Muse Musing 4

She wore black; although I suppose that's cliche, and my consciousness deserves reprimanding after all the years of training in literature about how cliches are horrible little creatures that sucked originality and uniqueness out of a piece until the writer sounds like nothing but a generic robot that couldn't come up with something more clever. Run-on sentences are included in this.

I had been dating a boy from Malaysia. The history of the birth of our relationship is unimportant in this; however, it is important to note that passion and loneliness (which we had in abundance) is not the ideal concoction for true love (which we lacked, and probably still do). It was unexpected, had the worst timing, but we had such faith in it, as if one day, we'd realize that years have passed, we were still in love, and the logical next step would be to put a ring on it. It was the first--and only--time I really opened up to someone. All of my dark secrets, all of my flaws, all of my thoughts and feelings and verbal vomit and attention were given to him. He, dear soul, accepted it all, and most importantly, told me so. In a short few weeks, I had become dependent on him. But the funniest thing about dependence is that there's a part of you that hates it. Absolutely abhors it. As if it were some disgusting parasitic creature feeding off of your life force, but for some strange reason, found it oddly charming and couldn't get rid of it, one way or another.

I was sleeping over at his place. I did that a lot. When we started having sleepovers, my entire body could still remember the pain and torture of the previous relationship. After we got past the physical barrier, I started having nightmares. I woke up in sweat, sometimes in tears, sometimes with a sharp inhale, and he would wake up to comfort me.

It's important to note that the Woman in White had already been conceived and at inopportune times, reminds me of her presence (and, perhaps, my insanity.)

On the edge of sleep, I saw a silhouette of a woman in the distance, just at the brink of darkness, when all of a sudden, her face was centimetres from mine, and I could see the smoothness of her black skin, smell the acidity of the gold lipstick she wore, and the shock of gold eyes that looked almost black. She had a wide, evil sneer, blood dripping down her sharp teeth, and I awoke, unable to breathe, unable to blink, unable to answer him.

I don't blame him from running. I would run too. I just wish he had the courage to tell me that that was the reason.

The Woman in Black is not a sympathetic character, nor is she important. She's sociopathic and violent. She's frightful and mean. If anything, she adds to the weight of the problem. But she's here and here to stay.

I'd like to note that yes, she is black, but not racially black. She is legitimately black--like a black crayon coloured her in with a heavy hand. Racially black has different tints; she does not. She is the colour of the absence of light.

IN-PROGRESS: Turns (1).

He turned on the end of the road, down a small alley easily missed. He remembered this alley by forced habit, not by memory. Returning had been an unfortunate obligation, and returning meant habits resurfacing; habits that he had torn from himself the moment he left town. At least, that’s what he’d thought. Suppose habits weren’t so easily torn from us after all.

The alley itself hadn’t changed: it was narrow, filthy with wayward-blown debris created only by inconsiderate humans, and it stunk of human waste. It was located right behind a public restroom, the type that had a long trench down the middle of the room with false walls up to protect one’s modesty, even though doors were taken off as precaution to prevent drug dealers from smuggling and dealing drugs within the restrooms. Every few minutes, a roar, and down came a torrent of running water to wash the waste down the hole on the other side of the building down into the sewers. No one ever went into that last stall. Too much splash.

Grabbing a silk handkerchief given to him by his fiancé’s mother, he stuck it to his face and hurried out of the alleyway.

He wasn’t sure what he was expecting at the end of it; maybe a field of flowers as a pleasant surprise, or maybe even a familiar building that became a place for him to woo girls when he was back in high school. Instead, he was met with more dark concrete, still wet from the previous night’s rain, and a woman in red who nearly collided with him as he stepped into the open.

“Hey!” the woman exclaimed in their native tongue. “Don’t surprise someone like that!”

If he wasn’t so surprised at the politeness of her diction, he was more surprised that it was Ying.

She had been a mousy thing back in school. She was teased relentlessly for it. He was rather taken back to find that she never left the place that bullied her for years.

“Sorry.”

“Just be careful next time.”

She didn’t give him a second glance as she continued her way to her destination.

Had this been a normal visit home, he would have just let it go.

“If it isn’t Little Mouse,” he said. She turned around slowly. “In a hurry?”

She said, “Boring Ben. Still stuck in old times. Back off, slug.”

He watched as she walked away.

He couldn’t describe the resentment, or the anger he felt as he continued his way home, dressed in his Hugo Boss suit and stylish haircut. Past the stinking bathroom where he could hear backpackers giving out an audible and understandable cry of disgust, and the meat market where the dog carcasses hung, and out of the bustling dirty road onto a smaller road where it led him through thickets of insects and bushes of spiderwebs. He emerged from the small road covered in nature and walked into the stone house where his father sat, staring into the distance beyond the small vegetable garden.

“I thought you said you were going for a walk, not a mountain hike.” His father’s attempt to crack jokes made the prickle in his chest tear into his heart.

“I changed my mind.”

“Your mother was good at that. Changing her mind.”

It’ll do that to you, the past. It hangs like a black cloud over you until you become accustomed to its shadow until one day it strikes with a torrent of lightning and rain. You wake up and realize you’ve never really left.

Ben—he goes by Benjamin now—grimaced and said nothing. He went into the bedroom that he had once shared with his parents, up until his sister had gone to college, and he could finally have her room. He dreaded the holidays when she came home, when he was forced to return to sharing a bed with his parents.

He glanced at the concrete slab that wasn’t even a bed.

It looked a concrete block, connected to the walls of the house. In the summertime, it was cool to lay upon, and in the winter, there was a constant fire burning in the hollowness of the box, keeping it warm. Practical, efficient, but not at all luxurious.

He sat on the concrete, not remembering what it was like without Wi-Fi. He had foolishly left his cell phone at home, romanticizing the idea of his homecoming as a cleansing process, to shake the city from his bones just for a while.

His sister couldn’t make it to the funeral. Tall, sturdily built, with a fire tongue, she had been his friend and constant tormentor. He was never as clever as she, and the world seemed to spin around her. Grass seemed greener as she walked by, flowers bloomed at her feet, and animals were drawn to her. If he hadn’t known better, he would be utterly convinced that she was a modern-day Disney princess.

Except he knew better.

The phone rang.

“Hey, B-sport.”

“What do you want?”

“Rude. Mom and Dad taught you better than that.”

“What do you want?”

“Can I talk to Dad?”

He yelled out to the patio, “Kay’s on the phone!”

He left them to their conversation.

The house never really felt like his, not really. Like something was misplaced or that he was destined for greater things. Perhaps he was the one misplaced. Simply put, he didn’t belong amongst the nature, the physical labor. The moment he moved to Beijing, it had felt like home to him. The struggle was real, but the pay-off at the end was worth it. Busing tables at various restaurants for 20 hours a day, seven days a week for years until he finally landed a managerial job at one of the largest restaurants in Beijing. It seemed uncolorful, but it paid well, and now he was ready to get married and settle down. Was it a crime to want for some normalcy?

He hadn’t told them yet. A part of him didn’t want to. He didn’t want them at the wedding. How embarrassing. His father had always hated Beijing, so really, there was no point. Why bring it up if everyone involved dreaded it? If he didn’t want to?

His father called for him, “Kay wants to talk to you.”

Off the bed, and into his parents’ room. No, parent’s. He must not forget.

“Yes?”

“When are you going to tell him?”

“What?”

“About Bethany. It’ll make him happy.”

“How’d you know about that? Never mind. Stay out of it. It’s none of your business.”

“Sweet girl found me on Facebook and sent me a message. She’s a good one. Knows where her priorities lie.”

“Back off, Kay.”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Just back off. Don’t touch her.”

“You know you don’t deserve her.”

“Butt out.”

He hung up.

There was going to be consequences.

There were always consequences. His favorite toy missing; an unfortunate accident that left him with a broken arm. And there was always Kay, standing in the shadows, eyes laughing, mocking. Nature bloomed around her, and humans withered. They never died, but they hurt, they suffer, and they are driven to madness. Death would be a much better consequence, but she knew that. It wasn’t in her nature to be merciful. 

[cont...]

FAILED: You Don't?

It is time. The time is here, almost here, a few more minutes, please, just a few. Let me speak. Go on. We won't hurt you. Not badly anyway, the way bears do it, mauling men the way they do. We're not animals, and if we were, we wouldn't speak to you...just sounds, guffaws, onomatopoeias, clickclickclicking at your throat.

No, don't get up, we just want to talk. You and me and us. It's not big dealio, just calm your titties, sit down, and enjoy our company. It's so rare to talk to you like this, just the two of us in this box of a room, like a mansion, big, tall, empty, lonely. Don't be afraid--a mansion is home. Cold, tall, empty, lonely. Your home.

You remember, don't you, the way blood spills with a glass of milk, dripdripdripping onto the linoleum like in sports drinks commercials. What is all that nonsense, selling things we don't buy and will never use? When the drinker drinks and runs and breathes you'd think they were going through a heart attack just waiting for life to start again. Hurling through space like nothing could ever stop them the way dinosaurs haven't stopped living--what time is it? Don't make me do all of the talking, you know I hate that all of that sit the fuck down.

Oh dear now you cry. I'm sorry, sorry, sorry shut the fuck up. Fingers thrust down your eyesockets and how do you feel? Cold, tall, empty, lonely? No? Explain. Perhaps like the wind of the winter, the flowers dying by your bedside, and they feel. Petals opening like puberty, take that away. Do you feel? We feel. They feel.

You don't?

FAILED: Unexpected.

It was a beautiful sandwich. Fresh vegetables and cold cuts, bread straight from the oven--a masterpiece. There was no better sandwich in the world for the man she loves. He worked late nights and bought her gifts. He told her that she was his, and he was hers. And one day, this place would be theirs. Possessive pronouns were special that way.

A bang of a door.

"I'm in the kitchen!"

A barrel of a gun.

"Who are you?"

A click of the safety.

"What do you want?"

A cold stare. A revealing of sharp teeth.

Bangbangbang!

FAILED: Cursed.

She yanked the suitcases out from under their--his--bed and began to throw in; the dresses, bras, underwear; pants, shirts, stockings; the jewelry box of rings and gold necklaces and special trinkets; the bottles of perfume and nail laquer and bags of make-up; hairdryer, straightener, Nair hair remover; shampoo and conditioner bottles; the stacks of photo frames sans photos; the archaeology books; the laptops, stereo, CDs. There wasn't enough room, so she pulled out several garbage bags for: the pots, pans, utensils, plates, bowls; the "genuine" African and Maori warrior masks; the fine sets of china and Japanese dolls; the Basano vase; the bag of money from the safe; the monkey's paw, the voodoo dolls, the Hope Diamond, the wedding dress.

He won't be home for another couple of hours. She threw the suitcases and bags into the van. A second thought, she went back inside and unlocked the Robert Doll from his glass case. She winked at him, placed a box of matches and another of gunpowder next to him, and then shut the front door behind her. She could hear movement from behind the door, and then the smoke alarm went off. She drove off.

He won't be home for another couple of hours. That gave her plenty of time.

REMINISCE: Once.

I once knew a writer who brought his own coffee and snacks to the writers’ group. He was eccentric, always smelled of cheap cigarettes, and he talked fondly of living in a tent. He moved his tent around every day to enjoy the beauty of the Iowan landscape. He was always dressed in camo and heavy boots, and he had a rasp in his voice that grated on your ears at first, but then it became comforting. He wheezed a lot, probably due to the unhealthy amount of cigarettes he smoked every day, but he was off alcohol, man, and boy, did it feel good! He wrote about his past, about what might have been his past, about something in his past moved into his future. He was eccentric, but we all liked him after a while.

There was another writer in the group—mousy, a little socially awkward—OK, a lot socially awkward, but had good things to say. She had a bit of a wheezy-hiccuping laugh, but it was endearing. She bit her lips a lot and wore baggy clothing. She had a complicated history, which may have explained her awkward tendencies, but we liked her all the same. She’d move away within a year, and then the others that tried to replace her never could.

Our leader was a family man, a writing man, and he was a friendly man. He worked at the English Center where students were encouraged to go and get help from people who were better at English than they were. He had a wife and a daughter, and he was the encouraging type. Of all of us, he was probably the most mentally stable.

And, there’s me. That angry looking thing in the corner that was attempting to be the cool type but was, deep down, a good girl and would never do anything outside of her moral code. That included under-aged drinking. A bit less awkward, definitely more quiet and had less interesting things to say, but came faithfully every week because, damn it all, I wanted to write and I wanted to be good at it.

I don’t know where we all are now. Eventually, we move on, grow older, think back on those times and imagine what it’d be like if we were together again for one last meeting. Smoking man would probably still be smoking, eating his various canned-tuna-on-crackers or some other interesting snack, and having more stories to tell us. He’d be real comfortable, man, and he’d talk about all sorts of things like hunting and things that he felt were rad, man, because they’re just so rad. Awkward girl would listen and laugh wheezily, add a few comments, and mentally take note of what he was saying for future because he would make a great character in a story someday. Leader would sit, laugh, and listen, occasionally bringing Smoking man back onto the topic of the story that we were reading before letting him spiral out into his vast brain. And me? I don’t know what I’d be doing. Probably sitting, enjoying the small group dynamic before going home and writing about Smoking’s stories in my journal for possible future use.

Or maybe we wouldn’t be able to stand each other. I’d be worse at correcting grammar after having taught English for three years abroad, Awkward would be giving a lot more comments after having been in a Master’s program for writing the past three years, Smoking wouldn’t have changed, and Leader would look older, having more time with his daughter and realizing that he’d have to deal with female puberty soon.

Perhaps it’s better having left everything the way it was. That way we can reminisce about the past with happier thoughts.

EDIT: Not Worth It. -> Ice Cream Dates

An ice cream cone sat on a fish’s head as it stood on one of its fins, the other waving from a sea of scoops of ice cream. Its full lips were puckered, the way a teenager would look being caught mid-first kiss. It reminded her of her first kiss, and her brows furrowed at the memory. Some memories, as sweet as they seemed at the time, were always tainted by history and better left drowned in the past.

It was an ugly mascot—even uglier in the setting sun where the fading sunlight highlighted the manic puckered grin of the fish in the sea of fire balls. But she waited patiently for him as he finished the last few minutes of his shift wiping down tables that hadn’t been used all day.

She brushed off the hem of her sundress and swatted away the mosquitoes that were attracted to her choice of perfume.

It’s been a year. Their first year. Her first one. He promised it’d just be the two of them. After her birthday fiasco, he promised he’d be better.

The review of his family’s ice cream shop when it first opened was framed in a faded gold frame, where the gold flaked off in places, revealing the black plastic underneath. It was located next to the door. Every time the door slammed closed, a golden flake falls, and she is reminded of a child’s dream dying.

From what she could remember the review was a positive one, praising his great-great grandfather’s creativity or, what was the wording?, “creative geniusness.” It might have had something to do with interesting ice cream flavors. One example was rotten fish. It wasn’t very popular from what was gathered, but it was twisted to be positive somehow.

They stopped doing that a while ago.

He just waved good-bye to his cousin—although she’s sure she’s seen them kissing in a darkened alleyway a couple of times her trip home from the library late at night, despite his insistence—and stepped into the street, just as the sunlight receded past his feet.

“Hey.” He grimaced as he saw her.

“Ready to go?”

“I can’t today. Busy. Hangin’ out with the boys. Next time, ey?”

He turned and walked away.

She heard the clanging of the shop door, and the entire frame fell and shattered.

“Oops,” his cousin giggled. “My bad.”

She disappeared around the corner into the dark alley after him, and the shadows swallowed the world and the last fractures of light bounced off the broken glass before they, too, were swallowed.

A Toast to Drunkenness.

1, 2, 3, drink!

Bottom of the ninth. No, not the baseball game. Ninth glass of beer. You can’t remember how many shots she’s had in between.

It is her birthday party. She said she wants to “get krunk” tonight. Forget everything. This is her day. Her day, so everything she says goes. Not that that doesn’t happen every other day, but today is special. Today is her day. Her word is law.

She invited her ex. When she told you, you had half of a mind to shove her into the bathroom and then barricade the door, then force her to think long and hard about what she’s almost done to herself and how thankful she should be to you for saving her from the disaster. A disaster you’d have to clean up afterwards.

Unfortunately, she had been prepared.

1,

2, 3,                                    drink!

She’s slurring on words. She won’t remember this tomorrow. Or ever. She’s not a drinker. How she’s still standing is beyond you.

Her ex is smiling. You clench your fist. Take a sip of your whiskey coke, then force your eyes on the strange men who’ve invited themselves to the party. She likes the attention, but there has to be a limit, right?

                                                                                                                   1

                             2

                                                                                      3                                                                      drink!

She’s been pouring vodka shots all night. She hates vodka.

One of the strange guys sidles up next to you, asking you why you have such a natural bitch face.

1,           2,           3,           drink!

You ignore him.

He’s persistent.

His hand nurses a glass, and the other rests on your bottom.

You pull away.

He follows.

1, 2, 3, drink!

Hands are grabbing now. Forceful. Unyielding.

Talk to me, bitch. You’re pretty.

1,2,3,drink!

Come on, loosen up that pretty face, or—he whispers—would you like me to loosen it up for you?

123drink!

Don’t ignore me, you bitch. Thinking you’re above everyone else. Look at me when I’m talking to you, you whore!

1, 2, 3, smash!

He slumps over.

Her ex is the only one to see it. Everyone else is still drinking, laughing, yelling, dancing, whirling.

A moment of silence, and he raises his glass to you.

1, 2, 3, drink!

Plane Crash.

In the off-chance that my plane crashes, please take note and tell her that I have transcended into the holy land and not to worry about the well-being of my soul. It is not being tortured. That is, if this piece of modern technology can transcend water--if we end up crashing in water, in any case.

Regardless, she will be relieved and stop hankering me or about me. If she asks how you know, tell her that her god has spoken and whisked me away on clouds pulled by the heavenly spirits.

And if she asks, again, how you know, tell her of the scent of jasmine that floated through the air before the crash, how we all saw a bright light, and how god had chosen me as a messenger, to report to him all I've witnessed, and to tell him of my experiences in the world that he had created in seven lazy days.

She'll probably get angry at you for that comment, so just tell her that's what god told me to tell you to tell her, because, let's be real, ain't no one creating a world in seven days could create such a shit world.

She'll argue, but just sit and listen. No need to say anything when she becomes of that state of mind. When she's finished, smile with sympathy, pat her on her shoulder, tell her that you must take your leave now to spread the holy word of the holy book. She'll light up, tell you that he blesses you, and you'll be on your merry way with one hundred grand in your pocket.

What do you say?

Quicksand.

At the bottom,
bubbling lives
clutching at the throats
praying to their dogs
inhaling sand

i am the sand at
the bottom
of the hourglass
and all you
can
will
should
do is surrender

Sinking,
singing,
in bubbles
cascades of dreams
sinking faster than
their
bodies

i am the time that
has passed
with infinitesimal speed
and all you
can
will
should
do is surrender

It's painful
it hurts
help me
help you
but cannot
reach or
touch or
hope

and i am the glass that
holds together time
with precision and symbolism
and all you
can
will
should
do is surrender.