The More Better

I was a man back when

I should have been a kkid

Hitting sticks and skipping bricks

Family god gave me and god gave good.

Stiil, I missed that innocence

For me I wanted only good

I wanted my mom to love my dad

She did. He was in jail, loveless.

I used to fear it was a curse

That I would repeat the mistakes

My ancestors did; have children

And show them how to Hate.

I am still a child

Barely a man. I have

scores to settle before

I can give in to youth

The weak weak ways of

Hate and Jealousy, even

Complacency and a two

week vacation to make sense of it.

See, what happened to me

I can't forget in two weeks

I choose the hardest path

before I betray my loves:

Balances

I will die here

I will die here

For someone else

Not for me

I won't die here

I can't die here

A sacrifice I can't

Make of myself

For you to live

Your hopes and dreams

You must crush mine

And I will die.

The Butterfly Knife

Every morning, Craig, a flaming gay 8 year old complete with shoulder fur and occasional skirt was the object of ridicule. The girls loved him, the boys made threats among themselves of the things they would do to him. Dirty gay straight boys. One of them was named Armand, a black kid who was as small as me, but who felt he should use his voice as loud as no one ever should. A rule of life, I learned, is that the louder you speak, the less you have to say.

Armand decided, for whatever reason, though I can imagine that it was because I was in his weight class and effeminate in his own right, that one day after school he would have it out with me. He accused me of being racist for not wanting to talk to him, for ignoring him, for keeping my even strides back to my house across the dirty field. Then the overt threats came. When they were ignored, I felt a sudden blow to the right side of my face. I stopped and turned to look at him.

"What?" "What exactly do you want from me?" I asked with an authority in my voice that was comfortable but somehow felt like it wasn't mine. "Give me what you've got!" I think he was making this up as he went along. I quickly produced a butterfly flip knife and flung the handles around and back so the blade made a forboding motion to lock. "I don't think so. I'm white, but I'm not the right white kid." He got all legal all of a sudden, "MY DADDY'S A POLICEMAN!" "Oh yeah?" I asked. "Then what exactly are you doing right now? "Self-defense" You attack me with that knife I have the right to self defense. "What about my self fence? You struck me without warning." "You're a racist cracker." We went back to this.

As I folded up the knife to put away, he snatched it. A good move, I have to confess. The tables were somewhat turned. I wasn't afraid. I moved in on him. He strugged to get the handles to lock and make the knife a weapon. I moved closer. He edged away. "NOW I've got EVIDENCE!" He did have a sort of point, though truly he shouldn't be assaulting other children then claiming his father was police and thus exempt from the laws that applied to the rest of us kids. I couldn't have been more than 10. What a brat, this kid.

I've had at least two amazing black lovers, and once you have a romantic sexual relationship with a willing, very giving woman from another race you're just not racist. I mean, we're all racist, we cross the street when it's full of black kids and the other side is little old chinawomen. That's just our programming. I can claim, though, that I've been very close, very much inside of the lives of black women, and even though they had to defend me from their friends who didn't appreciate her "peckerwood" and herself from the snide comments here and there down the street, we were lovers. One of whom is dead now, the other I'd rather not see again as long as she lives. In neither final scene of our affairs were there any racial calls before the curtain.

Now Armand had the knife. He was going to give it to his father for evidence. I figured I was just minding my own business when attacked and moved to defend myself. Granted, I was clumsy to have lost the butterfly knife, but I did what I thought was right. My stepfather at the time would lecture about the human condition, survival of the fittest, and wanting to kill your father and fuck your mother. What the hell did he know anyway? He just wanted my mother.

He took the knife running across the field, and later I'd get my revenge, no... let me rephrase. God would redeem that pain by providing me with two of the most gorgeous and hottest black lovers that even a black man could imagine. Good luck Armand. I hope your own father is there to protect you. Revenge is not my business, but you assaulted and robbed me. Did you have any hot sisters?

Love & Hate

The Bus

He had no idea how to use guns. Triggers, cocking, levers for reloading, etc. he had an idea about, but no practical familiarity with guns as weapon for a man. In his hands he had some sort of rifle. It had a switch for fully automatic and burst. Since he didn't have any known supply of ammunition other than what was in his cartridge, he went for burst. Their voices threatened through the windowless second floor, like they were on rooftops nearby. They were hunting someone. He would not be quarry. If they presented their bodies, he would fire projectiles into their heads and move after each volley. No matter how outnumbered he was, he would continue to kill them, one by one, two by two, until they were no longer a threat or he was dead.

His beautiful girl and son were already landing from their ferry across the sea. They would be safe. It was him against a fate, one which carried its threat through wrongness or evil. In his heart, he knew that he had not wronged anyone in any way that gave justice to the assault he faced. Men of hearts they were unsure of had fled, given up their wives or daughters, watched their sons slain in the hope that their miserable lives be spared. More often than not, the final conclusion was several rounds to the head of the man who had sold everything he loved to save a life not worth living.

Good men, loud men, men who spoke with great conviction about righteousness and god were all among those whose families they watched brutalized and whose lives ended without any hope for redemption or salvation. These were sad stories, they lived, and sad endings they found. Omar had been more quiet than most. He was aware that god had the tendency to make men eat their words. To him, tolerance, understanding, and forgiveness were the only ways that one might find their way to a life blessed and under the auspices of god. It was part formal training, but mostly he knew this in his heart.

They had accents from other countries, though he could understand one man from the South. He overheard, "They live like pigs, they will die like dogs!" Girls screamed too nearby for Omar to handle. He clenched his eyes and begged that mercy be made for them, that justice fall upon their attackers. Where, he seethed under his breath, did the Quran say anything about this? These men were savages, brutes, djinn making the devout seem evil. They made a mockery of all that was good and all that was love. It was not Omar's place to understand, but he could not understand how they should be allowed to live in such grotesque blasphemy.

Above, their boots clunked on his roof. He heard them make their way over to the Macias' home by rooftops. They were probably looking for valuables and women. How sick was all of this. Omar felt like he should have emerged to the roof to assassinate the most he could of them while they were still on the roof like vultures. How many families would he have protected? How many tears would he have held back from mothers, daughters, brothers and fathers? What sickness was this?

So many centuries ago, the arabs were at the forefront of architecture, medicine, astronomy, chemistry, math, and physics. Now they were mere pawns for great bloated beasts like the United States and her vicious appetites. He had met few americans. The ones he had met did not harbor any particular patriotism, in fact more of a sheepish almost embarrassed guilt for their nationality.

Where was the good for all of this? "All things must work together for good." he had been taught and knew by his heart. Where, then, was the good for the humiliation of his people at the hands of US and Soviet armed militaries. Their motive seemed clear: To establish the most docile and dependent regime they could and maintain them under their control. For the control of oil, Israel, and the fear and respect in the hearts and minds of people.

We are a civil, and peaceful people. We were, at least, until the Soviets came in and natural selection quickly eliminated all but the most piggish wardogs of us. Cross-eyed and brutal, without the sensitivities and love that man has for his brethren. It was all about who could command the most fear. One of the oldest most profane ways society could play out had done just so. When the Soviets had left, their arms were abandoned to the warlords. The U.S.A. came in with more arms and technology to make sure that the C.C.C.P. was kept at bay, and that no oppressor could ever exploit us again.

Omar was going to leave for Morocco when night fell, but he had to make it through the day first. Bearded men sat around a table with maps and drank scotch to determine the options they had for subjugating the city. Omar had paid his old friend Jacque for transport across the Algerian border in exchange for more money than any of the working class would make in two or three years. It was a cost that was not prohibitive, for it was a cost for life. Omar was buying his own life. That's how his life became so valuable, to himself at least.

Amazing, XKCD

The Man Who Laid an Egg

He sat on the floor of the Brooklyn basement apartment and stared at the other young men and women. He had a deviant smile on his face. Even though he knew it was an advertisement that read, "please ask me why I'm smiling" and so transparent and immature it was embarrassing, he couldn't help it. Andrea was laughing hysterically in the kitchen. We had all taken LSD. She wasn't laughing to be generous to me, or my antics, though if it were anyone other than her I'd surely need such generosity. She was laughing because I had concluded a long standing desire, and invited her in on a very peculiar secret.

When Andrea lived with me I used to sit on her bed and ask her if I could put an egg in her butt or maybe in her vagina. I mean a chicken egg. I had read and reread The Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille and was perhaps a little to much enchanted with the amazing symbolism. It gave me a whole array of colors with which to paint perversions, all of them a spectrum of eggs and eyes. Bull's testicles and the most grotesque acts of priests, the most grotesque victimization of priests. Sexual play with milk and eggs and ever so many more symbols of life and the sights of the eye that, to be honest, I needed a really kinky girlfriend to work out with because there was -no- way in hell I'd take any of the stuff between my head and my legs to any therapist.

I felt bad, though, because I love Andrea. I love her as a person. She's a beautiful and caring person, who at times, when necessary, is able to fuck someone over. She's human, but she is one of the most truly loving, nonjudgemental, and perfect lover of the absurdist theatre that is our lives that I can't imagine what she'd have to do for me not to love her. I don't think she could do whatever I could imagine she'd have to do anyway. Every time I crept into her room, which was only guarded and secreted by a gossamer of a sheet, holding a chicken's egg in my hand, sitting gently on her bed to say good morning I would leave feeling guilty. I felt like I was molesting her somehow. She was for the most part very gracious in her declinations to my propositions for insertions of an egg into her, and I don't think she felt too threatened, but I still would leave her feeling guilty.

The only girl that I dated around that time was a girl from Long Island who was a nice young girl like drinking a glass of water, to fuck her pure and soft, gentle and hungry body to both her own satisfaction and mine. She wasn't going to have me fuck her ass, let alone get freaky with some chicken eggs. I probably should have started her off with the bowl of milk. Either way, she was a dead end. I was a goy and she was a diversion. It was Andrea who was the apple of the egg of my eye.

This guilt I carried for a while. The LSD was beginning to work and I could feel the aether beginning to become solvent. It was clear. I would have to birth an egg for Andrea. All of my selfish perversions were my natural reaction to the fears of my pride. My role in this case was as mother, as giver, as nurturer.

The only flaw in the ritual is that the closest I could come to a pussy was my butt-hole. Holding the egg, a wonderful example of nature's architecture, my mind absolutely knew it would withstand the pressures involved in forcing an egg into one's rectum, so long as the pressures were applied correctly, evenly, and at the right places. Also, the bottle of Vaseline brand moisturizing lotion on top of the toilet was providence. Nature took over and soon and with little discomfort the egg was drawn into my ass. I was so proud that day. I had an egg in my butt.

When I emerged from the bathroom and sat with my smile, I realized that they would not know if I were lying or not. It was amazing. I told a curious and rather attractive young Beth that I did have an egg in my butt, or I didn't but there would be no way for anyone but myself and a man with an x-ray machine to know. This pretty much cancelled out any potential sexual engagement with Beth. No matter how well groomed, gifted of silver tongue or golden charisma, once you tell a girl that you have an egg in your ass -- or don't -- you have eliminated yourself from her menu of fuckable men for the evening. I was after redemption and magic, ritual and perfect ethereal aesthete. The fact that she was confused and still interested in that great question, "Does he or does he not have an egg in his butt?" sated me much more than she would ever sexually.

I ran the room for the determinations those in our party had. Many were wise and declared no disposition. Some reasoned that I was the type who would have gotten up to such buggery. Others said that it wasn't possible. A raw egg would surely break if forced through a tight sphincter. I sat comfortably on the floor, and that was clearly evidence that there were no fragile foreign objects inside of my hind parts. I was brimming with glee. The best part was yet to come. After the conversation on acid had twisted along and away from the "Egg or No Egg" case in theme, I discreetly invited Andrea into the kitchen with me. In a rather crass arrangement, I quickly set up to birth my egg into the trash can. She would know, and only she, that the egg I had begged her to take in I had taken to mothering my own self. Only she deserved to be let in on the great secret.

With surprising ease, I popped the raw egg out and heard it plop into the trash. Nothing but the egg, of course, for that would be rather disgusting. Instead, Andrea began to emit a peal of laughter, a laugh at the beauty of the insane, a laugh as if emitted when tickled by the spirit of the universe. My pants were up, and spectators came to arrive. She was unable to speak, because she was overwhelmed with the laughter one experiences on LSD that can heal years of psychic damage. She was my only witness and now mute. Later she would retell the tale to my embarrassment.

incarcéré (REALLY CONTINUE, REALLY DO, Joshua)

As he sat there on the hard bench, he looked down at his feet and the floor. Luc was being booked into the prison. He examined his wrists, which were fine after being handcuffed. It was well over twenty four hours since his last fix, so the dope sickness was setting in. The quote "No man can eat fifty eggs" mocked him in an internal dialogue he was trying desperately to stifle. He heard that phrase in his old friend Drew's voice. For as long as he'd been not quite right in the head he read too much into things. Things people said, the names of things, the synchronicity of things and the symbolism of experiences held meaning and were omens and auguries. Drew was mocking him in a friendly way from his memories as he sat in a large cell with a dozen other men who were, for now, the bad guys.

"JACKSON" a small man in a uniform called into the room. Luc looked up and his eyes saw the corrections officer in the sickening fake lights. Those lights made his vision vibrate a little bit. They were bright and made every dirty corner and filthy step of floor a harsh reality. The small officer walked behind him and told him to walk into the first room on the right. Luc saw another small man, a dark asian man with glasses and doctor's whites sitting down behind a desk.

When Luc was in the holding cell with the other men, one of the men was spitting on the floor, holding his stomach and moaning that he was sick, trying to make the corrections officers believe that he was somehow sicker than he really was, that he needed immediate medical attention. Luc sat down in front of the doctor on the edge of the chair, his hands cuffed behind him. The doctor asked, "You are Luc Jackson?" and several regular questions. He asked Luc about his addiction. "I know that everyone exaggerates their drug habits so that they're medicated with as much as they can get. It's not my way to make a drama of it, and to be truthful I've been much worse off. The problem is that my drug use is bad and my withdrawal is just starting. Believe me that it's going to get worse." For some reason the doctor looked up from his pad, turned his head and examined luc, smiled and returned to his pad. Then he concluded the session.

After waiting for an eternity in the holding cell, he was finally walked into the prison and to his cell. He had the cell to hisself, and a nurse came and brought him medication that made him feel better. There were 4 white pills and one blue pill. Because there were so many and he was afraid that he wouldn't be getting any more doses, he held one of them in his cheek as he swallowed the rest. When the nurse moved on he climbed back into his bed and took out the pill to examine it. It was marked DF 118. He wasn't sure what that was, but the three he had swallowed seemed to be making him feel better.

When he was still at the police station, he presented that he had a medical condition which could cause death if untreated. True words, they were, and treated as such. So the on-duty nurse that New Year's Eve medicated him with narcotics and what he believed to be a 20 mg valium. He felt just fine. Their threats held little to no bearing over him and so long as the drugs didn't wear off, he was ready for whatever they would throw at him. At least, in his favor, it was a country where they treated narcotic dependence as a disease, rather than a moral shortcoming or other despisable way. They gave him drugs. He felt better. When the detectives interviewed him he kept repeating, "at the advice of my counsel, I decline from making any comment. The hard-nose cops made the point that his responses were his own, and that if he chose not to comment that was on him, rather than on the Solicitor. Soon enough he was back in his cell, a big bright and cleanish one. He was jonesing for a fix, but the meds tempered that. He would make it, no doubt. He had kicked cold from much worse habits. There's no such thing as a free lunch, his grandfather used to say.

All too quickly a van came to pick him up and take him to the Her Majesty's Prison Brixton. It was there that he won the doctor's pity, if not repect, and was given a very generous detox over 4 weeks. In fact, it was more humane that those which had been provided ny insurance or Medicaid in the U.S. The doctor had done him a good turn.

Streetlights Through Nylon Stockings (CONTINUE)

Her skin never saw sunlight. After she walked out the door covered with a hat, scarf, gloves, and boots she turned around and locked it with a key. The door was metal, thick, and heavy. She could hear the cars up the street on the avenue making their engines whine and groan.

"What a fucking liar," she thought to herself. The television had been on all day and she heard the echoes of commemoration coins, new ways to process and store food, phone sex and phone psychics, car commercials and tampon commercials make their last pleas to her mind and hands as she left. The television was a liar, surely, but she was thinking about her boss.

She walked down to the subway, swiped her card and waited for a train. Gum spots, dead batteries, a film of grime, loud screeching trains that flew past expressly went unnoticed. Impatient, she kept leaning out over the edge of the platform for the train lights down the tunnel. It came in its time.

It was a long way to work and she was going to be maybe 20 minutes late. This would be a problem for someone. If it was Hank she would be fine but Helen would let her know that she felt challenged. "Fuck them," she resolved. She was reliable, sober, and competent and if they couldn't survive 20 minutes that was on them. The restaurant could practically run itself.

Ben was talking to Todd about how in Japan they have sushi restaurants where you enter your order on a computer screen, chefs make and plate the order and it comes out on a conveyor. Payment is made by a radio chip in the cell phone attached to a credit account. NPR had a piece all about it. A Japanese art student was telling the journalist all about how her mobile phone was more important than everything but life itself to her. Then she recanted this. The young issue so many words, make so many statements that if they were obliged to eat everything they said it would perhaps destroy them.

Todd listened more than he spoke. He listened while looking at the ground, nodding to acknowledge points heard or agreed. Ben liked this style. When Todd replied, if he bothered to reply, it was short and well scoped. "I want a Japanese girl," Todd concluded. In a way, Ben felt that Todd was always fucking with people but this was borne by Ben's sensitivity. He smiled.

As Lauren rode the train along its rattles and stops, she read the back of the free newspaper with all of its ads for vice and treatment. She wished she had a good vice. Maybe a heroin problem or a gambling problem, she weighed her options. They had television shows about people with drug problems. How great would it be to become a sad story, one that's hard to watch because you're embarrassed for all involved, all spectators, participants, and voyeurs. The whole bloody mess looked avoidable. Her stop was next.

Todd told Ben to get a dog. Ben hadn't asked him anything, but Todd felt that Ben would benefit from getting a dog. Ben didn't like dogs, and felt unsure about dog owners. Having to take care of himself seemed enough. When Ben was young he made proud statements about making a million dollars before he was thirty. He did start that and make significant headway before losing course and living life as he discovered it. To be true to himself, he'd set out on a great voyage and had gained large sums if not in finance. Also true, he had spent his most energetic years and come up with little more than memories and some confidence.

Lauren walked into the restaurant and saw Ben & Todd sitting at a table. It was obviously slow. Helen saw her walking up and yelled after her, "Lauren!" Lauren turned around and smiled. Her hands clenched her bag in anger. "Yes? I'm late. What do you need?" "Exactly! I can't have you being late. What will the servers do if they see you coming in whenever you want to? This is not professional!" Helen nagged. "Ok. Can we talk about this later?" Lauren buffered.

Ben and Todd watched. Lauren went through the kitchen doors and Helen went back to the bar. Ben shook his head. Todd smiled at Ben. "You know what this world needs Todd?" "What does it need, Ben?" "Nothing, Todd. It needs absolutely Nothing." "You're strange, Ben." "I'm OK with that though," Ben reassured him. A fat white man and his fat white woman sat down in a booth for six people. "That's you, Todd." "You can take it," Todd came back. Ben growled and got up and brought the fat couple menus.

Lauren dropped her jacket and bag in the office and went back downstairs. When she went back into the bar, Helen had gone for the day. "A break, finally!" she sighed out loud. The bartender looked up and said "Hey." "Hi Sal." White people with burned pink skin sat around the bar under the fans. They drank beers and frozen drinks. It was a hot day after the afternoon rain. Lauren could feel the barometry slowly ebbing. She filled a cup with ice and soda water and took a long drink until the bubbles hurt her throat.

Ben came into the bar to collect the typical holiday drinks served in souvenir cups for his two guests. They were hopeless. They were so hungry and so fat. Fortunately their order wouldn't take long. It shouldn't, at least, because the kitchen was far from busy.

enchanté par les enchanters (CONTINUE)

The music streamed out into the street, along with tense hilarity in the form of lights flashing in silhouettes like some theatre staging. Omar's heart rang and he knew for some reason that this place and time were of some import. He approached with caution, not afraid but aware that strange nights like these can bring strangeness of any sort. The door was open, and when he walked into the forechamber a young man with long blonde hair asked in French why he was here. "Is there somewhere else I should be?" came from Omars lips, a strange and true answer -- a question.

The blonde man smiled and waved Omar through the curtains into the room with lights and smoke. The music was loud and the people seemed in conspiracy to freeze him out, like they were expecting him and he was a guest of some sort of strange ritual role. It felt, in a way, that he would be the subject of some sort of cosmic joke. Young women swept along the hall, shadows and shapes of legs and waists, eyes and hair to contend with, their chests ample reminders that they can, by nature, be loving.

This was Paris, and he was far from the sea. He felt like a child among lesser men, and a boy in lust of women far too much for him to handle. In truth he was naive, if not innocent, to the trades and courtship of hearts and sex in the Light City Paname. The main room had a stage where the singers and speakers of whisps of stone and columns of cloud, the dreamers and the music makers, the enchanters and the enchantresses. It was a wild and careening night and the air itself became material. A dark man approached Omar and asked him if he had any mud. He meant opium.

"Who would need it, then?" Omar answered. "Come with me," and so Omar followed the man. The man passed along the hall of caryatids, more lustreous than before, and Omar entered a larger room with a lower ceiling where there were quiet sofas and calm whispers. "Is it him?" a wild young girl was hoping with eyes that hid nothing. She wanted Omar to be him more than anyone else. She was dreamlike in her beauty, like a vision of some eternal being, a god or angel in clouds of opium vapour. The course of Omar's life was changing, and as none of us are, he was in no way able to hand the helm or trim the sails. She smiled at him and their deal was set.

The Hunger (for the Transcendental)

Oxley - Son of a traveling magician and his assistant. Grew up in rural trailer with abandoned Bedouin north african heritage. How he came to exist in that community in the United States is unknown, a very unlikely mystery. Interesting mannerisms where he looks over his glasses without being ostentatiously condescending but somehow projecting a senior judgment of matters at hand.

Hammond - New York Catholic. Not Irish, not Italian. Caucasian, loves rhythm and prone to absurd utterances of spontaneity and playfulness.

Nox - Obnoxious young American trash. Given to superficial studies and summaries, skimming books and gleaning the essence. Dark and italian, but white. He has a treacherous nose.





Scene I





In the basement of 9 Washington Drive, three friends unite and conspire with a mischievous sense of brotherhood. The fluorescent light gives the grimy, dirty, and broken linoleum and bare concrete a postapocalyptic feel. There are 4 or 5 computers, several of them uncased and in a sort of pile of their components all running and humming and blowing the smoke and dirt around. The ashtray is beyond overflowing like a volcano. There are piles of electronica and abandoned clothes, along with items that have been forfeited to the disowned clutter. Their complexions are a pale bluish sick, as they aren't bathing regularly and they habitually chainsmoke under the fluorescent light without sleeping for days.

Oxley: You know what these are? (holds up a grooming kit that was complete with lock picking tools)

Nox: For cutting your nails?

Oxley: Hah, no they're for picking locks!

Nox: Oh shit! I read an MIT article about these! Pin rakes, tension bars, etc., right?!

Oxley: You read that? Hah!

Hammond: Let me see those!

Oxley: Dude, you can -not- borrow them. You have to be a locksmith to have them, or they're illegal.

Nox & Hammond: (look at each other) Uhm, you're not a locksmith.

Oxley: But my dad is. If you want to use them to learn about something, OK, but you will have no "practical applications".

Hammond: Ok, let me see them.

(They practice opening a master lock, then move on to the door, then move on to picking both locks on the door, then move on to trying to do it in the amount of time in which one can hold their breath)

Oxley: We have to pay the electric bill.

Hammond: Yes, yes we do. I don't have any money until next Friday.

Oxley: You can't ask your parents to cover it?

Hammond: Can't you ask -your- parents?

Nox: Aren't you supposed to have this stuff taken care of when you're a university student?

Hammond: If your family is rich, maybe.

Oxley: My family are -not- rich. Our home is mobile.

Nox: I lived in a trailer before. The trailer park is a magnificent place.

Oxley: Well, trailer parks are white trash. My trailer sits on half an acre of land.

Nox: So you're upper crust trailer trash? Is that like empty Dom Perignon bottles, empty caviar boxes?

Hammond: You're both rednecks. I'm from NYC.

Nox: Queens is the trailer park of NYC.

Oxley: No, maybe it's Staten Island or Jersey. Even Long Island.

Hammond: Long Island is not NYC's trailer park. NYC doesn't -have- trailer parks. We have projects.

Nox: Projects are the trailer parks of the city. Urban trailer parks.

Oxley: Except they're more culturally diverse than trailer parks.

Hammond: Whatever, how are we going to pay the electric? I think we can use these lock picks to help with the electric bill, and I don't mean selling them.

Nox: Yes. Hmmm. What lock would it be profitable to open? What building or storefront would have valuables or money not in a safe. I don't think robbery is OK, but burglary has a certain je ne sais quoi about it, as long as the treasure is worth it. I mean, the profit has to compete with the negative liability, in this case a jail term.

Oxley: What about parking meters?

Hammond: What about them? You can't pick those locks with a lockpick set made up of a tension bar and some pin rakes. Besides, it's just change.

Nox: How -much- change? How often are they collected? Can we look that up?

Oxley: Hammond, you're right, but we also have a sledge hammer.

Nox: Uhm, this didn't end well for Cool Hand Luke. It didn't end well at all.

Hammond: Yeah, beating the shit out of a parking meter with a sledge hammer isn't a very easily coverable endeavor. The idea is already projecting a cinema of the plastic seats in the backs of cop cars and hand cuffs and hars in my imagination.

Oxley: What about if we took the parking meters -off-, brought them back here and beat them open with a sledge hammer?

Nox: How do we take them "off" without a sledge hammer?

Oxley: I know how.

Hammond: Do tell.

Oxley: Come on, I'll show you.

Nox: *looks up heavenward* This will be interesting.

Hammond: On the way we can scope out sources of electric bill money.

Oxley: You're not bringing the picks, we're already conspiring to break the law and steal municipal property.

Hammond: Exactly, so what's the difference?

Nox: *looks up heavenward* I'm afraid that rhetoric will be answered. I pray it won't.

Oxley: Bad idea.

Hammond: Your credibility as a judge of good and bad ideas isn't very well established, given the consideration that you're spearheading a campaign to -steal- -parking- -meters-.

Nox: In court, we can make the defense that we were doing the public a service. No one likes parking meters.

Hammond: I'm minoring in criminal justice. That is not a good defense.

Oxley: It's better not to get caught.

Nox: Maybe the judge will be feeling philosophical

The leave the sledge hammer, and Hammond pockets the picks. Nox follows along behind Oxley. They go out to a strange car.

Nox: Whose car is this?

Hammond: My girlfriend's.

Oxley: I can't believe she's letting you use her car.

Hammond smiles.

Nox climbs into the back seat. Hammond turns the music up and pulls out with the jerky aggressiveness of ambition.

Hammond: Where to?

Oxley: We'll need to find a bar or pole. You'll see why when we find it.

Nox: This mystery business is getting annoying.

Hammond: You're always annoying.

Nox: Park behind the bank on main street, there are aluminum fence poles against the back wall of the gymnasium thing place.

Oxley: That's perfect. An aluminum fence pole will work perfect as long as it is longer than 6 feet.

They pull in and park. Oxley and Nox walk towards a small alley behind a large building. On the ground there is a cache of unused aluminum poles, covered in muck and leaves. They grab one and arrange it in the back seat with Nox.

Hammond: How are we going to use this?

Oxley: Leverage. It will provide leverage.

Hammond chews his bottom lip.

Hammond: We're going to unscrew it?

Nox: What?

Oxley: Yup. Let's go to the parking lot behind Diderot dorm. There are meters there and it's quiet.

Nox: Quiet may not be a good thing.

Hammond: It's not like we're using a -sledge hammer-!

Oxley: Just go.

They arrive at the parking lot and back into a spot. There is a meter. Oxley puts the pole between the two parking meters on the one pole and begins to push the very end of it. It gives.

Nox: Holy SHIT! We're gonna be RICH!

Hammond: We'll be lucky if we can pay the electric bill.

Oxley: It's spinning freely. I don't think it's attached anymore.

Nox wiggles it with his hands.

Hammond: Try to lift it up?

Nox lifts it off the pole. It is free.

Nox: It's freaking -heavy-!

Oxley: Put it in the trunk!

Nox drops it in the trunk and hears the change rattle around in the heavy cast iron.

Hammond: How many should we get?

Oxley: Let's get one more and then see how much is in them. If we need more we can come out and get more. The less we're driving around with, the less trouble we're inviting.

Hammond: Good point.

Nox: We're not gonna be rich?!

Oxley shakes his head and smiles at Hammond.

Hammond: Shut up.

They return to 9 Washington Dr. and unload the parking meters, dumping them on the floor of the wrecked basement they dwelled in. Nox studies them carefully, looking for a weak point.

Nox: Could we pry this door open with like a screwdriver?

Hammond: We could try. I don't know but I don't think so.

Oxley: Let's just bash them open with the sledge hammer.

Nox: Will that work?

Oxley: Have you ever used a sledge hammer before?

Nox: No. I've used a big hammer before, even a mallet but never a sledge hammer.

Hammond: Me either.

Oxley: Well, guess how it works.

Oxley lifts the hammer up and drops it in a mighty blow. The iron cracks and the hammer bounces back up.

Hammond: Damn.

Nox: I can see shiny!

Oxley: Wanna give it a try?

Nox: Hell yeah! John Henry's got nothing on me!

Hammond: Faggot.

Nox: Watch out!

Nox makes a heavy blow on the other meter. It dents the metal but does not crack it.

Hammond: Let me do it.

Hammond makes a similarly herculean effort, and the iron cracks.

Nox: I loosened it up for you.

Oxley: *Wipes sweat from forehead* Now for the other two.

They open the remaining meters and then shake them to get the quarters out of the locked receptacle. About 90 dollars in quarters and dimes and nickels was arrayed in a puddle of change on the dirty floor.

Hammond: Don't steal any, Nox. This is for the electric so that you can check your email account for email you never get from our computers. This is so that our alarm clocks will go off to let us know that we should be going to class instead of staying in bed because we stayed up too late on our computers. This is so it will be warm when you sleep on our sofa and steal our roommates' food and smoke our cigarettes. You need to get a job. Don't steal the quarters.

Nox: Wanna go get more parking meters.

Oxley: No.

Hammond: No.

Nox: OK. Can I have a cigarette?

Oxley: I guess.

Nox: Thanks.

Oxley: Will you go pay the electric tomorrow?

Hammond: In quarters?

Oxley: It's money, right?

Hammond shakes head.

Nox: You can maybe get the gas station to change it into bills.

Hammond: 90 dollars worth of quarters?

Oxley: I don't think so.

Nox: You can go to more than one gas station.

Oxley: Like 45 of them?

Nox: I don't know, I'm just trying to help you find a way.

Hammond: That's very nice of you. Oxley, If you can get these changed into bills I will take the paper money to pay the electric.

Oxley: That's not very helpful. I came up with this idea.

Hammond: And the electric bill is in your name.

Nox: Give the quarters to me and I'll get them changed.

Hammond: No way.

Oxley: You can take it to the bank in the morning.

Hammond: Yes, -one- could take them to the bank. Where is there a citybank?

Oxley: Fine, fuckit. I'll take the quarters to pay the electric bill.

Hammond goes up the steps. Nox looks at Oxley, smiles, and puts out his cigarette. Then he follows Hammond.

Oxley: (to himself) Something's got to give. I can't live like this.

Hammond: (to himself) God, I can't deal with this.

Nox: (to the window) Still, I am here and getting older and nothing is fun anymore.

Nox: Hammond, I need to go out.

Hammond: Ok. You don't live here. Go wherever you want.

Nox: You alright?

Hammond: Not really.

Nox: Something wrong?

Hammond: Not really.

Nox: Ok, bye.

Nox leaves. He stops when he gets to the suburban street and realizes that he'll be walking towards a main street he doesn't love and stares up at the sky, dimmed by the lights of the suburban hell.

Nox: God, I don't know what I'm doing, where I'm going. I don't know why I'm alive or what this is. I don't know anything, and it hurts.





Scene II - A year later





Hammond wakes up on his twin mattress on the floor. The window lets in a blue cast around the plastic blind. Clothes cover the floor of his half of the room. Oxley's half is only marginally less messy. Oxley isn't there. Nox looks over from the top of the stairs.

Nox: Are you awake?

Hammond: That's a stupid question.

Nox: There are no stupid questions, only --

Hammond: Except that one. That's a stupid question.

Nox: Aren't you going to class?

Hammond: I never go to class.

Nox: Isn't that bad?

Hammond: Another stupid question. I would try to ask less questions if I were you.

Nox: Funny. You're always a jerk then. See? Not a question.

Hammond: Do you have a lighter?

Nox: Do you have a cigarette?

Hammond: On the desk. Light me one.

Nox lights the cigarettes and sits on the edge of Oxley's bed. He hears a muffled, painful sounding cat cry.

Nox: There's no way around this question. Is your cat stuck in the bathroom?

Hammond: You did -not- have to ask that question. "Stuck" would be one way to phrase it, yes. "Quarantined" would be another.

Nox: Why did you quarantine your cat?

Hammond: It's not -my- cat, and he's diseased.

Nox: Oxley's cat is diseased?

Hammond: He's got the mange. It's contagious.

Nox: Can I let him out?

Hammond: That defeats the purpose of the quarantine.

Nox: I have to piss.

Hammond: Piss then. Just don't let him out.

Nox: Ok, man.

Hammond: Why are you here so early?

Nox: It's 6:00 at night.

Hammond: Hmm. Why are you here then?

Nox: I have an idea. You are the best candidate I can think of. Besides, you have access to the lock pick set.

Hammond: What's your idea.

Nox: Well, let me tell you a story. About two years ago I was up at like 5AM. My friend Ted mentioned ketamine and I started thinking about veterinarians. It struck me that one could procure ketamine from veterinarians, eliminating the retail expense and the ordeal of tracking down someone with a supply.

Hammond: Revelational! And?

Nox: So we concocted a plan where I, being the sucker, would enter a vet's office during the middle of the night, locate the ketamine and exit. My burglar costume was a track suit and running shoes, because my getaway would be disguised as an athletic runner training at dawn.

Hammond: Did it work.

Nox: Yes, it did. The thing is, entry was through a window that wasn't locked. I didn't break anything so it was pretty quiet. The dogs did bark because they surely heard me, but they were caged in a different part of the office, the kennel. It made me very nervous.

Hammond: You got in through a window?

Nox: Yeah. It was all too easy. I found what I was looking for, put it in a back pack and jogged my way home at sunrise. When I got home I prepared a batch of that great magic, that modern metaphysical elixir.

Nox: So I was thinking that we could look for an office that had a back door, one that wasn't alarmed and we could unlock it with the picks.

Hammond: How would we find out which ones didn't have an alarm?

Nox: Well, magnetic devices on the windows, stickers that say "alarm", etc. We could also enter the building, run around and try to set off any motion sensors and then leave and wait for an hour to see if anyone showed up. If no one does, and there's no alarm going off, we can then go in and take our time in finding the goodies.

Hammond: Sounds crazy. I think I like it.

Nox: I am from here, so I know of a few, but let's look in the phone book for ones outside of town. They are less likely to be well secured and alarmed.

Hammond: I'm not sure that's true, but we can do some reconnaissance. That's not illegal.

Nox: Nothing is illegal if you don't get caught.

Hammond: I'm not sure that's true either.

Nox: Where's the phone book?

Hammond: I don't know.

Nox goes downstairs and looks around the small apartment. He finds a telephone book on the counter. Hammond comes downstairs dressing on the way.

Nox: Here is one. I know where it is, I used to live right near there. It's not too far, but it's far enough outside of town.

Hammond: Really? You're not lying?

Nox: No, I'm not lying. We should check that one and look for one or two more that can be scoped in one circuitous trip.

Hammond: Good thinking.

Nox: Ok, so let's see what we can find.

They set out in Hammond's little japanese sports coupe. They park in a lot opposite their target. They walk up to the front of it, where it is paned with glass.

Nox: *shielding his eyes to peer into the office* I don't see any motion detectors. There's no sticker on the door.

Hammond: That's not definite.

Nox: But this is a really good target. Let's come back at like 2AM.

Hammond: Do you want to look around the back?

Nox: Oh yeah. I should have thought of that.

Hammond: *shakes head* Yes, you should have.

Nox: It looks good, we can do these locks in time that I could hold my breath for.

Hammond: Well, don't hold your breath, let's just not get caught.

Nox: Speed is of the essence.

Hammond: Not getting caught is of the essence.

Nox: Let's talk about if we do get caught.

Hammond: If we get caught, Nox, we -do- -not- -talk- about -anything- to the police.

Nox: I agree. I don't trust the police, they're not my friends. As far as police go, honesty is not the best policy. The best policy is to say -nothing-.

Hammond: Too right.

They drive back to the apartment.

Nox: Do you have any black clothes, for camouflage?

Hammond: If I have any, I'm wearing them.

Nox: Ok. Do you have a black coat or anything?

Hammond: Oxley may have one. Check the pile of laundry in the closet.

They smoke cigarettes and gather materials like rope, a knife, a backpack, tools, paper, pens, etc.

Nox: You know Hammond, I'm pretty much a nerd.

Hammond: I guess I am as well.

Nox: We have to do this with every bit of analytical thinking and logic and conservative strategy we can conjure up. Our only advantage is the wiliness of our addled and skeletal psyches. Sometimes I feel like my brain is an ancient sacred ritual where the skeletal notions dance in a magic circle to conjure up old gods and forces that govern the universe and my physical form as a wanderer through it and a mage of it.

Hammond: *shakes head slowly* This is sort of some kind of spiritual metaphysical adventure for you, isn't it?

Nox: I couldn't bear to just be a man, living in the United States of America, alternately embraced and estranged by our culture and ideals, morals, and society's judges and their irrelevance. To be mortal is a curse, one that is only broken by death. The very death, the sure and unquestioned fateful end of me as a mortal would be the only remedy by which the curse of mortality is lifted. Only then should I be free. Until then I seek the transcendental, that which lifts me above the rites of appetites, the burdens of eating and relieving, sleeping and waking, bathing and trying to desperately to understand what everyone else seems to understand about life and themselves. Whatever this mystery is it is lost on me. To make matters worse, I have practiced the rituals of the groups -- even "flocks" of us as men that are faithed to be borne of verite and divinity. All of this, all of my existence is relegated to lonely exile from the great and revered trust, the confidence that we as a collective are performing in orchestra the will, the geometry, the wish and the natural synchronization that the universe and its most profound conductor would issue harmony and pax in. I am at a loss, my friend, as to what to do with this man that I am, this life that I am, for a meaning I do not feel.

Hammond: So you want to burglarize a vet and take ketamine?

Nox: Shaman have long used potions and poisons to see the universe, to become closer to god.

Hammond: I don't think God wants you to steal ketamine from a vet.

Nox: I am not sure your God is god as he is.

Hammond: You're a Heathen.

Nox: You're a Catholic.

Catholic: So I am. Are you ready?

Heathen: Aye aye!

They head out, equipped for the predation upon an institution dedicated to providing for the health, recovery, and well-being of animals.

Heathen: I have a great respect for veterinarians.

Catholic: Apparently you do. You're about to steal from one.

Heathen: That's a matter of circumstance, a minor conflict that I reconcile with the speculation that this veterinarian can absorb a loss of less than 500 dollars worth of pharmaceuticals. If they have insurance, that may even cover it. I have much less reverence for insurance policy vendors.

Catholic: Sure. Go ahead with that, keep telling yourself.

Heathen: Want to call a priest? Want to call a clergyman you address as "Father"? Do you think he'd be able to assist in the ethical quandry we're toting along with us as we come closer to the target of our criminal enterprise?

Catholic: Funny. You're charging me that I can just confess and pay absolution.

Heathen: Whatever you need to put the wind in your sails.

Catholic: Ok, this time let's park across the street. We can see the office from over there but they won't be able to see us lurking in the shadows.

Heathen: Fine.

They park and walk as non-criminally as they can imagine someone who was not in the midst of criminal engagement might.

Catholic: So the idea is that we pick these locks in the back door, enter, run around waving our arms to try to set off any alarm, and run out and observe from across the street to see if any law enforcement respond to any silent alarms.

Heathen: God be with us. *smirk*

Catholic: Let's do it then.

Heathen: Cover me while I pick the locks.

Catholic: *whistles*

Heathen: *freaks out, startles and looks around* WHAT?! (whispered loud)

Catholic: What? I was just whistling. It makes us look less conspicuous.

Heathen: No, no it doesn't. We're breaking in. There is no inconspicuous. At best stand close to me so that an observer can't obviously see that our late night entry into the vet's office isn't any more unusual than it would be at 3AM.

Catholic: Ok. If I see something, I'll whistle.

Heathen: Fine. Just whistle quietly.

Nox unlocks the doors and opens them. They both seem surprised that it worked. They enter and pull the door shut behind them.

Heathen: Now run around, every room!

Catholic runs into the front office and grabs the cash out of the register. Heathen runs around in the surgery and back room office. They meet back at the door and then hustle out, leaving it unlocked. They hustle across the street to the car, sit in it and light cigarettes. Catholic puts the stereo on quietly.

Catholic: This is crazy.

Heathen: But you know it's smart. If we wait an hour or an hour and a half, any police should have arrived. At this hour, with no traffic, they should be here in 15 minutes or less.

Catholic: If they do, at least we won. I grabbed this money from the register out front!

Heathen: How much is it?

Catholic: Let's count it. 1,2,3,4 hundred. 10, 30, 50, 5, 6...456 dollars!

Heathen: Wicked. 50/50, right?

Catholic: You don't even need to say that.

Heathen: Well, I've known some unethical criminals. It seems that honor among thieves is a dying tradition.

Catholic: Well, you're my friend right?

Heathen: Yes, I'm your friend.

Catholic: Then let me explain that friends don't beat other friends. We're in this together.

Heathen: Most of this plan was my idea.

Catholic: What?! Fuck -you-. -We- came up with this plan. -We- are making it work, and -We- are not getting caught together. So it is -our- idea. I should give you 40 and keep 60 for that remark.

Heathen: Ok look, it was both of our idea.

Catholic: What time is it now? 03:11. We can look at going back in to grab the goodies at 04:11.

Heathen: That was my idea.

Catholic: No, that was -not- your idea. I -just- said it!

Heathen: Ok man, relax. I just meant that was how I proposed doing it. It was your idea to go back at 04:11, but it was my idea that we go back in an hour. So it became our idea. I meant that it was -also- my idea and that I agree.

They smoke more cigarettes and lay back in their seats keeping tired eyes on the target.

Heathen: Every time a car drives by they make me nervous.

Catholic: Sounds like you're the one that needs to relax.

Heathen: You're right, I believe that when you fear things happening and you cultivate psychic anxiety it is broadcast and somehow causes problems to crop up. We do -not- need any problems, not when the game has stakes that pay out prison for the wrong move.

Catholic: Can you stop talking? Just relax and breathe. I want to calm my head down.

Heathen: Sure, I'll quiet down. For a little while I'll think of ease and winning. Kind of like in Ghostbusters except the other way around.

The greenish-blue LED clock above the center console reads 03:51. They are calm.

Heathen: Wanna go inside?

Catholic: No. Seriously brov sometimes you piss me off. We -have- to play by the rules. For as mystic as you claim to be you are a dumbass when it comes to some things.

Heathen: I guess I understand. Like if we went in now because I got greedy or impatient and we got caught, I'd be so unforgivably pissed at myself. You would be too.

Catholic: *sighs* Ok man. It's like 20 minutes. Let's talk about the plan, but keep your eye on the building.

Heathen: The back door is still unlocked, but that's a really open space. Let's try to get in with as little vulnerability of being spotted. New rule: if there are any lights on in any windows and we see anyone -- we abort.

Catholic: That's wise. So we get in and then we throw anything that looks interesting in the bag and sort it out later. Let's give ourselves a 3 minute deadline for being in there.

Heathen: 3 minutes? Does it matter?

Catholic: It matters. The longer we are in there, the greater the chance of getting nabbed.

Heathen: Simple plan. The simpler the better. When the clocks hits 04:11, and there is no traffic we go. Should we pray?

Catholic: I don't think it works like that.

They sit silently in the car with the stereo on barely audible. Hammond stares out at the office across the street. Nox stares mostly at the clock, but closes his eyes in meditation and prayer. It turns to 04:10.

Nox: Ready?

Hammond: Let's go, man.

Nox and Hammond walk briskly across the street, around the back of the office and enter. They grab everything in the refrigerator in diaphragm vials. Hammond sees that there is an office inside the sort of surgical theatre. It is locked.

Hammond: Let's get in there!

Nox: We only have like 2 minutes left.

Hammond: You can't pick the lock?

Nox: *looks up* There's another way.

Nox jumps up to the top of the wall, which does not have a ceiling in the office. He drops down on the other side of the door and lets Hammond in.

Hammond: Nice. I knew you had it in you.

Nox: Shut up.

Hammond opens the desk drawers and removes a metal lock box that has "No drugs or money" written on it in black permanent marker.

Hammond: What do you think? *smiles*

Nox: It's probably receipts or something.

Hammond: You're so naive.

Nox: Whatever dude. Bring it if you want.

Hammond: And I shall.

Nox: Ok, time is up, let's get the hell out of here.

Hammond: Let's roll!

They leave and drive back to the apartment victorious. As far as they know, they've successfully accomplished their mission. When they get back they go through all the bottles and find morphine tables, vials of liquid diazepam, and a single bottle of K.

Nox: Just -one- bottle of ketamine? -fuck-, that was the whole point!

Hammond: Well, we also got the 450 dollars. Let's open the box of no drugs or money.

Nox: Ok, dude. Whatever.

Hammond pries it open with a screwdriver. There are 11 bottles of unopened ketamine. Hammond pulls them out with wide eyes.

Nox & Hammond: YES!

Nox: Let's get cooking!

Hammond: Breakfast! You know I'm supposed to leave for work in like 2 hours?

Nox: Is that going to happen?

Hammond: No. It's not.

Nox: Are you sure? You shouldn't let this get in the way of your job.

Hammond: Will you come to work with me?

Nox: Am I allowed?

Hammond: Why not? It's a service call. The client does not know you don't work with me. You can learn something.

Nox: Fine. Let's have a ketamine breakfast.

Hammond: Excellent.

They cook up their prize and insufflate. Nox loves the surreal dissociation, the anaesthetic, the physical tone it lends the body. Nox and Hammond lie like they are dead on a sofa and the floor. They are having near-death experiences but it just looks like they are dead.





Scene III - Another year later




Hammond lives in NYC, Oxley and Nox live in the same small town they all met in but Nox stays in his mother's basement often. Oxley has an apartment and a job. Nox is no longer a kid and very very depressed.

Hammond phones Nox

Hammond: What's up?

Nox: Not much, I'm not doing much at all.

Hammond: What's going on?

Nox: Nothing. I'm staying at my mom's. I don't have any sort of anything going on.

Hammond: Do you hang out with Oxley?

Nox: No, dude. I don't do anything. I'm really really sad. Just bored, lonely, whatever. I don't even know why I'm alive.

Hammond: Why don't you come up to NYC?

Nox: Because I have no money. NYC is expensive.

Hammond: Dude, come stay with me. You can get a job. Did I tell you about my job yet?

Nox: No, you haven't told me.

Hammond: It's awesome. I work for McMansion & Co. I'm like a tech analyst. You can come up here and get a job. I make loot. If I stay late, they send me home in a towncar. It's freaking amazing.

Nox: How could I get a job. I didn't even finish high school.

Hammond: But you know more than some of these guys that are 40.

Nox: So what? They won't hire me.

Hammond: Not if you don't try to get them to hire you. They don't -need- to know that you didn't finish high school. I'll help you put a resume together. Just trust me. Come up here.

Nox: Dude, I told you, I have -no- money.

Hammond: What about if I got you a bus ticket?

Nox: I still have no money.

Hammond: Listen, you and I have been partners in crime before. Just trust me. We'll get you up here and you'll get a job.

Nox: Ok, dude.

Hammond: You can't even get a bus ticket though?

Nox: *frustrated* THAT'S WHAT I SAID, I'M BROKE! WHEN HAVE YOU EVER KNOWN ME TO HAVE MONEY?!

Hammond: Can you call Oxley?

Nox: No. He's too smart to trust me.

Hammond: Let me call Oxley.

Nox: Ok then.

Hammond phones Oxley, then phones Nox and tells him to phone Oxley.

Nox: Umm, Hi Oxley.

Oxley: Heh. Hey. What... is... up...?

Nox: You're not very sincere sounding with that.

Oxley: How am I not sincere. I just talked to Hammond.

Nox: I know. I know you know. Are you going to help me?

Oxley: Help you what?

Nox: Get to New York.

Oxley: Now why would I do that?

Nox: I don't know. I really don't. But my hope was that somehow Hammond had convinced you to spot me a bus ticket.

Oxley: Hmmm. Well.... I don't know. Give me a reason.

Nox: I want to go to NYC?

Oxley: Not a good enough reason. You have to give me a reason.

Nox: Because it's a nice thing to do?

Oxley: Not a good enough reason. I'm not nice.

Nox: Because I don't have any other way, and it's humiliating that I have to beg you for a bus ticket and I can't live the way that I am right now for much longer.

Oxley: I guess that will do. If you get to the bus station, the ticket will be there for you.

Nox: You can't give me a ride to the bus station?

Oxley: WHOA! I'm already doing you a favor and I don't know why. Now you want me to drive you around?

Nox: Fuck, you're a bastard.

Oxley: Is that any way to thank me?

Nox: I'm not thanking you.

Oxley: Well, maybe I'm not helping you.

Nox: Look, will you please help me out?

Oxley: Sure buddy. I'll pick you up in a couple of hours. I'm sort of busy right now.

Nox: Ok. Any specific time?

Oxley: When I'm ready.

Nox: Thank you, man.

Oxley: Don't mention it.

Oxley picks up Nox

Nox: Can we stop somewhere first, so I can say goodbye?

Oxley: You're just going to NYC. You're not leaving.

Nox: I don't mean to come back here.

Oxley: Sure, why not?

Nox: I have to pick up some clothes and stuff there too.

They arrive at a townhouse. Nox and Oxley go up the stairs to the second floor apartment. In the room are Yaysung, Erik, and Saskia.

Nox: I came to say goodbye.

Yaysung: Where are you going?

Nox: New York City

Yaysung: What, for good?

Nox: That's my intention.

Yaysung: Ok then, well good luck.

Erik: I'll see you, mang.

Saskia just smirks derisively and waves. She is pleased that Nox is going.

Oxley: Ok, guys. I should stop by. I didn't know you lived here.

Yaysung: Well, I don't.

Oxley: Anyway, take care.

Oxley takes Nox to the bus station.

Nox: Thanks Oxley. Someday I'll pay you back.

Oxley: Maybe someday you will.

Nox: Anyway, thank you. Your doing this small favor will save my life.

Garden of Earthly Delight - Creation

• oil on panel, 1480/90 of ca. 1500
• Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid
• Hieronymous Bosch

Why, I ask, the cloven duality?

va te faire foutre Robert Anton Wilson

I was pouring over books that claimed to hold secrets. Later, these secrets would lose their lustre. Sarah's brother David watched me trying to perform the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram by candlelight with a butterknife on a night where the moon loomed heavily in the sky through the window. I could feel the electric in the ether. It was like static insanity. He looked at me, smiled, and said, "Be careful. Some people make the mistake of trying to make too many things fit together." I didn't understand, so I asked him, "What do you mean?" He said, "Not everything goes together. If you try to make sense of it all you'll be wasting your time at best and you may lose your mind at worst." Fuck him, I thought. I could make sense of it.

The Order of the Golden Dawn wasn't for me. That much I knew. Still, there was something strange. Even in the Christian orders my mother had brought me through they were chanting in strange tongues and casting demons. I don't mean they were speaking Latin, I mean they were going full-on glossolalia as men and women. They were having visions and they had gifts of the spirit. The Golden Dawn was just a book by Israel Regardie with different stuff in it than the book the Fellowship slung which was variations of canons, Maccabees and Enoch. In fact, the Sons of the Priests of the Christian Fellowship later initiated an Enoch Collective for harps, psalteries, and cymbals.

The Occult. Hidden knowledge was purportedly embedded in architecture, paintings, books, cards, tea leaves, and sins of divinare. There was a store that sold quartz crystals in the University town of Newark to the mystically inclined. Mario advised me that they may be doing something but it wasn't worth paying for. I didn't have any money. Still, you didn't need money for visions and derivations. Nor did you for divinations, but that I was told was wrong. If we could, as men, see what was hidden from us we were looking where we shouldn't. It was a fool's errand to consult an oracle, or to divine through mancy, and an offense to god.

Why then, did these things exist in broad daylight? I had read that women had been murdered because of Ergot on the rye and seen the Wizard of Oz. It was obvious that witchery was wrong. When we drove past a very lushly gardened house with iron gates wound with ivy, the Fellowship's Saul told me that a coven lived there and owned that house. How he knew this I do not know, but he did and let me in on the secret. "Why don't the police do anything then!?" I panicked? "Because witchcraft isn't illegal, the police don't care." I was thoroughly confused.

The world was on end, at it's end, and ending any day now. Like waiting for a bus or a train, I could not predict when, but it was going to come. No one would know when, they told me, because god would not say, but there would come a day that the world would end. "Probably in your lifetime," they told me.

When the worlds of genesis and youth became corrupt with vice and venom I left my small family for the world. The first place I went to was the Preacher's Son. Joshua scratched his head and listened to me tell my young story. Ang, his roommate, told me, "You are good. You will be fine." It was a strange sort of love she sent me and felt like a blessing. Joshua nursed his beer and mumbled about a guitar. He did do me right though, with all of his resources. So then I went feral. I was a young 14 and trying to find my role in the world.

They let me live with them, the college. I became a child of the University. I lived in girls' dorms, guy's drunken flop houses; I lived in houses on sofas as the houses changed tenants, like I was some feature of the edifice. Along the way I met a lot of young people with a lot of ideas. A girl named Sarah was very nice to me and I found myself flattered by affection. I lived with her in a room for a year. Someone compared me to Mowgli from Kipling's Jungle Book. I liked that.

I stole Marny's ritalin and gave myself a good dose of post traumatic stress disorder. Ending up in the University library I began behaving like a criminal trying to steal information. From shelfrow to shelfrow I slipped, searching for that answer that I would pilfer. What the hell was WRONG with me?!? It was in here somewhere, and by god I would find it. The Christians who told me that divination was a sin also claimed my grandmother. She would tell other Christians about how wonderful it was when she just opened the bible and the page fell to something for her especially. That, I felt, was bibliomancy! Well, then, call me a Bibliotecamancer and let me know.

I was totally fucked in the head. I sat there by candle trying to resonate Raphael, Gabriel, Michael, and Auriel. I didn't have a steel dagger. I had a butterknife. The butterknife became my go-to phurba. After a sojourn to Louisiana buoyed by the Fellowship and one sister of which who had the most lovely eyes and was so beautiful, an Armenian girl, I made an attempt to negotiate a return to domestic living with my mother and sister. I was promptly deceived and placed in a psych ward for youths. On my first visit to the cafeteria I slid a butterknife up my sleeve and then stowed it in my room.

Being so young to have life be so full of amazement with everything and to believe in magical things as I did I was a basketcase for real. For reasons of proper plot coursing, I told the kid in the next room over I would like to borrow his watch so that I could time the 15 min observation period checks from the nurses and techs. He did, but made me promise I would give it back. In fact, I left it on his windowsill on my way out.

Once the door opened and closed I thought I had 15 minutes. In reality, that was a presumption based on the notion that psych ward protocol would be followed precisely. Surely it wasn't. I listened to my roommate's breathing and he snored away on his psych meds. I slid the butterknife under the lock and popped the window open.

To this day I believe that god made that window lock for me. I can't describe it easily in words, but it was basically like they used metal screws and plates to bolt against the lever which would open it and lock that lever down. Even when the window did open when I broke the weak cast alloy plates to free the window, it only opened like 8 inches at max. There was a second catch for the window so that if it weren't locked it would only serve as a vent, not a port.

The nickname I adopted was "Itsy." Many people liked to make fun of it, and several very stupid and uninformed people asked if it were an allusion to my penis size. They thought that shit was clever. I was just small. I didn't want to be big, I didn't want to be seen. I wanted to be infinitesimal. My prayers were that god take back this whole world, that god would please just undo it. Infinitesimal indeed. "Infi" didn't have the same catch though. I slid through the slim opening and was outside in the cold.

It was frozen, the ground and there was old snow and ice. The air was crisp though, and I felt that electricity, the ether was charged. I placed my neighbor's watch on the outside of his windowsill, figuring that he could either ask one of the staff to retrieve it for him or not, but his puzzle wasn't my problem. I figured out how to get out, he could figure out how to get his watch back inside. The sky was cloudy and there was a purple amber light reflected in the low drawn clouds. HAHAA! I can win. Do not trick me. My mother and her lover had betrayed me and I was no longer her child, nor anyone else. If I could not trust her words then whose words then could I trust? I was a man of my own, father and all, and by no means fit for it.

That night I raced across their hospital grounds and across the street. I ran with such freedom and such natural levity, like a wild animal straight into the woods, knowing only that my instincts would guide me. I bounced over thickets and through thorns, but my freedom made me drunk from any fear or pain. As fast as a deer I flew through the woods until *splash* I was waist high in icy cold water. This was not a good sign, and I had become very sensitive, constantly seeking the omens, growing into my visions, becoming a seer, a ראה. Now I was a very wet young man on a night where ice didn't melt. It was clearly a profound trial.

I found train tracks and the moon lit them blue for me. They would lead north and south. There were people I knew to the south, in Newark that would help me to get dry and sleep in my victory over the tyranny of lies. I suppose I had a 50/50 chance of choosing the right direction, and no landmarks along a strip of rail through the woods. Still, having seen the sun in the psych hospital rise and set once calibrated me and I felt like I knew which way to go so I pressed on. The faster I moved the warmer I was. This was rhythmic and meditative and I sang songs in my head for divinity good and great.

When I encountered the road I was unsure. The brownies -- the county police -- or the bluey staties would surely take interest in such a small man walking down highways in the middle of the night. That would not do. I resolved to walk casually, subduing any fear and repelling the attention of those who would cage me. It was a ritual in its own right. Hitchhiking would attract no more or less attention, though I would be careful not to indicate with my thumb that I was adrift on the seas of suburban roadways until I knew that the headlights and car shape were not similar to patrol cars.

For as long as I can remember, I've hated police. They took away my dad, they came and lied to and were lied to by my grandmother, and my parents used them as armies against each other in some bizarre war that was their own type of love. I still hate police even though I have witnessed them do me a good turn or two, if you consider deciding not to further fuck with someone than you already have a good turn. That they enforce laws which may or may not be Right in the eyes and scales of mens hearts and Divine Omniscience, that they enforce laws which they may not believe are Right leaves me to conclude that they have betrayed their own sense of humility and love, that they have become tyrants faute de mieux. What's worse, they can choose as fallible men to enforce or ignore laws as they see fit. Either way, they're betraying something. Without them, though, I would have different contentions with someone else as an oppressor, and I am no more than them so I hate them with love and tolerance.

Late in the night, a woman pulled over. She was young to be a mother, but she spoke to me maternally. That night she drove me the remainder of the 14 miles between Meadowwood Hospital and Newark. I didn't tell her more than I needed to and she was either tender enough or tired enough not to probe. Maybe she didn't care. She dropped me off in Newark and I had arrived at my friends' friends house. Marco looked at me through confused and grumpy eyes, ready to close the door in my face but I pleaded and he pointed at the sofa. I went to sleep the victor. When I woke up, I had nothing but myself and was unwelcome at their apartment.

As time went by, I made my way and got by with a little help from a lot of friends. As mentioned, I stole Marny's ritalin --which was a horrible thing to do-- and became horribly tortured after I ingested it. I couldn't sleep and my mind raced and raved lunacy. So I stalked my quarry of information, my philosopher's stone deep in the University library. What -was- wrong with me? I could not account for my actions or antics. My thievery and lies were stalking me as I sought their own master, the origin of their motives. I was losing my innocence and was not letting it go without a fight.

I read about the Adamites, or the Brethren of the Free Spirits. Hieronymous Bosch, a mysterious man with many names in many places was charged with being a member, a ritualist as an Adamite. His paintings were geometrically profound, I could see through diagrams in books of his paintings what he was saying, the painted images and symbols or at least some of them. The thing is that the Adamites were trying to achieve lost innocence, a prelapsarian state through natural nudity and feral fucking. Unfortunately, though it is one of the better ideas for redemption that I've come across, I don't think it works that way.

After paranoia runs its course, the sufferer either encounters the threat or doesn't and in the process of fighting or fleeing it engages in some criminal or socially perverse antics that may make sense to the sufferer in defense of the Invisible Bureau of Investigation or whomever threatens him or doesn't and finds himself uncomfortable and sad, humiliated, and --quite literally-- emotionally gutted. So I found myself in the medical periodical section hiding from noone and searching for what was wrong with me. Flipping through some journal of Psychiatry inconspicuously I arrived at some article about sociopathy. The word sociopath scared me. I looked it with the nearest Psych reference I could find and read the most horrible things I could think to say about a person. It was all about me! Later I would be told that I am just self-centered and narcissistic, but in that library and on that day my soul was shattering. I was a MONSTER!

I had an answer what was wrong with me but I didn't feel any better. The ritalin hadn't worn off. Lost in a labyrinth of self, like discovering that I bleed if wounded, that I defecate if I eat, that my teeth are dirty dirty dirty and my tongue speaks nothing but hate and I, myself, my whole being, my soul is ugly and filthy and dirty. Do I kill it? I can't, can I? Sitting on the old stone wall of the post office, and staring down at the pavement I have never felt so dead.

Sid slid by and mocked me thoroughly. So quickly and so defensively I mentioned god, and he asked me questions like where did god come from. I spent time seeking the answer in my head. He laughed heartily at my confusion, my pain. Where did space come from? What was space in? The fallen human condition that Bill sprake, my stepfather, about which had roared laughing at me rang again and woke me from the comfort and trust of youth. This time it was in my own heart and there was no escape and no mother to protect me. Sid's perfect smile was joyously unrestrained, and he prodded further.

What is that forbidden knowledge, that light that some "serpent" gave through woman? Even today as a man past thirty I swat away creeping notions that Mephisto himself did visit me that day in young Sid. He taunted me in ways I can not imitate nor describe the smooth and almost gentle evil and brutality with which he did do. In the end, I was only completely certain that I was a monster and doubted that I could be saved from life itself, the great looming Heavens and Hells their own enormous problems on top of it all!

There were unforgivable sins, and perhaps in my flippant antics I had made an errant but blasphemous transgression and was no longer in the auspice of g-d. I was properly and thoroughly fucked.

He left me there and I began in my broken posture to become a stone chimera on the wall surrounding the United States Post Office Newark Delaware 19711-7307.

Mario stopped as he was passing me and I saw his shoes slowly turn to me. I followed them up his body to his head. He looked down at me with his own pout, like he and Sid had been in collaboration to break and mend me, and he was coming along to play "Good Cop". In reality this was all theatrics of my own twisted and drug addled psyche, drawing on the experience and pattern I have felt and seen. Mario was a clinical psychologist and on that day he was a good Samaritan. He asked me if I was OK.

"I'm a monster. I'm a sociopath and I don't deserve to live. I was in the library and..." Mario cut me off from my rant. He asked, "When was the last time you slept?" I had to think about it to answer him. "A couple of days maybe?" He told me in a very weary voice that I was not a monster, sociopath, and unfit to live and that the mere fact that I was so concerned about it eliminated me from that sort of unclinical categoric bullshit. "Get some sleep. I'm serious. Get up from that wall and go get some sleep." I knew a lot. This much I was sure. Sleep would not cure this malady. This was life. For every time you fell asleep you awoke to more of it, more of life, yourself, and your mind. I did find a quiet place on International's White Clay Creek Indian Reserve and I fell asleep. When I woke up I felt better and Mario made a little more sense. I wanted to exact revenge on Sid.

Later Mario took me to a meeting. It was in the Unitarian church. The meeting was for UFOlogists and those concerned with local extraterrestrial affairs. Reynold's had a wrap, a summary of the local sightings and events of interest. Later there was a speaker who did have, he claimed in front of a room of dozens of people, first hand experience with an alien. This man was Riley Martin. The alien he knew and even *represented* was named Tan. He was telling us about the Mothership that would come and collect a set of persons from Earth before the Earth fell apart somehow, and only those who had a "ticket" sort of paper would be collected. These tickets were on 8.5x11 paper, which is convenient for filing in the same cabinet as other papers.

One woman asked, "I have 11 cats. I don't want to go anywhere without my cats. Can I bring my cats?" Another explained, "I don't like being all cooped up. I need to walk around, stretch my legs and breathe fresh air. Is the mothership big enough to walk around on?" Riley satisfied their concerns and allayed their fears. Immediate family would be counted in the number and all would be well. Mario looked at me and said, "Any time you feel like you're crazy, like there is something wrong with you, remember this." I love Mario Pazzaglini for being that good to another soul, to my soul. Tickets were twenty dollars and could be purchased in the back of the room after the session.

As Mario and I approached the ticket table, Riley informed us that our tickets would be twenty dollars each. I just looked at Mario and said, "I don't have any money." I didn't. I never did. I don't now. Riley Martin looked at me with an intensity. He said, "You have a MAGNIFICENT spirit! MAGNIFICENT!" Mario concurred. I walked out with a ticket to the mothership on the house. I have since lost that ticket and will have to be content to be a really MAGNIFICENT spirit without any guarantee to be aboard that great vessel of salvation, the Mothership.

Sitting there with a butterknife and a candle, surrounded by lithe and perfect girls and acting like I do, they regarded me as insane I suppose. Only David reconciled my behavior with his older authority against their already fickle social calls. I really was trying to perform the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram. It was the beginning of the book. At least I could sort of understand this one. The visions they had in that Fellowship sometimes devolved into casting judgement cloaked in prophecy on other souls and became a comedy to me. I spoke in tongues because surely -I- had the Gift of the Spirit and not just the one, either. Visions, apparitions, smoke and mirrors. I had them all.

One day in the hot hot summer of I don't know when, Yaysung's cousin brought me along to work a day for pay. I was to be a carnie in Penn's Grove, NJ. He told me that Bruce Willis might even show up. It sounded good, especially if I were to be paid. When we got to the lot and set up from our truck, Yaysung's cousin and his own friend gave me the short end of the stick. I had to lie to every paying customer. It felt so fucking bizarre, the whole thing. The idea was a baseball pitch radar. The problem was that I wanted the kids to feel super so I lied too big. The first little kid and his dad came up and paid. I pointed the Radar Gun that was completely not a Radar Gun but a stupid piece of plastic across the trajectory of the pitch.

"The Radar Gun gave the kid 37mph. Not bad for a first pitch!", I barked. I was a natural. I started commenting real loud like it was a baseball game and the television is turned up so loud that your deaf-ass great grandfather can hear it in case he can't see it. "The kid's setting up... He's got his signal...Looks like a fastball!!! WOW!!! THE RADAR GUN CLOCKED THE KID AT 88MPH! HE'S A KILLER!" You see, I thought I was being conservative since the Rocket Roger Clemens back when he came up with the BoSox was cracking 100. The problem was that the father knew I was full of shit and the Radar Gun wasn't plugged into anything.

He demanded to see the result. Suddenly the gun "went dark". It does happen sometimes, you know. "Give me back my money." he was fucking serious. The father started looking around for an authority greater than myself to settle this with. There were two local cops leaning on their patrol car just twenty yards off. My boss, the kooky cunt that he was, raced the father to the police and explained, "The Radar Gun must have gone on the fritz. Do you think we can use your radar officer?" The police consulted each other and then gave us a negative. My job was over after my first client as a carnie. They paid me ten bucks for the day. I was pissed.

My mother looked down at me and god knows what she thought of my ululations and palatial clicks. I was all about beat boxing the Wholy Spirit. It was a parade of greatness every Sunday. When it got quiet and the lights were turned off the prophecies came out. I was never allowed to give mine. I did dig though, deep in my psyche and heart for the truth for all of us. It just wasn't there I suppose. I was, after all, a rather nihilistic youth in some ways but I still saw god presiding over all the nothingness. If they would have let me, I'd have given them the ripdown on the mic when it was praise and glossolalia. God would have really liked that.

I'm sitting at a table with a projection of cardinal posse of archangels around me and teenage girls confounded and an older brother who somehow understands my intent and wants to help me. At least I stole the copy of Regardie's Golden Dawn, and the literary goliath that is Border's Books caught the cost. David was telling me something important when he said that you can't make everything fit together. I don't think his statement as I represent it is true, but what he was telling me was not to go insane. I didn't listen. East is the direction of the dawn, indeed. Later I just learned to throw salt at the corners, and yes I am insane.