The next morning, Echo picked up Eros and me so that we could check on Phoenix before she got too wrapped up in the day to have the time. We found out that Phoenix's leg had been broken and untreated for at least six months and she was going to need to have it amputated because the infection had spread further than they had initially thought. Echo's demeanor darkened at the news, and I felt gut-sick over the money she was forking out because I really had no idea if I would be able to pay her back. Once the operation was all scheduled and there were no questions left to ask, we left to go back to the apartment Eros and I shared.
“You know, that really pisses me off.” Echo said suddenly, in a forceful voice that I had never heard her use before in all of my days of unintentional eavesdropping. Eros started and looked over at her.
“What, babe?” she asked, concern leaking into her voice.
“How her leg has been broken for so long without anybody even doing anything about it. It's so fucking typical!” Echo clutched the steering wheel and inhaled deeply. “I mean, she's lucky they didn't just kill her right off.”
“What are you talking about?” Eros frowned. “Why would they do that? I thought the vet tried to save animals, not kill them over broken legs...that's really stupid.”
“I know it's really stupid, I'm not talking about the vet.” Echo said, glancing from the road to Eros. “I'm talking about the fucks who race greyhounds. Once the dog breaks its leg it's no good to them anymore so a lot of the time what happens is they just kill them. Snag a life and throw it in the trash like it's a potato chip that fell on the floor.” She gripped the steering wheel in an outward display of disgust.
“Even the ones that aren't hurt are allowed only so much human contact and raised in pens that aren't climate controlled so there's the high risk of them either freezing or being overheated. But they're just money with legs to those people so it doesn't even matter.” She continued.
I almost wished she wouldn't. I was getting sick to my stomach, and car rides have never been easy on me anyway.
“Once they're finally retired and given the chance to actually be a dog instead of a remote-controlled human luxury, some of them are sent to adoption centers but there are so many of them that there are still thousands of them not adopted out that have to be put to sleep.”
Echo spoke passionately. She had become a public service announcement that I didn't want to hear. I grew more and more angry at myself with her every word for letting the New York City dummy go on unpunished. I was responsible for Phoenix, whether she was legally mine or not. Otherwise I never would have found her, she would never have been saved. I was more determined than ever to take care of her for the rest of her life and get the money to pay Echo for all that she had done.
Echo dropped us off and left to go to some class that was less than interesting enough to remember. When we got inside the front door, Eros and I exchanged a worried look. I had already been feeling this strong sense of presentiment in the back of my heart, and I hoped that this wasn't going to be the scene it was meant to play out. We could hear Dyce in the bathroom, screaming at herself in the mirror, playing the acoustic guitar that she and Cage shared. Playing violently. We closed the door quietly as we listened, trying to make ourselves as nonexistent as possible. She coarsely described her eyes and her smile and the way that others see them compared to the way that she saw them, the way that Cage saw them, the way her ugly-fucking-mother saw them. According to Dyce, humanity saw her as a one-dimensional surface to be walked on, labeled as this kind of walkway or that, dirtied, wiped clean, and repeat. Cage saw her soul, all the good parts that could never be lost in the oblivion of every day life. No matter who or what dirtied her up, he could wipe her clean, and still not pay attention to the grime left under his fingernails because to him, she was perfect no matter what. And her cunt mother just saw her eyes as needy, her smile as sycophantic, saw her as the three and a half year old leech that she had left at the daycare center, contacted 12 years later with empty promises of love and repentance-inspired trips to the zoo, and ultimately left reabandoned. She ended it with a frantic prayer. As she let the words spill out of her in short sobs, I could imagine her teetering unsteadily with her jaw arched toward the ceiling, her fists clenched, her soul ablaze, and I hated the world.
It was hard to tell if she was sober or not, the way that Dyce was. Sometimes when she was binging she would lock herself in the bathroom for hours writing and scribbling and strumming away at that guitar. Eros probably assumed that she was all doped up, but I had the feeling that she was completely sober and had probably just had a bad day. Cage wasn't anywhere around, so she might have just been feeling lost. He was her whole world, only it wasn't as pathetic as it sounds because she was his, too. They were always hovering around each other with an unhealthy-seeming devotion, a fact that at first I found revolting and really hard to stomach because it seemed like all they did was have sex and stay curled together in their bedroom when they weren't off doing the Madame's bidding. Eventually though I got used to the way they were and it became an almost comfortable norm. They were Cage and Dyce. They were each other's. Eternally. They were addiction personified.
And don't get me wrong, they were not just addicts of each other. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I would come back to the apartment to find them sprawled out right on the living room floor surrounded by dirty needles and pipes, Dyce draped like a doll over Cage's bare torso, Cage's mouth partially open, both equally lost in their own individual delirium. Sometimes they talked seriously about dying together, in just that position, Dyce draped over Cage's torso, clinging as though if she let go and they drifted apart the earth would shatter beneath them like ice.
They would die together, there was no other option.
Dyce saw life as a series of painful moments, monotonous ups and downs, a game that some lost, some won, and everybody else cheated at. Everything but Cage was just another dice rolled, a square to land on, and a consequence to live through until you finally reached the end of the game board. It kind of worried me sometimes the way that she assumed that life was just a game to pass the time until she died. And any shrink knows that there isn't a lot you can do once someone realizes the triviality of living...especially to convince them that something as small as the full harvest moon harbors the beautiful humbling majesty of existence and is worth staying awake to see. She refused to be humbled- strung out in an alley, yes, a puppet to her own lack of control, yes, but a big ol' no to humbled- and to me the fact symbolized that when it came down to it, she was beyond repair. I couldn't make her care about life or herself, things like her health and her future, as much as she cared about Cage and being obscured by her choice narcotic and having enough to last the rest of the month as well.
There wasn't anything I could do. People go through life guilt-tripping themselves about how they failed someone somewhere down their course of existence, how it's their fault that bad things happened and berating their decisions and actions or inaction with all the self-loathing pain in the world. I guess yes, sometimes blame is on your shoulders, but the truth is, some of us are just poisoned. Born to detonate. And there's really nothing you can do about it. All the loving words and nudges in the right direction you can muster will not keep someone determined to self-destruct from self-destructing. In fact, sometimes all it does is push too hard, cause more chaos, and set the detonation time from fifty seconds to fifteen.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Chapter 12
When I finally reached the apartment, I stormed in through the door out of breath and panting. For the second time that day I was responsible for making Eros and Echo jump away from each other, however this time I saw Eros's mouth open indignantly to tell me off, something about a tie on the door and what the hell was wrong with me. She clamped it back shut, though, after taking in the fact that I was carrying a dog she had never seen before.
I looked directly at Echo for probably the first time ever.
“Help her.” I held my arms out and she rushed forward with a little gasp and lifted the dog from me with a gentle ease that made me feel guilty for every unkind thought I had ever had towards her.
From there everything kind of happened in a blur. Eros, Echo and I took the dog in Echo's snazzy little Volvo to the veterinary clinic where she worked. Since I didn't have any money to cover the admittance costs or the actual treatment, Echo took responsibility for it all under her name and took care of all the financial stuff. She was a serious life saver that day, and I almost wanted to puke because of all the horrible things I've wanted to say to her or to Eros on behalf of her.
The three of us waited in the “waiting room” for any news of her, Echo stretching her rights as a secretary to sneak back and forth to check on the progress. She'd return with little phrases like “underweight”, “rehabilitation”, “fracture” or “internal injuries” and we would sit a while in silence until the actual vet came out and let us know what all they would and wouldn't be able to do for her and that they would inform us tonight if the conditions changed. We weren't supposed to expect her to be able to recover any time soon because there was more wrong with her than we could tell from the outside.
Technically, since we weren't her legal owners (and it struck me then how absurd it is to claim yourself the owner of any living thing rather than the guardian, and how maybe if we were all appointed the guardians of animals instead of the owners as though they're as inanimate chairs, people wouldn't confuse their worth with, well, the worth of chairs.) we didn't have to take her home if we didn't want to. We could just as easily turn her over to the clinic or somewhere else where they would try to adopt her out for a while until it didn't happen and they “put her to sleep.” I didn't particularly care for either option, and knowing that there were people out there who not only chose it but did so out of laziness rather than practicality and need made my blood boil. There was nothing I could do for the animals that had died just because people decided it was too annoying to take care of them, but I would be damned if that happened to her. I was busy thinking up names for her when I realized that in order to keep her, I would have to go through Echo first.
I almost wanted to name the dog Eros, then.
They were lounged into each other, Eros stretched across two chairs and her head resting in Echo's stomach. Echo had her arms over her possessively. There was nothing else that we could do there that night because the dog had to stay for more treatment, but something hanging in the air felt unresolved. I knew what it was.
“I can pay you back if you let me keep her.” I said suddenly, looking at Echo. “I will.”
“I know.” she said with a warm smile.
We all stood at virtually the same time and walked outside to her Volvo. We rode back to the apartment in silence.
During the silence that sets when a car full of people is left idle while waiting for said people to make some sort of parting gesture, I looked from the backseat into Echo's eyes from her rear view mirror.
“Thank you.” I said quietly. “I'm calling her Phoenix.”
Echo smiled at me and I awkwardly climbed out of her vehicle while she and Eros made their lovey-dove eyes and said goodbye.
When we were inside and Echo was on her way home, Eros and I were sitting in our room on our beds across from each other. I was stroking Tanner absently, lost in thought when Eros startled me by speaking.
“I wonder what made that guy want to hurt her so badly...” Eros asked into space. She clenched her fists. “Maybe she bit him.” she answered herself.
“Whatever happened, she didn't deserve that.” I spat, nauseated by the memory of the sickly looking city dummy. “I had an idea of what I should do to that guy, and if I ever see him again, he'd better hope-”
“I love it when you do that.” Eros said with a quiet laugh.
“Huh?” I was completely bewildered.
“When you act like you've got a mean bone in that little body of yours. You're not fooling anyone, so you may as well give it up.” she smiled teasingly at me and I felt myself growing red.
“He was a huge creep... he's lucky I don't carry a blade like Dyce does.” I said defensively.
“You would never use it.” Eros said, peering deeply into me the way she used to before Echo had come along. I didn't answer because I knew she was right. Instead I merely sighed.
“Do you think that I could get the money back to Echo from The Garden?” I asked, changing the subject. I wasn't sure how to act with her staring at me like that. It halfway excited me and halfway made me miserable.
“There would have to be something in it for her. You know that.” Eros answered, biting her lip. “Maybe if you just explained...”
“Yeah... maybe...” It was doubtful but worth a try, I supposed.
I looked directly at Echo for probably the first time ever.
“Help her.” I held my arms out and she rushed forward with a little gasp and lifted the dog from me with a gentle ease that made me feel guilty for every unkind thought I had ever had towards her.
From there everything kind of happened in a blur. Eros, Echo and I took the dog in Echo's snazzy little Volvo to the veterinary clinic where she worked. Since I didn't have any money to cover the admittance costs or the actual treatment, Echo took responsibility for it all under her name and took care of all the financial stuff. She was a serious life saver that day, and I almost wanted to puke because of all the horrible things I've wanted to say to her or to Eros on behalf of her.
The three of us waited in the “waiting room” for any news of her, Echo stretching her rights as a secretary to sneak back and forth to check on the progress. She'd return with little phrases like “underweight”, “rehabilitation”, “fracture” or “internal injuries” and we would sit a while in silence until the actual vet came out and let us know what all they would and wouldn't be able to do for her and that they would inform us tonight if the conditions changed. We weren't supposed to expect her to be able to recover any time soon because there was more wrong with her than we could tell from the outside.
Technically, since we weren't her legal owners (and it struck me then how absurd it is to claim yourself the owner of any living thing rather than the guardian, and how maybe if we were all appointed the guardians of animals instead of the owners as though they're as inanimate chairs, people wouldn't confuse their worth with, well, the worth of chairs.) we didn't have to take her home if we didn't want to. We could just as easily turn her over to the clinic or somewhere else where they would try to adopt her out for a while until it didn't happen and they “put her to sleep.” I didn't particularly care for either option, and knowing that there were people out there who not only chose it but did so out of laziness rather than practicality and need made my blood boil. There was nothing I could do for the animals that had died just because people decided it was too annoying to take care of them, but I would be damned if that happened to her. I was busy thinking up names for her when I realized that in order to keep her, I would have to go through Echo first.
I almost wanted to name the dog Eros, then.
They were lounged into each other, Eros stretched across two chairs and her head resting in Echo's stomach. Echo had her arms over her possessively. There was nothing else that we could do there that night because the dog had to stay for more treatment, but something hanging in the air felt unresolved. I knew what it was.
“I can pay you back if you let me keep her.” I said suddenly, looking at Echo. “I will.”
“I know.” she said with a warm smile.
We all stood at virtually the same time and walked outside to her Volvo. We rode back to the apartment in silence.
During the silence that sets when a car full of people is left idle while waiting for said people to make some sort of parting gesture, I looked from the backseat into Echo's eyes from her rear view mirror.
“Thank you.” I said quietly. “I'm calling her Phoenix.”
Echo smiled at me and I awkwardly climbed out of her vehicle while she and Eros made their lovey-dove eyes and said goodbye.
When we were inside and Echo was on her way home, Eros and I were sitting in our room on our beds across from each other. I was stroking Tanner absently, lost in thought when Eros startled me by speaking.
“I wonder what made that guy want to hurt her so badly...” Eros asked into space. She clenched her fists. “Maybe she bit him.” she answered herself.
“Whatever happened, she didn't deserve that.” I spat, nauseated by the memory of the sickly looking city dummy. “I had an idea of what I should do to that guy, and if I ever see him again, he'd better hope-”
“I love it when you do that.” Eros said with a quiet laugh.
“Huh?” I was completely bewildered.
“When you act like you've got a mean bone in that little body of yours. You're not fooling anyone, so you may as well give it up.” she smiled teasingly at me and I felt myself growing red.
“He was a huge creep... he's lucky I don't carry a blade like Dyce does.” I said defensively.
“You would never use it.” Eros said, peering deeply into me the way she used to before Echo had come along. I didn't answer because I knew she was right. Instead I merely sighed.
“Do you think that I could get the money back to Echo from The Garden?” I asked, changing the subject. I wasn't sure how to act with her staring at me like that. It halfway excited me and halfway made me miserable.
“There would have to be something in it for her. You know that.” Eros answered, biting her lip. “Maybe if you just explained...”
“Yeah... maybe...” It was doubtful but worth a try, I supposed.
Chapter 11
I thought I may never stop. I thought maybe I would stay trapped in the rhythm of walking forever, for the rest of my life and beyond, as though I had surrendered my body to a restless spirit that seemed to know exactly where it was going even though I was clueless. I was marching purposefully onward when something extracted me out of the trance, something as startling and sudden as broken glass. Except instead of broken glass, it was really more like a yelp, followed by a dull, sickening thud. I was facing an abandoned set of railroad tracks, and the sound had come from behind a dilapidated old train car that was overturned to my left. I looked over without turning my head, and before I even realized it, I found myself charging heedlessly towards the noise.
Within seconds I was laying over a pale, gaunt man, my hands wrapped around his throat. Behind us was a squirming bundle about the size of a young child. The way it was wrapped up reminded me of a body bag or something. I didn't know who or what was in it, but I was pretty sure that the guy beneath me wasn't exactly innocent. He was as white as a shop-window dummy in New York City and I was feeling a little hostile towards sickly-looking city dummies who could make any living thing yelp in anguish like that.
Pain is like a mental ambush.
I slammed his head into the cement beneath us, not hard enough to actually hurt him, but enough to let him know I was serious. He just gazed at me with this kind of sickening fear, like I was actually going to do something to destroy him somehow. I realized that if I indulged in my anger any further then I'd be just as bad as the currently helpless New York City dummy. I shook my head down at him, trying to signify to him that he wasn't worth me losing my grip on my humanity. I pushed myself to my feet, not particularly caring about whether or not I stepped on his fingers. He stood up cautiously and I started towards him. He turned on his heels and took off over the railroad tracks. Half of me wanted to chase the bastard, but the other half was more concerned with the thing squirming in the body bag.
I jogged over to it, hoping to god that it wasn't going to attack me. Part of me was convinced it might be a child or something and I had just let a violent kidnapper escape freely into the streets of Pennsylvania. Once I ultimately got the courage to take my chances of being attacked, or, at the very least, becoming even more deeply nauseated, I somehow clumsily managed to unwrap it. Two terrified eyes caught mine. The intensity of their fear made my soul lurch. At first I was convinced that the eyes were human and that I really had let a kidnapper run free. Upon further inspection however, I realized that the eyes belonged to a greyhound. It was shivering like mad, and before I thought to try reaching my hand out to it, we simply stared at each other. I could practically feel the waves of fear and bewilderment rolling from it, but all I could do was try to maintain a composed state of mind and project the most positive portrayal of my energy as possible. I imagined it was possible to replace all the anxiety and terror it was feeling with a state of peace and trust, hoping that it was possible to coax it from one to the other. I tried to come across as trustworthy beyond my limited range of action.
Eventually, I reached my hand out slowly and just left it there, waiting for a reaction from the greyhound. After what seemed like years of patient coaxing and the two of us looking at each other, it inched towards me and sniffed, then licked, my hand. My heart swelled at the breakthrough, although I realized as it was happening that the dog could barely walk. I nearly moaned out loud empathetically, but I bit it back, fearing that it might startle it away. I realized after a quick, unprofessional examination that it was both in awful shape and that it was female. I lifted her up with ease because she was pathetically underweight and we took off toward my apartment, attracting gawks from a menagerie of people who wouldn't have given me a second glance if I were curled up in the gutter. I didn't care. All I knew was that I needed to get back to the apartment because, as annoying as it was for me to admit it, I needed Echo.
...Damn it.
Within seconds I was laying over a pale, gaunt man, my hands wrapped around his throat. Behind us was a squirming bundle about the size of a young child. The way it was wrapped up reminded me of a body bag or something. I didn't know who or what was in it, but I was pretty sure that the guy beneath me wasn't exactly innocent. He was as white as a shop-window dummy in New York City and I was feeling a little hostile towards sickly-looking city dummies who could make any living thing yelp in anguish like that.
Pain is like a mental ambush.
I slammed his head into the cement beneath us, not hard enough to actually hurt him, but enough to let him know I was serious. He just gazed at me with this kind of sickening fear, like I was actually going to do something to destroy him somehow. I realized that if I indulged in my anger any further then I'd be just as bad as the currently helpless New York City dummy. I shook my head down at him, trying to signify to him that he wasn't worth me losing my grip on my humanity. I pushed myself to my feet, not particularly caring about whether or not I stepped on his fingers. He stood up cautiously and I started towards him. He turned on his heels and took off over the railroad tracks. Half of me wanted to chase the bastard, but the other half was more concerned with the thing squirming in the body bag.
I jogged over to it, hoping to god that it wasn't going to attack me. Part of me was convinced it might be a child or something and I had just let a violent kidnapper escape freely into the streets of Pennsylvania. Once I ultimately got the courage to take my chances of being attacked, or, at the very least, becoming even more deeply nauseated, I somehow clumsily managed to unwrap it. Two terrified eyes caught mine. The intensity of their fear made my soul lurch. At first I was convinced that the eyes were human and that I really had let a kidnapper run free. Upon further inspection however, I realized that the eyes belonged to a greyhound. It was shivering like mad, and before I thought to try reaching my hand out to it, we simply stared at each other. I could practically feel the waves of fear and bewilderment rolling from it, but all I could do was try to maintain a composed state of mind and project the most positive portrayal of my energy as possible. I imagined it was possible to replace all the anxiety and terror it was feeling with a state of peace and trust, hoping that it was possible to coax it from one to the other. I tried to come across as trustworthy beyond my limited range of action.
Eventually, I reached my hand out slowly and just left it there, waiting for a reaction from the greyhound. After what seemed like years of patient coaxing and the two of us looking at each other, it inched towards me and sniffed, then licked, my hand. My heart swelled at the breakthrough, although I realized as it was happening that the dog could barely walk. I nearly moaned out loud empathetically, but I bit it back, fearing that it might startle it away. I realized after a quick, unprofessional examination that it was both in awful shape and that it was female. I lifted her up with ease because she was pathetically underweight and we took off toward my apartment, attracting gawks from a menagerie of people who wouldn't have given me a second glance if I were curled up in the gutter. I didn't care. All I knew was that I needed to get back to the apartment because, as annoying as it was for me to admit it, I needed Echo.
...Damn it.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Chapter 10
During this deep dark period of overwhelming self-pity and isolation, (whether real or imagined I haven't concluded yet...) I decided that I needed to get out of the house. I barged out of the bathroom with a freshly shaved head and made a beeline to the door, careful not to look over at Eros and Echo who had jumped unsubtly away from each other, startled by my cameo. I headed to the Garden, sure that Madame Rook would be able to get me fucked up somehow. I wasn't let down, and left with a vial full of cocaine and the ambition to keep myself occupied. I started to head home, thinking about how Eros and Echo were on the couch, how they probably talked about me in hushed tones after I left and then progressed to peer into each other's minds, or at least the parts they wanted to see. How Eros would surely probe deep inside Echo's well-adjusted grasp of hardship so that they could play a game of soul-doctor. I decided that I wouldn't be able to handle walking in on that particular scene, so my legs steered me purposefully off-course. I was pretty coked up and the distance I wandered didn't seem like any more than a block or two. I wasn't even really paying attention to where I was going, I just put my body on autopilot and enjoyed the ride.
When I started paying attention to my surroundings, I realized that I was in a cemetery. It was like a scene from a dream, and I looked down dazedly to find my mother's name glaring up at me. I started, realizing that for the first time in over a lifetime, I was in the place my parents were buried. I took my little vial and shook a little bit of coke onto my pinkie, not really knowing what else to do, and inhaled it as I knelt to study my mother's stone. It was overgrown and flowerless, all weeds and no blossoms. I had seen it once before in its prime, when one of Lady Ebony's minions had taken me to visit because for some reason I felt like I should. Afterwards, I didn't request to come back again.
Now, it felt just right. As though I was beckoned by them to a safe place where I could finally reclaim whatever it is that I had lost when I lost Eros. I plopped down between the two stones, my mother's on the left, my father's on the right, and sat quietly, alone for the first time since that vast unbearable loneliness had started eating me alive. There, sitting between (and on top of if I wanted to be morbid about it) my dead parents, I began to feel almost...better. Like a fog was slowly lifting from in front of me.
For the first time since Eros decided to choose Echo out of need for a rebound, a “real relationship,” I saw just how important being solitary really is. I didn't need anyone but myself, a lesson I learned the day I realized that Liza was a chicken shit and that I was free.
It was a lesson that Eros had somehow made me question with her need for validation through another person, via her “real relationships.” I wasn't like that, was I? In fact, wasn't that why I had questioned my ability to commit myself to another person from the start? Did I really feel worthless unless I had someone lurking around, ready to pick up the shards of my shattered ego who expected the same in return? Did I really need someone around to tell me how much they loved me only to say the same thing two weeks later to a virtual stranger and drop me like I had forced her to? What the hell kind of love was that? And if that's really love, then there's something a little ridiculous about it. Who needs it? If love is that fickle, then what the hell was it that I had been feeling so intensely for over two years that led to me feeling this shattered once I was told I couldn't feel it anymore? If that fickle, erratic thing Eros was feeling was love, then that other thing in me, that vulnerable, raw, bewildered and broken thing in me, that couldn't be love. Isn't the first rule of love to harm none?
If that fickle erratic bitch Eros claimed was love, love then, was nothing but some huge ugly misunderstanding.
Love then, was abandoning all hope once you don't hear what you want from who you want to hear it from.
Love then, was shopping around for someone who will give you your own way.
I didn't want to be a part of it. I didn't need that crap to be happy. I was better off without it.
Right?
Sitting between my dead parents, I realized that what's just right for some people at times completely alienates the people you want to be just right with, and I wished my mother could have been around to let me know that, or at least hug me when I learned the hard way. Especially on days when I would mope in my room, jotting down random musings and comparing myself and my ripple in the world to carpet dust. As I gazed off into the trees, looking at them without really seeing them, I remembered a piece of paper I had crumpled up on the floor in between my foam mattress and the wall. On that piece of paper, I had written about how I had become concealed from the rest of the world, shrunken down, away from life, deep down and ground up into dust. Carpet dust. I sank between the fibers of alternate realities that nobody on their everyday course would ever think to consider, meanwhile poisoning all the other little carpet dust particles that managed to be within my sphere of influence.
And it occurred to me that without this confusion about love and love lost and trust never to be regained, assuming it was ever there in the first place, without those things I would never have thought to compare myself to carpet dust. I realized that I had given someone other than myself the power to dictate my emotions. I realized that yes. I was as bad as Eros.
Bummer.
Not only did I feel like hell not having her around anymore, but I didn't even know if she was worth feeling like hell over, even though past experience stated that yes- it was definitely worth having her available to talk to. We had had such an amazing relationship before everything went to hell around us. I was so confused. Did I want her to be with me or did I want to be alone forever so that I could maintain my facade of control? This bullshit little black and white reality was rapidly losing its comfort. I realized that the way I felt about Eros was beyond reductionist arguments defending my need for independence. I was losing perspective, hardcore, and I didn't know what to do. I had no idea of how to deal with it.
So I didn't.
I forced myself to stop thinking about it and sat there fidgeting, staring off into space a little while longer until I felt like I'd explode if I stayed still another minute. Simultaneous to a distant clap of thunder, I sprung to my feet and, waving good-bye to my parents, (who, by the way, had refused my parting gift of some tobacco or a gum wrapper), once again surrendered to the pulse beneath my feet, deeply inhaling, basking in the smell before rain. Once I rounded the corner away from the cemetery gates, I began to wander with a sense of determination that my lack of destination left completely unjustified.
When I started paying attention to my surroundings, I realized that I was in a cemetery. It was like a scene from a dream, and I looked down dazedly to find my mother's name glaring up at me. I started, realizing that for the first time in over a lifetime, I was in the place my parents were buried. I took my little vial and shook a little bit of coke onto my pinkie, not really knowing what else to do, and inhaled it as I knelt to study my mother's stone. It was overgrown and flowerless, all weeds and no blossoms. I had seen it once before in its prime, when one of Lady Ebony's minions had taken me to visit because for some reason I felt like I should. Afterwards, I didn't request to come back again.
Now, it felt just right. As though I was beckoned by them to a safe place where I could finally reclaim whatever it is that I had lost when I lost Eros. I plopped down between the two stones, my mother's on the left, my father's on the right, and sat quietly, alone for the first time since that vast unbearable loneliness had started eating me alive. There, sitting between (and on top of if I wanted to be morbid about it) my dead parents, I began to feel almost...better. Like a fog was slowly lifting from in front of me.
For the first time since Eros decided to choose Echo out of need for a rebound, a “real relationship,” I saw just how important being solitary really is. I didn't need anyone but myself, a lesson I learned the day I realized that Liza was a chicken shit and that I was free.
It was a lesson that Eros had somehow made me question with her need for validation through another person, via her “real relationships.” I wasn't like that, was I? In fact, wasn't that why I had questioned my ability to commit myself to another person from the start? Did I really feel worthless unless I had someone lurking around, ready to pick up the shards of my shattered ego who expected the same in return? Did I really need someone around to tell me how much they loved me only to say the same thing two weeks later to a virtual stranger and drop me like I had forced her to? What the hell kind of love was that? And if that's really love, then there's something a little ridiculous about it. Who needs it? If love is that fickle, then what the hell was it that I had been feeling so intensely for over two years that led to me feeling this shattered once I was told I couldn't feel it anymore? If that fickle, erratic thing Eros was feeling was love, then that other thing in me, that vulnerable, raw, bewildered and broken thing in me, that couldn't be love. Isn't the first rule of love to harm none?
If that fickle erratic bitch Eros claimed was love, love then, was nothing but some huge ugly misunderstanding.
Love then, was abandoning all hope once you don't hear what you want from who you want to hear it from.
Love then, was shopping around for someone who will give you your own way.
I didn't want to be a part of it. I didn't need that crap to be happy. I was better off without it.
Right?
Sitting between my dead parents, I realized that what's just right for some people at times completely alienates the people you want to be just right with, and I wished my mother could have been around to let me know that, or at least hug me when I learned the hard way. Especially on days when I would mope in my room, jotting down random musings and comparing myself and my ripple in the world to carpet dust. As I gazed off into the trees, looking at them without really seeing them, I remembered a piece of paper I had crumpled up on the floor in between my foam mattress and the wall. On that piece of paper, I had written about how I had become concealed from the rest of the world, shrunken down, away from life, deep down and ground up into dust. Carpet dust. I sank between the fibers of alternate realities that nobody on their everyday course would ever think to consider, meanwhile poisoning all the other little carpet dust particles that managed to be within my sphere of influence.
And it occurred to me that without this confusion about love and love lost and trust never to be regained, assuming it was ever there in the first place, without those things I would never have thought to compare myself to carpet dust. I realized that I had given someone other than myself the power to dictate my emotions. I realized that yes. I was as bad as Eros.
Bummer.
Not only did I feel like hell not having her around anymore, but I didn't even know if she was worth feeling like hell over, even though past experience stated that yes- it was definitely worth having her available to talk to. We had had such an amazing relationship before everything went to hell around us. I was so confused. Did I want her to be with me or did I want to be alone forever so that I could maintain my facade of control? This bullshit little black and white reality was rapidly losing its comfort. I realized that the way I felt about Eros was beyond reductionist arguments defending my need for independence. I was losing perspective, hardcore, and I didn't know what to do. I had no idea of how to deal with it.
So I didn't.
I forced myself to stop thinking about it and sat there fidgeting, staring off into space a little while longer until I felt like I'd explode if I stayed still another minute. Simultaneous to a distant clap of thunder, I sprung to my feet and, waving good-bye to my parents, (who, by the way, had refused my parting gift of some tobacco or a gum wrapper), once again surrendered to the pulse beneath my feet, deeply inhaling, basking in the smell before rain. Once I rounded the corner away from the cemetery gates, I began to wander with a sense of determination that my lack of destination left completely unjustified.
Chapter 9 (LONG)
The next day, Cage, Dyce, Eros and I returned to The Garden with news of my commitment. Madame Rook nodded knowingly, she didn't seem surprised in the least. She ordered that I accompany each of them on their individual tasks until I became familiar with the clientèle and felt comfortable managing a job on my own. When that day came, I was told to go with Eros and do all the talking, not letting on that I may have any insecurities. Eros was there only to rescue me if things took a turn for the worst or I lost my footing. After a few of these confrontations I was ready to brave the streets alone and in fairly good standing with my fellow “peace pawns.”
I gradually learned more and more about the force behind our system, and the role we played in propelling the dreams of Madame Rook. She seemed to be fond of offering hope to those with none, such as a little ice-blue-eyed street urchin, caged in the routine of survival, fighting demons both real and imagined. He had offered, yelling through the thick glass window of her Rolls Royce, that he would wash her windows for a dollar, no, 50 cents, hell, anything... when the door opened and a well-manicured hand motioned him inside. Cage felt he grew up in debt to the Madame Rook, to his “Mother,” feeling nothing but gratitude and loyalty towards her, and an ever-deepening faith in her alliances to the greater good.
He would ask no questions when he saw little girls, most much younger than himself, boarding private jet planes to and from foreign places his limited education made difficult to pinpoint, some returning a few days later with their teddy-bear backpacks stuffed with funny looking plants and tiny vials, others never coming back at all. When little Cage did get curious about something, he would only ask Mother a harmless, innocent question, (worded carefully so as to always keep her in a positive light,) and sit patiently through her answer, absorbing her every word like a sponge. He would keep her secrets and guard her with the fierce, stubbornly naive loyalty of a son. A son who happened to sleep in the tool shed.
I discovered that even as I worked with her, the Madame had children going overseas to visit imaginary grandparents to bring back extraordinary souvenirs-opium and other concoctions I don't have the power to describe. The children she used in “missions” such as these were usually those of other “Peace Pawns” that she had taken under her wing throughout the years, raising and manipulating their perspectives to not only condone such transactions, but to encourage their children to feel honored when chosen to play a part in them. They were pleased to help the lady who had helped their mommies. It was all very organized, very under the radar, and, in a warped sort of way, very impressive.
Eros told me that her mother had been one of the children who had traveled internationally for the Madame Rook, although she had never actually known her real mother. She had lived in the maid's chambers of the Madame's house with two women who kept a constant eye on her and made sure that she didn't get in Madame Rook's hair. We would lay awake all night, curled into each other, talking and laughing about the tragedies that were our lives and the things we were going to do to change them. The two of us became beyond close , nearly reading each other's thoughts and laughing at both the trivial and the bizarre things that only we seemed to understand. She was the most talented person I had ever met; her art left me speechless and inspired. It truly made me want to do more with myself than just peddle drugs to the local junkies and rob the recycling center of aluminum cans so that I could get more money from them when my “allowance” wasn't quite enough.
Eventually it got to the point where Eros really wanted to make something special out of our relationship. I wasn't entirely comfortable with the concept though because there were so many things about myself that I still didn't know. I didn't know where I stood on love or sex or even whether or not I could see myself on this earth as anything but solitary. I told her that I wanted to wait things out, until I could kind of have an idea of what our lives were leading to, because if we jumped too soon and fell on our asses, then we could lose what we had for good.
Basically what she heard was rejection.
I guess I wasn't clear enough. I knew I cared more about her than I had ever cared about anyone in my life, but I've learned in life that the sooner you label things, the sooner they lose their enchantment, their meaning. The sooner I would say, “Yes, Eros, I will be yours forever,” the shorter forever would become.
She dealt with what she perceived as a personal insult by finding someone who wouldn't keep her in the dark, someone who felt secure with a label tagged around her neck like a dog tag. She found Echo.
Echo and Eros.
Nice fuckin' ring, right?
Echo wasn't one of us though, she wasn't a “peace pawn”. Actually, she worked as a secretary at the veterinary clinic where Eros was sent to pick up prescriptions for the Madame's poor, fabricated little puppy dog. Echo had a place in the world where Eros so desperately wanted to belong, a world I honestly don't believe any of us will ever be a part of. Eros seemed to think it was possible though. She didn't feel at all like an outsider, an intruder in Echo's safe little world of euthanasia the way that I would have.
I guess that Eros believed that there was no better or worse in people, in status or gender or race or anything like that, there were just different shades of tolerance. That's something we disagreed a lot about. I was personally very intolerant of people willing to look down their noses at someone shuddering in the street as they're on their way to enjoy a thirty dollar meal for one. Eros though, she was different about it. Part of me even thinks that she understood it. Not me. I can't even watch a spider drown.
But no.
According to Eros, I wasn't supposed to judge those walking the streets, blinded by their own greed. She thought that judging people who are acting the way that they were taught to act would be the same as blaming a four year old for calling her a nigger instead of its parents. Personally, I don't see the connection there. And if I could, I don't think it would make much of a difference, because I believe that once they reach a certain age, people can choose what to learn from whom, and have control over their actions and what they do with what they have. Eros and I aren't always on the same page, Echo or no Echo.
Personally though... I prefer no Echo.
Not that I'd ever tell Eros that. I try to hide the fact that I'm the jealous type. It makes me feel noble... or something useless like that.
I mean, a lot of good nobility does when you've got the sickening idea of a picture perfect “E&E 4-ever” rotting in your heart. Sometimes I can almost relate to those crazy bastards who let their jealousy get the best of them. It's not that I'm controlling, I just hate the thought of not being the one to make her laugh. It makes me feel so meaningless.
Once Echo came along, my relationship with Eros grew steadily worse. We could hardly stay in the same room for four seconds without one of us getting annoyed by the other. Like I said, I try to hide the fact that I'm the jealous type. It doesn't always work. It got the best of me at times I didn't even realize that I was being transparent enough to let it. Eros, well, she just got pissed off because I was the one who had “rejected” her in the first place. But of course, I didn't see it that way.
The way I saw it is, I wanted to wait until everything was foolproof, that way we wouldn't make any stupid mistakes and ruin our friendship completely, until I knew myself well enough that there would be no deceptions on my part, no disappointments, no misunderstandings. I mean, I'll be honest, she told me a hell of a lot more about herself than I ever told her about me, and a part of me wasn't comfortable with that. I felt like by not being completely available, I was manipulating her somehow. I know it's ridiculous, but that's how it felt. I felt guilty for not being as open as she was, not that I had anything to hide. It's just that solid relationships aren't built one-sided. It's kind of like a rule.
Try explaining that to Eros.
Eros, who, at the time, was completely caught up in her flawless seraph. Echo. Eros and Echo. Echo and Eros. Saccharine sweetness at its best. So sweet, in fact, that it just makes your teeth hurt so badly that you wish they would fall out of your skull and bleed on the bright white paper Eros used to create declarations of love and capture the shocking likeness of her...beloved. It's the kind of sweetness you experienced when you realized for the first time, bent over the toilet, why so many pesky adults warned you not to eat too much candy. It's that chocolate bile sweetness. Bitterness. Bittersweetness.
And the worst part of it all was that I actually liked Echo. The little shit. I couldn't find one thing wrong with her. Echo was generous. Echo was kind. Echo was smart.
Echo was P.C.
She was going to school to be a social worker, to help kids who might end up trying to run from Lady Ebony so that they don't end up pushing drugs to their rich Madame's gynochologist or shrink, to old money and lotto-winners, to pregnant yuppies, twitching and clutching at themselves with withdrawal who still force fake smiles to their lips, meanwhile avoiding your eyes. Echo didn't want kids running around giving drugs, courtesy of Madame Rook, to people who hide them in their diaper bags.
Madame Rook, who didn't want any of us getting sick, lest we spoil the day's profits. She wanted her kids healthy, she'd say, nudging a syringe towards Cage, or a crack pipe towards Dyce, or a sheet of acid towards Eros. Our health mattered, she'd claim from the couch (where I had never seen her move from the entire time I knew her), watching us take handfuls of pills out of the candy dish as though it were bubble gum or bar peanuts. Feeding our addictions deeper into her debt, she would tell us how important we were, how we had to stay alert. How we had to take care of each other.
No.
Echo would not have cared for the Madame Rook.
And Eros knew it. She went through great pains to keep Echo in the dark about that side of her life. I thought it was aggravating that she was more willing to say “I love you” to someone she was constantly lying to than to even talk to me. She would do her coke or pop pills before a date, and Echo was completely oblivious. She had to keep up the facade of being a step away from perfection, keep her thinking that she was flawless. One in a fucking trillion. Obviously, after believing a person to be on par with creation itself, disillusionment can prove hazardous.
Personally, I think Echo was sort of an idiot for not figuring it out, or not calling Eros out if she did. But I guess some people need their messiahs. If you don't find one in your church, you find it in your girlfriend. Or boyfriend. Or parents. Or the devil. Nobody stops and takes the time to find it in themselves though. I guess that would be too obvious.
Honestly, who really wants the power to dictate their own emotions? Who would be left to apologize to when you did something wrong? Suddenly there would only be you and you wouldn't have any excuses for doing the same detrimental shit that you always do. When you put someone else in charge of your mistakes, then innocent little you can't help but make them, right? You don't know any better!
But no.
If you had to forgive yourself, it would be a hell of a lot easier not to indulge in careless, harmful bullshit that makes that gut feeling inside you squirm with discomfort. You would be forced to listen to that little voice deep down that everyone's always talking about. And who wants to listen to that little voice? Who wants to put moral priority ahead of ego? Fuck that little voice, right?
That's why you push your guilt onto someone else's shoulders, so that you don't have to live with it. Being your own person is just fine and dandy until you realize that you don't want to be responsible for your own greedy bullshit life.
But I digress.
Eros and I stopped sharing the futon. I got a little foam mattress and put it across the room on the floor in a spot where the wallpaper was hanging so low that it gently swiped my forehead with every subtle breeze or movement. One particularly bad night I just snatched it up and tore it off the wall, leaving a long, sharp-looking white area where it had torn.
It was particularly bad for me at the time because Cage and Dyce had abandoned me at the apartment by myself to go to the Garden and get fucked up. So I was feeling a little bit left out, when, to my dismay, Echo and Eros arrive at the apartment and claim the living room to watch some stupid movie and talk. So, being uncomfortable being the third wheel, I retreated to the bedroom, where I proceeded to feel very sorry for myself because I could hear every awkward, silent kiss and their conversation.
In case you're interested, they were making doomed plans for the future. They were talking about how they should get a Pomeranian named Wiggle or Snowball or Fruitloop, or some stupid cliché like that. I wanted to punch the wall, but I since I was supposed to be laying down with a headache, instead, I tore that moldy old strip of wallpaper from in front of my face and got a little uncomfortable bit of something in my eye. Then I shaved my head.
It makes me feel better because it's something I can actually achieve, as stupid as that may sound. It's a goal I know I can accomplish. That's what matters in the long run, right? Setting goals and reaching them so that you don't have to feel like a piece of shit failure for your whole life. What matters is destination. What matters, exactly, are goals.
Daydreaming about getting Mr. Wiggles or Snowball or Dandruff (or whatever you're going to call the poor over-priced dog you emancipate from the puppy mill) with someone you confessed to loving a week after she slipped you the tongue is not among my list of important life shit.
Rather, what matters, ladies and gentlemen, are things like shaving your head.
As for the lovebirds, I was pretty convinced that all they were doing was killing time and getting off, fooled by physical and emotional dependency. You know, the euphoria of having someone to kiss or cry to every time you feel happy or sad or lonely or secretly high and guilty about it. That's not love. That's addiction. What that is, is an in-between. What I call a “filler relationship.”
A filler relationship is when deep down, you know that you're pumping each other up on a steady steroid-strong diet of over-nice, over-concerned lies, sex and secrets. It's a filter of your orange personality into the hot-pink one you sense the other person wants to see. It's when you cut down your puzzle piece, you whittle and grind it down until it somehow manages to just fit into someone else's even though you know that it's not meant to. You're so busy compromising yourself for that other person to sustain the durability of a relationship that was never meant to work out in the first place that when it ends, and it inevitably will, you have to reattach all the pieces of yourself that you tried cutting off for that other person so that you know who fits for real. That is, unless you repeat the process, meanwhile losing valuable pieces of yourself forever for people who just want the same thing you do. To sincerely fit into someone else's life. Most people feign sincerity because they think it will bring them closer to it. They completely miss the point.
The way I saw it was, Eros and I fit. We didn't have to whittle anything away the way she did with Echo about Madame Rook and her secret career as a drug dealer. And I wasn't about to try changing who I was so that we wouldn't ever fit again. I could never have asked her to wait for me until I was ready because that would have been selfish, but that couldn't stop me from trying to wait for the day to come when things would be normal between us again.
I tried to push it once or twice, and lay with her on the futon to try talking the way we used to do, but she would just get up and say that things were different now, that I couldn't replace Echo and it was really shitty of me to try. It left me feeling pretty much like the scum of the earth, and after a while, I didn't even try anymore. I was in exile, wishing more than anything that I would have kept my mouth shut.
That's the loneliest I've ever felt in my life. And coming from an orphan, that's pretty fucking pathetic. I had just started getting used to the fact that someone on earth could love me, care about me, want to be around me eventually for good after such a long time of not having anybody in the world except people like Lacey, and even that was a sham. But with Eros it was different. I mean, I felt like we were walking on eggshells in case I somehow did or said the wrong thing, in case it would ruin us. And instead, I did exactly the right thing. And it ruined us.
Nobody ever told me there was such a thing as being too careful.
Well, I'm here to tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that if you're living your life too scared to be anything but too careful, whatever it is that you're being too careful about might just blow up in your perfectionist fucking face. And as much as I say I'd do things all over again next time, all right, I wouldn't. Because I listened to that little voice. I was honest. And everything being all right was what went wrong. I usually tell myself that everything worked out the way it did for a reason. If I was going to be brutally honest with myself though, I'd have to admit that my life so far hasn't exactly prepared me for the idea of closure. In fact, I don't even think I believe in it... I don't see how it could possibly exist. It's up there with freedom of speech and the easter bunny.
I gradually learned more and more about the force behind our system, and the role we played in propelling the dreams of Madame Rook. She seemed to be fond of offering hope to those with none, such as a little ice-blue-eyed street urchin, caged in the routine of survival, fighting demons both real and imagined. He had offered, yelling through the thick glass window of her Rolls Royce, that he would wash her windows for a dollar, no, 50 cents, hell, anything... when the door opened and a well-manicured hand motioned him inside. Cage felt he grew up in debt to the Madame Rook, to his “Mother,” feeling nothing but gratitude and loyalty towards her, and an ever-deepening faith in her alliances to the greater good.
He would ask no questions when he saw little girls, most much younger than himself, boarding private jet planes to and from foreign places his limited education made difficult to pinpoint, some returning a few days later with their teddy-bear backpacks stuffed with funny looking plants and tiny vials, others never coming back at all. When little Cage did get curious about something, he would only ask Mother a harmless, innocent question, (worded carefully so as to always keep her in a positive light,) and sit patiently through her answer, absorbing her every word like a sponge. He would keep her secrets and guard her with the fierce, stubbornly naive loyalty of a son. A son who happened to sleep in the tool shed.
I discovered that even as I worked with her, the Madame had children going overseas to visit imaginary grandparents to bring back extraordinary souvenirs-opium and other concoctions I don't have the power to describe. The children she used in “missions” such as these were usually those of other “Peace Pawns” that she had taken under her wing throughout the years, raising and manipulating their perspectives to not only condone such transactions, but to encourage their children to feel honored when chosen to play a part in them. They were pleased to help the lady who had helped their mommies. It was all very organized, very under the radar, and, in a warped sort of way, very impressive.
Eros told me that her mother had been one of the children who had traveled internationally for the Madame Rook, although she had never actually known her real mother. She had lived in the maid's chambers of the Madame's house with two women who kept a constant eye on her and made sure that she didn't get in Madame Rook's hair. We would lay awake all night, curled into each other, talking and laughing about the tragedies that were our lives and the things we were going to do to change them. The two of us became beyond close , nearly reading each other's thoughts and laughing at both the trivial and the bizarre things that only we seemed to understand. She was the most talented person I had ever met; her art left me speechless and inspired. It truly made me want to do more with myself than just peddle drugs to the local junkies and rob the recycling center of aluminum cans so that I could get more money from them when my “allowance” wasn't quite enough.
Eventually it got to the point where Eros really wanted to make something special out of our relationship. I wasn't entirely comfortable with the concept though because there were so many things about myself that I still didn't know. I didn't know where I stood on love or sex or even whether or not I could see myself on this earth as anything but solitary. I told her that I wanted to wait things out, until I could kind of have an idea of what our lives were leading to, because if we jumped too soon and fell on our asses, then we could lose what we had for good.
Basically what she heard was rejection.
I guess I wasn't clear enough. I knew I cared more about her than I had ever cared about anyone in my life, but I've learned in life that the sooner you label things, the sooner they lose their enchantment, their meaning. The sooner I would say, “Yes, Eros, I will be yours forever,” the shorter forever would become.
She dealt with what she perceived as a personal insult by finding someone who wouldn't keep her in the dark, someone who felt secure with a label tagged around her neck like a dog tag. She found Echo.
Echo and Eros.
Nice fuckin' ring, right?
Echo wasn't one of us though, she wasn't a “peace pawn”. Actually, she worked as a secretary at the veterinary clinic where Eros was sent to pick up prescriptions for the Madame's poor, fabricated little puppy dog. Echo had a place in the world where Eros so desperately wanted to belong, a world I honestly don't believe any of us will ever be a part of. Eros seemed to think it was possible though. She didn't feel at all like an outsider, an intruder in Echo's safe little world of euthanasia the way that I would have.
I guess that Eros believed that there was no better or worse in people, in status or gender or race or anything like that, there were just different shades of tolerance. That's something we disagreed a lot about. I was personally very intolerant of people willing to look down their noses at someone shuddering in the street as they're on their way to enjoy a thirty dollar meal for one. Eros though, she was different about it. Part of me even thinks that she understood it. Not me. I can't even watch a spider drown.
But no.
According to Eros, I wasn't supposed to judge those walking the streets, blinded by their own greed. She thought that judging people who are acting the way that they were taught to act would be the same as blaming a four year old for calling her a nigger instead of its parents. Personally, I don't see the connection there. And if I could, I don't think it would make much of a difference, because I believe that once they reach a certain age, people can choose what to learn from whom, and have control over their actions and what they do with what they have. Eros and I aren't always on the same page, Echo or no Echo.
Personally though... I prefer no Echo.
Not that I'd ever tell Eros that. I try to hide the fact that I'm the jealous type. It makes me feel noble... or something useless like that.
I mean, a lot of good nobility does when you've got the sickening idea of a picture perfect “E&E 4-ever” rotting in your heart. Sometimes I can almost relate to those crazy bastards who let their jealousy get the best of them. It's not that I'm controlling, I just hate the thought of not being the one to make her laugh. It makes me feel so meaningless.
Once Echo came along, my relationship with Eros grew steadily worse. We could hardly stay in the same room for four seconds without one of us getting annoyed by the other. Like I said, I try to hide the fact that I'm the jealous type. It doesn't always work. It got the best of me at times I didn't even realize that I was being transparent enough to let it. Eros, well, she just got pissed off because I was the one who had “rejected” her in the first place. But of course, I didn't see it that way.
The way I saw it is, I wanted to wait until everything was foolproof, that way we wouldn't make any stupid mistakes and ruin our friendship completely, until I knew myself well enough that there would be no deceptions on my part, no disappointments, no misunderstandings. I mean, I'll be honest, she told me a hell of a lot more about herself than I ever told her about me, and a part of me wasn't comfortable with that. I felt like by not being completely available, I was manipulating her somehow. I know it's ridiculous, but that's how it felt. I felt guilty for not being as open as she was, not that I had anything to hide. It's just that solid relationships aren't built one-sided. It's kind of like a rule.
Try explaining that to Eros.
Eros, who, at the time, was completely caught up in her flawless seraph. Echo. Eros and Echo. Echo and Eros. Saccharine sweetness at its best. So sweet, in fact, that it just makes your teeth hurt so badly that you wish they would fall out of your skull and bleed on the bright white paper Eros used to create declarations of love and capture the shocking likeness of her...beloved. It's the kind of sweetness you experienced when you realized for the first time, bent over the toilet, why so many pesky adults warned you not to eat too much candy. It's that chocolate bile sweetness. Bitterness. Bittersweetness.
And the worst part of it all was that I actually liked Echo. The little shit. I couldn't find one thing wrong with her. Echo was generous. Echo was kind. Echo was smart.
Echo was P.C.
She was going to school to be a social worker, to help kids who might end up trying to run from Lady Ebony so that they don't end up pushing drugs to their rich Madame's gynochologist or shrink, to old money and lotto-winners, to pregnant yuppies, twitching and clutching at themselves with withdrawal who still force fake smiles to their lips, meanwhile avoiding your eyes. Echo didn't want kids running around giving drugs, courtesy of Madame Rook, to people who hide them in their diaper bags.
Madame Rook, who didn't want any of us getting sick, lest we spoil the day's profits. She wanted her kids healthy, she'd say, nudging a syringe towards Cage, or a crack pipe towards Dyce, or a sheet of acid towards Eros. Our health mattered, she'd claim from the couch (where I had never seen her move from the entire time I knew her), watching us take handfuls of pills out of the candy dish as though it were bubble gum or bar peanuts. Feeding our addictions deeper into her debt, she would tell us how important we were, how we had to stay alert. How we had to take care of each other.
No.
Echo would not have cared for the Madame Rook.
And Eros knew it. She went through great pains to keep Echo in the dark about that side of her life. I thought it was aggravating that she was more willing to say “I love you” to someone she was constantly lying to than to even talk to me. She would do her coke or pop pills before a date, and Echo was completely oblivious. She had to keep up the facade of being a step away from perfection, keep her thinking that she was flawless. One in a fucking trillion. Obviously, after believing a person to be on par with creation itself, disillusionment can prove hazardous.
Personally, I think Echo was sort of an idiot for not figuring it out, or not calling Eros out if she did. But I guess some people need their messiahs. If you don't find one in your church, you find it in your girlfriend. Or boyfriend. Or parents. Or the devil. Nobody stops and takes the time to find it in themselves though. I guess that would be too obvious.
Honestly, who really wants the power to dictate their own emotions? Who would be left to apologize to when you did something wrong? Suddenly there would only be you and you wouldn't have any excuses for doing the same detrimental shit that you always do. When you put someone else in charge of your mistakes, then innocent little you can't help but make them, right? You don't know any better!
But no.
If you had to forgive yourself, it would be a hell of a lot easier not to indulge in careless, harmful bullshit that makes that gut feeling inside you squirm with discomfort. You would be forced to listen to that little voice deep down that everyone's always talking about. And who wants to listen to that little voice? Who wants to put moral priority ahead of ego? Fuck that little voice, right?
That's why you push your guilt onto someone else's shoulders, so that you don't have to live with it. Being your own person is just fine and dandy until you realize that you don't want to be responsible for your own greedy bullshit life.
But I digress.
Eros and I stopped sharing the futon. I got a little foam mattress and put it across the room on the floor in a spot where the wallpaper was hanging so low that it gently swiped my forehead with every subtle breeze or movement. One particularly bad night I just snatched it up and tore it off the wall, leaving a long, sharp-looking white area where it had torn.
It was particularly bad for me at the time because Cage and Dyce had abandoned me at the apartment by myself to go to the Garden and get fucked up. So I was feeling a little bit left out, when, to my dismay, Echo and Eros arrive at the apartment and claim the living room to watch some stupid movie and talk. So, being uncomfortable being the third wheel, I retreated to the bedroom, where I proceeded to feel very sorry for myself because I could hear every awkward, silent kiss and their conversation.
In case you're interested, they were making doomed plans for the future. They were talking about how they should get a Pomeranian named Wiggle or Snowball or Fruitloop, or some stupid cliché like that. I wanted to punch the wall, but I since I was supposed to be laying down with a headache, instead, I tore that moldy old strip of wallpaper from in front of my face and got a little uncomfortable bit of something in my eye. Then I shaved my head.
It makes me feel better because it's something I can actually achieve, as stupid as that may sound. It's a goal I know I can accomplish. That's what matters in the long run, right? Setting goals and reaching them so that you don't have to feel like a piece of shit failure for your whole life. What matters is destination. What matters, exactly, are goals.
Daydreaming about getting Mr. Wiggles or Snowball or Dandruff (or whatever you're going to call the poor over-priced dog you emancipate from the puppy mill) with someone you confessed to loving a week after she slipped you the tongue is not among my list of important life shit.
Rather, what matters, ladies and gentlemen, are things like shaving your head.
As for the lovebirds, I was pretty convinced that all they were doing was killing time and getting off, fooled by physical and emotional dependency. You know, the euphoria of having someone to kiss or cry to every time you feel happy or sad or lonely or secretly high and guilty about it. That's not love. That's addiction. What that is, is an in-between. What I call a “filler relationship.”
A filler relationship is when deep down, you know that you're pumping each other up on a steady steroid-strong diet of over-nice, over-concerned lies, sex and secrets. It's a filter of your orange personality into the hot-pink one you sense the other person wants to see. It's when you cut down your puzzle piece, you whittle and grind it down until it somehow manages to just fit into someone else's even though you know that it's not meant to. You're so busy compromising yourself for that other person to sustain the durability of a relationship that was never meant to work out in the first place that when it ends, and it inevitably will, you have to reattach all the pieces of yourself that you tried cutting off for that other person so that you know who fits for real. That is, unless you repeat the process, meanwhile losing valuable pieces of yourself forever for people who just want the same thing you do. To sincerely fit into someone else's life. Most people feign sincerity because they think it will bring them closer to it. They completely miss the point.
The way I saw it was, Eros and I fit. We didn't have to whittle anything away the way she did with Echo about Madame Rook and her secret career as a drug dealer. And I wasn't about to try changing who I was so that we wouldn't ever fit again. I could never have asked her to wait for me until I was ready because that would have been selfish, but that couldn't stop me from trying to wait for the day to come when things would be normal between us again.
I tried to push it once or twice, and lay with her on the futon to try talking the way we used to do, but she would just get up and say that things were different now, that I couldn't replace Echo and it was really shitty of me to try. It left me feeling pretty much like the scum of the earth, and after a while, I didn't even try anymore. I was in exile, wishing more than anything that I would have kept my mouth shut.
That's the loneliest I've ever felt in my life. And coming from an orphan, that's pretty fucking pathetic. I had just started getting used to the fact that someone on earth could love me, care about me, want to be around me eventually for good after such a long time of not having anybody in the world except people like Lacey, and even that was a sham. But with Eros it was different. I mean, I felt like we were walking on eggshells in case I somehow did or said the wrong thing, in case it would ruin us. And instead, I did exactly the right thing. And it ruined us.
Nobody ever told me there was such a thing as being too careful.
Well, I'm here to tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that if you're living your life too scared to be anything but too careful, whatever it is that you're being too careful about might just blow up in your perfectionist fucking face. And as much as I say I'd do things all over again next time, all right, I wouldn't. Because I listened to that little voice. I was honest. And everything being all right was what went wrong. I usually tell myself that everything worked out the way it did for a reason. If I was going to be brutally honest with myself though, I'd have to admit that my life so far hasn't exactly prepared me for the idea of closure. In fact, I don't even think I believe in it... I don't see how it could possibly exist. It's up there with freedom of speech and the easter bunny.
Chapter 8
Cage was ecstatic. He suggested that we inform Madame Rook first thing in the morning. We shared a victory cheers of cheap wine and he showed me around the relatively unfurnished apartment. Two bedrooms, one bathroom, living room combined with the kitchen, the cheap card table as the partition. I wasn't completely okay with the idea of living alone with him and was relieved when he mentioned his “Soul Mate”. That, and I asked him to just please call me Jet, no more of that little sister stuff. It made me feel like I was in a Bob Dylan record or something. He laughed, not offended in the least, and agreed to call me Just Jet. I was giddy with the prospect of hope, and we chattered, laughing together about random thoughts and things that we had experienced, like me thinking about all the idiots who would literally starve to look like me, for about an hour. He had just suggested a game of go fish when the door burst open and two girls, jittery with the cold, bustled inside.
The girl who entered first made a beeline towards Cage, greeting him with a brief but warm kiss. Her pale face was flushed from the wind outside and her shoulder-length blonde hair was tousled She was grinning widely, and pulled out two tiny zip-lock baggies to wave in front of his face.
“I scored big today, babe!” she said excitedly, pulling him into a loose embrace and planting another kiss on him. He smiled at her, his face lighting up.
The other girl was hanging back in the doorway studying me. Her skin was the majestic brown of an autumn leaf mid-flight, and she toyed with one of her long, dark dreadlocks as she held herself closely with the cold. However, she refused to shut the door behind her until we were properly introduced and knew whether or not she could trust me.
Cage noticed and beckoned her inside.
“A new addition to the family,” he explained. “who is Just Jet.” Cages mouth was covered once again by the blonde girl's and the girl by the door finally shut it hesitantly. She walked towards me, her eyes steadily roaming me, and offered her hand. I took it, a little self-consciously.
“I'm Eros.” she told me. Then she did something that I'll never forget. She pulled me into a tight embrace and kissed my left cheek. I could feel myself blush, and the imprint of her lips stayed warm on my skin, lingering until I was startled by the blonde girl's introduction.
“I'm Dyce.” she informed me with a warm smile, although her hand stayed draped around Cage's waist. I said some sort of hello, waving weakly as I watched Eros from the corner of my eye curiously. I realized that she had been doing the same thing and I quickly looked toward Cage and Dyce for some sort of direction.
“If I'm not mistaken, Jet will be staying a while,” Cage announced, sensing my tension. “so it looks like Eros has a new roomie.” He looked at Eros, who nodded.
“Do you have any things?” Eros asked me. I gestured toward the card table where Tanner was sprawled, and thought of the suitcase that I had left at The Garden.
“We'll get the rest tomorrow,” Cage assured me, as though he were reading my mind. I nodded, feeling suddenly very vulnerable. Social conduct had never been my strong point.
“Come on,” Eros said gently. “I'll show you our room.” She took my hand and tugged, urging me silently along behind her. It was across the hall from the room Dyce and Cage shared, and in the doorway were wooden juju beads tied aside for an opening. I complimented them and she grinned.
“I always wanted them when I was little,” she told me, “so that's the first thing I asked from the 'mother'.” She said “mother” with finger quotations.
The first thing I noticed about the room were the sketch pads and magazine clippings and art supplies scattered all over the floor in complete chaos. Then I noticed the pieces of cardboard painted extravagantly and hung with meticulous care over the peeling, faded, robin's-egg-blue wallpaper.
“I'm going to be an artist when I get my GED.” she said with a glimmer in her eyes. “An artist can make anything beautiful- they don't need paint or anything, just themselves.”
I smiled, nodding, taken aback by the thought of beauty in the world after being so convinced that it was out solely to break me. I turned my thoughts back to Eros, who was patting the futon couch, where she obviously slept, so that I would sit beside her. I took care not to step on any of the stray paper or colored pencils, grateful when I successfully made it to the futon without destroying something important to her creative expression. She obviously wasn't used to having guests.
She asked me all about myself, drawing me out of my shell with little provocation. Her manner was light and easy, making me feel instantly comfortable with her. She wanted to know what I thought I could do with my life and if I had any special niche. I told her the same thing I told Madame Rook. Not that I knew of, and I still wasn't comfortable letting myself dream about becoming a valuable member of society. She smiled sadly at this, kind of bowing her head as though she inwardly understood what I meant, although she wouldn't admit it out loud. Instead she just said that a life without dreams, without vision, is a life of misery.
I couldn't argue.
She went on to say that if I wanted, she could clear me off a spot on the floor where I could sleep, or we could share the bed. She didn't recommend the floor though. There were rats. And the rats had fleas. And the fleas carried the bubonic plague. And I didn't want the plague did I?
So that was the first night I spent with Eros, the first night in a millennium that I had a pillow and a blanket. The first night in an eternity that my feet weren't cold.
The girl who entered first made a beeline towards Cage, greeting him with a brief but warm kiss. Her pale face was flushed from the wind outside and her shoulder-length blonde hair was tousled She was grinning widely, and pulled out two tiny zip-lock baggies to wave in front of his face.
“I scored big today, babe!” she said excitedly, pulling him into a loose embrace and planting another kiss on him. He smiled at her, his face lighting up.
The other girl was hanging back in the doorway studying me. Her skin was the majestic brown of an autumn leaf mid-flight, and she toyed with one of her long, dark dreadlocks as she held herself closely with the cold. However, she refused to shut the door behind her until we were properly introduced and knew whether or not she could trust me.
Cage noticed and beckoned her inside.
“A new addition to the family,” he explained. “who is Just Jet.” Cages mouth was covered once again by the blonde girl's and the girl by the door finally shut it hesitantly. She walked towards me, her eyes steadily roaming me, and offered her hand. I took it, a little self-consciously.
“I'm Eros.” she told me. Then she did something that I'll never forget. She pulled me into a tight embrace and kissed my left cheek. I could feel myself blush, and the imprint of her lips stayed warm on my skin, lingering until I was startled by the blonde girl's introduction.
“I'm Dyce.” she informed me with a warm smile, although her hand stayed draped around Cage's waist. I said some sort of hello, waving weakly as I watched Eros from the corner of my eye curiously. I realized that she had been doing the same thing and I quickly looked toward Cage and Dyce for some sort of direction.
“If I'm not mistaken, Jet will be staying a while,” Cage announced, sensing my tension. “so it looks like Eros has a new roomie.” He looked at Eros, who nodded.
“Do you have any things?” Eros asked me. I gestured toward the card table where Tanner was sprawled, and thought of the suitcase that I had left at The Garden.
“We'll get the rest tomorrow,” Cage assured me, as though he were reading my mind. I nodded, feeling suddenly very vulnerable. Social conduct had never been my strong point.
“Come on,” Eros said gently. “I'll show you our room.” She took my hand and tugged, urging me silently along behind her. It was across the hall from the room Dyce and Cage shared, and in the doorway were wooden juju beads tied aside for an opening. I complimented them and she grinned.
“I always wanted them when I was little,” she told me, “so that's the first thing I asked from the 'mother'.” She said “mother” with finger quotations.
The first thing I noticed about the room were the sketch pads and magazine clippings and art supplies scattered all over the floor in complete chaos. Then I noticed the pieces of cardboard painted extravagantly and hung with meticulous care over the peeling, faded, robin's-egg-blue wallpaper.
“I'm going to be an artist when I get my GED.” she said with a glimmer in her eyes. “An artist can make anything beautiful- they don't need paint or anything, just themselves.”
I smiled, nodding, taken aback by the thought of beauty in the world after being so convinced that it was out solely to break me. I turned my thoughts back to Eros, who was patting the futon couch, where she obviously slept, so that I would sit beside her. I took care not to step on any of the stray paper or colored pencils, grateful when I successfully made it to the futon without destroying something important to her creative expression. She obviously wasn't used to having guests.
She asked me all about myself, drawing me out of my shell with little provocation. Her manner was light and easy, making me feel instantly comfortable with her. She wanted to know what I thought I could do with my life and if I had any special niche. I told her the same thing I told Madame Rook. Not that I knew of, and I still wasn't comfortable letting myself dream about becoming a valuable member of society. She smiled sadly at this, kind of bowing her head as though she inwardly understood what I meant, although she wouldn't admit it out loud. Instead she just said that a life without dreams, without vision, is a life of misery.
I couldn't argue.
She went on to say that if I wanted, she could clear me off a spot on the floor where I could sleep, or we could share the bed. She didn't recommend the floor though. There were rats. And the rats had fleas. And the fleas carried the bubonic plague. And I didn't want the plague did I?
So that was the first night I spent with Eros, the first night in a millennium that I had a pillow and a blanket. The first night in an eternity that my feet weren't cold.
Chapter 7
The first thing she wanted to know was if I had any remarkable talents, presumably for her to exploit and profit off of. I didn't know if I did or didn't, but I didn't think so, and that's what I told her. Next she wanted to know if I had finished school, and she raved about how important it was to have an education so that you wouldn't be on the bottom rung of the ladder your whole life. She claimed that if I were to cooperate and become an integral part of “The Dream” as she called it, that she would see to it herself that I got my GED and was placed in the college of my choice when the time was right. She filled me with hope and excitement, something to look forward to, to plan, to achieve. I would be able to find real work, a real niche in the world. I would be able to let myself wonder what I would be when I grew up because now I had an option.
Then she wanted to know about my family, where I was from, how I got where I was, and if I had anywhere I could go back to. The way she worded it made it seem as though “somewhere to go back to” wasn't a home so much as a prison or something. So I told her a little about the place I had stayed in New Jersey and that I was basically a runaway orphan. I think I saw her eyes sparkle.
“You could have a place in this city.” she told me, lazily. Her heavy accented words were starting to slur together due to the influence of a menagerie of substances that she had recently ingested.
“Go with Cage to his apartment. He'll explain what you need to know... details and things. I need rest- come back when you decide.” She gazed at me, her eyes roaming my malnourished body. “You can leave your clothes here if you wish- I'll have them clean when you get back.” I nodded, smiling my appreciation. “And Jet?” she added as we turned to leave. I looked back at her. “If you do happen to be off-put by the... details... and refuse the offer... I might suggest considering your state before you arrived here... it may just define the rest of your life.” She looked at me coolly. “Paint a pretty picture?” she asked.
I just stared at her before I turned back around, clutching Tanner, and followed Cage out of the Garden.
We arrived at a nearly hidden low-income apartment complex. It was a strange contrast in comparison to the luxury the Madame lived in, but it was warm and more hospitable, junkies notwithstanding.
And...
there was food.
As I scarfed down a freshly made grilled cheese sandwich and a glass of apple juice, I listened to Cage, who was sitting across from me at his small card table. He explained “The Dream”.
Basically, he told me, Madame Rook was like a patron saint of lost souls. She took people under her wing who didn't know how to care for themselves and taught them, (or promised to teach them) to be self-sufficient. She wanted equality world wide, the rich and the poor, the religious and the scientific, the free and the enslaved. Madam Rook, Cage claimed, was a visionary.
Madame Rook.
She Cared About People.
But you've got to give a little to get a little, he went on, withdrawing deeper into his idealistic portrayal of his beloved “Mother”. In the case of the lost souls, in the cases of the Cages and the Jets, we had to be the pawns. Peace Pawns, he explained. We had to go out, be proactive, spread the word, spread the love.
And, yes.
Spread the drugs.
But the drugs, Cage concluded, were just a statement, a way of sticking it to the people trying to control the lives of everyone around them. The drugs couldn't be taxed. The drugs couldn't contribute to capitalistic, money-hungry criminals. The drugs represented freedom. Freedom of choice. Democracy as it was originally intended. The drugs were peace.
We were selling peace.
“Mother- she pays for the apartment, for our food, all the bills, she gives us everything we need, but no more because she says materialism is the downfall of the human race. If she's going to help us make it in the world, we have to understand it first. We have to follow The Dream.”
“Us?” I asked. I hadn't exactly made a commitment yet, and there wasn't another soul in sight.
“There are others, little sister. You'll meet them. We work and live together, as a team, as a family. Mother directs us, guides us... tells us where to be and who to look for.”
“Um... you weren't looking for me, were you?” I asked him, finding the thought that the well-manicured woman might have psychic powers a little bit off-putting.
“No, family finds you. You found me the same as I found Mother, family finds each other. That's just the way it is.” Cage replied, looking wistfully beyond me, beyond our dimension. It was this look that I got to know so well, his dazed, imprisoned search for hope. He cleared his throat and came back to me.
“When you have family, you have a place to call home... All you have to do is follow her instructions. And don't ask questions. Mother hates mundane thinkers, she'll lose respect for you in a heartbeat if you question her ways. Especially since she's the one who knows what's best for us... she's the one who gives us a home and a family and a chance at a life free of dumpster food and numb toes.” Cage gazed over my shoulder dreamily and pulled a cigarette from his pack on the table. He offered me one and I refused politely. “Mother cares about all of us. All she wants is to see us succeed for the right reasons. If you don't show her what she wants to see, then it's over. I've seen many come and many forced to leave. I've never asked questions because I know that if I did, I would be as bad off as I was... and I don't think I can ever live like that again.” he admitted to me. He looked at me seriously, all the dreaminess was replaced by a hard, unwavering seriousness. “How about you, Just Jet? Do you want to go back out there tonight? Not knowing where to go or where you'll be, whether or not this is your last breath? Do you want food covered in cat piss? Mold? Things so heinous that you want to puke them up the second they're in your mouth?”
I shook my head silently, watching his eyes well up passionately. “Then please don't be stupid. It's all just a game to the people out there- the elite, the job-holding elite who spend their money on things they don't need in a world they don't care about. They know competition, but they know nothing of survival. Together we're stronger.” he explained. “We're all virtually strangers, but the spirit in us is the same eternal battery that has charged humanity from the start. Common experience, common spirit, collective experience shapes the world and you and me, Jet, we have that. You won't be alone, ever again.” he concluded gently, casting his eyes down to the table, apparently embarrassed by his outpour. He hit his cigarette, gazing at a torn spot on the table where the cork board beneath the layer of foam was visible.
So, as I downed the last of my apple juice, I contemplated all that I had been told. What he was asking of me, as I took it, was to become a member of a blossoming empire of communist drug-pushers who, in return for blissful ignorance, would provide me with a heated place to stay and warm meals that weren't from the soup-kitchen.
So obviously I agreed.
I became part of the “family.”
Then she wanted to know about my family, where I was from, how I got where I was, and if I had anywhere I could go back to. The way she worded it made it seem as though “somewhere to go back to” wasn't a home so much as a prison or something. So I told her a little about the place I had stayed in New Jersey and that I was basically a runaway orphan. I think I saw her eyes sparkle.
“You could have a place in this city.” she told me, lazily. Her heavy accented words were starting to slur together due to the influence of a menagerie of substances that she had recently ingested.
“Go with Cage to his apartment. He'll explain what you need to know... details and things. I need rest- come back when you decide.” She gazed at me, her eyes roaming my malnourished body. “You can leave your clothes here if you wish- I'll have them clean when you get back.” I nodded, smiling my appreciation. “And Jet?” she added as we turned to leave. I looked back at her. “If you do happen to be off-put by the... details... and refuse the offer... I might suggest considering your state before you arrived here... it may just define the rest of your life.” She looked at me coolly. “Paint a pretty picture?” she asked.
I just stared at her before I turned back around, clutching Tanner, and followed Cage out of the Garden.
We arrived at a nearly hidden low-income apartment complex. It was a strange contrast in comparison to the luxury the Madame lived in, but it was warm and more hospitable, junkies notwithstanding.
And...
there was food.
As I scarfed down a freshly made grilled cheese sandwich and a glass of apple juice, I listened to Cage, who was sitting across from me at his small card table. He explained “The Dream”.
Basically, he told me, Madame Rook was like a patron saint of lost souls. She took people under her wing who didn't know how to care for themselves and taught them, (or promised to teach them) to be self-sufficient. She wanted equality world wide, the rich and the poor, the religious and the scientific, the free and the enslaved. Madam Rook, Cage claimed, was a visionary.
Madame Rook.
She Cared About People.
But you've got to give a little to get a little, he went on, withdrawing deeper into his idealistic portrayal of his beloved “Mother”. In the case of the lost souls, in the cases of the Cages and the Jets, we had to be the pawns. Peace Pawns, he explained. We had to go out, be proactive, spread the word, spread the love.
And, yes.
Spread the drugs.
But the drugs, Cage concluded, were just a statement, a way of sticking it to the people trying to control the lives of everyone around them. The drugs couldn't be taxed. The drugs couldn't contribute to capitalistic, money-hungry criminals. The drugs represented freedom. Freedom of choice. Democracy as it was originally intended. The drugs were peace.
We were selling peace.
“Mother- she pays for the apartment, for our food, all the bills, she gives us everything we need, but no more because she says materialism is the downfall of the human race. If she's going to help us make it in the world, we have to understand it first. We have to follow The Dream.”
“Us?” I asked. I hadn't exactly made a commitment yet, and there wasn't another soul in sight.
“There are others, little sister. You'll meet them. We work and live together, as a team, as a family. Mother directs us, guides us... tells us where to be and who to look for.”
“Um... you weren't looking for me, were you?” I asked him, finding the thought that the well-manicured woman might have psychic powers a little bit off-putting.
“No, family finds you. You found me the same as I found Mother, family finds each other. That's just the way it is.” Cage replied, looking wistfully beyond me, beyond our dimension. It was this look that I got to know so well, his dazed, imprisoned search for hope. He cleared his throat and came back to me.
“When you have family, you have a place to call home... All you have to do is follow her instructions. And don't ask questions. Mother hates mundane thinkers, she'll lose respect for you in a heartbeat if you question her ways. Especially since she's the one who knows what's best for us... she's the one who gives us a home and a family and a chance at a life free of dumpster food and numb toes.” Cage gazed over my shoulder dreamily and pulled a cigarette from his pack on the table. He offered me one and I refused politely. “Mother cares about all of us. All she wants is to see us succeed for the right reasons. If you don't show her what she wants to see, then it's over. I've seen many come and many forced to leave. I've never asked questions because I know that if I did, I would be as bad off as I was... and I don't think I can ever live like that again.” he admitted to me. He looked at me seriously, all the dreaminess was replaced by a hard, unwavering seriousness. “How about you, Just Jet? Do you want to go back out there tonight? Not knowing where to go or where you'll be, whether or not this is your last breath? Do you want food covered in cat piss? Mold? Things so heinous that you want to puke them up the second they're in your mouth?”
I shook my head silently, watching his eyes well up passionately. “Then please don't be stupid. It's all just a game to the people out there- the elite, the job-holding elite who spend their money on things they don't need in a world they don't care about. They know competition, but they know nothing of survival. Together we're stronger.” he explained. “We're all virtually strangers, but the spirit in us is the same eternal battery that has charged humanity from the start. Common experience, common spirit, collective experience shapes the world and you and me, Jet, we have that. You won't be alone, ever again.” he concluded gently, casting his eyes down to the table, apparently embarrassed by his outpour. He hit his cigarette, gazing at a torn spot on the table where the cork board beneath the layer of foam was visible.
So, as I downed the last of my apple juice, I contemplated all that I had been told. What he was asking of me, as I took it, was to become a member of a blossoming empire of communist drug-pushers who, in return for blissful ignorance, would provide me with a heated place to stay and warm meals that weren't from the soup-kitchen.
So obviously I agreed.
I became part of the “family.”
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