Tail

by Julian Duenker

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  Time was dead and all that generic jazz had relocated. The point is, no one, apart from the barman, understood the concept of time as the night grew. Purple maintained its erected position of the night, spilling its drawn out shades across the reflections of all the puddles. Warm colours attempted to rise up to Purple’s podium. Burnt yellow cast against faces forcing them to blink. Hinted green hit the ground from the get go, afraid to reside among the fun of all the faces above. All while the music hounded similar beats pushing everyone’s heart onto the same conveyor belt. Susan couldn’t see the person behind the music to give it any context. She enjoyed the idea of music simply seeping through the walls of the underground building without any apparent source. The thought went well with the stacks of drinks that built up behind her.

  Descriptions of people flocked the place. They danced and stumbled from one end of the rainbow to the next. Shifting tongues and wet thighs occupied the cubicles nearest to the dance floor. The cubicles were bent and hidden behind the curved architecture. People seemed happy about their choice of seating... or maybe it was the swapping of intoxicated saliva that made them happy. Who knows?

  Charlie found herself in the midst of the floor, surrounded by flashing pooled lights shining up to her face from the drenched floor. She didn’t care, intentionally widening her eyelids to the burning shine from all the lights. Susan danced on the other end of the floor with a fractured gapped view of Charlie.

  Every few twisted movements were followed by a quick reference look over to Charlie. Susan’s surroundings didn’t consist of anything else apart from the addicted gaze over to this glitter hearted older woman. One, two, three and those usual skinny taps along the lining of her neck became the only form of human contact she had that night.

  Charlie’s older elbows flung from the axis of her arms with shifts of movements unknown to Susan’s innocence. Her popped and pilled knees bent abruptly up against her bulked man, as if instilling an erotic image within his protein cheeks. Susan couldn’t tell if he was red from the heat of the place or from the colours that died on his face.

  Susan said goodbye to time with a drunken handshake. Everything, pretty much everything just flowed along a transparent yet taught course for Susan. The space between the bottom of her boots and the floor grew with each new beat that hit the club. Looking through the gap between the heated bodies Susan saw Charlie as clear as broken glass. Her rough lips and chaffed exterior spread unapologetically across the stomping/dancing grounds. Charlie shoved a couple that were dancing next to her. She didn’t even look at them, just a simple and delicate shove to widen the distance. Shocked by Charlie’s strong handed gesture the couple left the dance floor with sour faces.

  Susan found it difficult to hate her, which after a few composed thoughts seemed really bizarre and naive. Whenever Susan looked at Charlie all she saw were these negative knives poking from her exposed gaps, shanking anyone that came into her vicinity. Yet she couldn’t help but pose herself to that exact posture that Charlie found herself in. How painfully obscure the imitation was, it didn’t go unnoticed by both women. Considering all of this it appeared prefect to hate Charlie, despise her, and fear her on paper. But it wasn’t that simple for Susan. It was precisely that, which made Charlie so captivating to Susan, her strongly built and roughly cut hairy legs.

  Every single one of Susan’s memories over the past few weeks had entirely been brushed under the carpet that night. The bought beats moved her with every shaking twitch from her drinking hand and she enjoyed it. Nothing tragic crossed her mind allowing the traffic of communal noise and group filth to fill the void of her problems. She felt good, with the only “bad” feeling being her increasingly sweaty armpits. But with a look around at all the people she reassured herself that they were in the same swimming pool of salty drinks and lubed ideas as her.

  Susan pulled off an impressive move that involved control of each joint she possessed. She couldn’t tell if it looked good apart from the odd look she got from smiles that danced beside her. Who cares? I sure don’t. My dance moves are just that... my dance moves. I’m just doing it for me. She thought to herself further solidifying her stance and further lubricating her joints.

  Then Charlie popped back into view through the slitted crowd. Sore red split the people, shading the bridge of their noses in dipped bloody maroon from the coloured lights above. As painful as it looked, no one felt anything. Naturally since it is very difficult to feel colour. Anyways, Charlie looked hooked with her bottom lip drooping from her face. Yet she still maintained an image of energy about her. Charlie’s arms loosened acting as the backup dancers to the main event, her legs. They bounced between puddles ignoring the space of nearby people.

  Susan looked sideways at her own arms and noticed how they hung from sockets without any intention. No thought came, not pondered and precise idea, just alcohol soaked reflex. Susan rested her arms like Charlie and hung them from her blue chequered shirt with quick concise forces of muscle twitchin like a mad fecker. With sleeves wrapped up to the elbow she felt a sudden sense of apathy as she swung her arms within her personal circle. All she did was drive her legs along the puddled road of shattered sharp blues and wasted drink. Her circle widened pushing nearby dancers further away from her flung arms.

  Light continued to seizure across the grounds with the dance floor slowly dwindling due to a sore back from all the over excited boots. The night had reached a point where depraved stomachs controlled people. Greasy food.

  Sam and Charlie’s group stayed within the place and returned back to their cubicle to regroup. Few words were said, or maybe there were a lot of words said, either way Susan couldn’t remember any words being spoken. She did remember the stilts she stood on however, but when she looked down all she saw were her legs broken into blurry graphics.

  A few spilled marks of random drink covered her left thigh. Not knowing if it was someone’s carless dance moves that caused the spill or if it was herself. She ran her hand over her thigh. She felt her soft and wet jeans and ended her fingers on a small stylised tear right above her knee. With the tips of her index and middle finger she caressed the torn edge of the rip. Among the loose thread she felt a glimpsed image of Mathew.

  It forced her fingers to further dig into the loose threads. She no longer felt control of her own hand. She imagined Mathew’s hand caressing her thigh to the point where he ignored her flesh and concentrated on the fabric tear above her knee. It was the sourest thing she had tasted the entire night.

  With a simple tap from Sam on Susan’s shoulder she snapped back up to an acceptable stance. She tilted her head to look at him, to remind herself of what he looked like. She knew him, she recognised him. His bent long nose acted as comfort for that moment. She felt safe staring at his broken bridge. The more she looked at him the less she saw of him, with her view dropping down to her chest. Then without realising it, she felt her chin in contact with her shirt and Sam’s two hands on her shoulders with a worried grip.

  He placed her back into the cubicle and made sure she was sitting as comfortable as possible. Susan was awake with a few crayon drawn memories. Sam looked at her directly and muttered a few words accompanied by a concerned look at her up and down. She couldn’t hear his words over the deaf sounding hum in her ears. She couldn’t tell if the music had stopped for the night or if it were still playing with loud intent. Then he left.

  Drink had simultaneously fulfilled its purpose and betrayed Susan. She set out for the liquid to wash away any clotted thoughts, but hadn’t thought about what might happen if she went too far. Over the edge with no friends to bring her home, it frightened her. She felt lonely in the cubicle with the only kind face having left her. It was difficult to form a complete thread of fear when every few seconds her view would drop to her chest and end up resting on the table. But within the moments where she had somewhat composed thoughts, she knew that it was her making, her fault that she was in that situation. Then
she thought about Charlie and her abrupt broken arms and hearted t-shirt. Believe it or not but thinking about her gave Susan a slither of strength. She could feel it stab its way up her jeans and rest on her lap with dead eyes. Staring at it she knew she could get through anything.

  No more drinks spilled, no more music was drummed out and people were being washed out of the place. A few loose strings of people remained to finish whatever captivating conversation they were drinking over empty glasses. Susan woke from a minute sleep to her red raw cheek. The cubicle was empty with the barman collecting drink glasses around her. He was quiet and acted if he was afraid to acknowledge her. He rolled his eyes around her afraid to make contact. She was too tired and disoriented to interact.

  Sitting up straight she tried to pick up her soaked thoughts from the shit riddled ground. Mixed drinks and strings of dry saliva hung from them. Ill clean ye tomorrow. The next step was to test her balance. She rested her trust in her boots as she edged the side of the seat. Before getting up she took a wobbled scan around the place to make sure Sam wasn’t hiding somewhere waiting. Not understanding why he hadn’t come back she focused her priority on standing up. It was all well and good to desire, but the reality was vastly different. She was still drunk, still waiting for that beautiful moment where her body passes out. She knew it was going to come marching with deafening screams. All she had to do was get in a taxi before it started knocking.

  Still holding onto the idea of meeting Sam she steadied onto her soaked boots. The laces dripped and dragged a trail of liquid behind them as they shuffled to the front room. The shafted hard lights that hung from the ceiling were still attached to whatever flashing colour they adored. Susan shoved them aside with loose swings that almost swung all the way around her body. On her right was the bathroom. The door was ajar held open by a large piece of shattered glass. Whatever naive ideas that Susan had left pushed her to enter the bathroom. Stepping over the glass she felt the need to be quiet and suppressed the noise of her boots.

  Easily enough, the door to the men’s bathroom was wide open, with screams and deep howls passing through. Nothing of interest to Susan apart from a few men stretching their testosterone pumped insecurities. She did notice however how the walls convulsed with green aged filth and the floor flooded from a nearby sink. It scared her to think what was growing in the bowl of the place. The woman’s bathroom was shut further along the corridor. A trail of broken and forgotten shards of glass peppered her walk to it. They were scattered and decreased in size the closer she got to the door. At that point with her fractured thoughts she had entirely forgotten why she was there. Curiosity had taken over her movements.

  With a quick and shunted shift the door opened and Charlie came out closing the door behind her. Her expression started off with surprised eyebrows trying to escape from her face. But she then quickly eased back into her routine and playful smile. The edges of her lips cut into her cheeks. She had one hand gripped onto the bottom of her t-shirt and the other quickly rested its curled fingers on Susan’s right shoulder. Susan’s eyes, for some strange reason, ended up concentrating on the pink fluffy heart design on Charlie’s top. She tried to shift her view up an inch to look at her aged face, but found it too comforting to stare at the woven glitter heart.

  Charlie muttered a few words that swiftly fell from Susan’s ears on to the filth ridden floor. With a guided hand and a strangely pleased expression Charlie directed her out of the corridor and up the stairs. As they went up, Susan saw remnants of everyone’s fun-saturated night along the steps. A few shoes and torn pieces of clothes painted the stairs.

  Then the oxygen hit Susan and punched any trace of lucid thought into the ground, leaving nothing but black images that held for a few uncomfortable seconds. All she felt was the guided fingered grip from Charlie on her shoulder. Her roughly cut fingernails were unsettled and tightened their grip if Susan veered too far away from Charlie. People littered the outside of the building painting the walls with personal graffiti made from puke spray cans and piss dipped paint brushes.

  Sam and everyone else from the temporary group of friends seemed to have disappeared, vanished from the social bucket of mixed fluids. A handful of taxis were parked on the opposite side of the road. The more Susan tried to walk to them the smaller they got and before she knew it she was on another street.

  Along Susan’s broken up memory she did have a few clear moments of what kind of a situation she was in. She wasn’t stupid, and she never saw herself as someone who would be used. So the fact that she was being guided to who knows where made her feel all the worse. She felt as if she let herself down. Her boots shook. They were on the cusp of crying their laces into a frenzy.

  The short walk had ended up at the entrance of an alleyway. The walls were dark with only a small section lit up from the street lights. Susan felt the cuddled grasp of sleep already fingering her armpits, teasing her to collapse. And with the stack of empty drinks built up behind her it proved difficult to resist.

  Charlie led her behind a large cardboard box. Nothing was clear to Susan. Everything was washed out and void of characteristic. Charlie held the back of Susan’s head and softly sat her down with her back up against the wall. Susan felt a thin puddle underneath her. She swam her index finger in the wet, rubbing her skin against the rock that lay beneath. Charlie looked Susan directly in her washed eyes. She seemed almost apologetic with a face carved by true tragedy. Susan didn’t remember many words from that night, but when Charlie slipped a few syllables from her cracked lips, she did her best to remember them.

  “You don’t look well darling. Get some rest and I’ll have some pancakes ready for you in the morning.” She said followed by one, just one, puff of laughter. With that Susan faded. All she was left with was the intrusive feeling of her pockets being molested.