Discover Top Posts Tagged with #houston post

“Didjew have fun?”

I hadn’t heard Heather’s voice in weeks. She was looking at me, eyes as still as rocks in a river.

“I had a wonderful time, thank you for asking.” I drank my OJ in one gulp.

A glum Monday morning in the informal dining room. Heather was reading yesterday’s edition of the Post. Donna was in the kitchen, steam rising, grease sizzling. She cooked rare breakfast for us, simultaneously eating her own—a small batch of seedless grapes. Of course, she took darling samples of our country bangers and scrambled-cheese eggs, just to make sure they were cooked right.

“I’m happy for you.” Heather’s voice was low, and she returned to her paper.

I was surprised by this turn in behaviour, in play for about a month now. If the girl was sincere, the therapy must be working. But even if it weren’t, and the baby was playing a new game, I didn’t care. I hated the Turners.

“So am I, Sammy.” Donna, naturally, always heard everything from afar. “I wish I could take off a week from my responsibilities whenever I felt like it.”

I stared at the two females, one old and wrinkled from the sun, but suited and booted; the other young, and pale and scruffy as an alley cat. Only the blonde chill of hair suggested similarity—that and sniffling red noses.

I asked where Neil was. Donna said an extended weekend corporate trip. Once a year, apparently, Neil and his fellow masons were compelled by IBM management to spend a few days and nights together in the wild in order to learn trust and co-operation amongst workmates so that there’d be higher performance in the workplace. I found this hard to believe.

Heather, meanwhile, was reading about something with the unfortunate name of caucus, being held in the state of Iowa, followed by a primary in a place named after Hampshire County. I knew she found politics fascinating. But I remained puzzled as to why. How many 15-year old girls do you know are interested in long-winded bluehairs vying each other for six long months just to be a candidate? Gore, Gephardt, Simon—“Who do you think will win?” I asked.

“The nomination? Dukakis.” Heather was succinct. “Not too old. Less liberal than Mondale.”

“Is that what the papers say?”

“Yeah.”

“Dukakis!” Donna slapped plates in front of us. “What kinduv name is that?”

“Greek.” I said, now knowledgeable about such things.

Donna sat, blew into her cup of old coffee. “It’s good you’re learnin bout this stuff, Heather. But so you know, you can’t trust any Democrat. Once you grow up and start workin for a living and payin taxes out the wazoo, you’ll see what I mean.”

Donna was her husband’s wife. Over the months, I’d been warned about every member on her shitlist: Commies, Socialists, Liberals, Democrats, baby-killers, tree-huggers, hippies. Donna also enjoyed saying how she’d run things if she were in charge, a popular American hobby.

Heather was unmoved. Yes, something had changed. I don’t know it was for the better, though. The girl’s blank eyes looked like prisons.

Madame concluded with comic coda. “Yup, taxation without representation. That’s why we fought the King of England, isn’t it, Sammy? I mean, don’t get me wrong. George Bush is no George Washington, or even Bob Dole. But he’s a heckuva lot better than Dukkake, or whatever his name is. I mean, would you look at this shrimp?” She dismissed with a wave of her hand a front page photo of the Massachusetts governor. “Do we really want one of Santa’s little helpers with his finger on the button?”

“Why doesn’t Britain have a Bill of Rights?” Heather asked me, quickly.

“I’m not sure. Strange you should ask. I suppose it never came up.”

“How do you know your rights then?” The girl was serious. So be it.

“Surely, what we can do is obvious. Once you write it down, the government just finds a way to use it against you. My sister says it’s best just to list the things you can't do. That way the tables are turned.”

Donna said this made no sense to her. I told she was within her unwritten rights and left for school.

February 1988 in Kaiser Lake meant cloudy sun and muddy ice.

The last month of winter and it hit fairly hard, staying just long enough to make one wonder, for a day, might it not be taking up permanent residence? I told myself I preferred it so, and did. But went on to add that though I hated the heat, it didn’t mean I loved freezing. I fear Texas changed me.

As I trekked that morning, it struck me how much my little Houston suburb had grown in six months. For instance, what used to be a small forest near the entrance to Stony Forest was now cleared of underbrush, with trees to be saved tied with yellow ribbons. By summer, a new housing division would be there, one to make Stony Forest look as old and poor as Stony Brook.

Not to be outdone, another patch of forest across the street from the high zoo had been fenced-off by barbed wire, and it was soon to be stripped so an office building could be erected, according to a sign. I’d never lived in such progress.

I was usually one of the first students to arrive at KLHS. My locker was in the Yellow Hall, where history classes took place. Each wall of the hall sported two rows of lemon coloured lockers, one atop the other. I had a bottom, meaning I had to squat in order to unlock and pitch textbooks protected by dust jackets. I never forgot my locker combo so long as I forced myself never to remember.

Usually I went to the library before classes. This morning, though, I changed routine, heading towards the canteen everyone called the Commons.

Always a pleasure walking down the main hallway of the school with no crowds dictating my pace. Though a Brit, I don’t tolerate crowds. Especially loathsome was the cretin who’d stop before me to jaw with other members of his species, yet I admired the anarchists who’d purposely push each other in the midst of the blob, disrupting everyone’s course.

The canteen everyone called the Commons was dark, main lights not being turned on till seven. I liked to sit in the centre of this black belly, away from the grey sunshine of the glass-walled atrium, as well as the wall lined up with vending machines, brand names lit in primary colours. So buried, I’d take a ten-minute kip. Any longer and I was groggy; any shorter, grumpy.

But firstly, a drink. I set backpack on table and approached Vending Machine Row, and their offers of sweets and crisps and other raw materials. I could’ve used a water fountain. They were all over. But everyone knows water’s uncool.

I thought about buying a Coke, but fifty cents was too much. Besides, why buy common Coca-Cola in the canteen everyone called the Commons of Kaiser Lake High School when you could buy bicarb?

That’s right. One vendor offered a small plastic cup of flavourless fizzy served on slush-cut ice for a quarter. As I sipped, I smelled a strange mix of trainer rubber and floor wax coming from the gymnasium next to the canteen.

I’d only been in the gym once, when the Federal Secretary of Education lectured to us Lakers back in November, attendance was mandatory. The nameless man told us how special we were for well over the scheduled hour.

Back at the table, I lay head in crossed forearms. Before visiting the Land of Nod, I noted the empty chair next to me at the table. By the time I awoke, I knew, it’d be gone. Once Lakers arrived en masse, all unoccupied chairs were taken away. Some kids politely asked. Most grabbed, some even making a show.

Skull in arms, nose touching spiral notebook—this very one, in fact—I wondered, before I disappeared, whether I’d ever start writing in it.

Hours later, I was sat at the same table, same chair, eating lunch with the gang, Jill’s words. We hated dining with other Falcons, but there was rain outside, which the telly weatherman said would turn to ice.

Worse, our holiday brains resisted, still, our return home, making this “scene from Planet of the Apes,” Chelsea’s words, indefensible, especially after some fellow seniours set up speakers and mikes near foggy atrium windows. Soon, there’d be entertainment to accompany our square-shaped slices of pizza.

“I have the strangest sensation,” I said, “I’m dreaming.”

The others laughed. Not only had I thought aloud, the others had been silent.

“Nightmare’s more like it.” Chelsea licked the sweet chocolate off an ice cream bar. She ate less after New Orleans, and then only junk food. She gradually stopped wearing make-up too. At least she clung to her Goth threads. But the girl was also seen clutching worn-out ’70s paperbacks of Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton, one or the other nursing from Chelsea’s pancake tits.

Do I still want Chelsea, I thought, sipping chocolate milk from a miniature milk carton. Does the Pope shit in the woods, the nerds in Maths would respond. Her birthday was coming up. Strange to think she and I’d soon be old enough to marry. Where is my mind? I lost it whilst one of the entertainers played a tape of a record scratching, and another cracked rapped about the perils of smoking.

“I miss New Orleans.” Chelsea found my mind.

“You miss Melissa.” Provocative Trent was never out of character.

“No.” Neither was Chelsea. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

“Really?” Though strung-out, I connected two dots. “When did this happen?”

“After we got back,” briefed Trent.

I stirred the rice pudding on my tray. Why wasn’t I hungry? In Louisiana, I couldn’t stop eating. “Did she dump you?”

“No one dumps me.” Chelsea was shocked—shocked, I tell you.

“Yes, Samuel.” Jill laughed, gallantly. “No one dares dump Miss Bianca.”

“Got that right. Oh, if only I was a ten-foot mouse,” Chelsea purred the inside joke, unknown to me. Back to normal, and to me. “You miss New Orleans, Sam?”

“I miss alcohol.”

“Hell yeah!” Trent unconsciously wiped greasy fingers on linen shirt. “I got so destroyed. All that acid too—goddam, what a week!”

Jill told me if Trent was the sole male in a group, he wasn’t so obnoxious. But if another—yours truly, especially—was present, then Mr Barker always rushed to concentrate attention upon himself. “Right,” I decided to stir his pot, “don’t forget to leave some brain cells to destroy in uni, yeah?”

“Don’t worry bout that, pard.”

Jill wasn’t interested. “I wish I could’ve seen more of your family this time, Chels.” Even sat, Jill Susan Eisenhower was a half-foot shorter than I. She was 18 now too; hair longer than ever. Actually, I don’t think that blanket of night was cut the entire time I knew her. And unlike Chelsea, Jill was wearing more make-up.

“Why?” Chelsea acted surprised.

“Well, they’re characters. I like them.”

“They’re assholes.” Miss Farmer dropped half-eaten stick of ice cream onto a tray full of food. Chocolate mixed with canned creamed corn. Whatever was left of my appetite vanished. Chelsea also plonked down her copy of Live or Die, and put on her multi-striped jacket. “They’re only good for money.”

“How awful,” my big mouth said.

Jill reached over; patted friend’s hand. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” Chelsea grabbed; squeezed. “Thank you.”

Did Chelsea fancy Jill in that way? She once said as much. But girls say everything. Besides, assured Jill, after she told me she and Chelsea, as small girls, used to kiss each other, “We were just practicing for boys—honest!”

Of the three, Trent looked no different—as tall and thin as he was in October. Truth to tell, past the scraggly clothes and bushy eyebrows, he wasn’t bad-looking. Certainly, his complexion was enviably pus-free. Must be the drugs.

“Yeah, her family’s a trip, all right.” He changed the subject; or got back onto the subject, with me now. “Ever meet her dad? You hear the way he talks—so fuckin annoying. And her mom...” He made a gagging gesture. Chelsea didn’t mind. Not one bit. “Ever hear of the New Age, Sam? Chelsea’s mom’s into that shit—crystals, palm-reading, Mother Earth worship, garbage-in, wax-off. She’ll read your palm if you ask her—seriously. She read mine once. Told me I was gifted. I told her, no shit. I already knew that. An I told her that Harmonic Convergence deal last summer was gonna be a bust and guess what, I was right. Who’s the soothsayer now, huh?”

“Some of that stuff can be interesting,” enter Goody Witness Jill. “It’s not for me, but I can understand it, at least.”

“I always said you were a closet Buddhist, Jill.” Camera back on Trent. I could see why he and Chelsea were friends, if not lovers. “You should move to Asia. You know? The Far East is radically different from the West. Even better in some cases, I’d say. I respect the hell outta them.”

Was I the only one thinking that if Trent had been born Chinese, he’d have respected the hell out of Christianity? But I’ve always seen through the hot air of actors. No wonder Revelation and Queasy disturbed me. They weren’t playing.

“Orientals are beautiful.” Chelsea joined the duet. “I wish more Asian girls were here. Kaiser Lake’s so white bread I could scream. Downtown’s where the real melting pot is. Melissa and I used to go sit on a bench in Hermann Park just to watch all the races go by.”

“Shit!” Trent curled upper lip; flicked dishwater blonde hair out of eye. “You wanna microcosm of this planet? Only one place to go—New York. Beats even Austin. Got everything and everyone and then some.”

“I’d love to live in New York City.” Chelsea was breathless at the mention of the Big Asshole, nevertheless maintaining enough air to add city, in case we misunderstood her passion to be for Buffalo. When you’re an actor, any place not your own is better. Though I didn’t like Kaiser Lake, places like Jericho were worse. Yet I did miss New Babylon. It wasn’t pretty. But it didn’t pretend to be.

“I hate Houston!” Chelsea was afire. “I hate Texas! Why do we have to be here?” Red face was dotted by whiteheads.

Sir Trent came to the rescue. “Ya know, I was thinkin the other day.” Fingers stroked chin. “If there’s gonna be a next great place, I think it’s gotta be Australia. Think about it. Paris is ancient history. New York’s still cool, but not gettin any younger. But Australia! Australia’s young and huge and next to nothin in terms of population. I predict the U.S. is already in decline and as soon as another Vietnam rolls around, there’ll be this huge brain drain to Australia, or New Zealand. I’ll be there too, dude. Less California works out.”

Chelsea’s face re-whitened. Grey eyes blinked like a carousel slide projector, irises glimmering with kangaroos, koala bears, twangy Oz beaver. “Oh my God, Australia sounds wonderful. And they speak English down there.”

“Down under,” I corrected. Under the table, Jill kicked my leg.

“How’s it go?” Chelsea looked to Jill. “I first saw you,” she sang.

“Ooh.” Now Jill’s fire was lit. “Gordon Sharp. He’s fine.” She and Chelsea giggled simultaneously.

“Alex Chilton, actually.” I fought back. I can’t think why. “Both of you are wrong. Clearly, the next great expat getaway’s Mongolia.”

Trent looked at me. For a second, I think he believed me. That’s what happens when you’re insecure. Someone’s always better than you.

“Think about it,” I mocked. “The Mongolian People’s Republic. Oh, I’ve waited ages to say that. But seriously, Attila came from Mongolia. So did the Mongols. And they nearly made all Europe Asia. And could do so again. So if we’re smart, we’ll go there now and be aheadof the game. Be One with the Hun. There’s a slogan for ya. Just the other day, in fact, I was watching Barbara Walters on TV, and she was asking Richard Pryor about his secrets, and Betty White about sex after 60, and Lionel Richie and his ability to be America’s No. 1 songwriter, and who did all three want to talk about instead? Sting. And the fact that he plans to record his next crappy solo album in Ulan Bator. And why not? Mongolian ska is, as they say—”

“Dude, shut up.” Trent broke the stream of consciousness, a good thing, in retrospect. My tired mouth was capable of anything. I missed the old me.

“Besides,” Barker resumed command, “Everyone knows the only band gonna be makin waves from now on is mine.”

“Yeah, it only took you a year.” Jill wasn’t impressed.

“Now, now, Penny,” Chelsea said in that annoying accent again. “Trent had to think long and hard before selling his soul to rock and roll. First, he had to break up with his calculator watch!”

The girls howled at this past version of Trent. “I’ll tell you why it took so long,” he defended. “Good drums aren’t cheap, that’s why. You wanna good kit, you gotta save. Or steal. I saved. I ain’t gonna play on shit. Fuckin sue me.”

“Yeah, selling acid solves a lot of problems, doesn’t it?” Jill joked, or accused, or both, and in doing so sounded like me. I was having an influence, after all.

“That’s Jim, dude, not me.”

“I’m not a dude, dude.”

“I don’t understand drugs dealing,” I clawed my way back in. Again, I can’t think why. I never wanted to be pack leader. I always just was, even when perfectly silent. But this town ain’t big enough for the both of us, the song goes.

“Think about it,” I mocked, less convincingly this time, fingernails drum-rolling table top. “Acid’s the cheapest drug, yet packs the most punch. You got pot, the most popular, which isn’t too expensive. But compared to acid, it’s outrageously expensive, and you don’t get a tenth of the trip. Then there’s truly pricey crap like H that just puts you in a bloody stupor and turns you into a junky without your even trying. So why isn’t everyone dropping acid, the most for least?”

Nobody was impressed; least of all, the hungry contender. “Better yet,” Trent barked, “jus fucking drink!”

I’m glad the bell rang. I’d nothing left.

We got up. But before I headed my way, Chelsea took me by the arm. “Come with me,” she commanded, seriously.

“And miss Psychology?”

The blonde sprite led me into the dark cavern that was the KLHS theatre, next to the canteen. I’d been here once, in December. Jill took me to see the seniour musical, Fiddler on the Roof, an irritating experience. Suspension of disbelief is one thing. A 17-year-old Tevye with fake beard, bottle dancing with remarkably dark-skinned Czarist soldiers, is another.

Naturally, I said nought to Jill. We were on eggshells so soon after reuniting. Yet if I had, and she saw me now, she’d have her revenge, telling me, truthfully, that I was more American than English. Whoda thunk it? Do shut up, Hay.

A dozen drama students were present, positioned in various parts of the auditorium, some practicing monologues. Theater rats, fellow Lakers called them—blowhards, irritatingly confident. Where was the next Meryl Streep? Bobby De Niro? All here, of course.

The rats were divided between two teachers, one a middle-aged baldie, always wearing black; the other a young woman with lopsided features—short hair and bulging eyes; bountiful bosom and flat derrière. Officially, the Svengalis made nice. Behind the scenes, they drilled their militias, intriguing against the opposition.

Baldie and Boob’s theatre rats worshipped emotion. Drama wasn’t drama until someone screamed. Each performance was a pregnancy. The artist retained and built tension until they could do so no more, giving birth to babes of rage.

Today was no different. Most of the tortured were busy with tech matters, but a few were practising their craft under the watchful eyes of Baldie and Boob, two educators so competitive they even had their soldiers face one other across the theatre in a kind of breakdance showdown. On stage left, a Baldie loyalist performed the climatic scene from Equus, in which an English teen confesses under mounting pressure that he can’t make love to his girlfriend because he can only get hard thinking about horses. On stage right, a Boobie rebel performed the climatic scene from Children of a Lesser God, in which a deaf woman confesses under mounting pressure that despite her disability, she’s still a woman, and by the eternal, one with passion, desire, needs not being met.

The dark theatre thundered with those two voices. And Chelsea led me over a sticky floor to the push-down seats in the back, lessening our chances of getting caught. She didn’t look at me as she spoke, playing her own role to the fullest.

“Something happened to me this morning. I didn’t bring it up with the others. I was about to leave for school….” Chelsea paused. Do I lose breath? “Guess who was waiting for me at the car?”

“Melissa Keller? With a tree to eat for Israel?”

But Chelsea was the eye in this surrounding storm of drama. “Paul.”

“Even better. Do tell, did he set himself on fire, like a good fanatic?”

She blinked. “What’s your problem?”

“Sorry?”

“How can you say that?”

“Why are you saying any of this to me?”

Chelsea stuck a hand into her purse, and removed a folded note. “He asked me to give this to you. And to let you know … that he’s running away.”

“Is that so?” I took the note I knew to be loaded with nothing. But thanks to Paul, I finally woke up. Yes, I was in Texas. Not some magical Tobasco republic, where anything can go wrong, and that’s just right.

“That’s right.” Chelsea’s eyes turned to the deaf woman nearby, beginning the earthquake that creates the tsunami. “He can’t live in the Happy House he used to call home. I can’t blame him. How did I end up so lucky? If I had parents like Paul’s, I’d have run away years ago. I wish him well, from the bottom of my heart. He deserves happiness. He certainly deserves it more than you. He told me everything.”

Switch to attack? Hardly threatening. “Naturally,” I replied. “Fret not, Miss Farmer, he’ll be back in Galveston before sundown. That man’s a mouse.”

Chelsea didn’t lose course. “You’re awful.” Her clothes were old, I decided; and not having been worn for some time, dusty, like one of Portia’s bottles of gin. “He loved you. You two could’ve been Rimbaud and Verlaine. Goin to New York—”

“London.”

“He’s a poet. You could’ve inspired him. He could’ve made a name for himself there, and finally gotten some of the love he deserves.”

I tried, knowing I’d never get credit. “If Paul’s serious about striking it on his own—New York, you said?”

“He’s got a friend there. Another Texas refugee. God, this state—”

“Then believe me, no one’ll be happier than me.”

“Yeah, right.” Chelsea watched the actress begin to ripple—the wave about to drown the town. Only then did I realise that girl was taking turns playing two different people. “You live to see him suffer. You’ve done nothing but manipulate him from the start.”

“That makes two of us. And if I’m such an ogre, why on earth do you bother with me? Why did you take me to New Orleans? Why does Melissa tell me to stay away from you, Miss Farmer?” Once could say I was ready for this charge.

Chelsea wasn’t. She whispered attitude, not answers. “I used to think there was hope for you. I thought you’d change if you had the right support, like Paul.”

“Speak!” The actress spoke.

“Now I think I sacrificed myself too much.”

“Speak!” Primal scream a-comin.

“I may have written my own note for nothing.”

At last, mushroom cloud. Imitating a deaf woman, the actress sounded like a retarded one. “Am I beautiful?! Do you want me?! Am I all you ever dreamed about?!” The bitch was so loud even Beard’s Blackshirts turned their heads. Aye, Breast’s Brownshirts won this round. But the war would go on.

“But I forgive you, Sam. That’s just who I am. I forgive and move forward.”

“Smashing,” I said, trying to reconstitute.

“There’s something else you should know.”

“I can’t wait.”

“He beat up his father.”

Was I supposed to be shocked?

“Paul told me. Happened last night. His dad was putting him down, as usual. He grabbed Paul. They got into it. No lie. And Paul let him have it too. Of that I’ve no doubt. That’s why he’s running away. You believe him now?”

“How is the Old Man?”

“He’s in the hospital.” Chelsea’s turn to be Arctic; and she was better at it than expected. “Fat, chauvinist, self-righteous pig got what he deserved, you ask me. We can only take so much, y’know. James says his dad won’t tell the cops anything. He’d never admit his fag son kicked his ass. Total and complete justice. I’m at peace with it.”

She let this sink in before switching back to Mother Goddess. “Now do you see why we have to stick together? It’s an insane asylum out there. Friends are more important than family. That’s why I said that in New Orleans. Only friends will ever allow your True Self. That’s why I mean it.”

Miss Farmer took my hands in hers. I’d never much held a girl’s hands before. Chelsea’s were delicate, of course; unlike the fists that sculpted Mr Chase into a cabbage patch, or so Chelsea said. I didn’t want to believe her. Yet Chelsea never lied about others—only herself. And truth to tell, I wasn’t dissatisfied. Glaswegian wannabes in string vests in hospital mean sweet fuck-all to me too.

“Paul asked me to tell you something.”

“What, that I’m next on his shit list?”

“No.” Chelsea was shocked as she slipped both notes between my palms; then squeezed the two together. “No matter what’s happened, he’ll always love you.”

“Love is for psychos.” I broke away, stood up, looked down at what suddenly appeared a little girl. “And hell is for children,” I added stupidly before leaving.

At the sight of a bin, I thought to pitch Chelsea’s note. Instead, I pitched Paul’s, and stole away to the library. I don’t think my Psych teacher would’ve given me hell for being late, especially if I told her I’d eaten the chicken fried steak at Applebee’s the night before, and therefore had an emergency, as I actually heard a student say, truthfully, in another class. But I was in no mood to fib after my stint in the terrordome.

Past stacks of chaste books, I found an empty carrel desk and sat. Note before me, I rubbed face with fingers, kneading thoughts into elasticity. The mere mention of Paul was enough to inspire, one of Portia’s musician paramours described it, a reverb-laden twelve-string guitar playing, in my head, a pleasant riff, over and over. And now I recalled disliking that git even more.

Chelsea was wrong. I didn’t hate Paul. We did, after all, talk more than we did exchanging courtesies. I did loathe the cry baby part of Paul Chelsea perversely preferred. But I did enjoy, if for no other reason than exoticism, the mopey peasant from the ugly island; the queer uncomfortable around blacks; the Morrissey disciple secretly worshipping the Moody Blues.

Looking back, Paul’s love of those harmless hippies no longer seems bizarre. Ultimately, their voices were elegant compared to his, and devoid of obscenity. The soft rock Brummies believed in better tomorrows, a notion Paul clung to desperately, even as his emotions nosedived into pitch black.

Right, I understand it now. Paul identified with those Mellotron surges that coloured even the Moodies’ happiest psalm, like drops of ink in a glass of water. And I rejoice to see I’ve lived long enough to write like Rolling Stone. I believed it all now. Paul turned his rage on father—ob-la-di. Now he’s run away—ob-la-da. The wise man has the power and we’re not gonna take it anymore.

I opened Chelsea’s note.

Sam, how delightfully flattered would I be to receive just one note from you. One friendly offering.

I am ever so eager to spend precious time in learning about you. You do make one very curious you know. I mean with your rude and curt conversations. Your intense conflicts. Black and white you are. You heard the song, oui? Eve White/Eve Black. Siouxsie Sioux. My favorite song. My favorite artist. I am her. You are her too. Sam White/Sam Black. You know how much I love white. And your hair is blacker than death.

You are mysterious to me. I realize that’s a direct result of my not knowing you. I know I am full of secrets too. But it seems so odd the way you pop in and out of my life the way you do. The way you enrage me one moment and charm me the next. Trent is like that too but he’s always been that way. I barely have known you and the, yes, intensity is MORE than it is with him.

Curiouser and curiouser.

So, do you fancy fettucini alfredo on a Friday night?

Good day.

I opened a loose-leaf notebook, different from this one. High time I fought nutters with nuttiness:

Chelsea, what greater dying agony can one bloke drudge through than to witness your saddened dejected depressed.... To realise You, and can do nothing. What greater burning can one flame scorch than to see you smile and laugh and smile.... What greater misery can I suffer than the cold knowledge that I cannot kiss your fingers. Guts diseased, tightened with disgust, despair a sharp blade of truth piercing masked flesh. My blood of life spewing upon the floor. Such pain! What a mess.... Would somebody please lick it up and kiss my lips? What restraint I am slaved with. What circumstances divide our arms from supporting one another’s crumbling temples. Hair untampered, undisturbed, free! Free flowing its waterfall length with a sun-ness, a blonde-ness, a rainbow mystifying in its shadows. Face so structured, finer hands cannot touch it, no git’s hands should touch such silk eyes so bright, so dark, so sparkling, for what blindness I would suffer. Chelsea, can I ever love you? Can I ever hold your face in my hands look deep into your eyes into the other side and say I love you I love you I love you I’m here for you no-one else not even myself I want to help you I want to make you a better person feel a better person I don’t want you hopeless and disillusioned with my sex I want you to cry in my arms on my shoulders tears flowing down my hands I want you to put my hand on your face so you won’t break apart can the space between us ever be bridged ever can we look at each other years from now and smile can I ever see you smile at me can I ever make you feel happy secure superior can we ever break down those fronts burn away our masks build our bridge so that nothing else in the entire universe and beyond has not the slightest significance except for us to hold each other and cry out our pain and touch each other mix our tears our words of fear of life of growing up of living….

And so on for another half page. I was well chuffed at myself. Effortlessly, I’d crafted a mass of confessional spontaneity that screamed bass-baritone duet between the ghosts of Jim Morrison and Ian Curtis.

The cherry was the end. I asked Chelsea to leave me alone. By becoming forbidden fruit, and letting the cunt think I was everything she thought I was, desire would first be sparked, then fanned, until the bitch simply couldn’t help herself, and she spread her wings one night and it’s gonna be alright….

Once in poet’s guise, it’s hard to stop. I returned to reality by reading an Isaac Asimov history—to my mind, always more interesting than his science fiction.

Afterwards, I wondered what I should do for fun that weekend.

Read more: http://daysofthrobbinggristle.tumblr.com/archive