Atomic Conjecture
By James JAJAC
Sandy sidewalks, and upturned streets, cracks that walk like kangaroos across the desert and a pair of sneakers that wont-stop-fucking-screaming. You don’t have to wake up, you don’t have to slice bread, or put the cookies back in the box, you don’t have to live like you learned it out of a dictionary you can just spin the wheel and laugh when all the windows break, it’s stupid isn’t it? It’s always stupid but it's the people who enjoy it that seem like the ones to watch. I don’t know, sometimes its hard to say, like this one time I had met a friend by the wall near the field at the end of the street and she was sitting there throwing bottle caps at kittens and it’s not like I feel there should be a line drawn but I thought that was silly and we got into an argument that eventually turned into a performance and she was all too happy at the heads in the windows but I told her that if god was a planet he would no doubt crash down upon her head and if god was a hammer and she was a nail, but then I got impatient and just left her there, I don’t like when people act like they don’t know what they are doing and it seemed all far to deliberate and that she was INDEEDY DOO thinking about everything before hand and then acting it out like a play that she is reading in her mind. I always think that if you’re thinking about what you’re saying – it isn’t real, but that is beside the point.
So its not like I’m starting over because I just changed directions and chose to walk through the mud even though it went on for miles but I thought it would be more of an adventure that way and it would be more memorable, and maybe it was because I was bored and frustrated and lost and angry and just stupid- tired but it really seemed worthwhile at the time and I don’t think I’ll ever let common sense stop me from doing something that seems like a victory at first glance.
Card board castles and ten gumdrop chandeliers, a record shop that smelled like stale wine and the beards of old men, there was a flap of leather on my grandfathers car and he threw it over his shoulder with out a thought, it caught in the wind and flapped back right on top of his wispy bald head and you know he didn’t even notice for almost an hour it was fucking hysterical, and then he turned on the windshield wipers even though it wasn’t raining and they squealed and scarped against the dry glass and he kept saying that kids don’t understand any more, not like he did, not like they did when he was kid and it was all because of how simple it was back then he said, everything used to be so simple. I wanted to believe that they were and that everything could really be stripped back to some form of purity but the way I process the world I simply could not believe it and I imagine him delusional, truly believing that the world actually was simpler at one point and that everything truly did make sense one day so long ago. I wanted to ask him if there was a day a specific moment when the world drew to a complete stop and took a shit on it self and stopped functioning according to the rules. I wanted to ask him a lot of things in retrospect, you know? Do you ever look at some one you’ve known your whole life and realize that aside from what you’ve witnessed you actually know nothing about them? I remember the Christmas where he set the family albums on fire with a cigar when he dozed off reading them, I remember when my cousins baby shit on his neck, I remember when he laughed so hard at the Benny hill show he looked like he would literally die, I remember his bad mood that started the year after grandma died but I know nothing else about the guy. Did he have sex in high school? Was that possible back then? I sure didn’t and I live in the quote-un-quote future, and even still I couldn’t imagine it. A fifteen year old boy has no right to intercourse and ejaculation with the opposite sex, I can’t picture; it’s just obscene. Did he fight with his parents? Did he ever look at his grandfather and think about how this old man has no idea what life is, that he has no idea what is real and that his point of view was hopelessly outdated and ob-so-fucking-lete. I want to think until I figure out how to lift myself out of the car and float into space and fucking explode. I want to open this door and drag my face upon the wet asphalt until there is nothing left but a skull. I long for digressions I long for comfort I dream of disappearing one day and never coming back, but the car stopped, we were there. Grandpa always buys me French toast on my birthday, happy birthday to me.
At the counter when he pays, he always gives the girl a twenty and walks away leaving me to collect the change. Even my surly cynical bad attitude can be melted by a gesture like that. That’s fucking class old man and I love you for it. It means so much to me it scares me, I don’t know what I would do with out him. My father may be a disappointment but this guy always seems to come through, maybe it’s because I like his attitude he seems angrier than every one else, like he can see all those invisible things that the normal folk cant. It’s what I’m talking about, how do I break through and figure out who this guy really is? Maybe I cant, maybe it’s a pipe dream maybe it’s a hopeless useless dream, and maybe I’m just too scared to ask because I don’t want to be disappointed. Maybe I’m standing here thinking while he is waiting for me in the car.
It was prbly a week later. I was alone. I had been spending a lot of time alone, not sure why, but I couldn’t handle other people that week, or month; the better part of a year really. Frustration, crustation, mustachion, UGH, my mind rambles and wanders like a lost duck in a submarine. I was in a field near the house I grew up and I saw the girl I had a crush on since kindergarten, and she looked beautiful. I remember the first day I saw her, sitting there by the window, engrossed in that days readings, the teacher (Mrs. Coogle) was reading aloud and I was dreaming, not paying attention, my head in the clouds, unfocused and my eyes fell upon her, and I couldn’t stop looking and she saw me and I got scared but she smiled at me and I smiled at her as I felt my face rush to red.
She looked a little beautiful and I felt that same rush of WHAT, of shame, of attraction? Maybe 15 years later and I still cant get close to her I feel this, this, this… she wore red jeans, she had let her hair grown out and it hung down all around her in a windswept blur, framing her face like autumn leaves. Her freckles had faded and as we got closer to each other I felt the tremors but I stepped around them, and let them swing past. I said hello, and she looked up like she hadn’t seen me and startled. Oh, OH! It’s you? Where you’ve been? No one has seen you in a while. I told her I was sick, and that I was listening to a lot of music (literally an out right lie), she said she was meeting some one and asked me if I’d like to come along. It was a shock and it was also too good to be true but all the same I turned around and walked along with her. It might have been the first official conversation we ever had. It wasn’t really about much, unfortunately it focused predominantly on grade school and the classes and teachers we had and people we knew and how everything had changed, on that whole school of thought. I listened so carefully to every word she was saying to me, like I was going to have to do a report on it, or as if I were going to transcribe it onto tablets when I was finally alone, but despite this I noticed something interesting as we walked, I noticed ever one else. I noticed how every one stopped to look at her, (I wondered did she grow her hair to hide?) I could see so fucking clearly how she radiated on the street but not only that I could fucking FEEL it, it was like walking with an inferno, and it scared me because It put me on the radar, it made people notice me, it made me visible, when I usually felt like an invisible ghost hiding in the darkness, their attention would be projected upon her but would quickly divert and linger upon myself and I didn’t know how to handle it; I felt like I was breaking the law. How do girls handle it? How can some one be beautiful? It must be like never being allowed to be alone, everyone always wants to get close to you, and they all want a piece of your perfect harmony. It made me sad and I looked at her with new eyes, softer more compassionate, does it mean anything? Does she even notice? In me? In every one else? Can she even see how much the world leans to her? I wanted to run away.
There was a question. Do I remember? 5th grade when Ms. Mitchell chased me across the room? I laughed! Do I remember? Do I remember being cornered and screamed at in a classroom full of kids because I spilled our big burly bully of a teacher’s coffee? Oh my god. One of the worst moments of my life, I told her I felt like I was gonna cry and she laughed so hard. She said she felt so sorry for me that day and I smiled like a little baby cradled in its mothers arms. She had had a thought about me! She had an actual feeling about MEEE! Our eyes locked in that moment and the joy submerged in my chest burst forth and I laughed like I was ashamed because I suddenly felt so stupid- happy it hurt. She Laughed too like we had just shared a joke but there really was nothing, it just sorta happened inexplicably and I watched our shadows on the road and tried to lose myself in the reality of the situation. She was absolutely beautiful and for ever how many moments it would be, she was with me and no one else at all.
Taking a short cut through the alley way she found the person she was meeting. It was big ugly Alan. The fat crazy drunken brute, fat ugly crazy stupid horse headed, monkey grizzle giraffe footed, pumpkin necked incinerator vomit toothed pig skull piss pearl oyster cunt headed scum nut Alan.
She ran to him, to his side and said quickly “Thanks for keeping me company!! BYE!!” and OFF-THEY-WENT. Keeping her company? Oh so that’s what I was doing. Oh well. So what if it was. God did I want to hit that kid with a brick. SO BAD. Soooooooooooo bad. It’s a new feeling. I’ve always hated him but I didn’t always want to kill him, like I did, like I really, really did right now. Kill him specifically with a brick.
Briefly there was a head ache, a head ache of disappointment and subtraction, like half the earth suddenly disappeared, or like nothing at all maybe. I bought a bar of chocolate and I went back to where I had met her trying to get back to where I was to regain the train of thought I had been on. Something about how life is blah, blah, blah, I couldn’t find it though. It had been wiped out of my mind. She had lifted me up to new heights and I didn’t think Id be able to put myself back down there. There was now an abyss where I once stood and I realized that there was no turning back. Silly but true. I stared into the stupid blue sky and I wished it would bend and twist into something else; I’m tired of everything being the same. I wanted everything to suddenly spiral and rearrange itself into a new breed of thing, I wanted the entire world to be eradicated and start over, from this exact point, from this exact second in time. 2:45pm Saturday after noon, it looked like it would rain it looked like it would rain.
I went home and sat in my room for five minutes, and I couldn’t do it, I didn’t want to be alone any more I called Ryan, not home. I called Eric, not home. I called Ian, he moved out or something his mom started talking and talking bad talking, what ever, no ones fucking home. As the night wore on so did my patience, I had this dying urge to do something I had never done before but all the roads in my mind lead to nothing. Where is all the mystery when you need it? Where is all the hopeless rage when you need some goddamn motivation? Where the fuck IS every body?
I walked. Down the winding sidewalks of Windbar Street, around the courtyard of Metrovilles BLAND apartment complex, I kicked the chains that linked across the grass, I walked until I hit the end of the bridge at Complex Divide near Luxton and I stood there for a minute counting cigarette butts on the sidewalk next to the curb. My hair was wet, I was sweating. Maybe I should go to the mall?
7:37pm. there were 34 cigarette butts. It was unacceptable, that I bothered.
The mall was occupied and crowded and I only saw one or two familiar faces, initially. Then they all seemed to appear one by one as if by sheer will. At first I felt apprehensive but then I didn’t care and I walked over to George who was standing by the pay phones. He had a purple shirt on.
Hey George.
What up?
Bored out of my head.
You too? This place sucks. You wanna come out to Ellen’s tonight? Her parents are out.
I didn’t even think about it. I said yes.
What time?
9 or something.
Ok sure. I'm gonna get something to eat.
He nodded preoccupied with a ringing phone and I headed upstairs to the food court. The food court always felt like a wave, like the complete embodiment of everything I avoid in life. A consuming collective of everything that was wrong and everything I despise. I always feel on the outside, I always feel locked out. I searched the crowd for familiar faces but only saw a few heads that seemed worth talking to.
I bought a soda and sat down. There were so many girls there today. So this is where they hide during the day. I could say “what’s the use in staying here all day” but I guess most people enjoy being around people and not every one can’t stand being around others, it’s an institution of like minded individuals. But for me, it is like a mental claustrophobia, I don’t have enough room for them in there, like a giant wave passing over me, it feels like doom, complete and total doom.
Empty chairs all around me, gum on the ground and under the tables and the loud chattering of voices blurring together, ceiling fans spinning and twisting in the sky, while tiles on the walls, like a ceramic prison, the room seemed to sway as the light flickered and I tried to step outside of it all, step out side of my mind and take it all in at once, the people on line, the dropped soda cups beside the garbage pails the crowd at the stairway, the hiss of the cooking foods, I wanted everything to be a single thing, to become an object, like an orb and to hold it in my hand and watch it and take it all in at once, I could pick and choose, I could turn it on and off at my command I could control how I respond to every little thing, I tried to control my mind and tie it all down, a storm was coming and I was right in the middle of it, I wanted control, maybe too much. Maybe that’s been the problem all along? I can’t get what I want so I avoid it, afraid to be misunderstood? To stand out? I can never seem to figure this stuff out. I’m not alone just because I think I am, maybe nothing is wrong after all? The soda bottle fell on the ground, and I left it there.
George and a couple of girls and I took a short cut trough some trees at the edge of the parking lot. There was a flash of lightning from above and one of the girls screamed and seemed genuinely terrified. It was actually kind of funny how scared she was, but not because I wasn’t scared but because it all seemed kind of cartoonish. Ellen’s house wasn’t far I reminded her and the thunder crashed all around us. I assumed George knew where he was going. It was dark and windy and the air was heavy and damp, any minute now it seemed, any minute.
We came out behind some ones garage and there were a few barking dogs behind the fences near by. They were loud and furious and they scared me a lot more than the lightning. Lightning was like a fairy tale, monster dogs biting your throat out, that seemed like a much more credible threat. It was dark but we could make out the house ahead, it was raised up on a hill side like a castle, the girls were talking about a movie they had seen and how stupid it was, George was alluding to me that he had brought some extra “stuff” along with him but I didn’t care so much, I was just glad I wasn’t alone. To be honest.
There were about 23 kids there, if I were to guess, maybe more, the music was hideous but I didn’t care at all, it blended into the walls and kept the room alive, it was like life support. The kitchen floor was all wet and some one had thrown down some newspaper to soak it up. There was black ink rubbed all over the tiles and it trailed out onto the red carpet in the living room. I slipped a little, but caught myself on the counter and I waited for some girl (Elaine?) to finish filling her cup up ahead of me at the keg. She looked up at me and said “OH HI” and I smiled kinda of afraid if her, we never talk, I held my cup beneath the spout and pressed down.
“So what have you been up to?”
I thought about it, It had prbly been 2 years since I last saw her, I tried to estimate the last things I could have talked to her about, and I remembered. The last time I remembered speaking to her she had asked me the exact same thing “so what have you been up to?” and I remember having the exact same reaction, no clue as to what to say or where to start and I thought that maybe I took the question too seriously because no one really wants to know what you’ve been doing and they are just being polite and trying to get away from you.
I’ve been kind of sick and listening to music I said.
Oh cool! That’s great!
Then she walked away and I lifted my full cup of beer and took a sip. It is at times like this that I think humanity has no hope. I don't even know why. Being trapped in these needlessly awkward moments and standing in a room full of people who have no idea what to do with each other, and every one deep down feels like they are going to explode and they just want to scream and to go crazy and to dull the “Pain”. Can you really call it pain? What a joke. The singular suburban seclusion I bet no one in this room has even read a book.
Oh, it hit me again; the notion that I’m lost in my own mind and I can’t escape it.
I drank my beer fast and filled it again. I could never figure it out. Where the world ended and I began?
Who am I and where do I belong. Please understand that I, not really asking myself that question specifically as if there was an answer that would be ridiculous. I’m asking myself the question with an implied sarcasm that kicks me and every one else in the head. What does it all mean? What is really on every ones minds? I bet their lonely, I bet we all are.
FUCK.
I drank my bear fast and filled it again.
Am I mocking them? Yes. Am I mocking me, of course.
I walked into the living room and Ellen was surrounded by boys, she was cute but it looked obscene. I don’t think men realize what they look like. Their eyes look like rocks, like a snow man with charcoal eyes. While Ellen was talking I waved at her and she lit up and waved! That made me happy.
I went from room to room. Next to the living room was the bath room and there was a long line (if it was me I’d pee outside), and beside the bath room there were obviously the bed rooms, three of them, three white doors all closed and I assumed locked. I walked over to one of them and glancing behind me I turned the knob.
The white door creaked open and I stepped inside. It must have been Ellen’s room and I felt like a savage violating some sacred party code, but it honestly felt good to be alone. I felt like I was aloud to think again and It dawned on me with complete sadness that I really did not want to be there, and then It felt like the food court all over again, the wave of suffocation of anxiety and fear and dread, like an ocean., like an ocean pressing against the door, I didn’t want to go out side, I wanted to hide. I sipped at the beer. It was bitter and warm but I hoped it would divide my mind into sections and make life livable, because as it stood, it was a mess. I didn’t want to be alone, but I didn’t want to be here either. What a dilemma.
I pressed my back against the door in the darkness. I couldn't get myself to turn on the light, I felt like a burglar hiding under the cover of black night. How long had it been since I related to any one? Why isn’t there a head I can turn to in this place? Am I really, really so odd? Am I really the monster I feel like? I was wringing the wet sock of my soul, I was hiding in a bed room, something is wrong with me. I opened the door quick and slipped out like a murderer, from out of the slow muffled steady murmur of quiet back into this booming dreadful mess. It can’t be all that bad can it?
I walked from room to room again, not enough familiar faces, that seems to be the problem no where to gravitate no where to-
She was there! It was her. I saw her red jeans from across the room and I swear to god it was instantaneous like the noise dropped and my mind cleared- I felt welcome! I looked all around for that fat pig necked cock frog Alan, why would she be with him? I didn’t see it. I had to talk to her! But I waited, I would wait, I should wait, I shouldn’t rush over. Right? Right. Stay cool and wait it out and …let her notice me, and she’ll talk to me and I can talk to- calm boy. You need to be calm.
I walked along the walls of the house; now that I had a purpose I felt alive and comfortable (or was it the beer kicking in??) And I could smile at people and make chit chat. I looked at a guy drinking beer and said “this shit is nasty” and we bonded briefly over the disgusting piss beer, I kept walking. I stood near the back door and there was a neat little girl in a skirt with blond hair. Wind blew through the screen door and I muttered “looks like it’s about to rain” She looked at me quickly and then back out into darkness, “yeah” she agreed.
Five minutes later, thunder and then rain. It poured down in buckets, the windows were all slammed shut and it gave the party a new life, like it was the end of everything, it gave the room an air of novelty because no we all suddenly had something exactly in common! Hooray for weather. People seemed so relaxed and every one seemed to all be in this together, what changed? Was it me? Shit, hard to tell.
I saw her by the stairs, I know she was looking at me and I almost fell but instead I turned on the lamp and then I turned it off. Oh my god I’m so stupid. I ran my hand across the table and tried to walk out of the room but then from behind me I heard her voice, she called-
My name.
I spun around and there she was, she looked happy and different some how. She seemed like she was bigger than before (Maybe I was shrinking?).
Come with me, I'm getting another beer
A spot of dread struck me. It sounded like before, "thanks for keeping me company” but I went any way.
She filled hers and then I filled mine and when I started to turn back to the living room I saw her stopped at the kitchen door. She had this mischievous look in her eye. She smiled so big suddenly and called me to her with her fingers I walked over feeling surprised. She opened the door and then she ran out side.
What are you doing?
She laughed as the rain came down on to her.
I stepped out too, drinking my watery beer, everything felt electrified, this moment felt real, like I had just been struck by time, the water ran down my face and into my eyes and I was alive, its stupid, but I felt alive for the first time in my life. She was running out there all around on the grass, throwing her hands up and laughing and she looked out at me her eyes so full of life and I felt it all around me I felt…something.
She threw her head back and swung her hair all around and she was soaked! C’mon! She said. C’mon!
And I ran out to her and we ran around Ellen’s back yard, and she grabbed me and pushed me over into the mud and she was dying laughing at me, I pulled her feet and she fell over and she rolled over onto her side and then jumped back up again and started running.
I couldn’t stop laughing.
She pulled off her sweater and threw it at me, and I was frozen. She was in her bra; I was seeing her in her bra.
She kicked off her shoes; they landed on the wet grass and in a flower bed. I tried to keep up with her, her soaked sweater in my hands and down the hill I saw her pulling off her pants, the red fabric was soaked through and she threw them up in the air.
That’s when I slipped real bad and fell hard on my face, I skid down the mound of wet grass and mud and flipped over onto my back. Ugh. Everything was blurry; the rain was coming down into my eyes I tried to find her sweater, when she appeared at my side. She was laughing at me.
Are you ok?
My head hurts.
She picked up some mud and threw it at me; I dodged it quickly and yelled:
Hey!
It was so weird. She started down the hill and I ran after her, I felt concerned...
Where are you going?
Wait for me will you?
I was so soaked, the water was squashing around in my sneakers and my clothes hung down on me like a dead weight.
I caught up with her at the trees, and she was standing and seemed quiet.
Are you okay?
There was some cover there under the branches. She looked so beautiful with her hair running down across her face; she looked so sad and vulnerable suddenly that I took a step back.
Are you sick?
She was distant.
I want to go back inside.
Okay. I have your sweater, but it seemed useless, it was soaked. She was standing in front of me in her underwear, soaked through I felt my eyes turning to stone in an instant and my mind clouding over. I wanted her to kiss me so bad, I didn’t want this moment to end, I- didn’t know what to do.
She just stood there so silent and sad; I reached a hand out but pulled it back.
Are you ok?
Now I was beside her and she looked me in the eyes and I felt that flash again, like everything suddenly came into focus.
C’mon, Ill take you back inside if you’re not feeling good.
Her eyes felt like they were watching me, she didn’t move and I felt so nervous I smiled.
While we stood there the rain had begun to let up, and a certain kind of calm seem to be forming, and it was quiet but it wasn’t awkward.
She looked into my eyes.
Are you ok?
Yeah! I-
She stepped so close to me.
Vague terror. It was ferocious what happened in side me at that moment.
Rain water ran down her nose, ran through her hair onto her shoulders, down across her chest and her bra, down her stomach, I felt the rain water running down my hands and-
You’re so weird, she said and then she leaned forward and our lips touched for just a second.
She looked at me and I leaned in and she kissed me again. Soft and long and quiet, she reached up and touched my face and then pressed her hand against my chest.
She started walking back toward the house and I followed behind her like a wet dog.
She found her pants and climbed back into them. She grabbed her right shoe and sat down to put it on. I walked over to the flowers and found the left one.
Thanks.
I felt useless holding her mashed up sweater. When she stood up I thought about handing it to her.
Do you – want to put this on?
Thanks.
She took it out of my hands but just held it.
At the back door she pulled her sweater back on and then stepped into the house, she held the door open and I dashed in beside her.
I felt connected to her. The wet clothes, it felt like it read as something, I felt some what guilty like I was wearing a terrible secret all over me. We were soaked but no one seemed to pay attention to us. We walked back through the party, I tried to not feel like I was following her but I didn’t know what to do. When she turned a corner with out looking I stopped myself. I went back into the kitchen to get some more beer and I thought I could maybe find her later.
It looked like the party had thinned out. How long had we been gone? It started to feel that maybe I should get going? There were only about 8 people left that I could see. When I walked back out to the living room I didn’t see her, or Ellen, or George. I checked beside the bath room and there was no line, I stepped inside and glanced in the mirror. All I could think was that she kissed this face, she kissed this face.
The light was on in Ellen’s room, I could see it under the door. I wanted to knock to talk to her for a second maybe, but was sacred she was with some one in there. I took a walk through the house and she was gone. I walked into the kitchen and she wasn’t there I looked out the back door and I saw our muddy foot prints like fossils pressed into the earth and I stepped back inside. I heard a door closing and I followed the sound, it was the front door, I opened it and I saw them, walking down along the front path. She was with Alan. I could see his car at the edge of the hill. She had a ride home, she had her sweaty mongrel, what the fuck does she want with me?
It was like a screw driver, or twenty, stabbing repeatedly into my chest, repeatedly ripping, ripping, ripping into me. I went back inside and closed the door, I didn’t want to see it any more, but I couldn’t help myself, I peaked out the window. They were now reaching the edge of the path and, and- he put his hand around her waist and then they were out of sight. With out a doubt the most evil silhouette I’ve ever seen. Awful, purely awful. I went back into the kitchen and Ellen stood by the sink but I didn’t care I walked right past her out the back door. I didn’t even look at her. I dragged my feet through our tracks and followed them down the hill to where we stood.
I felt alone.
I felt stupid. It didn’t matter. Ill just go home. What difference does it make? What’s the big deal? Better than nothing better than having stayed home, its better than being killed by a wart hog, what’s the meaning of life what the meaning of being alone. Did my grandfather ever get fucked over? Does every one get fucked over? I can’t imagine this happening every day but I bet it does I don’t think- it doesn’t seem like something she’d do. What does she want from me? I can’t imagine this happening to every one.
I walked through the forest. The light cut along the edge of the braches, ringing out like music, cresting along the surface blue green, I could see my feet before me, I could see myself walking, walking home alone, I could feel this weight on me, I was cold, it had gotten so cold out.
An old tire next to a wall, the body of a squirrel, wet leaves, puddles rising up out of the craters in the street, I step into them like little oceans and it rises over the top of my feet, and washes through them it washes clean through. I could feel a heart beat in the air, like a drum striking down, I felt weak but I felt accomplished. It was the end of the night, but it wasn’t over, not yet. I picked up a branch and broke it in my hands with a loud SNAP, soaked through it felt like a bone.
The next day I didn’t have a headache. I didn’t eat breakfast or lunch. As night fell I thought about only her. I thought about how I never see her and how last night was a lucky run. Where was I going to find her next? It felt like life was starting over and all I could think about were bricks.
The next day I visited grandpa at lunch time. He was watching TV and eating a ham sandwich, and that just about seemed too good to be true. He was sorta glad to see me and I helped myself to some food, and sat down beside him with a can of coke from the fridge.
He gets sorta dozey with TV, he goes in and out and in and out, and that starts to make me dozey because I’ll look over at him and look at his eyes and hear his breathing. It’s hypnotizing. My head started to bob and then I was out. When I woke up it was dark and he was in at the kitchen at the table, I went in and sat with him and it felt like never before, like all of this was new. It must be weird when your old and you can see the young people around you becoming people and knowing that while they were once children in your arms they are now these wandering minds and they suddenly watch you and try to figure you out. I try to shield the thought from my eyes and relax like we used to but I cant help thinking about him and wanting to know things about him, who he is and what he wants and what his whole life was like and… I want ask him about girls.
Sandwiches were good.
Yeah.
Did you see the end of the movie?
Nah catch it tomorrow maybe, it’s on again.
Oh.
It was pretty good.
Yeah I saw part of it already.
Grandpa?
Yeah
Can you tell me how you met grandma?
Heh. How I met her.
He exhaled deeply and I wished I hadn’t asked, make him relive the memory of the woman he had spent 50 years of his life with.
I met her at the movies.
She was sitting in front of me and she was the only one laughing. I had never been to the movies alone before and she was alone too, and after the movie in the lobby I started talking to her and we had lunch. After that we would meet once a week to see movie. That’s how I met her. You wanna eat anything else? I got some food today.
I didn’t know that. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought it up.
No I’m ok, thanks.
It’s late, I’m gonna get to sleep alright?
But stop by anytime if you like ok?
Yeah ok.
Ill-
Let yourself out will ya?
Yeah I will.
He creaked up the stairs slow and steady, and I heard his door close. I turned off the kitchen light and left thru the front door
The streets were empty at this time of night. Cool calm quiet and serene. I could only count seven stars in the sky.
No one really exits. It’s all a fever dream, a broken reality, a psychosomatic unretractable nightmare, a bag of sand, an empty turtle shell, a toe nail castle a truck painted goose yellow, a kitchen sink full of huckleberries, a rotating whistle shoot, and a toaster tied to a hurricane. I could twist words into a windmill and turn a canoe into a palm tree, and a tie rack into a nightingale. Turning and timing and twisting it into shapes, opening and closing and breaking things down and breaking him down and down again. If you push it if you fight it you can find it again you can remain in the window and you can take it all back and start over its impossible for something to be impossible its not an endless loop its just a channel, and no one can say that anything is more than it is and everything will just be the nobody and nothing will stop it’s all too much its all just beginning.
My mind just won’t wander. I feel locked into place like time had stopped.
I wish I could kiss her again.
And be close to her.
I wish I could see her again.
This is a train of thought.
I can’t seem to escape.
How do you rationalize that?
Maybe it’s all in the timing.
THE END
By James JAJAC
Sandy sidewalks, and upturned streets, cracks that walk like kangaroos across the desert and a pair of sneakers that wont-stop-fucking-screaming. You don’t have to wake up, you don’t have to slice bread, or put the cookies back in the box, you don’t have to live like you learned it out of a dictionary you can just spin the wheel and laugh when all the windows break, it’s stupid isn’t it? It’s always stupid but it's the people who enjoy it that seem like the ones to watch. I don’t know, sometimes its hard to say, like this one time I had met a friend by the wall near the field at the end of the street and she was sitting there throwing bottle caps at kittens and it’s not like I feel there should be a line drawn but I thought that was silly and we got into an argument that eventually turned into a performance and she was all too happy at the heads in the windows but I told her that if god was a planet he would no doubt crash down upon her head and if god was a hammer and she was a nail, but then I got impatient and just left her there, I don’t like when people act like they don’t know what they are doing and it seemed all far to deliberate and that she was INDEEDY DOO thinking about everything before hand and then acting it out like a play that she is reading in her mind. I always think that if you’re thinking about what you’re saying – it isn’t real, but that is beside the point.
So its not like I’m starting over because I just changed directions and chose to walk through the mud even though it went on for miles but I thought it would be more of an adventure that way and it would be more memorable, and maybe it was because I was bored and frustrated and lost and angry and just stupid- tired but it really seemed worthwhile at the time and I don’t think I’ll ever let common sense stop me from doing something that seems like a victory at first glance.
Card board castles and ten gumdrop chandeliers, a record shop that smelled like stale wine and the beards of old men, there was a flap of leather on my grandfathers car and he threw it over his shoulder with out a thought, it caught in the wind and flapped back right on top of his wispy bald head and you know he didn’t even notice for almost an hour it was fucking hysterical, and then he turned on the windshield wipers even though it wasn’t raining and they squealed and scarped against the dry glass and he kept saying that kids don’t understand any more, not like he did, not like they did when he was kid and it was all because of how simple it was back then he said, everything used to be so simple. I wanted to believe that they were and that everything could really be stripped back to some form of purity but the way I process the world I simply could not believe it and I imagine him delusional, truly believing that the world actually was simpler at one point and that everything truly did make sense one day so long ago. I wanted to ask him if there was a day a specific moment when the world drew to a complete stop and took a shit on it self and stopped functioning according to the rules. I wanted to ask him a lot of things in retrospect, you know? Do you ever look at some one you’ve known your whole life and realize that aside from what you’ve witnessed you actually know nothing about them? I remember the Christmas where he set the family albums on fire with a cigar when he dozed off reading them, I remember when my cousins baby shit on his neck, I remember when he laughed so hard at the Benny hill show he looked like he would literally die, I remember his bad mood that started the year after grandma died but I know nothing else about the guy. Did he have sex in high school? Was that possible back then? I sure didn’t and I live in the quote-un-quote future, and even still I couldn’t imagine it. A fifteen year old boy has no right to intercourse and ejaculation with the opposite sex, I can’t picture; it’s just obscene. Did he fight with his parents? Did he ever look at his grandfather and think about how this old man has no idea what life is, that he has no idea what is real and that his point of view was hopelessly outdated and ob-so-fucking-lete. I want to think until I figure out how to lift myself out of the car and float into space and fucking explode. I want to open this door and drag my face upon the wet asphalt until there is nothing left but a skull. I long for digressions I long for comfort I dream of disappearing one day and never coming back, but the car stopped, we were there. Grandpa always buys me French toast on my birthday, happy birthday to me.
At the counter when he pays, he always gives the girl a twenty and walks away leaving me to collect the change. Even my surly cynical bad attitude can be melted by a gesture like that. That’s fucking class old man and I love you for it. It means so much to me it scares me, I don’t know what I would do with out him. My father may be a disappointment but this guy always seems to come through, maybe it’s because I like his attitude he seems angrier than every one else, like he can see all those invisible things that the normal folk cant. It’s what I’m talking about, how do I break through and figure out who this guy really is? Maybe I cant, maybe it’s a pipe dream maybe it’s a hopeless useless dream, and maybe I’m just too scared to ask because I don’t want to be disappointed. Maybe I’m standing here thinking while he is waiting for me in the car.
It was prbly a week later. I was alone. I had been spending a lot of time alone, not sure why, but I couldn’t handle other people that week, or month; the better part of a year really. Frustration, crustation, mustachion, UGH, my mind rambles and wanders like a lost duck in a submarine. I was in a field near the house I grew up and I saw the girl I had a crush on since kindergarten, and she looked beautiful. I remember the first day I saw her, sitting there by the window, engrossed in that days readings, the teacher (Mrs. Coogle) was reading aloud and I was dreaming, not paying attention, my head in the clouds, unfocused and my eyes fell upon her, and I couldn’t stop looking and she saw me and I got scared but she smiled at me and I smiled at her as I felt my face rush to red.
She looked a little beautiful and I felt that same rush of WHAT, of shame, of attraction? Maybe 15 years later and I still cant get close to her I feel this, this, this… she wore red jeans, she had let her hair grown out and it hung down all around her in a windswept blur, framing her face like autumn leaves. Her freckles had faded and as we got closer to each other I felt the tremors but I stepped around them, and let them swing past. I said hello, and she looked up like she hadn’t seen me and startled. Oh, OH! It’s you? Where you’ve been? No one has seen you in a while. I told her I was sick, and that I was listening to a lot of music (literally an out right lie), she said she was meeting some one and asked me if I’d like to come along. It was a shock and it was also too good to be true but all the same I turned around and walked along with her. It might have been the first official conversation we ever had. It wasn’t really about much, unfortunately it focused predominantly on grade school and the classes and teachers we had and people we knew and how everything had changed, on that whole school of thought. I listened so carefully to every word she was saying to me, like I was going to have to do a report on it, or as if I were going to transcribe it onto tablets when I was finally alone, but despite this I noticed something interesting as we walked, I noticed ever one else. I noticed how every one stopped to look at her, (I wondered did she grow her hair to hide?) I could see so fucking clearly how she radiated on the street but not only that I could fucking FEEL it, it was like walking with an inferno, and it scared me because It put me on the radar, it made people notice me, it made me visible, when I usually felt like an invisible ghost hiding in the darkness, their attention would be projected upon her but would quickly divert and linger upon myself and I didn’t know how to handle it; I felt like I was breaking the law. How do girls handle it? How can some one be beautiful? It must be like never being allowed to be alone, everyone always wants to get close to you, and they all want a piece of your perfect harmony. It made me sad and I looked at her with new eyes, softer more compassionate, does it mean anything? Does she even notice? In me? In every one else? Can she even see how much the world leans to her? I wanted to run away.
There was a question. Do I remember? 5th grade when Ms. Mitchell chased me across the room? I laughed! Do I remember? Do I remember being cornered and screamed at in a classroom full of kids because I spilled our big burly bully of a teacher’s coffee? Oh my god. One of the worst moments of my life, I told her I felt like I was gonna cry and she laughed so hard. She said she felt so sorry for me that day and I smiled like a little baby cradled in its mothers arms. She had had a thought about me! She had an actual feeling about MEEE! Our eyes locked in that moment and the joy submerged in my chest burst forth and I laughed like I was ashamed because I suddenly felt so stupid- happy it hurt. She Laughed too like we had just shared a joke but there really was nothing, it just sorta happened inexplicably and I watched our shadows on the road and tried to lose myself in the reality of the situation. She was absolutely beautiful and for ever how many moments it would be, she was with me and no one else at all.
Taking a short cut through the alley way she found the person she was meeting. It was big ugly Alan. The fat crazy drunken brute, fat ugly crazy stupid horse headed, monkey grizzle giraffe footed, pumpkin necked incinerator vomit toothed pig skull piss pearl oyster cunt headed scum nut Alan.
She ran to him, to his side and said quickly “Thanks for keeping me company!! BYE!!” and OFF-THEY-WENT. Keeping her company? Oh so that’s what I was doing. Oh well. So what if it was. God did I want to hit that kid with a brick. SO BAD. Soooooooooooo bad. It’s a new feeling. I’ve always hated him but I didn’t always want to kill him, like I did, like I really, really did right now. Kill him specifically with a brick.
Briefly there was a head ache, a head ache of disappointment and subtraction, like half the earth suddenly disappeared, or like nothing at all maybe. I bought a bar of chocolate and I went back to where I had met her trying to get back to where I was to regain the train of thought I had been on. Something about how life is blah, blah, blah, I couldn’t find it though. It had been wiped out of my mind. She had lifted me up to new heights and I didn’t think Id be able to put myself back down there. There was now an abyss where I once stood and I realized that there was no turning back. Silly but true. I stared into the stupid blue sky and I wished it would bend and twist into something else; I’m tired of everything being the same. I wanted everything to suddenly spiral and rearrange itself into a new breed of thing, I wanted the entire world to be eradicated and start over, from this exact point, from this exact second in time. 2:45pm Saturday after noon, it looked like it would rain it looked like it would rain.
I went home and sat in my room for five minutes, and I couldn’t do it, I didn’t want to be alone any more I called Ryan, not home. I called Eric, not home. I called Ian, he moved out or something his mom started talking and talking bad talking, what ever, no ones fucking home. As the night wore on so did my patience, I had this dying urge to do something I had never done before but all the roads in my mind lead to nothing. Where is all the mystery when you need it? Where is all the hopeless rage when you need some goddamn motivation? Where the fuck IS every body?
I walked. Down the winding sidewalks of Windbar Street, around the courtyard of Metrovilles BLAND apartment complex, I kicked the chains that linked across the grass, I walked until I hit the end of the bridge at Complex Divide near Luxton and I stood there for a minute counting cigarette butts on the sidewalk next to the curb. My hair was wet, I was sweating. Maybe I should go to the mall?
7:37pm. there were 34 cigarette butts. It was unacceptable, that I bothered.
The mall was occupied and crowded and I only saw one or two familiar faces, initially. Then they all seemed to appear one by one as if by sheer will. At first I felt apprehensive but then I didn’t care and I walked over to George who was standing by the pay phones. He had a purple shirt on.
Hey George.
What up?
Bored out of my head.
You too? This place sucks. You wanna come out to Ellen’s tonight? Her parents are out.
I didn’t even think about it. I said yes.
What time?
9 or something.
Ok sure. I'm gonna get something to eat.
He nodded preoccupied with a ringing phone and I headed upstairs to the food court. The food court always felt like a wave, like the complete embodiment of everything I avoid in life. A consuming collective of everything that was wrong and everything I despise. I always feel on the outside, I always feel locked out. I searched the crowd for familiar faces but only saw a few heads that seemed worth talking to.
I bought a soda and sat down. There were so many girls there today. So this is where they hide during the day. I could say “what’s the use in staying here all day” but I guess most people enjoy being around people and not every one can’t stand being around others, it’s an institution of like minded individuals. But for me, it is like a mental claustrophobia, I don’t have enough room for them in there, like a giant wave passing over me, it feels like doom, complete and total doom.
Empty chairs all around me, gum on the ground and under the tables and the loud chattering of voices blurring together, ceiling fans spinning and twisting in the sky, while tiles on the walls, like a ceramic prison, the room seemed to sway as the light flickered and I tried to step outside of it all, step out side of my mind and take it all in at once, the people on line, the dropped soda cups beside the garbage pails the crowd at the stairway, the hiss of the cooking foods, I wanted everything to be a single thing, to become an object, like an orb and to hold it in my hand and watch it and take it all in at once, I could pick and choose, I could turn it on and off at my command I could control how I respond to every little thing, I tried to control my mind and tie it all down, a storm was coming and I was right in the middle of it, I wanted control, maybe too much. Maybe that’s been the problem all along? I can’t get what I want so I avoid it, afraid to be misunderstood? To stand out? I can never seem to figure this stuff out. I’m not alone just because I think I am, maybe nothing is wrong after all? The soda bottle fell on the ground, and I left it there.
George and a couple of girls and I took a short cut trough some trees at the edge of the parking lot. There was a flash of lightning from above and one of the girls screamed and seemed genuinely terrified. It was actually kind of funny how scared she was, but not because I wasn’t scared but because it all seemed kind of cartoonish. Ellen’s house wasn’t far I reminded her and the thunder crashed all around us. I assumed George knew where he was going. It was dark and windy and the air was heavy and damp, any minute now it seemed, any minute.
We came out behind some ones garage and there were a few barking dogs behind the fences near by. They were loud and furious and they scared me a lot more than the lightning. Lightning was like a fairy tale, monster dogs biting your throat out, that seemed like a much more credible threat. It was dark but we could make out the house ahead, it was raised up on a hill side like a castle, the girls were talking about a movie they had seen and how stupid it was, George was alluding to me that he had brought some extra “stuff” along with him but I didn’t care so much, I was just glad I wasn’t alone. To be honest.
There were about 23 kids there, if I were to guess, maybe more, the music was hideous but I didn’t care at all, it blended into the walls and kept the room alive, it was like life support. The kitchen floor was all wet and some one had thrown down some newspaper to soak it up. There was black ink rubbed all over the tiles and it trailed out onto the red carpet in the living room. I slipped a little, but caught myself on the counter and I waited for some girl (Elaine?) to finish filling her cup up ahead of me at the keg. She looked up at me and said “OH HI” and I smiled kinda of afraid if her, we never talk, I held my cup beneath the spout and pressed down.
“So what have you been up to?”
I thought about it, It had prbly been 2 years since I last saw her, I tried to estimate the last things I could have talked to her about, and I remembered. The last time I remembered speaking to her she had asked me the exact same thing “so what have you been up to?” and I remember having the exact same reaction, no clue as to what to say or where to start and I thought that maybe I took the question too seriously because no one really wants to know what you’ve been doing and they are just being polite and trying to get away from you.
I’ve been kind of sick and listening to music I said.
Oh cool! That’s great!
Then she walked away and I lifted my full cup of beer and took a sip. It is at times like this that I think humanity has no hope. I don't even know why. Being trapped in these needlessly awkward moments and standing in a room full of people who have no idea what to do with each other, and every one deep down feels like they are going to explode and they just want to scream and to go crazy and to dull the “Pain”. Can you really call it pain? What a joke. The singular suburban seclusion I bet no one in this room has even read a book.
Oh, it hit me again; the notion that I’m lost in my own mind and I can’t escape it.
I drank my beer fast and filled it again. I could never figure it out. Where the world ended and I began?
Who am I and where do I belong. Please understand that I, not really asking myself that question specifically as if there was an answer that would be ridiculous. I’m asking myself the question with an implied sarcasm that kicks me and every one else in the head. What does it all mean? What is really on every ones minds? I bet their lonely, I bet we all are.
FUCK.
I drank my bear fast and filled it again.
Am I mocking them? Yes. Am I mocking me, of course.
I walked into the living room and Ellen was surrounded by boys, she was cute but it looked obscene. I don’t think men realize what they look like. Their eyes look like rocks, like a snow man with charcoal eyes. While Ellen was talking I waved at her and she lit up and waved! That made me happy.
I went from room to room. Next to the living room was the bath room and there was a long line (if it was me I’d pee outside), and beside the bath room there were obviously the bed rooms, three of them, three white doors all closed and I assumed locked. I walked over to one of them and glancing behind me I turned the knob.
The white door creaked open and I stepped inside. It must have been Ellen’s room and I felt like a savage violating some sacred party code, but it honestly felt good to be alone. I felt like I was aloud to think again and It dawned on me with complete sadness that I really did not want to be there, and then It felt like the food court all over again, the wave of suffocation of anxiety and fear and dread, like an ocean., like an ocean pressing against the door, I didn’t want to go out side, I wanted to hide. I sipped at the beer. It was bitter and warm but I hoped it would divide my mind into sections and make life livable, because as it stood, it was a mess. I didn’t want to be alone, but I didn’t want to be here either. What a dilemma.
I pressed my back against the door in the darkness. I couldn't get myself to turn on the light, I felt like a burglar hiding under the cover of black night. How long had it been since I related to any one? Why isn’t there a head I can turn to in this place? Am I really, really so odd? Am I really the monster I feel like? I was wringing the wet sock of my soul, I was hiding in a bed room, something is wrong with me. I opened the door quick and slipped out like a murderer, from out of the slow muffled steady murmur of quiet back into this booming dreadful mess. It can’t be all that bad can it?
I walked from room to room again, not enough familiar faces, that seems to be the problem no where to gravitate no where to-
She was there! It was her. I saw her red jeans from across the room and I swear to god it was instantaneous like the noise dropped and my mind cleared- I felt welcome! I looked all around for that fat pig necked cock frog Alan, why would she be with him? I didn’t see it. I had to talk to her! But I waited, I would wait, I should wait, I shouldn’t rush over. Right? Right. Stay cool and wait it out and …let her notice me, and she’ll talk to me and I can talk to- calm boy. You need to be calm.
I walked along the walls of the house; now that I had a purpose I felt alive and comfortable (or was it the beer kicking in??) And I could smile at people and make chit chat. I looked at a guy drinking beer and said “this shit is nasty” and we bonded briefly over the disgusting piss beer, I kept walking. I stood near the back door and there was a neat little girl in a skirt with blond hair. Wind blew through the screen door and I muttered “looks like it’s about to rain” She looked at me quickly and then back out into darkness, “yeah” she agreed.
Five minutes later, thunder and then rain. It poured down in buckets, the windows were all slammed shut and it gave the party a new life, like it was the end of everything, it gave the room an air of novelty because no we all suddenly had something exactly in common! Hooray for weather. People seemed so relaxed and every one seemed to all be in this together, what changed? Was it me? Shit, hard to tell.
I saw her by the stairs, I know she was looking at me and I almost fell but instead I turned on the lamp and then I turned it off. Oh my god I’m so stupid. I ran my hand across the table and tried to walk out of the room but then from behind me I heard her voice, she called-
My name.
I spun around and there she was, she looked happy and different some how. She seemed like she was bigger than before (Maybe I was shrinking?).
Come with me, I'm getting another beer
A spot of dread struck me. It sounded like before, "thanks for keeping me company” but I went any way.
She filled hers and then I filled mine and when I started to turn back to the living room I saw her stopped at the kitchen door. She had this mischievous look in her eye. She smiled so big suddenly and called me to her with her fingers I walked over feeling surprised. She opened the door and then she ran out side.
What are you doing?
She laughed as the rain came down on to her.
I stepped out too, drinking my watery beer, everything felt electrified, this moment felt real, like I had just been struck by time, the water ran down my face and into my eyes and I was alive, its stupid, but I felt alive for the first time in my life. She was running out there all around on the grass, throwing her hands up and laughing and she looked out at me her eyes so full of life and I felt it all around me I felt…something.
She threw her head back and swung her hair all around and she was soaked! C’mon! She said. C’mon!
And I ran out to her and we ran around Ellen’s back yard, and she grabbed me and pushed me over into the mud and she was dying laughing at me, I pulled her feet and she fell over and she rolled over onto her side and then jumped back up again and started running.
I couldn’t stop laughing.
She pulled off her sweater and threw it at me, and I was frozen. She was in her bra; I was seeing her in her bra.
She kicked off her shoes; they landed on the wet grass and in a flower bed. I tried to keep up with her, her soaked sweater in my hands and down the hill I saw her pulling off her pants, the red fabric was soaked through and she threw them up in the air.
That’s when I slipped real bad and fell hard on my face, I skid down the mound of wet grass and mud and flipped over onto my back. Ugh. Everything was blurry; the rain was coming down into my eyes I tried to find her sweater, when she appeared at my side. She was laughing at me.
Are you ok?
My head hurts.
She picked up some mud and threw it at me; I dodged it quickly and yelled:
Hey!
It was so weird. She started down the hill and I ran after her, I felt concerned...
Where are you going?
Wait for me will you?
I was so soaked, the water was squashing around in my sneakers and my clothes hung down on me like a dead weight.
I caught up with her at the trees, and she was standing and seemed quiet.
Are you okay?
There was some cover there under the branches. She looked so beautiful with her hair running down across her face; she looked so sad and vulnerable suddenly that I took a step back.
Are you sick?
She was distant.
I want to go back inside.
Okay. I have your sweater, but it seemed useless, it was soaked. She was standing in front of me in her underwear, soaked through I felt my eyes turning to stone in an instant and my mind clouding over. I wanted her to kiss me so bad, I didn’t want this moment to end, I- didn’t know what to do.
She just stood there so silent and sad; I reached a hand out but pulled it back.
Are you ok?
Now I was beside her and she looked me in the eyes and I felt that flash again, like everything suddenly came into focus.
C’mon, Ill take you back inside if you’re not feeling good.
Her eyes felt like they were watching me, she didn’t move and I felt so nervous I smiled.
While we stood there the rain had begun to let up, and a certain kind of calm seem to be forming, and it was quiet but it wasn’t awkward.
She looked into my eyes.
Are you ok?
Yeah! I-
She stepped so close to me.
Vague terror. It was ferocious what happened in side me at that moment.
Rain water ran down her nose, ran through her hair onto her shoulders, down across her chest and her bra, down her stomach, I felt the rain water running down my hands and-
You’re so weird, she said and then she leaned forward and our lips touched for just a second.
She looked at me and I leaned in and she kissed me again. Soft and long and quiet, she reached up and touched my face and then pressed her hand against my chest.
She started walking back toward the house and I followed behind her like a wet dog.
She found her pants and climbed back into them. She grabbed her right shoe and sat down to put it on. I walked over to the flowers and found the left one.
Thanks.
I felt useless holding her mashed up sweater. When she stood up I thought about handing it to her.
Do you – want to put this on?
Thanks.
She took it out of my hands but just held it.
At the back door she pulled her sweater back on and then stepped into the house, she held the door open and I dashed in beside her.
I felt connected to her. The wet clothes, it felt like it read as something, I felt some what guilty like I was wearing a terrible secret all over me. We were soaked but no one seemed to pay attention to us. We walked back through the party, I tried to not feel like I was following her but I didn’t know what to do. When she turned a corner with out looking I stopped myself. I went back into the kitchen to get some more beer and I thought I could maybe find her later.
It looked like the party had thinned out. How long had we been gone? It started to feel that maybe I should get going? There were only about 8 people left that I could see. When I walked back out to the living room I didn’t see her, or Ellen, or George. I checked beside the bath room and there was no line, I stepped inside and glanced in the mirror. All I could think was that she kissed this face, she kissed this face.
The light was on in Ellen’s room, I could see it under the door. I wanted to knock to talk to her for a second maybe, but was sacred she was with some one in there. I took a walk through the house and she was gone. I walked into the kitchen and she wasn’t there I looked out the back door and I saw our muddy foot prints like fossils pressed into the earth and I stepped back inside. I heard a door closing and I followed the sound, it was the front door, I opened it and I saw them, walking down along the front path. She was with Alan. I could see his car at the edge of the hill. She had a ride home, she had her sweaty mongrel, what the fuck does she want with me?
It was like a screw driver, or twenty, stabbing repeatedly into my chest, repeatedly ripping, ripping, ripping into me. I went back inside and closed the door, I didn’t want to see it any more, but I couldn’t help myself, I peaked out the window. They were now reaching the edge of the path and, and- he put his hand around her waist and then they were out of sight. With out a doubt the most evil silhouette I’ve ever seen. Awful, purely awful. I went back into the kitchen and Ellen stood by the sink but I didn’t care I walked right past her out the back door. I didn’t even look at her. I dragged my feet through our tracks and followed them down the hill to where we stood.
I felt alone.
I felt stupid. It didn’t matter. Ill just go home. What difference does it make? What’s the big deal? Better than nothing better than having stayed home, its better than being killed by a wart hog, what’s the meaning of life what the meaning of being alone. Did my grandfather ever get fucked over? Does every one get fucked over? I can’t imagine this happening every day but I bet it does I don’t think- it doesn’t seem like something she’d do. What does she want from me? I can’t imagine this happening to every one.
I walked through the forest. The light cut along the edge of the braches, ringing out like music, cresting along the surface blue green, I could see my feet before me, I could see myself walking, walking home alone, I could feel this weight on me, I was cold, it had gotten so cold out.
An old tire next to a wall, the body of a squirrel, wet leaves, puddles rising up out of the craters in the street, I step into them like little oceans and it rises over the top of my feet, and washes through them it washes clean through. I could feel a heart beat in the air, like a drum striking down, I felt weak but I felt accomplished. It was the end of the night, but it wasn’t over, not yet. I picked up a branch and broke it in my hands with a loud SNAP, soaked through it felt like a bone.
The next day I didn’t have a headache. I didn’t eat breakfast or lunch. As night fell I thought about only her. I thought about how I never see her and how last night was a lucky run. Where was I going to find her next? It felt like life was starting over and all I could think about were bricks.
The next day I visited grandpa at lunch time. He was watching TV and eating a ham sandwich, and that just about seemed too good to be true. He was sorta glad to see me and I helped myself to some food, and sat down beside him with a can of coke from the fridge.
He gets sorta dozey with TV, he goes in and out and in and out, and that starts to make me dozey because I’ll look over at him and look at his eyes and hear his breathing. It’s hypnotizing. My head started to bob and then I was out. When I woke up it was dark and he was in at the kitchen at the table, I went in and sat with him and it felt like never before, like all of this was new. It must be weird when your old and you can see the young people around you becoming people and knowing that while they were once children in your arms they are now these wandering minds and they suddenly watch you and try to figure you out. I try to shield the thought from my eyes and relax like we used to but I cant help thinking about him and wanting to know things about him, who he is and what he wants and what his whole life was like and… I want ask him about girls.
Sandwiches were good.
Yeah.
Did you see the end of the movie?
Nah catch it tomorrow maybe, it’s on again.
Oh.
It was pretty good.
Yeah I saw part of it already.
Grandpa?
Yeah
Can you tell me how you met grandma?
Heh. How I met her.
He exhaled deeply and I wished I hadn’t asked, make him relive the memory of the woman he had spent 50 years of his life with.
I met her at the movies.
She was sitting in front of me and she was the only one laughing. I had never been to the movies alone before and she was alone too, and after the movie in the lobby I started talking to her and we had lunch. After that we would meet once a week to see movie. That’s how I met her. You wanna eat anything else? I got some food today.
I didn’t know that. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought it up.
No I’m ok, thanks.
It’s late, I’m gonna get to sleep alright?
But stop by anytime if you like ok?
Yeah ok.
Ill-
Let yourself out will ya?
Yeah I will.
He creaked up the stairs slow and steady, and I heard his door close. I turned off the kitchen light and left thru the front door
The streets were empty at this time of night. Cool calm quiet and serene. I could only count seven stars in the sky.
No one really exits. It’s all a fever dream, a broken reality, a psychosomatic unretractable nightmare, a bag of sand, an empty turtle shell, a toe nail castle a truck painted goose yellow, a kitchen sink full of huckleberries, a rotating whistle shoot, and a toaster tied to a hurricane. I could twist words into a windmill and turn a canoe into a palm tree, and a tie rack into a nightingale. Turning and timing and twisting it into shapes, opening and closing and breaking things down and breaking him down and down again. If you push it if you fight it you can find it again you can remain in the window and you can take it all back and start over its impossible for something to be impossible its not an endless loop its just a channel, and no one can say that anything is more than it is and everything will just be the nobody and nothing will stop it’s all too much its all just beginning.
My mind just won’t wander. I feel locked into place like time had stopped.
I wish I could kiss her again.
And be close to her.
I wish I could see her again.
This is a train of thought.
I can’t seem to escape.
How do you rationalize that?
Maybe it’s all in the timing.
THE END
posted by James Jajac at 3:23 PM
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