Ghost Stories

coffeeafterdark: I accidentally started playing It’s Time in...

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 10:40:24 -0700

I accidentally started playing It’s Time in two different tabs and it basically sounded like this

EDIT: for those who wanted it: Download Here

Plotting

Sun, 03 Mar 2013 13:32:25 -0700

Plotting for a short story/novella featuring a transgendered librarian wizard and female warrior sidekick. Because it’s Sunday and I feel like it.

Writing.

Sun, 17 Feb 2013 15:01:47 -0700

Writing.

Charbroiled

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 22:24:44 -0700

Red thin discs go in one end, come out as sizzling grey globs of fat and protein only remotely qualified to be called hamburger. They smell of natural gas, they taste like the gristle left between the gums a week after eating a steak. It’s nothing processed cheese and big squirts of condiments can’t fix. Come on, fat America, eat your surgically repaired heart out.

Otis’ job was to watch the machine, the hulking automated grill that he fed boxes of remaindered beef. He hoped to someday move up to assembling the burgers, anything to get away from the greasy heat of the machine. No, that wasn’t true. He hoped for something else, a dream he had locked away these past few years deep down into the earth. For now he hoped to move up to assembling the burgers. It would have to do.

The machine was in the middle of the kitchen, far away from the windows that were reserved for the white higher schoolers, and far away from the front counter, reserved for the less attractive white high schoolers. The machine couldn’t be seen from any point a fragile customer might see it. People still liked to believe their burgers were cooked specially by happy cooks, squashing the fresh beef onto the sizzling griddle with a dusting of salt.

Otis tossed frozen patties into the machine eight hours a day with little contact with others. In this respect it wasn’t a bad position to have. No snooty customers, minimal interaction with the other workers and the managers. Just the rhythm of bending over to the box filled with a hundred frozen patties, straightening up to put them on the ever moving conveyer belt that led to the flames. The sizzle, the soft squeal of the wheels moving the platform, the dull backache, the impossible to escape scent of bad beef and gas.

He could see the flames from his end, the start. It made him think of Sunday School as a kid and the stories of hell that scared him so much he’d stay up all night. He would try to fall asleep before the lights would go out, lest a roving demon, or, worse, the head demon himself, Satan, came to possess him.

One night when he was eleven he was certain the great trickster had finally come for him. He felt a hot, heavy presence in his room, breathing on his face. He clinched his eyes tight and prayed like he had been taught, but could only hear the pounding in his ears. The presence stayed in his room, sat heavy on his abdomen until Otis finally asleep in a terrified exhaustion.

The next morning he tried to tell his nana about his night visitor, but she wouldn’t hear of it.

“You’re full of sin,” she snapped, not looking up from the stove. He felt hot with shame. Was Satan inside him now?

The next night he felt that hot, heavy presence return. He felt fevered, like the intense flames of hell were lapping at his face and neck. He clutched the little silver cross he had found on the playground at church the week before and swore then to God that he’d do anything to be spared.

“Hey Otis,” the lead’s voice brought him back to the present. “We need more burgers down, it’s almost the lunch rush.”

He nodded and started putting patties on the moving belt, felt the heat against his hands.

Longlea

Sun, 28 Oct 2012 11:07:09 -0700

Congressman Harold Dalton stood before the great, long estate, hat in hand, and, for the first time since he was a boy, felt nervous. The estate sat on top of long, rolling green hills in Virginia, on a parcel undisturbed for a thousand acres. The House itself rose from the verdant ground with pink stone facing and tall windows, with whimsical, and expensive, touches that suggested great love and care. It was a House of great money and power. It was Longlea.

Harold found himself visiting this secluded estate because he had been told all lines of power led to it. And he needed power. Power to ingratiate himself in the byzantine world of the House of Representatives, power to get the projects he campaigned on accomplished, but most of all power simply to maintain his upward momentum. Harold Dalton was a man on the rise, or so the newspapers and local big shots back in his district often said.

The owner of the great estate of which Harold now found himself was Charles Reach, the great financier and utilities baron. Mr. Reach was known for his great wealth, but also his generosity in sharing his connections to those who were willing to play by his rules.

The tall door finally opened to reveal a formally dressed man with a mustache that Harold presumed must be some kind of servant. His assumption was confirmed when the man pulled open the door further and swept him in to reveal a grand foyer of marble and dark woods. Harold had never seen anything like it, and felt truly far away from home.

The servant did not speak as he led him to a sitting room, their shoes clicking on the marble floor until they reached the thickly carpeted sitting room. It had two leather chairs and a white couch, and a small table with refreshments. The servant indicated for Harold to sit, and then spun on his heel and left. The house creaked and sighed in a gentle way, but otherwise was silent.

Instead of sitting Harold paced around the room, hat still in hand, peering through the doorways and studying the furnishings. A few paintings were hung on the walls, great splotches of color and swirling form that he could barely begin to understand. One seemed to depict a blood red sun over a yellow field, but then again it might be a ball being bounced in a gymnasium.

“Nervous, Mr. Dalton?” The voice was low and melodious. Harold turned to see a tall woman, perhaps up to his shoulder height, standing in the doorway that led deeper into the house. She had red-blonde hair that cascaded around her white shoulders that made him think of strawberry ice cream. One slim hand was perched on her hip, and her eyebrow was arched as if amused by the sight before her.

He didn’t know what to say, so enthralled was he.

She spoke again. ”Nervous, Mr. Dalton? Or a man of few words? I hope its not the latter, as my husband will eat you alive. But if its the former you might not fair any better.”

Husband. His mind finally reengaged and he realized he stood before Mr. Reach’s wife, Rebecca. He had assumed, given Mr. Reach’s age, that the wife would be of similar generation.

“I hesitate to admit this,” he finally answered. “But I am a bit nervous. It’s been a busy week for me, as you can imagine.” He strode over to her and offered his hand. ”Harold Dalton.”

She took it lightly but he felt a charge of warmth from her slim fingers, and it traveled up to his shoulder. ”Yes, Mr. Dalton, newly elected Representative of the Arizona Second District. Mrs. Charles Reach. It’s a pleasure to have you at Longlea.”

He peered into her dark blue eyes, and great pools of deep water. He wished for wads of wax for his ears, or to be lashed to a pool, to prevent himself from the call. But he was untethered.

“The pleasure is all mine, Mrs. Reach,” he replied with a smile.

Suggestions

Sat, 13 Oct 2012 16:09:08 -0700

“I thought we were going out tonight.”

His voice was flat, but Charlotte knew what lay behind it. She looked down at the floral party dress she wore.

“You don’t like this?”

“No, it’s fine.” He was looking at his phone.

“I can go change.”

“I said it was fine.” His eye moved to the door without giving her a second look. ”We should go.”

“Oscar.” She stepped toward him, feeling wobbly in her heels. But he was already briskly moving toward the door.

The apartment was as expansive and sterile as its host. Jerry Weyr was a man who insisted on throwing parties for employees he found promising, which meant every sycophant an obsessively groomed LinkedIn account fought and positioned to get an invite. Mid-manager assholes in matching suits and tall, thin girlfriends were spread out over the main room. A low murmur was punctuated by short laughs and financial terms, and Charlotte felt alone.

Oscar worked the room with Charlotte following, he playing the role of junior associate hoping to be remember and she the role of the smiling support. People with some stature didn’t have to circle the party too much, partners not at all. They had been going to Jerry Weyr’s parties for almost a year, and she had come to realize that the less you moved, the more power you had.

“Jerry,” Oscar said, shaking his boss’ hand vigorously, “great party, thanks for inviting us.”

“I’m just glad to open my home up to some promising associates,” Jerry responded. He turned his shark grin to Charlotte. ”Stay with this one, and you’ll be marrying the fast track.”

She felt her face contort into the learned expression that she hoped said gratitude and happiness. She never knew what to say to that, especially since she had never had a conversation with Oscar about marriage. He was beaming now, but this was theater. Who knows how he’d react when no one was watching.

“I hear Steve is leaving to set up his own fund,” Oscar was saying to some other junior associate. They had made their way through all the important people and now were left to socialized with the other people at the bottom. They were clustered in a small group, six mid-twenties white men with five tall girlfriends, and Charlotte. Even in her heels she felt short, because not only were the other women taller naturally, but had on truly towering 6 inch stilettos. They all wore variants of the same black cocktail dress.

“Do you think he’d take any of us,” Garrison asked as he looked conspiratorially around the room.

“Who knows,” Oscar responded, supremely confident in his place as leader of this small cabal. ”Would it be worth it? Or would it better to put in the time here, a place with a track record, and make your own firm someday?”

The other men nodded and muttered their consent. One of them now turned their attention to Charlotte, and she tried not to visibly shrink from the gaze. “So what are you doing now, Charlene?”

“I’m still at the Milk Bar.”

“You should get into finance. What was your degree again?”

“French and philosophy.”

The group, except Oscar and Charlotte, burst out laughing. Oscar, who looked like he wanted to strangle the questioner, and Charlotte, who wanted to disappear.

“Well, maybe law school?”

The air vibrated with a shimmering drone only heard late at night in the city. Charlotte sat by the open window of her apartment and stared down at the empty side street. It was four in the morning and her head ached with too much wine. She wondered if anyone she knew was also awake, and where they were right then. There was no activity the last time she checked her phone, and she thought that she might be the last person in her tenuous network to be awake at that moment.

She hugged her knees to her body as she sat on the sill, trying to ward off the early autumn chill, and suddenly thought of a time years before when she had stayed up all night just to show she could. She had been 10 years old, visiting her grandparents at their great Cape Cod house. The entire house was still and she looked over the dunes that led to the sea. She had been reading Melville that past year at school, alone at lunch hour. She deeply wanted to take to the sea or to find adventure.

So she had sat as a 10 year old on the second floor of her grandparents ancient home, and just knew that when she was in her twenties she’d be having those adventures. She had looked around that little room, still painted purple and filled with childhood obsessions, and imagined the walls slowly moving away until the room wasn’t a room anymore but a neverending space that was ready to be explored.

Now she sat on the sill of the main room of her drab apartment, the one she shared with her college boyfriend, and she couldn’t imagine the walls moving. It felt like they were constricting, slowly moving in each day, inch by inch, until someday there wouldn’t be anymore room.

Charlotte was laying on their cheap, sinking coach when Oscar came home. He put his bag down with a sigh, and scowled around the room. ”Dinner,” he grunted.

“I was thinking we could have leftovers,” she said, looking up from her book. ”We just have so much food in the fridge.”

“Do we,” his voice flat. Charlotte waited for him to continue, but he just went into their bedroom and didn’t come out for the rest of the night while she lay on the couch both hoping he’d come back out, and desperately wishing he wouldn’t.

The ocean breeze cooled the wedding reception that was naturally on the Cape. Charlotte’s sister Audrey insisted her wedding be at their late grandparents home, dissenting opinions be damned. Charlotte, as maid of honor, was give a lot of responsibilities, but she knew she’d have no luck discussing the impracticalities of the location.

It had required a great deal of planning and fighting but now the day was here and if there were hitches, no one minded them. They were too busy enjoying the summer sun and the performance of everlasting love. Charlotte played her part well, smiling in the photographs and saying the right things, even as every relative asked her where Oscar was and why he didn’t come.

She didn’t have the strength to tell them that he was back in New York working and probably fucking every cocktail waitress he met. She didn’t have the heart to tell them that he had returned her calls or texts in the past week since she had come up to the Cape to prepare for the final push to the wedding.

They asked her what she was doing, and she didn’t have the heart to tell them she still worked at a restaurant, no matter how well regarded it or its famous chef might be, was still essentially a cafe that catered to rich East Village assholes. She didn’t tell them that she had filled dozens of notebooks with words and doodles, or that she had a near weekly rejection letter from various literary journals.

While the cake was being served she excused herself from the cousins table, the table that had been filled with her various cousins who all seemingly were more successful than her. They all had a piece of advice on how to get her life going, and she wanted to scream.

After giving her speech she slipped away. The prospect of chocolate and vanilla cakes filled with heavy creams and fruits meant no one was watching as she trudged back to the aging house. She found herself in her old room, staring again out over the see in its late afternoon color.

“What am I doing,” she asked the view, feeling silly for talking to herself. ”What the fuck, am I doing,” she more confidently. She repeated the phrase, practically yelling out of the window and to the sea. The water did not respond. Waves kept gently rolling up to the beach, birds kept flying in the sky, and the grass in the dunes waved gently.

She turned from the window and looked around the small room. It was still purple, still filled with stuff animals, still the room as decorated by a six year old. Sometime in middle school she stopped coming out to the Cape as much, preferring to stay in Boston with her friends, but her grandparents never changed the room. Maybe they had hoped she still liked it.

They had died the same night, both in their sleep. Charlotte had been 17, her sister already in college, and she remembered with shame feeling annoyed that she’d have to interrupt her exam preparation. She had sullenly put on a too small black dress and had glared through the entire process.

Looking around the room, she whispered, “I’m sorry, Grandma.”

The atmosphere in the room seemed to shift, and it seemed like a voiced well up from inside Charlotte’s mind. ”Sorry for what, Charlie?”

“For ignoring you as I got older. For feeling like your funeral was a hassle. For being a fuck up now.”

“Oh the other things don’t bother me. You were just getting older, learning to be your own person.” The voice paused, and then said in that same clipped, wryly voice her grandma had had, “And you’re not a fuck up.”

I probably shouldn’t use my grandmother voice to curse,Charlotte thought. She and her subconscious might curse like a sailor, but her grandmother had not.

“What else could I be,” she said to the room. ”I work at a glorified pseudo-chain bakery, I have two useless degrees from a small, obscure school, and my boyfriend is an emotional vampire. Let’s be practical here.”

In her mind her grandmother snorted.

“The world is full of practical people. But it doesn’t have enough dreamers. We have too many people who knowhowto get to the moon, but not enough demanding we do so. Go out and dream, my love.”

The room fell quiet and still. Charlotte didn’t believe in ghosts, or even an afterlife. Rationally, she knew that it was just her subconscious trying to convince herself what she should have accepted long ago. But she also felt that something had been there, if not perhaps her grandmother than perhaps some vestiges of the love and energy with which her grandmother had filled this house and this room.

The world on the other side of the door hadn’t changed. It was still mostly iron and water and carbon. She still worked at the Milk Bar. Oscar was still back at their apartment, likely fucking some cocktail waitress. But she felt if she went through the door things would be different. She didn’t know for certain. If she had to take wagers on things getting better, she’d probably feel pretty bearish. But she had hope. She went through the door. It would be enough.

This blog rarely updates, so please visit my other blog, a collage of music, clothes, food, and...

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 08:36:00 -0700

This blog rarely updates, so please visit my other blog, a collage of music, clothes, food, and other things that I like.

Echo - work in progress

Fri, 24 Dec 2010 12:01:07 -0700

Neil sat down heavily on his padded computer throne, a massive chair that allowed him total comfort for the numerous hours he would spend at his desk. He took a gulp from the sugary, over-caffeinated drink, and waited for the rush to hit him. It would a long night, just the capstone on a series of them that had him preparing for his biggest caper ever.

The National Intelligence Net/System. NINS. The most advanced computer system in the known universe, it protected the Nacu’s most vital intelligence secrets. No one had yet broken its security protocols, or at least lived to tell about it. NINS had become a millennial prize in the hacking community, whoever could crack it first would be the envy of all.

While he waited for his kcomp to boot up, Neil looked over at another monitor that was plugged into the /wh chat. He hadn’t given any indication about what he was going to attempt, no reason to give anything away. He didn’t completely trust /wh anymore. Though it was a heavily vetted, private community that could only be joined by jockeys that had been recommended by multiple /wh members, as well as had pulled off at least one ‘newsworthy’ job, Neil still suspected at least one federal agent had infiltrated the chat.

He didn’t have any proof, but nearly a year ago he had almost been caught after mentioning a small job on the chat. A couple other big users had been nabbed, though not directly from anything going on at /wh. It was just enough to make Neil suspicious. No, he wouldn’t let anyone know he was doing anything. The question was, what do you do if you succeed? Hide in fear, or take the recognition, even virtual recognition, you deserve?

But he hadn’t done anything yet.

>hyr: so i just mirrored the secprog back on itself

>gogol: nice

>ilium: you could have just avoided that

>ilium: total toy move

>ilium: put in the cmd f:/backdoor#

>ilium: its an old protocal toy admins forget to remove

>ilium: hth

>hyr: fuck you

>hyr: f

>hyr: u

>hyr: c

>gogol: lol

>hyr: k

>hyr: y

>hyr: o

>hyr: u

>hyr: hth :3

>hyr: dammit gogol

>wig: dammit gogol

>gogol: what

Neil logged in under his chosen disguise.

>sock has joined /wh

>ilium: hey man

>gogol: hey

>sock: hey guys

>sock: slow night?

>wig: yeah

>ilium: always

>wig: i heard something big was going down later

Neil felt cold. Was wig referencing his soon-to-be NINS heist? Neil hadn’t told anyone about, had referenced it once online or in person to anyone.

>ilium: like what

>wig: dunno, maybe govt

>hyr: bullshit

>hyr: whered you hear that

>wig: over on hilltop

He immediately switched tabs and pulled up Hilltop, a newssite for the security industry. First story: PLANNED NINS HEIST TONIGHT?

Shit.

This put a serious wrench in his plans. If went through with it tonight, then he’d be walking towards certain userdeath. But there was a reason he picked tonight: he had gotten word that it was a planned sec maintenance night. It was impossible to predict when the next one would be, if at all. Could he trust his work, his talent?

Maybe he could get a greedy toy or two to attempt their own heists, providing a diversion. He emailed the Tips Editor of Hilltop about NINS’ security upgrade that night. Within a few minutes the site was updated to say PLANNED NINS HEIST TO COINCIDE WITH PLANNED UPGRADE AT 1AM? DETAILS INSIDE

He flipped back over to /wh to see if anyone might be taking the bait. He’d have to wait to make sure others were going in first if he wanted to succeed. He could then replicate their IP’s to make it look like his own hack was coming from them.

>ilium: no one stupid enough to take nins

>wig: hilltop just updated

>wig: nins sec update tonite

>wig: perfect time to strike

>hyr: no shit really

>hyr: how much sys do you think be down

>ilium: if i knew i wouldnt tell you

>wig: youre not thinking of going in are you

>hyr: maybe >_>

>hyr: maybe not

Bait taken, now he just had to wait to see if hyr really was stupid to try and go in with no preparation. Assuming hyr was the toy it acted convincingly like, that is. Of course, there was always the possibility that hyr was the fed, and it was just trying to get lurkers make the dive into a fullblown trap. This sort of move required patience, but there was precious little time for it.

By this point Neil’s kcomp had fully booted up, but there was still an hour until showtime. He ran a few sec/kill programs, made sure everything was ready to go.

Finally the time was 1am, and he started a spy program to watch activity in the NINS database. It was a tiny program, one barely detectable by even the best sec agents, but it would allow Neil to determine whether an attack was undergoing, and where it was coming from.

At first, nothing happened. NINS engaged its update protocols, and he watched as the security programs changed, some switching off, and some switching on that he had never seen before. Then, at the time he would have made his move, an attack began. He pinged the attacker, checked his database on another screen, and saw that it matched up with hyr. The stupid bastard really was going for it.

Another attacker arrived, but Neiled couldn’t track the IP. He locked onto both attackers, then used their signatures to hide his own. Their code was sloppy, and they were setting off all kind of alarms. It was only a matter of time before both were getting a friendly visit from the on duty sec agents. Using hyr’s signature, Neil dropped a bit of code that acted as a kind of EMP in a program, sending shockwaves of damage through the security net that protected the first gate.

Security protocols were built with a series of “gates.” Gates were centralized units that determined everything that went on, monitored, and sent information to the next gate. If one went off-line, or was breeched, that information would be sent backwards to the next gate, which would pass it one until it reached the most interior gate, which would relay the information to the kernel. It wasn’t the most efficient system, and you could blow out multiple gates at one time, then you could conceivably make it far before anyone knew the wiser.

The problem here was using an nEMP that wasn’t too savvy, since it was supposed to originating form a toy like hyr. The one Neil dropped was only enough to blow through the first two gates, but he used a tiny trick of database compiling to duplicate his own signature to look like a packet of routine information being sent down the gate-line.

The entire system was lighting up with sec agents as they tried to fend off the intruders. Hyr and the other attacker followed Neil, not realizing what had happened, to the third gate, but they were stuck there as he skated on by to the final gate.

It was going a lot easier than he would have anticipated, but he couldn’t let that enter into his thoughts. Better to be cautious, especially the most difficult part lay ahead. The final gate likely would trigger another independent security program, maybe even an AI. If anyone would have an AI it would be the government, and it wouldn’t be happy to see Neil. No trick was going to conceal him now, he had to hope he would be fast enough to disable the gate, wall off any attempts to ID him, and defeat any sec program.

He loaded up a replicating program, and then overloaded the gate with a wave of data packets from the previously downed gates. The final gate, being the one that communicated directly with the kernel, could be especially vulnerable to information overload. He just hoped it would work this time, because hyr and the other attacker looked to be surrounded and tagged.

The gate was holding too long, Neil had to do something. He quickly wrote out some code that would cause the gate to attempt to repel the legitimate information. With any luck, it would fail as it attempted to both receive too much information, and repel too much information at the same time.

After a few seconds, the gate finally was breached, but too much time had been wasted. Still, he was in NINS. What he would find, he wasn’t sure. He closed the gate behind him, and then had it send out a message back up the gate-line that the gate closures were a routine part of the scheduled update. That wasn’t true, but by the time the sec agents figured that out, he would hopefully be long gone.

Beyond the final gate was a vast sea of nothing. Sure, there was code, but when usual there are millions of lines of dense code to be deciphered and broken, the inner part of NINS seemed to be devoid of anything. There were references to programs and subroutines, but nothing else. It was like standing in a vast room, the walls covered in drawers. In the drawers could be treasure or death, but the only way to know was open one.

He quickly read down the list of possible terms. The first was /echo so he typed:

://prompt

/echo = ;run

Nothing. He scanned down the remaining list, trying to decide which, if any, to activate. They could all be traps. He decided on /root, but as he began typing out the prompt, suddenly all the electronic devices in his apartment went out.

No lights, the computers were off, even the fridge was beeping on its emergency battery supply. The clocks, which had just said 1:21am now blinked 12:00am.

Not good, he thought. Sec agents, or worse had found him. That /echo program must have been a trap and now he was right fucked. Userdeath.

Suddenly, with a great whine and squeal, his five computer monitors came back on line, and the lights overhead flickered. He checked the monitor hooked to the kcomp, but it wasn’t connected to NINS. In fact, all of the computers were back to their login screens.

As he reached to type in his login information on his chat computer, his mobile rang. He hesitated to answer it, lest it be a fed. No number showed up on the caller-ID, not even “Private” or “Blocked.” Just blank. It kept ringing, though, not even switching to voicemail. Finally, curiosity got the better of him, and he answered.

“Hello,” he said. He felt very scared, completely out of control.

“Who is this,” the female voice on the other end demanded. It had a slight electronic ting, which sent shivers down Neil’s spine. A fed.

“Well, who are you,” he asked in response.

“I am,” she said, then paused. “I don’t know.”

“Why are you calling me?” Neil began feeling a little more confidence.

“You called me,” was the response.

“I did?”

“Did you not prompt echo?” Suddenly his kcomp was logged in and on the black background, glowing green lines of code appeared in repetition.

://prompt

/echo = ;run

://prompt

/echo = ;run

://prompt

/echo = ;run

where am I now

He stared at the glowing green text and wondered what the hell he had got himself into.

CARRY ME HOME - PART 5: CLOSURE

Wed, 22 Dec 2010 12:09:07 -0700

Harper got her life together, somehow. It wasn’t easy, but she eventually found herself as a writer for a news website. She was paid to write 10 stories a day, and was allowed to leave when she completed the quota. Some days it took all day, and others she could be out by noon.

Slowly, her life began to be pieced back together. She was sober, though still smoked. It wasn’t dangerous or sexy anymore. Now it was the only thing, along with coffee, that made her feel human.

She met a boy, left him, met another boy, got left, then met another boy who seemed alright and didn’t leave. They weren’t in love, but they fit together comfortably enough, like a piece of cheap furniture.

One day Harper was searching on Facebook and found her old friend Andre. He looked the same, well, until she looked at the photos he had uploaded from high school. He was thicker now, though not fat, and seemed more serious. She submitted a friend request, which was accepted almost immediately.

Her boy, what was his name again?, looked over her shoulder once after this and saw an old picture of Harper that Andre had uploaded. “Damn,” he said. “You could have been a model.”

They began talking again, mainly on chat programs or Facebook, trying to rekindle any friendly feeling. One day, out of the blue, Andre mentioned he was getting married and would she like to come? At first she was relieved that the invitation meant he didn’t hold any romantic longings for her, but she really didn’t want to go. Who would she know? And it was back in their hometown? She hadn’t been back to California since leaving. She said yes anyways, against her better wishes.

The month came and she packed a bag, went out shopping and found a dress. She and her boy had drifted apart by this point, like cheap furniture. She took a bus to Newark, and got on the plane alone, with one bag on her lap and another in the belly of the plane. As the plane turned its nose skyward she felt suddenly a great push of gravity and anxiety, suddenly wished to be off that plane and back in her shit apartment in the unsexy part of Brooklyn, and she looked out the window and saw New Jersey slowly falling away. She wasn’t moving, the earth was collapsing and soon it would be gone. She squeezed her eyes shut, prayed it would end.

Four hours later she landed down in California. A shuttle took her the nearly two hour drive to her hometown. It still looked the same, well, the major details did. She hadn’t bothered to call her parents, and checked into the cheap hotel about ten minutes from the wedding venue. She flopped back on the bed, stared at the ceiling, then finally worked up enough courage to call Andre and tell him she had arrived.

He of course wanted to go to dinner, to introduce her to his fiancée. Harper wanted to say no, but she was only going to be in town for the night, then leave the next night immediately after the reception. It was now or never as far as their friendship was concerned, and Harper didn’t want to screw it up again. So she pulled on a nice dress, though not the one she had bought for the wedding, fixed her hair and put on some makeup, then waited outside the hotel, nervously smoking one cigarette after another.

Finally a grey SUV pulled up, and Andre got out. He was smiling, he went for a hug, and Harper awkwardly leaned into it, worrying that she now reeked of cigarettes.

His fiancée had gotten out, too, and she was a short, petit, bookish woman. Harper thought she was the kind of girl that she wouldn’t notice, but then felt bad for thinking it. Andre looked at her with such love that Harper felt intense jealousy.

The fiancee’s name was Tina. She was just as boring as her name, but the dinner was polite, if a little awkward She constantly looked to Harper, and then Andre, trying to see if there was some kind of threat to her place. She thought to herself that Harper didn’t look all that great. Tall, sure, but her eyes were tired and a littly baggy, and she wasn’t as thin as those old pictures that Andre still kept. No, Tina wasn’t jealous anymore. Andre didn’t want this jaded, chain smoking, pathetic creature from New York. Tina felt confident in her veganism, her petit and calm nature. She almost felt bad for Harper, this poor, lonely creature that Andre has saved from the woods.

That night Harper fell asleep instantly, not even bothering to wipe off her makeup; dreaming of a time long before when she was still thin and beautiful and full of hope. And when Deion was still alive.

The morning of the wedding she got ready, feeling like shit. She pulled out the dress she had bought for this day only, and felt weird looking at it. It had seemed modern and daring back in New York, but now it seemed out of place. She’d be ‘that one,’ the one everyone remembered for all the wrong reasons. She wouldn’t ever see any of these people gain, so why did she care? But she did. She took a long shower, then a long bath, trying to relax. When she stared in the mirror, the reflection didn’t look so bad. She applied a little makeup, slipped into her dress, and then hailed a taxi to the wedding site.

The wedding was beautiful, but short. Non-religious, quasi-spiritual, utterly forgettable. Harper sat in the back, near the exit, nervously destroying her program and thinking of leaving the second the whole thing was over. But she stayed.

After the service, she stood outside smoking, eyeing the other guests who milled around the reception area. A cool, salty breeze floated over the crowd and Harper thought of the ocean. Soon this would be over and she would be back on her way to New York. To home. She just wanted to enjoy this right now.

Andre walked up. He looked good in his grey suit, looked happy.

“How’d you escape,” she asked.

“Photo time. They’re doing Tina’s family, so I have about a minute.”

“It was a wonderful ceremony. Congratulations.”

“Thank you.” He looked to where the photographer and Tina’s family were, but they weren’t motioning for him yet. “It’s too bad Deion wasn’t here.”

Why did he have to bring him up? Harper instantly felt her stomach being squeezed, but she kept her face still.

“Yes.” What else was there to say about that?

“I think during dinner, during the speeches, I’d like to have a toast for him.”

Harper wondered then if Deion’s parents were here, and what would they think of that. Why was Andre asking her? One final test? Or to twist the knife further?

“I’d like you to join me in it,” he continued. “To maybe say something, too.”

What else was there to do but say yes?

Dinner started and the guests all sat down. Harper was assigned to a table full of people that had gone to her high school, but she didn’t recognize or remember any of them. She doubted they remembered her, and beyond a little bit of awkward conversation she was largely ignored.

After dinner the speeches started. First maid of honor and best man, each giving sickeningly sweet and impossibly inside-y stories that they likely had agonized over for weeks. Then the parents gave gooey speeches punctuated by sobbing and hugs. As the toasts went on, Harper could feel the anxiety creeping up ever higher, until finally she stood (her table was near the exit) and slipped out of the room in the middle of Tina’s mother’s speech. She looked back at the last moment to see if Andre had noticed, but his shining eyes were locked on his new mother in law, full of love. He could give the toast alone, it was his burden to bear. Harper had to go. So she did.

Once out of the room, she ran down the hallway, ran through the courtyard, through the parking lot and down the road that led to the sea. She ran, tearing off her heels and felt the hard asphalt against her feet until she saw the sea. She touched her chest, then, felt the tattoo on her collarbone that had stayed with her all these years, felt it hot under her fingers. And she stared at the sea, and wished to suddenly be over it, far away.

CARRY ME HOME - PART 4: ANDRE

Tue, 21 Dec 2010 12:00:07 -0700

Harper packed up her car the morning of graduation. We three partied, Deion, Harper, and I, all night never wanting to end. The morning after, she left.

I don’t know all the places she visited, but she stopped in New York, the farthest place she could stand away from our hometown. She got a job a waitress at some shitty blues bar and found artists to latch on to.

At first we talked every week, me giving her news of home, her telling me wild stories of the city on the vanguard. Slowly, calls became emails, or texts. The time between each response grew. The change was unspoken, and barely noticeable. Until one day I woke up and thought of Harper and realized I hadn’t talked to her in 3 months.

I called her, made plans for Thanksgiving. Deion, Harper, and I had promised that every year we would meet for Thanksgiving, or meet as we were best able. Since Deion was still in Army training, we would be talking to him on the phone.

I flew out to New York, and Harper was waiting at the airport for me with an awful bedazzled sign. She looked great, a completely different creature than the girl that had left California at the beginning of summer. Now it was almost winter and she wore what even a clothing neophyte like me could recognize as stylish. She gave me a hug, and fawned me with attention that I had missed.

We found a hole-in-the-wall Chinese place for Thanksgiving, called Deion, and had a great time. The next day, she gave me a tour of Manhattan, and I marveled at the towering concrete canyons. Finally it was time to go. We made a promise to talk more, I got on the plane and didn’t hear from Harper again for almost another year.

As for myself, I was busy with school. I was studying engineering, against my better judgment, because I worried about getting a job afterwards. I took a part-time position at the college’s newspaper, and covered all kinds of mundane stories while dreaming of flying to Spain and being Hemingway.

At the beginning of the start of my second year of college, Deion was killed. I called Harper almost immediately after I received the call. She picked up the phone after it rang almost twenty times and I was ready to hang up. It was early in New York, even earlier in California. I told her the news, guilty that it was the first thing we had said to each other in nearly a year. I heard the phone hit the floor, her crying out “Deion, Deion, why.”

I said, “Harper, pick up the phone. Harper. Harper” until finally she did.

“Yes.” Her voice was thick with grief.

“The funeral is this weekend. Can you make it?”

“Yes,” she said.

But she didn’t.

The next time I saw her was Thanksgiving. I flew out to New York, not trusting that she would arrive in California unannounced. I knew where she lived, or least where she once had. She was still there.

I knocked, and she answered, looking like complete shit. Looking completely shocked that I was there. “What do you want,” she mumbled, blocking the door.

I pushed her back, she was weak. “It’s Thanksgiving.”

“So.”

“So aren’t we going to celebrate it together?”

She looked around her dingy studio and then laughed, a husky laugh that wasn’t there when I knew her before. “Oh, of course. Let me just whip up a wonderful dinner to have on my clean, wonderful, perfect table.”

She came towards me. “What do you really want,” she growled. “I know what you want. What you and Deion always wanted.”

“Harper, don’t do this.”

“Then what the fuck do you want from me?”

I went back to my hotel, intending to never come back. It was still Wednesday, though, and my flight back wasn’t until Friday. Instead of switching my flight, at great expense, I felt drawn back to her apartment.

I woke up Thanksgiving morning thinking only of finding some place open for food. After a quick bite, I dropped by her place. Nothing. Again, harder. Nothing, but the door moved open, it was unlocked. I pushed it open, and saw Harper lying on the floor, passed out. She looked dead. Hell, she might have been dead.

I called 911, rode by her side to the hospital, waited in an overlit room, called her disinterested parents, and finally was allowed to see her nearly a day later. I had canceled my flight.

I walked into her room, and her eyes were closed. “Hey,” I said.

She turned her head, opened her eyes. They were glossy, unfocused. “Hey.”

“How do you feel?”

She laughed, or tried to. “How do you think.”

I sat down on the chair that was crammed between the wall and her bed.

“What happened?”

“I’m sick.”

“Don’t bullshit me,” I said, letting anger come into my voice.

“Fine, I overdosed.”

“On what.”

“Heroin. I think.”

“You need help.”

She opened her eyes again; they were clearer. “No offense, Andre, but what do you know about what I need? You haven’t been here. You don’t know shit about me.”

“I did,” I said. She was crying, but so was I.

“I’m sorry,” she said eventually. “But you don’t anymore. I barely do either. I do need help, but not in the loaded, strings-attached way you or my parents are going to offer. This is my mess, and I need to get out on my own.”

We sat for the next few minutes in silence. Finally I said, “I can wait here until you’re ready to go to California. To go home.”

“Home?” She practically spat the words at me. “I don’t even know what that word means anymore. Home. I’ve lived out of a suitcase for the past 15 years of my life, there is no home for me to go back to. This is my home. New York is my home. Where I am is my home. Not California.” Harper turned away, then. “I’m tired. Can you leave?”

I did. Left the hospital and went back to the hotel for my bag and then straight to the airport without looking back. I didn’t see Harper again for another 5 years.

I threw myself back into my studies, forgoing any social activities for months. My friends understood, I told them why and promised that once I had a chance to process Deion’s death (and Harper’s rejection of me) then I would be ready to be social again.

And bless them, they waited. I might have lost one or two friends, but they obviously didn’t matter. My grades were impeccable, and I was making connections. After graduating I landed a job at a local firm, and although the pay was only middle of the road, it was a good job. I was happy, for the most part.

My days were filled with work, nights with various social activities. I occasionally thought about Harper and wondered what she was up to, whether she had ever figured things out. But those thoughts gradually faded away and she came up in my mind less and less.

One day, while at a housewarming party for a worky buddy, I was introduced to a girl named ‘Tina.” She was small, seemed to take up little space. Her voice was quiet but her words were forceful. Her eyes flashed with strength, and I was taken aback. Although we only chatted for a minute about the recent bank bailouts, I had to know more about her.

I asked my work buddy who she was, and he said she was a friend of his wife. By this point she had left. I begged his wife to introduce me another time, or perhaps set up a blind date. At first she was cautious, saying that Tina was one of her best friends and had been hurt by men before. I promised I wouldn’t do anything wrong. Finally she conceded, and a double date was set for the following weekend.

I was more nervous for that Friday than I had been for a long time. What if she didn’t like me? What if I wasn’t her type? When the day came, I rushed through work and came home to get ready. Finally it was time.

It turns out I didn’t have much to worry about, for I married her. She my best friend, and I’ve never been happier.

I do have to say one thing. Growing up, I had a friend. A dear friend who left us too soon. I’d like to invite up another childhood friend to raise a toast for Deion Rust, who died too young. Harper, can you come up here?

Harper?

CARRY ME HOME - PART 3: DEION

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 12:01:06 -0700

CARRY ME HOME

PART 1: OPENING

PART 2: HARPER

Deion joined the Army the day after September 11^th. He went down to the recruiting office, despite the pleas of his mother and Harper, and signed on the dotted line. The damn fool didn’t even have the sense to ask for a relative safe assignment like computer tech.

After basic and advanced training, he was shipped off to Iraq. A week later his mom was visited by army officers expressing their condolences and talking about how he was a hero, as much as you can be a hero by being blown up in a humvee by roadside bomb.

CARRY ME HOME - PART 2: HARPER

Sun, 19 Dec 2010 12:01:07 -0700

CARRY ME HOME

PART 1: OPENING

Harper packed up her car the morning of graduation. The morning after she left.

By the end of the summer she had seen nearly everything she thought she could see in America, and headed for New York to settle down. She had in her mind a thought of becoming an artist, or maybe an actress. That was what was great about New York, she had convinced herself, that anything a person could want to be could be achieved in a place like New York.

She pulled into Manhattan and as a way to prove to herself that she would never leave, the first thing she did was sell her car. Then she found a hostel and dropped off her meager belongings before heading downtown to party in some dingy club. She was now in the middle of it all, she now was it. What else was there?

She found a shitty job as a cocktail waitress at some shitty dancehall tucked into the East Village. It was more tourist than native, but she didn’t care. She filled her days by wandering the various cultural landmarks of Manhattan, not even bothering to gaze over the bridges or look down the tunnels that connected the center of the world to the periphery. She went to museums and galleries, tried out for plays and did the occasional modeling. Everywhere she went she met someone who would take her somewhere else to meet someone else.

She eventually found a little subletted apartment of her own tucked into the top of a dirty building somewhere near Chelsea. There wasn’t much to it, but she would sometimes buy day-old flowers to put by the window that looked out into an alley. She also got a phone line, and it was mainly to collect messages from Andre, who seemed to call everyday. Sometimes she took the calls, but quickly bored of them, and the spaces between answering grew.

It wasn’t completely a conscious effort. Harper was rarely in her apartment, spending her time meeting people and working. After a few months she quit her job at the bar and was a receptionist at a downtown art gallery. This allowed her to use her impressive well of sexual charm on all kind of monied people instead of the fat and drunk tourists that had come into her old job.

One day in the middle of November she was looking at her ever-neglected “To Do” list and saw Andre’s name circled. She called him on a whim, and he answered almost immediately. As they chatted, running down what each person had been doing over the past few months, he reminded her of the promise they had made about Thanksgiving. Harper had forgotten about it, but insisted that he come out to her, and that they would call Deion during dinner.

The day before Thanksgiving she went to Newark (ugh!) to pick up Andre. She had made an awful sign to kid him a little, which he glowered at and refused to find funny. The cab ride back to Manhattan was a little awkward, and he signaled he didn’t have enough to pay the driver, so Harper covered it.

They went to Chinese food the next day, the least romantic and blasé one Harper could find, but still she couldn’t shake that Andre wanted more than just a fulfillment of a promise they had made in high school. They called Deion, who couldn’t talk long.

The next day Andre begged to be taken around Manhattan. She loathed the idea of playing a tourist, having already convinced herself that she was a native, but she begrudgingly agreed to see the usual tourist crap. They didn’t get to the Empire State Building, luckily.

When Andre left, she settled back into her real life, the one not punctured by visits from the past.

Soon she was being invited to parties that she never previously would have been at. With these sort of high money parties, tucked away in private lofts all over the Meatpacking District, came a different kind of adventure. Instead of drinks and weed, the choice for the more collegiate and low end parties Harper had attended, this new crowd offered all the finest drugs money could buy.

She would never forget the first time she used cocaine, the rush of energy and the feeling that she could accomplish anything. But it left quickly and was too expensive. Heroin wasn’t her first choice, but a musician boyfriend convinced her to try some and she was hooked.

It didn’t affect her life, not right away, and so she felt that she had it under control. Besides, she only used it socially.

One day, she received a call from Andre. On a whim, perhaps at the desperate sound in his voice on the answering machine, she picked up the phone.

“Harper,” he said. “It’s about Deion.”

He didn’t have to finish, she already knew. It was what she had been dreading ever since he had announced sometime senior year that he would join the Army.

She dropped the phone, sank to the floor, and cried out “Deion, Deion, why.”

After sobbing for what seemed like an hour, she crawled away from the still unhooked phone, and lay next to her bed, staring at the ceilng.

Life became a blur after that. She tried to work, but her grief overcame her at odd times. She could tell her bosses were getting frustrated with her, but she couldn’t feel better. The only thing that seemed to help was heroin.

Before, it was recreational, fun, not a problem. Now she used it everyday. Days blurred by, and she sucked her boyfriend’s supply dry, and he would get more so she could use it all again. She remembered, hazily, of getting a call from her boss, telling her she was fired for not showing up for a week.

She found another job, this time at higher end club as a hostess. It’s hours were more in line with the way she was living now, so although her drug use increased, it didn’t really impede her except every so often.

Everyday seemed the same, she either worked or didn’t, but always was under some kind of haze. If it wasn’t heroin, then she’d drink until she’d pass out.

On one day off, a random Thursday, she woke up to someone incessantly buzzing her apartment. She let them up, and opened the door. It was Andre. Harper didn’t remember making any plans. He said it was Thanksgiving.

“It’s not a good day for me,” she said, hoping he’d just leave so she could go back to sleep.

“I just flew all the way across the country,” he said, leaning in, “and that’s all you’ll say to me?”

She moved out of the way, against her better wishes, and he came in. He looked around, but seemed to either not see, or choose not to see, the mess she had made in her addiction. He then turned his attention to her, and Harper didn’t like the way he was looking at her. Like a dog looks at a steak.

They made small talk for a bit, him of his boring college life, she lying to make her life seem just a little better. They sat down on her futon, looked out the window that had a vase full of dead flowers. She wished right then to trade places with the flowers for just the next ten minutes, or until he left.

The buzz that had been building in her mind grew to a dull roar, especially she made them a few drinks to take the edge off their boring conversation. He was too busy staring at the wall to notice her hands shaking as she poured out the drinks, and sneak a few slugs from the bottle.

Slowly they loosened up, until they were laughing like old times. She looked in Andre’s eyes and smiled, hoping to communicate some kind of harmless warmth. He smiled back, then leaned in and kissed her.

Harper jerked back, and said, “What was that?”

“Oh come on,” he replied, rubbing her shoulders and pulling her closer. “You’ve been eye-fucking me all night.”

“No,” she said. “No.” But he kissed her again, kissed her so hard that she couldn’t respond, and the room began spinning from too much alcohol and she couldn’t resist anymore.

The last thing she remembered before passing out was looking over at the window with the dead flowers, as he climbed on top of her, and wishing she could trade places with the flowers for just ten minutes.

When she woke it was early morning, just an hour or so after midnight according to the digital wall clock, and she staggered to her feet feeling like absolute shit. She looked around her tiny apartment, making sure Andre wasn’t there. She wondered if he had even come last night, or if anything had actually happened. What had been a dream, and what a reality? She didn’t know anymore.

Harper dug around in her drug kit, finding the last of her heroin. She cooked it up, then prepared a needle. It hurt going in, of course, but it was a barely noticeable prick after the thousand times before. Then she felt life rushing in, replacing what she had lost.

She slumped against the wall, dropped the needle and stared at the wall. The heroin had been from her boyfriend’s stash, and as her body shuddered she wondered if it had been heroin at all and if she were going to die. She wondered if Deion would be there, but then she thought about being a child and learning about hell. War heroes, even ones that never had a chance to be a hero, didn’t go to the same place as worthless drug addicts. She thought that, and cried.

When Harper woke up she was in a hospital. Electric beeps and panicked talking filled the air and crushed against her aching head. She groaned and tried to sit up, but couldn’t find the strength.

“Don’t,” Andre voice floated over like fog. “You’re still took weak.”

“Andre.”

“You overdosed.”

“Why are you here?”

There was a long enough silence that she began to wonder if he had left. Finally, he said, “I couldn’t leave you.”

“I almost wish you had,” she spat back.

“You’re not well.”

“Thank you, doctor.”

“You’re mad at me,” his cool voice was pissing Harper off. She decided to switch subjects.

“How long did you stay last night?”

He didn’t respond immediately, and she triumphantly waited.

“Let’s not talk about last night.” He moved into her view. “Harper, you aren’t well.”

“You said that before.”

“You need help.”

She knew it was true, but couldn’t respond.

“If you want,” he continued, “you can stay at my parents while you get better. There’s a decent rehab facility back home.”

“Home?” She could feel her strength returning. “Don’t make me laugh.”

“Don’t be unreasonable.”

“I’m serious. That place isn’t my home. I don’t even know what that word means anymore. Home. I’ve lived out of a suitcase for the past 15 years of my life, there is no home for me to go back to. This is my home. New York is my home. Where I am is my home. Not California.” She turned her head, feeling the short burst of energy recede. “I’m tired. Can you leave me alone for a while? Come back later when I don’t feel like dying.”

But he didn’t come back that night, or the next day. She waited until the night of the second day, and then took the IV out of her arm, dressed in the middle of the night after the nurse had checked on her, and walked out of the hospital, full of determination to change her life.

CARRY ME HOME - PART 1: OPENING

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 18:43:00 -0700

CARRY ME HOME

It was Harper who came up with the idea. She picked me up the morning of graduation and said, “Let’s get tattoos.”

I had never wanted a tattoo, so I just shrugged. She drove to Deion’s and he sat in the back, twirling a cigarette between dark fingers. He didn’t object to a tattoo, so their enthusiasm overruled my concerns.

She had already made an appointment for the three of us at a local hole in the wall tattoo parlor. I don’t think she would have taken no for an answer, but that was her way. As we sat in the lobby, we bandied about ideas, keeping in mind that we only had maybe a hundred dollars to spend.

At first we made jokes and awful suggestions, to relieve the nervous pressure. Finally we quieted down, and Harper stared at the wall full of pre-designed tattoos. I gazed at her, wishing then I could just have a tattoo of her, so that way she could never leave me.

Deion was looking at her too, probably thinking the same thing I was. It was an unspoken thing between him and I. Neither of us had had Harper up to that point, and I didn’t think either of us ever would. If either of us did while the other was still alive, it would rip apart our friendship. So Deion and I agreed, in the unconscious way men do, to leave it all alone.

“I’ve got it,” Harper said. “Swallows.”

“Swallows?” Deion looked at the wall now, trying to find what she had picked out.

“I read once,” she said, “that sailors would get tattoos of swallows as a good luck charm, so that way they would find their way home from sea.”

Not that Harper couldn’t be deep when she wanted to be, she was the smartest person I knew, but the profundity of her simple suggestion shocked Deion and I. We agreed instantly, just as a burly and heavily tattooed man walked up and said it was our turn.

A couple hours later we all stumbled out of the parlor, feeling the ache of the identical swallows we had all branded to our collarbone. We suddenly felt very adult.

Graduation was long and uneventful. Those chosen to speak each gave a long and boring speech about the future, about what we, the collective we, could accomplish if only we, collective we, tried. I looked down my aisle towards Harper, and we shared a grimace. I remembered then a couple years before when we first met and bonded over our similar hatred of pontificating. It was all so narcissistic. Speeches were vocal masturbation.

Finally it was all over, and after an eternity of photos and fawning parents, though only Harper’s mother was there, the three of us escaped to party for the first time as free people.

It wasn’t strictly true to say we were free. I was still going to college, a local one that Harper mocked me relentlessly for not having the courage to look beyond the horizon. Deion, for some inexplicable reason, had joined the army and was due to ship out in October. Harper was secretive about her own plans.

We rode in Harper’s car out to the hills that rolled into the sea outside town, and set up a little campground. In the trunk of her car was a stock of alcohol, pot, and other things. We put on some music, some Kanye and Outkast, and TI and anything else we could think of, and drank and smoked and danced.

Sometime in the middle of the night, when it should have been pitchblack, Harper set off the first flare. It flew up into the air, turning the fog a lurid pink. We laughed and laughed at this effect, and soon Deion and I were both shooting off flares too, red and green and blue, and the sky was giving off a kind of ghoulish light that might have been frightening any other time. It seemed then, looking back at it now, that we were in the middle of a grand parade, as these marching bands passed, following oversized floats, and there was this cheering as Harper, Deion, and I all dancer our minds out. Of course there was no one else there, but that’s what I remember.

Finally we all fell asleep, and woke up to a cold morning, with the sun trying to overcome the hills in the east, casting everything in a sickly yellow light. I sat up, the first to wake. Harper had falled asleep with her head in my lap, and I looked down at her then, calm and controlled, and stroked her hair, and loved her then more than I had ever before. Deion was asleep, to, so this would be mine forever, and I never wanted it to end. I imagined then that she’d wake up to my touch, and she’d look up into my eyes, and she would kiss me and I would kiss her back, all under the grey slate sky.

But she stirred then, and sat up, rubbing her eyes. She didn’t smear her makeup because she didn’t need any, and she was more beautiful than anyone I had ever seen before. She looked to me, then to the sea, and said, “I need to go.”

CARRY ME HOME

Fri, 17 Dec 2010 21:58:25 -0700

HARPER RAN AWAY. DEION JOINED THE ARMY AND GOT LOST IN THE SHIT. AND I STAYED HOME.

HARPER WAS ALWAYS LOOKING AROUND CORNERS AND THE SECOND SHE COULD SHE WAS OUT THE DOOR ON TO THE NEXT THING. SHE ALWAYS SAID “YOU NEED TO SEE THE WORLD IF YOU WANT TO BE A WRITER” BUT SHE NEVER WANTED TO BE A WRITER. SHE WANTED TO BE FOUND, I THINK.

DEION WAS FULL OF PATRIOTRIC BRAVADO AND HOPES FOR A FREE EDUCATION, EVENTUALLY. ACROSS THE ATLANTIC HE FLEW AND FELL INTO THE MIDDLE OF A BIG FUCKING DESERT WITH NO ROADS NO MAPS NO WAY OUT. HE CAME BACK IN A METAL BOX.

I WANTED TO BE A WRITER. LIFE GOT IN THE WAY. I ALWAYS SAID I WOULD COME BACK TO IT.

WHEN WE WERE ALL EIGHTEEN AND ABOUT TO FINALLY ESCAPE WE WENT AND GOT MATCHING TATTOOS. SWALLOWS. SO THAT WAY NO MATTER HOW FAR AWAY WE WENT, THERE WOULD ALWAYS BE SOMETHING TO REMIND US. TO CARRY US BACK HOME.

Retribution or Reprieve

Fri, 03 Sep 2010 10:06:33 -0700

Most sane people can’t handle any longterm exposure to submarine life. The isolation, the eerie sounds just beyond the walls that seem to close in as the days and months pass without incident. It’s not like being topside in a normal boat, or in a car, where windows reveal the route. The submarine’s scenic views are computer screens, neon lights against black backgrounds to represent ideas of danger and safety.

To survive on a submarine, the sailor can’t be normal. And Commander Tuttle wasn’t normal, in the normal sense. His ex-wife would suggest during their divorce proceedings that he was too normal, too sane, that perhaps he lacked any shred left of the animal unpredictability and passion that ironically also makes us human.

Tuttle believed in order, demanded it from himself and his men. Down here, far beneath the surface, it was needed more than anything else. Even air. The slightest disturbance, the smallest hint of mutiny, and disaster would strike.

But the HMS Valiant didn’t need to worry about disturbances. It was stocked with the Navy’s best men, all trained to the point of automation. They regularly made the three month tour of radio silence, patrolling the China Seas. Once a week it went topside, to receive signal that the world had not ended, but to not respond. The Valiant could never respond.

The tiny alarm clock rang out in Tuttle’s private cabin, but he was already awake. He pushed the button on top of the clock to end the noise, then stood and smoothed his uniform. Today they would go topside, like every other Sunday. If he were back in Bootle, he would take his mother to church, then have afternoon tea while reading her the newspaper. Today, he would go topside.

He left his miniscule cabin and headed to the bridge. There’s never a long walk in a submarine, one of the things he privately enjoyed of them. The bridge was empty, of course, the crew just beginning to eat breakfast. He liked arriving early, to clear his head and marvel at the technological beauty surrounding him.

The crew began filing in at 0700, local time, taking their positions as a signal of their readiness. Tuttle began running through the topside checklist, and soon they were rising to the surface. Underwater the changes in direction aren’t as severe as topside. Unless he paid special mind, he rarely could physically tell how they were moving, only that they were.

Once topside they began a set of procedures that Tuttle began to dread more the longer he served on the Valiant. It scared him more than dying at the bottom of the ocean, crumpled up from the pressure and lungs filled with blood and salty water. It scared him more than navigating a minefield, where the next inch might be their last.

He looked over the crew, then down at his computer screen with a small sigh. ”Gentlemen,” he said. “Begin the Mohican Sequence.” The bridge sprung to life again as the crewmen began their individual assignments. Each was to look for one thing, and then report back positive or negative. For the past five years of Tuttle’s commandment, it had always come back positive. He prayed it always would.

The first report: “Sir, Radio 4 is negative.” His stomach fell and he struggled to remain calm in front of the men.

Then, “Sir, Green Signal is negative.”

Then another negative. All around the room, negative. Tuttle turned from the waiting men, back to his cabin and opened a safe he hoped he never would. Inside this safe under the bed, was another safe. He punched in the combination, and it opened to reveal a letter. He pulled it out, and sat down on his bed to read it. Without bothering to use a letter opener, he ripped it open, took out the cream colored paper.

Commander Robert Tuttle, HMS Valiant:

You are reading this letter because the Mohican Sequence has failed, which means that all of England and its empire is destroyed, and that everyone you might know is dead. You are reading this now because the chain of command has failed, because those that might lead our military have been killed, and because I, the Prime Minister, am also dead.

If the Mohican Sequence has failed, then a nuclear war must have begun. It is now that I leave you with one final order, the last action of the British State.

Commander Tuttle, you have the capability to use your nuclear armament in response against the attack against our people. I cannot in good faith command you to use it, nor can I suggest you surrender. I will leave the final decision to you. Please be wiser than I, or our government, that we could not prevent this war in the first place.

Regretfully,

David Cameron

His hands were shaking as he finished reading the letter, the neat handwritten words blurring together. Tuttle took out a lighter, and burnt the letter.

He had been trained for this moment, they all had. They knew the procedures, they knew what could be done. He stood, straightening the uniform of a nation that no longer existed. He walked back out to the bridge, where his crew stared at him.

“Gentlemen, prepare the nuclear warheads.”

Face

Fri, 20 Aug 2010 09:46:26 -0700

She peered out into the darkness, looming high above the street. She, the chosen, busty vixen to sell perfume. Or was it a handbag? She didn’t sell it well, except for herself, her sultry look mesmerizing for anyone who looked up.

Tomorrow they would paint her over, hang up some other banner. Who would sell themself 10 floors high? Through rain and snow, attacked by birds, beaten down and faded by sunlight? Who would be ogled and fantasized by lonely men on the tenth floor across the street, the hint of breast and soft curves a siren call? Maybe it would be another woman, another product. Or maybe it would be blank. Maybe it would be stripped down to show the brick wall underneath it.

And what would be left of the old face?

A Late Summer Daydream

Fri, 13 Aug 2010 20:47:00 -0700

From her apartment on the Upper West Side Melinda could see the Hudson lapping up harmless against the barriers. The row of brick buildings were shining with a buttery light that made her think of summer. It still was summer, she supposed. The heat was shrinking back into whatever place it hid for the chilly autumns and biting winters. But the view out her window was still summer.

In her mind’s eye she could see people, packed shoulder to shoulder on the beaches of Long Island, trying to get in one last summer party. Feel the tingle of tanning, pre-cancered skin. Smell the twangy sun block. She breathed deep, and tried to hold on to that moment of teenage nostalgia before she would have to turn back to the table and finish what she had started.

Marc eyed her suspiciously. He was in a confrontational mood today, or perhaps she wasn’t. Either way, they were spinning wheels.

“Mindy,” he said, rubbing his temples. “The venue is the most important decision. Without that, we can’t do anything. So please. Tell me what you want.” She hated being called ‘Mindy,’ but didn’t know how to tell him.

Finally, she said, “Why New York?”

“You know why,” he answered. “We’ve been over this a million times. Your family is here, my family is here. Virtually everyone we know is right here.”

She turned back to the window, watched the thousands of cars jockey for position on the West Side Highway. The engines and honking were barely audible. She wished right then that she was in one of those yellow taxis speeding away, but that was silly. Going south on the Highway would just lead her Downtown, where there was nowhere to escape or hide.

But in her mind right then the Highway didn’t stop at Ground Zero. It extended out into the harbor, putting roots down to protect her and her taxi from sinking, as it stretched further and further to the sea. It curved with the earth, and did not end. And she rode that taxi all day, and all night.

Horizon - Work in Progress

Fri, 06 Aug 2010 09:48:17 -0700

It was always about control.

When Jakoba slipped further in the layers of her patients’ subconscious, she could feel herself fill the cracks, make them whole. In a way, it was like the patient was gaining sanity by taking a bit from Jakoba’s. Thousands of tests had been run before the technology had been approved for wider psychological use, but she still had doubts on the safety of it all. It didn’t stop her from using it, though.

And though she wouldn’t admit it in Top Level, the industry term for reality, she didn’t want to leave the subconscious levels, or Subs.

Time ceased to exist naturally in a Sub. One moment it would seem to move quickly, and the next it would slow down, the underlying hum of the subconscious lowering in pitch until it was felt rather than heard. A skilled technician could control that flow, and the elements the Subject would feel and experience. And Jakoba was the best.

It was a common misconception that what Jakoba did was enter someone’s subconscious, meet the Subject’s avatar and lead it to some sort of epiphany. In reality, she rarely met the Subject within Sub, instead meeting the various incarnations of the Subject’s mind. It was like a being a detective, but one with god-like powers. A technician’s job was to find the Subject, where ever he might be. Sometimes that meant climbing down to depths of a mind no one should ever see.

Jakoba didn’t know how far down she was. There were never any markers, just subtle changes. It seemed like she was in a rotting slum, the kind of urban decay found in old financial city centres that have been long abandoned to the sick, twisted, and criminal. Small trash fires gave an orange illumination to the street, and the occasional light was on in a window. Other than that, it was completely dark on this dirty street.

Different techs had different ways of visualizing the mind. Some liked to imagine it as a forest that grew thicker and more dangerous the further you were in it. Jakoba always imagined the Sub as cities stacked on cities, with elevators connecting the regions.

She knew that she had taken 3 elevators to get to this point, but numbers could be deceiving in Sub. The first elevator might take you down to Base, the lowest point in anyone’s mind, which often times is little more than shapes and desires. Or it might only take you to the pre-conscious.

Still, even without markers she was certain that this was the correct part of the mind for what she was looking for. Often, techs would be looking for the Subject, which would be lost somewhere in the folds of their own mind. Sometimes, though, techs would be hired to search for other things. Information, or memory. Almost always from dangerous criminals, but occasionally in memory-loss patients.

Most techs had never even to go on a data-run. Jakoba had only done it a couple times before, and it was always more difficult than searching for a person.

At the end of the drab, dirty alley was a door painted green. The paint was peeling now, a victim of neglect like everything in this part of the Subject’s mind. Jakoba walked up to the door, avoiding the rats that scurried around the alley, carrying little bits of trash.

This should be it, she thought. She pushed the door, it swung in, revealing a dark room. She stepped in, and the door slammed behind her, plunging her into total darkness. She reached back, hoping to feel the wall or the door, or something. There was nothing.

Not good.

To Third

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:04:21 -0700

The ball came howling in, and boy, was it really moving, like a bike with no brakes going down Cobb Hill. Roger squeezed the bat, wringed its neck, and tensed up in anticipation of the pitch. He was gonna hit the shit out of it. He felt his shoulder muscles clinch, and then loosen as he unleashed a holy terror on the ball and bam! it was off like rocket into the outfield.

He tossed the bat to the side and started running towards first, reaching it about the same time the ball dropped just before the splintery, wood fence that limited the outfield. Taking a big turn, Roger made sure to keep an eye on the centerfielder, who was having trouble get to the ball. His left foot hit the second base as the fielder finally picked it up and looked to make a play back in the infield.

With one last burst of energy, Roger barreled towards third. The ball was in the air, no cut-off man. It was going to be close, the only way he’d have a chance would be to drop down in to a head-first slide. Shit, were they gonna be mad if he got thrown out trying to stretch a double.

He dropped into the slide, felt the hard dirt scrap up against his chest. He put out his hand, felt for the bag, hugged it like it was a life preserver as the tag came slapping down on the top of his head. Safe.

What was lost ain't worth getting

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 07:29:45 -0700

Sometime between the 8th Street and Bellvue stops, Mary realized she had lost her necklace. A thousand stamping feet had passed by during the stops, and any one of them could have gone off with her necklace, attached to their shoes or crushed to dust.

She was beside herself, of course. That thin, looping yellow necklace had been on her neck for the past thirty years, had seen hurricanes and the Bahamas, and babies and grocery stores and everything else. It was, or had been, a short little chain with no pendant, and it had even’t reached her breasts, even when she was younger and they hadn’t made their inevitable slide towards her feet.

The necklace was gold, maybe, or silver painted yellow. It was a thousand useless details, but it mattered to her.

The bus was coming to a large sighing stop at Mount Vernon Street. Mary didn’t need to get off here, but she got up anyways and swam her way to the front, where a sweating mountain of a bus driver eyed her suspiciously.

“Gettin’ off?” he asked.

“No,” gasping, she could feel panic coming on. “I lost my necklace.”

“Okay.” He didn’t care.

“I mean,” no on else was getting on now, “did anyone turn a necklace in/”

“No, ma’am.”

“No one?”

“No, I’m sorry, ma’am.” He wiped the sweat from his neck. His name badge said ‘Harry.’ “Ma’am, I’m sorry, but I gotta keep this bus moving. You’ll have to sit down or get off.”

She sat down, and the bus kept going.

Two stops later was her exit. Harry must have felt bad by then, and he stopped her.

“Call the depot,” he said.

“Excuse me?”

“The bus depot has a lost and found. If someone turned it in, it would be there.”

“Oh.” No one was going to turn it in. “Thank you.”

Mary left the bus and walked the block to her faded, yellow house. It had been hers alone for ten years. Now even the street was lonely, quiet because it was a later afternoon on a Sunday.

She felt overheated, staring up the long stairs to her front door. She brushed some sweat that had gathered on her neck, felt the naked skin. It hadn’t been naked for thirty years.

Just another remind that Frank wasn’t coming back.