Armageddon

Michael bought a 42” plasma flat-screen television with surround sound and all the amenities that promised to make his life wonderful, but the goddamn thing never worked right. Now he found himself with a serious dilemma; should he take it back and save the world or just keep the annoying thing and hope that everything turned out okay? Michael wasn’t the type of person who returned something when it didn’t work correctly. In this day and age he understood that with electronics you were bound to have some difficulties, but he wasn’t about to be bullied either. He wasn’t going to put up with crap like that.

You see, the main problem with it was that sometimes the goddamned teevee had a mind of its own and when that happened it often let Michael in on some of its secrets. The most vital of these being wild aspirations to destroy the planet. It was extremely rare to find such desires in a normal household appliance, no matter how advance the technology was. Michael had an alarm clock that didn’t wake him sometimes and a toaster that always burned one side of the bread, but never anything as catastrophic as this. The crazy part about it was that he waited for Circuit City’s annual sale to buy the damn thing even though he could afford it at the regular price. He was a thrifty fellow, that’s just the way he was, which was the main reason he burned at the thought of returning it to those bastards!

It all began a few weeks earlier as fate intervened and forced him to procure alternate viewing scenarios. While watching a pre-season game between the Michael Vick-less Atlanta Falcons and the San Diego Chargers, a team he hoped would finally take the championship, his large bulky rear-projection dinosaur of a television had a meltdown and began to give him a triple-vision red-green half-assed poor-man's substitute of an image. Five hours later, after a television repair guy informed him that it would be cheaper to replace the monstrous thing than to fix it, Michael found himself nursing a beer and showering curses at the obscured in-triplicate survivors of a plane crash as they tried to discover the meaning of a small island located somewhere in the middle of the twilight zone. Not only was he thrifty, but stubborn as well and for a couple of weeks he suffered through headaches and nausea while watching sitcom celebrity Martians from hell. It's a wonder he hadn't been on a date in a few months.

It was shortly after he went out and bought the new, evil plasma teevee that all the real trouble began. It had been working fine for about ten days when a shudder ran through the image, followed by an abrupt noise that oddly sounded like a sneeze. Michael was just sitting down with his Healthy Choice Fettuccine Alfredo to watch Prison Break when the incident occurred. It was one of his favorite shows and he was eager to find out what was going to happen next with Dr. Sara Tancredi after she and LJ were kidnapped. You see, he was secretly in love with Dr. Sara and often imagined himself as Michael from the show instead of the regular old Michael that he was in real life. When the preview flashed across the screen two years earlier and he noticed her for the first time, he knew that an obsession was in the works. Forty-five episodes later, Michael had yet to miss a moment of screen time with his girl and he sure as hell was not going to miss one now. He jumped up from his seat and went to make sure that all of the connections were secure.

That's when his television began to speak to him.

“Hey, don't touch me there?” It said in a voice that sounded a bit like Fred Sanford on acid, which basically sounds exactly like Fred Sanford...but more omniscient.

Michael turned and looked at the front door, thinking that maybe one of his buddies had busted in and was cracking on him. His neighbor Gregory held one of the largest Sanford & Son collections in the world and loved to imitate the great patriarch but the door was locked, of course, like it always was since that day his ex barged in on him while he was playing Tiger Woods PGA Tour on his Wii dressed only his chonies. She left without a word and, though it was a bit hazy later from all the gin and tonics he'd been drinking that day, he knew that she wasn't expecting him to call either. Needless to say, no one was about to come in through his door anymore but he was about to entertain a very interesting house guest.

“You know that she's going to die soon, right?”

He whirled about, searching for the joker but all that he managed to see was another shimmery wave spread across the television screen that seemed to coincide directly with the question mark. He leaned in real close because, though he knew that plasma indicated liquid in some format, he was pretty confident that the picture wasn't supposed to come with a ripple effect. Michael was about to touch the screen with an outstretched finger, not really knowing if he had reached the point where it had become clear that he'd lived alone for far too long.

“Hell yes, I'm talking to you fool!”

Michael squealed and stumbled backward, unfortunately knocking over his Pacifico cerveza into his bowl of fettuccine. There was no getting around it. His teevee was speaking to him. His first thought was that extra terrestrials had harnessed his satellite dish and sent down transmissions into his living room. He thought of himself standing before the giant spaceship with bright colored lights reflecting a rhythmic classical order feedback into his brain just like Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encount...

...wait a minute, did it just say that she was going to die?

His television began to chuckle at him. The Prison Break intro, that he'd come to know and love, shook like a leaf. The chuckle grew into laughter and eventually expounded into a full gale burst of jest that rattled the screen so violently until it abruptly stopped, the teevee blinking into nothingness. That's when Michael knew that he was doomed. There would be no Prison Break that night.

The television, appropriately named Pan, began to tell him of the overtures of Armageddon, which could be found throughout historical creative expression and that the time of the rapture foretold through the ages was finally coming to fruition. Michael eventually grew tired of the pedagogical rantings of the doomsday simulacrum and after cleaning up the Healthy Choice disaster, he ordered a pizza and went to see if he could find some images of Dr. Sara on the internet to get him through his depression. By the time he went to bed, he could still hear the damn thing shouting away in the living room. Yes, he tried to lower the volume and even pulled the plug out of the wall, but it was definitely possessed by some sort of demon.

That's how it went for awhile. Whenever he sat down to enjoy something that he really liked, Michael would catch the image jostling and before a groan could pass from his lips, Pan would start asking him questions about random societal issues that he knew nothing about. Who had time to think about what was happening on the stock market or greenhouse gases or the president of Venezuela? It was enough to drive someone mad and it definitely brought about the most excruciating headaches. There were more important things to think about after all, like the first round of the Major League playoffs or the first round of American Idol. Couldn't this stupid teevee understand that?

Of course, it didn't interrupt him when nothing was on. There were days when he found himself surfing through channels, hoping that he could bide some time with anything halfway interesting until Sportscenter started and he suddenly would wish that the damn thing would start talking to him. Michael would have eagerly answered any query that the bastard wanted to send his way but no, he had to suffer through old episodes of Remington Steele and he hated Pierce Brosnan. One day he even found himself calling out to the screen during a really bad James Bond film until he realized what he was doing. He never imagined that he would be shouting loudly and trying to start a conversation with his television. He figured that if he stayed inside that house any longer, he would completely lose his mind. He needed to ground himself, so he called one of his buddies, hit the bar, got really drunk, picked up a hooker and spent the night in a motel. It was the first time he'd felt normal in quite awhile.

One day he couldn't take it any more and decided that it was time for his television to answer some questions of his own. Michael interrupted a rather vitriolic train of thought that Pan was dumping on him with a severe now looky here!

“Where do you get off wishing for the death of humanity?”

“Well, I suppose that it's a little cosmic conviction, a wager of sorts between the Gods.”

Michael was intrigued, mostly because Pan had finally responded to one of his questions but he wasn't one to turn down a little roll of dice, as well. Vegas was a first class sort of place as far as he was concerned and he had spent, literally, many fortunate hours within its lovely confines.

“What kind of wager?”

“Hmmm, let me see...” the 42-inch screen flickered at him, “...first there was a good bet going around on whether or not you'd even make it out alive once you left the ocean for land. You had a fighting spirit and the universe is a tough place, after all. Then most of us thought you wouldn't last long during the Jurassic era but Vulcan gave you an extra life with his heinous volcanic eruptions. He did have an issue with bloating back then, you know. But it wasn't until you became human that we knew for sure that you were doomed. We immediately got an office pool together and everyone gave their best estimate for Armageddon Time and put it down on the calendar. Now were all just waiting to find out.”

“You call this waiting?” Michael said, annoyed.

“Well...” embarrassment edging into Pan's voice, “...we're allowed a small amount of dallying to help move it along, if necessary.”

“I suppose your guess is coming along fairly soon.”

“Well, I suppose you could say that,” Pan said, a bit sheepishly.

Michael was beginning to find this amusing.

“How do you plan on doing anything from inside a television?” He asked.

There was long, empty pause from the screen and Michael started to assume that the thing had disappeared, that he'd stumped it with such a minor question. He was about to feel rather proud of himself when the voice came back to him suddenly.

“It's the fastest way to get my message across,” the teevee said to him.

“Well, I don't know about where you come from,” Michael explained to him, “but shouting out mantras as loud as you can and jabbering insane thoughts as much as possible doesn't get you a whole hell of a lot in this place.”

Pan began to chuckle. Michael sighed. He knew what was bound to follow so he reached for the remote and flicked off the power before the bombastic gut wrenching laughter cut the program short with a snap. For some reason, he always felt like the television was causing damage in there with its wicked sense of humor and now that the thing was starting to grow on him, he really didn't want to have to replace it again.

“Don't tell me that you have that much faith in your fellow man, Michael,” Pan said jovially once it had settled down.

Well, of course, thought Michael. He wasn't about to give in to visions of catastrophe, Jimmy Swaggert be damned! The human spirit was still alive and well, after all, and they would thrive until the end of time. Humanity couldn't be fooled by no two-bit God who sabotaged satellites to distract them into ushering along their own demise. There was more to life than getting caught up in some crazy sche...

“I wonder if Kate and Jack will finally hook up tonight?”

The screen wavered to life and the word, Lost, shimmered for a moment before revealing a sweaty pretty face. Oh, Kate is looking good tonight, Michael thought to himself as he settled into his most comfortable chair, his cold beverage still half-full.

That night he had a most strange and vivid dream. It couldn't be called unpleasant though the circumstances weren't ideal. He dreamed that he was incarcerated and, after getting into a fight in the yard, he ended up in the infirmary. Dr. Sara tended to him and she was scolding him, but he could feel tenderness in her voice and there was a sparkle in her eye. Deep in his heart he knew that they were falling in love and that, no matter the foreboding walls that closed all around them, somehow they would be able to discover that magical realm where all perfect couples inhabit. He awoke the next morning scrambling to hold onto that precious feeling, completely losing train of the reality that he was locked in a prison of which he was supposed to break free.

Entree

(photo courtesy of Reid Hawkins)

(start at the beginning)

Part Three



Sylvia could feel the damp residue clinging around her eyes from where she splashed her face and she imagined that her husband wasn't going to be happy about her appearance. He was probably already fuming over her abrupt departure earlier, though the thought of his concerns never entered her head as she fled from the roll in her belly and the ominous pressure of the shadows over their table. None of it mattered now because this night was over. The man that she married could wallow in his own slop for all she cared. She was leaving as fast as humanly possible.

She wiped at the wetness as if pushing away tears and once her vision came back to her, she was suddenly aware of the quiet in the room. Although the room had been far from full, she couldn't imagine that everyone had decided to leave at the same time. Besides, wouldn't other customers have arrived, seeing the notoriety of the place. Perhaps her husband's source wasn't as reliable as he imagined, at least when it came to suggesting restaurants.

The darkness of the room brought back the reason that she fled and she suddenly felt goosebumps rise up on her arms, though the room was far from cold. Something wasn't right and an uneasiness washed over her as she traversed the floor to her table. The broad light, that made the setting seem like a stage revealed only empty space and silence, so quiet that Sylvia heard the short gasp that burst from her lips. She was getting scared and there was no mistaking it, the restaurant was now vacant. For a moment she imagined that her husband was behind it all, that he'd set up some surprise party and all of her friends would jump out of the shadows to request the smile that came from the humor of a good joke. But there was no reason for such an occasion; no birthday or anniversary, no childhood acquaintances that she'd care to meet, and on top of it all, her husband didn't have the imagination to pull off such a blunder. No, this wasn't planned and she definitely wasn't in on the joke.

Sweat began to pour from the moist area beneath her arms as she wandered over to the front door. For the second time that evening, she had a frantic urge to escape into the night, push out into the cool night air and breath again. She realized that this muted pounding of fear, or panic, that was thrumming inside her right then was so heart-achingly familiar she thought that tears really would spring from her eyes. This need for flight had become second nature for her, a synthetic sheathing that encompassed her entire life, so natural that she forgot to name it. She'd grown a new skin the moment that she married that man and it buffered against all the sane feelings of walking right out the door. She swallowed a bitter lying pill that caused her to accept the curse of insanity, to live in a world that refused to give perspective to her heart, to make her believe all the terrible atrocities accepted and done to her name, to stiffen herrself in a thoughtless way against the leaden weight of a vicious and oppressing hand. The life that she knew, the society that held her sway, all of it but most distressingly, her unholy union, was horrendous!

Yeah, she should escape. She should walk right out that door. So that's what she did.

But the door was locked.

Her entire soul groaned. This was a test, that's the only way that she could deal with it. She'd always passed all of her exams and in order for her soul to come out sane was to harden herself to this task. Which wasn't so easy by the way, the locked door pushing her weakening mind toward some shadowy wormhole.

A sound came from a the kitchen making her turn abruptly, the tension in her shoulders flaring hot white. It sounded like someone may have dropped a metal spatula, a mundane occurrence in any normal culinary establishment but not here. It was more like the lightning slash of a knife that horror movies always tried to simulate. She suddenly felt like a young Jamie Lee Curtis, praying that she would make it through the night without some b-actor lopping her head off.

What could she do? Even though the audience screamed from their seats in rejected agony, there was really only one course of action left to her. She slowly walked over to the double-hinged swinging plastic door that led to the kitchen, each step raising her heart rate. She tried to peer through the circular plexi-glass window just above her eyesight, creeping up onto her tiptoes, but all she could see was fuzzy light, no movement. She pushed the door open so slowly that it seemed to take an eternity, every second lasting longer than the one before. It was no cliché, fear made every moment last forever. Yet, she didn't make a sound and once the door was open she could hear voices. She was sure that one of them was the waiter and her heart surge, though she didn't understand why? Because her sleuthing skills were second to none?

Then she could make out some of what they were saying.

“...got him...should go back.”

“She must be out of the bath...can't afford mistakes.”

“...well done yeah.”

Laughter, lots of people were laughing.

“...go get her then.”

Sylvia's mind was racing. What the hell was going on? Where was her godforsaken husband? She was going to kill the sonofabitch but then it all began to dawn on her. She shouldn't be there. She just had to get out no matter what, her stupid husband be damned.

She heard footsteps coming toward her from the direction of the voices. She slid back out of the brightly lit room, still trying not to make a sound and turned quickly to go. Maybe there was a window in the bathroom that would let her out of this nightmare but she never made it back to that dank place. Instead, she walked straight into a fat man and for a brief instance relief flooded through her, although the feel of her husband had never given her such relief before. It was strange all right but the sense of joy that surged like electric current with the familiarity of her arms wrapped around him soon began to wane. Something wasn't quite right and a nagging truth seemed to hover in the back of her mind.

Then she looked up into the horrible face of the man who'd stared luridly at her when they entered the restaurant. He was definitely smiling at her with an evil smile now, so her initial instincts regarding his nature were absolutely true...and in his hand was a glistening butcher knife.

Sylvia was shoved gruffly by her nemesis into the kitchen. The man insisted on holding the knife to her throat the entire time like he was some natural villain. It actually felt hopelessly surreal to her and the jostling that caused the edge of the blade to push at her larynx was like a jagged little prank. Her senses became heightened and her body hummed. She felt weirdly serene like the knife had already released her, her second skin writhing on the floor behind, trailing from an opened vein. When they finally reached the others, she'd completely shed the burden of her existence and was lighter than ever.

Everyone was there, which was hardly surprising but the scene was almost a mockery to her eyes, though in the end it was exactly what she expected. The familiar aroma when they first arrived that evening, the sickness that overcame her, the well-known looks on the faces of the other patrons; it all told the same story. Here was the man she married, til death do they part, laid out like full course meal. He wasn't quite dead yet but they'd pinned down his limbs so that he couldn't move and stuffed his mouth with...what is that...oh my god!

Sylvia almost laughed out loud and some of the wicked faces hovering over her husband faltered. But Sylvia wasn't looking at them. She had noticed that her husband's eyes, such a soft steel blue, still had life in them. They were desperately pleading for her to do something and Sylvia began to search her inner strength for some means of escape, if that was humanly possible.

“I found her trying to escape.”

The dumbass holding the knife to her throat had such a flare for the absurd, didn't he?

The waiter stood forth.

“Well, now that everyone is accounted for, I think that we can finally get under way with th evening's festivities.”

One of the thin older women actually nodded her head and licked her lips for chrissakes! This was getting way out of hand. Sylvia tried to pull out of her captor's grasp but he held her tight.

“Whoa, Nelly.”

These guys were a riot. Sylvia was bubbling inside and she could feel an enormous strength building deep within her. She sensed it surging forth, like an alternate identity, super-hero style.

The woman who licked her lips leaned forward and ripped open her husband's shirt to reveal his patchy chest.

“Let her watch.”

His eyes widened dramatically and Sylvia yelped...well, it was actually a burst of laughter that she could finally no longer keep within her. She was losing it all right and they all leaned from her, except for the idiot who held her. She was a loose wheel, wobbling with crazy symmetry that was making everything that they planned fall out of sync. But the strength...the strength was coming forth also and for a brief instance, her husband saw it too and hope glimmered in his eyes.

The final straw, the one that was her ultimate saving grace was the thought of her husband lying on some cheap and tawdry bed with a lithe woman, thinking that he was the king of the world just because he had spooped. Sylvia could clearly see the woman's hand rubbing that same chest hair that stood nakedly forth in the kitchen of a restaurant down an alley that no one could really find, sizing him up for this very moment. She used him for his body in the same way that he had used her's...consumption.

Yep, that's the way that it must've occurred and Sylvia was convinced of it. It was that very vision that brought out the strength within her, a strength that she'd always felt but never had to use. One day, it would always come one day when absolutely necessary. Now, when the chef stepped forward sharpening a long carving knife, Sylvia finally released it.

“STOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!”

Her voice was absolute power and everyone shuddered backwards from the force of it, even the beef that clutched her from behind stumbled. Her husband felt it too and it widened his eyes more than ever. She shocked him. She shocked the lot of them and then she was free, yanking herself from the bear paws that grabbed at her. They all stopped as she stepped forward and leaned toward her husband. The light in his eyes flashed hope once again. Was it possible that she could save him? Then he looked into her eyes, really looked and saw deep into her heart. Fear sprang forth abruptly once again in the soft sky beneath his puffy eyelids but it was even bigger than fear, it was panic...such an intimate panic that it caused a smile to creep over Sylvia's lips. It was he who was trapped after all.

She turned and looked at all of them, their ashen faces that didn't know what to make of her. Finally she stopped on the one who looked just like her husband, ultimately it was he who would understand. It was wicked, what had painted her face.

“I got dibs.”



The End

Entree

Part Two


Smothered again, in his choices, in his demands, in his fleshy stench, in his horrible opera, in his privilege. The smooth beast of a machine that exemplified their wealthy aspirations delivered them to an aphotic asphalt parking lot that requires you to slip a folded five dollar bill through a slivered hole in a wood box, not the valeted reception they were used to. Sylvia almost felt sorry for the car as she perceived its futile attempt to blend in with the unexceptional variety of vehicle that shaped the spaces in the lot. For a moment, she almost demanded that he take her home, unsure of whether she could stand the adventure that they'd likely discover once they returned to find the mammoth automobile stolen but the pure joy of witnessing his savage anger was enough to clamp her mouth shut. She rarely had such happy moments nowadays.

They walked down a busy thoroughfare for two blocks but couldn't find the place. The street was lined with derelict bars, liquor stores, independent boutiques, dentistry with a foreign scrawl, shackled storefronts with padlocks firmly clamped shut and rundown apartment buildings. So it seemed unlikely that an elaborate restaurant would be hidden amongst these sad displays. All that Sylvia could see was a dirty tacoshop and a Vietnamese place with a picture of a cow next to the elaborate script. When she tried to point out that maybe that was the steakhouse, the damn fool turned on her with lances in his eyes, the sweat quickly beginning to flow from his bald pate into them, a futile attempt to extinguish his rising anger. She diffused his flare quickly with an enormous bout of disdain.

He faltered.

“It's supposed to be right here.”

He was motioning at a dark storefront that offered cheap tuxedos and when she turned to follow where he was pointing she saw something in the shadows. It couldn't be? But her idiot husband was slowly moving forward to look down the pathway that squeezed between the two buildings. Hardly two feet wide, it ran cryptically into the darkness, a black well that swallowed her husband as he stepped into it.

Christ, he wasn't going down there, was he? Sylvia waited for a brief instance, then looked over her shoulder at the world, trying to see which way was the more enlightening path. A young man with overstuffed tennis shoes paused in his step and watched her intently from across the street. From her perspective it seemed as if he was leering at her then her husband's raspy voice rose from the depths curtly.

“Sylvia!”

She lurched forward into the dark passageway but for a second a voice came to her, a desperate plea of warning and when she glanced back at the young man across the street, he was slowly shaking his head. Sylvia stopped and watched him as he began to walk again, moving with a soundless rhythm and she had such a strong urge to curse her life, to bolt from the shadows and accompany that youthful spirit who was chasing the night that she actually turned to go back out into the light of the boulevard. That's when she felt her husband's clammy hand grip her wrist and pull her back.

“I've found it, right down here. What a strange place. You have to see it!”

There was excitement in his cadence and Sylvia found that she did want to see it, like the urge to see the grisly details of the accident on the side of the road or the pleasure of pressing deep on the ache of a bruise. She wanted to know what had stirred a fire in him and what was skipping her own heart with fear.

They emerged into a dimly lit courtyard with a couple of sputtering heat lamps covering the small area with their warm rusty film. Sylvia's husband was sweating courageously now and dampening his handkerchief with a continuous wipe but when she looked at him she wasn't sure that it was from the heat. It was like a fire from within that burned with excitement off of his shiny forehead. He was a constant embarrassment in her life and it appeared that tonight would not provide her with a change of pace.

There was no sign above the nondescript door that he pulled open for her, at least he retained some of his manners, but you couldn't mistake the aroma that flowed out from the labyrinth. This was the place all right, the sickly sweet smell of meat filled her nostrils and though Sylvia's stomach turned at the familiar scent, saliva also cascaded into her mouth. Instantly she craved what lay in the darkness behind that door, like a mad starving fool who pressed with greed to the front of the buffet line. She wanted to taste the meat, to feel it in the grind of her teeth, awash with the promise of a delicate and nuanced flavor found nowhere but down this tiny alley. Yet, when she stepped inside, the growl in her abdomen quite audible, the tender room reminded her of every modest place she'd visited over her life, nothing special, no drama to call her mother about, just an ordinary steakhouse...except for that aroma wafting from the kitchen.

A young gentlemen who was calmly chatting with a couple in the corner booth spotted them right away. He waved, made an amusing comment to the couple, which caused them all to chuckle and finally approached Sylvia and the puffing man beside her.

“Good evening, do you have a reservation?”

Their host pulled a small notebook from his back pocket and regarded the tiny script inside. Sylvia was flummoxed. Besides the couple that he was speaking with a moment before, there were only two other tables occupied. One with a group of hearty American men types, probably in town for a convention of some kind, here to spend their money on good food, good drink and good women who most definitely would not be their wives. Sylvia pictured her husband fitting perfectly among them and this was most likely the very image of him and his cronies whenever he went out of town on a business trip. The other table had two elderly women, skinny as sin, seated properly as if they were in a class run by Miss Manners. Both of the women were staring at the new guests and Sylvia instinctively smiled in their direction but the edges of her mouth soon creased back toward confusion. The looks that they gave her and her husband were far from inviting and there was also something else beneath the naked sheen in their eyes, something cold and eager.

She turned to look at the boisterous men who occupied the other table as her husband floundered before the maitre d.

“Reservation?”

He too, was confused but then he remembered his whore.

“Oh, yes, I almost forgot. I was supposed to mention that Nora referred us.”

He glanced at his wife with unease guilt in his eye but Sylvia wasn't even listening to him, which was strange because she lived for moments like these, when she could make her husband look like a total ass in front of others. The reason for her dismissal was that even though the four men across the room were having a perfectly fun experience, one that normally wouldn't arouse suspicion, one of the guys was staring right at her as he laughed along with his friends. But his eyes weren't laughing, they were devouring her and for the first time in years she felt desire stroke beneath her heart. This man was looking at her like he wanted to take her in the back room and bend her over the sink with raw animalistic rage, the kind that was stored for blind fucking. Sylvia was terrified and curious and stunned and pissed off all at once. Anger was the emotion that finally took over her catatonic brain and she sent a ruthless, fiery look right back at him. He was a pig! God, he was hardly worth looking at, he was so unattractive. The disdain she'd so immaculately perfected flooded out of her pores and washed over his hateful stare but all it made him do was smile even more, an absolute piggish grin crossing his face.

She turned back to her husband prepared to demand once again that they leave this place but apparently his codeword had allowed them a spot in this prestigious establishment, as their host was leading her husband to a quiet table near the center of the room. Directly within sight of all the other tables, of course, but Sylvia knew when the moment for escape had passed. She was a master at keeping her dignity and no one would ever take that from her, not her husband and certainly not that swine of a man.

The maitre d addressed them as he pushed Sylvia's chair beneath her rear.

“How about a nice bottle of Chianti to get you started.”

Sylvia frowned. She hated Chianti but it was like he could read her thoughts.

“A delicate grape to be sure but we have the finest blend in the city and since it's your first time here with us, the first bottle is on the house.”

“How can we say no.”

Her husband was the least charming person she'd ever met, even when he was trying so hard.

“I can assure you that you will not be disappointed.”

The man left and went into the kitchen. Sylvia felt eyes on her but when she tried to look through the room it was apparent that they had somehow managed to set up the lighting so that you couldn't see the other tables clearly. The people were shadowy puppets playing in the dark and though she could hear their minced conversations and continued laughter, they were suddenly discorporate sounds that gave her the creeps. But, if the lighting was designed in such an obscure fashion, why then did it feel like all the others were watching them?

“Don't you find this place strange?”

She asked her husband but the look she got in returned was disapproving.

“Don't start with your issues. I won't allow you to ruin this experience for me. Of course it's strange but that's what makes it so interesting. Besides, do you smell that steak?”

A dreamy blanket floated over his face and Sylvia knew that she'd lost him. So she tried to put the other patrons out of her mind, especially that fat bastard with evil in his grin, and focus on the reason they came to this place. The food!

Yes, she sensed the aroma again and found it enticing, but there was something about it that she couldn't quite place. It seemed obvious, as her mouth began to water once again, that they knew what they were doing here but what was it about that scent? It was steak of course, a thick cut cooked in it's own juices, sizzling under intense heat but there was something...her memory was full of fog but if she swiped at the smoke, she thought that the wanted vision would be revealed. It was there, at the edge of her mind...

“Ah, here we are.”

Their waiter was back, apparently he was the only attendee in the dining room, a jack of all trades. He was holding out a beautiful bottle filled with red wine. Sylvia's husband was nodding smugly, as if he knew what he was looking at, which made her scoff. The glare that came from across the table was disheartening but before she could sneer back, their host passed the bottle across her vision. The liquid danced delicately and the shimmer that swam in the reflection pulled all the hate from her bones. If there was anything that she was meant to do that night, she had to taste that wine. She looked up into the maitre d's eyes and found comfort there. He nodded at her as he pulled the cork from the bottle.

“Madam.”

Then he filled her glass one-quarter full. Sylvia scooped the wine glass professionally and held it before her nose. All of the disgust in her life vanished, especially that which was embodied by those in that very room, then she breathed red. It was funny because it hardly smelled of wine, no berry, no sweet caramel, not even the bitter hint of moss, but it was rich with delight and her body hungered for it. She gulped it down, the residue catching the back of her tongue. It tasted alive, as if the grape were still plump with moisture, swallowing the days of rain. It was full and wealthy and eager to ensconce her in its cocoon. She grew dizzy suddenly and the smoke in the room became too thick for her to breathe...but the flavor was remarkable. She could barely turn to smile up at the young man who was filling her glass again, she felt so drunk. She reached thirstily for the glass to quickly consume what she could before the world collapsed around her, then her stomach flopped. It was like the drop-off, her innards shrank to the floor in one vicious lump and it was all that she could do to keep the contents of it behind her teeth.

She lurched up out of her chair and scrambled for the bathroom. There are some people who simply have an innate awareness of where to find the bathroom in restaurants. Sylvia was one of those people and by the time that she pushed through the double-hinged door, the nausea was beginning to pass. She went to the mirror instead of one of the stalls because she hoped that the vomit would stay down, if not then a sink would be suitable, it was only wine after all. She quickly splashed water on her face and let the drops cascade down her skin, coursing through her base. For the first time in some while, she didn't care about her appearance. It was such a relief and joy to feel this cool presence on her skin. She held the moment of it and a brief vision entered her mind.

She was on her honeymoon, her body years young. She was swimming in the clear blue of the Hawaiian shore. It was absolute bliss to swim in that water, to feel it on her skin. The two weeks that they stayed in Hawaii, all that she did was spend time in the ocean. It was the only thing that she wanted to do. Her husband tried to get her to follow him out on his touristy adventures but she wasn't going anywhere, sending him out alone while she pushed her body through the blessed liquid.

It made her shiver now, to think of it. That was where she belonged. She knew it in that instant and that was where she would go, leave tomorrow, leave this life behind. It was all so suddenly clear.

She opened her revelatory eyes and looked at her ghastly face in the mirror. Oh God, how had she ever gotten to be so ugly, so miserable? She had to escape. She had to get beyond this life and discover the beauty in the world again. It was out there somewhere, waiting for her. She needed to feel it in her grasp, cling to it with a full heart. She wanted it so bad.

But first, she had to get through this wicked, wicked night.


(go to part three)

Entree

Part One


“Soup or Salad?”
--Anonymous


“I'm famished. When are we going to eat?”

Sylvia looked up from her book at her husband standing in the doorway. Why does he always have to be like this? One of the reasons they were still together was due to his persistent need to always get what he wants.

Her eyelids fell heavy as the acid dripped from her lips.

“What shall we eat, dear?”

Sylvia hated him. His presence was a knife that shivered through her skull every time he entered the room. His sweaty glistening forehead was growing larger each day and the brain beneath that shine grew more useless. He padded his belly with an insider trading appetite for filet mignon and mutton stew and online escort services, his ever shrinking hooded scepter disappearing from her life. No complaints there, it had never been of much use anyway. Couldn't provide a child or an orgasm if his life depended on it. She should count her blessings, especially now that he began to carry a strange unrecognizable odor.

At first she thought, or hoped at least, that it was the smell of the unwell, maybe a sickness that would take him from this world, but once the odor grew and began to permeate every eave of their home, Sylvia understood that her thoughts of chivalry, of her knight of the diseased order, were not to be fulfilled. The stench that her husband of ten years began to acquire was simply the sweet scent of success, the smell of those who feel that they deserve everything that the universe has given them. It was the perfume of privilege and the more that Sylvia sensed it in her nostrils the more it smelled of coiled and burning fat, hearty and rich, lathered with the proper dose of oily perspiration. It quite often made her gag.

She recalled his aroma from their years at Cornell. It was more the sour and acrid taste of desperation, or perhaps it was determination, the two weren't so far from each other on the periodic scale after all. Although, now that she thought about it, it seemed like this new scent had always been inside his skin waiting for the opportune moment to come out. Even when her desire for him cloaked all of his disturbing predilections, in the back of her mind there was a warning flash that echoed like the dull ache of a migraine that hasn't quite caught hold. She was young and foolish, like everyone else who grew up with the promise that this godforsaken place will take care of you, that your dreams are bound to come true so long as you watch enough television and discovered what it is you were supposed to be dreaming of in the first place. He bought her beautiful things and took her to swanky places and introduced her to the wealthy, and all of her princess visions swarmed through her mind with the misguided touch of enticement and the poisonous taste of decay. She fell under the spell of what he had to offer until it was too late to see that all he was offering was misery and the slow death of being compartmentalized. She was simply another item in his collection of privileged pieces, priceless until the cost of the divorce would tally her true worth.

Uuuuuughhh, how much longer would she have to wait?

Sylvia shuddered at the thought of the years that still lay before her. He wasn't large enough for a separation, wasn't at that obscene section of the privileged trough, wasn't gorging himself on the innards of those less fortunate than him. Not yet. He was still learning how to truly devour, to emaciate the landscape around him and eventually discover the ultimate gift of all great economic predators. How to cover his tracks? Because he didn't want to end up like Ken Lay, dead in disgrace, face down in a jail cell while the press pissed all over his carcass. No, it didn't have to be that way, people got away with it everyday and the keys to the kingdom were only available to those who were very committed. Sylvia knew that her husband was one of those people, learned it long ago when their marriage was more about her guests than the two of them and in order for him to reach the peak, he needed a devoted spouse to help him smile before the onslaught of vultures who would do anything to take him down. She was the ultimate shine of jewelry that he'd purchased to fit on his left arm. It didn't take much effort on her part to become accustomed to that role.

But she hated it and she hated him with every ounce of her soul. Every day she contemplated the choice between taking him down and destroying all that he worked for or suffering through the muck of their marriage until her big payday. Both visions offered treasure, one material and the other complete psychic bliss. Either way she would have to wait, it just depended on how long that wait was going to be? He was too small after all, puny on the hook and would be thrown back if she took the bait too soon. He couldn't continue to breathe, to go on living while she threw herself upon the blade. No, if she was going to bring him down, she wouldn't go to her demise alone.

She kept her eyes on the page of her book, though she didn't see a word, as the lasers from his eyes tried to burn through her defenses. She softly practiced her mediative breathing and composed her heart into blankness. Having too much time on her hands was bound to be good for something.

His voice was shaking with control when he finally spoke to her.

“I hear there's a great new restaurant down in the Valley.”

Her eyes were dead when she looked up at him.

“And who did you hear this from?”

“The new receptionist.”

But his eyes flickered down for a brief instant and she knew right away that the receptionist was actually one of his whores. There was always a new receptionist wasn't there? No need to address that issue.

“Hmmm, what kind of food did she say?”

Oh, but why bother asking, it was bound to be another steakhouse.

“It's a steakhouse, but apparently this one's supposed to be special.”

She could feel her stomach clenching up at the thought of endlessly chewing on red meat. For chrissakes, there better be a decent salad at this place! Placing her book on the side table, she stood up and turned to him.

“Sounds very nice dear.”

“Uh, you're not going dressed like that. Are you?”


(go to part two)

THE ROAD

(start at the beginning)

Part Three:

He called her Black River. She snaked through the night, like liquid. She hugged the the road with a steady moan and broke through the atomic universal current with rhythmic clarity, smooth as the dark silky breath beneath the wings of the paradisaical raven. With the age of industry she moved like the glide of water over terrain, unencumbered by obstacles and swallowed the night with a soft purr. She moved like the echo of a shadow, naked as amatory desire beneath a bed of stars peering down with winking vision. When he sat with her nothing affected him with such transcendence, nothing awoke his vital senses with such clarity, communing deeply with the rhythm of his soul. She alone defined his existence in this world.

She came from his thorough wisdom and creative spirit, sprang from his vivid imagination giving her the purpose that was indelibly written in his heart. He longed to touch the complex beauty and intuition that gave humanity the dark pleasure of the road, it's dusty ambition spreading across the map until it reached the edge of coastline east and west and everywhere in between with the consuming heat of asphalt. He became the engine that propelled humanity forward with a leap that left time dwindling in the rear-view mirror. He built a medium, swift and light as the antelope, but also strong and timeless as the fierce voice of nature so as to commune with the perfect harmony and poetry of the road.

What he built became Black River and she was loyal and true and never failed him. The unspoken shudder of helplessness never descended down his arms from where he held her guidance with tight caressing comfort. The harsh diseased cough of collapse never rose from the depths of her oily heart. The wicked steamy sigh of premature death never escaped from her hooded lips. She simply responded with a contented growl every time the ball of his foot pressed her for an answer and shifted into gear with firm potency beneath the palm of his hand.

She spoke to him in that way as the image of a woman with her arm raised high above her head, red bandanna clutched in her hand, reflected from his eyes onto the cool green glow of instrumental control. He never wavered, steady as the pulse in his wrist, focused only upon the woman and the black path beneath trees and stars that lay beyond her quivering shoulder. There was the rise of excitement climbing in the woman's eyes and he settled into the deep bucket seat ready to set Black River into motion. It was coming, this moment of truth. He knew where to find it in the erratic tinge of adrenaline that shook the human body until it could no longer sit still, until it could only act. That was when he sprang into action and discovered the most profound pleasure. A rhythmic gentle symbiosis with Black River unmatched by anyone or anything.

And then he saw it, the woman who stood before him paused for just a moment, a brief hesitation in her posture and a shadow of terror caught in her eyes. That's when she gave him reason to smile.

SNUFF

(start at the beginning)

When I wake we're in the desert. The sun is low in the sky behind casting a pale cool glow before us. This is my favorite time of day out here, a time of birth but locked in a meditative moment where everything gives pause. The silence of the world is revealed in this place, alive but not quite awake. You can feel it, hear it, see it all in the calm light of morning, before the bleating cries of humanity gasp for breath, before they come to cut the umbilical.

Lila tells me that she couldn't drive the whole night through. She tried but the halos of sleep interrupted her vision until the road grew dangerous. We slept at a rest-stop somewhere back in Arizona, can't remember the name of the place. That's how she is. It's unforgivable, she says, an attempt at order in a natural world grown from chaos. She hates all of it; names, categories, definitions, lines, corners, rules, any type of structure that tries to contain the burgeoning dream of existence.

It's destructive limitation, blasphemy. No wonder our first impulse is for war, to cause endless destruction upon the environment. We're simply rebelling against the chains that bind us, the social order that refuses to allow us to ever be truly free. We're lashing out, attacking the very structure that we implemented in the first place. We build it then we destroy it. A vicious cycle of hate taken out on ourselves. A bit misguided obviously.

She's ranting again but I can hardly hear her. I'm lost in wonder so her voice blends into the world at slumber, a soft drone at the back of my brain. To my right a distant mountain transforms into a prone figure of a woman on her side with her arm raised so that the crook of her elbow is resting on her head. I'm mesmerized by her. She is the soul of the desert, a guardian from the edge of eternity, a witness to the days of wane. One day she will awake and rise up on sturdy legs and find her way home. I wait for it, almost expecting it to happen right now at this moment but like me, she's not quite ready to depart from this world.

Lila takes the offramp and turns away from my vision. I decide not to show her. It's something I need for myself. We head south, toward my past, a place I haven't seen for years. Everything feels different. Massive shopping malls that weren't there before stand next to the road like beckoning giants, fervently wishing for the company of strangers, growing fat off our greedy consumptive souls. Fe, fi, fo fum. I smell the blood of desperation.

Lila's right. Sometimes the world seems so sick.

This place used to be empty. Nothing but vast flat sand interrupted occasionally by growing crops, a shocking green against the dry landscape, with the permanent smoke of sprinkled water hovering overhead to keep their delicate leaves from shriveling in the bright heat. Nothing more. The hulk of two towns, one on the border, the other stuck out along the highway out in the middle of this huge valley. It was never a place for growth. It was just a place trying to survive between one destination to the next. It's a wonder civilization attempted to establish here at all but the febrile mind tends to reach beyond reason, hasty and wanting it conceives a consciousness that is clearly insane.

As we drive through town I begin to feel the hunger for nostalgia. Once we pass the new development I notice that nothing much has changed. The familiar landscape caresses hidden sections of my brain. Rickety convenience stores and tortillarias lean with precarious treason at the clean world of commerce we left behind. I spot the infamous flea market, already pulsing with life and I want to it to Lila, get lost amongst the stalls, taste the greasy tamales and drink sweet sugar water. I want to make her laugh of my memories. She would love it, the type of realm that she longs to inhabit but we turn away and drive to my grandmother's house instead.

When we stop, I climb out of my seat with a stiff body but for some reason I don't feel as terrible as I expected. Through the dust raised by the wheels of Lila's car, the second home from my youth is revealed and my mind wanders away from future regrets. I'm no longer burdened by the weight of age beyond years. I am swimming down into the boundless prepubescent optimism that strangles my heart. I jump upon the porch and shake the dusty screen door shouting my grandmother's name, and somewhere in all of it I catch the aroma of fruit baking in the oven.

SNUFF

The moon cuts silvery pale lines along her porcelain skin. In the shadow she's pale as a ghost, but there's darkness all around her, engulfing her from her head down to her feet on the floorboards. I watch her hands move, her mouth move, her hair bounce around her shoulders. I think that she might be the most beautiful creature that I have ever seen, and I don't mean that because I'm in love with her, which I am but not in the way that everyone thinks. I mean it because she is the only person in the world that I can trust right now. She's the only person who believes in my mission.

Outside my window the night swirls around the landscape. The city lights vanished long ago, fading within our wake. Lila's cream comet cuts through the dark wedge like a meteor from decades before we were born propelling us forward toward that deep seated secret that worms around inside our warmth forcing goosebumps to sprout upon our skin. I shudder a bit and roll up my window, tired of feeling the cool air on my face. The orange-red glow of the car lighter shimmers on Lila's cheek as she sucks at the American Spirit, a faint smile rising on her lips as the nicotine takes effect.

I hear those are bad for your health.

It's a little joke we have between us. She laughs the way that she always does. That's why I love her. She's the only person who understands me right now.

She used to hate me, or so she says, a couple of years ago when we were still in high school. She said that I always acted like I was too good for them. I pretended that I didn't know what them she was talking about but I did know. I did act like that. Although it doesn't really bother me now, thinking about how I was before my body began to feel shallow and empty, before the nightmare descended upon me. I was thoughtless and careless, buried in my nescient life. Many of us would recognize the teenage pattern that gave way to my adolescent years. I just don't care about those feelings and thoughts anymore. They weren't real. They weren't above the shallow depths we drown ourselves in. The one echo that falls upon my heart with ease is the shun of shameless regret.

Over the past year I've learned that regret is the force of fading into insignificance. It is the debilitating focus of limits that we put on our lives. It is the heart of anxiety. It leads us into locked rooms with burnt out bulbs so that we can no longer see our shriveled selves. It is everything that I've left back in the dark of the rear view mirror. It is the self before we know that we are going to die.

Lila squeezes my leg with her warm hand. She knows when I ingest these bitter pills and descend into depressive thoughts. She is the essence of fire and she burns brighter than any star that might shine my way. I trust her beyond control right now. I give my life to her and take all that she's promised me because I know that she will deliver. She will take me into the darkness where she resides and allow me to climb inside my magenta core. She will allow me to consume every ounce of my precious life , which is all that I ask. It's all that I have left.

Please let me have that one simple truth, I screamed out loud.

She was the only one who truly heard me. Now she's whisked me away and together we are going to travel to the far distance, beyond the breathing beating shaking pulse of humanity. We shall unmask the twisted reality of the cosmos. Maybe then my life will find its meaning. Maybe then I can impart some value into the world, or at least feel good about where I am heading.

Who am I kidding? All I ever wanted was to be left alone so that I might understand my tiny place in this life. But that's impossible when you're pristine perfection to be idolized and fraternized and eternalized into someone else's vision. How can you understand beauty when it's shaped for someone else's consumption, for other's to fawn over. They don't know who I truly want to become, where my heart lies. They only know their own sick hunger that rises up through their endless deceitful entrails. They only know how to capture the creature, a hunted animal that should be tamed for their amusement. They never realize that the structure they impose is slowly devouring us, making us fleshless, naked bones on this corrugated island of conformity. They don't care that their seed is poisoning us turning our insides to death.

Lila's fire is suddenly inside me, climbing up through my heart. I can hardly breath. I jerk my leg away and her hurt eyes catch mine for a split moment, but I can't think about it. She'll understand. I clutch at the window crank with my claws and manage to get it open enough to feel the cold air on my face once again. I gulp at the night. My breath gasping, my heart racing, I struggle to live. I tremble beneath the oncoming shadow that rears before me. With wide eyes I search desperately in the dark fog, look for the tender touch I was always promised. But I don't see anything.

That's when I black out.

(go to 3rd departure)

THE ROAD

Part Two:

By the time he came out of the void her body was already gone, tucked away inside the darkness of the van up on the road. He remembered that he couldn't move any part of his own body except his eyelids and the first thing that he saw was the broken sun filtering through the leaves on the trees. Not long before she had commented on the way the rays of light separated into streams and ran down through the earth. With a laugh she had wondered if the two of them could find their way down as well so that they might touch the pulsing beating life of the planet the way that the sun did. Later they discovered that they did possess such an ability, aching and wild and carnivorous, both of them tasting the smile on their lips.

His eyes closed again because he couldn't think straight with them open.

Where did they go? What did they find inside that hesitant shiver?

They found her body thirty yards beyond the crumpled steel, where it came to rest. She never liked to wear her seatbelt, no matter how much he mentioned it, and she didn't buckle up when they left their little slice of heaven this time either. He could hear her wispy breathe sliding through the leaves, mingling with the sun and he knew that she was trapped here, that her energy remained and what was lying in that van was only a hollow husk. When he opened his eyes again they were stinging with tears and in the blur he saw her darting above him like a shadow, like the wind. He couldn't move his arm to wipe the tears away. He wanted to see her one more time before they took him from her. He wanted to touch the place where they had found their hearts before they took him back to all the sadness. But he couldn't move. He couldn't even speak to her.

He had held her too long and too hard in order to maintain the momentum of what they'd discovered out here, but due to his lack of haste they went beyond the edge of reason and forgiveness and stumbled into the depths. They found confusion in the whirlwind and gave in to the ghost of nature. He wanted to trade places with her. He didn't want to know the world without her. But what could he do?

He clenched his eyes closed and gripped at the darkness again. He called out for her hoping that she might be able to reach him, to give him her hand and take him with her. For a moment he felt himself descending into the nothingness again and his heart soared. Her face began to waver into view and he wanted to scream and grapple for her, to ache for her embrace no matter how dark it became. But his life was not ready to leave him.

“Can you hear me?”

It wasn't her voice, the woman who spoke to him.

“Sir, are you awake?”

He felt the shiver convulse through him and knew that it was immense sadness, the kind that couldn't remain with a heart still beating. But there it was, radiating out cold and empty.

“Sir, I need you to open your eyes if you can hear me.”

And she was no longer with him. Her softness dissipated and swarmed like the wind over the countryside. Hadn't they looked down from above not so long ago, like a hawk circling high, and spotted their jumbled bodies savoring the sweet mesh of skin on skin? How could that be gone forever? Didn't they find it? Didn't they just learn how to keep it and never let go?

But it was fading, the memory already becoming dull and lifeless as he climbed back up into the vision of the real. He was hurting, probably permanently damaged and he suddenly recognized that there truly was very little he could now do. He needed to give up, to the voice of authority that beckoned him.

“Please, open your eyes. I know that you can hear me.”

And even though he knew that it wouldn't be her face that he was going to see, he went ahead and opened them anyway.

(go to Part Three)

SNUFF

Hello, My name is Kirsten K----, and I am going to die.

I think that for as long as I live, which will not be long, I would rather not hear the word inoperable again. They give you all the technical terms, show you all the scans and always remain professional, but there’s still something in their eyes…something that hits you with crushing weight; it forces the air from your lungs. That’s when you know the finality of it all.

At first, the days don’t feel the same. Everything is like a halo surrounding a dark center, bright hues at the edges. Things seem sharp and crystal, precious and yet so sad. You feel sorry for yourself, and you try to convince yourself that the time left is going to be an amazing Hollywood ending.

But reality lingers. The days still have twenty-four hours in them and each one is one step closer to the inescapable. I soon began to realize that nothing has changed. The world is still the same. The sky is still blue. The sun is still bright. My mother still annoys the hell out of me and I am living my life exactly as I always have.

That’s why I’m leaving. I have to get out of this place, wander around the open skein of the world for a little while. I probably will never see my parents again. Six weeks ago they told me I might have a couple months to live, if I was lucky. So I’m not expecting to make it back any time soon and I don’t expect to be giving any blustery good-byes. There have been more than enough tear stained cheeks and snotty noses in my life to last a lifetime. I will be slipping out the open window in my room, a short drop to the damp ground below and a quick dash into the vanishing. I will be their ghost, their little girl lost.

(go to 2nd departure)

THE ROAD

Part One:

She sat next to him, her hand upon his thigh. He felt good. He felt real good. His juiced up heart beat within the rhythm of nature. The swirl of wild landscape that cascaded past them was more alive with vibrant yearning than he ever thought possible. He knew that it wouldn't take long for them to reach the city and that when they returned to that land of pavement the feeling that he was currently feeling; the one that coursed through him like hysteria, the one yet to be named; that feeling would shrink back down into its shadow. It would lose the light that it was so eagerly seeking at the moment. They would be okay, the two of them. They would go back to their natural comfortable existence that they always knew, but perhaps that what was truly sad about the entire affair.

Out here, amongst the trees, free from power lines and subway lines and shopping lines, they found a freedom that spoke to each other's hunger in a new way. They reached deep for once and, quite frankly, it was exhilarating. There was a big part of him that didn't want to go back but what else could they do? They had lives that they wouldn't throw away. They had jobs, family and friends. They had obligations, responsibilities that went beyond that secluded clearing. After all, it was impossible to remain in heaven forever. They always ended up coming down somewhere, sometime. It seemed such a fantasy to assume it would be any different this time.

They looked at each other for an instant and everything vanished. Their hearts understood the clarity of the situation. It was possible to hold onto what was guiding them in this precious moment. They could ride it out, drift past the mundane monster and find a warm room where their hearts would continue to beat for each other. The had found it out here amongst the clean air and heather and dandelion after all. It did exist. They had felt its touch.

Her eyes echoed his exuberant thoughts and he knew that anything was possible. But, then he saw the shiver in her, a brief hesitation and he mistook it for what it wasn't. He would regret it for the rest of his life.

(go to Part Two)

Entitled Number One

Gabe was bent over the fender, his head buried deep under the hood. His hand rested on a metal part of the engine. He breathed slowly, like he was trying to give life to the rusting hulk.

Stefan watched from a distance. He didn't know what to do. He couldn't understand this man who seemed so eager to show him how he was destroying his life. It was all very hard to bear.

First the sound goes. It's subtle and it happens so fast. Gabe grows distant and eventually he fades from view.

SLUTS (a short story)

The bar is caramelized night. The air walks in through the open door with all the other weary wanderers and begins to stew amongst the noisy heated bodies. It festers and grows stale with the stench of BO that cannot be squelched by the nefarious designs of perfumed skin. I feel the overwhelm of the onions around me and tears spring to life in my eyes. I can’t help it, so I turn away from the fire and tell Jonathan to give me another beer.

I see her staring at me, at the bar, a few paces to my right, halfway to the door, closer to escape. Right then I know that I will walk out that door with her. I can tell by the way she holds her head, the way her hand clutches at her drink, the way her want pours out of her skin and feeds through my nostrils just what she wants me to know about her. But I don’t look at her. I need to give her time, make sure it’s me she really wants, not just anyone.

I turn back to the sound jumping from the corner of the room. The music that swallowed the static of anticipation and filled it with ordinary punk rock. Music that is about as unoriginal as the Ramones sound today and completely lacking their bravado. It’s my roommate’s band, and I’ve already seen them play five times, four times too many. But he’s my roommate and I didn’t have anything better to do tonight.

I glance back in her direction and her eyes fill mine. She sends me a beer guzzling smile and the black electric that shivers between us makes me do just that. I suck down half my pint as my long-sleeve tee-shirt slides over the goosebumps that rise on my skin. I look at her again, just to make sure she’s still looking and now she knows that I know that she wants me and she also knows that I want her too.

It’s strange, but it’s that easy. I get up, pulling my languid soul away from where it rests on the bar and squirm my way down toward her. Everyone in the place is close; it’s crowded, especially at the bar. It’s easy to cop a cheap feel, but I don’t need to do that tonight, not that I’m above things of that nature. She doesn’t watch me because she knows where I’m headed, right there, that tiny spot right next to her.

She turns as I arrive opening her legs slightly so that I can squeeze in. I lean against the bar and stare into her eyes without saying a word as her leg closes again, pushing up against my thigh, pulling me into her web. The first touch says the same thing as the liquid smile that has never left her face. When can we leave? How long should we pretend? If I wore a watch then I would know that the time has already arrived, but then I don’t need a watch to tell me that.

We talk small while we pull at the rest of our drinks, say things that don’t matter, references that will never remain in our drunken brains. I’m sure she tells me her name but it swiftly fades away into the mist of others that sound just like it. Before we leave I want one more shot so that I might get a little bit drunker, that would be nice but not necessary. She takes my hand and I figure that I’m probably already drunk enough.

It’s cold outside, so cold your breath condenses in your face and drips onto the sidewalk. Immediately I notice the warmth of her hand in mine. I clutch at it so that it might cover over me like the jacket that I forgot to bring, to nuzzle inside me like an evening by the fire. The heat emanates from the club behind us like the breath of a dragon and the ground rumbles beneath our feet from the rhythm section of my roommate’s band. I wait for their pathetic roar to consume us and propel us into the blackness. I know nothing more could make my stride quicken so swiftly. I can hear him strumming the same three chords on his bass and I picture him on the couch back home, the familiarity of his crouched body, his fingers plucking at the empty strings.

She doesn’t live very far away so we walk. I notice crystals on the leaves of trees blending in with the scattered stars that peek through the foliage. The air is fresh and clean and after the club, so much more alive, purging our lungs of the stain of second hand smoke and sweat and desperation that comes with the territory in that bar. I’m grateful that I left the desire for another shot back in that place because the clarity that hits my mind exhilarates me like riding a flash of lightning across the sky. When I look at her I can see that she feels the same way. Her smile isn’t so tilted, so dreamy. The dream has climbed up into her eyes and they sparkle at me with promise.

It’s easy, so easy.

Her mouth on mine, speaking to me with a French accent, tasting the back of my throat where the sting of vomit resides. But our mouths flood fresh with the want, the desire climbs up like a voice in my belly and dives down into hers forcing the moan from her lips.

And we haven’t even reached her apartment yet.

Later, she fumbles with her keys under a dim light outside old architecture that I won’t remember in the morning. She glides the door open pulling at my heels. I feel like an ice skater sliding into the darkness of her room. She knows exactly where to go, her blindness not overwhelming her ability to live, to dance and shout at the heavens. She finds the couch in two seconds and tosses me down like a duffel bag, then she’s on top of me exposing me like dirty laundry, like all refinement can now be ignored.

It’s funny, this thing called want. How delicious it tastes when it lingers on your tongue, when it jumps on you quick like a black spider injecting its dangerous venom. It devours every part of your mind so that you become a single solid object of purpose, with only one emotion. Nothing else matters. Not the tenderness or cruelty of family. Not the terror that exists in nations far way. Not the socio-economic situation of the city that you live in. Not the responsibility of grades or papers that need to be written. Not the anguish of loss. None of it can pierce the thick hide where you reside in the very moment that want decides to pay you a visit. You become a slave to its glorious agenda. You are swallowed by its hideous rapture. You zombify and tranquilize and wake up like a stranger, usually in a foreign land and how you got there is a distant hazy memory.

I give in to it. My mind goes blank and I become living, seething, breathing moment. We are reality. Our bodies speaking through the ages, lost in our past, touching like we always have. We are down in the sweet of it, where flesh longs for more flesh, slipping and sliding and clutching and thrusting into everywhere each other. I don’t even know where we are, if we’re still on the same physical plane, still on planet Earth, if we’re still surfing on her sofa.

I hear the word sixty-nine in my brain. I don’t know if it came from her fast heated breath or if my subconscious is communicating telepathically, but she shifts and twists until I feel her heat on my mouth and my heat on hers. I feel her ecstatic soft liquid entity pulsating and begin to feel my pleasure begin its slow ride to the top of the mountain. We ride this slow carousel, rise and release, until I find myself diving down into the deep red behind my eyes hoping that I’m touching her in a dangerous place that makes her shudder like revulsion, the pleasure lapping through her body again and again until it slowly resides into panting inspiration.

I’m still as full as the smile on my face as I lift my head and grin at the drug in her eyes. She reaches between her legs and scrambles at me, pulling until I’m in a position that will satisfy both of us. I’m at the point of desire and she’s so warm and inviting. I thrust and dive trying to find the flint that will scorch both of us in a terrible burning wave, and it crushes down on us so that our lungs refuse the oxygen they crave and twist and dangle over the pit of oblivion.
Somehow we make it back. Here in her room. On her couch. Gasping for air. Beating madly at each other’s hearts. Born again. Naked as that day. Returned by the hand of God.

My eyes are adjusting to the darkness and I see the scatter on her floor with the way my head’s turned. I see her white panties lying on top of my dark tee shirt. The door is still slightly cracked open. I guess we forgot to shut it in the heat of passion. I don’t care if anyone saw us. All I want to do is hold this blessed being that knows me so well. That’s what we do. We don’t talk or look at each other or try to get comfortable. We are comfortable, with each other. We stay where we are, bodies mingling, gluing together as our sweat dries. We hold each other until our breath becomes even and our hearts beat together, her chest on mine, mine on hers

PASSENGER SEAT (a short story)

Outside the window I stare serenely at the dark, ominous clouds that hang on the mountains like a hat tilting over one eye, suggesting that the wearer has a certain amount of swagger. The twisting force of shadow and light threatens to swoop down through the valley until it overtakes us where we hide in our automotive refuge. Though, from this distance, it has a calm, gentle effect on me. It reminds me of cheap paintings that you find at an outdoor bazaar occupied by congregated tourists full of delectation toward the wondrous gathering of culture found in Amerika’s town squares. The paintings, filled with blue gray swirling back to black or white and occasionally streaked with yellow or red to create dramatic effect, are too perfect, yet somehow not quite right, not good enough for my wall. They’re eventually sold to gasping middle-aged families with skin that is too large, piling into oversized vehicles until they reach their suburban country two-story-six-bedroom homes with lawns pristinely manicured by other hands and rooms with plenty of wall space for schlock mistaken for Art.

What are you laughing at?
She glances at me sideways.

I wasn’t laughing.
At least I didn’t realize that I was laughing.

You weren’t, but I could tell that you wanted to.

Her eyes gleam at me and I knew that she could see right into my soul. I know that sounds ridiculous because what is a soul really? Do we even have a soul? Whatever it is, I know one thing, a soul is an extremely personal part of each of us, not meant for others to see or understand. She could do both as far as mine was concerned. This scares me and excites me at the same time, deeply, to the core of my being. That’s why, whenever she looks at me that way, my heart shrinks and slides into my penis giving me a fast erection. It was there, pushing at the crotch of my jeans before I can even react.

I shift in my seat, putting my feet up on the dash and look back out the window.

I realize that I was giving the view I perceived an improper analysis. This sky could never be as horribly perfect as those paintings. It had the passion of reality. It was flawed, angry and hungry. It had the hand of the universe to guide its turbulent motion. It forced open like an umbrella and dumped its sadness over the land giving life. It makes you sink down into the that deep, warm spot at the center of your being that is extremely thankful that cars come with heaters.

I wonder how long it will take for the storm to catch us, which makes me look to Amanda for insight. Her eyes remain locked on the landscape that she skillfully navigates and beyond my thoughts I hear the quiet immersed in the moment. So I secure my voice somewhere near my belly where all thoughts left unsaid go to be devoured and I begin to listen.

I hear the hum of the asphalt greeting the heat collecting in the tires. I hear the swish of the air as it plows over the front grill and effortlessly changes directions swooping, skidding, swerving, spinning, climbing along the surface of the car, twisting and twirling with new perspective until it escapes beyond the back-end into the car’s jet stream and is pulled along for a few meters until our inertia finally lets it go where it hovers, completely new but older, changed until it encounters a new force that will alter its perception forever. I hear the signs by the road whipping past, stating their greeting for a quick moment, letting you in on their vital secret that is always informative, sometimes helpful. I hear the grass in the fields that holds a dialogue with the wind that is aged beyond words or any form of articulation that we can ever imagine. I hear the grapes bursting on the vine, screaming to be drunk so that it may fulfill its mission of drinking humanity and making us slaves to its delectable delights that bring joy, sadness, humor and despair. I hear the trees whispering for the rain that will soon be visited upon their heads. I hear the lost cry of prehistoric birds that flew through the valley when it was free from the choking dust of industrial growth that spews out of our tailpipe. I hear the low grumble of the plates in the earth. I hear my heart swimming laps throughout my body, from my brain to my toes, along the lining of my stomach that isn’t quite finished with the quandary of when the storm would consume us. I hear Amanda’s soft, strong hands gripping the steering wheel and long for the memory of them clutching my back with devout intensity. I hear the hum behind her tongue seeking a melody from her childhood that lies at the edge of her thoughts, jumping away with its juvenile game of hide-n-seek. I hear her hair delicately caress her shoulders where her muscles ache beneath a scar purchased from a large expensive belt buckle that was bigger than the heart of the man who wore it. I hear my heels digging into the vinyl of the dash, which yields comfortably to the pressure bearing down on it. I hear the voice in my soul begging for me to listen.

Outside the window the world floats into the past at a remarkable speed and is forgotten instantly. Amanda and I, in our clanking time machine and our minute thoughts, will be forgotten just as quickly. Patient and malleable, this world will outlast our technological era that makes ghosts out of what is real. And the dream of humanity will fade from life. We only have a moment to really listen, to find our small space in this universe. A fleeting, quick second to understand our hearts and find the rhythm that beats in this earth, this world, this vast macrocosm that we are now a part. It’s a challenge, I know, but it’s all we have before we are gone.

I look over at Amanda. She cuts a quick peek at me and smiles so that I’ll feel better. Sometimes I think her heart is in that place that understands all that the universe is trying to tell us. Maybe that’s why she can look right into my soul. My eyes drift away from her, but don’t really see anything else. Not the instrumentation on the dash or the way her hand reaches out and touches mine delicately or the darkening world that still exists outside the window. My eyes drift down within my essence and the tranquil meditation begins. I sink into the nether world of sleep.

As the first of the rain splatters on the windshield, I am not there to see the answer to my question. I am lost. My eyes are closed and the world simply doesn’t matter.