The intervening hours since her arrival had been tense with the lack of development. Each minute felt like an hour of pregnant silence and as each hour passes without event, doubt wells in me that I have made some error like a calling to the grave. She continued to speak to me, and I to her, but things failed to change, and as noted before, very little was actually said.
Desperate to force some action, I began to make excursion with premeditation and without prediction. At first I left for fractions of an hour, then hours at a time, whispering pleadings into the chill wind that one of these absences would push her to some revelation. The thin, crisp air and muted smells of late autumn became the constant accompaniment to my disappointment on that front.
She had taken to either sitting directly next to me, the warmth of her presence noticeable in the stillness of those walls, or standing in the furthest corner from me. When pressed, she would lock eyes, but they seemed to grace my own with unnatural infrequency. I wondered if perhaps I could be imagining it, but I got the constant paranoid feeling that we were engaged in some clandestine battle, cat-and-mouse, the roles unclearly defined and the rules completely unwritten and both players utterly unsure if they wanted to be involved in the game at all.
Despite all of this, she slept in my bed. We did not touch, the occasional graze of accidental movements left me with a chill in my bones. Under linen shrouds I slept unrestfully, awaking for long periods in the night to stare unwaveringly at a spot on the wall. I would sense a ceasing in the constant, patient pace of her breathing and would eventually convince myself to reach out to her. Then her flank would rise, a gentle suggestion on the silhouette in the darkness. My fingers come to rest again against the sheets and heavy lids close out the world.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Paranoia
The movies have not been kind to me.
I'm stuck here in this place. It's not a city and it's not a suburb, it's ten years before its peak or ten years after it, the industrial outskirts of a transient people. Somehow this place keeps on existing, but the every block feels like ruins. Cars never move, lights seem dim and faces seem to dissolve before I can see them. The sky is gray and where it meets the asphalt is the faintest, jagged edge of a horizon line in the brief gaps between smokestacks where we can see it. Torrential rain has fallen for weeks in skirmishes and if I believed in a higher power I'd pray for them to mix some soap up in the rain, in the desperate hope that it might dissolve the decades of dinge and dirt built up impossibly on every surface. I am stuck with the realization that I'm the only person here, and the previous owners lost pride in her a long time ago.
Right, the movies. I wasn't in them, but boooy, are they in me.
They've taught me something, and I'm not sure I'm all that pleased to have learned it. The thing about knowing is you can't un-know, and irrevocabilities pretty dangerous I guess. It starts with the basics, and all these crime shows, ya know? The essential fact that no matter how hard you try, we're reactionary, if someone wants to hurt us, they can... and we only have control over how we handle it, if we can. So you start looking over your shoulder, just to be safe.
And that's good, ya know? But you're not the only victim, there's everyone else. Maybe I'm the only one who thinks this way... that might be a good thing. Someone leaves, and if they don't come back soon enough I start wondering if they got jumped in the hall, if they've been dragged somewhere, or worse. I pull at the thread like lightning, rapidly unravelling the whole thing, ya know? Trying to figure out who, why, what, and nothing's happened.
I push food around on my plate because I've been a little sick for a real long time and I can't really taste anymore. My tongue's been burnt a few too many times.
It's the big twist in the movies. The best friend, the lover, the business partner is working for the other side. You're exposed. Vulnerable. And here's where they've been so horribly, tragically abusive to me. They've broken it.
How's it supposed to work when every time you open your mouth, you double check your sentence to make sure they don't know too much? When you're watching them for any sign of a secret, in casual conversation? How can you be close when everyone's gotta be evaluated like an enemy?
I haven't been burnt that many times. Almost wish I had, it'd make it all make sense. Someone broke me, but I know that's not the case: It's always been broken, by the nature of it, and I'm the only one I've met who really knows it. All love is trust, ya know? Romantic or friendship or affection for your kid, or your dog... hell, school frickin' pride. It's all love, and it's all trust. You think you're safe with those people and in those places.
Love isn't a word that has a damn to do with affection. It's about how much you're gonna let yourself be vulnerable to another human being, how much of yourself you're gonna expose and the whole thing gives me the heebiejeebies. The movies... I've watched the main guy lose everything so many times I've learned that you ain't got nothin' but yourself. So how all these people do it I don't know, except that they're probably on a slow train to getting fucked over. I try not to make eye contact with 'em because I can't bear knowing that they're gonna walk into it blind.
I close the curtains and kiss her on the forehead. She's asleep. My little girl, her little green eyes are the only thing with any color in a world that's gone gray. I feel like I'm naked in the cold and the rain, I can feel the eyes all over me, evaluating, aiming.
I swallow hard, and my shaking hand brings a cup of cold coffee to my lips. It slides down my throat without me noticing, and I sit there for god knows how long, eyes stuck open.
The movies have not been kind to me.
I'm stuck here in this place. It's not a city and it's not a suburb, it's ten years before its peak or ten years after it, the industrial outskirts of a transient people. Somehow this place keeps on existing, but the every block feels like ruins. Cars never move, lights seem dim and faces seem to dissolve before I can see them. The sky is gray and where it meets the asphalt is the faintest, jagged edge of a horizon line in the brief gaps between smokestacks where we can see it. Torrential rain has fallen for weeks in skirmishes and if I believed in a higher power I'd pray for them to mix some soap up in the rain, in the desperate hope that it might dissolve the decades of dinge and dirt built up impossibly on every surface. I am stuck with the realization that I'm the only person here, and the previous owners lost pride in her a long time ago.
Right, the movies. I wasn't in them, but boooy, are they in me.
They've taught me something, and I'm not sure I'm all that pleased to have learned it. The thing about knowing is you can't un-know, and irrevocabilities pretty dangerous I guess. It starts with the basics, and all these crime shows, ya know? The essential fact that no matter how hard you try, we're reactionary, if someone wants to hurt us, they can... and we only have control over how we handle it, if we can. So you start looking over your shoulder, just to be safe.
And that's good, ya know? But you're not the only victim, there's everyone else. Maybe I'm the only one who thinks this way... that might be a good thing. Someone leaves, and if they don't come back soon enough I start wondering if they got jumped in the hall, if they've been dragged somewhere, or worse. I pull at the thread like lightning, rapidly unravelling the whole thing, ya know? Trying to figure out who, why, what, and nothing's happened.
I push food around on my plate because I've been a little sick for a real long time and I can't really taste anymore. My tongue's been burnt a few too many times.
It's the big twist in the movies. The best friend, the lover, the business partner is working for the other side. You're exposed. Vulnerable. And here's where they've been so horribly, tragically abusive to me. They've broken it.
How's it supposed to work when every time you open your mouth, you double check your sentence to make sure they don't know too much? When you're watching them for any sign of a secret, in casual conversation? How can you be close when everyone's gotta be evaluated like an enemy?
I haven't been burnt that many times. Almost wish I had, it'd make it all make sense. Someone broke me, but I know that's not the case: It's always been broken, by the nature of it, and I'm the only one I've met who really knows it. All love is trust, ya know? Romantic or friendship or affection for your kid, or your dog... hell, school frickin' pride. It's all love, and it's all trust. You think you're safe with those people and in those places.
Love isn't a word that has a damn to do with affection. It's about how much you're gonna let yourself be vulnerable to another human being, how much of yourself you're gonna expose and the whole thing gives me the heebiejeebies. The movies... I've watched the main guy lose everything so many times I've learned that you ain't got nothin' but yourself. So how all these people do it I don't know, except that they're probably on a slow train to getting fucked over. I try not to make eye contact with 'em because I can't bear knowing that they're gonna walk into it blind.
I close the curtains and kiss her on the forehead. She's asleep. My little girl, her little green eyes are the only thing with any color in a world that's gone gray. I feel like I'm naked in the cold and the rain, I can feel the eyes all over me, evaluating, aiming.
I swallow hard, and my shaking hand brings a cup of cold coffee to my lips. It slides down my throat without me noticing, and I sit there for god knows how long, eyes stuck open.
The movies have not been kind to me.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Day One
A luke-warm cup of coffee sat on the end table. The couch, the fireplace, the hoodies and blankets were failed and cluttering sanctuaries from the chill wind that moved dead leaves over the asphalt outside. Far away the sounds of cars have dwindled into an inaudible hum, leaving the air silent except for the scratch of those brittle leaves.
I heard her coming as her feet crushed a few leaves, but the occasional destruction of an autumn leaf is no great occurrence. No, it was the ringing of the door bell that shattered the silence. I approached the door empty-handed, and opened the door. I swung it open in a single motion but only had it open a sliver before I had seen enough to know it was her. She stood a few feet back from the door, off to either side, like she was waiting for someone more significant to walk up the steps behind her. We looked at each other with evasive eyes.
"Come in." My mouth worked without any permission from the rest of me.
"I'll make coffee." I turned around and walked toward the kitchen without bothering to see if she came in or not. She stepped through the rooms like she stilled believed that the floor was lava; touching things as little as possible, stacking her things on a chair so that they'll occupy as little space as possible.
She leaned in a corner of the tiny kitchen opposite me while I mixed the coffee. The cramped space forces her closer to me than we've been in months and it's unclear if the sparks, the heat, would warm hearts or burn down the world. I walk past her into the dining room, set coffee cups on opposite sides of the table, and we sit down.
For far too long no words are exchanged. We sip coffee, sweetness with a bitter aftertaste.
I tentatively extend my hand across the table. I can't take hers in mine, but my finger touches hers, and its as cold as I remember. Wind rushes down the alley behind her and we finally begin to speak. Words are exchanged until the sun has disappeared, but nothing is said, and we leave the cups empty.
I heard her coming as her feet crushed a few leaves, but the occasional destruction of an autumn leaf is no great occurrence. No, it was the ringing of the door bell that shattered the silence. I approached the door empty-handed, and opened the door. I swung it open in a single motion but only had it open a sliver before I had seen enough to know it was her. She stood a few feet back from the door, off to either side, like she was waiting for someone more significant to walk up the steps behind her. We looked at each other with evasive eyes.
"Come in." My mouth worked without any permission from the rest of me.
"I'll make coffee." I turned around and walked toward the kitchen without bothering to see if she came in or not. She stepped through the rooms like she stilled believed that the floor was lava; touching things as little as possible, stacking her things on a chair so that they'll occupy as little space as possible.
She leaned in a corner of the tiny kitchen opposite me while I mixed the coffee. The cramped space forces her closer to me than we've been in months and it's unclear if the sparks, the heat, would warm hearts or burn down the world. I walk past her into the dining room, set coffee cups on opposite sides of the table, and we sit down.
For far too long no words are exchanged. We sip coffee, sweetness with a bitter aftertaste.
I tentatively extend my hand across the table. I can't take hers in mine, but my finger touches hers, and its as cold as I remember. Wind rushes down the alley behind her and we finally begin to speak. Words are exchanged until the sun has disappeared, but nothing is said, and we leave the cups empty.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Curbside
Rapid press staccato on a keypad and the door clicks shut behind him, back turned to a dust free gallery of meticulous lighting and impossibly vibrant color coordination, face turned into a waning sun. Differences in pressure, temperature and temperament forces a gentle sigh from his lunges and he picks his feet up again.
They glide with soft, determined footfalls over pavement and past people. Pulling on sunglasses, he continues a destined path in the opposite direction of the early evening crowds towards the center of town. It is a place in transition, the late afternoon shift ending and the early evening beginning, and the night of the week that people without some greater purpose seem to gravitate to this place invariably. The air is already ripe with the smells of fried foods, the kinds that bear no value to the body, but some great and unquantifiable gift to the spirit; chewy, sauce-drowned, crisped, and satisfying in a purely visceral way. The sorts of smells that erode discipline and drag people into the gutter.
As he enters the few most central blocks, this smells is mixed with the smell of tobacco, the smoke itself thickening he air and making all the sweet, mouth-watering flavors in the air smell like they've just been burnt. The air vibrates with the thrum of cars and piped-in music, bar stool conversations mingling together into an indistinguishable riff of innuendo. The words themselves didn't matter, the same conversations were taking place inside every bar and every restaurant, the quibbling details were all that changed.
They come into view as he continues his march, spine erect and body quivering with preparation. Behind darkened glass, he can see it all. People convincing each other that they like each other's company over forced laughter; young, mis-matched couples struggling through different stages of the same relationship crescendo; too-youngs struggling to find out what besides times makes you older and the one's who've grown too old and know the answer. The words they pass back and forth across the table sound clever in their uniqueness, but listen to all of them and the banality hits like a tidal wave. The clothing could all be compressed into half a catalogue of thin, glossy photos.
A red light halts a man who moves with the inexorability of a force of nature. Still for but a moment, all of it rushes in on him and shouts demands for reaction. He's not even angry, he's just sad, desperately searching their eyes for something special or unique. The light turns green before he finds it and he walks across the intersection. At the end of block is an old Rastafarian, far from home and utterly sublime in the plucking of his bass. Next to him sits a young, white hipster providing an accompaniment on harmonica. Slumped in relaxation next to one another they strain to be the same despite their differences.
Something. Curiosity. Possibility. In the purple haze around them, parts of each other are being exchanged. If they sit their long enough, will they become something else or will they simply switch places without standing up? He walks past them and the sweet, citrus smell of the smoke his him like a wall. He continues past, and the curb extends onto a bridge as every light before him turns green.
Behind him, the city melts.
They glide with soft, determined footfalls over pavement and past people. Pulling on sunglasses, he continues a destined path in the opposite direction of the early evening crowds towards the center of town. It is a place in transition, the late afternoon shift ending and the early evening beginning, and the night of the week that people without some greater purpose seem to gravitate to this place invariably. The air is already ripe with the smells of fried foods, the kinds that bear no value to the body, but some great and unquantifiable gift to the spirit; chewy, sauce-drowned, crisped, and satisfying in a purely visceral way. The sorts of smells that erode discipline and drag people into the gutter.
As he enters the few most central blocks, this smells is mixed with the smell of tobacco, the smoke itself thickening he air and making all the sweet, mouth-watering flavors in the air smell like they've just been burnt. The air vibrates with the thrum of cars and piped-in music, bar stool conversations mingling together into an indistinguishable riff of innuendo. The words themselves didn't matter, the same conversations were taking place inside every bar and every restaurant, the quibbling details were all that changed.
They come into view as he continues his march, spine erect and body quivering with preparation. Behind darkened glass, he can see it all. People convincing each other that they like each other's company over forced laughter; young, mis-matched couples struggling through different stages of the same relationship crescendo; too-youngs struggling to find out what besides times makes you older and the one's who've grown too old and know the answer. The words they pass back and forth across the table sound clever in their uniqueness, but listen to all of them and the banality hits like a tidal wave. The clothing could all be compressed into half a catalogue of thin, glossy photos.
A red light halts a man who moves with the inexorability of a force of nature. Still for but a moment, all of it rushes in on him and shouts demands for reaction. He's not even angry, he's just sad, desperately searching their eyes for something special or unique. The light turns green before he finds it and he walks across the intersection. At the end of block is an old Rastafarian, far from home and utterly sublime in the plucking of his bass. Next to him sits a young, white hipster providing an accompaniment on harmonica. Slumped in relaxation next to one another they strain to be the same despite their differences.
Something. Curiosity. Possibility. In the purple haze around them, parts of each other are being exchanged. If they sit their long enough, will they become something else or will they simply switch places without standing up? He walks past them and the sweet, citrus smell of the smoke his him like a wall. He continues past, and the curb extends onto a bridge as every light before him turns green.
Behind him, the city melts.
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