Ulysses

Breathe

In.

Out.

Through the nose. Out the mouth.

...

It’s not working.

Jesus fuck

Sweat pooled on my hands as I laid them outstretched on the smooth mahogany table. The etches on this table teemed with history - Obama, Trump, West, Johnson, Smith.

What the fuck happened to this country.

Just a walking self-writing fiction - a bleeding lumbering behemoth where the only currency are blood and lies. Where actions are reduced to virtual likes and dislikes, and the sounds that come out of our mouths are white static noise. Our Rosa Parks and Luthers sign off their souls as they plug their sponsors on rallies they livestream for 10% discounts on online therapy. Real actual relationships are null as we turn to Virtual Reality and haptic suits. A land of dreamers and victims that live in our own heads with our eyes glued to screens tuned into a dead channel.

Glamour and bandaid hold our limbs together as we carry our right arm clamped in between our bloody jaws.

Too big for our own good. Too proud.

A slick black pen with a fancy golden trim sat neatly right next to a stack of papers. The papers trembled quietly in my clammy hands.

Alright no worries. It’s just a show. 36 hours. I can make a change, at least one.

Education well... that one’s pretty easy

Drug Policy ok

Health Insurance hmm

Abortion uhh...

Gun Control fuck

Military Spending ...

I laid the papers gently down the table.

One at a time Bailey.

I loosened the tie - or noose - around my neck. At this point, can’t really tell the two from each other and a part of me favors the latter.

“Hey uhh... can you turn on the A/C?” The words grew claws and scraped themselves up and out of my dry throat. The Special Service agent that towered over me hid any hint of emotion behind those pitch black shades. He looked like he was born - no, made - in the oval office, made here just like this chair or those neatly placed books on the shelves.

“It’s already on. Sir.” The stoic figure boomed. A poster boy for modern America. Black, dreads that hung till his neck, tall.

“Oh al-”

A blip from the screen.

TempleAttack: ‘most boring one yet’

Then another one.

ddkk1129: ‘googogogo’

Then another.

XmissmX: easy single girls c: limited of-

Fuck

It started.

The chat whizzed by with continous blips, screaming its lungs out while it falls from the sky without a parachute. My heart found itself lodged in my throat as it tried to race with the emojis, memes, and capital letters with exclamation marks that all melted with each other.

And the number of people viewing was still rising.

How the fuck am I supposed to reply to all this? You’d think the producers would think this show through.

“Sir?” The figure behind me presented me with a bottle of pills

“Uhh... what’s this?”

“Adderall. Sir.” He seemed blind as he looked towards the window, his eyes hiding behind those shades.

“I uhh... I’m good, I think.”

He replied with a curt nod and left the labeless bottle on the table with a mechanic motion.

“Err... thank you.” Fuck if I’m taking that shit. Read from forums they put nanobots in those pills so they control you if you leave this place.

Well alright... sitting around doesn’t do anything

The stack of papers grew teeth and grinned, and casted this heavy shadow over me. The light around the contours of it started to die off, giving off this heat that made the back of my neck collect sweat.

Jesus.

Bailey. Start at the to-

The blips of the chathad no more space in between them until it turned to a sharp cutting ring. Like someone just died or I was covered in rubble as a car bomb went off.

“Fucking hell, can we turn off the notifications. Can’t even see what the fuck they’re writing here.”

“The hit reality tv show POTU-”

“I know what the fuck this show is about man. You don’t need to tell me again.”

Silence

“The hit reality tv show POTUS is design-”

“For fuck’s sake. Forget I ask. I got it. Holy shit.” A bass pedal in a post-neo punk concert started to beat on either sides of my temple, vibrating my innards and shaking my bones.

Wasn’t even supposed to be here.

“You actually think you can do something?” She blew the vape smoke towards my face, wafting away the smoke tendrils to somewhere. A pink and purple neon filter laid over that portrait and buzzed with my heart.

“I mean, how hard could it be?” I choked at the smoke and laughed with a nervous smile. We hid underneath a tarp as the rain gave off a shiny sheen on everything it touched. Lavender came through against the sea of chemical and rain.

I was on acid. And in love.

″-he mic. Communicate freely with your fellow patriotic Americans. POTUS brings democracy, free speech and fun all together! And remember, can’t spell freedom without democracy!”

“What in the fuck.” Managed to escape under my breath. Don’t think that’s right.

“The mic. Sir.” His finger pointed at it.

Right, the headset laid there right next to the keyboard. But my hand was interrupted by a kaching that came from the speakers.

GunComplex donated $5000 dollars: Can our medical insurance cover our kids when they get their trans operation? Also what’s up with the gender fluid restrooms down by the McDonald’s in Seattle? They still haven’t put up a sign for us yet. #POTUS #self-love #selfcare

A deep sigh echoed through my head.

Another kaching

SmashingKids2032 donated $5000 dollars: TAKE DOWN PAPA JOHN’S FOR CULTURAL APPROPIATION OF ITALIAN CULTURE #civilrights #pizza #italy #POTUS

Oh my fuck-

kaching

TheRockDidNothingWrong donated $5000 dollars: SO FUCKKKKKING SLOOOWW. IT’S BEEN 5 MINUTES. DO SOMETTTHINIGNIGNIGNGI #WORSTEPISODE #POTUS

...

Guess this is how they keep the lights on.

I slumped back on the chair. Only been five minutes and my eyelids are already heavy. The fluorescent light that hung from the ceiling buzzed with the deafening ring and kaching of the chat.

I stood and stretched my limbs, forcing the chair to creak in the same tired tone that echoed throughout the oval office, and walked towards the view. The glass windows were cold to the touch, and the night sky wasn’t a ghost town anymore. It was an oil painting where a whirpool of glistening stars dazzled against a backdrop of purple and pink cosmic spacedust that reminded me of her. They spiraled into each other, and the ebb and flow formed her eyes. She was a genie out of a bottle or poetry untethered by paper, not bounded by a physical context. The cold expanse tempted you to jump into its maw. And after a while, I was staring down an oil black abyss and my feet were playing with a cliff.

It watched over the founding fathers. Their faces carved into the stone.

Of course it’s not real

Saliva pooled at the back of my throat, and a heavy piece of lead squirmed through me. My breath fogged up the windo- .... the screen.

The night sky was just a glorified popcorn ceiling. And tears blurred the view.

I wiped it away with my hand. “Hey... what’s your name?” Those faces on the cliffs were dead. Just fading pieces of Americana we’re trying to save. A dead sea passing through stigmatic hands; only residents in the water were stranded whales.

“Ulysses. Sir.” .

“Uh... hm... alright how much time’s left Ulysses?”

“35 hours and 49 minutes left. Sir.” He still stood on the same spot. Unmoving.

A groan massaged the insides of my head “Alright... what’s with the name actually?”

“Ulysses was an influential figure during the American civi-”

“Okay... there umm... a shorter version?” My hands instinctively waved through five minute ads

“Name of a man that united two nations under one flag. Sir.”

“Poetic.” His poster boy face for America reminded me of the ones on that cliff.

Only thing that separated him from those dead faces was the mouth that moved.

I walked back towards the table and found myself comfortable in the chair. Nothing changed. Trillions of letters and symbols put together culminating into digital trash. 1.2 billion people were watching me through that single webcam. All of those empty eyes that were trapped in that black lens stared at me with cold apathy.

“You’re not real right?” I looked up towards Ulysses as I fit the headset snugly around my ears.

“No. X Ash A-12 made me. Sir.”

“Huh. Thanks. Never figured out how to say his name. Looks more like a plate number, really.”

Those dreads of his swayed as he replied with another quick nod. Don’t know which one he nodded to. Maybe both.

“They can hear me through this right?”

Another nod.

“Can you give me a glass of water actually?”

Ulysses took his hands behind his back and presented me with a bottle of clear water.

“Nice trick. Thanks.”

The cold pure water smoothed the insides of my throat, a welcome friend.

Breathe

In. Out.

In the nose. Out the mouth.

Alright...

I closed my eyes. And there was only a figure of you.

Wonder if you’re laughing up there, Kima

I cleared my throat.

“Dear men and women of America. Left and right. Mothers and fathers. Sons and daughters. Why are we so alone here? Why do we waste away, all tangled up in hate. Bogged down and divided by opinions that weigh nothing more than air. Right or wrong, the weight of these words are no more and no less than those that are used to speak of murder and great acts of courage. Because, as we all know, one of us can be right and wrong both.” The black lens still stared with ambivalence. But the chat stopped screaming.

“We’ve lossed our way. But there’s beauty in this place we find ourselves in even though we don’t often see or feel it. All we need’s a little less weight. A little less hate. A little less anger. Little more joy. A little more hope. A little more light. Little more freedom.” I shifted in my seat and my hands steadied.

“We’re an army, you understand that, right? You have to believe that. All of you, in your vr headsets; you in your commute back home, you who just started your nightly shift, you who carry the weight of school debts, you who’s going to drop out of school because you want to be happy. We’re all just scared lost little kids that wear grown up clothes and talk with grown up words and move with grown up walks. And so we float all alone in each second, where the days are long and the nights are cold.” The chat pulled the parachute cord.

“We were taught not to believe. Taught not to say certain words. Taught to be angry. Taught to be offended at every single thing. Taught to hate. We never learned how to love. Never learned how to hug! Never learned how to dance or how to care! Never learned words that can split the sea or move hearts!” Easy. Breath Bailey.

“We were just waiting. Just biding our time till someone said it. But no one ever said them. No one ever cared because we waited for someone else to do it for us. I know, because I am one of them. And I am as much a stranger to courage than any of you.” Through the nose, out the mouth.

“Lovers and friends. Hope still lingers. I know this because no matter how different the paths we chose to walk are, we’re the same - same flesh, same blood. I have it too. Hope lingers somewhere buried beneath all our hate, all our disappointment and all our failed expecations. It lingers with the innocence. And I know... I know it’s so fragile and it shakes under the wind that blows these days. But it’s still there. The twigs and the kindling’s still there. Just need someone to light it up. Either from someone next to you or yourself. And I assure you it’s waiting for glorious fires.” The beat of my heart calms.

“I know life has a funny way of breaking us down. Spits down your throat and tells you to stop struggling and fighting. It openly shouts in your face that you will lose, that you won’t get what you want, and that you’re an idiot for even trying.” A shooting star winks as I gazed at the view.

“But with a wink and a smile, with warm open arms and a mother’s touch. It encourages you to be that idiot. So go write those words for poems that’ll go unread, go leave school and work on something you’re passionate of, go make candles to pay the bills even if you think you’re delusional, and then we can all hold our hands and be mad together.”

Oh Kima, what a beautiful and ridiculous plan.

“We will find our way.”

Too big for our own good. Too proud. But mayb-

The chat roared murder. Parachute chord cut off.