I've been working on Vol 1 & 2 the past few nights, and while I don't want to post anything substantial, here's some (obviously unedited/unrefined) tidbits of what I've been up to.
Vol 1. - Faster Than A Speeding... Oh Wait, No.
Therianthropes, even in their human form, are fast. I launched forward with a snarl, a single bound closing more than half of the distance between us. But therians are not faster than bullets. The man’s eyes opened wide with surprise, but he leveled his handgun and pulled the trigger. He fired only one shot, that certain that he could kill me. The bang resonated through our small kitchen, deafening, and my forward momentum simply… stopped. I think Estelle was screaming, but the sound was almost completely drowned out by the ringing in my ears. I stood dumbly, not even feeling the bullet yet, and like every asshole in a made-for-TV movie, I stared down at my chest with surprise. Watched, like I had all of the time in the world, as the tiny hole in my shirt became wreathed in red.
I looked up, my field of vision already narrowing, and staggered a few clumsy steps forward. The handgun discharged again, and this time I felt it; as the bullet ripped through my abdomen and out my lower back, it felt as though it was simultaneously stabbing, beating, and burning its way through my insides. I yelped like a wounded animal, my legs giving out as I teetered on the brink of unconsciousness from the shock of the pain. Crumpling against the kitchen floor, I begged every god I didn’t believe in to please, please not let me lose consciousness without ensuring that Estelle was safe.
Vol. 2 - Lost Dog
Scrape, scrape scrape. A high pitched whine. The clatter of claws as a tight circle was paced. I sniffed the air and stood in dumb shock for a beat; Elise? And one moment later, I caught another scent: my neighbor Mrs. Roberts. Shit. Her Pomeranian erupted into a rapid-fire series of high pitched, territorial barking. God damnit. I opened the door to see Elise looking over her shoulder in a startled crouch, ears pinned and hackles rising. This could get ugly fast.
"What should I do, should I call animal control?" gasped Mrs. Roberts, eyes wide and wrinkled lips pulled back in a fearful grimace.
"I think it's just a lost dog," I bluffed. "She was clawing at my door to come in."
"Come in to eat you maybe. By God Mr. Wiktor, I've lived in Montana long enough to know a wolf when I see one!"
I did my best to muster an insulted frown to mask my growing dread.
"M'am, I am a wildlife biologist. I think I'd know a wolf if I saw one." I crouched down to Elise's level. "Hey girl, you lost? It's ok, c'mon." I silently willed Elise to wag her tail and play along. She only looked at me uncertainly.
"It's ok girl," I urged. "Good dog, do you want to come inside for treat?" My voice lilted at 'treat' for effect, but I'd emphasized 'come inside' as well, and she finally got the picture. Tail lowered and wagging, she licked my outstretched palm and whined, then curled in a sit leaning against my side. It was an applause-worthy performance. Mrs. Roberts breathed an audible sigh of relief as I scratched behind her ears then rose to open the door. Elise padded through the doorway.
"See, no problem. I'll call around and see if anyone reported a missing dog; if not I'm sure someone will give her a good home." I faked a noble and compassionate smile then fought every urge to hurriedly slam the door shut behind me as I returned inside.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Saturday, December 18, 2010
You Could Stay.
I officially suck. Not only have I failed to produce ONE finished novel, but I have been dashing back and fourth between Volumes 1-3 of Raze. I worked out an entire plotline from Trent's poorly constructed character background for Vol 1 and began writing it, only to think "Man, Vol 3 is going to be SO MUCH FUN. So, here's some Volume 3, towards the end of the novel no less.
"You could stay," she said, squeezing my hand. Her finger tips looked so pale and dainty across my knuckles. I remembered how her hand looked in mine the day I'd slipped the ring over her finger, the day she said "yes."
"I can't, Estelle." I stroked my thumb across her skin then raised my eyes to meet hers. "I'm not the same person you once... knew." Saying "loved" may have been more accurate, but it stung too much to verbalize.
"Trent.. back then, I was young and stupid and scared, and I'm sorry, I truly am. But I don't care what you are."
I cracked a small, sad smile.
"What I am isn't the problem. It's who I am, who I've become... the things I've seen, the things I've done..." I got to my feet, pulling my hand gently from hers.
"What could you possibly have done?" She folded her arms over her chest, stubborn and insecure all at once. "Despite all this talk, when I look in your eyes I still see you. You look sad, you look confused, you look desperate, but you still look like the man I fell in love with."
I flinched at hearing her say that word.
"Looks can be deceiving," I replied quietly. "Estelle... you have a good life here. You have a steady job, a beautiful home, an ambitious future. I have..." I looked down the hallway, towards the bedroom where Gabe and the others were resting or at least politely pretending to. "I'm not part of the world you live in any more."
"You could be," she said. "Or I could be part of your world."
I let out a bark of incredulous laughter and for a moment was angry at her, irritated that she could be stupid enough to think it that simple.
"Part of my world? My world? The last time I dragged you into my world, a man nearly killed you. Or have you forgotten that already?"
Estelle went very still, and her eyes revealed that her mind was somewhere else, a darker place. When she returned, she looked me very squarely in the eye.
"I haven't forgotten. Not a day goes by that I don't remember that night," she took a step forward, defiant. "But even when he was tearing my clothing off, even when he had that gun pressed to my temple, do you want to know what I was thinking about? I was thinking about you, lying on the floor, dying. The thought of losing you was scarier than anything he could have done to me." Her eyes dropped. "The sick irony is, he didn't take you away from me that night. I sent you away. And ever since that day, I've wondered how things could have been different if I could have just accepted you."
The look on her face was strong, but her voice was faltering. I reached out to gently brush her cheek, then tilted her chin up to face me. She looked at me with those clear, beautiful blue eyes, her expression almost begging.
"Oh Estelle." I smiled. "How could you, how could anyone possibly accept me? I don't accept myself."
"You could stay," she said, squeezing my hand. Her finger tips looked so pale and dainty across my knuckles. I remembered how her hand looked in mine the day I'd slipped the ring over her finger, the day she said "yes."
"I can't, Estelle." I stroked my thumb across her skin then raised my eyes to meet hers. "I'm not the same person you once... knew." Saying "loved" may have been more accurate, but it stung too much to verbalize.
"Trent.. back then, I was young and stupid and scared, and I'm sorry, I truly am. But I don't care what you are."
I cracked a small, sad smile.
"What I am isn't the problem. It's who I am, who I've become... the things I've seen, the things I've done..." I got to my feet, pulling my hand gently from hers.
"What could you possibly have done?" She folded her arms over her chest, stubborn and insecure all at once. "Despite all this talk, when I look in your eyes I still see you. You look sad, you look confused, you look desperate, but you still look like the man I fell in love with."
I flinched at hearing her say that word.
"Looks can be deceiving," I replied quietly. "Estelle... you have a good life here. You have a steady job, a beautiful home, an ambitious future. I have..." I looked down the hallway, towards the bedroom where Gabe and the others were resting or at least politely pretending to. "I'm not part of the world you live in any more."
"You could be," she said. "Or I could be part of your world."
I let out a bark of incredulous laughter and for a moment was angry at her, irritated that she could be stupid enough to think it that simple.
"Part of my world? My world? The last time I dragged you into my world, a man nearly killed you. Or have you forgotten that already?"
Estelle went very still, and her eyes revealed that her mind was somewhere else, a darker place. When she returned, she looked me very squarely in the eye.
"I haven't forgotten. Not a day goes by that I don't remember that night," she took a step forward, defiant. "But even when he was tearing my clothing off, even when he had that gun pressed to my temple, do you want to know what I was thinking about? I was thinking about you, lying on the floor, dying. The thought of losing you was scarier than anything he could have done to me." Her eyes dropped. "The sick irony is, he didn't take you away from me that night. I sent you away. And ever since that day, I've wondered how things could have been different if I could have just accepted you."
The look on her face was strong, but her voice was faltering. I reached out to gently brush her cheek, then tilted her chin up to face me. She looked at me with those clear, beautiful blue eyes, her expression almost begging.
"Oh Estelle." I smiled. "How could you, how could anyone possibly accept me? I don't accept myself."
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Powder Kegs
Oooh, well this is rare. I'm posting something from an actual book in progress. Fancy, huh? This is from Raze Vol 3, enjoy.
I find that most old flames are suited only for lighting powder kegs. So it was probably stupid of me to come here at all. And yet...
It almost looked as though time had stopped when I'd left. She hadn't moved out of our old place. The simple one story building hunched in the shadows of the ancient oaks towering above, a perfect image of the way I'd left it. I'd half expected the gutters to be full, the lawn overgrown, her small Dodge in the driveway to be growing rusted. But everything was maintained to perfection, and I suppose I should have expected no less from her.
This was not to say that things were no different, only that they looked the same. She had gotten another dog since Rhett had died. It must have been indoors, but I could smell its territorial pissings from the tree line. The scent of the place was different; it didn't smell like "us" anymore. I doubted she had a stable companion, but there were old traces, masculine wans lingering behind. A stupid part of me felt jealous about this, like it couldn't remember the nearly seven years that had passed since I'd left.
One window was illuminated an incandescent gold, a rectangular beam of light stretching across the lawn outside. This used to be our dining room. If I craned my neck, I could see that she had replaced our large mahogany dining table with a more personal, modern-style table for two. With her parents having moved out of state while we were together, and mine estranged by my disappearance, she didn't need a seating for family gatherings any longer.
The quiet house suddenly came to life with movement. First, a big, bounding dog - some kind of shepherd mix - bounced enthusiastically past the window in the direction of our - her -kitchen. If I strained, I could faintly hear her laughter and the soft, cooing tones she used to address the dog. I smiled, tail thumping between my legs; she'd always had a way with animals. The jangle of a leash, however, swept the smile from my face. Many dogs reacted to therians the way they would to any large predator: territorial, aggressive, warning. Up a tree for a good vantage point, I was a sitting duck.
Frantically, I began to scrabble down the trunk, only to hear the front door creak open. Almost immediately, the loud, booming barks of the dog filled the silence of the night air.
"What's wrong, Boomer?"
What an amusingly apt name.
"Boomer, no! Hey! Get back here!"
Pounding paws, jangling metal, and the slithering of something dragging through the leaves: that would be the sound of a dog yanking its leash from its owner's hand and dashing off in pursuit of a werewolf. I jumped to the ground just in time for the dog to reach the tree line and erupt into furious, rapid-fire barking as it closed in on its target. I realized with a growing sense of dread that with the dog already at a full run and me just regaining my footing, I couldn't run away fast enough. If the dog attacked me as I fully suspected it would by the familiar aggressive tone to its vocalizations, I was going to end up killing it in order to defend myself and escape. I sighed, then began the undignified climb back up the tree trunk, where I hunkered in the densest boughs that would hold my weight.
The dog stood at the base of the tree, neck craned upwards, teeth bared and pelt standing on edge. He barked, one loud, sharp note after the other. I imagined in dog he was saying something to the tune of "Hey, Estelle! I've got your ex up a tree! Come and look!" which was of course precisely what was going to happen as I heard her clumsy human footfalls drawing ever nearer. Finally, her pale skin was visible through the trees, and she addressed the dog in a stern, scolding voice that made me want to submit.
"That is very bad, Boomer! Very bad!"
The dog let out a low whine, ears drooping and tail hanging slack, but didn't move from the base of the tree nor remove his fixated gaze from me.
Estelle stopped a few feet away.
"Come here."
The dog's eyes flicked her way and he whimpered, sitting down, but continued staring upwards.
"Boomer! I am talking to you, now you come here. You're a very bad dog!"
Boomer stood up, prancing from paw to paw and groaning. He looked over his shoulder at her, then back up the tree, and let out a whiny bark. Estelle heaved a great sigh.
"Ok, what have you got up there? Raccoon again?"
Not quite.
She strode over, squinting upwards in the darkness. Her weak human vision couldn't spot me, and I held still, barely daring to breathe. Perhaps she would lose interest and take the dog back inside... nope, there was the flashlight. Well, fuck. The beam of light snaked up the tree trunk, and I attempted to hunch lower among the branches, vanish into the bark. It was a futile effort; the light bounced off of my feline pupils, and Estelle let out a short gasp. Her brow furrowed deeply as the small circle of light offered tiny pieces of a larger puzzle: a long, canine snout, a thick striped pelt, a humanoid forearm garbed in fur. When the light finally caught the dense mat of dangling dreadlocks at my nape, however, her eyes widened and her lip trembled.
"Trent?" She called out softly, her voice barely a whisper.
My pulse began to race; I hadn't heard her speak my name in so long. Did I dare to reply?
"Trent, is that you?" she said a little louder, focusing the flashlight on my face. I squinted at the brightness and turned away with a huffing sigh.
"Well this is embarrassing," I finally replied, aiming for mirth but a distinct sadness tainting each gruff, barely human syllable.
Estelle let out a long, rattling breath. Her dog let out a confused whine; I heard his tongue lapping against the palm of her hand in a gesture of comfort.
"I'm going to take Boomer back inside... promise me you won't leave?"
I didn't respond.
"Trent, please. I think you owe me as much."
I sighed, ears drooping.
"I won't leave."
But Christ, did I ever want to.
I find that most old flames are suited only for lighting powder kegs. So it was probably stupid of me to come here at all. And yet...
It almost looked as though time had stopped when I'd left. She hadn't moved out of our old place. The simple one story building hunched in the shadows of the ancient oaks towering above, a perfect image of the way I'd left it. I'd half expected the gutters to be full, the lawn overgrown, her small Dodge in the driveway to be growing rusted. But everything was maintained to perfection, and I suppose I should have expected no less from her.
This was not to say that things were no different, only that they looked the same. She had gotten another dog since Rhett had died. It must have been indoors, but I could smell its territorial pissings from the tree line. The scent of the place was different; it didn't smell like "us" anymore. I doubted she had a stable companion, but there were old traces, masculine wans lingering behind. A stupid part of me felt jealous about this, like it couldn't remember the nearly seven years that had passed since I'd left.
One window was illuminated an incandescent gold, a rectangular beam of light stretching across the lawn outside. This used to be our dining room. If I craned my neck, I could see that she had replaced our large mahogany dining table with a more personal, modern-style table for two. With her parents having moved out of state while we were together, and mine estranged by my disappearance, she didn't need a seating for family gatherings any longer.
The quiet house suddenly came to life with movement. First, a big, bounding dog - some kind of shepherd mix - bounced enthusiastically past the window in the direction of our - her -kitchen. If I strained, I could faintly hear her laughter and the soft, cooing tones she used to address the dog. I smiled, tail thumping between my legs; she'd always had a way with animals. The jangle of a leash, however, swept the smile from my face. Many dogs reacted to therians the way they would to any large predator: territorial, aggressive, warning. Up a tree for a good vantage point, I was a sitting duck.
Frantically, I began to scrabble down the trunk, only to hear the front door creak open. Almost immediately, the loud, booming barks of the dog filled the silence of the night air.
"What's wrong, Boomer?"
What an amusingly apt name.
"Boomer, no! Hey! Get back here!"
Pounding paws, jangling metal, and the slithering of something dragging through the leaves: that would be the sound of a dog yanking its leash from its owner's hand and dashing off in pursuit of a werewolf. I jumped to the ground just in time for the dog to reach the tree line and erupt into furious, rapid-fire barking as it closed in on its target. I realized with a growing sense of dread that with the dog already at a full run and me just regaining my footing, I couldn't run away fast enough. If the dog attacked me as I fully suspected it would by the familiar aggressive tone to its vocalizations, I was going to end up killing it in order to defend myself and escape. I sighed, then began the undignified climb back up the tree trunk, where I hunkered in the densest boughs that would hold my weight.
The dog stood at the base of the tree, neck craned upwards, teeth bared and pelt standing on edge. He barked, one loud, sharp note after the other. I imagined in dog he was saying something to the tune of "Hey, Estelle! I've got your ex up a tree! Come and look!" which was of course precisely what was going to happen as I heard her clumsy human footfalls drawing ever nearer. Finally, her pale skin was visible through the trees, and she addressed the dog in a stern, scolding voice that made me want to submit.
"That is very bad, Boomer! Very bad!"
The dog let out a low whine, ears drooping and tail hanging slack, but didn't move from the base of the tree nor remove his fixated gaze from me.
Estelle stopped a few feet away.
"Come here."
The dog's eyes flicked her way and he whimpered, sitting down, but continued staring upwards.
"Boomer! I am talking to you, now you come here. You're a very bad dog!"
Boomer stood up, prancing from paw to paw and groaning. He looked over his shoulder at her, then back up the tree, and let out a whiny bark. Estelle heaved a great sigh.
"Ok, what have you got up there? Raccoon again?"
Not quite.
She strode over, squinting upwards in the darkness. Her weak human vision couldn't spot me, and I held still, barely daring to breathe. Perhaps she would lose interest and take the dog back inside... nope, there was the flashlight. Well, fuck. The beam of light snaked up the tree trunk, and I attempted to hunch lower among the branches, vanish into the bark. It was a futile effort; the light bounced off of my feline pupils, and Estelle let out a short gasp. Her brow furrowed deeply as the small circle of light offered tiny pieces of a larger puzzle: a long, canine snout, a thick striped pelt, a humanoid forearm garbed in fur. When the light finally caught the dense mat of dangling dreadlocks at my nape, however, her eyes widened and her lip trembled.
"Trent?" She called out softly, her voice barely a whisper.
My pulse began to race; I hadn't heard her speak my name in so long. Did I dare to reply?
"Trent, is that you?" she said a little louder, focusing the flashlight on my face. I squinted at the brightness and turned away with a huffing sigh.
"Well this is embarrassing," I finally replied, aiming for mirth but a distinct sadness tainting each gruff, barely human syllable.
Estelle let out a long, rattling breath. Her dog let out a confused whine; I heard his tongue lapping against the palm of her hand in a gesture of comfort.
"I'm going to take Boomer back inside... promise me you won't leave?"
I didn't respond.
"Trent, please. I think you owe me as much."
I sighed, ears drooping.
"I won't leave."
But Christ, did I ever want to.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Peace
I have a massive folder stuffed with papers of little tidbits I wrote at various points over the past year. This was in there. Before anyone throws a hissy fit, yes, I am well aware that self injury is NOT an indicator of suicidality. However, since it is concurrent with such a wide range of psychiatric conditions, it isn't unreasonable to think that someone with an SI history might also suffer from suicidality. That being said, if you have an SI history PLEASE do not read this as it may be triggering.
"Fuck!" I shout to no one in particular, slamming both hands against the steering wheel before veering off hard to the right. The undercarriage of my Chevy protests as the tall grasses and lumpy, uneven earth scrape close. Stopping the car about a hundred feet into a barren winter cornfeild, I kill the ignition and sit in silence, head tossed back and eyes closed. My breaths rasp heavily from my lungs, and even my own nose wrinkles at the alcohol reek on my lips.
Gazing skywards through that strip of tint the old cars like this always have at the top of the windsheild, the moon and stars are cast in blue. They look so cold without their natural soft yellows, uncaring voids in the desolation of space. I feel like that gibbous moon, barren and empty, half obscured in shadows, always chasing some warm glow I'll never be able to hold on to.
My Guiness beckons and I grab the half-empty bottle to take a swig. It slips through my sloppy drunken fingers, hitting the hard plastic of the cup holder just right - or just wrong, depending on how you look at it - and shatters, spilling its frothy contents across the passenger seat. I wail like a wounded animal, rubbing my hands over my face and dropping my head to the steering wheel. Even my escapes are failing me.
Fighting back tears, I look down at the shimmering shards of broken glass, glinting razor-sharp in the moon light. That urge, that obsessive urge like a ravening hunger, wells up inside of me. I pick up a green glass daggar, rolling up my left sleeve. In the dim lighting, the shadows play off of the scars, turning slight abberations of my flesh into nightmare landscapes of ragged pink gorges and lumpy white ridges. I trace the surface of my arm tentatively with my fingertip, the glass clutched in my hand running gently and cooly along my flesh like a promise of what was to come.
I hate it. I hate this. I hate the persistent tick-tock in my chest. I hate waking every god damned morning knowing that I've fucked up for good, that the rest of my life is just damage control from now on. Grazing over the thick blue veins peeking out from behind the pale flesh of my wrist, I wonder if I can go through with it. After all, isn't that what all these scars are? Practice?
I press the glass against the underside of my forearm, feel the sensation of the skin straining, straining, breaking. Feel the epidermis split, feel the fascia part, feel the muscle tear. Blood is already welling, making the shard slick so that I have to grip it tighter, make it bite into my palm to maintain grip as I drag it downwards. Closer and closer, it inches towards my wrist, the sound like shredding pantyhose but heavier somehow. The flayed flesh hangs open like a gutted fish in the moonlight. The blood looks black in darkness, like I am full of rot - and who's to say I'm not?
No good. Not close enough to any vessels. Is there nothing I can do right? Forget the slow stuff, foreplay is over. Steeling my arm and clenching my fist, I drive hard and fast against the skin, a puncture-then-pull motion meant to do major damage like a wolf's fangs worrying an elk's gut.
Suddenly, I'm not making a fist any more. My hand unfurls like a flower in sunlight, limp and exposed. Shit, I've hit a tendon instead of a vessel. So much for slashing the other wrist; better make this one count. I palpate the throbbing artery deep below the surface, beat skipping excitedly from the pain, leaving perfect rubicund prints behind just before I force the glass straight through it. Pain, sudden intense pain, then pulsating. Staring at the chunk of glass embedded a full half inch into the slickened flesh of my forearm, I see thick rivulents of blood welling up in a steady cadence all around the makeshift blade. No going back now. I drag the shard with gritted teeth, listening to that wet-fabric ripping noise of tearing flesh, then withdraw. The climax, my blood flowing out in big horror-movie gushes, begins to stain the upholstery.
I lean back in my seat, useless hand hanging low in my lap. The car is getting cold, and it's not just me; I can see my shuddering breaths rising in tiny white clouds before my eyes from the frigid temperature. I shiver a little, from the night air or the blood loss or both, and reach out with my right hand for the lever to recline. It slips from my slick grasp the first few times before finally letting the seat down. I fall back, letting out a long tremulous sigh before rolling my gaze skywards to the ceiling of my car. I wonder if this is what being in a coffin feels like.
Outside, crickets chirp and distant cattle low. No cars rumble by on the rural dirt road behind me; I am truly alone. It reminds me of how the sick barn cats on my grandpa's farm used to walk off into the woods to die. I never got it as a child, but I definitely understand right now.
Everything is getting cold now, the world fuzzy and dark around the edges. I'm not worrying about work or school, about relationships, about how I'm going to survive the next day. I'm just listening to the chorus of crickets fading in the background, feeling the warmth fading from my body just the same, the steady gush from the wound growing weak and erratic. I have no hope, no ambition, no plans for the future. And for the first time in as long as I can remember, I finally feel...
Peace.
"Fuck!" I shout to no one in particular, slamming both hands against the steering wheel before veering off hard to the right. The undercarriage of my Chevy protests as the tall grasses and lumpy, uneven earth scrape close. Stopping the car about a hundred feet into a barren winter cornfeild, I kill the ignition and sit in silence, head tossed back and eyes closed. My breaths rasp heavily from my lungs, and even my own nose wrinkles at the alcohol reek on my lips.
Gazing skywards through that strip of tint the old cars like this always have at the top of the windsheild, the moon and stars are cast in blue. They look so cold without their natural soft yellows, uncaring voids in the desolation of space. I feel like that gibbous moon, barren and empty, half obscured in shadows, always chasing some warm glow I'll never be able to hold on to.
My Guiness beckons and I grab the half-empty bottle to take a swig. It slips through my sloppy drunken fingers, hitting the hard plastic of the cup holder just right - or just wrong, depending on how you look at it - and shatters, spilling its frothy contents across the passenger seat. I wail like a wounded animal, rubbing my hands over my face and dropping my head to the steering wheel. Even my escapes are failing me.
Fighting back tears, I look down at the shimmering shards of broken glass, glinting razor-sharp in the moon light. That urge, that obsessive urge like a ravening hunger, wells up inside of me. I pick up a green glass daggar, rolling up my left sleeve. In the dim lighting, the shadows play off of the scars, turning slight abberations of my flesh into nightmare landscapes of ragged pink gorges and lumpy white ridges. I trace the surface of my arm tentatively with my fingertip, the glass clutched in my hand running gently and cooly along my flesh like a promise of what was to come.
I hate it. I hate this. I hate the persistent tick-tock in my chest. I hate waking every god damned morning knowing that I've fucked up for good, that the rest of my life is just damage control from now on. Grazing over the thick blue veins peeking out from behind the pale flesh of my wrist, I wonder if I can go through with it. After all, isn't that what all these scars are? Practice?
I press the glass against the underside of my forearm, feel the sensation of the skin straining, straining, breaking. Feel the epidermis split, feel the fascia part, feel the muscle tear. Blood is already welling, making the shard slick so that I have to grip it tighter, make it bite into my palm to maintain grip as I drag it downwards. Closer and closer, it inches towards my wrist, the sound like shredding pantyhose but heavier somehow. The flayed flesh hangs open like a gutted fish in the moonlight. The blood looks black in darkness, like I am full of rot - and who's to say I'm not?
No good. Not close enough to any vessels. Is there nothing I can do right? Forget the slow stuff, foreplay is over. Steeling my arm and clenching my fist, I drive hard and fast against the skin, a puncture-then-pull motion meant to do major damage like a wolf's fangs worrying an elk's gut.
Suddenly, I'm not making a fist any more. My hand unfurls like a flower in sunlight, limp and exposed. Shit, I've hit a tendon instead of a vessel. So much for slashing the other wrist; better make this one count. I palpate the throbbing artery deep below the surface, beat skipping excitedly from the pain, leaving perfect rubicund prints behind just before I force the glass straight through it. Pain, sudden intense pain, then pulsating. Staring at the chunk of glass embedded a full half inch into the slickened flesh of my forearm, I see thick rivulents of blood welling up in a steady cadence all around the makeshift blade. No going back now. I drag the shard with gritted teeth, listening to that wet-fabric ripping noise of tearing flesh, then withdraw. The climax, my blood flowing out in big horror-movie gushes, begins to stain the upholstery.
I lean back in my seat, useless hand hanging low in my lap. The car is getting cold, and it's not just me; I can see my shuddering breaths rising in tiny white clouds before my eyes from the frigid temperature. I shiver a little, from the night air or the blood loss or both, and reach out with my right hand for the lever to recline. It slips from my slick grasp the first few times before finally letting the seat down. I fall back, letting out a long tremulous sigh before rolling my gaze skywards to the ceiling of my car. I wonder if this is what being in a coffin feels like.
Outside, crickets chirp and distant cattle low. No cars rumble by on the rural dirt road behind me; I am truly alone. It reminds me of how the sick barn cats on my grandpa's farm used to walk off into the woods to die. I never got it as a child, but I definitely understand right now.
Everything is getting cold now, the world fuzzy and dark around the edges. I'm not worrying about work or school, about relationships, about how I'm going to survive the next day. I'm just listening to the chorus of crickets fading in the background, feeling the warmth fading from my body just the same, the steady gush from the wound growing weak and erratic. I have no hope, no ambition, no plans for the future. And for the first time in as long as I can remember, I finally feel...
Peace.
Monday, July 5, 2010
The Muse
The Muse
Her cage has bars of branching neurons
from behind which she sings like a canary
and screeches like a harpy.
Her feathers are dry and dusty
her claws overgrown
her muscles atrophied:
she hasn't flown in so long
that her wings are only a memory.
With wild eyes
she watches the world go by
until the moment's right.
She'll break free
Swoop over peaks of poised pens
Dive through the valleys between pages
Dip her beak and talons in ink
And scratch her voice across the paper
Her cage has bars of branching neurons
from behind which she sings like a canary
and screeches like a harpy.
Her feathers are dry and dusty
her claws overgrown
her muscles atrophied:
she hasn't flown in so long
that her wings are only a memory.
With wild eyes
she watches the world go by
until the moment's right.
She'll break free
Swoop over peaks of poised pens
Dive through the valleys between pages
Dip her beak and talons in ink
And scratch her voice across the paper
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Two shorts slightly based on reality.
May was damned busy. I got virtually no writing done aside from a few tottering steps forward in my actual novel. So to kick of June, here's two short pieces that aren't very well written and reflect how rust I've gotten from months of inactivity.
When Words Like "Socioeconomic Status" Suddenly Mean Something
Staying in this house is unsettling to me. It's not for any of the reasons you'd expect - unfamiliarity, homesickness, loneliness, boredom. Rather, wandering the vast spaces of their opulent home is overwhelming. I spend my time like a savage cast unexpectedly into civilization. Their modern luxuries are alien technology: twin showerheads you can individually engage by turning a knob, a microwave that detects when the popcorn is ready, a clock radio that produces soothing nature sounds and - at five o'clock every morning, regardless of my attempts to disable it - an alarm that starts as slow, hesitant beeping and rises to an urgent, high-pitched wail. Their dogs have nicer beds than many children. Their cupboards are stocked with foods I could only justify affording for special occasions.
They have an alarm system. A code to enter the garage. Floodlights. Deadbolts. Neighboring homes looming close. My house has no security system. The garage door's lock broke years ago. A tiny lightbulb that often burns out casts its glow only as far as my front stoop. Our old locks and windows can be overwhelmed easily with a sufficient ammount of prodding. Tall trees hide us from neighbors that don't even smile in acknowledgement when we briefly meet at the edge of the road, fetching bills and court dates from our mailboxes.
Yet every night, I sit huddled on the couch between two dogs, mace within arm's reach, jumping at every tiny noise and fleeting shadow. The TV's indifferent glow somehow offers reassurance as if darkness and silence were prerequisites of violence, as if home invasions couldn't happen with a studio audience laugh track filling the room.
I'm frightened because these people aren't like me. They have things worth stealing.
The Reality Check
Our clothes were so drenched that my seats had the perfect imprints of human bodies damply etched into upholstery, and the entire car reeked like wet hair. I felt a certain glimmer of hope, a skipping rythm in my chest, when you suggested with a grin that we take them off. How many stupid girls had fallen for that dazzling smile, thinking that an eccentric intellectual would somehow be the moral superior of a man who pants down the front of your shirt with alcohol on his breath at the club? A college career doesn't neuter a man.
Afterwards, when you'd promptly found an excuse to leave, I foolishly laid in that tangle of sheets still stinking of sex and smiled. I'd fallen prey to the same idiotic mentality of every woman shafted (literally) before me; I'd allowed myself to get excited by the notion that we were now lovers. Yet as the sheets cooled in the absence of your body, I came to realize the reality of the situation. I was a lover. You were just a fucker.
When Words Like "Socioeconomic Status" Suddenly Mean Something
Staying in this house is unsettling to me. It's not for any of the reasons you'd expect - unfamiliarity, homesickness, loneliness, boredom. Rather, wandering the vast spaces of their opulent home is overwhelming. I spend my time like a savage cast unexpectedly into civilization. Their modern luxuries are alien technology: twin showerheads you can individually engage by turning a knob, a microwave that detects when the popcorn is ready, a clock radio that produces soothing nature sounds and - at five o'clock every morning, regardless of my attempts to disable it - an alarm that starts as slow, hesitant beeping and rises to an urgent, high-pitched wail. Their dogs have nicer beds than many children. Their cupboards are stocked with foods I could only justify affording for special occasions.
They have an alarm system. A code to enter the garage. Floodlights. Deadbolts. Neighboring homes looming close. My house has no security system. The garage door's lock broke years ago. A tiny lightbulb that often burns out casts its glow only as far as my front stoop. Our old locks and windows can be overwhelmed easily with a sufficient ammount of prodding. Tall trees hide us from neighbors that don't even smile in acknowledgement when we briefly meet at the edge of the road, fetching bills and court dates from our mailboxes.
Yet every night, I sit huddled on the couch between two dogs, mace within arm's reach, jumping at every tiny noise and fleeting shadow. The TV's indifferent glow somehow offers reassurance as if darkness and silence were prerequisites of violence, as if home invasions couldn't happen with a studio audience laugh track filling the room.
I'm frightened because these people aren't like me. They have things worth stealing.
The Reality Check
Our clothes were so drenched that my seats had the perfect imprints of human bodies damply etched into upholstery, and the entire car reeked like wet hair. I felt a certain glimmer of hope, a skipping rythm in my chest, when you suggested with a grin that we take them off. How many stupid girls had fallen for that dazzling smile, thinking that an eccentric intellectual would somehow be the moral superior of a man who pants down the front of your shirt with alcohol on his breath at the club? A college career doesn't neuter a man.
Afterwards, when you'd promptly found an excuse to leave, I foolishly laid in that tangle of sheets still stinking of sex and smiled. I'd fallen prey to the same idiotic mentality of every woman shafted (literally) before me; I'd allowed myself to get excited by the notion that we were now lovers. Yet as the sheets cooled in the absence of your body, I came to realize the reality of the situation. I was a lover. You were just a fucker.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
And that's how Clarence became a terrorist (Part 1)
Clarence Bryd, werewolf, is a character I will eventually write about if I ever finish my first two novel ideas and get to a third. Without revealing too much, he eventually becomes part of a terrorist organization. It all started with a visit to one of his buddies from Vietnam. I began to write out this scenario for a post at the RPG "Tower," but obviously it being Tower, it deviated from the actual outcome. So here is Part 1 of 2 - Clarence arriving at his buddy's apartment. Part 2 is fourthcoming as soon as I have a moment to write.
Clarence turned the wipers off and killed the ignition. The raindrops slapped gently against the windshield, congealing, distorting the world outside until the sparse trees, the ramshackle apartments, the cracked concrete looked as though they were fashioned of melting wax. A stray cat, rail-thin, despairing, and ragged like the people here lapped water from a puddle, its surface iridescent with motor oil. A woman who was just a child herself pushed a weathered baby carriage, wheels spattered the mud and grime, over sidewalks addled with deep fissures. Her eyes were hard, joyless.
Clarence turned the wipers off and killed the ignition. The raindrops slapped gently against the windshield, congealing, distorting the world outside until the sparse trees, the ramshackle apartments, the cracked concrete looked as though they were fashioned of melting wax. A stray cat, rail-thin, despairing, and ragged like the people here lapped water from a puddle, its surface iridescent with motor oil. A woman who was just a child herself pushed a weathered baby carriage, wheels spattered the mud and grime, over sidewalks addled with deep fissures. Her eyes were hard, joyless.
It caused Clarence a strange discomfort in the pit of his stomach, thinking of Robert living in a place like this. He remembered his smiling, clean-shaved face, eyes transfixed on the shimmering Pacific ocean far below their plane. Over the roar of the engine and snoring of their fellow marines, the other man had told him that his service would give him the money he needed to study biology in Europe, where therians were treated like humans. He wanted to travel the world filming endangered species, or something like that.
Decency was an endangered species in this town. He could smell through the car’s vent the scents of humanity’s decay: the vinegar reek of old heroin syringes; the alcohol stink of discarded whiskey bottles in paper bags; the musk of used condoms from cheap alleyway dalliances; the stinging wan of gunpowder and with it, old blood. He sighed, his hand resting on the door’s handle, not sure he really wanted to venture up the rusted fire escape, a five story ascent, to visit some ghost that barely resembled the man he’d known in Vietnam.
Sunday, April 4, 2010
Young Sreya
I never write from Sreya's perspective. This bugs me. She is the female protag of my novel, and she doesn't get nearly enough attention even there. So, I decided to think back to what Sreya's still-human days as a college intern at an emergency veterinary office might be like. And I wound up with this; I think it suits her very well and suggests that there was very much a hint of "matriarch" there even before the "hyena" bit.
Six in the morning. Anywhere else it would be silent, still. In the city, I could already hear the hustle and bustle of traffic, the distant wail of sirens, the soft trilling calls of pigeons. This street was comparatively quiet; it was the sort with boarded up windows and broken dreams. No one here had a reason to be up this early; many of them had just filtered home from their night-time escapes from reality. Conversely, I’d been on night duty at the animal ER, a full-immersion shock therapy treatment in reality. The dog I was walking needed a fecal sample; I’d already collected it, and now it was just the quiet clatter of his claws on the pavement until we returned.
The pitbull mix at the end of the leash tensed suddenly, his ears snapping forward and legs stiffening. I looked up the corridor of concrete. Beside a crumbling brick building with a sagging, lopsided stoop, a young man - perhaps in his early twenties - leaned against the wall. His eyes were maliciously mischievous, sexual as he shamelessly gave me a long look up and down. This reaction was sadly somewhat typical when I dared to venture out in public donning my lab coat and scrubs. Something about a woman in professional garb seems to make men feel even more determined to reduce her to mere meat. Threatened, perhaps?
My tension was traveling down the leash; I could see the pit’s hackles raising. Not wanting to bear responsibility for another injurious dog bite statistic for the beleaguered breed, I called him in close to a “heel” position and patted his flank reassuringly. I then continued along my path, eyes focused dead ahead, exuding all of the cool confidence I could muster without throwing on a pair of shades and popping my collar.
My efforts to proceed in quiet dignity were for nigh.
“Hey, baby.”
I’ll never understand why men think this line will ever attract a woman; being compared to a helpless, squalling shit factory is hardly what I call a term of endearment. I strode past him without so much as a sideways glance, refusing to acknowledge such a salutation. His lanky frame peeled away from the wall in a creeping fluid motion.
“Oh, don’t be like that girl,” he chided, pulling a cigarette from behind his ear and lighting up as he approached. “That’s a nice dog you got.”
“Yup,” I replied succinct and tight-lipped with vast disinterest.
Deterring a horny, overconfident twenty-something, however, is like trying to stop the tide.
“You like animals, baby?” He was nearly jogging beside me as I hastened my pace in an effort to reach the busy main street ahead. He leaned in close with a leering grin, teeth yellowed from the smoke that crept between them as he smiled. “I can be a real animal.” His voice was dripping with sex.
I stopped in my tracks, chin raised defiantly, and gave him the sort of look I normally reserve for the discovery of dog vomit on the clinic floor.
“My job also involves picking up pieces of shit,” I said, raising the full bag clutched in my hand. “Are you going to throw me some cheesy line about how you can be a real piece of shit as well?”
He flushed with anger, pausing flustered as I began walking away before roughly grabbing my arm. The dog let out a low growl, and I muttered a quick reassurance.
“What’s the matter, bitch?” Ah, I’d gone from a baby to a dog. This was an improvement. “You don’t wanna do it doggy style?”
I grinned at him, the sort of big glistening smile that turns into a snarl at the edges, the sort with hollow, dangerous eyes. Confusion flitted across his face. He didn’t even have time to react as I dropped the bag and pulled the knife from my pocket in one seamless motion. The blade thrust upward and stopped with the tip gently grazing the hem at his inner thigh.
“I castrate dogs.”
Six in the morning. Anywhere else it would be silent, still. In the city, I could already hear the hustle and bustle of traffic, the distant wail of sirens, the soft trilling calls of pigeons. This street was comparatively quiet; it was the sort with boarded up windows and broken dreams. No one here had a reason to be up this early; many of them had just filtered home from their night-time escapes from reality. Conversely, I’d been on night duty at the animal ER, a full-immersion shock therapy treatment in reality. The dog I was walking needed a fecal sample; I’d already collected it, and now it was just the quiet clatter of his claws on the pavement until we returned.
The pitbull mix at the end of the leash tensed suddenly, his ears snapping forward and legs stiffening. I looked up the corridor of concrete. Beside a crumbling brick building with a sagging, lopsided stoop, a young man - perhaps in his early twenties - leaned against the wall. His eyes were maliciously mischievous, sexual as he shamelessly gave me a long look up and down. This reaction was sadly somewhat typical when I dared to venture out in public donning my lab coat and scrubs. Something about a woman in professional garb seems to make men feel even more determined to reduce her to mere meat. Threatened, perhaps?
My tension was traveling down the leash; I could see the pit’s hackles raising. Not wanting to bear responsibility for another injurious dog bite statistic for the beleaguered breed, I called him in close to a “heel” position and patted his flank reassuringly. I then continued along my path, eyes focused dead ahead, exuding all of the cool confidence I could muster without throwing on a pair of shades and popping my collar.
My efforts to proceed in quiet dignity were for nigh.
“Hey, baby.”
I’ll never understand why men think this line will ever attract a woman; being compared to a helpless, squalling shit factory is hardly what I call a term of endearment. I strode past him without so much as a sideways glance, refusing to acknowledge such a salutation. His lanky frame peeled away from the wall in a creeping fluid motion.
“Oh, don’t be like that girl,” he chided, pulling a cigarette from behind his ear and lighting up as he approached. “That’s a nice dog you got.”
“Yup,” I replied succinct and tight-lipped with vast disinterest.
Deterring a horny, overconfident twenty-something, however, is like trying to stop the tide.
“You like animals, baby?” He was nearly jogging beside me as I hastened my pace in an effort to reach the busy main street ahead. He leaned in close with a leering grin, teeth yellowed from the smoke that crept between them as he smiled. “I can be a real animal.” His voice was dripping with sex.
I stopped in my tracks, chin raised defiantly, and gave him the sort of look I normally reserve for the discovery of dog vomit on the clinic floor.
“My job also involves picking up pieces of shit,” I said, raising the full bag clutched in my hand. “Are you going to throw me some cheesy line about how you can be a real piece of shit as well?”
He flushed with anger, pausing flustered as I began walking away before roughly grabbing my arm. The dog let out a low growl, and I muttered a quick reassurance.
“What’s the matter, bitch?” Ah, I’d gone from a baby to a dog. This was an improvement. “You don’t wanna do it doggy style?”
I grinned at him, the sort of big glistening smile that turns into a snarl at the edges, the sort with hollow, dangerous eyes. Confusion flitted across his face. He didn’t even have time to react as I dropped the bag and pulled the knife from my pocket in one seamless motion. The blade thrust upward and stopped with the tip gently grazing the hem at his inner thigh.
“I castrate dogs.”
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Romance, Raze-Style
I feel badly about abusing my hypothetical readers with poor quality, emotionally disturbed writing from my teenage years earlier today. So I have a treat for you: pure, unfiltered sap with two of the novel's cutest couples. For those who don't know them: Trent is a hybrid therianthrope, while his girlfriend Sreya is the matriarch of a werehyena clan. And Gabe the werebear has his heart set on the vampiress Evelyn, a former fighting animal he helped rescue from an illegal preternatural pit-fighting operation.
1. Gabriel and Evelyn
Evelyn turned to walk away and Gabe reached out, grasping her wrist gently but firmly. Her skin was clammy against the heat of his palm.
"Don't do this, Evelyn," he pleaded, dark brown eyes scanning her face in hurt confusion. She stared back cooly, the black voids of her large pupils unrevealing.
"We're just kidding ourselves, Gabe. This can't work. I'm not human." She choked out a pained laugh. "I can't even take a walk in the park with you during the day time."
Gabe snorted.
"For the record, I hate the park. Nothing but pigeon shit and and homeless people." he grinned. "Besides, I'm not human either. Or did you forget the whole "turns into a ravening bear on the full moon" part of our relationship?"
"It's not the same thing," she replied with a scowl, jerking her pale, slender wrist free of his grip with ease. "I'll outlive you, probably by a hundred years. You'll grow old and die, and I won't age a day."
"So I've got a few more years of being the lucky dude with the experienced older woman, and when I'm 80 I get to be the dirty old man with the hot young girlfriend?" He wriggled his brow, silver hoops dancing up and down. "Sounds good to me."
"Is everything a goddamn joke to you?" she replied with disgust, aggressively pulling the door open. Gabe countered, slamming his palm against the wood. It closed so forcefully that it shuddered on its hinges. Evelyn turned around with an exhasperated sigh and was surprised to find a great intensity of raw emotion in his young eyes.
"You are not a joke to me." He reached out brushed the pale, cool skin of her cheek with the back of his dark, hairy knuckles. "Evelyn... I want to watch the sun set behind the Bitterroot with you. I want to walk along the creek in the moonlight, see the stars shining in those beautiful black eyes of yours like a reflection of the night sky. I want to hunt with you, hear the rush of your wings above me." He cradled her chin with his other hand. "I don't want a human, or another therian, or anything else. I want you."
He pulled away, straightening out his posture, folding his muscular arms over his chest stubbornly, and gave a sly smile.
"And because you just made me say something that fucking lame, you're stuck with my until I'm a toothless old pervert."
2. Trent and Sreya
Although it was sufficiently warm this late in the summer for my t-shirt to cling to my back with sweat, the breeze coming off of the lake was crisp and cool. It smelled like freshly melted snow, sharp and pure. The mid-day sun sparkled on the water's surface, choppy from the wind. It made reflections of the mountains looming high above distort and ripple, like their vast, craggy peaks were melting away. A few well-worn tree trunks and pitted glacial erratics broke the surface at staggared intervals by a shore of smooth cobbles. I could hear the water softly lapping at the stones.
Sreya had abandoned her backpack, jettisoned her hiking boots, discarded her socks in a crumpled heap by the water's edge. The tan flesh of her smooth, muscular calves prickled into goosebumps as she waded out ankle deep. She grinned over her shoulder, raven-black hair falling over her face strand by strand in the wind.
"It's so cold!" she remarked, sounding pleasantly surprised.
"It's fed by run-off from the glaciers." I pointed to the network of narrow streams and waterfalls cascading down the steep, rocky prominences all around us. She shielded her eyes from the sun with one hand, face a mask of wonderment as she scrutinized the towering walls of granite and the scruffy little trees clinging desperately to the rock.
"This is fantastic. I can't believe I've lived in Montana this long and never came here!"
She planted her hands on her hips as if readying to scold herself for such a transgression, then looked back to me. Her khaki shorts were smeared with dirt, her dark green shirt damp with sweat where the backpack's straps had crossed her shoulders. Her hair was billowing in a wild, unruly tangle around her face, cheeks still flush from the strenuous climb. ...And damned if she wasn't still positively breathtaking.
"Will you take my photo? I want to remember today," she asked with a beaming smile. I was rummaging through my pack for the camera before she could finish the sentence; I wanted to remember today as well.
1. Gabriel and Evelyn
Evelyn turned to walk away and Gabe reached out, grasping her wrist gently but firmly. Her skin was clammy against the heat of his palm.
"Don't do this, Evelyn," he pleaded, dark brown eyes scanning her face in hurt confusion. She stared back cooly, the black voids of her large pupils unrevealing.
"We're just kidding ourselves, Gabe. This can't work. I'm not human." She choked out a pained laugh. "I can't even take a walk in the park with you during the day time."
Gabe snorted.
"For the record, I hate the park. Nothing but pigeon shit and and homeless people." he grinned. "Besides, I'm not human either. Or did you forget the whole "turns into a ravening bear on the full moon" part of our relationship?"
"It's not the same thing," she replied with a scowl, jerking her pale, slender wrist free of his grip with ease. "I'll outlive you, probably by a hundred years. You'll grow old and die, and I won't age a day."
"So I've got a few more years of being the lucky dude with the experienced older woman, and when I'm 80 I get to be the dirty old man with the hot young girlfriend?" He wriggled his brow, silver hoops dancing up and down. "Sounds good to me."
"Is everything a goddamn joke to you?" she replied with disgust, aggressively pulling the door open. Gabe countered, slamming his palm against the wood. It closed so forcefully that it shuddered on its hinges. Evelyn turned around with an exhasperated sigh and was surprised to find a great intensity of raw emotion in his young eyes.
"You are not a joke to me." He reached out brushed the pale, cool skin of her cheek with the back of his dark, hairy knuckles. "Evelyn... I want to watch the sun set behind the Bitterroot with you. I want to walk along the creek in the moonlight, see the stars shining in those beautiful black eyes of yours like a reflection of the night sky. I want to hunt with you, hear the rush of your wings above me." He cradled her chin with his other hand. "I don't want a human, or another therian, or anything else. I want you."
He pulled away, straightening out his posture, folding his muscular arms over his chest stubbornly, and gave a sly smile.
"And because you just made me say something that fucking lame, you're stuck with my until I'm a toothless old pervert."
2. Trent and Sreya
Although it was sufficiently warm this late in the summer for my t-shirt to cling to my back with sweat, the breeze coming off of the lake was crisp and cool. It smelled like freshly melted snow, sharp and pure. The mid-day sun sparkled on the water's surface, choppy from the wind. It made reflections of the mountains looming high above distort and ripple, like their vast, craggy peaks were melting away. A few well-worn tree trunks and pitted glacial erratics broke the surface at staggared intervals by a shore of smooth cobbles. I could hear the water softly lapping at the stones.
Sreya had abandoned her backpack, jettisoned her hiking boots, discarded her socks in a crumpled heap by the water's edge. The tan flesh of her smooth, muscular calves prickled into goosebumps as she waded out ankle deep. She grinned over her shoulder, raven-black hair falling over her face strand by strand in the wind.
"It's so cold!" she remarked, sounding pleasantly surprised.
"It's fed by run-off from the glaciers." I pointed to the network of narrow streams and waterfalls cascading down the steep, rocky prominences all around us. She shielded her eyes from the sun with one hand, face a mask of wonderment as she scrutinized the towering walls of granite and the scruffy little trees clinging desperately to the rock.
"This is fantastic. I can't believe I've lived in Montana this long and never came here!"
She planted her hands on her hips as if readying to scold herself for such a transgression, then looked back to me. Her khaki shorts were smeared with dirt, her dark green shirt damp with sweat where the backpack's straps had crossed her shoulders. Her hair was billowing in a wild, unruly tangle around her face, cheeks still flush from the strenuous climb. ...And damned if she wasn't still positively breathtaking.
"Will you take my photo? I want to remember today," she asked with a beaming smile. I was rummaging through my pack for the camera before she could finish the sentence; I wanted to remember today as well.
Drive Safely
More old stuff: the blogger's solution to an utter lack of inspiration.
With all of the lights flashing red and white, it would have been festive. Would have, if it wasn't just the constant flash of alternating tail lights and break lights in the stop-and-go hubbub of the town. The cars were clotting up the roadways like cholesterol in a trouble-bound aorta, every new set of tires hitting the street just a build up to the bursting point.
It was always like this around the holidays; instead of spending time at home with their families, everyone was cursing in bumper to bumper traffic, cutting each other off and running redlights with a predictable regularity that made the offenses boring and run of the mill. It stripped each of these life-threatening acts, these callous moments of disregard, of every bit of shock value until it was just another asshole endangering someone's life. Half of the time the folks running red, children in the back seat, weren't even quick about it, didn't even look sneaky or ashamed. The new unspoken rule wasn't that we'd all abide by the rules of the road, but rather that we'd stop and look both ways before daring to go on green.
I was pressing the tip of a Marlboro to the red-hot coils of my car's cigarette lighter. The tobacco ignited in a flash of brilliant orange, curled black paper dissolving away like the tender alveoli of my lungs. I brought the thin white stick to my lips, using the other hand to press the horn at an SUV who was sticking half of the way out into my lane, insistent on edging his way into the tie-up so he could wait somewhere else. As I inhaled, I could feel the hot smoke curl down my trachea and blossom in my lungs, more satisfying than air and yet somehow less substantial as well. As twin plumes of pale grey curled from my nostrils, I fancied that I had become the traffic dragon, some surly beast laying in wait until one more idiot incurred my fiery wrath.
When the light turned green, I inched up to the bumper ahead of me, eager to get through this time around. I was midway through the intersection when my peripheral vision caught a flash of motion to the left. It was the only warning I received before the Chevy collided with the driver's side door. I remember thinking how funny it was; something that crumbled like a ball of tinfoil on impact made so much noise! Steel shouldn't collapse like that, so it must have been something else - paper, aluminum - than hit my side so hard that I found myself in the passenger side a moment later, head pressed against the window and elbow jammed between the seat and the frame.
I don't know if I blacked out or what, but in what only seemed like seconds later, there were sirens in the distance. My side felt strange, too many angles and fluidity all at once, like I was a leaky plastic garbage bag filled with broken bottles and their former contents. I could feel the cigarette, still pressed snugly between my index and middle finger, littering ash all over my skin as my shaking hand attempted to lift it once more to my lips. Something was wrong though; my elbow was stuck, my wrist felt strangely limp.
So I lowered my head, feeling for the first time the gritty sensation of the safety glass pressed into my cheek and scalp, glued in tight by coagulated blood. When I finally was able to clumsily close my lips over the Marlboro, I couldn't get the suction I wanted, the smoke just leaking in - unsatisfactory. And when I tried to exhale, I was no longer the traffic dragon, but something different - an incense burner, with little tendrils of smoke rising from the dark red patches on my broken-bottle side. When the lights started flashing in the distance, reflecting off of the dark blood pooling in the side-door ashtray that I'd dropped my cigarette into, I again found myself thinking, how festive.
With all of the lights flashing red and white, it would have been festive. Would have, if it wasn't just the constant flash of alternating tail lights and break lights in the stop-and-go hubbub of the town. The cars were clotting up the roadways like cholesterol in a trouble-bound aorta, every new set of tires hitting the street just a build up to the bursting point.
It was always like this around the holidays; instead of spending time at home with their families, everyone was cursing in bumper to bumper traffic, cutting each other off and running redlights with a predictable regularity that made the offenses boring and run of the mill. It stripped each of these life-threatening acts, these callous moments of disregard, of every bit of shock value until it was just another asshole endangering someone's life. Half of the time the folks running red, children in the back seat, weren't even quick about it, didn't even look sneaky or ashamed. The new unspoken rule wasn't that we'd all abide by the rules of the road, but rather that we'd stop and look both ways before daring to go on green.
I was pressing the tip of a Marlboro to the red-hot coils of my car's cigarette lighter. The tobacco ignited in a flash of brilliant orange, curled black paper dissolving away like the tender alveoli of my lungs. I brought the thin white stick to my lips, using the other hand to press the horn at an SUV who was sticking half of the way out into my lane, insistent on edging his way into the tie-up so he could wait somewhere else. As I inhaled, I could feel the hot smoke curl down my trachea and blossom in my lungs, more satisfying than air and yet somehow less substantial as well. As twin plumes of pale grey curled from my nostrils, I fancied that I had become the traffic dragon, some surly beast laying in wait until one more idiot incurred my fiery wrath.
When the light turned green, I inched up to the bumper ahead of me, eager to get through this time around. I was midway through the intersection when my peripheral vision caught a flash of motion to the left. It was the only warning I received before the Chevy collided with the driver's side door. I remember thinking how funny it was; something that crumbled like a ball of tinfoil on impact made so much noise! Steel shouldn't collapse like that, so it must have been something else - paper, aluminum - than hit my side so hard that I found myself in the passenger side a moment later, head pressed against the window and elbow jammed between the seat and the frame.
I don't know if I blacked out or what, but in what only seemed like seconds later, there were sirens in the distance. My side felt strange, too many angles and fluidity all at once, like I was a leaky plastic garbage bag filled with broken bottles and their former contents. I could feel the cigarette, still pressed snugly between my index and middle finger, littering ash all over my skin as my shaking hand attempted to lift it once more to my lips. Something was wrong though; my elbow was stuck, my wrist felt strangely limp.
So I lowered my head, feeling for the first time the gritty sensation of the safety glass pressed into my cheek and scalp, glued in tight by coagulated blood. When I finally was able to clumsily close my lips over the Marlboro, I couldn't get the suction I wanted, the smoke just leaking in - unsatisfactory. And when I tried to exhale, I was no longer the traffic dragon, but something different - an incense burner, with little tendrils of smoke rising from the dark red patches on my broken-bottle side. When the lights started flashing in the distance, reflecting off of the dark blood pooling in the side-door ashtray that I'd dropped my cigarette into, I again found myself thinking, how festive.
Scene from a Nightmare
This is actually old writing, but I figured I'd cross-post it here because a. I haven't put out anything new and b. it's reasonably well written, if not a bit disturbing. It is very literally a scene from one of my nightmares; I had some really twisted dreams after my best friend was raped (by a friend of mine, no less), and this was one of them.
"This would be a lot easier," I say, "if you would just stop screaming."
Not really, not physically at least, but my ears wouldn't be ringing, and I'd be able to focus better. I mean, it's bad enough that his head is almost completely shaved, just this nasty coarse stubble that gets slick and impossible to grasp with all the blood, even with my hand spread wide and my fingers digging in. There's nothing to grab on to, no fistful of hair to twist into a handle. I have to use this belt instead, crammed into his mouth and fastened until his doughy creeks droop over the leather and the veins in his temples throb like an orgasm. With one hand controlling his head like he's some unruly stallion on the end of my reigns, I'd really only have one hand to work with if I wanted to keep slamming his face into the curb, and at my weight, one hand doesn't really cut it, especially with his slippery, grainy scalp.
But really, I didn't wear the right footwear for stomping, so the whole thing is taking much longer than it should.
I have these stupid, smooth-bottomed Walmart shoes that are coming apart at all of the seams and have faded into a grungy beige over time. The soles are a death trap in the rain or mud, so if I'm not careful, I'll be the one coughing up teeth on the curb by the time I finish. The balancing act is bad enough; one arm pulling up on the belt to keep it nice and tight and controlled, one foot forcing down hard on the back of this squirming, screeching head. I think the poise demanded of sociopaths is severely trivialized. Balancing all of my weight on this one grounded leg, and wagging my grimey rubicund free arm around like some really twisted tightrope walker, is all I can do to keep from falling flat on my ass.
The curb is starting to look like one of those precautionary snuff films they show you during defensive driving courses. Three hours of staring at big crimson stains and little wet erubescent chunks, wondering if you're the only one getting off. This guy, his face is starting to look like there's more of it on the curb than on the bone. The concrete is a thick, slick mess of blood and snot and tissue, a rainbow of just reds ranging in color from "clot" to "connective tissue."
The little bits of broken teeth are making horrible grinding noises every time another forceful kick drives them against the hard, uneven conglomorate. There's that walking-through-mud squelching of his raw face against the pulp of everything that made it raw spread out all over the sidewalk. Sometimes, there's a wet snap or pop when the cartilage in his broken, mashed up nose shifts or breaks.
I'm sure he thinks the pain is the worst part, but really, it's the sound.
"This would be a lot easier," I say, "if you would just stop screaming."
Not really, not physically at least, but my ears wouldn't be ringing, and I'd be able to focus better. I mean, it's bad enough that his head is almost completely shaved, just this nasty coarse stubble that gets slick and impossible to grasp with all the blood, even with my hand spread wide and my fingers digging in. There's nothing to grab on to, no fistful of hair to twist into a handle. I have to use this belt instead, crammed into his mouth and fastened until his doughy creeks droop over the leather and the veins in his temples throb like an orgasm. With one hand controlling his head like he's some unruly stallion on the end of my reigns, I'd really only have one hand to work with if I wanted to keep slamming his face into the curb, and at my weight, one hand doesn't really cut it, especially with his slippery, grainy scalp.
But really, I didn't wear the right footwear for stomping, so the whole thing is taking much longer than it should.
I have these stupid, smooth-bottomed Walmart shoes that are coming apart at all of the seams and have faded into a grungy beige over time. The soles are a death trap in the rain or mud, so if I'm not careful, I'll be the one coughing up teeth on the curb by the time I finish. The balancing act is bad enough; one arm pulling up on the belt to keep it nice and tight and controlled, one foot forcing down hard on the back of this squirming, screeching head. I think the poise demanded of sociopaths is severely trivialized. Balancing all of my weight on this one grounded leg, and wagging my grimey rubicund free arm around like some really twisted tightrope walker, is all I can do to keep from falling flat on my ass.
The curb is starting to look like one of those precautionary snuff films they show you during defensive driving courses. Three hours of staring at big crimson stains and little wet erubescent chunks, wondering if you're the only one getting off. This guy, his face is starting to look like there's more of it on the curb than on the bone. The concrete is a thick, slick mess of blood and snot and tissue, a rainbow of just reds ranging in color from "clot" to "connective tissue."
The little bits of broken teeth are making horrible grinding noises every time another forceful kick drives them against the hard, uneven conglomorate. There's that walking-through-mud squelching of his raw face against the pulp of everything that made it raw spread out all over the sidewalk. Sometimes, there's a wet snap or pop when the cartilage in his broken, mashed up nose shifts or breaks.
I'm sure he thinks the pain is the worst part, but really, it's the sound.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Finding Humanity
His flat, round, unblinking eye is staring out from the bowl. It darts to and fro like a fish does, like he used to. His only other movement is the tremor of his body, his gills flapping laboredly. His mouth opens and closes in great, gasping gulps like he is out of the water. His bright gold scales are a sparkling wave of iridescence with every twitch of his dying body; they seem too cheerful, inapropos, for his dire state. Little red streaks from sepsis travel through his fins like road map to suffering.
A little girl in the class asks the other youth minister why God allows people to suffer. She is probably only six or seven years old, but she already recognizes the incongruity. He smiles her words away and offers the same tired platitude: God has a plan for us all. I remember a time when I could say those words with conviction.
My attention drifts back to the fish and his silent plea for mercy. I fancy that man must be the God of beasts, for like Him, we ignore their suffering. I let out a strangled bark of laughter that garners a frown from my comrade; I don't care. I pick up the bowl, the cool orb heavy in my hands, and I dash from the room. I run past the Christian nursery school, children seated semi-circle in rapt attention, their bright eyes focused on picture-book depictions of Jesus. The preist's sermon echoes incoherently down the hallway.
I am not certain of what I will do with this goldfish, but I am certain of one thing: I am tired of being a God. Today, I have found Humanity.
A little girl in the class asks the other youth minister why God allows people to suffer. She is probably only six or seven years old, but she already recognizes the incongruity. He smiles her words away and offers the same tired platitude: God has a plan for us all. I remember a time when I could say those words with conviction.
My attention drifts back to the fish and his silent plea for mercy. I fancy that man must be the God of beasts, for like Him, we ignore their suffering. I let out a strangled bark of laughter that garners a frown from my comrade; I don't care. I pick up the bowl, the cool orb heavy in my hands, and I dash from the room. I run past the Christian nursery school, children seated semi-circle in rapt attention, their bright eyes focused on picture-book depictions of Jesus. The preist's sermon echoes incoherently down the hallway.
I am not certain of what I will do with this goldfish, but I am certain of one thing: I am tired of being a God. Today, I have found Humanity.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Three Shorts
1. Soldier
My hands are too clumsy weak, too slippery with blood to really grasp anything properly... but I want to hold it anyways. I fumble against my coat pocket; I've had this coat for years, but suddenly this old friend is a new enemy as the fabric sticks to my fingers, folds under my grasp, refuses to yield. It takes most of the energy I have left to finally clench it weakly between a trembling thumb and pointer, and the rest to withdraw it, hold it in the fading field of my vision. Things are getting dim, but her smile on that faded, wrinkled film is brighter than the sun creeping over the horizon to my back.
"All for you, babe," I mutter to a memory. "It was always all for you."
2. Cattle
It did not take long to find the herd; they bellowed and belched and reeked blatantly, the quiet, cautious decency of a prey animal long forgotten. Hunkered in fat, dull masses like their human masters, the cattle wrapped their strong tongues around the grass, dragging it up by its roots and chewing idly. Their hooves cut into the frozen soil as they slowly paced to and fro to strip more plant life from the earth. All around, the prairie was marred by their gluttonous destruction.
3. Nevermind
I still remember how you invited me back to your house, paused, and then said "Nevermind." I thought little of it at the time; you were busy with academia as always. Now I think perhaps you knew that it was going to be the last time you ever saw me, and wanted to keep it as simple and perfect as the day had been. But part of me still wishes I’d known, too.
My hands are too clumsy weak, too slippery with blood to really grasp anything properly... but I want to hold it anyways. I fumble against my coat pocket; I've had this coat for years, but suddenly this old friend is a new enemy as the fabric sticks to my fingers, folds under my grasp, refuses to yield. It takes most of the energy I have left to finally clench it weakly between a trembling thumb and pointer, and the rest to withdraw it, hold it in the fading field of my vision. Things are getting dim, but her smile on that faded, wrinkled film is brighter than the sun creeping over the horizon to my back.
"All for you, babe," I mutter to a memory. "It was always all for you."
2. Cattle
It did not take long to find the herd; they bellowed and belched and reeked blatantly, the quiet, cautious decency of a prey animal long forgotten. Hunkered in fat, dull masses like their human masters, the cattle wrapped their strong tongues around the grass, dragging it up by its roots and chewing idly. Their hooves cut into the frozen soil as they slowly paced to and fro to strip more plant life from the earth. All around, the prairie was marred by their gluttonous destruction.
3. Nevermind
I still remember how you invited me back to your house, paused, and then said "Nevermind." I thought little of it at the time; you were busy with academia as always. Now I think perhaps you knew that it was going to be the last time you ever saw me, and wanted to keep it as simple and perfect as the day had been. But part of me still wishes I’d known, too.
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