Leave me behind as you do is because of my fault. The fault you saw in me is the one you said you'd fix, it's the fault you spoke to me about while we sat on the bus, and I still had a smile, and a home, I still had ambition and curiosity as to where I belonged. I sat and stared out the spotted window and saw a man on a bicycle, and the bicycle made a sound both wooden and metallic against the side of the bus, and the lump under the wheels did not come with the...
Creeping up again. That is what I thought as as I woke up in my nice but dull apartment. The life I had made for myself, without you, or her, or anyone really at least not anyone warm and willing...wet. Here i was sure, so sure this time that I had vanquished these feelings these ridiculous needs to share my life, my bed to feel your long fingers reaching in to hold me. Gah, too much whiskey not enough coffee or maybe the other way around. I needed to get up to take care of this go downtown and buy...
She didn't look at him.
Instead, she stared out of the window, quivering as though she would cry at any second.
"Bev?" Steven called out tentatively.
She shook her head, still not looking at him. All Steven wanted was for her to look at him. Her gorgeous green stare always made him breathless. She always made him happy.
But now? He screwed up.
"Beverly, c'mon. Say something."
She stared out of her window as though he weren't even there. He walked closer and reached out to touch her shoulder. "Beverly-"
Jerking back violently, she twisted his direction and snarled, "Don't....
He sat in the corner with that look on his face, that look that said, I am about to speak.
"Let's get up and go."
I felt so sick, my joints ached, my mouth felt like it had been dry since the moment I was born. I got up anyway. There was no point resisting.
"We've gotta hustle." He said preemptively thwarting the gleam of protest he already suspected.
"But I'm so tired, baby." I said, hoping in vain that he would go for me.
We got off the cold floor without another word. I threw up on the way...
I was an optimist. I thought that I, like Hemingway, could weave my influence between countries, live in the welcoming limbo between a government I believed in and one that spoke my language. I stopped trying to return to the United States thirty years ago. I am an airplane steward now. Sometimes I write in imperfect Spanish for a newspaper named after a boat named after a nameless elderly woman half a century dead. I believe every word I write. I am happy.
But the days I spent in the narrow land come back to me every day. They knew...
Chazz sat back after moving off a ways. He wanted to see the reaction. It wasn't going to be easy for the old man. Chazz had a picture in his house of his granparents sitting together on the beach. Most beach chairs were low to the ground, these weren't, these afforded old folks a short trip to vertical. The women weren't memborable, but the men were. Both we wearing white undershirts, one V-neck the other not, black shorts with gold clasp belt buckles, and black dress sock up to their knees. The old man was dressed the same way.
He...
Cleanliness was a virtue. They told him that.
"Who are they?" The others would ask. The others didn't believe in they. But they are there. They must be. Or else, why they tell him that?
They also told him of the magical properties of the string. The others didn't believe in the string, but he convinced them.
you must try the ritual of the string, or it will not work it is powered by nonbelievers
The others were intrigued. Still, they did not believe, but, perhaps, what harm is it to see where this leads?
Of course, the ritual of...
Dolly told me about the swimming pool in Mr. Sakimoto's bonsai garden. The water was warm, she said, no matter what time of year. Also we could pee in it. Mr. Sakimoto didn't mind. In fact, it was expected.
We went after school that one day in February. I'd bought a special bathing suit just for the occasion. It was a Speedo. Yellow. With Scooby Doo on the crotch. Dolly didn't like it, but she wasn't my girlfriend, so it didn't matter.
We arrived at 3 a.m. (The bus broke down so we had to walk.) By that time, we...
The key couldn't break.
Forged by the hand of fate
In the fires of adversity
Her love would mold
The white-hot metal
Into the shape it was meant to take
Then
Cooled by her touch
Quenched with desire
It would unlock
Anything
"I shot my butler." I threw the manuscript across the room. Grabbed a scotch. No. Wait. Wanted a scotch, grabbed a bourbon. Drank it anyway. What kind of a piss-poor story ends with "I shot my butler?"
It was Fight Club, that's what did it. I think. All this unreliable narrator business. The publishing world hasn't been the same since, filled with hacks trying to seem clever with these terrible twist endings. It's almost unbearable.
I polished off my bourbon. Still wanted scotch. Rang for Jeffrey. The house is too big, I can't be expected to go all the way...