Like at a dance club with a couple hundred people after a wedding reception.
Lights, and pop music vibrates these days like never before. It feels like Mom’s heartbeat back in the womb.
Folks do strange things, and so do I, yet still I wonder if they know about the Strangeness.
Why am I standing so tall, my spine so full and so light? I was sober too.
Most folks were not sober and were lonely. But on the dance floor they dispelled that loneliness.
They channelled the Strangeness, whether they knew it or not.
And all of them there, and all the music videos to the songs playing on TV screens all around,
and having just seen a beloved friend of mine change her name in a patch of God-light,
overwhelmed me. What is this life but a manifestation of God?
Every moment, everything. There is respecting that, and there is not.
From there derives all morality, conscience. Innocence ever unfolds through time, a constant gateway through which anyone can view anything and see the truth.
It is my magnifying glass, and I am some sort of Sherlock Holmes in God’s womb.

I – The Night Before

The wind shakes the window and the leaves are carrying the branches around wildly. There are things under my eyelids, and I can’t sleep. I was asleep but I woke up – I have so much energy! There is an energy I get at night that is unlike anything in the daytime. I slip under my blankets and kick up my legs kick, kick, kick, my sheet slides across the bed. I try to settle but the shakes take me – you know, the jitters I’m picking up good vibrations, Ah! Ha ha! Hee hee hee! Grrrrrrrrrrrr- ah! Kick, kick! Kick, kick! The rain taps against the window and all over the roof, putchichichichehchehcheh-putchichehchichehchicheh. The house’s stillness is a sound a large sound an ocean really a massive color of sound like what’s under my eyelids, what’s under my eyelids, the colors and the things so many things. It’s a fierce sound that shakes the window. There are velociraptors outside I swear. I wonder if there are velociraptors outside. I know there aren’t any, but if I’m being honest I still hope there are no raptors outside I really do… I can’t even tell you that hope. I don’t want to be torn a part by a velociraptor. It’s so SO vicious and terrible, so helpless, so terrible and horrifying, to have no control in so much pain, to be so mindlessly hated… Don’t think… Don’t think about it… They don’t exist… They don’t exist… And they wouldn’t get into the house anyways… I’m picking up good vibrations… She’s giving me excitations… Good! Good! Good! Kick, kick, aahh!! Good vibrations! There is a shadow on the wall, a tilted square of light orbiting my bedroom, a car is whooshing by sounds like the tide of the lake at night. Why at night? The lake seems different at night I don’t know why, when no one’s around… I wonder why. Maybe there is a ball of light in the center of the lake that no one can see, night or day, and… it changes at night to a silver light like the moon, and the silver makes a different sort of sound and actually makes the water feel different. Maybe that’s Hell at the bottom of the lake – Hell is supposed to be somewhere below everything maybe it’s right there at the bottom of the lake. How deep is the lake anyhow? Pretty deep probably it might go down to Hell I mean - if Hell is in the earth then the deepest it could be would be the very center, but Hell is a pretty big place I mean it must be to hold all those evil people through all those generations, so the center could be a large center, expanded I mean, which could reach the very bottom of the lake if Hell is in the earth. Even if it’s not then the portal to Hell could be at the bottom of the lake, and that portal definitely gives off a color, probably red, but at night it’s silver. It’s like different if you die at night it’s a whole different feeling – you go into the lake your spirit leaves your body and you go into a silver light, or it could be green, and it’s just different. Even if Hell is in the earth it’s different at night I bet. I’ll probably never know I mean I really hope I never know. I’m going to go to Heaven definitely the way Mom and I read the Bible there’s no way I’m not. It’s a sure thing the way she loves me I know she’s going to Heaven and I’m definitely going to go wherever she goes. You know – I could probably go scuba diving someday to the bottom of the lake just to see – I wonder if anyone’s ever done that. Hm. I bet no one has or they’d have said whether they found Hell or not. Anyway it’s a big lake I bet if anyone did go looking for Hell they probably didn’t search the whole thing like I would if I had an oxygen tank and flippers. Man! I should ask for an oxygen tank and flippers for my birthday! That’d be awesome. But I bet an oxygen tank is expensive, probably too expensive… That sucks. That’d have been the coolest. I could have found Hell and told everyone about it. Aw MAN… Sigh. I curl the green blanket around my fists and up past my neck, my cheek on the pillow, my body lying on its side. Thunder rips open everything rips open the air – one of those incredible sounds that dominate everything stopping inside thoughts and even conversations in their tracks. I bet Snoops my cat is totally freaked right now probably in Mom’s room. It frightened me too, and honestly I’m still frightened, foot shaking, eyes open when before they were closed. How does that sound even exist? It’s ridiculously loud. I like thunder OK, but I hate that thunder. Now I’m never going to fall asleep. I’m picking up good vibrations… She’s giving me excitations… Ugghh, punch, punch! I’m going to Heaven for sure, and… Don’t… And… Don’t go there… The feeling is coming now the real terror. I wish… I wish it just wouldn’t come I wish I didn’t even know it existed. I know it’s a feeling and a thought all at once, and the feeling blends into the thought and the thought into the feeling and the feeling is terrible nerves like I’m sure you wouldn’t even believe honestly I doubt anyone can ever know this feeling, because if anyone knew this feeling people wouldn’t be the way they are I mean – people wouldn’t be able to do what they do, because how can you do anything when this feeling grips you, my God, Please. Please don’t… And then I live forever, forever and ever up in Heaven, and it never ends. It never ends… It never ends it never ends it never ends it never ends it never ends it goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on forever and ever. What am I going to do? What am I going to do in all that time? I’m sure you can’t understand. Nobody knows this feeling, nobody has this terrible thought. I have never known fear like this, and I wish I could rewind back to before the thought ever came, but I can’t, and now that I know the truth, the reality of existing forever as me endlessly cycling the same me, I will never be rid of this thought and this feeling. I am doomed to be bursting with these nerves for the rest of my life, constantly forgetting and remembering and when I remember my God I need to get away from people, even mom. The last time the thought came back to me I was in the kitchen around everybody mom and Dan and Uncle Aaron and I started sweating so bad and breathing so bad I had to get out of there. Why does it frighten ME?! Why just me?! It’s not fair. It’s not fair! Everybody else is all for living forever in Heaven, and it seems nice at first, but then it goes on endlessly. I mean I’d rather be endless in Heaven than Hell, oh my God I don’t even want to think about that. My God don’t think about that, just don’t even – you’re going to Heaven for sure.For sure. Another crack of thunder, not so tremendous this time, and actually it relaxes me. It distracts me, and the fear eases into the ocean of chaotic sound swarming the still house. I close my eyes and watch the colors ebbing and swirling into the strangest visions, so strange I could hardly imagine them in words even if I tried my hardest.

II – In The Afternoon

I couldn’t find my name tag this morning so this whole time at work I haven’t had my name tag just a plain black polo and visor. It doesn’t mean shit. I mean sure – some folks look at the name tag, but what difference does it make? Nobody says my name even if they do look, and ninety-eight or ninety-nine percent of folks don’t look anyways. Maybe ninety or ninety-five or God knows, but really it wasn’t worth Samantha even mentioning anything to me, let alone in that bitch fucking EEHHH tone, but I guess that’s her job, and hey! If that’s what fills up your conviction with purpose then fuck it – have fun with that for the rest of your sorry ass life, cunt. Yeah yeah I know – look who’s spiteful and unappreciative and out of love blah blah – I know. Work is work. Work is always work, just – work. I’m on register and headset, because we’re understaffed, which is some more bullshit, but I’m over that I mean – it’s out of my control. I’m tired of getting all worked up over things beyond my control these days. What’s the point? There’s what I can do, and there’s what I can’t, and the latter is an infinitely larger category of things than the former, and that’s pretty much always going to be true, for me and for ninety-eight or ninety-nine percent of the entire world population, and you know what? Even those cats in Dubai probably aren’t as free as they think they are or poor, starry-eyed Americans think they are. Everybody’s in a system, you know? It’s a slow day anyway, so working the headset is no big deal, especially ’cause I like to have fun with the headset – I enjoy the physical disconnect. Folks at the counter, you know, you have to be pretty straight with, because it’s their person there, and there’s so much to a person’s body, so much weight they carry around. I’m not even getting too deep here, either – it’s true. Those folks’ bodies come up to my body, separated by the counter, and they think about what they want for a minute or they tell me what they want like they knew what they wanted hours ago – when they woke up this morning – and there’s manners (usually), but there’s never any real fun. I’m telling you, there’s something about bodies, because your body isn’t used to smiling and giggling and letting loose with strangers on a plain, sober Friday afternoon – or ever, really. It’s not up there in most peoples’ banks of memory and experience – the subconscious log of bodily movements. Same goes for me. But, on the other hand, the folks in their cars I’m much more relaxed with. There’s that physical disconnect, no eye contact, no bodily presence, so I have a lot more fun on the headset – natural enthusiasm, you know, like, “Onion rings! Excellent choice!” or, “What’ll you be having on this lovely afternoon?” I know they’re not even that strange or out there of comments (although sometimes, yes, I have flirted on the headset, for which I have gotten a mild scolding), but it’s true I’m not the same around whole bodies in the store. I bet it’s the whole eye contact and lack thereof thing that does it. It’s almost time to go now, so mentally I’m checked out (I mean more than usual). There’s a buzzing in my pocket, but Samantha’s hovering about, plus a fat couple just walked in. The guy’s wearing a Donald Duck t-shirt and the woman’s wearing a low-cut blouse that shows quite a mass of cleavage. Man. Sometimes I wonder about fat couples. I know it’s dick, and people are people, but I’ve always been skinny, so a fat person very tangibly represents a different way of being, and the external differences are clear enough, but it’s the internal ones I wonder about. How do they think? What’s it like to believe in freedom as a fat person – not saying they’re not free – just that it probably feels a little different is all. What are their attitudes romantically? – like this couple here. “What can I get for ya?” I ask.  They don’t look at me or say anything at all – their eyes are fixed on the board above. This is common, not just for fat people, but for little children and grandparents and men in suits. Some of the best customers actually are dirty guys coming in from their trucks, working God knows what God knows where – folks who probably don’t even live here in Erie, but from around the county somewhere. Those guys are polite, and they don’t dilly-dally with their order like it’s Sophie’s fucking choice over here. And when they do open their mouths they’ve got a sense of humor about it. Not so with the mister and miss (or brother and sis?) before me.

“I’ll have the number six…” he mumbles.
“One roast beef,” I say.
“Yeah the roast beef, and what do you want, hon?”
“I don’t know. The fish sandwich looks good…”
“You should get that,” he says.
“Yeah… Hmmm… OK,” she says, her voice full of disappointment for all the alternative futures and their glory.
“You sure?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
“Number six and number three?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says.
“Will that be all?” I ask.
He nods.

Now, about fat people again: I want to rationalize that thought I was having, because it’s starting to weigh on my conscience a bit (really fucking weird however that monstrosity works – the conscience). See, everybody’s got a different perspective and everybody treats their freedom a bit differently. I mean look at skinny folks. The boys like to get strong and the girls like to wear high heels and make up and tight everything and around St. Patrick’s day they get wasted drunk and make bad jokes and “connect” in conversation until they feel comfortable sharing genital-space, to which I ask this (one of the fundamental questions of existence, if you ask me): how come even skinny, well-proportioned folks need to get drunk and forget everything they stand for just to have sex with one another? (I am guilty of this). See what I mean about freedom – how it manifests in shyness, unhappiness, uncertainty in the face of fast food options, etcetera? So yeah, I admit, fat people are a bit more strange to me than skinny people, because I’m not one of them, but everyone’s sense of freedom is a bit different – I’m not saying fat folks are any less free than any other folks, just that the difference between my mind and theirs is doubly apparent due to the difference between my body and theirs. Needless to say, I hand them their change and place their order and hand them some paper Coca-Cola cups, and they fill their cups and find a booth where they sit and wait and all in all time passes so strangely sometimes it’s hard to believe this is real. I punch out, say goodbye to Tony and Marissa and Samantha, push open the glass door and step into the sunlight. The sky is blue with puffy clouds straight out of Toy Story, and it’s breezy, man, a lot windier than it was this morning. I crawl through the passenger’s side of my ’98 Kia Pride I inherited from my old man, because the driver’s side door’s broke – it’s liable to pop out if I try to open it. Cindy texted me, asking me what I’m up to – I tell her I’m just getting out of work. The car’s not starting, I mean not even trying to turn. Stick it in neutral and the engine turns, no problem though. It does that every tenth try or so. “Crazy in Love” by Beyonce is on Bob 94.7. Retro. Weird that this used to be an oldies station too – that’s still strange to me. I remember a few years ago I turned it on expecting some Motown or The Beatles or something and U2 was playing – “With or Without You” or something Joshua Tree. Peach Street’s busy, stop and go stop and go; traffic moves forward like a caterpillar with a penchant for stopping to smell the dirt. Can caterpillars smell? This is the busiest street in the municipality. It’s the franchise capital of Northwest Pennsylvania, where general managers reign over giant stores and restaurants like nobles in gutted-out castles. Nobles whose purpose it is to spread (as opposed to hoard) the opulence – the opulence chopped up into a million pieces, infinite cross-breeds of the seed of luxury. No one goes hungry and no one goes without acquisition on Peach Street, Erie’s capitalism haven. Of course the hidden truth that’s not so hidden at all (to me anyways) is that most folks really are unbelievably bored. And this I believe wholeheartedly, although if I were to tell anyone this truth it’d be completely offensive, the truth that boredom to most folks is like a ceiling – it’s the limit to their freedom, which of course must be limited and can’t be infinite, because (and this is IT, I mean the truth) because the infinitecannot be made manifest. That’s the motherfucking thing, man. That’s the thing! Now if I didn’t know that, I’d probably be dead right now, dead from o.d  or suicide, probably, because what’s someone who understands the infuriating, madness-inducing nature of freedom doing working in the literal belly of the beast – right in the hub of Meaningless Central? But that’s just it – it’s the truth that liberates me, because what is my life but an inherent manifestation? Right? There’s nothing infinite about this here right now, this car and this flesh and this everything! Hence the absurd, Camus, “Howl”, the Ford Taurus, Brittney Spears’ baby, “Saw VII”, Doritos, the moon, etcetera. Speaking of strange manifestations, the marquee for the dollar theatre by the East entrance to the Millcreek Mall says there’s a couple kiddie movies and a couple horror movies playing, both genres I’m not real into, but there’s that new Scorsese movie, Hugo, except it’s not in 3D, but that could be cool. I’ll text Cindy later, or Matt if she’s not about it, but she will be. I take Liberty down to 32nd and turn right on Emerson and left on 29th towards Auburn and I’m home. Dan’s car is in the driveway – that’s odd. God I hope he’s not home. In the living room little man Liam is playing a new Mario game for the Wii.

“Hey, little man,” I say.
“Hey, Uncle Aaron,” he says.
He’s waving his controller-wand around, focussed on the screen. Elise is drinking coffee and reading the classifieds at the kitchen table. Little Dara is in her seat, looking googly-eyed at her little hands and the back of a cereal box on the table.

“Hey, Elise,” I say.
“Hey, Aaron,” she says drily. “How was work?”
“Work was work. What are you doing home?”
“My shift got cancelled.”

I fix myself a bowl of milk and cereal and have a seat.

“Cancelled? Why?”
“They’re cutting hours. It was a slow day I guess.”
“That’s some bullshit.”
“Yeah.”
“Man. What are you going to do?”
She raises her eyebrows and frowns. “I’m looking for a new job. Know any places hiring?”
“Hm…   Uh… Hm. No. Not that I can think of. I’ll let you know if I hear of anything though. Or think of anything. Man. That sucks. They shouldn’t be able to do that. Why you?”
“Well. Tony is sleeping with Hillary, so she stays.”
“Damn.”
“And Mary is a single mom with three kids, plus she’s been there longer than me.”
“How do you know he’s sleeping with her?”
“I don’t, exactly, but… Something’s going on.”
“That’s messed up… What’s Dan’s car doing here?”
“He came back during his lunch break, so I could use it. I spent most of the morning cleaning, and then I went out and applied at a few places. I visited dad.”
“Oh yeah? Hm. How’d that go?”
“He’s basically the same. A bit more intense today.”
“It’s tough knowing all the secrets. You’d think God’d make it a little easier on him,” I say, getting up, rinsing the bowl, sticking it in the dishwasher. “The place looks really nice.”
“Thank you.”

I rinse the bowl out, put it in the dishwasher, take a look out the window at the backyard.

“What a winter,” I say.
“Yeah,” she says.
“When was the last time the lake didn’t freeze over?”
“I don’t know. I can’t remember.
“Almost over now…”

I’m looking at the backyard, and I’m not thinking anything. The grass and the wooden fence. Other folks’ houses, folks I don’t know. There’s a bird on the fence I don’t know what kind of bird it is. The sun is shining shining yellow on the grass. It’s caked on the window between some strange shadow-play with a tree and its leaves. There’s a buzzing in my pocket. Cindy’s picking up a bottle of liquor, wants to know what I want. Whiskey, I say, or rum maybe – I don’t know. Whatever’s fine with me.

“How was school?” I’m sitting in the recliner, where dad used to read novels.
“School was OK.”
“Did you learn anything?”
“Umm… I don’t know. I got my history test back.”
“And…”
“I got a one hundred.”
“Jesus, again. Good job.”
I shake my head and watch Mario, Mario, my God this fucking guy what is it about him? Jumping on bad guys and moving forward in life. Forever reaching for the goal, the princess. What Liam doesn’t learn is how the game would change after they fuck. How convenient for the princess to always be captured again and again – forever chasing a princess, what a heavenly life.
“Man, I used to love playing Mario,” I say. “Back on the old Super Nintendo. I had a ton of Mario games. I should pull that out sometime.”
He’s immersed, and there’s nothing doing on the chair, in the living room, in the kitchen, nothing doing anywhere, so eventually I head towards the basement. How many seconds and minutes I spend just sitting on that chair though, mindlessly watching the front windows and Mario jumping on bad guys and moving forward in life I don’t care to admit honestly, but isn’t that how it goes. Mindlessness is like a disease like the flu or like sneezing – we sit down until we get up.  We lay down until we get up, and when we get up well I head toward my room down there and I get on the computer, check my e-mail, check facebook. Some old friends are starting a new term at school, someone wishes winter would be over makes me think this is the mildest winter the east coast has experienced possibly ever, at least in my life – find another excuse to complain. Someone else is obviously making a declaration to someone specific via an indirect “If you’re going to do X, then you should Y before you Z, bitch” kind of wall posting. My buddy Eric posted on my wall, says he saw The Killers down in Virginia made him think of me – that’s sweet. I pick up my copy of “Madness and Civilization” by Foucoult and read a paragraph, then I put it down and hit up the freezer by the stairs. There’s one fudgsicle left; it’s mine. I’ve always loved fudgsicles. I throw the wrapper to the garbage, but I miss, because it was too light, so I bend over pick it up and drop it in – suddenly I have to use the toilet. I hold onto the fudgsicle between my lips as I sit down in the basement bathroom there’s a mirror attached to the shower door so I can see myself. Even as a little boy I found this strange. There’s a buzzing in my pocket Cindy’s telling me I can come over whenever I want in order to text back I hold the popsicle stick with my teeth biting down and say OK – I’ll head out soon, probably, and do you want to catch Hugo at the dollar theatre? Now I’m sitting and time of course passing as strangely as ever – I glance at my reflection, and I don’t know what I should be thinking it just feels weird, so I stop. The fudgsicle’s tasty. I’m not thinking anything. Cindy says that’d be fun she’s feeling restless and horny. The fudgsicle’s gone I gnaw on the bare stick. “I’ll make sure the movie’s pleasurable” I text. I wipe a little bit, which I imagine no one wants to know, and when I stand up the toilet is full of shit. Whoa I don’t even remember shitting! How did that get in there? That must be a metaphor for something. Weird. I check showtimes and read some more Madness and Civilization in my bed. There’s footsteps outside my room, someone opening the freezer, footsteps back up the stairs. Foucoult is on about Renaissance culture subverting the attitude towards death. Artworks involving “crazy” people, Hieronymous Bosch. Once death was something to long for and then it was something to fear, but either way you look at it life is strange, and madness ever subverts order, or something like that. I could have it backwards… The moon is half full. Streetlights, shadowy streets, I’m whizzing through the air on a bicycle. I’m with a lot of my old friends, guys I hardly talk to anymore who I haven’t seen in ages. Chad is leading the way I believe we’re going to a whore house. It’s drizzling. The half-moon is just radiant. All I want to do is look at it, but there are cars about and I have to pay attention and soon enough I’m in a glass chamber. There’s this girl I had a big crush on in the seventh grade all dressed in a white, knitted sweater with fuzzy strands sticking out of it and black panties. Red hair red lipstick.

“It’s been too long”, she says. “I’ve missed you.”
“You have?” I ask.
She nods her head.
“I didn’t know you cared about me.”
“I do. I have. Some people you meet and you never forget… I never knew your true value until I experienced more of the world. More people.”
“I loved you.”
“I know. I was blind. You were a true friend, and I didn’t know what I had.”
“But I stopped. Loving you. I haven’t missed you. I don’t even think of you much.”
“I understand. What else could you do? And even now that love you felt is still so remote. I can feel it. Your heart is surrounded by distance. But please. If you care about me even a little bit still, please. Fuck me. Before we talk too much. It’s the only way to begin us, which my heart needs. Please. Aaron.”
Her lips are parsed and her eyes are sad, full of hope and desperation. I lift her sweater slowly my cock already full of something that’s so hard, something I’ve never felt quite like this before. My breathing intensifies, my heartbeat is quicker – tremendously fast. Each pound vibrates through my skin, and there is her, her, her, Jennifer.
She whispers in my ear, “I am yours” – the vibration on my neck means the same thing to me as the words. “Fuck me now…” Her panties are off – she’s all there. “More,” she says. “More. I want more of you. Give me more.”
I’m giving her my all all that hardness I’m afraid there won’t be anything left. My whole body is thudding vibrations thudding to my heartbeat like a drummer hitting a gong.
“Open your eyes,” she says, and suddenly my eyes are open and I realize that I don’t ever need to stop. I am in complete control. I can experience as much pleasure as I want for as long as I want, so I lift her up and open my chest up rolling my shoulders back and she screams in uncontrollable ecstasy. I’m not sure if it’s the scream or our maneuvering but the glass chamber shatters and we fall fall into stabbing glass and nothingness, or somethingness but I can’t tell what it is. We are full of glass, and I am inside of her – the pain blends into the pleasure. “Come,” she says. “Come inside me right now, and you’ll become a father.” I’m about to come, it’s so close rising through me, and I don’t know what will happen – the future has never seemed so dependent on the present, and suddenly I’m lying in bed. I’ve got a boner. What time is it? The movie starts in an hour. I rub myself. I… I want to come but it’s not the same. It felt so real. I rub myself just to the point of no return and stop. Cindy. Cindy. Uggh. I get dressed in black corduroy pants and a t-shirt that says “I (heart) New York”. Deodorize my armpits. Brush my teeth throw on my jacket. Up the stairs and Elise asks, “Where are you headed?”

“I’m going to see a movie with friends.”
“Can you pick up some groceries?”
“Sure what do you need?”
“Bread, onions, butter. We’re out of fudgsicles. I think that’s it.”
“You want me to pick up fudgsicles?”
“Here, here’s twenty bucks.”
“Keep it. Just uh… Shouldn’t we be on a budget?”
“We’re out. Liam wants some. He says he didn’t get to have hardly any.”
“Right. Sure thing. I’ll be back later.”
“Bring the groceries back today, yeah?”
“OK. See you later, Liam.”
“Bye, Uncle Aaron.”

III – The Morning Of

That’s a cardinal. A cardinal… There aren’t any red birds I don’t… Any other hm… In the Japanese… The what is it? Breakfast. Uh… That tree? Shit. These people… These people I don’t know I don’t know. Do they know Jesus? If I could just ask, if I could ask them, but I can’t. I can’t I can’t I can’t. It’s. It’s too dangerous. I can’t I try but I open my mouth and and. And. Jesus Christ you you are the love you are so… So inside of me but you’re not… You’re not… God damn! God damn! God damn evil!  Evil! I’m breathing. I’m breathing heavy. I can’t breathe I can’t… Where is she? I don’t know. I should stop I should stop. Stopthis this, this… Breathe that out, I breathe… I breathe that out. Hm? Hi, Sue, hi. Sue? Sue Sue uh uh, Seh Seh Sabrina, hi. No, I just. Eh. Heh heh! Yes. No, it’s nothing. Thank you, dear. OK, now. OK. She’s nice. She’s nice. Maybe I could talk, talk to her maybe. Yeah. But… She may not… understand. About the evil, not everybody understands. No no you just can’t tell somebody can you, no. So many people, so many… Hm. Jesus do you, is it true you speak to them all? If only they listened. If only… It’s so, it’s so, it’s so, the light is so… You are the light, you are, but it’s so dark. So dark. There is one way to Heaven, just one way, and I just don’t understand. When he tore down the veil the curtain. Matthew, Mark. Paul. Peter. Peter. Heaven… Heaven was then… for everyone. The spirit was all around, the Holy Spirit. It’s all around us. He tore it down. The church! The LIES! The LIES the LIES. They’re LIES! People don’t see, they don’t see. I… No, thank you, no. Water. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. That’s very kind, very kind. Wait, wait, do you… Um… Uh. Jesus. Uh huh… And heaven. They tore it down, he tore it down. I mean He tore it down, you see. Do you know? Wait. That tree, uh. I point. I point. The tree. Do you… Do you. Japanese Maple. Japanese Maple… It’s gone… Cardinal… Oh. OKAY! OK, now! Thank you! Japanese… That’s neat. Neat… God… God is so so full of, of neat… Neat things, neat things. Neat things. People don’t know God I don’t… I don’t think people really… So… No. I don’t think… They’re neat, though, I think. They are neat, very neat, so it’s all… Heh. Yeah yeah. Yes. It’s all… I can’t say. I can’t show, I can’t. That’s not me, not me… Who can. Who can, who can, who can say… things. Who says the things. I don’t know how. I don’t know how. But I KNOW. I KNOW. I don’t know how, but I KNOW.. It’s real! It’s REAL by God! I KNOW I KNOW the truth. I can’t say it, but it’s… It’s there. The kingdom. The kingdom of Heaven, it’s. It’s all over. It got torn down! The veil! Ripped open! And it pours, it pours in, in. In… In. Into. I don’t… I don’t have that. I can’t say that! I can’t! I don’t know how! I don’t know how… But… I, I, I wish I could. I wish I could… Did I eat breakfast? I don’t know. Yes, yes, I did, I ate breakfast. Breakfast. Oh yes I remember. Yes. Before, I did, thank you. Oh? Oh OK, OK. Yes. Uhh… Heh. Hi. Hello. Me? How…? I… Heheh, you… You tell me. Do I know? Sure, sure I know. You’re… I know. Heh. I know. You’re an angel. Sh, sh, sssshhhh, sh, sh. I know… Ssshhh… I won’t say, I won’t say. Your name? You don’t, no. You don’t, heheheh! I know. I don’t know you tell me. I want to… Will you tell me? Please. Am I? I don’t know, I don’t how I am. I don’t want… I don’t want to say. I can’t say that. Will you tell me? Will you tell me, because… I know… I know that. You can’t lie. You won’t do that, so… Would you please? I just want to know. Sometimes I wonder, because… Because I know about the evil. Oh! Heheheheh! My cheek, my… You’re… you’re sweet. I know. And I know that, it’s just. The evil, it’s. It’s…so…so…Oh. I’m crying. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. You can’t stay. You can’t. You can’t stay. You have to, you have to go. You have to go now, now, now, NOW! GO! Don’t… No, no, don’t… Get OUT! I’m sorry… I’m sorry…It’s good, it’s good for you. It’s good for you. It’s me. It’s me. I know all about the evil. You came… You came in the kingdom, with… and I can’t…I can’t…I’m sorry. OK. OK, bye now. Bye now. OK. OK. OK. It’s good. That’s neat. An angel, a real. Heh. Whew. That’s neat. That’s… That’s a good thing. A real angel. Ooohhhh… Wow… The sun… The sun, the sun. The sun. Ooohhh… Wow.

IV – That Evening

Smells like Pine Sol. Rubber gloves, SOS pad, bucket of soapy water. This bathroom is filthy. I don’t even know… what this shit is. Behind the toilet. In the shadows…Just. Gunk. Disgusting. When I’m done with this I really should go right downstairs and clean the other one. God knows when the last time was that the bathrooms were cleaned. Whenever I cleaned them last, and I don’t… Ugh. Maybe last summer. Jheez. Maybe August. I don’t know. Nobody cleans but me. Right – Men don’t clean, that’s right. It’s like… that’s just something they just don’t care about. Different hearts, different priorities. Hearts are different. God knows girls can be filthy as sewer rats too. Different hearts different priorities. Truth. But some things just need fucking done. Different priorities can only go so far! Houses need to be clean. Am I crazy? I don’t think so. I really don’t! Hahaha! Maybe a little, but come on, really. House of filth, soul of filth, mind and body, etcetera. I think that’ll do. Back there. That mark’s not coming out. Ohkaayy… Well. Hm. Oh shit, the phone.

In the kitchen, out of breath: “Hello?”
“Hey, ‘Lise.”
“Weennddyyy, hey!”
“How are you doing?”
“Good… Good. I was just cleaning. You know – if I don’t do it nobody will.”
“Oh tell me about it. The other day – ”
“The sun’s almost set – what time is it?”
“Ummm – ”
“I need to make some dinner.” What can I make? Liam needs to go to bed soon. How did I forget?
“Oh well I can call back another time. I just wanted to say hi. I’ve missed you.”
“It’s fine. I can talk. I’ve got some burgers thawed. I can cook and talk. How are you?”
“Same old same old. Derek’s getting ready to go back to Afghanistan.”
“Already?”
“Yeah. It went by too fast.”
“When does he leave?”
“Sunday morning.”
“This weekend! You should have had a party or dinner or something.”
“Yeah. I mentioned it. He didn’t want anything like that.”
Damn, that’s too much oil. Too late now – won’t hurt it. Afghanistan. The war should be over I don’t get it. But what do I know? Are we out of bread completely? Is there any in… God damn it Aaron! Probably won’t be back until the morning. I should have gone myself that was stupid.
“How’s Dan? …What?”
“What?”
“You made a sound like – maybe not everything’s OK.”
“Define OK.”
“Like things are bad.”
“He’s unhappy. Not that he was ever a happy-go-lucky guy.”
“(Hahaha) No.”
“That’s all. Things are pretty much the same. One sec. Liam! Will you go downstairs check to see if there are buns in the freezer? OK I’m back.”
“And Aaron, is he… going back to school or… Does he have a plan yet?”
“No. I don’t know. He’s pretty aimless. He’s got some buddies in San Francisco he wants to visit or maybe move there. I just don’t want him to cycle back, y’know?”
“Yeah… Is he still seeing  that girl?”
“Yeah, he’s probably with her right now.” (Doing God knows what, but I have a pretty good idea too). “I can’t say too much right now.”
“I understand. He should have never dropped out – he was real bright.”
“Oh yeah, his mind’s all wrapped up in brightness. In his own way he’s a lot like our dad, but an atheist. His church is a pill that he could swallow. Literally.”
“Seems like we all go through something like that.”
“Yeah.”
“I sure did, but… in my own way. How old is he now, twenty?”
“Yep!”
“I was pretty wild then. ”
“Oh I know. Me too. Everybody has their phases. I just wish they’d pass a little quicker sometimes… Thanks.”
“What?”
“Nothing I was talking to Liam.”
“How’s he?”
“He’s… fine. Healthy. Hey I got to let you go though I’m almost done with dinner.”
“OK. Well give me a call. We should hang out some time.”
“I will. I will. Give Derek my best, OK?”
“I will. OK. Bye Elise.”
“Bye Wendy.”
Click. Whooo, OK…This is almost done. It’s still a little pink. “Liam food’s almost ready set the table!” Tomorrow before work I’ll drop Dan off then I’ll go to that law office, Eat’N'Park, Applebee’s, T.G.I. Friday’s…Maybe I should wait until Anne’s working to go there. Where else? Mcgarrey’s. That coffee shop on State. I hope that’ll be OK, for now. I should go around the bars. “OK do you want an apple or a banana with your burger?”
“Apple.”
“Hold on I’ll get it, just one second. Here you go. Here’s some ketchup.” We’re running low on ketchup… “Here’s an apple. Let me know if you’re still hungry after.”
“Are you eating?”
“Not right now, honey… What’d you learn today?”
“Ummm… We talked about… I can’t remember. We talked about explorers.”
“Oh yeah? What explorer?”
“Magellan. He was the first one to go around the world. But he didn’t actually make it all the way around, because he was speared by an Indian. And most of his crew died.”
“They were killed by Indians?”
“No. Some of them were, but… they died from something called… I can’t remember. It’s like hunger. Or when food’s bad you get it. Oh man! I can’t remember. This is really good, mom.”
“Thanks.” You don’t even know what really good tastes like.  Oh I should text Anne: “when do u work next so i can swing by then?”
“Where’s Dan?”
“He’s working late, honey.”
“Oh. That’s cool.”
I hope tonight’s OK. I really don’t want to deal with him tonight. Hopefully we’ll just watch TV, fuck, and go to sleep. God knows when Aaron will come home, if he’ll come home. This isn’t good. If he’s drunk and Aaron’s not here. I hope I don’t have to put up with his shit. God…
“Do I have to go to sleep? It’s only eight.”
“Eight fifteen. What do you want to do?”
“Play more Mario.”
“What if I want to watch TV?”
“We could watch TV.”
“Is your homework finished?”
“Yes, I told you.”
“Are you finished?”
“Mhm.”
“Put your plate in the dishwasher. I’ll clean up. Why don’t you check what’s on.”
Hot water makes a crater in the grease, erodes it slowly off the pan. The sun is set, the last of its colors linger in the sky. Cyan, I think that’s cyan. Or… teal-ish. Magenta, pink. It’s beautiful. The budding leaves are faintly silhouetted. Spatulas are such a bitch to clean in between their little gaps, and the tips always melt. I need a better spatula.
“Avatar’s on if you want to watch that.”
“Sure. Cool.” I melt into the recliner I love this recliner. Prince Zuko’s alone in the Earth kingdom.We’ve seen this episode before I believe…
“Mom, wake up!”
“What? Ahh I must have dozed off.”
“Dan’s home.”
“What time is it?”
“Almost nine thirty.”
“It is way past your bed time. Go to bed right now.” Headlights glowing outside the front window.
“It’s friday!”
“Now.” He’s off. The sound of a car door slamming. Headlights moving away. Was I dreaming? Something about Jack in a tuxedo – I can’t remember. Why am I dreaming about Jack, the bastard. The door swinging, those brown boots, dirty hands. “Hey, Dan.”
“Hey.”
I move to the kitchen. “Are you hungry? Do you want anything to eat?”
“I ate at McDonald’s. We don’t have any food.”
“I made Liam a burger. There’s another in there thawed if you wanted it.”
“You can have it. What are you up to? Find any places?”
“I’m gonna go tomorrow and apply at some places. Restaurants. A law office down at 4th and French. I figured I’d drop you off in the morning and go around before work.”
“What about Aaron? Can’t you use his car?”
“He’s out tonight.”
“Is he working tomorrow?”
“I’m not sure.”
Shakes his head. Opens the fridge pulls out a beer, opens it, ktsch, gulps. The fridge door slowly clicks back.
“Did you even ask him?”
“Who?”
“Aaron.”
“Ask him what?”
“If you could use his car.”
“Well I might have. He’s supposed to come back tonight.”
“But he won’t… Ask him. I like having my car.”
“Joey’s our neighbor, you’re together all – ”
“That’s not the point. You didn’t even ask him. You don’t ask him for anything. He’s a freeloader.”
“That’s not entirely true.”
“I like having my car if I can help it. It’s my car. I don’t like not having it. If you need it that’s FINE. But Christ there’s another one.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I’ll text him. If he doesn’t come home I’ll have him pick me up in the morning.”
He just drinks his beer.
“Dan.”
“Huh?”
I sit in his lap, caress his cheek, left hand on his thigh. “I’m sorry about that.” He nods. His skin is firm, he needs a shave, jeans are torn and dirty. He finishes his beer. I whisper in his ear, “Let’s go to the bedroom. You’ve had a long day.” Then he’s kissing my neck and leaning into me I’m pushing backwards nearer to the pillows. Go in don’t tease me. His fingers ahold of my thigh so close, so close… He smells like beer I don’t mind the smell is kind of arousing to me these days. He’s unzipped, and he pushes in, his cheek against my cheek, Oh! I gasp, he whispers in my ear, “Do you like that, whore?” I can’t speak. No. “You’re such a fucking slut. You’d like anyone in here, anyone who could take care of you. You just like me ’cause of my cock, don’t you? Don’t you, whore?”
“Shut up, Dan, you’re drunk.”
“Don’t you!” He pushes all the way in and stops. “You and your good-for-nothing brother. Bastard kids. Eh? Why don’t you get someone richer? Eh? Why don’t you get someone richer? ‘Cause you love it. It’s the best you’ve ever had.”
“Get the FUCK out of me!”
“You love it!”
My vagina freezes, my body fixes in hardness. I feel a tear running down my face. “You’re not a man. I don’t know what you are. And I don’t want to know.” He fucks me even harder, and I dig my nails into his cheeks as piercing as I can, and he screams. His penis slips out of me and my pelvis jumps away from his. He smacks my hands away. “Cunt!”
“Get out.”
“Jesus! No one else would want you, that’s why! Fucking whore!” He holds his cheeks.
“Get out of my house.”
He looks at me at me a look I’ve never seen before in my life. There’s nothing there, nothing I recognize anymore. His left hand’s rubbing his thing, his right hand’s in a fist. The baby’s crying, but I can’t get to her yet. She’s outside of this look, thank Heavens, but I am not. I’m glad I didn’t drink tonight or God knows where I’d be in that nothing. I do have a pretty good idea of what’s going to happen next though. Next comes the tough change.

V – Another Night

I’ve stopped crying. I don’t know what to say. Someone’s riding a bicycle. The McDonald’s is lit up. It’s really bright. There’s people in there. It’s twenty-four seven. Red brake lights, red stop light, the sky is black, the stars…What is this feeling this passenger seat feeling? It’s overwhelming. Seems like no one knows about this either this overwhelming feeling or at least no one talks about it. Seems like no one ever talks about their feelings I mean the real feelings. I don’t know what to say I have something, something to say but… Uncle Aaron’s bruise shimmers under the glow of the streetlight, purple glistening – specks of blood, a bright red cut on his lip. Shines, darkens, shines, darkens, streetlight, streetlight, another orange phase. There’s houses houses with yellow lit-up porches and lit-up windows so many houses I mean how is this all not overwhelming? Don’t cry. Don’t cry… Everything seems so plain to people, but everything seems so… overwhelming to me. House after house, restaurants. There’s the big cemetery, all dark no lights with the stone sign, “Calvary”. A motel, bars. He turns right into a neighborhood. Where are we going? I don’t ask. He’s quiet, completely. I’ve never seen him so quiet. What is this place? An orange street light hangs over a small dirt parking lot shaped like a thought bubble. We stop. He gets out, quietly. I follow him to the edge of the parking lot.
“Watch your step,” he says and hands me his lit-up cell phone. They’re wooden steps, a lot of them. I can hardly see a thing, and some of them are at angles, and some of them dip, or are broken. Good thing there’s a hand railing. We’re surrounded by trees. There are some houses in the trees I can make out just a few around us. We reach a landing, a wooden walkway that runs perpendicular to the stairs and goes on farther than I can see. “These are peoples’ summer homes. No one’s living here now. They probably won’t come for another month or two.” I hear the lake. We keep walking down steps. Whoa! Whew. I nearly fell. Oh, the earth, sand. There’s a wooden fence lined with green plant-life. We walk through an opening in that, and we’re on a beach. He climbs onto a man-made stone jetty that juts out over the lake, and I follow. We sit down at the edge, together. He’s quiet, and I don’t know what to say. There’s just the lake talking, hushing, whooshing, ssshhh’ing, fuf, shuf, fuf, shuf, and the moon a silver half-moon shining rays glowing out from it. A few stars. Fuf, shuf, fuf… “I’m glad you called,” he says.
“You are?”
“Yes. He’s gone now, and he won’t be coming back.”
“Good.”
“Your mom’s gonna be OK.”
“I know.”
“She just needs sleep.”
“Uncle Aaron?”
“Yeah?”
“What happened?” I shake my head. “Wh… Why?”
“I don’t know, Liam.” His voice chokes. He’s breathing heavy I’m breathing heavy our breathing blends into each other into the lake, fuf, shuf… “I don’t know why people do what they do. People… fuck up.” He’s crying. “I don’t know why. I wish I could tell you, but I don’t… I don’t know why. He’s a bad man. He doesn’t love.” He’s sobbing. I’m crying too. I don’t know why. I put my arm around him. I hold him. He cries even harder. “I’ve fucked up too. People do that sometimes. Before you called Cindy told me tonight she doesn’t think I can fall in love, and… I don’t know. I just can’t keep fucking up.”
“You can fall in love. Anybody can fall in love!”
“I don’t know what that means these days.”
“I love you, Uncle Aaron.”
“I love you too, Liam. I love you more than anything right now.” He means it. I know that. We both sniffle, and our crying slows. I don’t know what to say I… don’t have anything to say. We’re quiet for a while just watching the lake.
“Wouldn’t it be cool,” I say, “to get an oxygen tank and explore the lake?”
He chuckles. “Yeah, that’d be pretty cool. Or get a boat. A boat would be nice.”
I nod my head. He straightens his back, so I straighten mine, and we both look out at all the water stretching back into the darkness, fuf, shuf’ing towards us again and again. I feel like the future’s more real than it’s ever been, but more distant too. The present is so enormous, so overwhelming, and the past and the future are off somewhere in the water, in the night, under the moon. Our feet dangle over the water. I’m picking up good vibrations…She’s giving me excitations… Kick, kick! I start to sing I’m picking up good vibrations. She’s giving me excitations. I’m picking up good vibrations. She’s giving me excitations. Good good good… Good vibrations… He sings I… love the colorful clothes she wears… and the way the sunlight plays upon her hair… I hear the sound of a gentle word… Something something something something something… We both sing, I’m picking up good vibrations… She’s giving me excitations. I’m picking up good vibrations. She’s giving me excitations. Good! Good! Good! Good vibrations! Kick, kick, kick, kick! He kicks with me, kick, kick!

In those days I was thinking a lot about an idea for a novel I had called “The Gateway”*. On this particular night, as I was listening spiritedly to the music, I spent even more energy thinking about what the word ‘gateway’ means to me. A Gateway, I imagined, is something that you pass through that changes you. It can be anything, though in my novel idea it manifested primarily as a relationship between two teenagers. Throughout my stroll I kept thinking about how much reality there was around me. Countless cars and people walking, buildings with rich histories, statues, so much to perceive and understand. Everything struck me as a potential Gateway.

The sun set completely; dark blue faded into night. Around fifteen minutes deep from Drexel, three blocks past Penn’s campus, I turned down 43rd St., because I wanted to see Sarahjane. At that time she was the object of my heart’s desire, the apple of my eye, and one of my best friends regardless of any potential romantic reality. We were both film majors at Drexel; she, a senior, and I, a junior. We grew close the previous Autumn when I helped her write the screenplay for her senior thesis. It took us longer than it should have to complete the short script simply because we enjoyed each other’s company so much that we found it impossible to stay focussed on our task. After we finished I auditioned for one of the lead roles in the film, not because I had the ambition to act, necessarily, but because I cared about the script so much that I’d rather have given her the option to choose me rather than needing to pick someone who wouldn’t be as good as me. I got the part.

She’d told me once, the night I told her about my feelings, that she wasn’t ready for a relationship. She asked me what I wanted, and I said, “When I’m with you… not much.” She said that maybe after she was finished with her movie she’d be ready for a relationship. When I was walking on 43rd St. and thinking about visiting her, the film hadn’t been shot yet.

About a half a block away from her house a man approached me from behind and diagonally to my right. I saw in my peripheral vision that he was black and looked poor, and instantaneously I feared that he might want to mug me and steal my ipod. For a moment I regretted my choice to listen to music.

“Sh’oo’me’an,” I heard him say faintly under the roar of Free Energy’s electric guitars and drums. I took my headphones out and nervously shoved them in my pocket as I continued walking at a steady pace.

“Excuse me,” he continued, following me.

I slowed but continued walking, tilting my cheek and chin just slightly to acknowledge his presence and show him that I was listening.

“You want some stuff, you want a DVD player, TV? I got electronic stuff,” he said.

I stopped and turned my right shoulder and right leg to face him. He held a white plastic bag full of some bulky electronic stuff in front of him. His feet were planted on the edge of the street, mine on the sidewalk. Already shorter than me, he had to tilt his neck a bit so we could speak face to face. He wore a heavy brown jacket and torn and faded, baggy jeans.

“I…” I began to respond but wasn’t sure exactly what to say.

“Ten bucks, man. Ten bucks, you want a DVD player? Just ten bucks.” I shook my head slightly and didn’t say anything. He continued, “You want a TV? Ten bucks.”

“You’ve got a TV in there?” I asked, my voice dripping with skepticism.

“No, man, at my apartment. It’s a nice TV. It’s big. Works fine, just ten bucks, I’ll get it for you.”

“No,” I shook my head. “I don’t want or need a DVD player or a TV. Thank you.”

“Please, man, I need ten bucks. I just need ten dollars is it. I’ll go get you the TV. It’s not far.”

“I don’t want a TV.”

“Come on, man, I really need ten dollars, that’s it.”

“What do you need ten bucks for so bad?”

His face was earnest. He looked at me pleadingly. “I’m trying to get into a clinic for the night. I got to get into a clinic tonight, it’s ten bucks to get in.”

“A clinic? What for?”

“Drugs.”

I paused and thought. My face was pointed down, but my eyes darted up towards my brows to look at him. “What drugs?”

“Heroin, man.”

“Whoof.” my shoulders rolled back.  I immediately thought about this kid I had recently had a conversation with on Sarahjane’s porch swing (the exact spot where she and I’d discussed my feelings, except I was sitting where she had sat). A fellow film major in my year, he saw me sitting alone during a party and looking out at the the quiet residential city night, so he sat down next to me. In the next five minutes he told me about the love of his life, a guy, who had given him his heroin addiction and left him for rehab in California. All he wanted that night, he said, was a fix. I hardly knew him before that conversation. I guess there was something about my presence that spoke to him. After he left I stuck around sitting there, and some time later I saw him leave with a nice girl. That was the first person I ever met with a heroin addiction.

This was the second. I sized him up. Standing directly across from me, his face to my neck, his chest to my ribs. Looking for what? A sign of the truth, of the right thing to do? I was biding my time to realize the direction of my conviction.

“Please,” he said, shaking his head, “I got to get to this clinic. I got a kid, my son.”

“How old is he?”

“He’s ten. He’s in the fourth grade.”

This reality hit me with an empathetic force. Fourth grade, ten years old. I was showing up my class and the fifth grade class at Math 24. The fastest kid in the class at times tables. Next to my best friend, the most complex literacy skills. A big fish in a small pond with a fiercely motivated mother. Fourth grade. Ten years old. I looked him in the eyes, hard.

“Please. If I don’t get into this clinic tonight I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’mah be up front with you, I want a fix right now. I can’t do that. For my kid I can’t do that. I’m trying to change.”

I nodded and started walking, and he followed me. I headed towards Best House Pizza at the end of the block. I still wasn’t fully convinced I wanted to give him any money, but my body moved that way regardless. Passing right by Sarahjane’s place, I noticed a bunch of Sophomore film majors I didn’t recognize transporting film equipment from inside the house to a car outside. The door was open; the living room light was on. I kept walking. We talked during that walk, or… He talked. My eyes were facing forward; my brain was buzzing with uncertain conviction; I can’t remember what was said.

He sat down on one of Best House’s circular metal tables enmeshed with holes. I faced the ATM. It was going to charge me a couple bucks for a withdrawal, more than I expected. Damnit. I couldn’t take out a ten; I had to take out a twenty. Damnit. Am I going to have to buy a slice of pizza just to get change? I was quickly becoming regretful of my decision. I went through with it anyways, thinking: there’s a chance I’ll judge him as deceitful and keep the twenty. This was the first time I’d ever used that particular ATM. A bulky, gray one with a glowing white sign on top with blue letters, “ATM”, it had an annoying plexiglass cover with a metal handle that you had to lift up just to reach the keyboard.

When the machine told me my money was dispensed I couldn’t find it. I reached my hand between the machine and the gray, metal covering, past the keyboard, but I felt nothing. There was another metal handle a couple feet from the sidewalk that opened up a small slot. I reached my hand into that and found a dead-end. What the fuck? I opened the plexiglass and tried again. No go. I knelt onto my knees and opened the metal slot and reached upwards. Nothing. Still on my knees, I tried the plexiglass again. Nope. Once again with the metal slot, and this time with feeling. Yes, there it is, sheesh. I pulled out two twenty-dollar bills. The person who’d used the machine right before me must have just given up in the search for the dispenser. Wow.

I told him what happened and gave him a twenty. He insisted that I take his bag full of electronic equipment. I tried to refuse, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. We crossed the street and stopped in the 34 trolley stop to part ways.

“How will I know if you went to the clinic?” I asked.

“I will, man. I’m going there right now.” He gave me an address for the clinic on 60-something’th and Elmwood or Woodland – I can’t remember.

“Yeah, but. How can I know?”

“…You can’t. That’s just God, a God thing, you know. God’ll send you a sign.”

“Hm…” I nodded. What he said reminded me of Claudell Edwards, the first man I interviewed from the homeless shelter on Girard Ave. and Broad St. for a documentary on homelessness I did for class. Claudell was working at a deli, divorced with two kids, when his place of work shut down. His fruitless job search quickly left him discouraged and penniless. He got into drugs. When I met him he was running with Back on Our Feet and writing for One Step Away, Philly’s first newspaper written about the homeless, by the homeless. He was looking forward to running the 10-mile Broad Street race and enrolling in classes to become a journalist. Throughout the interview I kept coming to a point where something didn’t add up. What motivated him? It wasn’t just his kids, and it wasn’t just his care for himself.

“That extra bit of willpower,” I said, “that pushes you now… when it didn’t before… where does that come from?”

“Oh, I don’t know. To me, that’s God, you know. That’s just God.”

Back on Baltimore, before the man left, I asked him what his name was.

“Kyle,” he said.

We shook hands. “I’m Ian.”

“Ian,” he repeated, nodding. Then he walked west along the northern perimeter of Clark Park. Dazed, I walked north back towards Sarahjane’s place. The Sophomores had gone. I knocked on the door, and no one answered. I turned the knob and found it unlocked, so I walked inside. The lights in the living room, dining room, and kitchen were all on, but no one answered when I called out, “Hello? Sarahjane? Alexa? Anybody home?” I left.

When I crossed Baltimore again there was a young woman standing at the 34 trolley stop. She was wearing dark skinny jeans and a dark hoody. She had a multitude of ear piercings and a lip piercing. Her hair was jet black. I found her attractive, and I felt compelled to make a connection with her, but instead I walked past her, head bowed as though I didn’t notice her. Walking west on the same sidewalk Kyle had just embarked on, I didn’t make it fifteen feet before my uninhibited spirit got the better of me.

“Excuse me,” I said to the girl. “Hi…” She looked up at me. “You’re just waiting for the trolley right? I mean, you’re not busy doing anything else?”

“Yeah…” she said. Her eyes were blue.

“I imagine, like most people standing, waiting for the trolley, you might be very bored. I mean. Whenever I’m standing just waiting for the trolley I’m usually really bored. And… This strange thing just happened to me, and I really feel like I want to share it with someone. I was wondering if you’d care to hear a quick story before the trolley gets here?”

“Sure,” she said, “Better be good…” There was a strange edge to her voice.

I told her the story quickly, intermittently focussing my gaze downwards to concentrate on the details of the story and westward to keep my eyes peeled for the trolley and eastward to see her face. When I reached the end of the story, I said, “He said that I’d see a sign from God, that’s how I’d be sure of myself. And… I don’t really believe in God, but I do believe in omens. I feel like I already saw the sign, or the omen, in the extra twenty dollars, because I didn’t really lose anything by helping him. And that’s it. Then I saw you.”

The trolley’s headlights shone our way from down the street. “Oh. Now the trolley’s here. Perfect timing.”

“That was a good story,” she said.

I looked at her and nodded with a slight grin. “Well. Have a nice night,” I said. Then I turned around and walked away without even asking what her name was.

When I made it home that night I stuck the bag of the electronic stuff in the basement without even bothering to investigate its contents. Then I headed up to my room where I tried writing the story. I put the twenty dollar bill next to my laptop and got to work. But it was too soon. Time was too compressed; I had too much excited energy.

I didn’t see Sarahjane too much before the beginning of her film. She was busy. On the first night of shooting, me and another actor followed the film’s director of photography, Maggie, who was perched in the back of Sarahjane’s dad’s van with a DSLR on a steadicam unit. He and I walked with our bikes for blocks in Fishtown as we pretended that I was confessing that I’d done a low-key heist that went wrong and that I was afraid for my life. It was an intense game of make-believe. At the end of the night when we locked the door to the house we were using for storage we realized we’d locked Maggie’s camera inside, and none of us had a key. Maggie was upset; she was afraid one of the tenants might come home drunk later and knock it over accidentally. We called the tenants. None of them were on their way home anytime soon. We tried breaking and entering, but it didn’t work, plus Sarahjane didn’t approve. We ended up leaving Maggie and the producer there with Sarahjane’s father’s van to keep tabs on the house for when a tenant came home. Then, between 2 and 3 in the morning, the rest of us went back to Sarahjane’s house on 43rd where her mom had prepared dinner.

On the way over Sarahjane expressed her frustration about the night to her father, who was driving. I sat in the seat behind her. He soothed her with tough love, asking her to consider everyone else’s perspective. She quieted and stared out the window. I was watching her through the crack between the chair and the side of the car. I wanted to reach out to her, to hold hands. I admired her ability to curb her frustrations and remain level-headed. As we neared her house, her producer, Laurel, called. Apparently, she’d driven the van to a nearby McDonald’s to use the bathroom. On the way there she got into an accident. She was OK, but damage had been done. She was crying. At this point no one really knew what to think or how to feel. We were all just there and in it, swirling.

Over egg plant parmesan and pasta I was able to catch Sarahjane’s ear for a while. I told her I wanted to tell her a story that might entertain her in this confusing moment. I told her about Kyle. The twenty dollars. Her empty house. The girl at the trolley stop. “Wow,” she said when I was all finished. She smiled and told me that she enjoyed the story. She seemed genuinely relaxed.

A couple weeks later, we shot my last scene of the movie. All I had to do was pretend to die. On the drive over to Fishtown I listened to “Beat Connection” and “Yeah” by LCD Soundsystem on my ipod. I marveled at the highways full of cars, the hotels and huge apartment complexes full of lights and people, the city skyline. Philly. When we got there they put fake blood on me and made it look more or less like I could have been dying. Then I lay down on the street and tangled my feet up in a bike. I tightened my jaw. Sarahjane yelled, “Action!” My gut convulsed, tightening; my eyes bulged, and my breathing started and stopped sharply. My middle finger twitched. Pain. My face grimaced. Pain. My face grimaced again, and then it relaxed. Dying. I looked at the moon glowing behind a thin cloud. Dying. I looked sideways at my blood on the road. Dying. I’m about to die. This is my blood. Everyone has blood. Everyone dies. My eyes welled with tears, and my breathing relaxed. I inhaled. I inhaled again, and my eyes relaxed. I stopped breathing. My heart beat on. “Cut!” Then we did it five or six more times. Afterwards I was high on life. I felt as though I’d passed through a Gateway.

Back at her place I drank wine with her mom and dad and roommate and listened to their stories about Sarahjane’s childhood. I soaked it up. I could have listened to them all night long. Eventually, though, her dad offered me a ride home and I accepted. Sarahjane and I stood together, just inside her front door, as we waited for him to bring the van up to the front of the house. She told me about how she’d really like to make a cover of “Home” by LCD Soundsystem, one of my favorite songs. As she was telling me how if she ever did that she would want me to collaborate with her, I cut her off, saying, “I love you.” To this day I doubt I’ve spoken words more confidently in my whole life. She looked up at me and said, “I love you too… but not romantically.”

I nodded. ”That’s cool,” I said. “That’s fine. I mean… Our relationship began creatively, that’s the nature of it. It would be hard to change that. I mean, we should just keep being creative.” It’s amazing how quickly our hearts will adapt to accept whatever we can get. The truth is, I couldn’t (and still can’t) imagine my life without her presence, in some magnitude or another. My love for her is real, regardless of what tangible behaviors, lifestyle choices or creations derive from it.

A couple months later, during the summer, I was walking to the trolley stop at City Hall from my internship at the Philadelphia Inquirer on North Broad St. when I came across a peddler for the One Step Away newspaper. Since shooting the documentary I’d made a habit of buying new editions of OSA whenever I came across them. He and I chatted for a minute; then I gave him a buck and went on my way. I started reading it on the trolley. The main article was about Claudell Edwards. He’d just moved into his first home since becoming homeless. The article had a big picture of him sitting on the stairs leading up to his apartment, smiling. As I read the article, surrounded by fluorescent-glowing, silent strangers in a dark underground tunnel, my eyes welled up with tears.

Philly love has the strangest way of manifesting.

*You can find my “Gateway” writings from that time period that I published on this blog here:
Chapter 1: http://www.indiegesis.com/2011/03/the-gateway-chapter-one-a-paw-in-my-face-this-makes-the-other-two-chapters-2-3/
Chapters 2 & 3: http://www.indiegesis.com/2011/02/the-gateway-a-progress-in-work/
A Piece about my creative process while obsessing over Gateway characters: http://www.indiegesis.com/2011/02/running/

Dad. In your sexuality and food and desire
for money, everything makes sense.
Everything. Religion and will power.
Everything is, and you’re alive, therefore freedom
isn’t even something to wonder about.
Its lack is the limit to your happiness.
A given, a part of life.
For some reason I’m not aware of
I cannot stop abstractly questioning
if I’ve found the limit to my happiness.
Thoughts, thoughts, thoughts.
I love you. Dad.
I would take care of you in the end.
But I’m grateful you’re getting married
knowingly lovelessly. Maybe
you don’t think I’d take care of you, or maybe
you don’t want me to, or maybe you’re just in it
for the time passing and the sex. Maybe you think
it’s the right thing to do. God only knows. Regardless,
I’ll take advantage of the opportunity to be selfish and take
extra care of myself, because everything is,
and I’m alive. 

There’s yeah yeah yeah
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah being
overwhelmed and not in control
dancing the chaotic
wild if you can
call that dancing.
When you’re not expressing
anything, but you are reflecting
some universal truth, namely,
that you’re going to die,
and how strange it is to be alive.
Like who’s to say I can’t or shouldn’t
become completely unraveled?
Certainly not me.
Certainly not anything
wild and free.

There’s containment.
Ear awareness.
This is harder to poeticize.
But like
a turtle swimming
around your nearest
lampshade (take a look),
now follow the
lines I’m pushing
and relax, that’s eye
awareness.
Now do that with your ears.
Light time-passing, like
the music can’t hurt you, nothing
can hurt you, because you’re
just light on a body, just
light and a body, a
sound lantern.

There’s phone conversations for
no particular reason but to hear
the sound of their voice and
pass the time in
loving company.
Apparently
that’s not music…?

There’s glorious silence
all around us all
the time. There’s
God and all Its
manifestations
in strange arrangements,
which we rediscover
in good times that
roll.

Where do all the metaphors go
when we’re not identifying with them?
Do they blend seamlessly into each other
in the infinite sea of God,
or do they just disappear
like fireflies into the night?
All the metaphors are a flash
of heat lightning over the ocean.

Hold my hand.
Hold my hand is this holy land.
I don’t need you to understand,
understand?