“You’re so much like them,” I hear for the dozenth time. I smile and nod politely, even though all I want to do is scream.

I am nothing like my parents! I want to shout. I am against everything they ever stood for! I am their polar opposite!

Except I’m not. Hard as I try, I can’t escape the things I inherited from them. It’s more than just my mom’s red hair and my dad’s pointed nose. It’s my dad’s temper, and my mom’s tendency to reach for a drink the minute things get a little challenging. It’s my dad’s need to be right and my mom’s refusal to acknowledge when there’s a problem. These are the characteristics that I’ve defined them by, and these are the traits that I wrestle with every day.

The outside world never saw any of it, but I did. Growing up, I had to listen as my dad screamed at us; I had to watch as my mom reached for that bottle. I felt the impacts of my dad’s stubbornness and my mom’s denial. They’ve passed on their traits to me, but they’ve also shown me how those traits can hurt others. And I plan to do everything I can to be different.

I can’t eliminate my temper, but I can go to therapy and learn how to deal with anger in healthy ways. I can never be free from the temptation to take a drink when things get rough, but I can learn to face my problems head-on and ask for help when it’s more than I can handle.

And I can surround myself with people who make me better.

I loved my parents. I still do, but now I have people in my life who have shown me how to treat the people I love better.

I may never be able to leave behind the imprints my parents have on me, but maybe, if I learn from others, the things I inherited from my parents will just be small pieces within the patchwork of my life – integral to who I am, but no more important or noticeable than any other. And maybe even less so.

Futzing round out in the dark…

Tripping wires,

And spilling ink…

Futzing round out in the dark…

Where elbows rap, and

Knees go clink…

Sweeping arms at what’s familiar…

I think I’ve seen your shape before!…

Feel so bold, I reach to hold

An inured fixture I recall…

Drawing close to check the status…

I view a fresh development…

Something wavy…asking questions…

Hanging by my advocate…

This new stink fills me with tremors!…

…Challenges my point of view

In this murky witch’s cauldron

I have met a bugaboo…

Futzing round out in the dark…

Tripping wires,

And spilling ink…

Futzing round out in the dark…

Where elbows rap, and

Knees go clink…

I’ve waited out my parking meter…

The climax of this hour is nye!…

Escape with style…I close the file…

None the wiser…All cards disguised…

At each backdrop that I have chosen

I can’t allow one thread to fall…

Must return where hearts are frozen…

To prop one ear against her wall…

She sees an in and throws a line out…

Red lips, and legs a mile long…

By calculation, I near her fireplace…

My blindness shifts to meet her law…

Futzing round out in the dark…

Tripping wires,

And spilling ink…

Futzing round out in the dark…

Where elbows rap, and

Knees go clink…

Bunny Villaire

6/1/24

Edit #2

She’s forgotten you.

It’s time to forget her,

let that memory die,

slip from the cliff side,

and no amount of tears,

no amount of pleads and cries

will keep this existence

anything but final,

so let her image

slide down the mountainside

let the decades of friendship,

that one night in heaven,

dissipate in the rain,

let the journeys and conversations,

the poems, the stories,

the memoirs and memories

fade to dust

and blow away with the winds of time

even if it takes

an eternity.

I wish I had time

to think about Gaza,

bombs and bodies,

women and children butchered,

land that’s been disputed

for thousands of years.

I feel like screaming

“This world belongs to God!

And all of us!”

I wish I had time

to talk politics,

to feed the hungry

and house the homeless,

end war, end suffering,

give the hopeless hope

like arms reaching down from Heaven

in gentle rain and sunbeams

to hand fire and mana,

nectar and ambrosia,

but I’m dead and buried

beneath the dirt and mud

of children and divorce

in a stark mausoleum

of cold winter responsibility,

a mom whose mind

has become a leaky boat

wandering aimlessly

through battering storms,

a dead father

I never had time to grieve,

tears don’t fall

and the drought is starving me;

the tears have dried up

and the crops are dying

and infested with locusts.

I’m buried beneath

bits and bites at work

and billions of dollars,

revenues and obligations,

unpaid lawyers and unpaid bills,

the grime and sludge

of missed opportunities

and broken promises,

and I look for fixes

of music and poetry

in the soaring raven of night,

notes and words

that flutter like butterflies,

charge like angel armies,

burn like phoenixes

across the painted sky

of creativity and imagination,

blazing orange and yellow

in the broken sunrise,

trying to schedule sex,

praying for things

to fall into passionate place

just one more time,

fire blazing motivation

and freedom like an azure sky,

somewhere I can fly

just one more time,

to help me wrestle

the unforgiving demons

of early morning loneliness,

postponing love

for some later unknown date

as it hides in the fog

like a far off lighthouse;

I only see the faint memory

of a dream of light,

a light I know

I will never reach.

So I wish I had time

to ease the problems of the world,

to let them find a place

in my cluttered sinking mind,

to give them space

in this dying star of a heart

which is imploding in on itself,

becoming a black hole,

but the space is taken,

overwhelmed

with the struggles of my own life,

these ropes and chains,

this prison cell,

and now it seems

I’ve been given a life sentence.

When my plane landed in San Francisco I knew the torture of the last two years was over. Leaving the plane, I promised myself that I would never step foot in Florida, Alabama, or the South ever again. The South and I had developed a deep loathing for each other and if I ever had to hear ”Sweet Home Alabama” again I was going to gouge out my ear drums with rusty ice picks. I had learned my lesson, California had its faults, but despite it all, it was home.

As I weaved through the airport crowd I couldn’t stop smiling and felt spank me twice and call me naughty, happy to be home. On the downside, I only had sixty bucks to my name and I was going to have to stay with my mom until I got a job and got back on my feet, but that was okay. Though basically broke and pseudo-homeless I felt free because I no longer had to deal with being called a Yankee by people who had more toes than teeth and humidity that steamed one’s balls just about every day of the fucking day of the year.

Returning to California, I wasn’t familiar with where I was going to live. All I knew was that it was a town near Modesto, which given its reputation, was trying to be the west coast’s answer to Detroit, but I hoped that would be very temporary. It was imperative that the time I spent staying with my mom was as brief as possible because after two days in her presence we’d be at each other’s throats like two starving wolves over the last pork chop. Still, despite the obstacles I faced, I thought my life was looking up.

Being new to the area, I knew it was going to be a challenge finding a job and that $60 I had in my pocket was gone after getting a haircut and buying a button-down shirt for job interviews. Facing poverty and the tension of living with my mom, I swore I would take the first job I was offered.

After a couple of weeks of pavement pounding, I was hired by Taco Bell. My job was a whole 15 hours a week for $4.75 an hour. The position was, “Lot Person” meaning I was to clean the parking lot, stock the dining room with condiments, and clean the restrooms before the restaurant opened. I didn’t complain because I was 19 years old and filled with the kind of optimism that only village idiots and Disney characters possess. It was just cleaning; how bad could it be?

The job seemed too easy until the first time I walked into the restrooms with a mop and bucket in hand. What I saw and melt was a god awful, biohazard filled example of how some human beings are not only happy to wallow in their own filth, but they are also eager to share their filth with others. After a few days of cleaning the restrooms I came to a surprising conclusion. The women’s room was by far the scariest, dirtiest to clean.

Now, let me just say that I have always felt that women are superior to men in every single way. I truly believe that women are the apex of human evolution where men are basically just a drunken evolutionary stagger in front of our knuckle dragging ancestors. A week of cleaning restrooms and my high opinion of women was crushed a little by reality

The men’s room was always what you’d expect. The trash can was full and the sink was filthy and often caked in a disgusting film of chewing tobacco. It was not unusual for boogers to be found on the walls, doors, mirrors, and even on the ceiling (now that’s talent). Of course, being a Taco Bell restroom, the toilets were always a cross between a sewer treatment plant and Chernobyl in terms of cleanliness and sanitation. I came to theorize that the state of the commode was a direct result of the fact that Taco Bell doesn’t always sit well with everyone’s digestive plumbing. After consuming this, “Quick Serve Mexican Food” many people experience the phenomena where their Nacho Supreme, Taco Supreme etc. races through their stomach, squeals recklessly through the curves of the intestines, and finally exits the sphincter with the speed of a behind schedule Japanese bullet train. The result was never pretty and not always contained within the confines of the commode. Lucky me, I was responsible for cleaning the aftermath of this burrito-based, porcelain destroying crime against restroom sanitation.

The women’s room was different. Oh, it had an overflowing trash can and grimy sink. One difference between the lady’s and men’s room trash cans was the addition of dirty diapers (both infant and disturbingly some adult). The toilets were just as bad (one could sense distinctively feminine daintiness to the aftermath of the taco-induced spontaneous rectal purge) as their counterparts in the men’s room.

What stood out in the ladies room, what haunted my dreams, was the diabolically inappropriate disposal of feminine hygiene products. Though it didn’t happen on a daily basis, there were times the women’s room looked like someone tried to perform a dinner theater version of Stephen King’s Carrie in there. Tampons and sanitary napkins could be found on stall floors, floating in the toilets, and one time it looked like someone threw a very used sanitary napkin against a wall, repeatedly. The reason the restroom was so abused was a mystery to me. Maybe it was a raving mad femme artiste who chose to work in the medium of uterine blood instead of watercolor or oil paint. Maybe it was a disgruntled employee. All I knew was I wished the panty-liner Picasso would practice her art at the Burger King down the street.

I have a strong stomach, but I was ill equipped to deal with what I’d seen. Instead of mop, bucket, and cleaning cloth, I felt this menstrual mess required a pressure washer, followed by a sand blaster, followed by an exorcist (the power of Mr. Clean compels you) for good measure. A couple of weeks after working as a lot person, one of my first purchases with my Taco Bell wages was a pair of rubber gloves I’d seen plumbers use. There was no way I was going to use the paper-thin plastic gloves Taco Bell provided to clean, IN THERE.

Though I was somewhat traumatized by what I had experienced cleaning the Taco Bell restrooms I did learn three things. First, I should be ashamed of my fellow males because most of us have the manners and cleanliness of an undersexed chimp watching a Planet of the Apes marathon. Second, not all women are polite and emotionally mature demigoddesses. Some are downright foul. Finally, I am a bit of a masochist because it took me thirteen years of promotions, punishment, being told to get a real job, and red sauce seeping from my pores to hand in my Taco Bell uniform and go back to school.

My body thirst for yours the way a sinner does sin.

The fire in you eyes engulfs my world of color into that of one of heat and passion.

The tips of your fingers leave delicate indentations in my ivory skin.

Black and blue stain my legs, each a symbol of our love, rough and loving.

I thirst for your attention, I thirst for your touch, your body, you.

This thirst is overpowering, each time we touch is like an ice cold bead of water running down my parched tongue.

Your body mends with mine, melting and shifting in the rhythm of our silent love song.

Your lips search for mine in a way that makes my skin burn up in sin.

Your hands grasp my wrists, my hips, my hands, my hair, my neck, marking me with your invisible hand prints, making me yours.

Your eyes search mine, whispering all the promises of love.

You burn me in that the thirst of a love I have never know.

What makes you so dependent

On the trinkets in the store?...

I see belief suspended,

And it’s stretching more and more…

You read the Daily Panic

That is funneled through the pipes

It accentuates your high pursuits,

From old age to the next life…

I need eye to eye,

Skin to skin..

Necessities

You toss in the bin!…

I need mouth to mouth,

Cheek to cheek…

Heart language

Is the one I speak…

Your status is the sacred cow,

It reflects in all you buy…

Behind closed doors, in the here and now

You will wait for when pigs will fly

When the real you is revealed to all

In it’s shameful, sorry state…

With one fin revealed…hidden jaws of steel,

You’re the shark that guards your lake…

I need eye to eye,

Skin to skin..

Necessities

You toss in the bin!…

I need mouth to mouth,

Cheek to cheek…

Heart language

Is the one I speak…

Your the judge and the defendant

In this parody of whims…

Can you see me leave your courtroom

When the outlooks growing dim?…

I cannot stomach the torture

That the sanitized endure…

They’ve been backed into a corner

By these tickets they’ve procured…

I need eye to eye,

Skin to skin..

Necessities

You toss in the bin!…

I need mouth to mouth,

Cheek to cheek…

Heart language

Is the one I speak…

5/5/23

©

Bunny Villaire

It's probably cringe to some of you, but a character I've always found comfort in and related to was Ticci Toby. I have been in the creepypasta fandom since I was 11, And Toby was always the one I saw a lot of aspects of myself in. Even as I've aged, I still see parts of myself in him. We both have Tourettes, are survivors of abusive parents, and have been bullied heavily. We both are very pale and have crazy wavy dark hair and natural dark bags or shadows underneath our eyes. We have many differences, but in many ways, I see the reflection of myself in him.