Lock and Key

2010-06-22T13:56:00.001-07:00

“You look good.”

She reached across the table and gave his hand a little squeeze. He smiled at her as best he could. When he couldn’t do it anymore he looked down and stared at the way her slender hand rested on top of his scarred knuckles. A quiet laugh.

“No I don’t,” he said simply.

It was true; the years of his exile had lent an unkempt wildness to his features that hadn’t been there before. His hair was long, reaching past his ears, and tangled. The sun had hardened his skin, and a layer of coarse brown covered his once clean-shaven jaw line. The effort of the years he had spent running and hiding were apparent in all of his features.

And yet the adoration in her eyes was unmistakable as she looked over the table at him.

“Do you remember when we used to go out in places like this?” he asked, looking around the brightly-lit restaurant.

She laughed, but it was a real laugh for once, not a sad one.

“If you didn’t like the waitress you’d stick her tip halfway through the table. She’d come around to get our check and we’d be gone and there’d be a one-dollar bill sticking out of it! You must have given so many people nightmares….”

She laughed again. He wished she would never stop. But she did. She stopped abruptly, as if her body couldn’t handle the strain of expressing yet another emotion. For the first time that day he realized just how worn she looked.

“You’ve been worrying,” he said gently. “You always get bags under your eyes when you worry.”

What a stupid thing to say, of course she’s been worrying.

But she didn’t snap at him. She stared right into his eyes and said, “will you do it?”

“Do what?”

But he knew what. All the contents of his stomach turned to ice; the blood in his veins was freezing. He couldn’t answer. Not until she said it.

Her lip trembled only slightly. It was obvious that she had been thinking of this moment for a long time.

“Will you… put us together?”

I Am The Last Of A Dying Breed

2010-04-22T08:57:00.000-07:00

The Spartans:

Built to fight and born to lead.

It's Monday Morning

2010-04-19T18:35:00.000-07:00

And I would kill for a chance to drive

Get so far away from here with you my dear

That I'll never leave your side

- ADTR

D.I.M.B.

2010-03-04T19:57:00.001-08:00

Come down from there!
An aluminum mountain we
descend on wax paper
we slip down yellow brown until
the slide is straight,
swing so high you circumnavigate
“the bar,"
sitting your hands in your lap
praying to the camera
but you’re smiling
and your minor cohort stuck
to you like a sidecar,
the Egyptian cotton between us,
the interstate highways,
Focus- I remember it was red,
I remember how you looked and
what you said and when you come
back to Travis- which you never will-
it will be backslaps and toasts instead of
bubble gum and razor blades.
This is my brother, and he knows karate.

Working title: Disappeared. Dearly need a better one.

2010-02-07T17:36:00.000-08:00

[So at the moment there's nothing- that I know of- that I can do about the absence of indentations. Oh well.]

Toby Dobrinick didn’t believe in many things. He had never, for stale example, been fooled by stories of Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny; something that had troubled his parents and Montessori teachers. He did not believe in any god or God (or gods or Gods). He did not believe that his roommate, with whom he shared a small apartment in a complex known as “The Runaround,” liked him very much at all. He did not believe that the college he attended, the classes in which he enrolled, or the textbooks he wearily read would make him a substantially better human being. And he certainly did not believe in magic. In fact, Toby’s favorite activity was writing stories that began in fantastic worlds in fantastic times in fantastic ways. But as the tales progressed, Toby would steadily exile the fantasy, deconstruct the wonder, and re-paint the dreamscape gray, ending each of his stories in a new universe of dullness and banality, bathing what came before in a contemptuous light.

Most of all, Toby did not believe that any person in the world really needed another person in order to get by. That isn’t to say that Toby didn’t believe in love. On the contrary, Toby readily acknowledged the existence of love. He loved his mother and his father, he loved his sister and his brother, he loved animals, and he loved unusually cold air on rainy days in the summer. He just didn’t accept the idea that there was some ultimate happiness or perfect fulfillment to be gained by living the entirety of his life with a woman. Besides obvious anatomy, was a woman really that different? In what ways could a woman, a wife, make him happy that friends couldn’t (again, overlooking obvious anatomy)?

It was thoughts like these that Toby was considering the day he saw the flyer. He was trudging along the sidewalk, his stomach full of inadequate- but cheap- pizza, when a bright yellow leaf of paper stapled to a telephone pole caught his eye. As he approached, Toby could make out the short message written upon the canary-colored sign:

WANTED

closet space- will pay $67/week

must be climate controlled

Inquire at Wired Willy’s Coffee, 2:30 PM, Mon-Wed

Toby snorted. Had he read correctly? Was somebody really attempting to rent closet space? Several more appraisals of the strange words seemed to leave no alternative. Toby grunted another laugh, yet he was becoming more intrigued as seconds passed.

By the time he reached his apartment, Toby had made up his mind: he was going to meet this unusual advertiser at the coffee shop on Tuesday at 2:30, if for nothing more than a laugh and a chance to scratch the itch of curiosity with which the odd bulletin had left him.

Toby walked exhaustedly into his room, swung his backpack from his shoulder to his bed, and retreated into his desk chair. He swiveled around to face his closet. It was so long that it constituted one entire side of Toby’s room, and it was unusually deep for a wall closet. Folding slatted doors separated it from the rest of the bedroom. The only objects residing therein were a few pairs of Toby’s shoes and a set of crutches; Toby kept all of his clothes in the drawers of the dresser next to his bed, to the extreme annoyance of his roommate.

“You know, your shirts would be less wrinkled if you hung them up like a normal person. They wouldn’t have a big crease down the middle from where you folded them, either,” Mitchell would often point out.

Toby leaned back in his seat, picturing his closet full of crates of candy or magazines, thinking hopefully of the prospect of $67 a week for box-sitting.

* * *

At 2:10 that Tuesday, Toby left his house for Wired Willy’s. He was dressed in Khakis and a polo shirt (which he hoped was respectable attire for a young closet leaser), and had with him all necessary preparations (his photo I.D. and a picture-phone photo of his closet). There was only one thing he had overlooked, Toby suddenly realized as he approached the coffee shop: he had no way of identifying the individual who had posted the sign.

Toby was now quickly losing confidence in the legitimacy of this deal. He stood outside the café window, peering inside to look at the customers, hoping against all reason that he would spot somebody wearing a “We buy ugly closets” T-shirt.

It took only moments for Toby to notice him, a man sitting alone at a table built for two, who easily could have been the victim of a recent, vicious paint-fight. He wore a white tuxedo, complete with coattails and top hat, that was splattered with what can only be described as a vomit of colors. Most of the coffee clientele, Toby noticed, was glancing and giggling at the man, who seemed not to notice. Toby made up his mind that this man in the Jackson Pollock suit was the owner and poster of the yellow “wanted” sign.

With trepidation, Toby entered the shop and walked to where the man sat alone. When Toby reached the table, the gentleman looked up from his coffee cup. He appeared to be in his mid-forties, and his face was lined and somber. Toby had the distinct impression that this was a habitually unhappy person, given his watery eyes and the saggy corners of his mouth.

“You’re late,” sighed the man in a morose voice that perfectly matched his countenance.

“Excuse me?” Said Toby, caught off his guard.

“I said you’re late,” repeated the stranger. “I specifically requested you to be here at 2:30. It’s now…” he shook back his sleeve to check a purple-strapped watch. “2:34. I’ll be wanting those four minutes back, mind you.”

“Oh… I, um… I’m sorry,” Toby stuttered apologetically as he sat down opposite the man. “Very sorry. But at least you had your coffee to occupy you for those four minutes, right?” This very brave attempt at humor was scowled down by the stranger.

“Hardly. Awful stuff. In fact- ah, here we are,” and he flagged down the waitress who was walking by.

“Yes sir?” She said with an impressively straight face and only a tiny downward peek at the man’s colorful suit.

“I’d like another coffee, this one isn’t nearly hot enough,” the man said coldly.

“Heh, Tom Swifty…” Toby chuckled as the waitress hurried off. The man sitting across from him raised an eyebrow.

“Tom what?”

“Tom Swifty….” Toby repeated.

The man shook his head, his face betraying utter perplexion and a hint of frustration.

“What in God’s name are you talking about, son?”

“Tom Swifty? You know, it’s… it’s a joke where a quoted phrase is linked by….” Toby trailed off, considering the consequences of further damaging the fourth wall. “You know what? Forget it,” he finished lamely.

“Very well then,” the man said slowly. He now regarded Toby as though he thought him to be quite insane. “If you’re through… can we get down to business?”

“Of course,” Toby agreed, grateful for the change of subject. He held out his hand to the man. “My name is Toby Dobrinick.” The man did not take Toby’s hand.

“Dobrinick? That’s not Bulgarian, is it?” Asked the man, and he looked down at Toby’s hand as if suddenly afraid it would bite him.

“No sir, Croatian.”

The man regarded Toby silently for a moment, his brows furrowed suspiciously, then reluctantly shook his hand.

“Croatian it is, then,” he said. “My name is Saul. Well, enough chit-chat, back to business. You have a closet for lease?”

Toby nodded. “I do. And about that—”

“How much space does it have, exactly?” Interrupted Saul. “I need a fair bit of room, you know.” Toby reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone.

“It’s actually pretty big,” he said as he showed Saul the photo he had taken. Saul nodded his approval.

“And when will it be ready for use?”

“As soon as you want,” replied Toby. “And speaking of use… what exactly do you want to use it for? What’re you going to put in there?”

Saul shrugged uninterestedly.

“Anything that I disappear.”

“Anything that… sorry?”

“Anything that I disappear.” Saul repeated impatiently. “I’m a magician, you see, ‘Saul The Stupendous,’ and I’m in need of a reappearing zone.”

Toby was becoming extremely confused extremely quickly. “Um… I'm sorry, but I’m not familiar with the term ‘reappearing zone.’ What… what is that, exactly?” He asked, hoping he didn’t sound ignorant.

Saul sighed as if Toby had asked him to explain multiplication tables, where babies came from, or how to flush a toilet. “A reappearing zone is where objects reappear after a magician has made them disappear,” he said very condescendingly.

Toby squinted skeptically at Saul The Stupendous.

“But… how does that work? Are you trying to tell me that you actually teleport the things that you make disappear in your magic acts?”

“Of course,” Saul yawned, maintaining his air of disinterest in the subject. “Everything has to go somewhere, doesn’t it? Nothing can be nothing. Things don’t just go away, never to exist again, and it’s equally impossible for something to come back and be something again once it’s been nothing. So disappeared things have to be put somewhere, you see. And if you’re a magician, they have to be put somewhere out of sight.”

“I’m sorry,” Toby apologized again uncomofrtably. He didn’t know what to believe. Every word from Saul’s mouth seemed so ludicrous, but the ease and indifference with which he spoke them made Toby uneasy. He was afraid that he might actually believe the old magician. Toby would normally have walked out on this conversation by this point, but the unhappy certainty of Saul kept him in his seat. “It’s just that… I figured there was some disappointing trick behind the whole ‘disappearing’ thing.”

Saul frowned, the lines of his face and the droop of his mouth reminding Toby very strongly of a sallow-eyed hound dog.

“There’s nothing not disappointing about this, young man.”

Toby opened his mouth to ask what Saul meant, but the magician continued, cutting him off.

“So, you agree to lease me your closet at the rate of sixty-seven dollars a week?”

Toby nodded, still squirming with questions but doing his best to remain still.

Saul pressed on. “Alright, now that that’s settled, there are just a few things that we should discuss concerning the items that will be appearing in your closet.”

“Okay.”

“First of all, you have my assurance that I will not send anything dangerous into your home. No men juggling swords or fireballs or Siberian tigers….” Saul paused thoughtfully. “You aren’t allergic to rabbits, are you?”

Toby shook his head.

“Good, then no, there’s nothing to worry about.”

“But what am I supposed to do with—”

“I’m coming to that,” said Saul irritably. “Be patient. Now, the objects that I use in my show are normally junk… useless things. That is precisely the reason I use them for the disappearing act; they aren’t things I dearly want to see again. I usually don’t disappear anything valuable. Therefore, you may do whatever you like with any of the items you find in your closet. Keep them, sell them, throw them away, It’s up to you.”

“Okay… but back to the rabbits. Am I supposed to just… let them go? Or sell them to pet shops? It seems kinda expensive and wasteful to use a new rabbit for each performance when you could use the same one…. Why don’t you want them back?”

Saul shook his head. “It’s not as expensive as you would think. Magician’s discount. And besides, I never use the same rabbit twice in my shows… you get too familiar.”

Toby frowned. “But what’s wrong with making friends with a rabbit? Don’t you like rabbits?”

“I love rabbits,” Saul replied somewhat dispassionately. “I simply believe in keeping my business and personal affairs separate, as far as rabbits are concerned.”

Saul was not much of a conversationalist, not one to linger over his coffee, and soon the bill was paid and goodbyes were exchanged. Toby walked home with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on his shoelaces, still undecided as to whether or not he believed that random objects were going to materialize in his closet over the next few weeks.

That night Toby locked the door to his room and closed up the closet. He undressed slowly and lethargically. By the time his head was on his pillow, his thoughts were still full of doubts, concerns, and guilty curiosity of the possibility of real magic.

Not since the Christmases of 1994 through 1998 had Toby rolled out of bed so excitedly. After a night’s sleep he was no longer ashamed to admit to himself that he was ready to be proved wrong, that he was earnestly hoping that what Saul had claimed as fact was nothing less. But still he wanted proof. He wanted evidence. He wanted a reason to believe.

This atypical morning idealism was short lived. Toby slid open the doors to his closet to find nothing that hadn’t been there the day before. All optimism not quite crushed, Toby walked into the closet and turned on the light, checking all four corners, even scrutinizing the carpet for a magical thumbtack, a teleported paperclip, but he found nothing.

He dressed quickly before class, annoyed with himself and feeling foolish. Of course there wouldn’t have been anything there this morning, he thought. I mean, it’s not likely that Saul was going to be putting on a performance right after leaving the coffee shop, is it?

But there was nothing in the closet that afternoon when Toby returned home from class, either. Nor was there anything the next morning, or the morning after that. An entire week passed, and Toby had still not discovered anything unexpected in his storage space, nor did he receive a check for $67.

‘Reappearing zone.’ Right. Toby thought to himself bitterly on the eighth evening of waiting. By the tenth day he had given up hope entirely, decided that Saul was just a crazy and lonely old man, and started a new short story about an elf (who would come to learn that he was, in actuality, just an abnormally long-eared boy who had been abandoned in the woods as a baby).

And that’s why, two weeks after the meeting with Saul The Stupendous, when Toby walked into the kitchen/dining room after a long day of midterms, all thoughts of magical closets were absent from his mind. In fact, he had nearly forgotten the idea entirely.

Toby was accosted on the way to his bedroom by his roommate, Mitchell, who was pacing the living room.

“What’s making all that noise in your room?” Demanded Mitchell without preamble.

“What noise?” Toby asked politely, trying diligently not to allow his frustration with Mitchell’s pompousness to manifest itself by way of vocal tone.

“That scratching noise! Listen….” Mitchell pressed a finger to his lips for dramatic effect.

Sure enough, once they had stopped talking, Toby could hear a weak skitter emanating from behind his closed bedroom door.

“That’s… weird. I have no idea what that is. Did you not look in and check?”

“No,” Mitchell said pompously. “I don’t barge into other people’s rooms without permission.”

The emphasis on “I” made Toby quickly search his memory for a time when he had entered Mitchell’s room without permission. He couldn’t remember one.

“It hasn’t been bothering you, has it?” Toby asked, still trying to paint sincerity on his own face. But Mitchell was already retreating into his own bedroom, and didn’t answer.

Toby grunted. He had come to expect this sort of behavior from Mitchell, who operated under the impression that the entire world was constantly and intentionally offending him.

A soft thump redirected Toby’s attention away from his standoffish roommate. He opened his door and slowly walked into his bedroom, revolving on the spot, listening, seeking out the source of the strange noise.

skit skit skitter… thump

It was coming from the closet. And suddenly it all came flooding back: the coffee house, Saul The Stupendous, the (sub-standard) leasing agreement. Toby rushed across the room, stumbling over a variety of floor junk in his hurry, and flung open the slatted doors.

Something white and blurry zipped out of the closet and past Toby’s feet. Taken completely by surprise, Toby screamed, jumped backward, lost his balance and fell hard on his back. Before he could lift himself up, the unidentified scurrying object ran to Toby and jumped on his chest.

Toby looked down his body. Perched on top of him was a small white rabbit, which had begun to creep slowly up his torso towards his face. Toby was panicking, but didn’t dare to move. As his conqueror approached his head, Toby wondered frantically if rabbits had a taste for human eyebrows (the eyebrow being the most appetizing-looking feature of Toby’s face, he had already decided).

The bunny stopped an inch away from Toby’s exposed neck. Toby closed his eyes, wishing the animal would go away, waiting for the nasty, jugular-severing bite that was sure to come. The rabbit pounced, sprang from Toby’s collar bone and onto his chin… and proceeded to poke its pink, quivering nose into every reachable region of Toby’s face with the authority and determination of a tiny, furry, horribly cute and extremely jittery airport security guard.

Toby laughed with surprise. He wrinkled his nose and tried to turn away from his fervent inspector, but the rabbit only stretched out its soft neck to continue sniffing.

“Ok! Ok!” Toby chuckled, his face puckered against the tickle of whiskers. “I get it. Ok!” And, still laughing, he gently nudged the rabbit with the back of his hand. The bunny leapt off of Toby’s body just as Mitchell entered the room.

“Uh… what is that?”

Toby sat up and rubbed his nose, which tickled maddeningly after his attack, with the palm of his hand.

“Looks like a rabbit to me.”

Mitchell frowned.

“But you didn’t pay the pet deposit. Why didn’t you pay the pet deposit if you were going to have a rabbit in your room? Where did you get it, anyway?”

Toby had to stop himself from replying with “the closet.” Even if he could convince Mitchell that the rabbit had been teleported to their apartment from a magician’s magic show, Toby felt that the story was too good to waste on Mitchell.

“I, uh… got him yesterday.”

“Well then why didn’t you tell me? And why didn’t you say anything before when we were talking about the noise?”

“I don’t know, I guess I forgot, alright? I’m sorry.”

“But you never paid the pet deposit. Are you gonna pay the-“

Mitchell stopped short as the rabbit suddenly hopped on top of his sneakers. Four seconds later it bounced away again, leaving behind a small brown mass atop Mitchell’s left shoe. For a moment both Toby and Mitchell could only stare at Mitchell’s befouled foot. Then Toby burst out laughing.

Mitchell made a disgusted, angry sound, gave both Toby and the rabbit a burning look, and walked out of the room cautiously, so as to avoid spilling rabbit feces on the carpet.

Toby picked himself up off the floor, closed the door behind Mitchell, and sat down on the edge of his bed. He looked over at the rabbit, which was watching him from the floor, and smiled.

“That was pretty great.”

The rabbit, apparently excited at being addressed, sped the length of the room back and forth before launching itself onto the bed, and he settled himself on Toby’s knees. Toby scratched the rabbit behind the ears, and it drummed its feet happily on Toby’s lap.

Upon further inspection, it was decided that the rabbit was a young male. Toby named him Hatrick, and the two were soon best friends. Every day after classes when Toby walked in the front door, Hatrick would race across the floor and, almost doglike, bound in circles around him. What was even more remarkable about these greetings was the fact that Mitchell insisted on locking Hatrick in Toby’s room every morning, citing “to protect the carpet from more rabbit crap” as his reason. Toby resented the phrase “more crap,” seeing as how the only time Hatrick had ever voided his rabbit bowels inside the house was on his first day in the apartment, on top of Mitchell’s shoes and not the carpet.

Whenever Toby was stressed or unhappy, Hatrick would attempt to cheer him up with what Toby began to call his “drum solos.” Hatrick would lie on a surface in Toby’s room well-suited to producing percussive sound and tap out a rhythm. He was uncannily talented. Sometimes Hatrick would even use two different surfaces- say, the wood of the desk and the cover of a book- to create different pitches and give his compositions some basic form of a melody. Toby had always disliked the term “swan songs,” considering it too feminine and trite. He preferred his rabbit songs, and wondered why nobody had ever thought to make that into an idiom.

Soon after the arrival of Hatrick, objects began to appear in Toby’s closet frequently and regularly, usually in the evening. There was no sound, no flash of light or other archetypal signal that would herald a new materialization; Toby would simply open his closet doors to find something that hadn’t been there before.

Mostly, as Saul had said, the things that Toby pulled out of his closet were junk. He filled garbage bags with scarves, dirty stuffed animals, fake coins, plastic flowers, colorful foam balls, and he threw them into the dumpster under the cover of night to avoid Mitchell. The only other items that appeared in the closet were checks written out for $67.

“Huh, that’s clever,” said Toby as he picked up the first check and showed it to Hatrick. “Saves him money on postage. I guess he didn’t count those first two weeks when he wasn’t disappearing things….”

Even though he was now on the payroll, Toby was beginning to grow disillusioned again, weary of hauling shabby things from his closet to the garbage bin. Magical trash was still trash, after all. His new job behind the scenes of the magic show business was beginning to seem very boring, but then the next rabbit came.

This newly arrived cottontail was big, dumb, and lazy. Hatrick, behaving like a polite host, tried to incite the freshman bunny to play (run around like mad), but soon gave it up for a lost cause. It didn’t take long for Hatrick to start drumming one foot on the ground slowly and deliberately, much like a human does when waiting impatiently for someone who is running late. The new rabbit was promptly dropped off at the animal shelter the following morning.

While their dull visitor may have underwhelmed Hatrick, Toby found himself preoccupied with a new and slightly disturbing possibility as he drove home from the puppy pound: would Saul ever vanish a person for one of his performances? Would Toby, like Hatrick, have to entertain an unexpected visitor? And what if such a visitor appeared in the closet while Toby wasn’t home? What would he do or say if he entered his room to find a stranger sitting at his desk?

Coincidentally, that evening Toby found in his closet a letter from Saul (along with two gaudy, pink flamingos) that addressed his concern:

Dear Mr. Dobrinick,

I am writing to inform you that, due to an upturn in business, my performance budget has grown. As a result, I have been able to hire an assistant, whom I will use in an all-new disappearing act. This individual has been given very specific instructions as to how she is to respect your living space. Seeing as how she will not be able to lock the front door behind her in the event that she reappears in your home while you are away, she will wait in your room until you are able to escort her out. Don’t worry; she will be disappeared with plenty of cash and a bus pass. I hope you do not feel that this is a breach of our original agreement.

Wishing you the best,

Saul The Stupendous

Toby wasn’t sure how he felt about the situation. He didn’t think that Saul was dishonoring their contract, and he didn’t necessarily have a major problem with somebody materializing in his closet. And yet, Toby felt inexplicably wary about this new part of Saul’s show.

Toby crossed the room and sat down at his desk, where Hatrick lay warming himself underneath the reading lamp, and dropped the letter in front of his small lapin friend.

“We’re gonna have another guest, what do you think?”

Hatrick looked over the letter for so long that Toby began to worry the rabbit was actually reading it. When finished perusing, he drummed apprehensively.

“Yeah, I know. I hope she won’t be anything like our last visitor too,” said Toby.

After receiving the letter, Toby spent a few anxious evenings waiting for a woman to show up in his room. The more he thought about it, though, the more he began to feel a small amount of excitement along with his anxiety. Maybe Saul’s new assistant would be the kind that Toby had always seen on TV and in movies, young and beautiful with perfect teeth and flawless breasts. Toby was further excited by the realization that the assistant would be appearing in his closet in her performance attire, which he imagined would be sparkly and, more importantly, minimalistic. The deal seemed sweeter every minute.

Then one evening, as Toby sat at his desk reading about German expressionism in film and as Hatrick snoozed on top of Toby’s bed, the closet door suddenly opened.

Toby snapped around in his chair and beheld the creature that stood in the middle of his room. At least one aspect of Toby’s imagination had been fulfilled; the woman was scantily clothed. Her costume was golden and shiny, and it was adorned with several large pink feathers. The rest of the hopes that Toby had held for the assistant, however, were smashed, and his once-stiff enthusiasm went instantly limp.

She was old. She may have been beautiful once, but time had caught up to her and subsequently left her in the dust. Her hair was brown and thin and meticulously curled. Beneath her chin were two breasts that were fooling neither Toby nor Hatrick, the latter having awoken at the sound of the door opening. Her face was leathery with worry wrinkles, and she gave off a dried-out, wispy aura, the kind that one sometimes associates with chain smokers.

“Which way outta here?” She asked in a gruff voice, and then began hacking in a way that suggested she dearly wanted to liberate one or both of her lungs from her chest.

Yup, definitely a chain smoker, Toby thought to himself.

“I’m Toby,” he said over the sound of her coughing, not sure whether or not he should pat her on the back.

Finally she stopped coughing and straightened up.

“Denise,” she grunted. “This the way out?” And without waiting for an answer she walked out the bedroom door and into the living room.

Toby followed quickly, praying silently that Mitchell wasn’t in the living room. Toby’s prayer was answered. Mitchell was in the kitchen.

“Excuse me,” said Denise as she brushed past Mitchell and made her way to the front door. Before leaving, she turned and spoke to Toby.

“See you sometime next week.” And with that she walked out the front door, her feathers swishing as she closed the door behind herself.

Toby sighed. Mitchell was staring at him with a look of confused revulsion. Everything had happened so fast and so unexpectedly; Toby hadn’t been able to fabricate an excuse in the event that Mitchell witnessed the departure of the assistant. He should have planned for this to happen.

Oh well, thought Toby, who was still bitter that the magical assistant that had teleported to his closet wasn’t a twenty-year-old blonde bombshell. I’ll make up an excuse to tell him later.

“What the hell….” Began Mitchell.

“I’ll think up an excuse to tell you later,” said Toby, and he walked back to his room and closed the door, leaving Mitchell stammering indignantly in the kitchen.

“Saul’s got some taste in assistants, wouldn’t you say?” Toby asked Hatrick as he sat down on the bed beside the rabbit. Hatrick made a tiny retching noise, like a kitten coughing up a hairball, and drummed rapidly on the bedspread. Toby laughed, scratched Hatrick’s neck, and committed himself to his desk once more.

By the time there were no more pages to be read, the digital alarm clock on the bedside table displayed “3:47” in treacherous luminescent green. Toby swore to himself, certain that he would sleep through his morning classes again. He hastily brushed his teeth and undressed, then turned out the light and climbed into bed. Hatrick crawled up and settled himself beside Toby’s neck for warmth.

Toby lay on his back with his eyes shut for several minutes, but sleep wouldn’t come. Something didn’t feel right. Careful not to wake Hatrick, he turned his head to look at his clock.

4:03

And then Toby heard it, something was making noise in his closet. He sat bolt upright, prompting Hatrick to awaken and hop away sleepily. He stared at the closed slat doors, trying not to breathe, listening for the sound to come again. And it did.

It was a sob, small and pathetic. Somebody was in his closet, and they were crying. Toby looked at his clock again. Saul had never made anything disappear at such an hour before.

“Hello?” Toby whispered into the darkness.

There was no reply other than a slight increase in the volume and frequency of the sobs.

“Hello? Who’s there?” Toby slowly removed the bedcovers from his legs and slid his feet slowly to the carpet. Hatrick, he noticed, was cowering at the edge of the bed farthest from the closet, his face hidden under his paw. The crying grew more earnest as Toby crept towards the closet.

“Hey….” He whispered as he reached the slatted doors, though which he could barely distinguish a hunched form. Very carefully, standing as far back as he could, he reached out and pulled the doors apart.

Sitting on the closet floor, shaking, her knees drawn to her chest, was a woman. For a moment Toby thought it was Denise, but a few seconds’ scrutinizing through the darkness revealed that the pitiful lady was not Saul’s assistant. The woman that sat before Toby now seemed to be of middle-age as well, but when she lifted her tear-smeared face to look at him he perceived softer angles and kinder features.

“Close the door,” she squeaked, and she buried her face in her knees.

“I’m sorry… what’s going on?” Asked Toby.

The crying woman merely shook her head.

“Is this some… are you a part of some new act?” He asked hopefully. This just made the woman sob harder.

“Leave me alone,” she said more loudly. Toby held out his hands and shushed her.

“I’m sorry, I just want to know what’s going on. Where did you come from?”

The woman raised her head again.

“He… he m-made me disappear,” she sobbed.

“Well, yeah, I know that, but why—”

But before Toby could continue his interrogation, the woman leaned back and grabbed one of the closet doors. She pulled it closed and leaned forward for the other door and shut it as well.

“Go away.”

Toby stood there for a moment, staring at the collection of fractions of woman that he could see through the slats of the doors. Then, silently, he turned his back on the closet and crawled back into bed. Hatrick scurried to him and burrowed himself partially under the covers, where he shivered against Toby’s chin.

Toby closed his eyes. The moonlight from the window had illuminated the woman’s hand when she had reached for the closet door, and on that hand Toby had seen a diamond ring. With Hatrick beside him and sobs escaping from his closet, Toby tried to sleep, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t do anything but think about the things he had always believed in, the things he had never believed in, the words of Saul The Stupendous, and what it took to make somebody who loved you disappear.

Stretch

2010-02-01T23:38:00.000-08:00

[It's absolute, run-of-the-mill, sing songy garbage... but it's so me.]

Pretend you’re a writer,

pretend you’re a poet,

pretend it’s a lovely body,

pretend that you own it.

Pretend that you’re quiet,

pretend that you’re sleeping,

pretend you don’t see it,

pretend that you’re dreaming.

pretend you’re a lover,

pretend that you’re listening,

pretend you’re not leaving,

pretend that you’re kissing.

Pretend you hear music,

pretend it’s your chance,

and when they pretend to ask you

be sure to pretend to dance.

Sunwater Sister

2010-01-07T15:42:00.000-08:00

[Originally paired side-by-side with the preceding poem. Again, not really my thing.]

Sunwater Sister,

your fit is fixed

again. You’re taking

it all with a

fist of coyote-

red. And one

day the rhythm

will be gone, and

so will the rhyme,

and you’ll only

have the one

reason, emptying

like cracked steel

drums into sky-

stained water

bailing out your

vessel to keep

from flying

counting lines

so you can

fit every word

reading it backwards

to catch snags

like flies on their

papers like notes

on a staff playing

up to meet James

tapping his toe

you’re a sound he never knew

Boxwood Brother

2010-01-07T15:41:00.001-08:00

[Not really my thing. But I did it anyway.]

Boxwood Brother,

why won’t you

lower your eyes

for the sake

of your fists?

you breaking

breathe fixing

flashing you

cast your hands

in molten

silver, chill

in calm cold

calamity.

underneath

a plastic sextant,

on your parade

of water

creatures

and things

that float

you trouble

yes I implore

you hiding

sideways along

the secret

compartments

in your coffin,

whispering you

a lullaby

2009-12-21T22:50:00.001-08:00

The Authorial Intrusion

2009-12-11T16:47:00.000-08:00

[Thanks to Suzanne Stroup]

Kara Rose Clement sat in front of her dressing room mirror, putting the finishing touches on her stage makeup. She was dressed only in a soft, comfortable robe; one of the many benefits of playing the lead female role and having her own room backstage. Of course, the privacy of her personal preparation space offered more perks than the ability to apply makeup while partially naked. Away from the boisterous babble of the cast and crew, Kara was able to think.

She thought of the best friends that she had ever known, the actors and stagehands that were chattering and laughing loudly outside her door. For four years they had played together, fought together, and grown up together. They had learned to cooperate, more like a family than a team, in order to create nights of enchanted illusion. Sadly, tonight’s illusion would be Kara’s last to craft with them.

She thought of Grady High School and its beautiful theater. It had been a pirate ship, and it had been a flowering field. It had been a dark castle, and it had been a cheerful village. But most importantly, Grady Theater had been a home for Kara and a refuge for the members of the drama department. The equipment was top-notch; the stage was beautifully large; the gallery, which could easily seat one thousand people, was reminiscent of a darkly carpeted coliseum. Kara wondered if her voice would ever again fill such a beautiful place with music.

She thought of Zack Stanley, the tall, blonde soccer player. They had been playing a game of cat-and-mouse high school romance ever since the day they first met, and Kara could feel it drawing to a close. Tonight would be the night that Zack would be waiting for her when she opened the large double-doors that separated the backstage from the gallery, where the actors exited after a performance. He would give her a bouquet of flowers, kiss her on the cheek, and tell her that she was incredible. She just knew it.

Kara was so absorbed in her thoughts that she did not hear her dressing room door being opened.

“Kara?”

With a startled gasp, Kara turned to see Abigail Baxter’s uncomfortably blue eyes peeking at her from around the door.

“Abby! You scared the hell out of me!” Kara exclaimed. Abby grinned, blushing slightly.

“Sorry. I just wanted to let you know that you’ve got a visitor.” Abby stifled a giggle behind her smile. “A gentleman visitor.”

Kara gasped. She jumped out of her high makeup chair and flung herself onto an old pink love seat that was pushed flush against the wall. Since its donation, this particular piece of furniture had been a place of repose for divas with headaches. It would have to do.

“Send him in,” said Kara. Abby withdrew her head from the room and closed the door behind her.

Kara took a deep breath, willing her heartbeat to slow and her cheeks to stop glowing. She had not expected Zack to come to her so soon. With growing anticipation, she recounted in her mind all of the close calls over the last few years; all of the near misses and misunderstandings. So many times they had been so close. So many times she had felt his breath on her lips, had traced the gray lines in his green eyes, like rivers cutting through dark forests. And now here she was, possibly seconds away from something for which she had waited years.

There was a knock on the door. Kara took a second to run a hand through her hair and to straighten the wrinkles in her robe.

“Come in!” Kara called in what she hoped was a charming and lady-like voice. The door opened. At the first sight of her visitor, Kara’s heart sank. The romantic adrenaline that had numbed her legs quickly dissipated.

A boy walked into the room, but not the boy for whom Kara had been so anxiously awaiting. Instead of the tall, strong figure of Zack Stanley, an entirely different creature stood in front of her. This strange visitor was short in stature and very skinny. He wore a handsome three-piece suit. Thin-rimmed glasses perched upon his pointed nose. The only physical attribute of this boy that impressed Kara was his hair, which looked very soft and was black as iron. The boy must also have shared a liking for his mane, for he ran his fingers through it lavishly as he entered the room.

Kara’s visitor wore a very strange expression. With eyes that seemed filled with surprise and wonder, he glanced around the dressing room as if he were astounded by all that he saw. His lips bent into a small smile as he considered the various pieces of furniture and decoration. Just as Kara was about to speak up, the boy turned his gaze upon her. His pleasant smirk grew into a wide, toothy smile.

“Hello Ms. Clement! My name is Erich Ackerman. Are you ready for your last big show?”

Kara was momentarily without words. As soon as she heard Erich’s genuinely warm voice, a strange and sudden sense of recognition overcame her. She was certain that she had never seen his face or heard his voice, and yet Kara was equally sure that she knew this boy. Somehow, in some unknown or forgotten way, she knew this boy.

“Yes- I’m sorry, have we met?” Kara asked. Erich chuckled, once again combing his dark hair with his fingers. Then he abruptly said something strange.

“You feel like you know me, don’t you?” he said in an oddly knowing manner. “Nothing about me is familiar to you, but you still can’t get rid of that nagging feeling, right? The feeling that we know each other?”

Kara was momentarily speechless. As soon as those thoughts had formed in her mind, they were being spoken by Erich. How was that possible? How could he have known what she was thinking?

“But how-”

“A lot of people have said that to me tonight,” Erich answered before Kara’s lips could shape the question. “Tonight…tonight?” he repeated to himself, seemingly perplexed by his choice of words. “I wonder if this is all one night? It feels like it’s been days…” he trailed off, his eyes staring unseeingly at the wall.

This strange behavior confused Kara even further. Whatever game Erich was playing, she didn’t like it. She had a performance to prepare for, and she needed to be relaxed and ready. Erich’s presence, however, was only filling her with more and more unease. Unable to shake the unsettling feeling that she knew him, and unwilling to waste any more time by discussing it, Kara decided that it would be best if Erich left. She rose from the couch and began to clear away her makeup kits.

“Well, as you can imagine, I’ve got to get ready for the show. So if you’re finished with whatever joke the Morrison High School kids have put you up to…” she stopped there, as she considered the “get out” was implied.

Erich, to Kara’s extreme annoyance, didn’t move. His smile took on a touch of smugness.

“That’s very like you,” he said. “You can’t just say ‘get out’ or ‘please leave.’ You have to make a production of it. You really are a little diva, you know.”

Kara felt that this was going too far. She closed her eyeshadow case with a snap and turned angrily to Erich.

“Ok, listen, I don’t know who you think you are, but you’re being an ass. You don’t know me. We’ve never met. You have no right to talk about me like that. Please go now so I can get ready.”

Erich’s smile disappeared. He took a step backward in the direction of the door, his eyes now trained on the floor. Kara was sure he would leave now, but instead he spoke.

“I do have the right….” he said very quietly to the ground.

“What was that?” Kara asked hotly, unable to believe that Erich was taking his joke so far when it clearly wasn’t funny.

“I said I do have the right to talk about you that way,” Erich answered much more loudly. His eyes were now determinedly challenging Kara’s disgruntled gaze. There was an edge to his voice that frightened Kara. She was just about to exit the room to find someone to escort Erich away when he spoke again.

“Nothing here is real. It came from my head. I wrote you. I created you. Nobody knows you better than me. You came from me.”

Erich looked anxiously at Kara, as if afraid she might explode, awaiting her reaction to these words.

Kara didn’t know whether she should laugh or run for her life. For a moment she simply stood there, looking into Erich’s eyes, and he looked back, not a crack of a smile or twitch of mirth visible on his face.

“You’re actually the third person I’ve visited tonight,” he continued, cutting through the momentary silence. “I- I walk through doors and they take me to different times and different places, all places that I’ve written about. I don’t know why, but for some reason I’m being allowed to see what life is like from inside my stories. But- please, no, hear me out!”

She had taken all that she could. Kara, now extraordinarily flustered by this prank-pulling time waster, had walked around Erich and opened the door.

“Leave.”

“No, please wait, there’s more! I came to tell you-“

“Leave!”

“I can’t keep the stories alive; they’ll end. I don’t know what-“

“Get out!”

Erich’s eyes exhumed sadness and regret as profound as the curiosity with which they had glowed only minutes ago. With a nervous tug at his hair and one last glance around the room, he made his way through the doorway.

Just as Kara was closing the door behind him, he turned and said quickly, “I hope that you get those flowers from Zack tonight. I know you’ve been waiting a long time.” And with that he exited the backstage area, leaving Kara standing in her dressing room and feeling deeply troubled.

* * *

In all her years of performing, Kara could not remember putting on a better closing show. All dance routines were flawless, every note was sung on key, and the audience was one of the most boisterous and appreciative that Kara had ever seen. It was as if every person in the theater- actors, crew, and spectators alike- had conspired to make this, her last night, unforgettable.

But the show, sadly, soon came to an end. When Kara stepped from the wings to take her final bow, nearly one thousand pairs of hands radiated their admiration. Kara’s face barely had room for her smile as the massive crowd rose to its feet. As she joined hands with the entire cast for their last obeisance, she finally spotted the person she had been most anxious to see. Zack Stanley was beaming as he clapped, his eyes fixed on Kara.

Backstage there were hugs, congratulations, tears, and goodbyes. One by one, the young players changed out of their stage clothes and exited through the double-doors to the gallery, where two hundred appreciative spectators waited to greet them with gifts and more cheers. Every time the doors were opened a wave of cheering flooded the backstage dressing area, and Kara could see friendly hands pulling in the actors as the doors swung shut.

Kara had removed her costume and replaced it with a black dress, but she still wasn’t ready to leave. Instead, she watched as her friends departed through the doors, surrendering themselves to the handshakes and backslaps.

It might have been a little egotistical, but Kara wanted to be the last one to leave; to be the final member of the cast to emerge from behind the doors to greet the throng of admirers. She wanted everyone in the crowd in the gallery to think, “Wait! Where’s the star of the show? Where’s Kara Clement?” And then she would come out, assaulted by applause and accolades, and Zack Stanley would hand her an enormous bunch of flowers, kiss her, and tell her she was wonderful.

“Ready to go?” Asked Abby, tearing Kara away from her daydream. Kara realized suddenly that only she and Abby remained backstage.

“Oh… er…no,” Kara said, searching for an excuse to stay behind. “I lost my phone around here somewhere.” Of course, her phone was safely in her purse, but Abby didn’t need to know that.

“Okay, I’ll help you look!” Said Abby brightly.

“No, that’s alright, I’ll be fine!” Kara replied hastily. “I’ll find it, Abby, you go on ahead. I’ll be right behind you.” She turned her back on Abby, pretending to comb the floor for her cell phone, straightening only when she heard Abby exit the backstage.

I’ll just give her a minute to herself, thought Kara. After all, what kind of friend would she be if she came out too soon, distracted the crowd, and denied Abby the full attention that she deserved?

So Kara paced the large, empty coed makeup room, looking around fondly at the mirrors and chairs and thinking about all of the times she had used them. Soon enough, however, she stopped her reminiscing; she was ready to go.

She walked up to the double doors, going over in her head exactly what she was going to say to Zack Stanley. With a readying breath, she placed her hands upon the doors, pushed, and walked out into a gallery filled with....

Nobody.

To Kara’s amazement, there was nobody waiting for her outside the doors. In fact, there was nobody in the gallery at all. The crowd that she had seen no more than one minute ago had vanished, along with every other attendee that had been in the audience. Her mouth slightly agape with bewilderment, Kara slowly walked into the high-ceilinged chamber, hardly believing her eyes as they scanned row after row of empty, velvet-covered seats.

Suddenly a sound sliced through the silence. Kara screamed and jumped, looking around frantically for its source. Her surprise intensified as she realized that the theater was not abandoned, after all. Sitting behind a pillar that partially hid him from view was Erich Ackerman, and his solitary applause was what had frightened Kara.

“Excellent! Bravo! You really are something!” He said, wearing a proud smile. “I never wanted that show to end.”

Kara had no words. She suddenly realized why the gallery was devoid of all life except for Erich. For a few seconds she simply stared around at the many vacant seats, refusing to believe what the absence of her admirers must mean.

“No way,” she muttered to herself as she shook her head.

“Beg your pardon?” said Erich, a look of polite concern on his face.

“I said ‘no way.’ I don’t believe this,” Kara said. She was so angry that she was laughing in spite of herself. “You actually got everyone to hide outside, like they’d forgotten me? Is that the big joke? Is that what you were planning all this time?”

Tears began to slip around her eyes, but she brushed them away furiously. How could they all do this? Were they really all hiding in the lobby, sniggering, without a care in the world about how upset this would make her? Didn’t they know how important this night was; her last chance to be temporarily famous?

“Actually, I don’t know where they all went,” Erich said slowly. “One moment they were all here, and the next, everyone was gone.” He was frowning slightly, as if only mildly troubled by the sudden disappearance of one thousand people.

“What do you mean, ‘they just disappeared?’ How do so many people just disappear?!” Kara cried disbelievingly. But she guessed what Erich was going to say before he had even opened his mouth to speak.

“I don’t know,” he replied, tugging absent-mindedly at his hair again, his calm contentment starkly contrasting Kara’s teary anger. “I think something is happening to me, you know, in the real world. My world. Maybe I’m dying….” His eyes glazed sadly for a moment as he said these words.

Kara didn’t care what Erich had to say. She groaned loudly and stomped her foot, not caring how childish she looked or sounded. “Oh don’t start with that stupid story again!” She wanted to howl at the top of her voice, to run at Erich and hit him across the face. The exodus of her admirers had shaken her like nothing ever had before. How had this boy, whom she had never met, planned such a malicious prank that had affected her so overwhelmingly? She turned on her heel and stormed towards one of the large, round doors that led from the main theater to the lobby.

“I wouldn’t bother with that,” Erich called.

Kara stopped just short of the door, her arm outstretched.

“And why not?” She asked hotly, letting the contempt that boiled in her stomach engulf her words.

“Because it’s probably not going to open. I doubt there’s anything out there at all. To tell you the truth, seeing as how everybody else has vanished, I’m surprised any of this is still here.” He gestured with his hands, indicating the empty theater around them.

Kara ignored this renewed foolishness and turned her back on Erich once more. She pushed on the door, but to her astonishment, it would not budge. Frowning, she threw her shoulder into the door, but still it did not move. Panicking slightly, she kicked out at the wooden barrier. It did not make a hollow knocking noise, as one would expect, but rather a dull thud, as if it were a marble slab. The door never shifted a single centimeter within its frame.

“What the hell….” Kara pressed her ear against the door, hoping to catch the sound of voices from the lobby. She heard nothing.

“Will you come and sit with me for a while? I’m sorry you’re so upset, but I’d like to talk to you. That’s why I’m here,” said Erich.

“Fuck off, creep,” Kara replied. She banged her fist against the door- pointlessly, for again she could make no percussive sound- and began to yell. “Whoever’s out there, open the door! This isn’t funny… I mean it!”

Nobody answered. The door remained closed.

“You!” Demanded Kara, swinging around and pointing a finger at Erich. “Open this door. Right now. I’m through playing around.”

Erich bit his lip and pushed his dark hair away from his face nervously.

“I don’t know… are you sure….”

“Of course I’m sure! You think I want to be stuck in here with you anymore?”

Erich sighed, rose slowly from his chair, and walked around the rows of seats to join Kara at the door. She started to withdraw slightly when he approached.

“Stay close,” Erich said solemnly. “You need to see this.” Before Kara could reply, Erich pushed open the door.

Kara was too shocked even to scream. The door hadn’t opened to reveal a lobby full of chuckling people. Beyond the doorway was endless, limitless darkness; nothing. Erich regarded Kara grimly, watching her as she stepped closer to the dividing line where velvet carpet met eternal emptiness.

Never in her life had Kara feared the sight of anything more. This wasn’t simply darkness, she realized as she steadied herself by clutching the doorframe. This was the complete absence of existence in any form. It was the purest deletion, the sincerest annihilation. And then, with icy suddenness, Kara realized that it was coming for her.

She raised her hands to cover her face and screamed. Erich reached into the void and quickly pulled the door shut. Kara sank to the ground, sobbing, terrified, hiding her face in her hands so she wouldn’t see the door. Because she knew that the blackness couldn’t be shut out, and that it was still there, waiting to grab her and take her away and squeeze her into nothing.

Erich sat down on the floor next to Kara. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and gently pulled her towards him. T o her own surprise, Kara found herself unwilling to resist. She descended softly into Erich’s arms, resting her head on his chest. One hand held her steadily to him, the other stroked her hair. He lowered his lips to her ear.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

With each frightened tear that soaked into his jacket, Kara’s previous disdain for Erich dripped out of her. In its place arose the inexplicable familiarity that she had felt when she first met him, only now it was much stronger. Kara felt closer to Erich than she had ever felt to anyone, and without any words or explanation, Kara knew that Erich was everything that he had claimed to be.

They sat there, huddled together, for several minutes before Kara was able to speak. She wiped her face with the palm of her hand, trying desperately and unsuccessfully to think of something to say. Here she was, in the arms of the person responsible for her existence, so many questions in her head clamoring to be asked that they made a din, and she could give words to none of them. Finally, she removed her head from Erich’s chest and looked into his face.

“I was terrible to you. You were telling the truth, and you only wanted to see me, and I was terrible.”

“No, it’s alright,” Erich replied. He smirked down at Kara. “That’s just how you are sometimes, isn’t it?”

At these words, Kara fell silent. A new dread began to overtake her as she considered what Erich had said. How was she? Was she nothing but a puppet, a meaningless character driven by the whims and ideas of another, unable to see the cogs that kept her moving? The way she had always lived, the way she had thought of herself, could she be responsible for any of it? Her entire persona; was it the way she was, or was it the way Erich had made her?

Erich briefly squeezed her shoulder. “You’re worrying.”

Kara sniffed. “How do you know that?”

Erich regarded her incredulously. “Well, I mean… I’d be worried if I were you.”

“Is that it? Or do you know I’m worried because… because you’re making me worried?

Erich looked puzzled, but then his face slackened with apprehension. “You think I’m controlling you right now… controlling everything that happens?”

“What am I supposed to think?” Kara asked helplessly. “If you made me, if I’m here only because of you, how can I know that I can do anything by choice?”

Erich frowned. “I didn’t make you,” he replied. “I just put you down on paper. You’re every bit as free as anyone could be. Besides, if this was some fantasy that I controlled completely, like a playground that has to obey my rules… if I couldn’t meet you, argue with you, learn more about you…” he shook his head. “I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t care.”

Kara sighed with relief. Her fears had been allayed, and in their place arose a hungry curiosity. She gently pulled away from Erich and scooted on her hands and hindquarters until her back rested against the darkly-papered wall.

“Can I ask you something?”

Erich laughed and raised his eyebrows.

“Some thing?”

“Ok… several somethings,” Kara corrected herself.

Erich relocated himself as well, so that he sat with his back against the railing that separated the gallery from the raised entrance wings. He shuffled for a moment, searching for a comfortable spot on which to lean. When he was content with his position, he crossed his arms across his chest.

“Ask away.”

After a moment’s consideration, Kara knew what she wanted to ask first.

“How did you get here?”

Erich looked thoughtfully at the ceiling before answering.

“I’m not really sure.” He closed his eyes tight, frowning with the effort of remembering. “I was lying in my bed, and I think I closed my eyes just for a few minutes, just to try and sleep a little, but when I opened them I wasn’t in my bed. I was lying on my back on one of those big blue mats they use for high-jumping.” Kara furrowed her brows, completely lost. “I was at a track… In the middle of a track meet, actually,” Erich clarified.

“What were you doing at a track?” Kara asked.

“Same thing I’m doing here,” Erich answered. “Visiting a friend.”

Kara smiled. “So how did you end up here?”

“Well, I’ve already visited a few places. The change always happened the same way. After I found the person I was looking for, and after I talked to him or her for a while, I would start to feel really… tired. Like I couldn’t hold on to things anymore, you know? And I would close my eyes, and when I opened them again… I’d be somewhere else,” he concluded simply. “That answer your question?”

Kara nodded. She pictured it in her head; Erich travelling from story-world to story-world like some sort of transdimensional sleepwalker. “Can I ask you something else now?”

“You sure can.”

“Alright.” Kara tried to keep her voice calm and her face impassive, but she was beginning to grow more anxious as she considered the possible consequences of her next questions. “Why did you make me- I mean… why did you ‘put me down on paper?’”

To Kara’s surprise, Erich’s cheeks began to glow pink. “Tough questions…” he mumbled sheepishly.

“Well?” Kara prodded.

Erich cleared his throat uncertainly. “I was… lonely.” He waited for Kara to smile, maybe even laugh, but she did nothing but evenly return Erich’s gaze, so he continued. “I never really… had many opportunities to go out and actually meet girls. The only ones I ever knew well were in books or on TV.” His voice was steadily losing its bold confidence. For the first time, Kara thought, it seemed as if Erich didn’t know what he was going to say next. “So one day I decided that, if I couldn’t go out and be with real girls, I’d… well, I’d just write about a girl. So I wrote about you.”

Once again, Kara found her mouth in debt of words. Erich mistook her silence for pity or disgust, and quickly spoke up again.

“I’m sorry! I know how weird that sounds. I shouldn’t have said anything… But trust me, it’s nothing… bad. I never wrote myself into your life. It was never anything like that. I just wanted to… to be familiar with the life of a girl, to watch you and get to know you. It was like… I wrote about you so that I could… sort of feel like I was a part of your world, this ideal world of beautiful, talented people. But I didn’t belong in it. That’s why I wrote about Zack Stanley. He could do the things I never could do. And even though I was jealous, and even though some days I wished I was him, just being able to watch the two of you was… enough.” He looked desperately and dejectedly at Kara. “I’m really sorry. I know that none of this makes any sense. I’m terrible at explaining things like this….” He hung his head, staring at the floor.

Kara suddenly found her voice. “Hey,” she said gently. Erich didn’t move. “Hey, look at me,” she repeated. Erich raised his head, revealing a face colored with embarrassment. “Don’t be sorry. You should never be sorry for doing something that makes you happy… at least, that’s what I’ve always thought. And like you said, you weren’t doing anything wrong, you weren’t living out any… fantasies or anything. You were just telling yourself a story. Right?”

Erich considered her words for a moment, then nodded his head slowly in agreement. “Thanks,” he said in a voice filled with relief. “To be honest, I thought you’d be angry or freaked out when I told you about that.”

“’When?’” Kara repeated. “You already knew I was going to ask you that question?”

Erich’s sly grin slipped back onto his face. “Pretty much, yeah.”

“Well then, do you know what question I’m going to ask you now?”

The smile fell from Erich’s face so quickly that you might have heard it shatter on the floor. He looked grave, maybe even frightened. “Yeah… I can guess,” he said quietly.

Kara could tell that Erich was upset by the direction in which the conversation was going, but she pushed on. “Well then, tell me: Why could you never go out and meet girls? Why do you say you don’t belong in a world of beautiful people? Why do you talk like....” She stopped abruptly. Erich’s face was stone. A terrible possible had revealed itself to Kara, as in her head echoed words that Erich had spoken only minutes earlier.

Maybe I’m dying….

“Erich…” her voice was barely more than a whisper. “Erich, what’s wrong with you? In your world I mean, what’s…” she gulped. “What’s happening to you?”

Erich sighed deeply and shrugged his shoulders. He tried to accompany this with a reassuring smile, but the upward curl of his lips was immediately beaten down by the coldness of his eyes.

“I’m sick,” he said, staring through the wall behind Kara’s head. “I’m very sick. I always have been, ever since I was little.”

Kara couldn’t stop herself. She began to cry. Even though she had hated this boy until very recently, even though they had never met before this night, she cried. And as the sobs left her throat, the reason for Erich’s visit became clearer.

“Is-is that w-why you’re here?” She gasped. She took several breaths, trying to control herself. “Erich, you’re dying?”

Erich didn’t answer. He pulled himself up off the ground, walked over to Kara, and held out his hand to her.

“Come on. Come with me.”

Kara looked from Erich’s hand to his face. He was suddenly calm and standing tall with an aura of purpose. She took his hand, and he helped her to stand. Still holding on tight, Erich led Kara towards the seating gallery. When they had reached the middle row of the main aisle, he stopped and turned to face her. Her hand was still in his.

They stood there, in the middle of the theater, surrounded by dimly-lit walls and thousands of empty seats. Kara’s tears had retreated from her face, but were still hiding behind her eyes. Erich examined her, his gaze concerned and anxious. With an unbidden sadness Kara recognized it, the “are you going to be alright” look.

“I think it’s time for me to go now,” Erich said softly. “Don’t be scared.” His eyes began to flutter, as if he was having trouble keeping them open.

“Wait!” Kara said, shaking him. “Wait! What happens to me when you go?”

Erich shook his head, trying to clear it. He suddenly looked like someone who hadn’t slept in days. His skin was becoming pale and loose. His eyes were bloodshot.

“I don’t know…” he said groggily. “I hope… but I hope you’re ok.” His eyelids couldn’t be denied any longer. “It was nice meeting you,” he said with a sleepy smile. His eyes closed and did not open again. For a fraction of a second he swayed on the spot, then, like a board, he began to fall backwards. Kara yelled and grabbed for him, but it was too late. By the time she had raised her hands, he was gone, and she was completely alone.

Kara turned in all directions, looking around the gallery, but she knew it was useless. She knew that Erich had gone for good.

The theater was perfectly quiet. Kara’s pulse quickened as she surveyed her surroundings, frantically wondering what she would do next. She didn’t dare go near either of the doors again; the thought of what lay beyond them made her hands shake. No, she wouldn’t take two steps nearer to the darkness if it wasn’t absolutely necessary.

But I can’t very well stand here waiting forever, can I? She thought to herself.

Kara ran her hand along the back of one of the chairs. They were made of black plastic and augmented with red cushions; typical of any theater. She found herself wondering how exactly it was that the chair had come to be there. Had somebody made it? If so, who had made the person who made the chair? Was it Erich? Or did the chair have no maker? Or did the Chair come from Erich as well?

A dull noise snapped Kara from her reverie. She looked around for the source of the sound but saw nothing. She waited, completely still, to see if it would come again. A few seconds later, it did; three consecutive strikes.

“Hello?” Kara called out to the empty theater. No reply came. She heard the strikes again. “Hello?!” She yelled more loudly, but still there was no answer. The strikes came again, only louder this time. Kara thought it was coming from the wall to her left.

Louder now. BANG BANG BANG. With horrible certainty, Kara realized where the noise was coming from: The door to the lobby; to the darkness. Something was knocking on the door.

“H-hello? Who’s there?” She yelled. For a long moment, there was silence. The knocking stopped. The only sound Kara could hear was her heart throbbing in her ears. And then, without warning, a terrible crash came from the door and reverberated across the room. Kara screamed and jumped backwards. The crash came again. The sound was tremendous and violent. The door shook in its frame as some angry, massive force collided with it from the other side. Kara could do nothing but cringe and stare. It was as if a hurricane was trying to break its way into the gallery.

And then Kara heard another sound, one with which she was very intimately familiar, a sound that she would have given anything not to have heard.

“Please. Please no,” she sobbed. “Please….”

KA-CHUNG

It was the sound of the house lights turning off.

The top rows of the coliseum-like seating gallery were plunged into complete and absolute darkness, a terrible gaping void, and Kara understood: the darkness had gotten in somehow. It had gotten in and it was coming to take her.

KA-CHUNG

The lights illuminating the exit wings were extinguished. Kara screamed. She turned and fled towards the only side of the room that was still visible, the stage. She sprinted past the rows of chairs and scrambled onto the warm wooden platform. Panting, she stood and chanced a glance behind her. The lights were going out more quickly now, and the darkness was steadily approaching the stage.

Kara ran backstage and hurtled down the main hall that connected the dressing, prop, and costume rooms. Behind her, she heard the spotlights of the stage pop out of existence. She ran the hall’s length and burst into the main cast dressing room, where she had waited hours ago, expecting to exit the double doors into the gallery to be greeted with cheers and applause.

There was a fluorescent click from the hall she had just vacated, and it too became lost in empty black. Now Kara had no choice; she had nowhere left to run except for one room: her private dressing room. She bolted the length of the long dressing room, past the swivel-chairs and makeup tables, reached her door, pried it open and slammed it shut behind her.

The room was exactly as she had left it before the show had begun. Kara looked around in vain, searching for some means of escape. Then, as before, there was a knock at the door.

“Go away!” Kara screamed. But the knocking continued.

Kara turned away from the door, unable to bear the sight that she knew was inevitable; the door breaking open, the darkness advancing with its mouth open wide, coming to engulf her. However, once her back was to the door, she noticed something that made her gasp.

The mirror of her makeup table was not reflecting the dressing room. Instead, Kara realized as she slowly walked closer, it was providing her with a view of what appeared to be an immaculately clean, white-tiled bathroom.

The knocking on the door had evolved into a malicious raucousness. The thin wooden door trembled. Kara looked from this frightening scene to the inexplicable window she now had to an unfamiliar restroom. Cautiously, hardly daring to hope, she reached out a hand towards what was once her mirror. Her heart leapt with both excitement and fear as her fingers passed right through the vanity and into the phantom room.

With a final, wall-quaking percussion, the dressing room door flew open. Kara didn’t risk a second in looking back. She leapt onto the table on her hands and knees and rolled into the white bathroom.

Kara’s knee smashed against the sink fixture, and she came crashing down onto cold tile. She sat up quickly, grabbing her bruised joint with both hands, and looked up at the bathroom mirror. There was no blackness, only a regular mirror, reflecting the white wall and ceiling. Kara sat still and quiet, listening for the sound of knocking, of light bulbs dying, but she heard only the hum of air conditioning and the buzz of fluorescents.

Breathing deeply, Kara sat there with her eyes closed and her back against the wall, simply appreciating the solid ground beneath her backside and tasting the clean air in her lungs. Several small tears of relief descended her cheeks, but quickly dried.

After a minute or so, Kara stood up and looked around. She was indeed in a bathroom, complete with a commode and a shower, but it was unlike a normal bathroom in that it was uncommonly clean. The entire space smelled strongly of disinfectant, and reminded Kara of something she couldn’t quite identify.

Timidly, Kara walked to the small white door and placed her hand on the knob, but was afraid to open it. She placed her ear against the cold metal and listened. There were no sounds from the other side. With trepidation, Kara turned the handle and exited the bathroom.

She emerged into a darkened room. Tables and counters and shelves lined with various strange instruments and implements, unidentifiable in the half-light, covered the walls. Against the far wall was a pipe-frame bed. Several machines were stacked beside the bed, emitting tiny sounds periodically. Bundles of cords ran from these machines to the bed, atop which lay a young man in a gown. Kara raised her eyebrows in surprise; she had walked into a hospital room.

As quietly as she could, she crossed the tile floor and made her way to the bed. She came to a halt beside it, gasping as she looked down into the face of the occupant. His hair was completely gone and his face was horrifically thin and withered, but there was still no mistaking the bold lips or the confident cock of the eyebrows.

“Erich,” she whispered as she bent closer to him. “Erich, wake up. It’s me.”

With a slow effort that was painful to watch, Erich’s eyelids opened and he turned his head slightly. When his eyes focused on Kara’s face, he went into a fit of coughing. He rolled over onto his side and brought his hands up to cover his face as his lungs heaved. Not knowing what to do, Kara placed a hand on Erich’s shoulder in an attempt to calm him.

When the attack had subsided, Erich rolled onto his back and stared up at Kara. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but then closed it again. He shook his head carefully, a tiny smile appearing on his lips.

“You weren’t supposed to be able to do that.”

Wanting and Giving [Revised]

2009-11-11T08:47:00.001-08:00

Silver labret-
she’s learning to play the keys,
in her head there’s a melody;
she wants someone to sing her a song.

Black nails-
she’s studying the masters,
in her head there’s a canvas;
she wants someone to paint her a picture.

Eyes hide behind brown hair-
she’s reading all the classics,
in her head there’s a man and a woman;
she wants someone to tell her a story.

My head is low,
my eyes shut,
above the stolid ivory runnels
I abide, creating nothing.

Theef

2009-09-08T09:07:00.000-07:00

[Viejo.]

Would be smart of me to
write it down,
just can't seem to
find the time.
sleep and bed
are my best friends
but sloth has stolen
all my rhymes.

The Birth of Stanley Harbor

2009-09-08T09:00:00.001-07:00

[This one is not in the same vein as the others....It is much older.]

They lifted the mask,
slowly his eyes fluttered
open.
They all gasped, amazed,
trapped by the blackness
and the coldness of his gaze.
They collected themselves,
asked him his name.
Could he remember?
Was he healthy?
Even sane?
He rubbed the dark marbles
in his face.
"Stanley," he said with a voice
like burnt ice.
"Stanley Harbor is my name."

The Only Star (Later Scene)

2009-08-30T23:42:00.000-07:00

[Same disclaimer as before. Oh, and just to fill you in: John awakens and he is no longer in outer space. His ship has washed up on a strange beach with palm trees and gray skies. He gets out to explore this latest unbelievable phenomenon.]

EXT. White-sand beach, day

John staggers through the sand, weighed down by his flight suit. He regards these new surroundings with amazement and disbelief. After traversing the beach for several more minutes, he comes across a fantastic sight: A large plane, beached on the shore like a giant, silver whale.Suddenly, a voice calls to him from the treeline.

VOICE:

Hello there!

John turns to see an oddly-dressed man walking towards him from the trees. The man comes to a stop in front of John and salutes, and John realizesthat this man's strange outfit is in fact an old, brown flight suit.

MAN:

(Still holding his salute)

First lieutenant Leonard G. Johnson, sir.

JOHN:

Where are we? What is this place?

Leonard does not answer, but frowns slightly as he waits for John to return his salute. John returns the salute impatiently, and Leonard's frown disappears.

LEONARD:

Why, this is the island of lost travelers, sir! At least, that's what we've taken to calling it, ever since we washed up here. That's my bird, right there.

Leonard points to the silver plane on the beach.

LEONARD:

Where's your ship, sir?

JOHN:

(Ignoring the question)

This isn't earth. It can't be... can it?

LEONARD:

(Amused)

No, I should think not! I've been here for some time, I'd say, and I haven't aged one minute...haven't had a bite to eat, either. Besides, how many deserted islands are there on earth that lie in oceans that never see any sign of seaship or airplane? No, I'd say we've all left earth pretty far behind, sir.

Leonard begins to walk toward the beached airplane; John follows.

JOHN:

But how long have you been here, exactly? How many months, or how many years?

LEONARD:

(Shaking his head)

I don't think you understand. This place is special. There's no day and there's no night. Do you even see a sun?

John surveys the sky, and to his surprise sees no trace of the sun in the gray sky.

JOHN:

(Softly)

Jesus....

LEONARD:

You seem surprised, sir. Why should any of this be so hard to believe, after what you've been through. Wasn't the way you came here incredibly strange? What about the lonely star?

JOHN:

(Surprised and slightly suspicious)

How do you know about the star?

LEONARD:

Everyone sees the star before they come here.

JOHN:

There are others here?

LEONARD:

(Shiftily, quickly)

There used to be.

Leonard steps up to the silver plane and pats its massive side, brushing away patches of wet sand. For the first time, John notices the numbers "441" printed boldly on the shiny metal of the aircraft.

LEONARD:

(Pensively)

October 30, 1954...the last date I ever knew. We were transporting personnel to a naval base in Portugal. We hit some bad weather, so I flew above it- 19,000 feet, like you should. But suddenly the storm clouds just rose right up and grabbed the plane. I tried to go higher, I tried to go lower, but the storm wouldn't let us go. Then, when the clouds cleared away, everything was gone. The ocean, the mountains, hell even the god-damned sky was gone! We were floating in pitch-black; couldn't see anything except the star.... This might sound crazy, but I think we might actually have been flying through outer space! Sounds crazy, I know, but....

John is surveying the airplane with renewed interest. It seems somehow familiar to him. He shakes his head, not paying full attention to Leonard.

JOHN:

Not crazy. Space travel is common now; it has been for about ninety years. The air force carries out many missions in space...cartography, resource location, biological indexes.... I was traveling through space myself before I was brought here.

LEONARD:

(Excited)

You, sir, are a real-live cosmonaut?! Hell, I never thought I would live long enough to meet one- well, I suppose I didn't, not really.Of course, right before I came here there were lots of rumors... all about the damn Russians, of course. Tell me, sir, did they ever actually build that...that "artificial Earth satellite?" Have people visited other planets yet? Is your ship close? May I see it, sir?

John is not listening. He has just realized why the ancient silver airplane seems so familiar.

JOHN:

Wait! Now I remember! Flight four-forty-one. This is the Lockheed Martin Super Constellation that disappeared over the Bermuda triangle! It just vanished without a trace. This ship was supposed to be the most bizarre disappearance in aeronautical history.

LEONARD:

(Happy, flattered)

Well, how do you like that! You've heard the story? Is it a famous story in the future? Am I famous in your time?

JOHN:

Not many people know the story, actually. I read your story in a book. They don't teach things like this in history classes at the academy.... Strange and inexplicable cases usually get swept under the rug.

LEONARD:

(Disappointed)

Oh, I see....

JOHN:

So where are all the personnel you were transporting? Where's your crew?

LEONARD:

(Suddenly very sullen and brooding)

They're gone.

JOHN:

Well then, why are you still here?

Leonard does not answer; instead, he turns away and begins walking back up the beach and towards the trees.

LEONARD:

(Calling over his shoulder)

Come on, I'll show you the island.

The Only Star

2009-08-18T23:15:00.000-07:00

[The format isn't quite what it looks like on Celtx, so forgive me.]

INT. space shuttle

John Taggard is strapped into the pilot's chair in the cockpit of a space shuttle. The only thing visible through the front viewports is a single star; all else is absolute black. The light inside the shuttle is fluorescent, white, and harsh. John shows physical signs of suffering extreme cold. He reaches a hand toward a switch labeled "log recorder." He pauses for a moment, collecting his thoughts, then flicks it on. A green light shines to life, indicating that the device is recording.

John

This is Commander John Taggard aboard the STS Theseus. According to my chronometer, it's been six days, four hours, and twenty-three minutes since I came into contact with theelectrical storm. Navigation systems remain nonfunctional....

John stops speaking as he begins to shake. He folds his arms across his chest for warmth and continues his log, but he now speaks with less confidence.

John

Only systems powered directly by the fuel cells are operational. I still have light, but the climate control is losing power. Interior temperature is steadily dropping. Food and water stores are nearly depleted. I...I still don't know where I am. It doesn't seem possible. I'm completely surrounded by empty space; all recognizable stars have disappeared. Everything is black except....

John's voice trails off. He looks through the front viewport at the lonely star; the only speck of light against the endless, black doldrums.

John

(Losing composure and pretense of military professionalism)

Catherine...Catherine, I know they told me to only record my logs with this, but I don't care. To hell with them. It doesn't matter anymore. I just need you to know what I'm doing. I'm floating in empty blackness. I don't know where the storm took me, but I can only see one star. Cold and dark surround me for infinity, and the only light in all of existence that can reach me comes from one little star.So, Catherine, I'm doing the only thing I can do. I'm orienting myself to reach that star, heading straight for it. I may not know where I am, but I do know where I'm going. I'm coming back to you. You have to be there, because that star is the only source of warmth and light in all the universe right now. How could you be anywhere else? How could you be somewhere in the freezing darkness? No, you're there in the light. I know you're there.

John pauses, pain is etched on his face as he prepares to verbalize the inevitable.

JOHN

I know I won't be alive when you hear this message. It'll take years to reach that star, and I probably have a day left...two at the most.But I want you to know...I want you to know that I didn't die lost and afraid in some damn abyss. I'm on my way out. I'm on the road home. I'm not staying here in the cold and the blackness. I'm leaving it behind for sunlight, and air, and your warmth. That's all I'll think about until it's over.... I promise. I'm not afraid, so don't be sad.

John reaches out a finger to turn off the recorder.

JOHN

Commander John Taggard, STS Theseus...out.

He flicks off the recorder. The green light is extinguished. Once again folding his arms across his chest, he sighs, leans back his head, and closes his eyes.

The Naming

2009-08-16T23:48:00.000-07:00

The night was warm and still. I walked a deserted street, carrying with me a red book; a French-English dictionary. This volume was not for reference, as I have never successfully commanded the French language. Rather, I was transporting the book to my home, where it would be used to repair a wobbly table.

Very suddenly and without warning, a monster leapt from the ditch and into my path. He had matted hair and long, sharp teeth, which flashed at me as he spoke.

“You,” growled the monster, pointing hungrily at me with a clawed finger.

“Me?” I asked nervously, which was silly of me to say, since I have already explained that the road upon which I travelled was deserted.

“Yes…you,” said the monster. “I am going to eat your flesh and floss my teeth with your hair.”

I gulped and clutched the dictionary close to my chest.

“Unless…” continued the monster. “Unless you can name me.”

“Name you?” I asked incredulously. “You mean if I guess your name correctly, you won’t devour me?”

“That’s right,” replied the monster, taking a step closer to me. He smelled of dirt and blood. “Name me and you will have nothing to fear.”

Stifling panic scratched at my face. How could I possibly guess this monster’s name? There must be hundreds of monster names…maybe even thousands!

“And what if I guess wrong?” I asked the monster. His answer was a grin full of cruel teeth.

I attempted to suppress a shudder. The chances of guessing the monster’s name correctly seemed astronomical. I would surely die if I did not concoct a scheme for escape. However, the monster was one step ahead of me.

“Don’t think that you’ll outsmart me, boy. You may think yourself clever, but believe me, I am more so.”

“But I’m very quick,” I replied. I was rapidly gaining confidence in the face of such a grim situation. “I’m much quicker than I am clever. I could run from you.” It was true, the monster was terrifying and imposing, but he was also very big; too big to be very quick.

“You can’t escape me,” said the monster, shaking his massive head. “Even if you did manage to escape me this night, I would find you, and I would tear you apart. I would never stop chasing you. If it took me all your life, I would eventually find you.”

This option did not seem much more promising than guessing the monster’s name. In fact, it seemed much less promising. What sort of life could I live if I was forever running from this beast? I resolved, therefore, to name the monster; to face my foe and not live in fear.

Then, hardly knowing what I was doing or why I was doing it, I opened the dictionary I was still holding. I turned to page two hundred and forty three and said aloud the first word that I saw.

“D-Doute,” I said, willing my voice to be steady and brave. “That is your name. You are Doute.”

A moment passed and neither I nor the monster moved. Then, with one last angry growl, the monster lumbered back into the ditch and disappeared into the dark night.

I had done it! I had named my enemy, and in doing so, chased him away. Happily I made my way home, noticing much more keenly how particularly fine the summer air tasted. That night I slept peacefully in my bed, without fear, knowing that I would never again have anything to fear from Doute.

Lamentirely

2009-08-15T02:03:00.001-07:00

Mine are unconscionable cave-drawings,
crass, cro magnon.
I have nothing but asterisks and parlor tricks,
playing to the sound of
cymbal splashes and car crashes.

But yours are fine things,
and though they belong to someone else I
still dip in a cold fingertip, touching it to my tongue;
it tastes like seeing places I’ve never been,
like hearing songs that’ve never been written,
like touching the hand of a girl I’ve never met.

Love Poems with Stanley Harbor

2009-07-21T16:48:00.000-07:00

[Still doing these.... Still not titling them differently]

I hear spiders spinning in the room where I am a prisoner,
Bound fast to an iron chair with iron chains.
Before me in the near-blackness is a cold stone table
Upon which sits paper and pencil,
Both embroidered with my hair and traces of my own dried blood.

She says she won’t let me go until I write one for her.
I reach out a cracked hand and pick up the pencil, but still
No saving words come.
None.
When did I give up rhyme and rhythm for malicious missives?
When did faith and fraternity give way to distrust and despair?

With a triumphant snap I destroy the pencil,
But she is there before I can tear the paper,
Appearing beside me out of the frightened air.

Her eyes brighten and the chains tighten,
And I shut my eyes hard against the sight of her.
She bends forward to give me inspiration,
Her lips stifle the scream erupting from mine.

When she withdraws I recoil, spitting.
She tastes of lies and the last man she has eaten.
All I know is the surest shame and
The retching noises that take the place of her name.

Before leaving, I had told the man in the mirror
To come looking for me if I wasn’t home by morning.
That was two days ago.

Sleeping with Stanley Harbor

2009-07-13T20:13:00.000-07:00

[I need to stop doing these...or maybe title them differently.]

The sleep clock sounds, but I am not in my sheets.
I am hanging upside-down in my closet,
Thinking of the orange detour signs and
Making a list of all the things I am not.

An unhappy echo reflects my sawdust sighs:
“As long as my eyes are on backwards,
I’ll keep doing the wrong things to
The right people.”

The chime chirps again; this time I don’t ignore it.
I crumple up my list, and
With a great effort I flip the world straight.

I crawl into bed between cold sheets,
Rub my shoulder,
And think of brown eyes and burnt skin
Until morning comes.

Breakfast with Stanley Harbor

2009-06-28T16:12:00.000-07:00

I wake up to the shine of bare walls washed white with bleach,
I rise from my creaky bed, brush the cobwebs and silverfish from my head
And shuffle sideways to my desk.

I push a finger to my eye, concentrate, and apply pressure;
The congealing creative juices come forth, once captive in my cranial cavern.
My mind is filled with pencil shavings, eraser debris, and vinegar,
I let it drip into my notebook: loose-leaf pages made from
The bones of transients and plagiarists.

You Write Like Dillinger

2009-06-28T15:50:00.001-07:00

Fitfully sleeping; muscles burning,
Solace leaving, not returning.
Every story has a plot,
Every rhyme a scheme,
And your scheming, plotting pencil-work is
Scratching all my dreams.

Wanting and Giving

2009-06-28T15:31:00.000-07:00

Her lip is pierced,
She’s learning to play the guitar,
In her head there’s a melody and
She wants someone to sing her a song.

Her nails are black,
She’s studying the masters,
In her head there’s a canvas and
She wants someone to paint her a picture.

Her eyes hide behind brown hair,
She’s reading all the classics,
In her head there’s a man and a woman and
She wants someone to tell her a story.

My head is low,
My eyes shut,
In my head I understand
The problem of being a tone-deaf mute with no hands.

A Little Tarded

2009-06-28T15:26:00.000-07:00

[This one kinda cropped up in my head on my last drive to Pittsburgh, and I jotted it down as soon as I got my hands on some implements. I thought it was funny.]

I solve always to member the volution.
I need no minder in order to member,
It will always main an easy collection.
with no straint and no gret
we brandished our volvers,
proachfully monstrating,
fighting for form.
I quest neither ward nor compense,
I only quire an assurance that history will never peat;
That the evil times will never turn.

Brother's Room

2009-06-28T14:59:00.000-07:00

Once I had a brother,
And he fought off the monsters
That prowl our house at night:
Monsters that live behind the
Laundry room door,
Monsters that peek down
From the attic,
Monsters that crouch and hide
On the dark stairs.
But now my brother is gone,
His room is empty,
And monsters live there too.

After a Nightmare

2009-03-29T23:03:00.000-07:00

[Feeling nostalgic. This is from back in the day.]

Rest your head upon my chest,
With your hand caress my cheek,
Tell me it will be alright
and softly lull me back to sleep.

Far Between

2009-03-18T00:54:00.000-07:00

You walk as if none of this were real.
You talk as if the rules don’t apply.
In your world of smoke and mist,
i am a whisp
that grasps feebly at your hair.
You walk right through me,
leaving me to dissipate into
the night air.

You know what I could be doing right now?

2009-03-15T00:22:00.000-07:00

I could be going back through all of the things I've had to re-post and insert italics,
underlines,
or any other script that's missing.
But I'm not gonna.
You know why?
Because it's almost 3:30 in the @#$%^&@# morning!

So Much More Untitled Than Yours!

2009-03-14T12:31:00.000-07:00

...And so you believe that you yourself are the only human-being capable of free and original thought. You think yourself too original even for names, because everything has a name, and that is simply too cliche for one of your works of art, one of your masterpieces, one of your compilations of words that is better than the English language itself. How could a silly jumble of letters express the gift you have given to humanity? What sort of meek and mindless man would dare profane your opus with a label? You call it nothing, because it is mysterious like the air. You call it nothing, because it is more difficult to trace than a fleeting breeze. I call it history, because it sinks like a rock to the bottom of the ocean- to a forgotten mound- along with all the others before it.

The New Car and The Last Poem

2009-03-11T19:15:00.001-07:00

It was the classic tale: Tim loved his wife, and his wife loved his money.

It hadn’t always been this way. When they had first met, Tim was unemployed. He was fresh out of college, bright, enthusiastic, and wretchedly poor. He survived only by living off the kindness of his friends, with no recompense to offer but hugs and promises of repayment.

“Just wait. When I’m a rich author someday, I’ll pay you back triple!” He would say. And he meant it.

Dana had a job as a waitress. When she met Tim at a party, she fell recklessly in love. At first, she thought this was very odd. She had always chased after the big, burly men that had hair on their chests and jail time under their belts. But what she felt for the thin, innocent, bespectacled man completely transcended biker-boy lust. She was in love with the way he talked, with the way he breathed, and with the way that he thought. Somehow, days after their first meeting, she was intimately familiar with the most basic building blocks of his existence, the very stuff that made him the man that he was.

And so they were married. They lived in an apartment that was more like a broom closet with a sink and a stove. They ate two square meals a day, and more often than not these meals consisted of water and cold spaghettiOs. But the conversations they shared over such feasts were filled with laughter and smiles. The two thought they could survive this way forever, as long as they had each other.

Tim’s career as a fiction writer didn’t “take off,” as people normally say of such things; it exploded. With the revenue from his first three books alone, he was able to move himself and his wife into a deluxe apartment in the best part of the city. The books kept coming out of Tim’s head, and the money kept pouring into the bank. Tim could finally afford to give Dana all the nice things she had always deserved.

And that was the problem. Dana knew that she had always deserved nice things. Once Tim became successful, it was as if she finally came to the realization that she had been short-changed her entire life. Was she about to let the world get away with this injustice? Hell no. She proceeded, on principal of fairness, to slavishly pursue every expensive thing that could ever make a woman happy.

As time passed, and as Tim wrote more books (and just as many scripts for movies), Dana continued to change. Each dollar in her pocket made her forget a little part of why she had loved her husband so fiercely. By the time the couple purchased and moved into a beachside mini-mansion, Dana had completely lost that untraceable attraction that had once bound her so unexpectedly to her man. All that she was left with was disdain for the scrawny, balding, saggy ATM machine that was her spouse.

Tim did everything he could to remind his wife of what they once had. He would scribble poems for her on napkins, leaving them in her purse in the morning when he left for work, just like he did when they were young. She never once thanked him for these surprises, or even mentioned them at all. Tim suspected she was throwing them away. She was. He continued writing them for her anyway.

As one can imagine, Dana’s lust for high-dollar items always peaked during the Christmas season. She took infinite pleasure in recounting the gifts she had asked for when she was a girl- a Barbie, a new hair brush, a pair of skates like the neighbor girl had- and comparing them to the things she received now. How stupid and childish those things all seemed, when compared to in-ground swimming pools, Gucci Genius Jeans, and diamonds! So, in order to make up for the embarrassing mistake of enjoying cheap plastic dolls in her childhood, she demanded increasingly extravagant gifts from Tim.

One Christmas in particular, the first celebrated in their new tropical home, Dana decided she wanted a car. Not just any Ford POS ’06, mind you. Dana’s hands ached to grasp the steering wheel of a brand new Maybach 57 S. Price tag: $367,000 USD.

First, Dana tried dropping subtle hints. “Did you see that car in Spielberg’s last movie? The one the bad guy drove? Wasn’t it gorgeous?” Or, “I felt so plain driving to the mall the today, Tim. Every redneck in Florida owns a Porsche! It’s embarrassing!” Tim, however, didn’t want to discuss his wife’s desire for a new auto. He was more concerned with talking about current events, or asking how his wife’s day had been. What a dull man. Dana thought. Can’t he take a hint?

It soon became obvious to Dana that subtlety was getting her nowhere. Her next plan was more aggressive: the seduction of her husband.

“Timothy,” she cooed in his ear, stroking his back lightly with the tips of her fingers. “What are you going to get me for Christmas?” Her hand slid over the border that divided back from front, north from south. But when he rolled over to take her, grinning with animal lust, she couldn’t go through with it. Turning away, Dana muttered something about remembering an early coffee date with a friend. Dejected and confused, Tim rolled over and left her alone. Dana decided then and there that she would rather drive her shitty Porsche for the rest of her life than let that old, bald skeleton mount her.

It was Christmas Eve when Dana lost all control. Tim had continued to show no interest in Dana’s latest, most urgent desire, and almost certainly had not purchased for her a new Maybach 57 S. Now he would pay. An explosive argument began.

“You ungrateful jerk! How dare you call me selfish?! How dare you?! You’d be nothing without me! It was me who sheltered you and fed you, back when you were a pathetic, mewling excuse for a writer. And what thanks did you give me? What do you still give me? Poems! Cards! Stories! We didn’t need any of that shit, Tim! We needed money! But you didn’t care about that. You just sat at home, typing away on your stupid little typewriter, working on your idiotic stories, while I slaved all day to keep us alive! Was that selfish of me, Tim? Was it?!” Her breaths were short and fast. Her nostrils flared and her eyes threw stones. “And now that we have money, you still can’t do any better for me! You keep putting those damn napkins in my purse, as if I wanted that shit!”

Tim’s eyes were hazy. He stammered and stuttered, searching for something to say in retort, but it was no use. Dana had pulverized him; stripped him of all his weapons. He wanted to ask her if she had always felt this way. He wanted to ask her if she had even once bothered to read any of the poems he had written her. Most of all, he wanted to know when she had stopped loving him.

* * *

Dana woke up Christmas morning, alone in her bed. Tim must have spent the night at a hotel, she thought as she roused her aging body. She shuffled downstairs to the kitchen, rubbing her eyes and thinking about the things she had said to her husband the previous day. She felt a small speck of guilt for the way she had treated Tim. Even though she had meant every awful word she had said, there are some things that even Dana knew a person should never have to hear. I didn’t need to go so far, she conceded. I’ll apologize as soon as he gets home. It is Christmas, after all.

Upon entering the kitchen, Dana heard a noise. A car was idling in the garage.

Good. He must have just gotten home.

In the spirit of making amends, Dana began making a pot of coffee for the two of them. However, something was not right. After several minutes the pot was on, and Dana could still hear the car engine running.

Just what is he up to?

Dana walked to the door that led to the garage. She opened it cautiously. A cry of joy fled her lips, and was quickly transformed into a scream of horror.

There in front of her, parked neatly and humming readily, shone a brand new Maybach 57 S. Tim was slumped limply in the driver’s seat. Where his ear should have been there was a gaping maw; his nightshirt was stained red.

The world rose up beneath Dana, catching her as she fell.

***
Dana sat at the kitchen table, wrapped in a blanket. Two police officers stood beside her, attempting to question her without much success. More officers were busy with the “scene” in the garage. Their voices were audible in the kitchen.

An elderly officer walked slowly, determinedly into the kitchen and asked Dana’s interrogators to leave. When they had gone, the officer seated himself at the table. In his hand he held a piece of paper inside of a plastic bag.

“We found this in his pocket when we searched him,” the officer began. He took a tired breath and reluctantly clarified, “it’s a poem.”

Dana looked at the bagged paper. The policeman held it gingerly with two fingers, as if it were something dirty or indecent. She didn’t need to interpret the look in his face. She had never been more frightened of anything in her entire life.

“Anyway, we-“ the officer stopped, chose his words. “We think he wrote it for you.”

Of course he did, Dana thought. The blood was fleeing her face, her hands, and her legs.

“It’s evidence, so I can’t give it to you.” The officer then placed the awful thing on the table in front of Dana, blank side up. She stared at the bag as if it were a snake prepared to strike. “But I can let you read it, in the bag, before I take it away.” His job over, the officer sat up and exited the kitchen much more quickly and readily than he had entered it.

***

Half an hour later, the elderly officer reentered the kitchen. Dana was gone, and the note was still face down on the table. He picked it up, making sure his eyes didn’t so much as catch a glimpse of the words on the other side.

Not again, he vowed to himself.

As he left the kitchen, the veteran policeman found himself wondering if the widow had even read the poem. She hadn’t.

Vestidos Blancos

2009-03-11T19:14:00.000-07:00

Vestidos blancos,
Caminan,
Se vuelvan flores urbanas,
Son un verso verdadero,
Pero también los
Vestuarios de un
Charlatán.
Tu corazón es un hoyo,
Y tus sentimientos
Están solos con la brisa.

Relación

2009-03-11T19:13:00.000-07:00

Sin tribulación,
No existe ningún triunfo.
Sin tronada truculento,
No hay trueno.
Sin tulipán,
No tenemos tufillo tentador.
Sin traumatismo,
No recibamos tratamiento.
Sin tristeza,
No sabemos ternura.
Sin terror,
No aprendemos tolerancia.
Sin tormento, tortura, y tiranía,
No sentimos la libertad.

Parte de mí es tuyo

2009-03-11T19:12:00.002-07:00

Tú eres una ladrona.
Lo robó y lo has llevado
Al otro lado del mar,
Por encima de las montañas
Y a través de los lugares
Más desolados del mundo.

No es la verdad,
He estado mintiendo.
Nunca era mío, realmente.
Siempre he querido que
Lo tengas.
Siempre he querido que
Lo cuides.

Ellen?

2009-03-11T19:12:00.001-07:00

I remember everything about her:
Her dress, red with black trim,
Her frame, so slight and slim,
Her eyes were of the bluest bright,
Her touch was warmer than a summer night,
Her voice was symphonic in my ear,
Her hands slid behind my neck, pulling me near.

Her breath was the wind after the rain,
Her scent was the cheapest drug,
Her kiss numbed my lips,
Her taste was inescapable.

Yeah, I remember all this.
But I cannot,
For the life of me,
Remember her name.

The Man and His Boy

2009-03-11T19:11:00.000-07:00

He held in his hands the perfection of innocence. He cradled in his arms every piece of himself that was good and pure. This was his one treasure; his true love. The man stared down at his beautiful boy, at his only son, not daring to look away. If he looked away for even an instant, his child might disappear. No, he would not look away. He would have this moment for as long as he could.

In the street there was honking and shouting.

The baby slept peacefully, wrapped in an old blue blanket. His little fists, tiny to the point of absurdity, were balled and held against his mouth. He let out a small hiccup as he slept. The man laughed softly, feeling an immense amount of joy in the thing his boy had just done. This is my living, breathing son, he thought to himself. That was my son’s noise. My son made that noise with his own mouth.

In the distance, a siren sounded.

The father felt joy because the boy could do no wrong. How could he? Looking down upon the bundle of blanket and skin, the notion that this child could cause any harm was ridiculous. And besides, angels don’t hurt. Gifts from God cannot bring about pain. They can only bring happiness, contentment, and wonder.

The alley was wet from the morning rain.

With an introspective smile, the father looked at the face of his precious boy. He wondered if he would grow to be a good, strong man. He wondered if his son would do the things that he never could. He wondered if his son would love any person the same way that his father loved him, right now, at this moment.

The evening air was cold.

With small pouting noises, the son awoke. The father felt cold inside himself, inside his chest. His eyes, he thought, his eyes are just like hers. But they were so different. The fire in his son’s eyes was shining, hungry to see and to learn and to understand. His mother’s eyes were losing focus. His mother’s eyes were dimming as her breathing became slow and shallow. Her eyes were meaningless glass balls inside of a skull, her mouth a maw of flesh, her hair was tattered cloth.

The father could not stop the tears. As he lifted the silver trash-can lid, the baby started to cry. He did not try to calm the child. He lowered the bundle in his arms gently into the cylinder, laying it to rest atop a pile of refuse. The child was bawling in earnest. His fists flailed against the air and his little body. Sobbing, the father bent down and kissed his son’s silky, warm forehead. The shadow of the trash-can lid traversing the child’s bright face was like an eclipse of the sun.

Enumerating

2009-03-11T19:10:00.000-07:00

You are the shake in my knees,
The birds to my bees,
The bee in my bonnet,
The haiku to my sonnet.

You are the kiss on my cheek,
The hide to my seek,
The river in the bend,
The beginning to my end.

Broad Street

2009-03-11T18:41:00.000-07:00

Chill winds are blowing,

Headlights are glowing,

The streetlamps are showing

The small town of Athens.

Music is playing

And everyone’s staying,

Their bodies are swaying,

Twilight in Athens.

The money’s not spending,

The rules aren’t bending,

The party is ending

For the children of Athens.

Sipping and sighing,

I know that we’re trying,

But slowly we’re dying

Somewhere in Athens.