss C began searching the surrounding area with the help of co-worker B. miss B, a friend of paul's, asked around the gathering and through her drunken inquiry she came to find out that the apple had, earlier, been speaking in a hushed tone with two friends of miss C's and that they had all climbed into a car without a word to anyone about where they were going or why.

miss C, in the mean time, had come across a blue sedan in her neighbors yard that was, until she came into view, violently rocking. thinking she had interrupted one of the guests at the party, she turned back. as she came back into her yard, she remembered, with shock, that she had actually recognized that car as jimbo's. hoping to play a friendly prank on a decent friend she snuck back to the now still car to give the two sexually engaged occupants a nasty scare.

she ripped the door open and screamed triumphantly only to find an empty car with a soiled pair of leopard print, female undergarments. having gone swimming one bright summer afternoon with the apple, she had, like most decently acquainted female friends, had the chance to change from wet clothes to dry ones with her. these panties stirred some familiar memory within her inebriated mind that didn't came to light until much later.

miss C than returned to the party, slightly confused, and met up with her companion miss B. the two were equally astonished by the apple's mysterious disappearance. they compared notes and, at this point, the familiar feeling struck miss C like lightning. the apple had left with a man, someone other than paul, and, would most likely, not be returning to the gathering that night.

the apple was found at home by paul's loyal, but drunk friends. they had absolutely no knowledge of the turn of events that had occurred that evening, they even convinced her to drink more with them on the front porch. one more day and paul would return, they happily sang. this would be the last time anyone of them would get along as well as they did. already the two co-workers, B and C, were piecing the nights mysterious event together, the whisper watched with strained interest as the look of shocked horror began to dawn on their now enlightened faces."

after your two roommates, bedraggled and depressed, finished their second hand tale you flopped limply into a nearby couch.

"there are two types of shit in this world. floating shit and sinking shit." one of your roommates said.

"there's also shit that won't flush." the other roommate chimed in.

"right. whether or not they sink or float, or whether or not they flush down the first time, doesn't matter."

"the point is," the other started to finish,"shit is just shit and you, the shitter, hold the trigger."

they rose, thinking you needed time to consider their convoluted bit of advice, patted your slumped shoulder and retired for the evening

Act 6: revenge is a dish best predigested and served in a soup bowl

2008-12-02T22:41:00.000-08:00

the scene is thus:

paul wandered, right hand clutching an aching side, down the narrow pathway. with each step the area became colder and darker, each of his clumsy steps seemed to be hitting light switches in a room with perhaps millions of lights devoid of warmth. he was adrift between worlds, after all, and the sun here held no more warmth than the moon in his reality. his head remained blank, random thoughts raced by on their ways to god knows where in his mind, semi trucks with drivers hopped up on speed just thoughtlessly delivering goods. plans, directions, questions and meaning, no thought remained long enough to mull over nor did paul feel any real urge to dwell on them. what happened had happened, whether or not there was a reason behind it was of no consequence.

he hit the third block line, though it was hard to say without any street signs or traffic lights to mark, and turned left down a driveway. the naked trees desperate for company blindly reached across the driveway for the comfort of their neighbors, their branches intertwined like boney fingers. paul thought of the old couples he had seen walking together in the city parks, palsied, liver spotted hands weakly grasping one another as if, at any moment, one might just float away like a hot air balloon piloted by a smiling grim reaper.

paul like balloons.

the trees parted, finally, revealing a dimly lit cookie cutter house, one of those nondescript suburban homes from the late seventies, with chipped navy blue trimmings and a sky blue coat on the walls. paul, never quite set on a course of action, navigated his body with blank dead reckoning. he numbly approached the front door of the house and knocked, almost politely. parked to his left lay the blue sedan he had heard so much about, the engine clicked with content as it cooled. he knocked again, but still no one seemed to stir within. the dim light emanating from the living room window remained uninterrupted, no shadows crossed the line of light, no other lights were switched on either. a growing sense of unease emerged from somewhere amongst the grunts and groans his stomach made.

he took notice, then, of a small pile of lumber to his immediate right, neatly stacked and waiting beside the front step. he selected a good sized block of wood, tossing it lightly from frozen hand to frozen hand, and heaved it with as much strength as he could muster at the clucking car's passenger window. with a loud 'thucrack!' it lodged itself into the car about halfway. still no response.

he sauntered over, wiping his dripping nose on his sleeve now crispy and flaky with dried snot, and removed the log. the hole, about the width of a baseball, revealed to him, not one, but two pairs of leopard print panties that he identified immediately. the colors of one inverted and oppositional of the first, and appearing to be quite dry. she had intercourse with him earlier, paul thought, but not recently.

his vision went suddenly white then and his head rang loudly, the sound was not a crystal clear chime or 'dong' like a common church bell, but flawed and cracked, more like the liberty bell. it rang defectively and painfully. paul's senses began gradually returning to him then, his fingers felt dewey grass and his spine felt the random pointy stones and gravel strewn across the yard. he lay face up on the sticky wet leaves of the lawn while something trickled sweetly down the sides of his face. his head had been forced into the car door, the force and impact had split his pale forehead open and blood began fleeing excitedly from his open wound.

three figures stood above him, one smiling gleefully, two with fear stricken faces, they shifted back and forth nervously. the smiling man, paul could only assume, was the fiend. how he had taken on such a human-like form was, at this moment, beyond him. the fiend pressed his bare foot against paul's painfully swollen gut and pressed roughly. being dazed and bloody, paul could not help but express his dismay with a single burst of explosive gas followed by bits of fecal matter. it warmed him up, to some degree, but did nothing to help the crucial matter at hand. the fiend laughed, the raspy sound of desiccated scriptures being pulled from underneath piles of other archaic records. sulfuric smoke spewed forth from that horrid slit of a mouth. painful tremors began racking paul's splayed and helpless form. what had he hoped to accomplish, he wondered to himself, besides increasing the amount of shame he already felt?

the fiends foot, though encased in a black loafer, revealed to paul the fiends strange skin pattern for, where the shoe ended and the hem of his khaki pants began, was solid navy blue skin. the edge of a boom box only slightly visible from beneath the pant leg and a microphone, the wire seeming to connect to some amplifier in the shoe. the monster, it seems, had shed his old skin in paul's bedroom, a strange process of metamorphosis these peripheral demons underwent after spending a certain amount of time in this reality. a guess, on paul;s part, but likely true. the rest of his menacing form seemed obscured by shadow. yellow teeth and bloodshot eyes the only beacon in it's abysmal umbra.

the fiend flicked it's twisted hand then, motioning the two lackeys to join in. they froze, their eyes glazing over, and with rigid, robotic conveyance they grasped paul's legs and arms and held him dutifully, awaiting their masters next command. with foot still planted firmly on paul's throbbing gut, the abomination leaned inward to get a closer look at his victim's tortured expression. the same strange patterns ran over it's gruesome mien, they seemed to dance and shift, flickering more and more excitedly as their masters face drew nearer and nearer. this creature believed it's victory was at hand.

paul, bound by the his captors steadfast grip, felt the seething concoction of emotions erupting within, the frozen surface that once held them at bay shattered violently giving way to an active volcano, the hideous face of his enemy was within mouth's reach and paul reacted without thought. he felt his teeth sinking into a cold rubbery material, that could not possibly be human skin, and tasted bitter metallic liquid, much similar to the water at the stadium drinking fountain. the abomination, losing all concentration, reacted to the nose bite by jerking it's head back suddenly. this reaction caused much of the flickering skin on it's nose to rip free, it roared in pain and seemed to bat at invisible insects buzzing about the gushing nose. fountains of blood splashed paul's face, the dangling shred of skin till clamped firmly between his teeth.

this unexpected attack broke the creatures hold on his minions, they loosened their grip on paul's limbs and gaped in astonishment at their flailing master. paul, now free to do as he pleased, hefted himself upright and, with surprising speed, stumbled away from his three adversaries. he managed to take five steps before plunging, face first, into the grass. his stomach was quite agitated and had been rather rattled up by the fiends foot and the taste and swallowing of fresh blood, it seemed to pull the energy right out of from under him. the three, composure now regained, stormed towards paul who, once again, curled himself up into fetal position, eyes tightly closed. the apothecary's face floated in the darkness and he remembered that mysterious vial of green liquid.

paul weakly uncorked it, aware now that his enemies stood above him, perhaps plotting his slow and painful demise, and chugged the bottle's entire contents just as the large lackey grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. the abomination, face no longer gleeful, now full of pure anger and pain, pummeled the abdomen that jimbo presented him with. what seemed like years passed until finally, perhaps winded, the creature ceased his beatings. the smaller man, lefty, then handed it something sharp, something that glinted in the little available light. with this in hand, the fiend looked into paul's eyes and finally grinned, black blood spilling over it's mouth and chin, dribbling with sickening 'plopping' sounds onto paul's dangling feet. a swipe, a sharp sting and a sudden feeling of displaced weight was all paul felt, and then jimbo tossed him blithely to one side, his limp hand grazing the abomination's tense grip. paul felt himself hit the tree and his spine shatter. but through all the abuse, he had not one single thought and made not a peep, this aroused the creature considerably.

paul, in his sad state, somehow felt an overwhelming sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. he cradled his juicy intestines, now exposed to the cold elements, with the calm expression of a first time mother doting on her ugly, slimy newborn. while rocking his digestive organs back and forth, he began brushing bits of leaves and dirt off his exterior that had accumulated on impact. a soft smile, warm and welcoming, shone brilliantly from his face down onto his guts. he felt them twitch in his protective embrace and a sudden warm, substantial amount of weight was added to the little bit of defecation that stained the interior of his boxer shorts. finally, he thought, the unsettling gut feelings and pains he had were lifted, cured, even.

the fiend, along with his two minions, seemed utterly astounded by this unexpected reaction and approached the tree slowly and cautiously, the smile the creature once held up proudly now seemed to sway with uncertainty, held up by a single unsteady nail. the smell, the three creatures realized, became more putrid with each step, the heat also seemed to increase for paul's intestines steamed intensely in the winter air. they stopped short, a good two paces out of reach, when they noticed the soft cooing noise paul made, a lullaby without any real melody or rhythm. just one long, warbling musical tone.

paul lifted a hand, bloody and slimy with internal organ juices, and almost seemed to present the three gaping monsters with the piece of stolen metal. the triangular shaped shard had been wretched free of the fiend's grip, and now paul was armed, but was he dangerous?

he slowly brought the sharp end down towards his newly exposed organ and sliced, his facial expression revealing no pain to the fiend. he then presented a sliver of intestinal tract, inflamed and bloated, that pulsed happily in the palm of his opened hand. it began to swell, then, and, as if it had taken a life of it's own, began glowing a radioactive green. the three trembled slightly, but they remained still unable to free themselves from the horror that was unraveling before them. the pulsing picked up, bulging in random areas. the fiends crimson eyes grew wide on it's blood caked face, realization dawning on it's horribly disfigured face. it was not the only creature that could step between the realms boundaries, neither was this pathetic man. the apothecary, the vagabond, the whisper. they could all jump between, the only one the fiend had been on friendly terms with was already exhausted, meaning, any of the others could just as easily supply this mortal with a immortal weapon. oh, the fool he had been underestimating his peers meddling!

the appendix, green pharmacon breathing life into it's cheesy fajita soul, grew bigger and bigger, it's movements becoming more excitable with each size increase until it spilled out of paul's trembling hand. blob like movements seemed the only forward movement the creature was capable of, it approached the the fiend with blobby determination. a gurgling sound, like a fat man chuckling, resounded from somewhere inside the appendix, it sent chills down the abominations spine. the durability of this enigmatic organ's skin, once strained enough, began to fail. pin prick holes began appearing, one at first, then another not to long after, soon more followed, releasing with them a steaming yellow digestive liquid. the appendix's 'footprints' reacting to the wet earth like molten lava on ice.

paul's enemies backed fearfully away, one step at a time, and then turned to run, finally able to free their terror filled eyes. the second they spun around though, a large hole, the size of a grapefruit, split open and a fountain of acidic goo doused the three of them. the appendix, its contents now able to escape, began to deflate significantly with each gallon lost, the hole began emitting an unflattering sound, that of butt cheeks applauding its masterpiece performance.

all at once the three fools froze in their tracks and slowly began to turn towards paul's now exhausted form. skin began peeling away, flaps that eventually shriveled into themselves, revealing a bleached skeleton underneath. their eyes, faces quickly losing muscle and tissue giving way bubbling green froth, rolled wildly about in their sockets until, they too, began to liquify, dribbling poetically down exposed cheek bones. screams of all pitches and tones, pleas for mercy and promises for revenge, sang out breaking the stillness of the night. music to paul's bleeding ears. the steaming remains of the three creatures then tumbled into one another in a heap of crispy white bones.

leaning comfortably against the base of the tree with his intestines on his lap, paul felt himself drift sleepily into the unconscious realm, attaining that near zen state that had brought him here and had kept him mentally sound throughout the journey.

Act 7: A hot cup of joe after a large meal settles the stomach

2008-12-02T22:37:00.002-08:00

continuing where we left off:

paul couldn't say how long he lay there dozing, seconds, minutes or hours, all he knew was the sun of his reality, not the inverted one of the periphery, began to rise from its rightful place. shaking away the sleep that accumulated around his eyes and stretching the knots that had formed within his shoulders, paul, minute man rip van winkle, began to come too. his spine was still broken, the severity of the break he could not say, his legs remained motionless before him, dirty and splayed in a V like fashion. with the throat tightening odor of human defecation wafting up to his now snot free nose was intensified as paul began rummaging about in his pockets. the first smoke of the day, he thought, is always the best. He lit and exhaled contentedly, surveying the damage done the night before. it all seemed so hazy and distant, as if it were the foolish escapades of the hard headed youth this old man once was.

paul knew he should be dead by now. his intestines were, after all, on public display and his spine felt to be protruding from his backside, broken edge grating against his makeshift laz-e-boy. he also knew that he had succeeded in the mission bestowed upon him by those devious and enigmatic periphery representatives. still the strange green liquid seemed to course through his veins making him feel fresh and, almost, energetic. why, if his body hadn't been in such a poor state, paul might even have considered joining a little fun run, had one been happening. something else must happen, that was it, it wasn't completely over. he smoked a little while longer till the smell of bacon, eggs, sausage and pancakes (or maybe even french toast) broke through the fecal fog that surrounded him. he had a cooking shift today, that was it, maybe he was meant to work one last time before expiring. then he noticed, or rather heard, movement within the recently deceased fiend's house. a sleepy smile began to creep across his healthy blushing face. he felt like some coffee.

he waited a while longer until the disappearance of her under cover lover began to dawn upon her. she tentatively opened the front door, reassuring herself that his vehicle was still soundly parked in the driveway, and stopped short when her eyes fell on the mess that lay sprawled out beside the tree trunk. she wore an apron and nothing else, an apron that demanded the cook be kissed, and within her grasp sizzled the rapidly crisping bacon paul had smell from outside.

she never expected paul could have found out so quickly of her infidelity, after all and honestly, he wasn't the quickest rabbit in the brood. but mistaken she was, for here sat paul eyeing her nearly naked form with amusement, she returned the look with one of shocked bemusement. her bacon began to smoke and burn. she set the crackling pan to one side of the doorstep, with the manner and demure of a patient mother gently chiding her whining child. she smoothed her hands on the front of her apron and began walking towards paul, a slight blush betraying what would have normally appeared to be a calm disposition.

she said hello and good morning. in response paul smiled cheerfully, if only a tad bit sleepily in her direction. she saw his wounds, unaware that his spine had split, and inwardly felt that if he forgave her she would call an ambulance for him, save his rapidly fading life.

"i don't know how this looks to you, i don't know how to explain this to you, i don't..." she stopped theatrically, a star performer pacing her sentences, exaggerating her pauses and of course...

"i don't know..." that utterly inessential, dramatic repeat followed by an ellipses.

as if on cue, she began to tear up until she burst into full on crying. between sobs she apologized to paul for all she had done to him. she admitted that she had sex with multiple men, different men, and at different times in their relationship. how she couldn't stand being without him which was why she never left. how she loved him, now, more than ever. how relieved she felt that she could now, finally, be honest with him. he smiled, stoic expression phlegmatic and unmoving.

then mistaking his smile for a sign of forgiveness and feeling now that she had, despite being caught, obtained the higher ground in the argument, began subtly hinting that he had driven her away. she kept it light at first, then it became a little rougher, hints and precautionary advice gave way to demands and accusations. man up for once in your sniveling life, seemed to be the most prominent of the demands. he smiled wordlessly back, this reaction to her scolding set her off for a second. she peered at him suspiciously. was he dead?

she leaned in, closer, hoping to spot some eye movement or feel some rank breath. she thought that feeling his pulse might complicate matters further, what if they finger printed his pathetic corpse and found her prints on his beaten neck or wrist? unlikely, yeah, but possible. she floated closer closer until there noses nearly touched, his eyes flickered down to her now fully exposed cleavage and darted back up, his sunny smile now wicked and sharp like a crescent moon. she had no time to scream, his movements were quick and precise, two flowing loops of his fleshy lasso and she was hog-tied. another flash and a loop around her throat shut off all breathing passages to her lungs. Paul could feel her writhing body begin to stretch the outer skin on his intestines but knew she would lose strength well before she would rip them open. her naked body, now arching in pain and desperation, collected leaves and dirt sticky with dew.

their bodies were found three weeks later by a kid named wesley walsh, bicycling through on his way to school (he said it was short cut, really he was cutting class to smoke a joint) who had stopped to piss and noticed the smell. five bodies total, investigators feared that a psychopathic murdered was on the loose. when friends, co-workers and neighbors were questioned and the rumor was brought forth, the police reassessed their initial ruling. the investigators ruled out murder suicide noting that the would be killer, paul, could not have possibly melted three grown men with sulfuric acid, then ground up the forth, a women, into what appeared to be coffee grinds and stuffed her lower half in the freezer, all with a broken spine. the coffee cup in paul's hands did rouse some argument, though. word eventually leaked out, via rumor, that a serial killer was on the prowl. the police apprehended a suspicious looking homeless man outside of a nearby convenient store three nights later. the grizzled man was brought in for questioning. they found nothing but a pocket knife, a belt buckle with no strap, some loose change with pocket lint and a vial of sour apple gator aide. a similar vial was found at the scene of the murder along with fingerprints from paul's hand as well as the homeless suspect. the court figured this was substantial enough evidence to make a case. the suspect, in court, claimed that the vial held a magical pharmakon that, once imbibed, would assimilate itself into the body giving temporary life to one's insides and the ability to command the animated organs. all temporary, of course, for it worked doubly as a potent poison that eventually drained the life of the individual. he was sentenced to life in prison with psychiatric care.

The homeless man disappeared during the Christmas season that followed. a large hole in the prison wall, appearing to be the work of a large explosive device (though the guards on duty claimed not to have heard a peep) and theorized that it was a two man operation. his corpse, along with that of an unidentifiable male, was discovered not too far from paul's place of work. the homeless man, serene smile on warty face, lay face up in snow with his rib cage exposed as if a time bomb had been nestled in place of his heart. the mystery corpse, on the other hand, suffered severe burns to the front side of his body. and, along with an empty bottle of sour apple gator aide swaying softly by his badly burned side, were words written in blood: The rumor is finished. all escapees are accounted for and the border secured. our mission was a success. have a happy holiday!

2008-12-02T22:37:00.000-08:00

the land of potato soup

2008-10-17T21:50:00.000-07:00

your name is paul

2008-10-05T18:37:00.001-07:00

the first half of the night felt great. you swung that ancient wok up and down, tossing stir fry mix seemed not unlike tossing salad mix. anal. veggies galore, dash of garlic and a tablespoon of water, flavor condensed into vapor all wafting up the hood system and out into the alley. the alley itself smells strongly of sizzling teriyaki sauce and garlic. you know this, right? the inside smells as it usually does, the air saturated with the sickly sweet smell of soy sauce, aged and dried in the act of running down the sides of the grey trash cans placed conveniently around the restaurant. it's liquid defying the laws of gravity with the help of whatever secret ingredients this mystery sauce contains and the natural toll time takes on edibles. salt and soy? nah.

you talk shit with your co-worker, updating her on the present situation you're in, normally these sort of events remain hidden from the untrustworthy public, but because things seem to be running along oh so well and because you've just taken in enough caffeine to kill a horse, you feel your over active tongue give into the rush an overly strained heart and a brain pumped full of oxygen presents. you speak, at lengths, about your trip, arrival and return, as well as the usual problems associated with a prolonged love life: respect, fidelity and future plans. your co-worker seemed interested enough, especially when you mentioned the shirt. remember? this was the first shift after a weeks absence, you traveled extensively throughout the United States. you came home to a foreign article of clothing that had a strong, pungent odor of masculinity. right?

the corner of your eye, the dubious realm of shifting shadows and familiar humanoid forms and, possibly, mistaken movements or colors, announces, quite suddenly, the appearance of a new character onto your mental stage. the actor arrives from off stage left, a navy blue veneer dotted with boom boxes and microphones, such an innocent front for something, you're convinced, is the ultimate threat to the circumstances at hand. so quick was this image projected that you fear you did not actually see it, just a creation of your overly hyped imagination. but if it was actually there? well, then, the threat is imminent, you know this, it must be confronted as soon as possible. the pattern on the sheet teases you with familiarity. right? do you confront the matter now, possibly make a fool out of yourself? perhaps you were mistaken, as i said before, the realm this fleeting abomination arose from is a strange one, often deceiving the most composed of minds. hell, what you saw could have just been a glimpse of movement, a leak of activity from this forbidden realm, and nothing more. casual, that is how this must be approached, casual and calmly for you have made mistakes before and, as you know, it is never good to repeat these sort of mix ups.

you weaved your way through oblivious employees, who dart to an fro, and past the great array of dishes. yes. those pronged racks arranged with steaming china and soup bowls. those great sheets of plastic, multi colored dishes stacked between the prongs form crop circle signs. the linear soup cup arrangement (red miso bowls, white salad bowls, red miso bowls, white salad bowl, etc.) and square plates, limed up domino style, or the swirl approach, dishes arranged in beautiful patterns circular patterns around immense ceramic entree plates. the nicer the arrangement is, i believe makes it more likely those darting bodies will take notice, and actually put them away. the brightest flower is often pollinated by even the most distracted of bees. but, right now, you cannot be distracted by such things. yes, strange, obsessive observations, but not now. no. there is another matter you must tend to. perhaps you can make use of these things...?

you grabbed at the dishes, randomly, and through the darkened hall, the doorway between front and backstage, into the dimly lit front you went. you casually put away those godforsaken plates all the while you ran your eyes over the dining area, looking for the uncertain, strangely decorated sheet. yes, so damn familiar, isn't it? your eyes halt halfway and yes, it is real, that sheet with its innocently designed facade is there and it's enjoying itself. so, not only is it real, it's confident. and quite aware that you've noticed its presence and not giving two fucks about it. it seemed to say to you, quite loudly, "so what if I, a fictional creature, escaped the boundaries of my world. i'm here and ready, nothing you throw at me can effect me. i am impervious to all tools and weaponry of this reality, but mine to you? well, you'll find out soon enough, that is, if you have the balls to confront the matter."

you smiled in its direction, not a waning smile, but certainly not assertive. just a simple smile, take that as you will, positive or negative. 'who am i to play jailer?' your expression said. but beneath the frozen surface of Europa lies a raging sea of god knows what. a swirling maelstrom of negative emotions and thoughts will haunt you the entire evening after that. you feel like you're balanced on the edge of your toes, craving the satisfying gurgle that a toilet makes once it has been successfully flushed, watching the dirty log swirl about. but i am disappointed, that's for sure, and my toes began to burn horribly after a while, that shit just bobs there, calmly.

we'll see how this plays out. this diaphanous specter can't stick around for too much longer, can he? oh , but he does. you retreat back to the lair of solitude, which really isn't all that solitary, and mope. it isn't after too long after that it reappears, beer in its coiled sheet edge. can this creature even speak, you wonder. or, much less, drink? who knows, really. what looks exchanged or words spoken within this span of time are lost, for you are submerged beneath the icy surface of Europa. you keep focus on the cooking at hand and eventually the creature retires, perhaps losing interest your passive mien or perhaps losing interest in the mundane routine our reality offers, but still, you are left without peace of mind. if this can happen once, if these creatures with their ambiguous intentions, have the ability to free themselves from the confines of their world, how often will they appear? when will their true objectives be clear? should you wait on it? wait for them to put, quite possibly, their insidious plans into action? no, you tell yourself, you will seek them out, break out of this layer and confront the living or un-living shit out of them. how will this night end and when will it ever end?

suddenly, you find yourself pondering the matter on your roof, many a beer carcass by your side, unable to sit on the slope you lay them in organized rings on the edge of the chimney. dead indians or 'engines,' is how you remember them called. something else happened between the end of the shift and now, but you aren't quite sure what. information was circulated throughout the restaurant, talk of a party honoring the arrival of the sheet, you believe. there was also the bar you insisted on going to alone. now, how does getting drunk help your situation? drinking till there's no worry or pain? nah, that's a bit cliche. wait. like flower petals to bees or dish racks to servers, the plan will manifest itself within, perhaps it will be attracted by your pathetically slouched form and mustard yellow finger tips, and pollinate your ideas. they will grow and blossom in turn, and the way shall be made clear. correct? maybe. just wait, be patient, that's all. shush.

quite suddenly, you are blinded by two mental projections playing almost simultaneously in your head. the plan has arrived, finally, all it took was a twelve pack and a pot of coffee. in one you are gripping both edges of the sheets, a gentle smile on your placid face, as if you had just pulled this enemy from the dryer and its comforting warmth had settled over you. you appear to be folding the sheet for storage until, at the last second, a maniacal grin and a wide eyed expression burns away the calm, like dryer lint to lighter flame, and the sheet is roughly torn in two. those boom boxes battered and corded microphones cut. yes, sure that is a good reaction, destroying the cocky bastard. but does that still not leave the gateway open for more beastly, otherworldly creatures? the other image is one of patience, the straight forward approach, you assumed. this series of images portrays you draping the sheet over your empty bed, neatly tucking it beneath your pillows, and you lay down on it, hands folded behind your head with a thoughtful expression on your carefree face. still, it's quite possible the sheet will enfold your form and smother your unsuspecting body.

quiet now. you see them arriving, how much time has past since your epiphany? you wonder. the car pulls up the driveway, is the mischievous fabric lurking within? or have they arrived alone? you hope for the lone crowd, but crave sighting his softened edges curled around her neck, his company and you're on to it and its intentions. that's right. your vantage point offers some secrecy, from here you can figure out what is really going on between the sheeted one and the female. make a noise and you'll be discovered, who knows, the stretch of fabric may well destroy you. you will the mental images back into place, both seem much much more detailed. you burn the fabric after savagely ripping it into shreds, you confront the fabric, drilling it confidently with questions. 'what have you been up to?' you ask, "friend or foe,' you specify.

you're not sure what the rules are for this foreign reality, so you'll never be exactly sure which of the two scenarios took place. you are sure of this though, the sheet was not in the car with them and, to this day, has not made an appearance. your mind seems to be more at ease for the moment, but uncertainty seems to encrust the outer edges of this loaf of bread.

amazing what effect a stray piece of laundry can have on one's peace of mind.

2008-10-05T18:35:00.000-07:00

the conflict

2008-05-03T21:26:00.000-07:00

like watching your reflection in the mirror
knowing that it's not quite what others see
but what your mind has convinced itself of.
a flimsy character out of a short fiction.
you know you're not a liar
you know what this man is and what he has done
and you see yourself within him.
he is, after all, human.
much like you.
and you, like him, are very capable of the very evils
he possesses.

admitting there's a problem

2008-03-17T05:32:00.000-07:00

i see them in france or spain, or whatever other hip country or continent.

i tell myself it's only the hipness of the place that draws them there, not the experiences or the sights, but sometimes i wonder. why the hell am i so deserving when they're the ones working their asses off?

i guess they don't always bust behind, some just come from wealthy backgrounds.

but still, they're younger, more active and attractive.

they can commit to their schooling, and still seem to have fun, while i putter along directionless and hopeful.

no amount of reading will get me there.

no amount of writing.

i feel stupid, real stupid.

while perusing the internet, spying on old familiar faces, i've stumbled upon some very sad news. i can't believe cocaine habits and pity whoring could take you so damn far in this world. they go from tokyo to brussels to sydney to new york, taking memorable snap shots all along the way. i've always believed that some of these bastards had a real shit storm headed their way, some horrible karma lurking in their unsuspecting shadows, but somehow they've sidestepped their impending reciprocation and continued merrily on their way.

without schooling.

without changing.

parents feeding them money, maybe? hell if i know. hell if i'll ever know.

some people, i realize, i've wrongly accused of some stupid trivial thing or another. i can see that. i can also see them doing much better than i, you know, traveling around and enjoying themselves and yada yada. as jealous as i get, i can only shrug my stupid shoulders and forget about it. but the others...

shit.

i can only say this:

life isn't fair, goddamnit.

2008-03-16T11:07:00.000-07:00

mad scientist in the fish aisle.

a variety of filters and subterranean bubblers.

kissing gouramies, blood parrots, schools of piranha like oscars, cichlids and tiger-striped barbs.

a small wooden desk, blotchy with chemical spills and slightly warped by accidental fish bag spills. underneath sat large empty buckets that, judging by the silhouette of the drowning toddler, once contained something hazardous. now only slippery moss and algae.

old aquarium parts, light bulb fixtures white with calcium deposits, glass feeder doors, broken aqua green nets and other bizarre equipment, some having no place in the fish aisle.

aqua boy, professor xenitor.

the stare of a man fresh out of a coma.

skin made of plastic cling wrap. stares into your soul.

an evil telepathic super genius.

customers emitting rays or vibes that sickly resemble those of a chinese foot binder or a goatse enthusiast. obsessive, lacking some important quality

khmer rouge

2008-02-14T09:05:00.000-08:00

to keep you is no benefit. to destroy you is no loss.

12:03 AM*rough draft

2008-02-04T19:25:00.000-08:00

My eyes snapped open like a pair of over zealous roller shades and my red rimmed eyes skim about the all too familiar living room. two dirty sneakers, where bare feet reside, rest on a glass coffee table. I notice on either side of my periphery a stretch of green leather couch, empty but welcoming. it was as if i had been expecting guests earlier in the evening. but, over the course of the night, had drank myself into a comatose state.

the first thing my immediate gaze attaches itself to is the lime green and dark brown skyline of some translucent cityscape that lay before me on a glass infrastructure that resembled the coffee table i had remembered being empty hours before. i feel the the right side of my cheek tighten and contort into an odd smile. i had remained still as stone, a sleeping mountain chiseled over decades by some ancient race of people into the vague form of an omnipotent being. a mount rushmore of some sort. whose unseen divine powers had once held influence over a primitive civilizations moral structure and whose wrath had once commanded the outcome of precious crop conditions.

over time, however, these people seemed to have lost faith in their all powerful creator and turned, instead, to scientific research and basic reasoning. this great mountain became a mere reminder of the archaic and embarrassing beginnings of this now great race. a tourist attraction.

this being has slept for too long. clouds of dust, skin of the ages, crumbles and swirls with every slight movement. his people have vanished into obscurity, leaving only vacant buildings and deathly quiet streets.

the living room is dimly lit by a dull yellow hallway light, half hidden behind a corner, a dying star reflecting on a blank television set. it all adds to the utter loneliness of the room.

my giant hand slithers down the empty street once proudly called budweiser memorial drive and up heineken avenue, resting on marlboro square. the leather clings to my body as i rise up and every bone in my body creaks in protest. my skin felt two sizes too small. i can already tell this will be another eventful, sleep depraved night.

a meeting is to be held at two.

while cracking open the unopened pack of smokes i find myself wandering over to my parents liquor cabinet and browsing through the fine assortment of cheap liquor, most are covered with a thin layer of dust. it's pretty apparent that my folks aren't heavy drinkers. the fullest of the bottles, a bottle of *brandy*, stands out among the rest. a bright label, a cheery smile and some heavy lidded eyes.

"hello." i said, my words somewhat muffled by the tobacco stick dangling from my lips.

"eh? oh, you again." he said almost impatiently.

i remove the cigarette.

"yes, you'll do quite nicely. these things don't go particularly smoothly without a drip, you understand." i start heading for the back sliding glass door.

"yeah, yeah. do what you gotta do, i guess." he said.

-the full moon casts subtle light on my backyard. a white-blueish glow that creates an odd feeling of calm. the way the ocean waves silently lapping at the sandy shores can put you in a zen state, of some sort. the light seems edible, delicious even. a subtle taste so familiar, but so allusive to the senses. a butterfly that refuses to be pinned down and displayed. the light fills you like cold milk but breaks like ice or glass, so as not to cut up the roof of your mouth. like icing on cake. yellow, on the other hand, seems more ketchup and mustard like, more aggressive and abrasive on the pallet, but also smooth and creamy. the blue seems to soften the harsh edges of any angles, from the castle-like concrete retaining wall to the swaying blades of grass.-

also, within my window, i see my familiar shape. the two different types of lighting competing make the details of my body almost indiscernible. my form, outlined by a halo of dim yellow, seemed dotted, easily detachable from the world around it. the inside, or filling, blank and shadowed, only a heavy brow line and a prominent nose remain visible. as if molded out of clay and yard debris, a golem bending and moving to its masters will. strangely camouflaged with what lay beyond this sheet of glass, another bit of earth and life, an assemblage of active carbon, oxygen and hydrogen molecules. i also notice the reflection of a blinking red dot. the answering machine.

baited, i turn to regard it only to find my flight itinerary laid out neatly at its side.

"something on your mind, kid? you look a little sick." brandy asked me curiously.

"hmmn, just a little shocked i guess. things seem to be moving at an extremely quick pace. i'm just sort of carried along with it"

"oh," he glances down at the flight plan, "denver? san francisco? how about aberdeen? tokyo? something a little different?"

"boy, i wish," i say regretfully, "money, or lack thereof, is the problem."
"can't help you there."

'no, you can't, seeing as how you're partly to blame. if only things weren't so uninteresting without your company."

i grip and yank at the handle on the sliding glass door and step out into night air thick with insects and humidity. clutching my companion by the neck i rush out into the fray, a field medic in search of an escape from the constant, bloodsucking barrage of mosquitoes. the gelatin air suffocating, suppressing, almost painfully wrecking havoc on my pitiful sweating body. to think the night had appeared so peaceful from the inside.

The Naked City

2007-11-24T20:17:00.000-08:00

Winded, I flip my mobile phone closed. It was three in the morning already. I felt I had just awakened, not but a minute ago, to the irritatingly cheerful jingle of my alarm clock. But apparently I was mistaken, an entire day had just past me by without notice. This routine of mine had become so familiar, it was as if I had just driven through it. My foot had pressed the accelerator on green and the brake on red, I matched my speed with the neighboring traffic while my mind replayed past conversations and television shows. I had now reached my destination, hours from my point of origin, with only snippets of insignificant road memories to show for it. Had I lived another day without full knowledge of actually living it? Why is it that nearly every conversation I had had today was as easily recalled as my first footsteps? I could’ve sworn I told my mind to store that information away, catalogue every goddamned event in this cycle of drinking and working, speaking and smoking.

Three o'clock with an empty pack of cigarettes. Obviously I had been doing something, whether or not it was productive, though, is up for debate. I stood up from the plastic lawn chair on our front porch and surveyed our nice little view of the peaceful street just beyond a wall of shrubbery that marked the boundaries of our humble front yard. Within this square of leased property, overgrown grass and ivy plants creeping up the neighbors dividing fence, we were safe from the hustle and bustle of the outside world. An all to familiar realm inhabited by university students on wireless pocket phones, hyped up or hung over, speeding up and down the street in questionably expensive vehicles. Immersed in their digitalized conversations and pixelated text messages with deliberately misspelled words. A reality spoon-fed to the new youth, the future, by popular television and fashion magazines. Life is no longer cruel or unfair, unless it’s on the discovery channel. Life is now glamorous and shallow; acceptance and self-fulfillment can be purchased at the local mall for ridiculous prices. Phone bills, rent, tuition or any other financial annoyances, are problems left for those best suited for them…the parents.

My back ached bitterly; I had sat there, still as a statue, for far too long. While stretching, I entered the dark, slumbering household, the door creaked open slowly and a rush of escaping warmth greeted me like an excitable dog rushing to its returning master. I had become so absorbed in my phone conversation that I hadn’t realized how frigid the air was and how it had made the tips of every angle on my body numb with cold.

The rectangular living room, with its ceiling fan spinning sluggishly, resembled a bear cave in winter, a room dimly lit and comfortably warm with wear. A square patch of carpeting, at the far end of the room, marked our seating and lounging area. A half circle of couches and cushioned chairs surrounds the entertainment center and a square coffee table, in the center of the sitting space, bustling with the recently forgotten drug and alcohol activity of the night. Empty bottles decorate a wooden, L shaped shelf in the corner of the living room, just below the ceiling, like tombstones marking the graves of parties long since past, spirits long since imbibed.

Rick, our road crazed squatter, lay sprawled out on the long leather couch against the wall, directly below the row of bottles. Without a blanket, the fine details of ursine figure were exposed to all, including a sliver of furry belly that slipped out from beneath his wrinkled shirt. His bearded face had a pleasant, drug induced grin stretching across it. Dan, my roommate, lay huddled under a thin sheet on the couch adjacent to Rick. Dan is sort of an intimidating character. Each of his arms is decorated with an impressive amount of detailed tattoos also he’s a very burly looking guy, not one easily messed with. In stark contrast to his character was the faded flower print sheet draped over his body. It was one of those aged blankets that one always finds in the back of a forgotten closet. Every so often it’s dug out, unfolded and examined. You find yourself remembering, vaguely, all the times you had to use it as a child when one quilt just wasn’t enough to build a sofa fort. Then the musky scent sends you into a fit of sneezing. It was a very innocent looking blanket on a very rugged looking man who was far too tall to be completely covered by it. I watched the two of them sleep for a second, the way one cautiously watches a napping bear, before continuing on.

I felt like a nicotine-crazed buzzard, of some sort, as I circled the inside of my pitch-black house, hovering over snoring bodies looking for something to smoke. I needed something to fill the growing void between my two tar stained fingers that seem forever frozen in the act of victory signing. I found nothing but empty packs scattered about, vacant seashells offering nothing but colorful patterns and faint signs of its pre-existing life. I know for a fact that the same disappointment resides in the kitchen as well as my room, so I don’t bother.

I think about quitting for the thousandth time than, begrudgingly, slip on my shoes and zip up my sweater, and head out the door towards the nearby circle K. I’m careful to close the door slowly and quietly as not to waken my inebriated friends. Once outside I exhale noisily and snort my nose, the airs effect on my sinuses is immediate. I clambered down the front steps, clumsy feet stomping, and walked down the driveway towards the little road in front of our house. My breath shrouded my face with a moist fog, I imagine my appearance to be visible only between exhales.

The spot where our driveway intersects with Lipona road, the small road in front of our house, was dimly lit by a streetlight veiled in a thin mist. An omen, I guessed. I felt the secrecy of the night. Not a full on cover-up, but a light lie and shushing finger over a friendly smile. Not an ill omen, perhaps, but certainly not a positive one either. I crossed the street, swept under the streetlight, and stepped onto the sidewalk. There was a minimal amount of noise outside; light construction to the east, a neighborhood dog barking to the northwest and a raccoon sniffing the fenced in yard of our neighbor, Mr. McCormick. I could see the black-banded nightmare watching me as I passed, two calculating eyes hiding unknowable thoughts, rotating on a face with a strangely bland expression. Those glinting orbs cut through the cloudy night, for only a second, before their owner skillfully climbed the side of McCormick’s trashcan and disappeared beneath the lid.

I suddenly envied all the night critters in the area, they must have it this good almost every night but without the weighted drag of sleep exhaustion.

I hit Pensacola Street, pretty quickly, and took a left headed west. The sidewalk is pitted and weathered, peppered with black blotches of hardened gum. No more than a mile ahead is a hill. Behind me, the same incline only much steeper. Pensacola Street, this side of town, is a series of U shaped valleys, a stretch of undulating asphalt frozen in action. The crest of each wave hides any oncoming activity of the adjoining valley. Both sides of the road are lined with various businesses, from corporate fast food joints to local establishments, each with a beckoning sign reaching out to the speeding cars. I felt as if this portion of the street were spiraling, on its own, throughout space, that I and any other conscious being had been completely disconnected from our home world.

The chill had, by now, numbed a good portion of my legs making them feel a little stiff and rigid. And, after a bit of walking, they even seemed to have developed a mind of their own. I was carried towards the store effortlessly on two fleshy hinges attached to my waist with boney poles fixed on the opposite ends. A wind-up toy soldier, without a turnkey, with a strangely life like expression painted on its face.

As I expected, the strip was ghostly and empty. If I hadn't known any better or if I had only just arrived in this little town, I would've mistakenly believed that the cities population consisted of two sedans (one green and one black), an expedition SUV and a cherry picker truck parked on the sidewalk by the liquor store up ahead. An enticing array of stoplights and streetlights, halos of light smudged with filmy fog, lit the walkway. They shone for no one else but me. The blue, beeping walk signal across the street never looked more welcoming then it did at that moment. It spoke to me in a gentle voice that seemed to say: “cross, if you’d like, to. It’s okay if you don’t need to. Just know that I’m always here for you and, if ever you need to cross, just let me know with a push of that button.” I smiled politely at the offer. The streetlights beamed down on me as I passed, their motherly instincts activated by the setting sun. “So long as you remain under my light, you will be seen. I offer little warmth, unfortunately, but the light I provide should take you far in relative safety.” I was grateful.

I suddenly found myself right beside the now rising bucket of the cable truck. I had been completely lost in thought and hadn’t been paying any attention. I had already passed the Cuban restaurant and the dry cleaners, now I was just outside of the liquor store.

A Jamaican guy, with a hardhat and work jumpsuit on, was being directed from the ground by large, middle-aged white man in denim jeans and a plaid shirt. He was a Jackie Gleason kind of guy, someone you expected to have a lit cigar wedged between his molars at all times of the day and a permanent squint at the corner of each eye. But apparently looks aren’t everything. The only habit he seemed to have, neither good nor bad, was smoothing back his full head of grey hair. I wondered if this tic had developed as a result of some building stress or maybe a lack of sleep. Maybe the guy was jus picky with his hair. The two bickered back and forth, something about wiring and the trucks hydraulics systems, he pointed about wildly, with one hand, and worked his scalp with the other. I wordlessly made my way around them all the while silently wishing I had the old man’s beautiful head of grey.

Colorfully lit signs, of all shapes and sizes, pierced the thin fog like daggers through flesh. Stationary images now unobstructed by the traffic, smog, pedestrians and the noise of the morning, seemed so awfully clear and obvious in the empty night. Eye-catching colors and large billboard messages meant to forcefully grab and rape the attention span of the mid-day rusher. The idle car at the stoplight with the occupant absorbed in cellular matters, the fitness junkie speed walking in short shorts and whatever other hapless bastard that managed to wander by, all eyes were drawn to the radiant rays of light like moths to a lamp.

They preached various messages such as ninety-nine cent value meals, twelve-dollar haircuts, gas at three dollars and nineteen cents a gallon, freaky fast delivery service, but to a non-existent congregation. Brilliantly dressed holy men whose grandiose voices echoed throughout an empty church. Here I walk, intense visuals and light pollution bearing down on me, wondering why the street continued to remain so loud even without the ridiculous amounts of five o’clock traffic. Wasted efforts bleeding the city’s power supply.

Up ahead was a beacon of hope that cut through all the competitive jabbering. A familiar face spotted in a group of coercive strangers. The angelic symbol could be seen through the thin fog, a red K encircled by white. I shot straight through the empty parking lot, mindful of the pumps, and up towards wide expansion of crystal clear windows and glass double doors. The light this place emitted held promises of warmth, food and shelter, for a price, as well as reasonably priced tobacco. I opened the left door and entered, my body shuddered involuntarily as my skin rejoiced at the sudden rise in temperature.

The entrance bell binged, a king whose arrival was announced, not by flagged trumpets, but an electronic chime that drew the eyes and ears of every surf and peasant in the store. The single soul, an employee, was a dead eyed man behind the register whose puffy gaze briefly flickered up to me then lazily back to his tabloid. Truly this man was ready for what dangers could come, be it a ski masked man with a loaded handgun or a drunken bum with an attitude, either way, he was ready. I imagine him rolling up his tabloid into a tight paper bat and bludgeoning the shit out of whatever bastard decided to make this miserably boring shift into an interesting, possibly rewarding, night of action and adventure. This man loved inactive stretch of the morning hours, it was written all over that dreary mess of a face.

I goose stepped over to the refrigerator aisle, poked around and fridge window shopped for a bit, than decided to grab a gator aide. I wasn't exactly thirsty, or anything, it might’ve been the severe visual marketing mind fuck I had just received on the walk over that had me reach my hand back into the cold groping for a drink. The great deals while supplies last, extra value menu, useless bargain crap had wormed itself into my head and I needed to purchase something, anything, to feel better about myself.

I swiveled my way through candy aisle and condom lane until I stood right in front of the front register. He was still engrossed in that rag, though now I saw what exactly he was reading. Apparently batboy had a sex change operation done last week.

I set my drink down on the counter and the man lazily swayed upward. His movements, head and arm, required little to no muscle power, more swinging and nodding then anything. He seemed to rely mostly on gravity for strength and guidance. As a result, his movements became sloppy and uncoordinated, as if he were a Jell-O cube molded into man form. Was he drunk? No, he'd be having a little more fun with me and he probably wouldn’t have been so deadpan unless he had gotten sick already.

I wondered, out of the blue, if the man had ever slept with anyone. And if so, whether or not I would've found her even remotely attractive. He wasn't hideous, a patchy chin beard, small gut tucked under a tight belt and a beauty mark just above his right cheek, he was just sort of bland. The circle K uniform wasn't especially flattering, either. He looked beefy in it. The unlucky woman, what if she were small and fragile? Petite? I just couldn't imagine those apish arms gracefully thrown around a women's shoulder, not without knocking her flat on her face anyway. This made me smile, slightly, a response I hope he took as a positive greeting of some sort. His expression remained impassive.

I told him my brand and he grabbed it from behind the register and casually tossed it next to my drink. It landed and bounced over the edge of the counter. I reached down and picked it up.

"$6.44." he said simply, his mouth movements resembled that of a fleshy Muppet. A fish, a giant grouper perhaps, sucking in water and filtering out the oxygen.
"Here you go," I slipped him my debit card. "Thank you."
His mouth still hung there. It was as if he were silently dragging out the last 'four' of that single, short sentence he had just spoken. It hung there even after he had swiped my card.

The credit card machine started chattering and spitting, a paper tongue slipped out. He ripped it away and handed it to me. I glanced at his nametag, for no good reason, and it read, in plain text, Ted. A one-syllable name for a one-syllable kind of guy who lived a one-syllable kind of life. Dull.

I left, silently; the door beeped a robotic farewell, as genuine and warm as an answering machine operator’s voice. The K sign, which had once been so welcoming, now waved a single middle finger at my departing behind. It, like all the other signs, just wanted a piece of my hard earned pie. I kept my frozen hands deep within the pockets of my sweater and pulled up the hood from behind my neck. The few souls driving by would see a sullen young man with legs that moved as if bound to wooden stilts, a ghoulish character with a craving for, not brains, but nicotine and gator aide. A car passed by and honked. For a second, I entered someone's mind, I’m sure of it. I had now assimilated myself into that person's brain and played a minor role in their epic life. I felt both dirty and proud.

The cherry picker men ignored me as I neared; the man up top had busied himself with a malfunctioning transformer. I secretly prayed for an explosion, and then feared the after effect, a high voltage shock followed by a giant metal tube bearing down onto my unsuspecting head, which suddenly felt so frail and paper thin. I heard Jackie Gleason behind me complaining about his job, the Jamaican guy seemed to ignore him, or maybe he just didn't hear him.

This town sleeps for now. Just for now. In three hours, or so, something will stir. The beasts hibernate, shut down, for seven to eight hours, than wake up again, and with their internal batteries all charged up they climb into their cars and begin honking and screaming and cursing. Living, what they believe to be the new reality: What television has said is acceptable to say and what GQ has shown as physically attractive. Any new gadgets, no matter how unimportant they are, must be obtained. Being out dated is worse then death. Their parents, simpering providers and work slaves, are only around to pave the path to success with green bills. These sub-humans (although some may argue that, as the future, they are atop) selectively ignore all that is around them but, at the same time, are directed solely by what surrounds them. What a strange paradox.

I've seen the city naked tonight and, frankly, I’m not that impressed by its swinging member or those enormous breasts. It has no hold on me, no noticeable influence as of yet. But it feels like it presents an unspoken challenge, of some sort. An invisible gauntlet has been dropped and my cheeks are red and stinging. Shall I proceed to whip it out? The city itself is welcoming and positive, the force that drives it, on the other hand…
I remember the empty packs of cigarettes lying around the house. At one point they contained twenty cancerous sticks. When emptied, the packs become nothing more than harmless pieces of thin paper boxes.
What’s this I’ve suddenly come across?

I notice a pile of what appeared to have once been a serving of hamburger helper, a meal that had escaped the judgment of someone's stomach. A small river of bile trickled from the splatter of semi-digested food and snaked its way across the sidewalk. I avoided stepping in it by practically launching myself across with my feet. After landing foolishly, I had to adjust my pants, which had somehow slipped down past my butt.

By now I had reached the corner of the street, my house lay just ahead of me and to the left on the other side of the street. I turned back towards the stretch of street, its glowing signs still seeming to ramble on foolishly, speaking to no one in particular. I thought I could almost hear them. It was a strange bird song, of some sort, made up of high frequency squeaks and chirps, vibrant messages my human ears couldn’t even begin to process. All I could hear was the hum of electricity. Subliminal wording? Maybe. Or maybe it the sound of the city’s population feeding. A growing fetus connected to the town via the umbilical cord. Undeveloped and incapable of rational thought, these creatures are somehow mistaken for fully-grown adults and are treated as such.

I take Lipona road, slip through the wall of shrubbery and climb the front steps to the porch. The walk is taken without thought.

I slip into my dark house and begin typing. Yellow teeth, all nestled in a bed of pink gum, form a crooked smile that reflects the glow of the blue screen. A cigarette, ember running on one side, masks my face in a carcinogenic haze.

sleep deprived and paranoid

2007-11-11T15:40:00.000-08:00

"One must be disinterested, accept that a sound is a sound and a man is a man, give up illusions about ideas of order, expressions of sentiment, and all the rest of our inherited aesthetic claptrap."
-john cage

a smoke break in the middle of a slow shift. uncomfortably seated on a curb not too far from the entrance of the restaurant.

i could see the narrow set of stairs that led up to the shaded patio dining area. my view was slightly obstructed by an over sized SUV parked crookedly beside the landing. so, really, i could only spot the last step, a slight drop afterwards and you were on asphalt, and also the varying tops of the disembodied heads of our satisfied customers as they left the restaurant with their invisible, possibly nonexistent, bellies full of cheesy goodness and tangy marinara.

it's kind of hard to say whether or not these mysterious heads leave the restaurant with the bodies they originally came in with. perhaps they had coldly left them in the trunk of their cars, squirming and scratching at the interior with frantic passion. without the head to reason and puzzle their situation, the body is left to its own carnal devices. the heads coldly float along with as much regard for their headless partner as a hit man for his cemented sneakered victim plummeting to the bottom of the boat basin.

or...

maybe they suddenly sprout them again, some strange evolved human with the regenerating powers of a skink, only more widespread throughout the body. have aliens conquered this city? subjugated it's people? mind fucking us into ignorant submission? i'll never know, for sure, they seem to grow them back when i think about it too hard or when i take any notice of it. what if, and maybe this sounds crazy, they had us so utterly pinned, we would unknowingly place replacement bodies in reserved seats? somewhere in the back of every restaurant in this town lies a miniature station where their biomechanical traveling suits are manufactured by brainwashed humans. i couldn't possibly be involved in the production, i'm way too technologically back-ass-wards. or maybe i am included. just another working component in this giant war machine. i just have to keep playing it their way, i guess, so long as i leave with my pathetic pay check and my equally pathetic life.

such bizarre thoughts on such a muggy day. the humidity seems to addle the ol' noggin.

i could also spot them (these crazy humanoids) leaving when the front door swung open. these faces seemed able to travel on the slight rush of air escaping from those spring loaded doorways. so light, they appeared to be, that even a simple gust of air conditioned air could send them whirling into their cushioned seats.

the plug was pulled and two wrinkled heads slowly hovered out, then gradually turned towards my little vantage point, which (and i didn't know this yet) just happened to be right next to their car. with god given, sloth-like grace common in most older couples, four sets of mossy loafers descended the stoop. time abruptly changed. flowed differently. as if a stone had been thrown in the middle of the shallows, redirecting the original flow of the creek.

dry paint began to dry more, sun began to dropped, grass grew noisily, and the yellow moss on their feet seemed to grow brighter. hours became minutes and seconds became minutes, months were years and days were years. these two characters seemed to have induced a universal seizure of some sort.

death has obviously been shadowing these two for a long time. he crept into neighbors attics, potato sack full of random surveillance equipment. a stake out with emilio esteves. bugs have been planted in every single phone in the house, mini cameras installed in their medicine cabinets, rotating cameras above showers and beds, not one sluggish footstep went without notice. the house hummed and beeped with electrical life, and the tenants were none the wiser. some how their time was never up. death grits his teeth and shakes his fists above his head, his frustration could not be more apparent. the couple was too slow to die, time was always way ahead of them, across the finish line and over the sea, hasn't bothered to look back. maybe it's about time death reset his wristwatch. pressed an ear to check the its pulse. then again, maybe this odd pair found a way around death, avoided the alleys and corners where he lurked. strange creatures with even stranger abilities.

they eventually hit the final step. an anvil thrown into an empty library.

there was something that took on the appearance of the female. wrinkled arms thinning with muscle atrophy, curled up over two hideous excuses for breasts, that dangled listlessly over a belly the size of a basketball. the skin was fake, it must have been. there was no way that could've been living tissue. this was one defective body she had been stuck with. should i tell her? no. too funny, too awkward. somehow those tyrannosaurus arms of hers could support enough gold jewelry to sink a spanish galleon. she could obviously afford a decent body. her neck. my god, it was a deflated cow's udder and, like most people her age, was probably covered in a field of fine white hairs. her body, in it's decaying state of being, must have mixed up the vials of testosterone and estrogen. an aging cell, keeper of hormones, with failing eyesight reads the label wrong. a practical joke, perhaps?

so ghostly pale and thin, silky even. i bet they'd be worth thousands of dollars on the black market.

yes. she appeared first, stooping and shuffling along as if she'd just been released from her little cubby hole in the bell tower. the man, her husband i assumed, though he showed absolutely no interest in her, also hunched, but much less so than his mutant wife. their postures resembling that of a drunkard beaten within an inch of his drunken life. the man wore his best, dusty old suit, that looked to have been purchased somewhere in the nineteen seventies. a thrift store get up, of some sort. something i would buy and wear with my darth vader helmet. the lady wore a shaggy moo moo fashioned out of kitchen window curtains.

*at this time i picture this old man naked slithering along into an old cardboard box labeled "donation bin." two seconds later, he pops out fully dressed, mothballs and cigar holes. a bottle of dime store cologne tucked away neatly in a shirt pocket.*

the couple kept shuffled along, wordlessly, stiffly and without any other bodily movement whatsoever, until they had reached the bench where i sat silently watching them. the old man's head then slowly, ever so slowly, turned towards me bringing, into the sunlight, a head as bald as a bastard. so clean and white was this fleshy spot that i was temporarily blinded by the reflection of the setting sun. his cold blue eyes regarded me thoughtlessly, two sky blue windows, beyond which a set of rusty cogs, stiff sprockets, and toothless gears, sputtered and groaned, shaking away a coat of rust and frozen oil. a dead hamster, skin drawn tightly over it's miniature skeleton, rocks back and forth on a squeaky running wheel turned cradling casket. all behind a brittle egg shell and some amazing liver spotted skin draperies, that swung about comically before those empty blue windows. He stared at me for a while, a very stern stare. a strange self-conscious mind examining me through the front windows built into a ridiculous facade. his gelatinous, pale skin seemed to be attached to his face with an ancient and very cheap epoxy, it quivered with senile confusion.

the more i stared, the more his physical form changed. his skin seemed to take on a life of its own. a symbiotic relationship of some sort, between man and costume, costume and man, the lesser species on the outside, blanketing the tender innards and conveying the thoughts, emotions and feelings of the greater inside organs through facial expressions and foolish hand gestures. it's very survival depends on its ability to decode and translate his decrepit master's electric signals into an acceptable form of human behavior. i pity that skin, i wonder if it knows it's life giver's own life is nearing it's end. will it crawl off, defeated, and slug along the asphalt only to find another skinless body to lazily drape over and hang onto like a wet sheet on a clothesline?

he kept looking, some inner struggle seemed to tear him two different ways. or just one, but what it was, i'll never know. maybe he wanted to express his thoughts on the meal, the service or atmosphere of the restaurant or maybe he just liked my shirt. maybe he thought i looked goofy, just another foolish young brat that thinks he knows everything there is to know, but only understanding one biased half. good or bad, i felt i had to break this strange ice developing and show my good intentions. it would take them months to reach their car door, quite possibly years. my break was nowhere near done, so i figured i might as well make what few minutes we would share together more comfortable. i smiled, politely, and waved. i come in peace. a mere flowered shirt tourist lost in this brief overlapping of opposite circles. generation blank and generation old, come together and...

did he take it positively? wait, maybe i angered the sorry beast. no, i don't think his memory banks, so holed and dilapidated, could recollect the meaning of a simple smile and a friendly wave. maybe. harmless memory loss or blatant rudeness?

not a word was said about the food, service or speed. no complaints and no compliments. no smile or perfunctory nod, slight hand movement or a brief elevating of the eyebrows. just one long, endless stare. i broke eye contact and became lost in thought, a feeling a little embarrassed.

the female creature, who took absolutely no notice of me, pawed weakly at the passenger side door. her long, bright red nails scratching in patient impatience at the flawless wax coat on the car. her gaudy jewelry rattled and banged. so loud was it that i'm almost certain the ears of every homeless man, women and child in bangladesh, perked up in hungry anticipation. the man fumbled dumbly with a complicated set of three keys until he finally fit the point into the hole.

* i'm sure the man would experience some strange sense of doddering deja vu later in the night. i pictured him, glass of tiger's blood and panda milk in one hand, bottle of viagra in the other. dressed in his sexily conservative pair of pin striped long johns. the crone prepares for the romantic night ahead, topping off their sexy italian meal. the man's hard on, try as it might, is shamelessly losing the battle against the thin fabric of his pajamas. a small white flag is all it's able to raise.

his wife, in a silk nightie, unable to sleep lying down flat (lest the fluids in her hump consume her), is propped upright by a reading pillow. she's as close to being "good to go" as she's gonna get and her husband knows it. she crooks a finger in his direction, beckoning him towards her, then slowly spreads her veiny legs apart. the sound, i imagine, is one of an ancient stone door to an egyptian treasure tomb slowly sliding open for the first time in over two centuries. a grainy rumble that echoes impressively throughout the dusty chamber. a geyser of dust spews forth signifying that the vagina is open and ready, gaping like a hungry maw. the man desperately tries to rouse his defeated pecker, her withered vagina is about as appealing to him as the mouth of a lamprey eel. actually, just thinking of how much better those rows and rows of sharp, bloodsucking teeth would feel when compared to this barren, skin searing wasteland of a cunt, really got his motor running. he'd have to remember to get one of those next time. dig around in some swamp, bleeding cod fish as bait.

what follows can only be described as the lamest mummy fuck ever. rhythmic weight shifting, stifled yawns and desiccated wheezing orchestrates this repulsive dance of sorts. their pores audibly emit an eerie hissing sound, much like a tea kettle on a lit stove. powdered sweat mixed with what little moisture their rubbing bodies can spare creates a very pasty and very chalky sex cocktail. the soft sound of snake skin on a wet pile of yard trash can be heard above the monstrous crescendo of hacking and spitting, bone creaking and occasional snapping.

time has lost all meaning, somehow. once again, these abominations send the universal order spiraling into oblivion. any poor soul observing might get lost in their hypnotic pumping, caught somewhere between gagging and shitting themselves.

suddenly, the air is still and silent, no orgasmic moans have been heard in this room for the past thirty years, and, if the room actually expected to ever hear it again, it would be terribly disappointed. the old man collapses in a heap beside a snoring wife who may or may not have been conscious when he had finished. they will not move for seven days. *

i watched them leave, a smug smile creeping its way across my sorry old mug. they had unknowingly been casted in a perverted play of mine that. i'm sure in reality, they would've turned those bloated old noses up to it or maybe just keeled over from a heart attack. their sorry faces and pathetic routines, were all just props, sets and masks, easily pasted and thrown together in this mr. potato head imagination of mine. no copyright laws or U.S. patent documents or wavers that needed signatures of approval. just good ol' imagination and a guarded tongue. revenge is sweet, especially when the victim is none the wiser.

(i wonder if they really would've turned down my little script.)

they staggered into a box shaped scion with a heavenly white coat of unscathed paint, and slowly drove away.

i scratched the rim of my nose and was pleasantly greeted by a giant clod of green and yellow. this nose goblin had been dangling out in the open, probably had seen the whole thing too. wonder what he thinks of me now. i wiped it onto the bottom of my shoe.

i flicked my smoldering butt, got up and returned to the endless grind of alien slave labor. all the heads remained still. i was now onto their sick, twisted plot. smart, wise and ready.

the living percentage

2007-11-11T14:26:00.000-08:00

seriously amazing.

suntan lotion

2005-06-29T18:09:00.000-07:00

boy, i am tired.

my eyes burn from staring at the sun for too long. the only way to stay awake in the face of all the danger. i'm suffocating under this veil of weariness. mental and physical exhaustion bolted to each of my ankles like over sized sinking lures. hands hanging languid, arms swinging back and forth to the beat of the ambulating living dead. a thin sliver of drool makes its way down the length of my chin as i type. blood shot eyes rolling about in dry sockets, sandbags grating against the lids. those irritating mobile organs set in my face. my brain has shriveled to the size of a peanut, which is not really a nut, but a legume.

i'm not really thinking. i'm really bound by brown, leather straps to a rickety wheelchair in a mental institution somewhere in harlem.

yesterday i left school early to get some well deserved rest. at least, i thought it was well deserved, i guess there could be a number of hard working people in this world who would angrily disagree. but who the hell gives a damn about them? i sure don't. those bastards were born to work. since the time of their conception (of which i am convinced they came out of the womb at forty years of age, fully clothed in a business suit and tie, ready to work) to the time of their death they have probably worked non-stop trying to make their lives as miserable and mundane as humanly possible. from hammering circle pegs into square holes at the playground to the STAT reports they've toiled over endlessly that were due yesterday. the bastards have done and can do nothing without first draining it of fun, scrutinizing the life out of it until it becomes yet another one of their meaningless tasks.

this, right here, is one hundred percent hard work. failing miserably, but with much dedication.

anyways, i went home early to get, what I thought was, some well deserved rest. i turned a corner swiftly next to the church over in...well, jesus i'm not sure what village that is. Barrigada? whatever. i saw a dog lying in the middle of the goddamned road. by middle i mean, of course, within the safe boundaries of the median. at first i had to take my fatigued consciousness to the ring for a good ol' one on one wrastling. the only move fatigue seemed to know, and do successfully, was the sleeper hold. but, being so damn tired himself, he could only manage to do his moves in a sluggish fashion. my better half wrestled the weakened bastard to ground, a move met with much resistance. slightly bruised and sleepy eyed, my better half took control of the wheel. i turned my tired ass around and pulled up into a bedraggled, unkept street across from some typical chamorro household. i looked at the dog in the middle of the road who appeared surprisingly at ease with all the damn traffic zooming inches away from his snout. it was one of those bastardly thin medians that are only about half as long as a car's width. i don't know what the point of those is, i mean why not just make it the proper size? why not go the whole nine yards and make room for the entire car?

i put on my hoodie and approached the edge of the road. the sun was blazing down on my brown sweater, beating the living hell out of the back of my neck. not so bright of an idea, but one that worked...i think. some sort of means to an end? i just can't stand being stared at, especially by these rubbernecking bunch of yokels. i just know that one occupant in some speeding vehicle would slow down to almost a complete stop to stare from the panting dog on the road to the idiot white boy in the hoodie. i would be the topic at at least one of their conversations at their overstuffed dinner tables. maybe. who knows, it more than likely didn't even make it to the table. these bastards are so hungry for gossip that they would find any opportunity to start running their traps. i bet they started yammering on about it in the car. fuck.

i stood there, staring at the dog, who stared right back at me, waiting for the right chance to dash onto the road, grab the dog and dash right back off. seemed pretty damn easy. i even hoped some beautiful, distraught damsel would come fleeing out of the house crying "oh, my baby, my beautiful baby! you saved him! how can i ever repay you?!" i would then say something along the lines of "oh, it was nothing. just doing my part to keep all the citizens of this village safe and happy. even the little ones like ol' sparky here!" then i would nudge the panting snout of the dog, politely, and he would miraculously heal.

sparky would yip happily and do something very cutesy at that moment, me and ms. distress would then look at each other and respond with a simultaneous "aww" or something. i'm not too sure what a traumatized dog can do that would be considered cute, though. besides lick our faces or do back flips into pools or something.

so...

i waited for the traffic to subside on both sides of the road. i was afraid that if i ran out too quickly i would startle the dog into limping headfirst into the speeding wheels of a passing car. i tensed up, crouching low, all ready to sprint, but then the dog barked at me in a threatening way. this seemed strange to me for some reason. then i realized that i hadn't taken any of the potential variables into account. i was acting capriciously, foolhardy even. i mean what if the dog snapped at me, what if it struggled painfully from my grasp while i was running, what if its spine or neck had been broken and by moving it i would have just caused further injury or even death? what if it bit me and i had to get a rabies shot, or worse, what if i immediately contracted rabies! but that thought was completely dismissed from my head. i don't think rabies are on guam. hydrophobia?

i figured i had to chance it. this was the moment i had been waiting for, the flood of gawkers in their dilapidated trucks and chintzy mercedes had momentarily ceased. luck. i burst out on to the road, past the two empty lanes and into the median where i crouched beside the dog. of course at that very moment my luck vanished without a trace and all the neighborhood dogs, aroused by their wounded compadres barking, rushed out from under the shade of their owners trucks and garages to bark at the strange man on the road. also, at that very moment, every car on guam decided to take a little detour through barrigada. the road became packed with spectators and loud mouths. someone had pulled the lever and released the stray hounds and gawkers from their cages.

i almost expected to hear the booming voice of a sports commentator over some goddamn loudspeaker. "he crouches, goes for the scoop up...will he? will he? oh, no bite so far. i think...yes...i think the dog is yowling in pain, ohhhh the clumsy kid drops it!"

the dog was covered in piss. a pile of dog crap laid neatly at his side that it looked as if been placed there on a serving tray by a butler, and puddles of urine that appeared to be pretty fresh. the dog reeked of death and piss. i guess it had lost all hope of rescue and just sort of started to rot. dogs do that though. they stink. i remember when my dog was hit by a car years and years ago. i was all panicky, pacing back and forth from my room to the living room knuckling my forehead stupidly. my parents were scrambling all over the house looking for something to stop the bleeding. any make-shift tourniquet. a huge puddle of blood, spurting through my father's pushing hands, was making its way down the hallway. god, the stench was unbearable. panic and death and excrement's and fart. absolutely terrible.

i scooped it up, whimpering, in my arms and ran across the street. two cars had stopped for me, i attempted a wave at them from beneath the dogs weight (which was surprisingly light), hoping to convey some sort of thanks. they just stared back at me, dumbly watching me pass, then slowly started back up again. once i reached the sidelines i realized i had nowhere to set the dog down. i scanned the area hoping to find a large, shaded tree or anything that would keep my doggy friend out of the sun. i found none, nothing but skinny coconut trees whose shade would shift as the sun progressed through the afternoon sky. i set him down in the garage across from my car instead. a nearby leaky faucet provided an adequate, maybe a little muddy, water supply so he could cool off. i bet that asphalt must have cooked the hell out of him. i patted him (or maybe her) on his or her head and walked over to the car. by this time, all the barking and honking had aroused the attention of the house owner and he made his way out of the house. a shirtless chamorro guy with a prominent beer gut covered in home-made tattoos, sauntered out of the back door in mild interest. he seemed completely oblivious of the dog laying comfortably in the shade of his garage. i pretended to examine something under my car; some invisible imperfection or defect under the wheel. then i got in. i completely avoided looking the whole time, started my car and casually feigned an interest in my troll-like reflection in the mirror.

i felt a little bad depositing such a burden on the guy. then again, maybe it was his dog. if so, maybe he should put some restraint on the dog. maybe he should put on a shirt, as well. i felt great. the incident had me shaken, aware and awake. i'm still waiting for that crazy damsel though.

it's a great world run by terrible creatures.

june 29th, 2005

old shit

2005-02-13T19:35:00.000-08:00

woke up and got stuck in the neighbors garage.
i was only a few years old.
that's the oldest memory i have, and really, i don't actually remember it.
i know it happened because people tell me it happened. then again, people tell me a lot of things. i used to walk to the park next door in nothing but my god given skin.
i have these frozen images in my head, pictures in a sort of blurry stasis. sometimes they mimic movement, dusty film flickering and flackering.
god do i hate it. that's all i have left. now i'm an old bastard, sitting in my old bastard chair, smoking my old bastard cigarettes and drinking my old bastard wine. tomorrow i'll be an adult, some stuck up prick locked in a basement investing in shady stocks or something.

so sad.

if you see me walking on the side of the road, high off the serotonin, don't wave or say hello. i won't remember you. i'm still stuck in that goddamn garage.
*
he wears a tweed suit, carved from granite.
he speaks the good word that puts a hole in the heart
and a tear in the eye of even the most righteous man.
he drives a bug, a beetle made of concrete.
it spews green chemical waste, complex smog
that could put a hole in the lung.
with retractable wings, made of solid stone.
can fly a man to mars and back again.
boys are boys. it all exist between the lines of
fiction and reality. i have a hole in my heart
and a stone in my belly. i have a soul, a command center
in my brain.
*
so today i'm trying to print out this damn paper but my computer in the lab is giving me shit.

adam: ahhh, finally done with this stupid paraphrasing. what a great article though, i'm glad to have read up on Cambodia's gruesome past. now let me just hit the old print button here. annnndd...
computer: nope.
adam: hehe, what's that?
computer: huh uh, no printing here, bub.
adam: i'm sorry, but, uh, i really need this paper, it's uh, well, it's due today.
computer: yeah, well, you're gonna have to move your ass on over to the next poor sucker, because i ain't your bitch.
adam: hey, now just a minute...!
computer: don't you 'juss a minute me' i'll whoop your bastard ass into submission, you sorry sack of shit!
adam: look man, there's no reason to get violent...
computer: hey! hey! you comin' all up in here making me print your shit! i will kill you! you hear that? kill you!
adam: jesus, hey you wanna go?! fine we'll go! *roll up sleeves on my short sleeve t-shirt*
computer: yeah, c'mon just gimme your best shot, ya bastard!
adam: oh i will, don't you make me...
computer: c'mon, i dare ya, ya fucking cunt rag!
adam: you know, what? you know what? i'm calling your damn computer management man! how's that mister big shot?!
computer: ahh, ya fucking bastard, you ain't even a man! go cry to mommy!

then i go up to the computer supervisor guy that sits around at his desk looking bored.

adam: hey man, your damn computer's giving me guff, man, i really need this...
guy: whoa whoa whoa, guff? did you just say, guff? what is that, guff?
adam: what?
guy: well, i mean, what, are we in the eighties? you gotta use the word guff? are you some damn handy man husband giving me a lecture? what is this?
adam: look man, i just meant your...
guy: hey, i know what you meant, but did you have to use that word? guff? christ man, that's a loser's word right there...if you know what i mean. you want the chicks? you keep up with that 'guff' stuff you ain't gettin any.
adam: wait a minute, eighties word? i think guff's been around much longer than that. and, well, you know what? guff is a word too, it has just as much right to be used in a sentence as any other word.
guy: hey man, you can say guff till your face turns blue. just don't expect to get any props from it.
adam: what the hell are you talking about 'props'? i couldn't care less about what these college non-identities think of my vocabulary skills, or use there of. look, i just want my damn computer to print my goddamn paper, alright?
guy: hey, don't have to get all testy and start using the lord's name in vain. i'll fix your computer, you damn vocabulary crazed heathen.
*

junkers jumo

Smoker's Oasis *rough draft

brewing: rough outline

*Coffee relieves indigestion: rocky's unexpected return* Act1: Misery prefers company

Act1: Misery seems to prefer company

Act 2: spinal knives and foreign worlds

Act 3: opposing sunrises setting

Act 4: these are no lip stick stains, that's high grade seminal fluid

Act 5: "the rumor: an unreliable chain of exaggerated personal theories and second hand fact

Act 6: revenge is a dish best predigested and served in a soup bowl

Act 7: A hot cup of joe after a large meal settles the stomach

the land of potato soup

your name is paul

the conflict

admitting there's a problem

khmer rouge

12:03 AM*rough draft

The Naked City

sleep deprived and paranoid

the living percentage

suntan lotion

old shit

Coffee relieves indigestion: rocky's unexpected return Act1: Misery prefers company