The face in the fly-specked mirror was a hard one, shaped even meaner by the rusty room. An aura of stagnant humidity lingered behind the stinking mixture of excrement and paper that filled the mineral stained toilet in the graffiti scratched stall; a literal shit-hole. Cyrus Bohannon had recently added his own bloody shat to the odorous pile in the bowl, carefully hovering himself overtop so as not to touch his ass to the filthy seat.

“Perfect!” He cursed aloud. “No hot water!” An undeterred Cyrus shaved in the tepid water anyway, dribbling it disgustedly over his cheap, pink, “toss-away” plastic razor. His toothbrush remained in his pocket, though. He did not pull it out, fearful that somehow the putrid, humid air might carry the shit smell into its bristles. He was successful in washing the sweat from his skin and face, but the tired redness would not rinse from his eyes, no matter how hard he scrubbed.

Cyrus Bohannon’s whole life smelled about like this cankerous Arkansas highway rest stop.

So Cy reached into his other pocket, the one without the toothbrush, removing from it a clear sandwich baggy, the baggie’s bottom a rainbow of colorful pills. His arthritic hands split one of the capsules in two rather deftly before pouring the powdered contents of each half into the hollow made at the base of his left thumb and index finger before tossing the empty halves into the sink’s trickle. Lastly, Cyrus Bohannon lowered his face into the powder and inhaled deeply, feeling the burn that sucked through his nostrils until came the familiar acidic drip down the back of his throat that preceded the rush.

The sun was bright upon re-entering the world, so Cyrus squinted into it, using a hand to shield his raw and red-rimmed eyes. Worn boot heels gave the old man an uncomfortable looking, bow-legged stride, or maybe that was the hemorrhoids, it would be hard to guess between them if an observer were to try.

Cy climbed up onto the cab’s fuel tank, grasping for the grimy Stuckey’s bag he had shoved between the rig’s seats. There were picnic tables close by the toilets, but Cyrus did not care for company so he found a shaded curb near the rig where he lowered himself gently down to the concrete, mindful of the electric pain from his arse-hole. He gripped the greasy bag tightly in his shaking hands, not really hungry but knowing he needed to eat. That was the problem with the speed, you never, ever felt hungry.

Once seated Cy allowed his eyes to close for the briefest moment. On the highway behind him the hum of tires and throaty roars of the “Big-Rigs” zipped along with a frequent and soothing irregularity, that and a warm sun lulling him despite the jittery-tingle of the pills. In a brief, but vivid dream a blinding silence of snow drifted around the Freight-liner’s cab as it slid down Monteagle while a desperate Cy fought at the wheel, the dream so real that he actually heard the lonely whine of air-brakes squelching high-pitched and hungry just before the crash. At the end Cy lay dead in a twist of metal, but he couldn’t be dead could he? Can you be dead and still feel the heat of the day, or the weight of the crushed door pressing your thigh?

“No, you cannot,” he reasoned. But still there came to him the whoosh-wooshing of passing cars on the highway, so Cy squeezed his eyes tighter yet, wishing to go back to being dead, but he could not ignore the cab door moving against his thigh, pressing harder now. Reluctantly, the “dead” being so peaceful, Cy peeked open his unwilling eyes.

He was surprised to find that it was not the door of the cab pressing against his leg, after all. No, it was a damned dog, a lowly mutt that had crawled its way up beside him while he napped, a damned flea-bag stray! Cy “shoo-ed” it angrily, willing it away. And it did take a wary step back, but it did not go. Instead, it whined… the same whine as the air-brakes in Cy’s dream? Cy “shoo-ed” again, and the dog took another step away to where Cy could get a better look. “Just a damned mutt, spotted brown and white like a Holstein cow, long-eared and long-tongued. Ugly, is what. You are one ugly dog!“

Shamed, the dog took a circle at these denigrations, sitting itself down on Cyrus’ other side, but leaning itself up hard against his right thigh this time.

“Shoo, dog!” He hollered it this time, angrily. Once again the dog stepped off, but not far away. Instead it stretched its nose toward the Stuckey’s bag, eyebrows high and hopeful. Cy noted then how thin it was, even for a dog. He pulled the burger from the bag then, tickled when the dog sat down. Curious, Cy put the burger back in the bag, it amusing him when the dog stood back up. Cyrus took it from the bag again, “hooting” this time when the dog sat down once again.

“Well, how about that?” Cy didn’t even realize in his excitement that he was speaking aloud. He unwrapped the burger now, smiling when the dog sat back down. He took a bite, surprised when there was no reaction from the dog, not even a whimper. Not hungry himself, he pulled the patty from between the buns and tossed it at the dog, who promptly snagged it out of the air and smacked it down.

“Whooeee! I reckon you are a smart dog!” Cyrus took out the french fries next, and tossed them one-by-one at the cur, who yanked each one from the air and smacked them all down, just as it had the meat patty.

Fries gone, Cyrus wadded up the bag. The dog sat.

“That,” Cyrus thought aloud, “is really something! I reckon she knows just when to sit. You are a smart bitch, ain’t you now?”

As if it could help, Cy grabbed at a handful of air, pulling himself with it up from the curb. The dog stood as well. Limping his way towards the Freightliner, he glanced back to see the dog limping along behind. A mini-van sailed by on the highway, its children waving at Cyrus and the dog through its opened windows. Cy found himself waving back, though he wasn’t sure which was more noteworthy; children waving at him, or him waving back?

He climbed into the cab then, settling his hemorrhoids into the warn cloth of the Freight-liner’s seat. Triggered, the big diesel roared beneath his boots, shaking the cab like an atmospheric re-entry. The dog sat hopefully below, patiently, its wide eyes looking up at the driver’s side door. With the hissing of brakes and a grinding of gears the big rig shuddered forward fifty slow feet before the brakes hissed again, lurching the rig to a stop. The man climbed back down and gestured toward the dog, who dropped her ears and trotted happily forward.

At sixty-four years of age Cyrus Bohannon finally caught a break. He found his luck just outside of Little Rock, so that’s what he called her. And so that everyone would know, he painted it beside the Queen of Hearts on either side of his cab:

Cyrus Bohannon

Owner/ Operator

Me and My “Little Rock”

The man chain smoked on the park bench several yards from where I'd settled. He looked over at me as I played fetch with his little French Bulldog for about an hour. I had no business in the dog park, really, being in town without a dog.

I just went out for a walk. The hotel had grown too small and the world outside just a little too large; the relative quiet of the Tribeca park was a nice compromise between New York City and me. The fact that it was a dog park was a happy accident. No one seemed to mind me being there, quietly petting or playing with the furry visitors as they came by to pay respects.

This man's dog, though. She was different. She took a shine to me as soon as I shut the iron gate and sat on an empty bench. She was a stout little thing, fifteen pounds of muscle in a seven pound frame. The little critter actually reminded me of the cartoon bulldog from Tom & Jerry in shape if not size. Her front legs were like oversized arms on a bodybuilder, with her rear legs like that same bodybuilder who ignored leg days. She snuffled at me and dropped a ball at my feet.

I looked up at her owner, and he gave a tiny nod. Permission granted to play, from behind a veil of tobacco smoke. I grinned, and tossed the ball across the park and the feisty little bulldog fetched. This went on for the better part of an hour, not a word was spoken, and I lost count of how many times the flare of a Zippo caught my eye.

Finally, flicking away his last butt, the man slid to the end of his bench and turned towards me. He stood, straightening a tan trenchcoat that fell from his shoulders like it'd hung there for years. Watching us continue to play fetch, he spoke in what I immediately clocked as a British accent. I'm terrible with identifying them beyond "British," it could have been somewhere in London or the countryside, I don't know.

"That ain't my dog, bruv," he said. I was surprised to see a new unlit cigarette between his pointing fingers. "Nope. I'm just watchin' 'er for a bit. Thank you for playin' with the thing. Saved me the trouble."

I smiled. "It's been fun. A nice distraction from...everything." I tried to keep melancholy out of my voice, but it always has a way of creeping in around all the edges.

"Mate. It ain't my business, but what brings you to the city?"

"Family stuff." I wasn't going to tell this stranger that back in my hotel room were ashes to be spread at places in the city that meant a lot to someone I cared about.

He nodded, not comprehending, but understanding. I gave him a weak smile as thanks for his refusal to press the issue.

"You notice how that little mutt keeps droppin' the ball just out of your reach every other time she fetches?" I had noticed, in fact. We'd established a pattern: after about four throws, she'd break in the shade, lying with her legs splayed so her belly would rest on the cold autumn concrete. I was comfortable in the crisp air, but several people around us were wearing sweaters or coats. The little Frenchie was obviously getting heated with all the exercise. Every other throw, though, she'd drop the ball too far to my right, almost like she thought I was sitting on that side of the bench instead of leaning on the left armrest. I'd tell her to bring it to me, she'd stare up at the empty seat, look over at me, then kick the little ball so it would roll into my hand. I thought it was a clever trick, but odd that she kept doing it that way instead of bringing it directly to me.

"Yeah, it's strange. Like she forgets where I'm sitting."

The man nodded, grunting in what I assumed was an affirmative.

"It's not that, mate."

She dropped the ball at the opposite end of the bench again.

I looked over that way, then back up to the blonde chainsmoker.

He reached into a coat pocket, handed me a plain white business card. I thanked him, looked at the card, and then back at him. "So, Mr. John Constantine, what kind of work do you do?"

He paused, lit yet another cigarette, and stooped down to hook up the bulldog to a leash. He didn't answer until he'd taken a couple of long, contemplative drags.

"Mate, when you ever need me, call me. I don't know what brings you here to the City, but what I do know? You ain't been sittin ’ere on this bench alone, and the mutt knows it, too."

I should have felt a cold chill, but instead, all I felt was happy.

Off the

beaten path.

No street lights,

nature has

embraced you.

Solitude has

been found.

Suddenly,

feeling as if

you’re not alone.

The darkness

becomes palpable.

Shadows embody

subtle movements.

Heart rate increases,

breath quickens.

You begin

walking faster.

Trying not

to panic.

It feels like

something is

following you.

Now what?

Dread sets in,

anxiety starts.

Your eyes

say you’re alone.

Yet your mind

says otherwise.

Footsteps echo

in the growing

silence of the night.

As phantoms dance

in and out

of sight.

Each one becomes

more terrifying

than the last.

The mania

of the mind

begins to manifest

in your vision.

Shaping fantasies,

promoting nightmares.

Your mind is

fatally infected

with the delusion

of paranoia.

Now you begin

to question

your sanity.

It feels like

the entire forest

is watching you.

Are those really

tortured souls

in the trees?

Rocking. It is the constant that surrounds me. Rhythm.

Both personal and impartial and uncertain in its constancy. It is a movement that occurs as the byproduct of all things in motion, myself as well, no matter how still I try to make my mind or body or the article on which my feet have stopped.

Crib, seesaw, or chair, or open field...

Age has relevance, as a descriptor of events, such as measure of day.

It does not define me, inside nor out, and rocking reveals nothing other than the reassurance that minutes are passing and there is yet the potential for end.

Or change of pace, or a similar continuation.

Whatever the tempo, the rocking is the meter surfacing in my awareness.

Like breathing. Heart beating.

I am ancient.

I am infantile.

I am cradled,

within living rock.

07.31.2024

Completely Open Ended... challenge @Last

If you fan

those dying embers

you try so hard

to keep alive

in the end

all you'll be

left with

are ashes

in your eyes

Chapter 1

Friday and Saturday nights were music nights at my house. No matter how many times we moved, my father found a room for his sanctuary and built a kick ass man cave. The walls always filled with posters of KISS, Black Sabbath, Alice Cooper, and a variety of other arena rock bands from the 70s and 80s.

For a while, he held a job on the railroad, which allowed him to have weekends off. I don’t know how long this lasted, but I remember it was during the time we lived on Brookside. At this time, my mother was working at Wal-Mart, which came to town around 2004 or 2005. After the promotion for different movies ended, she would take some of the cardboard cutouts and posters and bring them home. I’d fill my room with posters of Spiderman, The Matrix, Star Wars, and countless others, and the cardboard cutouts would hang on either side of the stairs descending into the basement. It was cool.

There was a giant Spiderman and Green Goblin from the 2002 movie with Tobey Maguire and Willem Dafoe going down the stairs. Then when you walked into the basement, there was a small TV, which my father would keep on mute with a hockey game or a movie on AMC, posters, DVDs, and VHS tapes surrounded you along with my father’s massive CD and record collection, which were towards the back wall. It truly was a sanctuary, and an escape from a world where your body and mind were expendable. A place where you could enjoy the fruits of your labor, if only for a little while.

It was a fun place to be, and I’d get into many arguments with my mother during the summer months when I’d rarely leave it. Though I played sports, and had friends, I’d often find myself for days on end just walking to the movie store on Roseberry to rent VHS’s and walking back to grab a snack and fade away into my old man’s sanctuary. I can see why she was angry, because as a parent now, I don’t always love when the kids plant themselves in front of the TV for the day. The outside world is important. There’s no denying that. But the world is hard, unfriendly and unforgiving. Who wouldn’t want to slip away for a while? Plus, the days of being in my head feeling something akin to a goddamn Eli Roth horror movie would occupy a lot of time during my 20s. Those days were some of the last, where being inside my head was a paradise. Two best pals eating snacks and watching Jackie Chan clumsily beat the ever living hell out of gangsters.

During the school years and summer, though, Friday and Saturday nights at 7 were always the apex of the week, and something that I’d carry with me throughout my university years and deep into fatherhood. The importance of those evenings is instrumental, and still to this day, when the three of us get together, we make sure to crack a few beers and get the tunes going.

I think they were important because they felt like the only hours during the week where our father belonged solely to us. The rest of the week, he had some kind of preoccupation. Whether he was working, or spending time with my mother, or even when we all spent time together, it was nice in a different way, but it wasn’t the same.

My mother understood that too, and also understood the importance of having a couple of hours of “me” time. She loved music, but not in the same way, and she certainly didn’t feel a need to sit in a basement and discuss the merits of each song played accompanied by one of my father’s stories of being young, and how different songs changed his life. She’d always roll her eyes and playfully tell him he was brainwashing me or and my brother. Maybe he was, but what the hell, there are worse things to be brainwashed into than kick ass music from the 70s and 80s. He wasn’t Jim Jones, and the basement wasn’t Jonestown.

There was also a happiness in his eyes on those evenings, a sense of peace. And as my brother and I got older, he relished the fact that we took an interest in his life before us. I wanted to know about working on the oil rigs. I wanted to know about his high school years and his fights. I asked about his girlfriends. I asked about my grandfather and sometimes felt saddened at their distant relationship, while simultaneously feeling grateful for ours. I could listen to him talk for hours. He never bored me with those stories, though I’m sure he felt he did.

He never seemed to sink into depression, but there was a certain darkness in his eyes when work demanded more than his body wanted to give. There was anger in them, too. And it didn’t happen often, but when he lost his temper, it was frightening. You stood there and did your best to not let a single tear escape your eye. But as quickly as the darkness overtook him, he could cast it away once again in the snap of a finger. Something that I’d inherit from him.

During the music nights, we’d pick two songs each. My father would start, and then we’d rotate. It was fun, and we mostly picked songs we knew my father would like, but every so often we’d pick something new we heard at school and hope he enjoyed it. You wanted something that kept the evening fun going along at a nice, steady pace. You didn’t want to drop the ball with something that no one liked, because you’d hear about it. In fact, my family always had a propensity for never letting things go. So, you’d probably hear about it a lot more than was really necessary. But if you could take it, you’d get your chance to give it at some point.

My father would also designate someone as the beer guy. Since we didn’t have a mini fridge in the basement, my brother or I would have to run upstairs and grab the old man a couple of beers from the fridge and run back down, trying not to miss too much of a song that we loved.

For as long as I can remember, I loved the taste of beer. Especially that first drink when the cap came off. Sometimes my father would let me take that first sip, and that carbonated burn as it slid down my throat made me feel like I was getting a teaser into his world. The world beyond the fog. I was drinking and talking about the good ole days. The days before, I was even a thought or a whisper.

It always felt like I was training to be a man from the time I was a young kid. I wanted to see him leave in the morning and study how he walked to work. I wanted to partake in the weekend evenings of beer drinking and rock and roll music. I wanted it all, because there would come a time when I’d be my father’s age, and I’d have young kids getting me beer from the fridge. It’s the circle of life, I think, or some variation of life. The songs would be different, but the spirit of it never changed. It was a time when I belonged to the kids, and it was my time to talk about old stories and brainwash them in the church of Bruce Springsteen.

But those years of growing up and listening to music were important. They were important because I was being introduced to albums and artists that were well before my time. I was building a deep understanding of rock and roll music that none of my peers had. Then, when I’d find myself in university surrounded by musicians and looking to take a stab at writing songs and performing, I’d be able to speak their language.

You wanted to debate about The Stone and The Beatles? Let’s do it. You wanted to talk about shock rock in the 70s, glam or thrash in the 80s, great. If you wanted to talk about grunge and alternative music, fine. It was all good, because I’d dipped my toes in all of those waters. I became a well rounded, and I think unbiased music lover and critic. Well, maybe not completely unbiased, but I was being introduced to albums that may have been considered uncool at the time of their release because of generational factors, but I wasn’t there. So, everything was fresh and new and exciting. I wasn’t chained down by the ideologies of music gatekeepers.

And this was all thanks to my old man. But for all the great music he introduced me to (and there was a lot), Springsteen wasn’t there. Of course, I was aware of who he was, but he was never played on those sanctuary evenings. Not once.

But when a friend of mine introduced me to The River, and I’d be out on my own, studying music that wasn’t my fathers, I’d understand why. Springsteen didn’t always offer the escape that my father was looking for after a hard earned work week. In the basement, we listened to KISS, watched Star Wars and talked about days gone by. I rarely, if ever, asked how his day was. He rarely, if ever, talked about building trains. Because if we did, then work would occupy every second of his existence, and he was hellbent on ensuring that his life was about more than work.

My father and my grandfather never had those moments of talking through their differences. Much like Springsteen and his father, my old man grew his hair long. My father got his ears pierced, and my grandfather asked him if he was a faggot now? They argued about the state of their relationship. My grandfather wanted him to play sports every second of his life, and my father wanted to listen to his albums.

My grandfather was a railroader and my father, like myself, tried to run away from that life. But he got my mom pregnant at 19 and went to work on the oil rigs. From there, he went to the railroad. Then when my grandfather died in 2008, I heard from my mother that he cried, but I never saw it, neither did my brother. We were there for him in our own way, but we never really talked about how badly it hurt. Or if there were things he wished he’d said before he passed. We just kind of stood there, offering quiet support while our minds ran amok, trying to figure out how to actually help.

Still, to this day, I don’t speak to my father much on that level. We still laugh and poke fun at anything and everything. We still listen to music and drink beers when we get together, but it can still feel hard to shed that skin. But I told him one day that I love Springsteen because his music reminds me of him. I don’t know if he thought much of that, but I wanted him to know that this was music that dealt with complicated people and complicated relationships. It said the things that we were often too scared to say in real life.

But one day last year, I called him. He lives in Ontario now, and I don’t see him much. Sometimes I listen to My Father’s House, The River, Independence Day, or all of Darkness on the Edge of Town and think how much will go unsaid on the day that he dies. Will I sit and cry, wishing desperately that I’d said what I needed to say? The truth is, probably.

I made the call in desperation. I was losing my wife. I was losing my whole life and I could see it happening. My head was fucked, and I needed help. So, I called and for a while we joked, but he knew that something was up, because these weren’t calls we had often. So, eventually I asked how he and mom did it. How did they survive through it all? Because I felt like I was losing it.

That afternoon, as my wife was away with the kids, we had a great conversation. He offered advice in the best way he could, and when he had to get back to work, he told me to call anytime I needed anything. When I hung up, I felt like I was going to collapse with the sheer weight of finally telling the strongest man I’d ever known that I was feeling weak. And that I was in serious trouble.

The call made me realize that in many ways we were the same, and also different. I loved Springsteen because it hit home truths I was running away from. Whereas he didn’t want to be reminded of those truths, because he knew them all too well.

I sometimes picture a fictional version of those music nights. I’m ten years old and already a huge Springsteen fan. I put on Darkness on the Edge of Town. For my two songs, I pick Something in the Night and the title track. Or any two songs from the album, really. He places the vinyl in his hands and reads the lyrics. What happens? Does he become a fan, or does he tell me to turn it off so he can play KISS? I don’t know, but I often think about it. I think he would have found some hard truths in there, but I also think he would have revered the anger in a young Springsteen’s voice. Because in which other profession can you let out a primal scream like Springsteen does in Adam Raised A Cain, or Streets of Fire? You can’t do that in real life, though many of us would like to.

I know my father’s work weeks were often torturous, especially in the winter. I remember my mom telling me how much it upset her to hear the winds blowing off the river, howling so viciously you could barely hear yourself think, and knowing that he was out there. Out there walking that line between the tracks, reading a switch list, and trying to do a complicated mental puzzle inside his head to lessen the amount of moves and time it took to complete his job.

I’d understand when I got older and walked that same line, if only for a little while. I’d think about my father and those music nights, and I’d think about his eyes. They were tired, and there was anger behind them, but he never substituted hard work outside of home for the hard work inside. He did both, always and to me he was a goliath of strength. An impenetrable force, and as I get older, I’d feel much weaker knowing that we were cut from the same cloth. Though, I don’t know what the inside of his head was like; he handled that life like only he could.

That’s why the man cave was a sanctuary. Because it was his direct link to his childhood, it was a direct link to good memories with his kids. It represented everything the outside world didn’t. He needed it to keep sane, and I’d find the same thing as an adult. Escape through music and writing. Finding those links to times that didn’t crush you and make you feel small and weak. An insurance that no matter how bad things got, there was always a place you could go where things felt good, and things felt right. And while my father would seek it with KISS, and other huge acts, I’d find it with Springsteen.

At the worst of times, there would be songs that fit my situation like a perfectly placed puzzle piece. When I’d find him, it would be the closest thing to a religious or spiritual experience I’d have. An alignment of the world. An answer to the world’s hardest riddle. It would save me, at least from making it through my 20s.

There would be times when my world was ending. And the kids would go to bed, and my wife would follow suit. Then I’d find myself walking down the stairs of my home, feeling so weak I could explode and heading to my record player, putting on Darkness, or Born to Run, Nebraska, or The River, and just sitting trying to keep it together. Trying to rationalize my situation and find an escape. Seeking the strength of my father. The man who’s back was never hunched. The man who walked through the early morning fog, not with a mentality of “the world is going to beat me into submission”, but one of “I’m going to beat it into submission.” I’d search for that strength, and search and sometimes feel so depleted at the notion that it just wasn’t there for me. That his strength just wasn’t in the cards for me.

The music would help me understand. It would help me understand my childhood, my relationship with my parents. It would allow me to think about my parents as kids, and how that generation must have felt with their parents. A generation that felt like their folks were 500 years older than them. The coldness of my father’s father, and how it was his goal to be a better father, and how he was raising me to be even better.

Then, with that, I’d write poetry set to some of my favorite songs. I’d pick up a guitar, learn some chords and sit with those for a while, then I’d put words to my songs, and play bars and cafes, closing my eyes and pretending I was Springsteen in his early days at the Cafe Wha, or another Greenwich Village cafe around the time he was getting ready to sit at CBS in front of Jon Hammond and play his heart out for a record deal.

I’d seek words as a form of understanding. Songs could answer questions that an argument with my wife just couldn’t solve. I’d write and write, and then my chances at stardom would crash and burn like so many before me. My father who could have gone pro in hockey. I, who could have possibly done something with music, would find it ripped out from under me, the fog of my childhood pulling me back to the place I’d wanted to leave. Or maybe that was another question that needed to be answered. Did I ever want to leave?

Then I’d have to seek those answers in another form of writing. So I’d write stories. I’d write stories about railroaders and small towns. Imagery of smoke stacks like a gun barrel, burning winds coming off the river and cutting like knives. I’d write about people deep in depression staring at the sun creeping through the window blinds and wanting a darkness so absolute, it must mean death?

I’d write about characters in Springsteen songs. I’d read Springsteen books, and buy all his records and hope that just because music and sports didn’t work out for me, I wouldn’t just work and die without a single piece of art ever completed.

But first, I’d have to learn to survive without living under the same roof as my mother and father. I’d have to navigate a world alone as they moved hours and hours away in the opposite direction. And I’d have to deal with almost watching my brother die at the same time.

All of the madness

stopped for a moment

on the tip of a paper

thin dime

and the earth shifted

from blue to

ink jet black

and the truth

raised above

the vast horizon

like a lion

over the blood red

sky of the Serengeti

wall streets,

with English ivies

that choke the stars

of persons

Transposed,

black "lorsque" eyes and

migratory tonsiled vocals

singing gutterally

into the nonsilence

of night, wince

the global heart

cries,

as to Where? does small

ambition

crawl,

to untold

beanstalk heights...?

I don't want to lose us

to the abstract columns,

bookended sidewalks---

the fiction

that curdles human blood,

with salt, or twist-of-lime Realty,

downed in a gulp!

an acquired taste

we connoisseur to,

as an aspiration...

hungover

the shoulder loosely

with pompous name

like Olympus or Olympia

that could be picture maker,

or picture taker,

or landscape,

in fanciful distance...

in any case, or shelf, or reservation

a higher order, for a cold

sampling

of what every fresh foundling

knows as ferment

and decay...

otherwise known as

...Civilization...

“When am I ever not at a party?” At first I’d been a bit pleased that Bram had called–because I’m a narcissist that likes attention. And because it’s unlike him to have gone so many days without checking in, considering the circumstances. But now he’s kind of pissing me off. As usual.

I’m standing in the corner of Castle of Stuff, shaking my head at Jamie, who’s at a stuffing station just a few feet away. He’s holding the fabric exterior of a goose against the end of a tube, watching the cotton-candy colored, glitter-infused stuffing churn through the clear pipes that fill the ceiling of the warehouse-like building. He keeps pointing and grinning at me as he watches his goose get filled from the inside. It’s really the kind of stuff only serial killers should enjoy.

“Are there kids there?” Bram sounds more than a little surprised.

I turn towards the wall, attempting to use my body as a sound shield, but shrieking kids run by with their own stuffed animals. And to imagine that Eve has a little brat like these. What a horrible thing to have to look after. “Maybe,” I reply darkly. It's Eve's fault for having her birthday at place clearly designed for people a fifth of our age.

There’s silence on the line, and I sigh deeply. “So. What do you actually want?” I ask him, eyes catching on Eve. She’s standing beside Jamie, looking as young and pretty as she was in college, nailing a simple-but-elegant style but still able to pull off hip, almost-in-your eye, dark bangs. She looks like the world’s most picturesque mother as she smiles and hugs her daughter to her side. There’s no way she’s really that happy to have to take care of a tiny carbon copy of herself, right?

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised; we never liked the same things.

Eve, by her own making, was my best friend in college. We had no similar interests, no overlapping classes, and completely different home lives. Eve went to church every week, I went day drinking; Eve studied calculus and linear algebra, I slept in during my english literature classes; Eve visited her parents and three siblings often, I made any excuse to not see my mother. But she’d been determined to befriend me, so eventually I gave in. Somehow we were roommates for three years.

And now our lives have branched in even more opposing directions, if possible. She married a nice, if boring, nurse. They have a kid and two dogs. They live in a little affordable house in Minnesota. Every year on her birthday I get to hear how fucking happy she is. It’s sickening. I don’t know why she puts up with me.

“Hello?” I’ve completely zoned out, but Bram still hasn’t said anything. What is wrong with this man?

He makes a “hm” kind of noise then says, “Sorry, Masie. I’ve gotta go.” I stare at Jamie’s finished goose, which he’s holding up like Simba, as the line goes dead.

How utterly rude. He calls me, and for what?

I stomp back over to Jamie and Eve and Mini Eve. Mini Eve looks at me through her matchy-matchy dark bangs and points at my pink combat boots. “I like your shoes.”

I am spared from making conversation with the child because Eve asks me, “What is it? Work?” She’s looking at me all doe-eyed, which is how she used to get me to do things in college with her. The worst part is she’s not being manipulative, that’s literally just what her eyes are like. She’s probably half deer.

“Yes,” I say distractedly, since at the same time Jamie is trying to hand me the limp body of the unfinished tiger I’d picked out.

“Was it Bram? How is he?”

I’m holding the tiger by its back leg, letting it dangle in front of me. I can’t help that my eyebrows raise as I look back at Eve. How is Bram? As if I would know. As if she should care? It takes me a second to think of something to say. “He’s really great. He’s doing just fine. Loving life. Just like you and mini-you.” My voice comes out bitter.

Jamie steps on my foot. He really must’ve put some force behind it because I feel it through the boot. This is why I hate hanging out with Eve, it makes me feel like a small dog yapping at a big one for no reason.

“Oh.” Eve gives me a thin smile; she’s not stupid. She takes her daughter by the hand. “We’ll be by the glitter tornado.”

As soon as her back is turned Jamie throws his newly-birthed goose at my head. I’m too slow to dodge, and it bounces off the side of my face. “What the hell?”

He holds up a pointer finger. “There are children around here.”

“Ok. What the fu–”

“You haven’t said a single nice thing to her all day! You begrudgingly said ‘happy birthday’. The first thing you said when you saw her was ‘have you had work done?’” Jamie’s finger is now pointed accusingly at me.

“Oh, right, because you weren’t thinking the same thing?” I fold my arms.

“We see her once a year, Masie.”

“Yeah, exactly. Once a year, so what’s the point? I don’t even know her anymore, and she definitely doesn’t know me. Why bother?”

“Because that’s what friends do. She’s making an effort.”

I laugh. “Making an effort to what? She gets to see me once a year and go, wow, thank god I’m not like this crazy bitch. I’m probably just entertainment for her cute little family, just a reminder of how great she’s got it.”

Jamie’s nostrils are flared, which only happens when he’s really mad because he thinks he looks like a bull when it happens and he tries his best to avoid doing it. “You’re literally so self-centered, Masie. This is her birthday. The world doesn’t revolve around you. I’m your friend, right? I make an effort too. I call you even when you haven’t talked to me in forever, I invite you out when I know you need someone to go with. I let you talk about yourself for hours even though you never ask if I have anything new or different or hard going on. Everyone else has their own life, how can you not see that? And if you don’t want to make an effort, then fine. We won’t either.”

I’m so shocked I literally drop my tiger carcass on the ground. Jamie and I have fought, but not like this. “Is this about something I said last night? Because I was drunk and I don’t really–”

Jamie shakes his head. I think there are tears in his eyes. “No, Masie. But speaking of, when you find a new friend, you should try apologizing to them and not just giving excuses.” He juts his chin into the air. “Now, Hank Featherford and I are going.”

“Hank–?” He swipes his goose off the ground. It's probably a better friend than I am. “Wait. Hey, I’m sorry, Jamie. I–”

He turns on his heel, Hank Featherford clutched against his chest. He’s definitely crying. “I’ll be at the confetti waterfall. Please don’t follow me.” He sniffs.

I scoff, then cringe at myself. Be nice, be nice. “Hey, wait. Is this about us or is this about Eve? Because, honestly, I wasn’t really that mean to her. But we can sort this out!” He’s not listening. And really, I don’t want to go any closer to the confetti waterfall anyway. So I pick up my sad tiger and take a few breaths. I’m not gonna fucking cry when there’s a seven-year-old two feet away, clutching a bright blue dinosaur body and waiting for the stuffing station.

I try miserably to smile at him, and then wander away.

--

(previous chapter)

pt 21: https://www.theprose.com/post/816609/contradictions