by Garret Ford
“The stuff I did, that got me here, I wanted to shock her, to snap her out of it- you know.” I mumbled to myself, hoping he would hear me.
“My mom is really distant, she is gone, but hadn't left.” I said, trying to goad him into talking- he adjusted his seat, continuing to check boxes and turned towards me; with an expression of someone being told about getting a flat-tire.
“Me and my sister had a fight- we aren't a family anymore so why bother acting like it.” I said, completely crestfallen.
“What was it this time?” His gray eyes squint.
“She wanted me to come out to a party. Have fun.” I said.
“You don’t want to have fun.” He said, taking a note.
“No.” I motion emptily.
“Kids your age should go to parties, socialize, make some good friends. It makes dealing with this easier.” He said, his glass eye staring.
“The other kids don’t get me.” I said.
“Have you even tried to be close?” He asked.
“No. But I know they won’t.” I said.
“How do you know?” He asked.
“They call me weird, crazy, and other stuff. That doesn’t really make me want to open up to them.” I said, sadly.
“If they are inviting you they want you there.” He said.
“They say that stuff to me, and it reminds me that they don’t actually get me or want me around, they think I’m weird.” I said.
“I'm sick of waking up into this mess and want to go back to another time when things were good, or at least skip this part. I don't want to have to deal with it anymore. I want a re-roll.” I said with mournful exasperation.
“Suicide is the cowards escape.” He frowned.
“I need some good karma so I can have some good stuff happen.” I grumble under my breath.
“Make- good actions, good follows.” He laughs, taking notes.
“What’s funny?” I asked.
“Karma is cyclic reaction and action; not coins you use to buy happiness or hire assassins to punish others.” He said, shrugging.
“These are hard times for everyone.” He said.
“You don’t even know what hard means!” I yelled and stood.
“I think I do.” He said, pointing to his glass eye and missing ear.
“Sorry.” I said, sitting down.
“Don’t apologize. These are hard times for you. Natural to get angry.” He said, writing down the rest of my prescription.
“Thanks.” I took the prescription from him.
“Give this to your guardian, I upped the dosage.” He said.
Swaying with the bumps and turns, the bus ride is long. I shuffle aimlessly. Nobody is ever home. I descend the stairs, curl up on the age worn chesterfield in the basement. I lay there for a while staring into my reflection in the black screen of the old tube television. I turn it on, static. Dead noise. A mocking parade of disappointment, I am sick of blessings in disguise; where are the real blessings. Nobody gives me a chance. Nobody wants me around. I want to disappear into TV static and never return. I stare at the static on the television. I want to reach out into the static and pull myself into a different life. I put my hand on the screen and feel the warmth. I close my eyes, I listen to the static and storm. I imagine myself somewhere beautiful; then I dream of dreadful things, places too bleak for mortal minds.
“Why am I cursed with this!” I screamed in the empty house.
“Pumpkin, poor life choices- only yourself to blame- you persevered in obstinate condolement.” It said.
“Things are still fucked though, don’t leave me…” I cried out.
I awaken on my old worn chesterfield. A peal of thunder nearby causes the entire room to shudder. I peer out my dusty venetian blinds. The sky is black and the trees twist in the wind. Rain pelts against the window. I look at the dust on my fingers. Filthy place. Not that there was much on the floor. Stacks of books. Dust bunnies congregating. The static and the storm in harmony. I open the window and let the smell of rain into the house. I put the kettle on. I get an expired packet of Earl Grey tea from my cupboard and set it beside my Keep Calm and Carry On mug.
Solitude now. Nothing to do but breathe and sleep. In an instant a tear drop spreads into a vibrant blue ocean that spreads out towards the horizon. Warm sunshine smiling and white soft sand under my toes. How perfect this place is.
My pale skin, now tanned and I feel healthy- happy? I swim in warm blue water. Calm. Solitaire. Blue seas, white sand, palm trees. The ocean breeze whispers in the air. Whispering breeze slowly turns into a shrill screaming.
The kettles shrill whistle snaps me out of my daydreaming. I realize- I’m looking at a picture on the back of a deck of cards that I’m playing solitaire with. I turn off the television and I return to the kitchen and make a cup of tea. The storm continues to rage outside. I blow on the tea, the steam rises. I take a sip. A warm hug on a cold day.
“Why do you have so many characters?” She asked, pointing to my long list of alts.
“I want to be able to play through everything in the game, some stuff you can only do if you play a certain class or race.” I said.
“Why don’t focus on having a main rather than having alts that you don’t know what you are doing on?” She asked.
“I have a main, see?” I said, pointing to my warlock.
“Wouldn’t it have made sense to play a thief?” She said.
“Why?” I asked.
“A stolen name from a famous thief?” She asked.
“I wanted to have magick.” I lied, I hadn’t thought of that.
“By making a deal with the devil?” She said. “Nice work Faust.”
“Is that a band?” I asked.
“Too much time on your hands.” She said.
“No, I don’t play that much.” I lied.
“Liar, you play plenty.” She said.
“Why wouldn’t I. In here I can be Barbadious the Barbarian the slayer of black dragons, killer of the devil queen, and conqueror of the undead. Out here I am…” I trailed off.
“A mere mortal?” She mocked me.
The peacock angel, most beautiful of all angels- kissed by god, casts away that love to rule in hell. For control. For spite. For the conceit. Damned fool.
Damned spot, all the waters of Lethe could not wash away.
Away! Fly! Away!Fly! Now!
Fly, my sparrows. The hawk hunts the doves while you fly.
Build nests in the hawk’s aviary, bitter feed the sparrows.
We birds can fly away while beasts remain below.
Poor dumb beasts,
Wretched creatures hunt the amphisbaena.
Starvation or deprivation.
Their prey is foul.
Crack bone, suck marrow.
The ape mocks them.
Flinging offal and rocks.
The beast only knows hunger and slouches toward the east.
I am not of flesh. Claw and bite.
I fly.I am the sky.
I call my children to follow my wings.
I cannot help them kill the beast.
The beast grows. The beast bellows.
When birds become beasts and all is lost.
Flesh is flayed.
Bones are gnashed.
Flecks of blood bespangle their teeth.
The beast pulls down the walls of Babylon.
Weep now angels.Weep for the ruins.
Not for the dead.We did this.
Time to time. Mind to mind. Umbilical to womb.
Linked together; all from above.
Hive mind.
The past.The Future.
There is no gift.
Save perception.
Alas. Poor, Yaughan, I drank with him, Horatio.
Eat, drink, be merry, for tomorrow.
We die…
Azure sky- cheerful wispy cloud spun as cotton.
A harvested field. Bright sun.
Faith, foul whip to the children of
men.
Toil- Bow-
Show reverence in the shadow of the conqueror worm.
Alexandria in ashes-
Wind of death howls.
Fresh soil calls for plows-
Salvation mulched-
A beautiful thing.
The children of men to play.
The cavalry cometh!
Down from the sky!
Babel falls into ruin.
Apple orchard burns.
The children are scattered to the sea.
The child of man and gods ascends;
Wanders among the wolves and lambs.
Eastern stars
Shining! Slumbering hate
Hungry souls. Pale waters rise, they sweep the land.
The toiling ants scurry away from the storm.
The beautiful thing grows on a foreign shore.
The dragon rises and stalks the dire hunter-
And feasts!
Land is flesh..
Blood moon-…
Soul sun-.-.
Star—
The stars!
Blinding damned charnel house.
AshFlesh
Screams.
Fire storm. Shadows linger.
Ants scurry.
A second sun rises.
I remember flesh,
Blood,
Softness.
I weep for the steel birds,
Demons in disguise,
Bloody hands,
Washed in the rising tide,
Bones rattle in the deep-
Calling for revenge.
Thus, man toils.
Chapter 9
“The sad thing is that people are only nice to me until they learn I won’t fuck them.”
Lilia S. Delphia
My friend promised to come with me to the tarot reading. I was nervous about the whole thing, and didn't even want to go and now they didn't show up. They keep doing this, maybe it was like Stockholm syndrome- if you spend all your time doing drugs, do you fall in love with them?
The neighborhood is a pocket of suburbia turned slum where people have ignored the last however many decades. I can almost hear Third Eye Blind playing on a boombox. How the inhabitants ignore the outside passage of time, I will never know. Time had stopped dead here; the iteration of one year has been repeated. Any why not, pre-terror North America was awesome. There were downsides, there always was in life, but you have to learn to take the good with the bad; not that I knew how.
I stand outside the brown house waiting for my friend before finally giving up. The house was nondescript, common as common. The remnants of winter lay melting in the corners of the front yard.
Faded brown paint. Faded brown fence. Old stone flower planter with a single fake blue flower stuck in it, perhaps for colour- or the illusion of growth. The lawn tattered and brown. Cinder block keeping the back gate from opening in the wind. A carport with a decaying blue luxury car, the back axle rusted through.
The mail box has a note scotch taped to it. I read it.
“No Religion. No Politics. No Junk. GO AWAY.”
I turn to leave, the door opens. A man stands in the doorway. He is average height, with long brown hair with strands of gray, unkempt beard, large nose, small eyes, frayed cut-off jeans, bird shirt.
“Cards?” I murmured unsure.
“Fortune telling.” He responded, nodding.
“Sorry, I’m lost.” I said turning.
“Come in, the cards are ready for you.” The fortune-teller spoke in a gravely tone at first, a car starting on a cold winter morning.
The landing has two flights of stairs, one leading up, and the other leading down into darkness. He leads me up the flight of stairs. The house is dusty and dried leaves sit not only on the landing but a few on the stairs as well. On the walls are masks. He opens the door at the top of the stairs a motions for me to enter before him.
More idols, symbols, masks, and statues confront me. Uneasy; empty eyes upon me. Simple, grotesque, familiar, Anubis or maybe Imhotep. Tragedy and comedy, straw and steel.
The living room was stranger. Screens and mirrors. There were five screens; all off. Desktop computer, tube television, large flat-screen television, laptop, small travel TV, all perched precariously on different desks. The mirrors were similarly positioned. Looking into one mirror meant you could see around the entire room, each mirror reflected into infinite.
I sat on the old leather chesterfield was swaddled in blankets, a beloved child. In front of the chesterfield is a heavy looking coffee table made from solid wood, it is marred by numerous gashes and from countless years of use. Above the chesterfield there was a painting of amorphous yellow.
“What is it?” I asked and stared at the painting.
“Art is what you make of it, the same with life. Regardless of the artist’s intention, meaning is derived by the viewer.” He said.
The more I focus on any one part of the painting the more it seems to shift. He prepared different colored candles on the coffee table. White, Red, Blue, Green, and Black, placed upon the right. In the middle he placed a long piece of incense, and lit and the candles. I return to the painting.
“Familiar with the Rorschach test, or the Voigt-Kampff test?” He asked, droning as he produced a large half seashell containing two pieces of rope and placed it on the left on the left.
“I don’t know what either of those things are.” I answer.
“Creation the same, might set up the stage as a divine comedy, you may perceive it as an infernal tragedy. Does that make sense to you?” He smiled with his yellow teeth and retrieved a deck of cards from the cupboard.
“Art mimics life or life mimics art?” I turn back to the painting.
“If someone else tells you what to see in the painting, then you will see that, but in the end that is not your truth. Coming here wasn’t even your own idea, isn't that right?” He pulled up a chair that looked like it belonged in medieval feast hall to the coffee table.
“What do you know?” I turned from the painting and sat down on the chesterfield, he pulled up a wooden chair with a green cushion.
“Nobody comes to a fortuneteller when life is going well and they are sure of their path.” He said, yawning.
“Like a therapist?” I asked, laughing. “I’ve never been.”
“More a ferryman, than a therapist.” He said.
“You will take me to a distant shore?” I raised an eyebrow.
“The incense is lit, therefore our time is limited. It works because it works. Words are power.” He makes a gesture to the deck of cards in the center of the table.
“Fuck?” I cried, the inside of the seashell, it was not pieces of rope but a desiccated snake’s head and tail.
“On the right I have our protection, on the left something to remind me of the dangers of my craft. Though dead and turning to dust, the fangs hold venom. There are powers, the old ones, that hold sway in this domain.” His voice is tinged with fear.
“How did you find it?” I peer into the snake’s eyes.
“Like you, it found me.” He smiles sardonically.
“How does this work?” I asked.
“A painting, you can determine what it all means to you. I present a set of ambiguous symbols- a hack’s parlor trick if you desire- or if you are prone to idealization then view me as mad mystic.” He speaks softly and draws circles in the ashes in the incense tray.
“How much do I owe you for this?” I grimace.
“If you find the reading to your satisfaction, a sacrifice of equal value- be it pocket lint or pocket watch.” He said.
“Sorry, this is my first time-” I said.
“Any questions before we choose the signifier card?” He asked.
“Nah. Let's do it.” I swallow nervously.
I am at the bar. It is karaoke night. There are drunkards staggering back and forth mumbling song lyrics into an ancient microphone; the dance floor swaying to the music. I sit and watch the da
ncing lights on the walls. Me and my roommate are there; he is a nice guy, awkward, hobbled nose, spiked hair, and fat to a fault.
“You’re singing again?” My roommate yelled.
“I just said- I’ll do it!” I yelled back over the noise of the bar.
Dark. Seedy. Home. The green pressed leather seats. The old hardwood booths. The portrait of the Duke of Wellington on the wall. I am here every karaoke night. Welcome to vaudeville.
I got back to my booth and my roommate offered me a bite of his cheese fries. I took a bite of the salty cheesy goodness, and looked up- my jaw dropped and the fry fell out. There stood Adonis on stage, the voice of an angel. The flies at the bar stopped haggling for drinks, the harpies in the bathroom stopped laughing, and the world outside for a moment stopped too--. For me anyways. The clangor resumes, I sway silently, enthralled by his siren song.
The song ended, I clapped for him, my world, started again. My palms are sweating, heart-pounding, and I can’t stop looking at him. He buys me a drink or three. My roommate finds me and orders more onion rings. The hours wind by… the bar is closing. We clamber into the back of a cab. We drop my singer off first, I touch his hand as he gets out of the cab.
“Can I come inside?” I asked, voice unsure.
“Of course and…” He smiles and looks at my roommate.
“You two go ahead.” My roommate waggled his eyebrows.
I feel weak in my knees for a moment. The singer welcomes me inside. I descend the stairs. My heart is pounding. Drink. We sit on his bed. Drink. We are watching a science fiction show with time travel. Drink. My hand finds his. Drunk. We kiss. His stubble tickles me. I laugh and hold his muscular body against mine. I can feel his throbbing erection pressed against me.
I don't want to say anything. I shouldn't say anything. I stop.
“What is wrong?” He whispers.
“…” I stammer nervously, inexperienced, afraid of rejection.
I trip over my words. I clear my throat nervously, I hadn't done anything like this before; giving into lust. Why did I come with him, to make him happy? Nothing so selfless. I wanted to satisfy myself. Instrumentality. I was giving my body to him, but not myself. He might have thought he was victorious over me but I was conquering him- I had seduced him.