Anthology Complex IV by M.B. Julien - HTML preview
Download the book in PDF, ePub, Kindle for a complete version.
¶ Sometimes when this place gets kinda empty, there is a sound that it has. You can only hear it if you listen, and even then you have to know what you're listening for. It always makes me think of Celladoor when there are no waves. Just silence in the Milky Way. Just a faint sound of water moving. After you get tired of the stillness, a part of you wishes for a tsunami. Or something to remind you that the universe won't always give you peace.. Wish I knew what you were looking for. Probably something shimmering and colorful. Am I pretty 175 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
enough? Or will I forever be a victim to the part that is missing from me?
¶ I only want to be with you. I love you. Why won't you let me tell you this? Even if you don't say it back I want you to know how I feel about you. I love you so much, from the bottom of my heart and with all of my heart. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. In sickness or in health, I will endure it all because we are meant to be together.. I love you.
I heard her make a sound and shift onto her other side. I quickly put the diary and the key back where I found them and went around over back to the chair to sit beside her.
10 A.M., Friday
After ten minutes I had fallen asleep and began to daydream about insects. When I opened my eyes I was looking directly at a smiling woman. I could do nothing else but smile back.
I blinked from the still daydream and found that the iris of one of her eyes were pirple and the other read, but blinking again they returned to normal.
“Sorry, I couldn't sleep. I was excited to see you. I tried to force myself to stay up but I fell asleep.” “What happened to your cast?” “It wasn't that much of an injury.” “So you can masturbate in public again I see.” She slapped my shoulder. “I told you. For the rest of your life.”
I got up from off the chair and went over to a small bag, pulling out the clothes she asked me to bring her for when it was time to check out. She thanked me after I handed it to her and I asked her if she knew that her doctor's name was Dr. Sylvenstein. “Yeah! I know! I almost laughed when I first talked to him.” Looking through the bag she kept laughing, and I think her persistent laughter hindered her from finding what she was looking for. As she went for the bathroom, she continued to laugh, saying, “because I keek-eh dey bawl to maek goal.”
When she was gone, I looked in the direction of her diary but didn't take the risk of reading more. Instead I waited, waited, waited, and eventually she came out in Mysterious Clouds, the red and purple clouded dream of a dress she showed me a while ago. Again, I blinked; the white part of her eyes, one was crimsonelle, the other lavendelle, and blinking again her eyes returned to normal.
She came back towards me with the bag and took her purse that was beside me, then swung it directly at my body and I felt a hard part bang my rib-cage. “Why???” “That's for yelling at me. Be happy I didn't aim for your face, punk.” She walked away.
Without any hesitation she put her diary and other belongings into the purse and then sat back down on the bed. Something told me she didn't even care if I read it, and yet, as I 176 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
got up and laid on the hospital bed beside her, a part of her slightly flinched, and again, I'm sure she didn't notice.
11 A.M., Friday
“Do you talk to yourself?,” I asked her. “No,” she laughed. She couldn't lie for shit, and that laugh, it was that laugh that told me the truth. When I didn't say anything she looked at me and asked, “Do you?”
I told her that I did. That I had been for a long time now. She began, “I don't ramble, but sometimes I do say things outloud.” That was also a lie, I heard her rambling when I came to give her the flowers. I wonder, why did she have such a hard time admitting it?
She got up from off the bed and while doing so said something about mortal gradients. At the window she looked out and told me about the blue flowers that used to roam these areas and how they all died. Deep autumn.
I got up and stood beside her near the window. “Can you check on my flowers?,” she asked. I told her that I had already been watering them. Down below we saw a man being wheel-chaired out of the hospital by a child and into a car.
12 P.M., Friday
At noon, while church bells rang along the street, time seemed to stand still as I thought about God. “I'm hungry,” she said, and of course I had to go to the cafeteria to find food. The second oldest trick in the book.
As we ate lunch in the room, she began telling me about how one night she was walking around and found a plastic foot in one of the children's rooms; it was off of a doll. She said it made her sad for some reason, and as she spoke about it I saw the gloom come over her face as it finally silenced her. I didn't know how to respond.
“Yu knoe, beck en my 'ome coontree,” I said. She started laughing and cut me off,
“dey caul me 'Duckter Seilverhstein'.” “Because I keek-eh dey bawl to maek goal,” I finished.
She immediately asked me if I could speak in the frenched accent like I did many weeks before, and so for the rest of the hour, we went back and forth trying to communicate over broken French. I'm sure at one point Spanish also found its way in.
177 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
1 P.M., Friday
“What do you like better, 'a soul reaver on a high tide' or 'the soul reaver on the high tide'?,” she asked me. “What is it for?” “A painting. Or, well, concept art for something.”
“...The soul reaver on a high tide.” She laughed; and then she laughed again.
I ask her what the picture is going to look like and she told me it would be based off of some Cell Door Lake. It would be a tsunami storming onto a beach with something spooky at the top of the wave.
She eventually went off on a tangent about how she used to visit the lake all the time when she was younger and how it helped her get through difficult times. She surprised me when she started speaking about how we were not in an unconditional relationship.
She surprised me even more when she said she believed that there was no such thing, and that we were no exception. We were just like everyone else, prone to failure and defeat.
For a while we talked about going back to just being friends. No obligations or anything of the sort. But we both knew that where we were at now, that was unlikely to work. Either we knew eachother or we didn't, there was no middle ground.
After the discussion, she extended her hand out to me and I jokingly shook it, both of us knowing that if we ever met defeat, it would have to be a true sever, both of us out of eachother's lives for good.
2 P.M., Friday
“Sleepless in Atlantis” is a movie about a city where the people never sleep. The city's location is unknown but one clue given in the movie is that it doesn't get dark there until one a.m., meaning it is always a white morning.
Lynne and I were watching the film in her hospital room when over the intercom we received a tornado warning. “We recommend all persons remain in the building until the strong winds recede.” We kept viewing the movie until we witnessed something whack the window nearby, and when we got up to verify the visitor, we saw a very visible and vivacious tree branch dancing violently and wildly in the wind; we watched as it eventually snapped and wandered into a parked vehicle.
The strength of the crash wasn't enough to do much damage, but soon after, we saw another branch break of another tree, and its target, the second floor window of a house, was completely shattered.
This went on for at least thirty minutes, branches snapping off of trees and causing property damage. Lynne told me that this was the exact time Olya went to work every 178 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
day. Again, from there, she went off on a tangent, talking about how her cellmate left and musings on last year's roadtrip through Greenville and the carnival.
3 P.M., Friday
At around three the winds died down and finished passing through our area. Sleepless had finished and, leaving her room, we somehow ended up in the hospital's courtyard. As we walked through it, we saw only three others; a man and his son, and then a tree branch.
Sometime later we both sat down on a bench. I believe by now she was getting tired and just wanted to rest as she said nothing to me. As she looked the other way, I looked over her clothed body, this work of art. Red clouds on a purple sky.
Something was bothering her. I couldn't tell because I'm some kind of psychic with a sixth or seventh sense, I could tell because a butterfly landed on her lap and she didn't notice. I harmed her mentally, in a way that she perhaps thought could never be possible.
So much so that a butterfly split halfway in between red and purple would not make a new color but would become more or less one or the other; Mother of the Hymmoth.
4 P.M., Friday
“Why did you say God doesn't care about me?” She kept staring in the direction away from me, waiting for an answer. “Do you really want to know?” I asked “It's not something a lot of people like to hear...” She didn't answer, but I know she wanted the answer to her question.
“The need to procreate, find love, have a meaningful life, have families, it's all subjective, not objective. These are no universal objective goals for existence. You are socialized and taught that you need them, that that's the way life works. You find a lover and you have children, and you find a purpose to live. But that's an irrational way of thinking which is based almost purely on human instincts, to think that life, the way most humans live it, is the correct way of living and to insult anyone who says existence is ultimately futile. It might sound like a terrible way of thinking, but you'll be better for it at the end of the day. There isn't really any goal, having David and Sarah didn't inch you closer to the goal of humanity.” “But it inched me closer to my humanity,” she interrupted as if she was offended or annoyed. “...As a human being, you see that most people have children, so you think to yourself, 'I should be doing the same thing because I too am a human. We are socialized into believing that society and life works one way.”
179 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
“So Sara and David mean nothing?,” she turned at me angrily. “I didn't say that,” I replied.
A cootishly loon pause flew by. “I don't look at the world the same way you do, Lynne.” “Obviously,” she turned away again.
After a long while of the silent treatment, she began speaking again, “I feel like you rescued me, or saved me, but at the same time sometimes I feel like you're the bad guy.”
… “I know I can be hard to be around, but I don't mean to. I know sometimes I wear you down and you get unhappy. But I... Are you still going to talk to me?”
She thought about it for a while, then finally looked in my direction, at me, saying
“Maybe... Duh. I want to know you... If knowing about objectivity will make me a better person then I want to know about it. What you said sounds depressing though... I'll be the artist, you can be the thinker.” I couldn't tell if she was joking or not as she maintained a serious face.
“I'm not as depressed and angry as I used to be because of you, though. I remember when we were gardening, I remember thinking, you had a reason to be angry but you weren't. And I didn't have any real reason to be angry yet I was. I think a part of me wished I could be like you. I don't know, optimistic,” I admitted. “And look at what being optimistic got me,” she laughed.
5 P.M., Friday
As we walked back to her room, she told me that today was the day she volunteered to help a nurse with a bunch of kids who were going to be drawing things. This inevitably reminded me of the mail of hers I had opened before. When I told her that I had accidentally opened her mail, and told her of the contents inside, she joked, asking me if I was going to yell at her for that as well.
6 P.M., Friday
For most of five p.m. and fifty two minutes of six p.m. I stayed in her room doing random things. She took her bag with her, so I had no way of being nosy with her diary.
By this time the Sun was beginning to set as we entered deeper into fall, and as the days got shorter so did her flowers.
I happened to be in the bathroom when she returned. I heard her call out my name, first slowly, then quickly. When I went back into the room I saw her at the window, and looking back, something calming settled into her face.
180 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
7 P.M., Friday
“Look,” she pointed at her silverside. The kids she visited drew all over her fake foot.
The most distinguished piece of art was a red circle circled by a purple line-circle. When I asked her what it was, she told me it was a “power” button. “I don't get it.” Just then she began to walk rigidly about the room and finally I understood that the children thought she was partially a robot. She told me the entire time was spent obeying orders and doing demands demanded by the kids.
“I'm hungry again,” she said after a while, and after I came back with food from the cafeteria we ate dinner.
8 P.M., Friday
I think we got tired of eachother by eight. Having to have seen eachother's faces since about ten a.m., I decided to watch television on her bed as she sat in a chair near the window looking outside. There was complete silence until from the intercom we heard the message of visitors' hours being over. She turned around and gave me a look, it was like the one before, but the opposite of it.
9 P.M., Friday
I knew I was supposed to be leaving but I didn't. I don't think she would have let me anyway. This is why I was a little surprised when doctor Sylvenstein entered her room and began speaking. Once he noticed that I was there, he stopped and greeted me, remembering me, then telling me that unfortunately, I would have to leave soon.
“Is there anyway that he could stay?,” she asked the doctor, “My husband has been out of town and today is the first day he has been able to see me.” What a fucking liar.
She eventually got the doctor to play nice and he allowed me to stay, saying it would be best if I stayed inside the room. I wonder, what developed between them for her to receive special treatment.
10 P.M., Friday
“If your arm is healed, and you seem better, why did they let you stay? Usually I hear people getting kicked out of hospitals all the time, but you've been here for a while.” “I 181 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
stopped going to my check ups.” “What does that have to do with anything?” For some reason it seemed like she was afraid to answer me; it was either fear or perhaps guilt. She eventually finished by telling me that they found a tumor in her foot, her face accumulating to what was now definitely fear and anxiety.
“Is it benign?,” I asked immediately. “They don't know, that's why they kept me.
They wanted to keep an eye on me.” I could tell she was examining my emotion intensely, almost scrutinizing it.
“But you're leaving soon, aren't you?” “Yes.” “Maybe they don't think it's too bad.” “I don't want to talk about it right now.”
I went over to her near the window, taking a chair, and sat it down right beside her, sitting on it. I grabbed her fleshed foot and placed it on my lap, taking off her shoe then her sock, then slowly began to rub the topside of it.
11 P.M., Friday
About half way between the Yelowe-Art bridge and the Ernest Gate statue, the motor-road hastily joins the railroad and runs beside it for a quarter of a mile, so as to shrink away from a certain desolate area of land. This piece of land is the first to be commissioned for renewal, being followed ultimately by various sections of the city and its neighboring towns.
Her foot now completely naked, I saw that her toes were painted in ice blue midnight nail polish. “Is that what you like?,” she asked me. “What do you mean?,” I asked back.
“Do you like feet?,” this time asking innocently. “Yes,” I replied. I tickled the sole to relax the tension. Once she stopped laughing, I slowly rose, purplishly, up her leg until I reached the scar of her inner leg and began to rub it gently. She became even more relaxed, until I decided to move back and forth faster causing a tickling sensation; her inner thigh was a strange location that was sensitive and ticklish. Eventually she cried for me to stop, so I did, and I took her leg off my lap.
“I like certain things, too,” she said. “Like what?,” I asked. “Afterwards... I like afterwards. I like having sperm in me, walking around knowing it's inside of me, going to sleep knowing I have it inside me. It's more a feeling than a sexual desire, though.” After I didn't answer, she continued, “Oh shut up,” she slapped me on my shoulder, “that's not half as bad as someone who likes feet and scars. Definitely not as bad as someone who has dreams of cutting women's feet off, either,” she winked.
After this we stayed quiet for a while, staring only in front of us, out of the window into a dark night accompanied by sadly dancing trees; under the Milky Way, the residue 182 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
of the winds that passed by here before were still here but in lower magnitude.
12 A.M., Saturday
“It's midnight, let's go to sleep now?” she asked. We got up, myself walking towards the bed and herself walking towards the bathroom. I laid down, waiting for her to finish with whatever she was doing in there, and when she came out she walked over to me and laid directly on top of me. Once I asked her what she was doing, she began singing. It got uncomfortable after a while, having someone sleep on top of you like that, so I sat up and push back up against the wall behind us, and she pushed back up against me and basically sat inbetween my legs, the back of her head resting on my chest. I put my arm around her stomach and could feel the vibration of her singing. As she sang, I cut in to tell her that she got better at it, that she wasn't so bad anymore. She took the compliment, if it was one, and continued to sing.
In her song, she sang about building a gardened theater; singing for millions of people but only I could see her in the intimate way she desired.
“You have to write me a poem, then we will be squared,” she said this after the song.
“Alright,” I said, “but don't expect much.”
She got out of me and laid beside me, then grabbed my arm as she turned away from me and placed my arm around her.
1 A.M., Saturday
Much time passed and I assumed she had fallen asleep, but I was proven wrong when something she said came out with a droopy speech. “I'm afraid of you... I'm afraid of doing something wrong...”
I didn't answer her right away, but after thinking about her crash, after it ran through my mind, the many possibilities, I finally said what I had planned to say since last night,
“Lynne, you have to work less.” … “You have to work less or I can't be with you,” I spoke into her back. It was non-negotiable, an ultimatum that I was well intent on keeping.
At least twenty minutes must have passed, but this time instead of being fooled I knew she was awake every second of that twenty based on the way she was breathing, and on the twenty first minute she broke the silence: Whatever happened to you, I can't fix it. She then fell asleep.
183 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
2 A.M., Saturday
I'm still not asleep. I'm certain by now that I will not fall asleep. I can still hear the sound of the wind outside because the window is still open. Should have closed it. Did something just crawl onto
3 A.M., Saturday
my leg? Better not be poisonous. Probably just the sheets moving. I probably actually shouldn't fall asleep. I don't want a nurse or doctor Silverstein to walk in here and see me... I really do like staring at the back of her head. I wonder what is going on inside of it right now. A far away dream? In a land of portals to countless possibilities...
4 A.M., Saturday
I get up out of bed and leave her there. I find my belongings with a plan to leave the hospital. Before I leave, I take out a twenty year old photo and leave it for her on the table next to her bed. Its imagery and symbolism would bring these words to your mind: Bust, on the west side of a westward tree, a bright green burst of leaves are illuminated in a darkened night, one red leaf among the lush.
I kiss her nose and then exit the room. In the dark parking lot I saw the broken fragments of many tree branches.
5 A.M., Saturday
During the drive back home there were very few drivers and the sky was clear. I thought mostly about whether or not she would work less or decide to discontinue our relationship. Whether she would say no to me just to see if I would actually leave.
6 A.M., Saturday
Just after six, I arrived back home and stood in front of the lightly lit apartment building. I noticed they had re-brightened a nearby street light. The dark blue setting sky reminded me of the passage of time, and time itself's illusory linear progression in what seems to be a forward motion.
Pairing the notion of Newton's third law with the concept of time accompanied by 184 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
M.B. JULIEN
space, we would be left with the end result of time acting upon itself, meaning, as time moves “forward” it also moves “backward.”
Do the past and the future act on eachother to create the present? Is it possible that forwards time and backwards time have equal magnitude, which would then cause a net outcome of zero, making what we know as the present a stable balancing act of pure equilibrium? This would mean time is not going forward, which is the way we as human beings perceive time, but is actually perfectly still, perfectly balanced, between the forward of the future and backward of the past. It is almost as if the future and the past are two atoms that have an equal amount of attracting and repelling, therefore causing motion to be in a state of rest; the product of these two atoms and their apparent motionless being the makings of time itself.
I walked into the building, passing her dying yet lively garden, and I think to myself, if one cannot move backward in time, then there is no merit in regretting what you are.
One could only continue to move forward, fixing only that which one could.
185 | MYSTIC GARDEN II
(2:1 / 4 / IV)
Part 4
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 31
ELEMENT GAME
2:1:4:31
“KEVIN hated the snow. He despised it. I think he had a condition that makes his bones weaker during the winter time or something,” said Chipper. That year, winter came early for the home team, and though they hadn't known it yet, the playoffs came right alongside it.
Their week fifteen matchup was against their division rival who they had lost to during the first week of the season. During that game, David Croft had the task of taping the opponent's sideline and observing their actions, which, today, may or may not pose as an illegal action under the league's technical rules. The footage acquired by Croft, of course, was meticulously studied by Clayton and much of the team's staff and players.
“Red... Right... Eighty-eight!,' yelled the opposing team's quarterback. After Reggie Rice heard these words, he changed foot-stance and optioned for a delayed blitz. The ball is snapped, Rice moves in, circling around a teammate who was locked into a battle with an offensive lineman, cuts under another defender and leaps forward into the unaware quarterback and delivers a punishing blow. The football pops out of his hands and slides backwards into the icy snow, and after a rumble, is eventually recovered by the home team's Boe Tamana.
Croft introduced the idea of “Red Right 88” being a deep ball play, designed to give the quarterback more time for a long play. Rice took note of this and decided that he would listen and pay attention when the play-modifier was called.
“That play, I just knew,” Rice told the interviewer, “I knew it was time for me to blitz. I could feel it. I sensed the passing play and I went in for the hit and caused a fumble. I got really good at reading the count.”
The opposing team's quarterback makes a motion with his hand, one that resembles an “L” with his thumb and index finger, then snaps the ball to begin the play. Quickly, he releases the ball to his leftward side for a slant play but is picked off by the home team's Warren Stacy and returned for several yards.
“Stacy was something of a ballhawk. He could sniff out passes if he was on his game that day, and that day, he was on his game,” replied Rice.
Croft introduced the idea of the “L” signal being some type of quick passing play designed for a third-down conversion, perhaps a slant, toss or a shovel, and Stacy made a mental note of this and watched the quarterback heavily for this sign.
This device was elemental, if not errable, and irony came when the method worked against them. After Croft introduced the idea that the signal of patting one's head meant to reverse the play, Rice observed this during the game and at that moment opted to blitz.
186 | ELEMENT GAME
M.B. JULIEN
The blitz came too late as the quarterback soon passed the ball for a short route which ended in a forty-seven yard run and eventually a touchdown, never knowing that the quarterback made a mistake in calling a play that would earn them seven.
On a slightly cold morning in early October, Javier and Vyncente wait on a sidewalk for their bus to arrive. “I will give you Skelosis for Soothsayer,” Javier said. “Skelosis doesn't even have a power-attack, why would I give you Sooth for him?” “Because this Skelosis is a rare Japanese first-edition.” Vyncente paused, then demanded to see the card. Upon inspection, the trade was confirmed. As Vyncente dug in his pockets to make the trade, Christina walked past both of them and met alongside Pattie.
After completing their secret handshake, Pattie asked Christina if Sara was going to be doing Halloween with them this year. Christina did not have an answer, and at this moment, the bus arrived.
Parking the car in the school's parking garage, Emily shouted at David who had forgotten his lunch in the vehicle. “Thank you G,” and he ran off after Sara.
Inside the somewhat cold school, the first activity of the day included science, where students in groups of five played an element game; simply spell out words using element symbols from the periodic table of elements. After creating a word, students would learn about the elements themselves.
The second activity included a guest speaker. Scott Merils, now a retired officer of the law and Director of Security and Safety at Harvest Moon Hotels, paid the little ones a visit to speak about treating others with kindness and respect, and how to be safe during a fire.
Three or four hours later, it was reading time as Karuna read to half of the class. She read in a lower voice than usual, in a slower speed than typical, and maybe perhaps at least one of the many students knew that she was sad.
After school is let out, and after a quick drive back home, Karuna stops in front of her apartment and thinks for a long while, periodically calling herself names, crying, and describing herself with adjectives meant to touch down deep into a person's insecurities.
These are the unwanted thoughts and feelings that invade a person's mind when they are told that their employer can no longer employ them.
“Yo I'm at Cedric's crib, this nigga got a goat in his house. Nah for real, I ain't even playin'.” “We out,” Cedric said to Malcolm. The three left for the bus stop where other high school students were chatting about various subjects, the most interesting of them perhaps a discussion about Mrs. Shorts between Kenard and Elliot.
An uninteresting train ride to school provided free by a school train-pass bored Becca, and getting off at Thorndale she happened to meet roads with Latasha. The two looked at eachother with familiarity until Latasha asked her if she was in Mr. P's class “at the end 187 | ELEMENT GAME
M.B. JULIEN
of the day,” to which Becca confirmed. They walked together, not to talk, but most likely because they were headed the same way and had an unusually identical stride to their way of walking.
Hiding from them was Chris who normally met Becca just outside of the train station.
Becca did not wonder where he was, as she knew their relationship was a secret and knew he wanted to keep it that way.
Andre was in the mood for ditching school, but his defiance was cut short as a van hired by the school district drove up and forced him inside. “You're going to school today,” Steve Jefferson demanded more than he requested.
Andre appeared inside Mr. Paxton's first period class, English, and Paxton told him that it was nice of him to show up.
Eight periods later found us in a slightly cold room where P. was teaching his Critical Thinking class. At the whiteboard was Latasha, who had agreed to teach the class one of the puns she had found for last night's homework assignment.
“Please turn to chapter one,” she requested. As the class opened their books she told them the sentence in question was “This car is also parked, but running, as if it is ready to stop living such an idle life, but at the same time too reluctant to do so.”
She then wrote the word “idle” on the board and its definition: without purpose or effect; pointless; not working, active, or being used. She then explained that in this instance, an “idle” life was one without meaning or purpose, or, movement; afterwards, she explained that the car mentioned in the sentence was “idling,” representing a vehicle that was not functionally properly and was therefore not fulfilling its purpose of motion or transport.
“Ah, the student becomes the teacher,” Paxton joked as she finished. “I noticed something else, too, but I don't know what it's called.” “What is that?” “Lynne paints a flower, then she like, basically paints herself into a flower when she puts on makeup, and right after that the narrator basically calls her a flower. Is there a word for that?”
Paxton thinks for a moment, then tells her that the literary device being used is called
“verb symbolism.” “There is also verb imagery, for example, when she compares gardening to painting, if you paint a flower from the stem, it literally grows onto the canvas. In a way she is both gardening and painting at the same time.”
As Latasha went to sit back down, someone shouted from the back of the room, “You ain't no flower, you too ugly to be a flower.” When Paxton looked to see it was, he recognized it was Andre. “Shut up,” Latasha said calmly, sitting down.
“You too big to be wearing dresses,” Monica cut in. “And you need to stop throwing up after lunch,” Latasha fired back. Before Paxton could stop the insults Latasha and Monica were locked into eachother, the whole class in a frenzy led by Andre.
188 | ELEMENT GAME
M.B. JULIEN
Arimatla attempted to break them apart but was soon toppled after Monica pushed Latasha onto him. Eventually Paxton came to split them into division, and after catching his breath, yelled in the direction of Monica and told her to leave the classroom and visit her counselor; this was the first time anyone in the class had ever seen him lose his temper.
Monica, now passed the door, could hear Andre talking back to Paxton, and even she felt afraid once she heard Paxton raise his voice, even higher than he did to her, to Andre, telling him to leave the classroom and too visit his counselor.
With the two of them gone, regularity was quickly restored in the class after Paxton announced that that type of behavior was past them and was no longer allowed.
The rest of the period was somewhat quiet as the class dove more into science and math than literature. They learned about and played many games of luck, as opposed to games of skill, which Paxton noted was a common theme in Anthology Complex.
They played with dice, cards and coins, all objects which symbolized the abstract concept of probability. Paxton taught them that the flip of a coin could determine the fate of many things, leaving very few things to coincidence; that the revealing of a card could reveal how lucky some people can be even with a total cardinality of fifty-two; that the roll of a die could... Damn, there is no mathematically-based word that starts with die. If there actually is, please make contact.
After the bell had rung, Paxton told his class that the weekend's homework assignment was to remember the dream they had the night before and write three paragraphs imitating M.B. Julien's writing style in Anthology Complex about that dream, analyzing it and explaining what they learned from it about themselves.
“You know what we learned about today in CT,” Sandeep asked E.J. “What you learn?,” he asked. Sandeep looked at Karen, “Tell 'em.” “Rollin' dice,” she emphasized
“dice.” “Man that class is the shit,” Sandeep finished.
During the second half of the snowmatch the two teams were tied at twenty-four a piece; a touchdown reception by Calvin Marshall, two running scores by Joseph Lee and Bradley Chipper and a field goal by Taylor Lawrence.
Clayton had played in a championship game before, though the head coach of another team, and the loss, as the people who knew him often say, “destroyed him irreparably.”
From this came his overwhelming desire to win.
At game's end, his team had won the divisional game by a score of three, sending them to 7-7. All-purpose kicker Taylor Lawrence gave the team a lead with a 46-yard field goal as the third quarter ended, and with only six seconds left on the gameclock in the fourth, eventually punted away the ball.
“He punted the ball from our endzone and when they caught it they started lateraling 189 | ELEMENT GAME
M.B. JULIEN
the ball around,” said Okadigbo, “it almost worked too, and for a while everyone was on their toes.”
The opposing team got the ball up to the thirteen yard line until Lawrence finally landed a tough shot on the ball carrier, Chris Redfield himself.
“That shot was sweet revenge for Taylor, because earlier in the game Redfield took a cheap shot on him during a punt return as Taylor tried to defend the returner. The shot sidelined him for the entire first quarter. So when Taylor got him back at the end of the game and caused him to fumble the ball, I'm sure he was well-satisfied” ... “Yeah, they were our division rivals. We didn't care about hurting them and they didn't care about hurting us.”
As the ball slid on the snow after Taylor's crushing hit, there was a scramble for the ball until one of Taylor's teammates came and batted the ball towards the sideline, effectively ending the game. The referees came in, signaling the end of the game and awarding the home team the game, though this was done in error, as it was illegal for a player to bat the ball out of play.
“The refs blew the last call on that game. There should have been a penalty and they shold have had a pretty decent shot at the endzone, but that's not what happened,”
continued Okadigbo, “that's why in life, you have to do your own research. You have to learn to play the game for yourself, because sometimes even the people who are suppose to know the rules of the game don't know them.”
190 | ELEMENT GAME
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 32
VADEAN WATERFALL
2:1:4:32
ABOUT a week ago, sometime in the evening, I laid down to rest my eyes but eventually fell into a deep sleep.
In my dream I had been on my way to my log cabin hidden deep inside the snowed-in woods. I am walking until in the distance I see a pack of wolves; three of which who were a mother, father and a child.
The father, I could tell, had been wounded, perhaps by a hunter or another wild animal, and was resting his eyes as his wife and child played nearby pawing at eachother.
Moving to the right about twenty yards, I could now see the father-wolf's eyes as he stared into an oblivion lavafall, and the lone-stare of his eyes gave him the quality of an eternally pensive sadness.
“The most accepted theory is that pain and suffering are associated with the size and complexity of the animal's brain. Because mammals and birds are more advanced and have more complex brains, it's likely they all possess capacities to experience pain. The
'gray area,' as scientists call it, comes with animals such as fish and lower invertebrates.”
Frankfurt Research Team, 1942.
I remember reading that, several years ago, and it made me think... Made me think about fear and pain, how they are almost mutual concepts; one was more likely to be fearful of something after that something caused it pain, and one was most likely to be in pain after the crippling effects of fear.
But where do fear and pain come from? Are they simply things that develop in an organism's brain? Perhaps so, as there are some humans whose brain do not develop the ability to feel either. But maybe it goes deeper than this, way back to the origins of life.
All life on Earth as we know it seeks to reproduce. A human and a virus have the same fundamental motivations; persistence. Replicate your existence. This tells us that at some degree, there is something fundamental in the concept of life. I say this because, unlike the human, a virus probably cannot feel fear or pain, two things that are probably reserved for organisms that are higher on the evolutionary scale. And yet, couldn't you say that both fear and pain stem from the need to persist. The need to survive to replicate one's existence? From this, there is at least one thing I can conclude: Persistence is the most basic attribute of life, and is the parent to fear, pain, love and anything else it has developed to help life persist.
I got up from my peeping location and went to walk away, though in doing so noticed a strange mutation concerning the baby wolf; it had several black spots along the side of its body, something not seen on any of the other wolves. The sight did not fail me 191 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
intellectually. Adaptation and evolution, too, must be children of persistence.
Finally leaving and tracking into the snowy mountains, I felt the faint fade of waking up back into reality.
My first night alone way back then, sitting alone in my parents' home's basement, completely unaware of the madness that was coming, it was difficult, but as the years rolled by, prison became home. Solitary confinement became peace. I didn't know it then, but darkness, hatred, anger, contempt, they were children of wisdom. They had as much a stake in peace, if not more, than light, love, happiness or kindness. There is something to be said about the solidim.
I rang the doorbell to Emily's apartment, a place I had never seen before, and very quickly Dave buzzed me in. I made my way to the fourth floor and found Emily waiting in the hall as Dave and Sara prepared to leave with me.
She greeted me and I greeted her back, there was no small talk, no chatter, just silence as we waited for the little ones. Once we could hear that they were almost ready, she finally broke the silence, saying, “I don't know what's going on between you and my daughter, but she is better now and I didn't see any markings on her.” … “We disagreed on something, that was all.”
Taking the bridge back towards the city, neither Dave nor Sara said much until we passed by the Lone-star sign. “You are evil,” Dave said. The words caught me off guard, though when I looked in the rear-view, I saw that he was reading something off of a playing card. “In your solitude, the days shall be dim. Sight will come to you in the darkness, and in the light, it will banish,” he read aloud with a lisp. Looking long enough I noticed that he had a bruised lip, which I later found out he got from a fight at school with one Javier.
When we got to the hospital we went directly to Lynne's room to find that she was sleeping. Dave went to the bathroom and Sara walked around her bed to examine something that resembled a piece of cake.
Suddenly there was a loud exploding yell that came from Sara's direction, and being scared, I looked in her direction to find that Lynne was in fact not sleeping, only pretending, so that she could scare Sara as she approached the food.
With her arms in the air imitating a monster and her loud scream, Sara panicked and began walking backwards until she tripped over a bag and into a chair near the window.
Her head hit it pretty hard, which is why she began to cry after being relieved of the shock.
Lynne saw that this did not go the way she had planned, and after we both went to see if she was okay, she felt the side of her head to show us a streak of blood.
“Dumbass, what the hell is wrong with you?,” I asked her. “I didn't know” “Mom 192 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
why did you do that” Sara cut in gasping from crying. “Did someone just get shot?,”
Dave asked as he walked out of the bathroom with only his underwear on.
Sara rose up violently saying words that were unintelligible, and taking off her glasses found that they had once again been broken. Lynne followed her, pleading, saying she would fix them, but Sara was still upset and the fear had not completely worn off.
Eventually Lynne went and got her a band-aid, but it was only partial in getting her daughter's forgiveness. Added on to the partiality was when she offered her the food that caused all of this, which was actually a piece of pie. Sara ate it, but her mood was only slightly affected.
Once Dave came out of the bathroom finished with his duty, he immediately went to set up the game console on the hospital's television. We all patiently waited for him to finish and eventually he asked “Who's playing?”
At first he put in a game that only he and Sara liked, and Sara, wanting nothing to do with her mother, joined him in playing. As they played, I went to Lynne and asked her how she was feeling. “I'm okay, just a little tired.”
She was wearing “Vadean Waterfall,” the blue and white dress that won the contest many a time ago. It was still the same dress, and yet there was something different about it, though I think this mirage came from the dress-wearer rather than the dress itself.
The average person has one color to their aura, but it seems to me that she has every color in hers, as if she wore a Chameleon Pearl. Emerald, ruby, sapphire, diamond, any thing and any color she is dressed in compliments her aura and her aura compliments any thing and any color she is dressed in, her appearance becomes something you've never seen before, which I think is the reason why she is never the same thing twice to two different people. There is no way that you and I see her in the same light.
In a philosophy book I once read that when a person does not have inner beauty, their outer beauty means nothing, though, if a person has inner beauty, they could still shine despite the lack of an outer beauty. I took this to mean that outer beauty is actually a product of inner beauty. I took it to mean that a person who wears thrift store dresses, fake jewelry and a stolen purse could be priceless in comparison to a person with a three-thousand dollar outfit, real diamonds, real leather, et cetera.
The Chameleon Pearl gave her this power, to be vadean rich, and to not need to use the trick of the dame. She must have spent years to acquire it, going through every experience known to man, and surprisingly, black was one of her strongest colors.
193 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
NE 13-2; MIA 10-5; BUF 7-8; NYD 4-11 /// PIT 10-5; BAL 8-7; CIN 5-9-1; CLA 1-14 ///
HOU 9-6; TEN 8-7; INT 7-8; JAX 3-12 /// KC 11-4; OAK 12-3; CHI 8-7; LAC 5-10 ///
DAI 13-2; NYG 10-5; WAS 8-6-1; PHI 6-9 /// GB 9-6; DEL 9-6; MIN 7-8; DEN 3-12 ///
ATL 10-5; TBH 8-7; NO 7-8; CAR 6-9 /// SEA 9-5-1; ARI 6-8-1; LA 4-11; SF 2-13
“Fuck yeah!,” Dave exclaimed, then turned to me, saying, “Nigga, you just got rocked!” For the first time, in I think a year and a half, he finally beat me at Tetris, and I have no idea how. For the next five minutes I had to watch him dance around the room until Lynne, who was reading a fashion magazine, finally told him to shut up, stop using profanity and offensive words, and sit down.
“Since I finally beat you, can we have cable now?” “No.” “If we do good in school and Dave stops being bad then can we have it?” “Maybe.” The two of them stare at Lynne until she returns the look, and she then says, “...Maybe.” Sara was again dissatisfied with her.
A bit later I watched as Lynne watched Dave watch Sara feel the side of her head. Me still watching her, I saw her pick up a bag and walk into the bathroom, passing in front of Dave as he played NBA Street and causing him to miss a crucial shot as she nearly tripped on a cord.
It must have been about five minutes until she finally came back out wearing a blonde wig that had red highlights. Grabbing a nearby remote, she posed herself as she sang into the remote, “Saraaaaa, you are my sunshiiiiine, my only sunshiiiiine. You make me haaaaappy, when skies are graaaaay.”
Dave and I found it, at most, barely funny, but Sara didn't share the same feeling as she didn't react at all. Defeated, Lynne crawled back into bed with an air of hopelessness.
“This place was more interesting when you weren't all here,” she said under her breath.
Around noon, with all of her belongings packed, we exited what was both a prison and a home to her for a small lifetime. I noticed her watching a waterfall as we walked by it, looking back as if to say goodbye. I noticed her watching a painting as we walked by it, looking back as if to say farewell. The final parting came when we walked past a dead garden of what used to be blue flowers just outside the hospital. The temperature had increased sharply.
Dave and Sara jumped into the back of the car and I went to the passenger side to open the door for Lynne. “What are you doing?,” she asked. I told her I was opening the door for her, but she became irritated with me and told me that she could open her own door. I have no idea where her irritation came from, but it came quick and was in full blossom.
She didn't say a word during the drive home. I thought it was a joke at first, but it 194 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
wasn't. When we finally arrived to building 8038, we walked up the stairs to the second floor but could not enter the apartment. Something was jammed inside the keyhole.
I gave Dave the keys and told him to go around back and try the backdoor, and of course, Sara, wanting nothing to do with her mother, left with him leaving us there.
We didn't say anything to eachother, and after a while I noticed that my cut thumb had completely healed.
Just standing there in silence, we could hear Sara and Dave entering the house and walking towards us. A moment before, the buzzer sounded, and after asking who it was, Dave let the person into the building and opened the door for us. Sara came out and told us it was her friend, Pattie, who Lynne confirmed yesterday was allowed to visit.
As Sara went to meet Pattie at the top of the stairs, Lynne and I watched as they completed something that looked like a secret handshake. Walking back to us to enter the apartment, Pattie said hello to Lynne as Sara completely ignored her.
I followed Lynne into her bedroom and put her bags on the ground beside the bed, and almost immediately she said, “Someone stole my headphones.”
She stormed into the living room searching here and there for them, under piles of papers, corners of clothes, and finally I said, “I think that little kid stole my headphones, too.” She looked back, confused, “Who?” “That Korean kid on the first floor.” “You mean Gun Ho?” “You know him?” “David and him trade toys sometimes.” Sara cut in,
“You don't know Gun Ho? And his brother, Dam Son?” Dave walked out of his room lifting up his pants, “Gun Ho is here?”
Just then there was a knock on the door and Lynne went to go answer it. It was Jasmin, who was now living with Jack, who came by to welcome Lynne back. Lynne eventually stepped out into the hallway to talk to her, and I eventually left the children to go into Lynne's room.
I sat at the edge of the bed and took off my shoes, then one sock, noticing that the cut on it had healed unusually quickly. I then begin to look around her room and take note of all the items in it.
As I turned to see what was behind me, I felt something move under my leg, or, under the sheets, and getting up, a blue ball fell from under the sheets and directly onto the ground. I picked it up and saw the word “Altamira” wrapping around it. It seemed to be that of a small icy planet.
My mind in rewind, I thought about how the ball fell straight down, literally, and this led me to wonder why magnetism worked this way. Why when magnetism attracts or repels an item, it doesn't go in many wild and random directions but in a very trained motion, the trained motion usually being a straight line or an orbit.
There's a theory which suggests that as the blue ball fell from location A, the bed, to 195 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
location B, the floor, it took every route possible (note anti-predetermination). However, any route which had an equal opposite would be canceled out (note [1]+[-1]=0) (also note
“+” is not addition, it is representory of both 1s existing in the same field). This is to say 1 and -1 cannot co-exist and are computed to 0. The end result would be the route that is not canceled out, or the route which does not have an equalized opposite (note
[1]+[0]=1). The route in question would always appear to us as a trained motion, usually a straight line, as in which the ball fell, or an orbit.
Is this how magnetism works? A compliment theory also suggests that the universe is more inclined to results that require the least amount of work. You could call our universe lazy, so to speak. The simplest way for the ball to get to the ground from the bed is in a straight line, rather than going this way and that way. It seems like magnetism is a great way to cancel out unnecessary information, almost akin to a compression algorithm. I wonder, was gravity, magnetism, electromagnetism, were those all designed or evolved to make physical objects travel in a straight line? Is what we know as gravity the result of the universe's “compression” algorithm?
I lift up the bed sheets and underneath I find more of Dave's toys. Two astronauts and a spaceship with the word “Eden” on its side.
“Sorry I took so long,” Lynne crept up behind me, scaring me. “Deana and Mike also stopped to say hello and welcomed me back.” “You're very popular,” I responded. “Not with you,” she said sharply.
“I'll see you tomorrow,” I went for the door. “You're not sleeping here tonight?,” she asked. “Obviously you're mad at me so I was going to go home.” “I'm not mad... Sorry...
I'm going to work less,” she finished hesitantly. I now saw why she was in a mood.
“I appreciate that,” said I, “I will come by more often.” She looked at me with confused and calculating eyes. “Why?,” she asked. “You don't want me to come over more?” “No, I do, but why would you offer that?” … “I'm not stupid, I'm aware that you like to be alone, and I also know that you keep your word, so I want to know how you will make that work...”
I thought about the question, then began looking about the room, then finally answered while gesturing, “I think I will section off this room, or perhaps build a new room, maybe a study, so I can be here yet still be alone and away from you and your children.”
She looked back down at the clothes she was laying out on the bed. She didn't laugh at first, but after a few seconds a smile cracked. “So you gonna come up in my house and straight up redesign it?,” she asked. I laughed and moved closer to her, making every possible uotion that I desired, wotioned even, to stay inside the chamber of secrets.
“Well, I'm responsible for you now. You know, the Chinese say that once you've 196 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
saved a person's life, you're responsible for it forever. So, I'm committed. I have to know,” I told her.
She looked into my eyes then turned her head towards the window, saying, “There's so little that I know... It's as though I... I were walking down a long corridor that once was mirrored. And fragments of that mirror still hang there. And when I come to the end of the corridor, there's nothing but darkness... And I know that when I walk into the darkness... That I'll die...”
The last of the light that was left in today's Friday vanished as Lynne and I laid together in her bed. At first she asked more on the subject of objectivity, but somehow we ultimately landed on the reality of echoes.
“If the concept of echoes can appear in our universe for us to experience it, it may also exist on a much bigger scale.” “So the idea is each life and each universe is basically repeated?” “Yes.” “That sounds more like a ripple...” “I guess...” “Does that mean I can exist in more than one place at more than one time?” “It's debatable whether you can exist concurrently, but it is probable. Each ripple can exist independently but none of them are exactly the same. Ripple A, which is further from the source than Ripple B, will have different measurements.” “So what you're saying is because each one has a different waveprint, or soundprint, no alternate life can ever be repeated?” “Did you just make that word up? Soundprint?” “Yeah?...” “Interesting... If you can measure B the moment it moves into a position A used to be, and if B does indeed equal the measurements A had at that position, then that would mean it is repeated. If the measurements are off even slightly, then it is not repeated, and therefore we can never repeat our lives.”
She looked at the ceiling with incredible curiosity. “Um, I like this conversation,” she looked at me. “I like you...,” I replied, and then leaned towards her to try to kiss her but she put her hand to my face and pushed me away. “What's the matter with you?,” she asked. In a deep voice I replied, “I used to have conversations like that with myself, but maybe now I can have them with you.”
She cracked a smile and, looking at my chest, she commented on that fact that I always wore black. “Why is that?,” she asked. I had no answer, and because of this she called me a spooky individual.
She turned over away from me to go to sleep saying nothing afterwards. I tried to hug her from behind but she pushed me away then too, basically telling me that while she wanted me here, I should stay there.
Maybe a minute after she got up out of bed with a plan to pee. As she opened the door I could see the darkness in the living room. As soon as I heard her open the door to the bathroom, I heard a loud scream that sounded a lot like Sara. There was somewhat of a commotion as I heard someone, probably Lynne, fall backwards into something.
197 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
When I got into a position to see, I saw Lynne lying across the rug trying to catch her breath, and I could tell she had been literally scared almost to death.
“That's what you get,” Sara revenged. She knew that her mother had a habit of using the bathroom at around midnight.
Once Lynne actually caught her breath and realized she was still alive, she began to laugh, understanding this was something she deserved. I laughed as she crawled, and once close enough, stood up to embrace Sara as she began to laugh even louder. It was the sort of embrace that came from atonement.
198 | VADEAN WATERFALL
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 33
THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
2:1:4:33
01101101 01101001 01110011 01110011 01101001 01101111 01101110 01011111
01100110 01100001 01101001 01101100 01100101 01100100 00101110 01101111
01100100 01110100 00111010 00100000 01010100 01101000 01101001 01110011
00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01001010 01110101 01101110 01101001
01101111 01110010 00100000 01000011 01100001 01101101 01110000 01100010
01100101 01101100 01101100 00101110 00100000 01001101 01000101 01010100
00100000 00110010 00110001 00111001 00110000 00101110 00100000 01010111
01100101 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01101100
01101111 01110011 01110100 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101110 01110100
01100001 01100011 01110100 00100000 01110111 01101001 01110100 01101000
00100000 01000101 01100100 01100101 01101110 00100000 01100001 01101110
01100100 00100000 01101001 01110100 01110011 00100000 01110000 01101001
01101100 01101111 01110100 01110011 00101100 00100000 01000100 01100101
01101110 01101110 01101001 01110011 00100000 01000110 01100001 01101100
01100011 01101111 01101110 01100101 01110010 00100000 01100001 01101110
01100100 00100000 01010010 01100001 01101110 01100100 01100001 01101100
01101100 00100000 01001101 01100001 01110011 01101111 01101110 00101110
00100000 01000011 01110101 01110010 01110010 01100101 01101110 01110100
00100000 01101101 01101001 01110011 01110011 01101001 01101111 01101110
00100000 01110011 01110100 01100001 01110100 01110101 01110011 00100000
01101000 01100001 01110011 00100000 01100010 01100101 01100101 01101110
00100000 01100101 01110011 01100011 01100001 01101100 01100001 01110100
01100101 01100100 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 00110010 00101100
00100000 01101001 01101110 01100100 01101001 01100011 01100001 01110100
01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01101101 01101001 01110011 01110011
01101001 01101111 01101110 00100000 01100110 01100001 01101001 01101100
01110101 01110010 01100101 00101110 00100000 01010111 01100101 00100000
01100001 01110010 01100101 00100000 01110011 01110100 01101001 01101100
01101100 00100000 01110101 01101110 01100011 01100101 01110010 01110100
01100001 01101001 01101110 00100000 01101001 01100110 00100000 01110100
01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000
01101100 01101001 01100110 01100101 00100000 01100101 01101100 01110011
01100101 01110111 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 00101110 00101110
00101110
199 | THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
M.B. JULIEN
"I take it you're here because of the black paint," the white shade said. "I am,” the black shade responded,” “How did he find the room?" "You'll have to ask him when he gets here." "I don't have to ask. You brought him here. Still trying to prove me wrong, aren't you?" "You are wrong." "Am I? They come, fight, they destroy, they corrupt. It always ends the same." "It only ends once, brother. Anything that happens before that is just progress."
The black shade sat at a table opposite the white shade to play him in a complicated dice game called “Hazard.” They each rolled black and white dice as they discussed various items.
“They will choose goodwill, brother, you shall see it.” … “And you will be a hypocrite. You will give will to your creation but will have no will of your own.”
Just then, the black dice made his final roll and was awarded the victor of the game with a score of 25.0.0.71.0.0 and the white shade having a score of 4.0.6.58.0.0. A second afterward, the door to the room clicked, signifying the door had finally been unlocked.
The black shade stood up, looked at the white shade, then proceeded towards the door. “I wish you had agreed with me, brother,” the white shade said to his back, but he did not respond. The black shade had left the room.
In the city of brotherly love, I searched all around for the man covered in darkness.
He continued his slew of bizarre murders, leaving me to nickname him “Dice.” The world was getting darker, colder, and my obsession with Dice were the only thoughts that grew from my mind.
I woke up in the morning, in Lynne's bed, to overhear Dave talking about a dreamcast. When I walked into the living room I saw them both sitting on the couch watching Saturday morning cartoons.
“Where's your mom?,” I asked them. “At your house,” Sara replied. I walked slowly to the door but panicked in my mind. I opened the door to my apartment and called for her. Her answer came from the bathroom, and as I walked past the composition room I checked to see if the door was closed. It was, and I was terribly relieved. How did I forget to lock the goddamn door, what the fuck is she doing in here without me or my permission.
Still energized, I accidentally yelled her name once more as I finally saw her, scaring her. “What are you doing in my apartment?” I noticed my keys right beside her and figured she had taken them sometime in the morning. “Your bathroom is filthy,” she told me. I then noticed that she was cleaning.
I wanted to tell her never to come here with out me, but that alone would give the 200 | THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
M.B. JULIEN
implication that I had something to hide. Instead, I calmed myself, walked up to her, grabbed her arm gently yet forcing her upwards, and said to her that it was her first day back and she was already working again.
I'm not sure how we got here, but the next thing I know I'm forcing her to take a hot shower in her apartment. She doesn't give me much resistance as she enters the tub.
About a minute into it, she realized I was still in there and asked me what I was still doing in there. “If I leave you'll probably start cleaning this bathroom, too.” She laughed.
I sat down on something. Something very small, and waited for her to finish. Within ten minutes the steam began to take over the room and I told her that she should sit down.
Again, no resistance as I saw the shadow move downwards. Not one single noise came from her and I knew she was completely relaxed as she was being watered.
“Hey Spook,” she woke me up. “Is that me?” “I saw something in your apartment.”
“What did you see?” I saw that notebook I bought you on your bed. And I read some of what you wrote... Was that about me?”
I had just started a new one, but it didn't have any dreams in it yet. What it did have, though, were the first words to a stupid poem I had to write for her.
She turned the shower off, grabbed the towel and I watched her as she walked out and began to brush her teeth. Playing around, I began tugging at the towel, and she kept calling for me to stop. Once she was done and after she had washed her mouth out, I completely pulled the towel away from her and exposed her naked body. She panicked, covering her breasts and her vagina, and turning towards me shocked.
I didn't say anything but I stared at her all over from her foot until I finally got to her eyes. And finally, she slowly removed her right arm from her breasts and her left arm from her vagina, pacefully and gracefully sliding both hands into a position on her hips.
And even more leisurely, she slid her hands a little more to the backside of her hips so she could enter into a very feminine pose; so I could see all of her. The legacy scar will never heal, but she was clean and had the scent of Eve.
“What was it like being the first referee to ever eject a coach from a game?,” the interviewer asked as he laughed. “Terrifying,” Austin responded, “especially when you consider it was the mad scientist himself!”
In a contest that sported throwback uniforms, Henry Clayton found himself many reasons to be angry, but among two of those reasons were these; a delay early in the second quarter that lasted nearly forty minutes and the simple fact that this game would decide whether they made it into the post-season or not.
Though they had been leading the entire game, an offensive holding call that went against them caused Clayton to snap.
“There are two plays that will drive any coach mad,” said former referee Hernandez, 201 | THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
M.B. JULIEN
“offensive holding and not being able to convert third and short. So when you combine those two together, it's a madhouse.”
Bert McCormack was the culprit, who was called for holding as the home team attempted to convert on third and two. Clayton did not agree with the call, and after basically quarreling with Austin the entire game on what he suspected were bogus calls, he finally ran up to him during this penalty, asking, “What kind of trash call was that?
Fuck you! Piece of shit.”
A yellow flag flew into the air, dismissing Clayton from the game with less than half of a quarter left. As Clayton began his walk into the locker room, cheers from fans could be heard throughout the stadium, as this was the closest the home team had come to a championship for many years. This ovation would be remembered as a highlight of the season.
“That was an exciting game. They didn't just have to win, they needed two other teams in their conference to lose. They got really lucky with the odds, I'd say,” said former referee Copenhagen.
Inside the locker room, Clayton watched the rest of the contest with Croft. The home team eventually won, but the battle was not complete until the other two teams lost, setting up the home team for what would be an historic playoff run.
“That team was a joke, that's where players went to retire, and for the first time in sixteen seasons, the 'Claymen' were going to the playoffs.”
“Anthology is a conspiracy,” declared Paxton, “the narrator conspires to keep information hidden from you or masks it in an obscure way. Some parts read almost like a riddle; Lynne's appearance is important yet there is actually very little detail given about her appearance, for example, her face is never described except for the exception that it has an abstract light about it. The narrator also plays tricks on you, keeps certain information a secret, and” a student interrupted Paxton, asking, “Is that why the white rose is secrecy?”
“What do you mean?,” he asked Audrey. She replied, saying, “The only person who know about his feelings towards Lynne is the reader, he keep it to himself like a secret...”
“The white rose could indeed be a symbol of his love for her, but” Paxton is again cut off, this time by Cedric, “He doesn't love her, he's just obsessed with her.” “What makes you say that?,” P inquired.
“He says it over and over again, that he don't know how to love. And he proves it at the end when he doesn't let her stay with him,” finished Cedric.
“But,” Carson inserted himself into the conversation, “what if it's not something as simple as whether he loves her or not, or if he's obsessed with her, what if he just feel a way about her that the average person can't explain or define?”
202 | THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
M.B. JULIEN
“I think he really does love her, but at the same time is confused because he hates humanity,” stated Chris. “Does she love him?,” Karen turned the question on its head, emphasizing “she.”
Latasha, who wanted to take part in the conversation of love, rubishly rose her hand, and Paxton allowed her to speak.
“She probably doesn't love love him, but I'm sure she has strong feelings for him too.
One thing I noticed is that we have almost no connection to her mind, we see everything through him. That would” Latasha is interrupted by the school's intercom, “May I have your attention please... The last bell for the school day has not been set to ring early for early release, teachers please dismiss your class at 1:40. Thank you.”
The message had thrown the conversation out of loop, and when Paxton asked Latasha to finish, she stated that she couldn't remember what she wanted to say. This prompted Becca to speak, “I think I know what she was going to say. Since we can never see in her mind, we can never know how she feels about the narrator, which is the core of all relationships. Not knowing another person, not knowing how they feel about you. It brings insecurities and doubt, which is something I think both he and she have to deal with, because you have to note that she keeps whatever she is feeling a secret as well.”
After the clock had struck 1:40, high school students flowed out of the building early.
Chris Bell, who was in very close proximity to James Paxton, was going through his locker when he heard Paxton mutter the words “goddam motherfuckin' son of a bitch”
under his breath.
Chris accurately guessed what had happened, and closing his locker, laughed as he walked over to James who had been conned by a vending machine.
“It ate my money,” Paxton said to Bell. “I got you P-trunk,” Chris said taking out his wallet. Paxton politely refused his advances, but Chris suddenly pulled out a single dollar with what appeared to be plastic attached to it. He inserted it into the machine but held on to the plastic, effectively fooling the machine into thinking it had received currency, and quickly pulled the dollar back out as he held on to the plastic.
Paxton was amused, confused and excused. “Now you got two.” “...Yeah.” “Ain't that that shit we be talkin' 'bout in class. Even-sum or something?” “You're right, it is.” “If the machine don't play by the rules, why should we?” Paxton, still fascinated by the genius of the plastic dollar, could only say “I agree.”
“You ain't gonna snitch or nothing right?,” Chris joked as he slapped Paxton's shoulder. Paxton laughed, then made a motion as if he was going to hit him, causing Chris to flinch. “You flinched,” they both laughed.
Chris then began to walk away, and soon after heard his name. When he turned around, Paxton tossed him one of the two candy bars. “It's zero-sum, Chris.”
203 | THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
M.B. JULIEN
As Chris was walking to meet Becca, he heard a sudden car honk, and then a sudden yelling of his name. It was Becca's mother, telling Chris to come. He walked over to her and she asked him to get into the car, telling him she was picking up Rebecca and would give him a ride home.
Chris was hesitant but found it difficult to refuse, and he climbed into the backseat of the vehicle. Moments later, Becca appeared, a bit surprised to see her boyfriend sitting in the back.
¶ We wandered through a bright charming place,
¶ For all around us was magic, a glaring light that streams,
¶ But it dove into an endless rivercase
¶ And in eternity, we saw the dark city of dreams
204 | THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 34
ORIGINS
2:1:4:34
STANDING at her bedroom door was Lynne, who was calling me over with a smile on her face, ready to let me in. When I entered I saw that her room had ebony-painted walls, which reminded me of her wall painting at my parents' home. The moment I stepped in I began to float, and she followed, too floating behind me.
The walls had the stars and planets of deep space on them, and in a dark corner I saw twin sunsets. When I looked back at her, I noticed she was now wearing “Déijàs Are Forever,” the black dress with a red stripe down the middle.
“The universe has no origins?,” she asked me. As we floated past each other I told her that it was possible that the universe perhaps has never “started” and will never “end.”
That it was possible the universe was structured in a way that it could not not exist, but at the same time only presented the illusion of existing.
“Elaborate,” she insisted as she bounced off the ceiling and towards the bed through a wormhole. Usually when we talk about the origins of the universe, we talk about how or where it “began,” but a scientist from Luxembourg decided to go a different route, he proposed the universe could never be “turned off,” and that for there to be “nothing”
would be completely erroneous. He died, though, never proving his idea.
She bounced off of the bed and floated towards me with a sapphire moon attached to her silver foot. “It makes me think of God turning a line into a circle to create an endless and eternal universe.” “What do you mean?,” I asked her. “With a line, you have point A and point B, bend the time, and you end up with infinity.”
Just then, a revir opened up in her closet and sucked us in, sending us at blazing speeds of what appeared to be an invisible tube.
She, having less mass, was the first to go, and I soon followed. The location was now even deeper space, where fire and ice was but a yard away.
“At night, Cellardoor's waves are ice blue because of a chemical reaction,” she told me, and after saying this, a backdraft blew her dress back towards her, revealing her undergarments. The cardinally obsidian panties made her extremely sexy.
“I donated my old prosthetic and my old yellow dress,” she again spoke, and I now realized why I hadn't seen the dress I first saw her in for such a long period of time.
Suddenly the revir split into two ways and we found ourselves going in different directions, to what we thought would be different destinations. As she blazed further and further away from me, I could hear the echo of her calling out for me, “Spooooooooook!”
For a while I traveled through dark space, then light space, until finally I could see her room at the end of the revir. As I plowed through, there was much friction that 205 | ORIGINS
M.B. JULIEN
slowed me down as I entered back through the door, and the same happened to her as she entered back through the window at the same time.
In the room, the slow momentum propelled us both towards eachother, and floating to eachother, we extended our right arms, then our right index fingers, and when we finally made contact, an onyx butterfly came out of her mouth. She smiled at me, like she had done so many times before, but this time in a black dress and with a darkness in her eyes.
Sara opened the door to the bedroom and found us both lying wide awake on Lynne's bed, “Mom, you didn't hear us ringing the bell?,” she snapped. “I think it's broken again,”
Lynne replied. “Oh...,” Sara closed the door.
In the living room Dave was going through his newly acquired cards when he decided to phone Gun Ho, though it was Dam Son who answered. “No if I do my dad will be mad and he will make me run,” Dave spoke over the phone. No deal was to be made with the boys downstairs.
As Lynne and I went to exit her bedroom, she informed me that the hospital called and told her that her tumor was benign.
She walked over to the kitchen and I went into the living room, staring at Dave for no reason. After a while Lynne called out to me, and this put a confusing look on Sara's face.
“What did you call him?,” she asked. Sara found her mother's nickname for her friend interesting at least.
“Olya just messaged me, she's done with your vacuum, which is actually my vacuum.” “Okay.” “Okay so can you go get it, she's busy helping someone set up a yard sale.” “Why? You're the one who left it in my apartment.” “Yeah after vacuuming it.” …
“You can't beat me on this one, just go get it...”
I walked out into the daylight and began walking towards Olya's apartment building.
On my way there I could see the yard sale being set up, and when I finally got to her she quickly ran upstairs to retrieve it. I greeted her friend, he greeted me back, and he continued to display various items for passerbys.
While waiting, I noticed a sort of suction instrument, but what was less interesting than it was a plain and simple gold-band ring alongside it. “How much are you selling this for?,” I asked the merchant. “For you, ten bucks...”
I thought about it, then told him to tell Olya that I would be back. After leaving my apartment with a ten dollar bill, I walked back to him to find Olya coming out of her apartment with the vacuum.
“We have just won the team's first playoff game in sixteen years. It feels good.” …..
“Not sure why I have decided to record this, but I feel like it's something I should do.
One thing I regret is not taking more notes on the last playoff run.” ….. “So I could learn from my mistakes.” ….. “I think maybe this is also a good way to ease tension and relax 206 | ORIGINS
M.B. JULIEN
as we go into the work week and start preparing for the divisional round.” ….. “Children are sleeping, wife is reading.” ….. “These are just some thoughts I would like to have a record of.” ….. “I wonder what Isaac is doing right now.” ….. “Anywho, that's not important. I need to focus on the strengths of yesterday to visualize our gameplan for next week.” ….. “Whether we lose or win, I believe football as we knew it is no more, end to the era, because I have done something, or I mean, we have done something, to change how it is played.” ….. “Football... What a wonderful game.” ….. “Second family. In ways I feel married to it. Married to the game.” ….. “Copper Field... Sixth seed never sees home again...”
Somewhere in southern Asia, the three of us made plans to rob a cruise ship. During the heist, Mushashi was struck in the back by a solitaire sword, dying almost instantly.
His death was that of a careless one, mostly on his part, but his lawless life was made of the things you'd find in genesis tales.
“A pair of masked thieves from New York burglarized a bank on Wall Street earlier this morning, leaving with an estimated $31,500. The criminals have not yet been identified, but it is heavily suspected that the two were involved in a prior kidnapping of a law enforcement officer who was found inside the Brooklyn tower.”
207 | ORIGINS
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 35
NIGHTS INTO DREAMS...
2:1:4:35
IT is “four,” but not “fourty.” It is “forty,” but it is derived from “four.” I noticed this when Dave told me I spelled the number “40” wrong after checking his math homework.
Dave and I had been walking to my parents' home when in the distance he pointed out the image of a few men working on a home. Renovating it.
The sight reminded me of my hazy past: of Jose, Jason, Jakub; building an extension to a middle school, or a junior high school, I'm not certain which is the correct term.
When we finally got to the home we saw Lynne and Sara's bicycles laying in the middle of the backyard. Around the corner I saw her dead and dying garden.
It is “anthology,” but “antho” is a prefix meaning “flower.” Yet, an anthology is a selection of works, not the study of flowers. Why not “anthography?,” where the suffix is defined as in a relation to writing.
Dave chose to visit the treehouse for moments of solitaire, speaking to himself as he cut across the lit yard, and I went inside the home to find Sara walking around quickly in search of something. “Spookie,” she called out to me, that was what she was calling me now, “did you see my nights into dreams things?” I nodded my head sideways. These
“things” she was talking about were block building toy sets for children, places you could design and build at a childish level.
She began walking away, continuing her search and speaking to herself, “I already have autumn nights into dreams built, I need to find winter nights and summer nights before I can build spring nights, but I don't know where it is!”
It's “its” to show its possessive form, but it's “it's” to show it's a contraction. Though I would say “Sara's sets,” using an apostrophe and an “s” to show possession, I could not say “Saras sets,” which seems to go against saying “it's sets” and “its sets.”
As I made my way up the stairs and towards my younger brother's room, I heard faint music coming from Lynne's art room. When I opened the door I saw her laying down on a sort of homemade bed, and right next to her was a desk, atop it a laptop which the music came from. This was the same computer I bought for Sara and Dave.
I walked over to her and after a while she noticed my presence. “I have a name for it now,” she said. “For this huge painting?,” “Yes,” she laughed, “...The view from Datura,”
she finished.
After she saw me think for a moment, she added that it was influenced by something I said to her the last weekend. I couldn't remember saying anything about views and I have no idea if Datura is a person place or thing, and honestly, all in all, I have no idea what the name itself means, but I told her that the name seemed fitting.
208 | NIGHTS INTO DREAMS...
M.B. JULIEN
She reached for my pants and pulled herself up, and without saying anything else left the room and walked towards a pantry, where I overheard Sara asking her about winter nights.
I looked back down at the bed, then at the computer, and finally directly in front of me for a strange view. I've seen it before, many times, but it is still quite a view. Look up, down, left or right, diagonal, ahead or back, and you will see something she created in her mind.
Maybe she named this room Datura? And maybe in it you can observe all types of things? I don't know...
A great irony is that many of us believe it is the things outside of ourselves that will make us happy, but really, isn't it the things inside of us that do? When you cultivate a dream, it is something you see happening in the outside world, so instinctively you will reach for it, trying to attain that dream. The problem is we don't realize that these dreams are actually occurring within, making a reach for it pointless, because a person cannot reach for the imaginative mind or for the desiring heart.
A wise man once called up a foolish man in the middle of the night and began playing jokes with him. He teased him, saying he could see everything he was doing through the window. When the foolish man had had enough, he cleverly escaped through a back way and ran towards the only other building rooftop that the wise man could have been spying at him from. When he got to the rooftop, he saw that it was empty, and looking back across the way to the home he had just left, there on its rooftop he saw the wise man, laughing and hurrying into the ghostly darkness. Everything you need is inside, not outside.
Looking at the view from Datura, I understand that Lynnette has more dreams in her soul than I do in my apartment. This gives her the fantastic ability to turn nights into dreams...
¶ THE VIEW FROM DATURA
¶ Venus-light, up above, calls to me within these closing walls
¶ To think upon a vast universe, angrily governed, by these strange man's laws
¶ The waters ripple, then wave, then tsunami, according to design
¶ But each movement so delicate, and yet so backwards without reason or rhyme
¶ When did this all begin? Can it start? Can it end?
¶ Or is it all just a doomed illusion, some geometrical bend 209 | NIGHTS INTO DREAMS...
M.B. JULIEN
¶ Off the asteroid, off the satellite, off the country of Finland
¶ The echoing soundprint dances once, then twice, then comes back again
¶ Philosophy, the lovers of wisdom, of pain, of madness and sorrow
¶ They know only one thing, that they know nothing, and that knowledge is only something you borrow
¶ Diamonds and crystals and emeralds and rubies, gold and silver, onyx, sapphire
¶ They demonstrated the daisied dame as she sang in daisies and satire
¶ A portrait of the ladybird in her rosedress,
¶ Twin souls, too rare to die, and sleepless in atlantess
¶ This is my view, my disease, my dark aurora
¶ This is now my home, furnished with a philosophical view from Datura
¶ 12/4 – A soulmate isn't always another person. Poetry, reflection, adventure, these things have souls too. I took a midnight bike ride last night, my first ride in months, and realized this on my short journey.
¶ We visited my lover's home, and because he fell asleep while watching Forensic Files, this left me to ponder the night alone, something we recently have been doing together.
¶ I rode back to my apartment because I had forgotten my new earphones, and then began my ride on an unfinished bike path they were making a few blocks down the road.
Music has always had a way of reviving my soul, and this anthology of soul was no exception.
¶ When its done, I hope they'll give it a ruby rosy path. Fourty-thousand red roses all along the ups and downs and stops to loose yourself in brand new dreams.
¶ There's this guy who lives in my building. His buzzer says Cheng. Mr. Cheng seems friendly enough, but it's his ladyfriend that I'm uncomfortable being around. You know those people who are always polite but in an unpolite way? Like you can just tell they talk about you behind your back. She thinks I have no idea but I know she's a bitch. I feel sorry for Mr. Cheng, especially considering they have a baby on the way. Man is she gonna use that baby to manipulate him. I know because I've had thoughts of doing it myself. Not saying I'm a bitch, but when times get rough people get low.
¶ My love has been a little bit softer with me since I departed from the hospital, but there are parts of him that have become rougher, I'm not sure why. He has been rougher with me during sex, but he doesn't realize it, and at some points it really hurts me, but I say nothing. He doesn't like it from the back, he prefers it face to face, which is actually the exact 210 | NIGHTS INTO DREAMS...
M.B. JULIEN
opposite of Silvio, but I'm starting to see that they are both two sides to the same coin.
¶ On my way back home my jeans got caught in the chain and this ruined them. I'll probably still wear them. . Or just sew them back up. Night over. .
¶ Sitting here writing, listening to his snores, I am beginning to realize that I enjoy solitude as much as company, if not more. I think I've always known that, but it's only now that I am actually beginning to see it, that I have a tendency to cling on to people, but even when I'm on so tight, I am still alone. .
¶ “Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god. .”
“...Is this thing on?” …....... “Oh, there we go.” …..”Let this serve as the second tape of my fourth playoff run.” … “Bradley made history today, being the first rookie quarterback, as a sixth seed, to beat a first seed team.” ….. “I'm proud of the kid... Had a running play where he broke multiple tackles for a touchdown. He has worked hard this year...” ….. “Some of the analyst are calling it the biggest upset in league history, and that we are finally real contenders, even though I personally believe we have been playing at a level superior to most other teams late in the season.” ….. “The name on the front is more important than the name on the back.” … “Kevin hasn't said a word to anyone since the wildcard game. Well, he's talked, but he's only said what he needs to say, which is just as shocking as us winning the division game.” ….. “...Finally figuring out this recorder.
There is actually a red light at the bottom to indicate you are recording, I didn't notice that before...” … “In addition to these notes, I am noting that our opponent's field conditions were terrible, and is something the league should look into.” …..….. “If a play goes on long enough, it starts to break down and is beneficial to the offense... I think given enough time, an individual will become aware of their strengths.” …....... “I was a part of drafting Okadigbo, and he is now one of the best running backs in the league.” …
“Sometimes I wonder if I have pushed him too hard, or if I'm too stern with him. Like a hardened father. I look at him sometimes, and it is easy to see that there are moments when he feels alone...”
A sign of the Devil playing a trumpet could be seen on a building a few yards away from Clinton Community High School. Inside the school building, on the first floor, Mr.
Allan's Principles of Economics class could be observed as they learned about economics. On the second floor, Ms. Murphy's Anatomy and Physiology class could be observed as they learned about the human anatomy. On the third floor, Mr. Paxton's Critical Thinking class could be observed as they learned about analyzing text.
“Do I have to spell it out for you, Mr. P! The Sun at the end is a symbol of Lynne's smile! Geez!,” exclaimed Karen. Paxton stood there, for a moment, confused and perplexed, and not understanding how he had never seen the ending to Anthology Complex in this way before.
Into the next session of the class, Arimatla read aloud a passage from the novel: There 211 | NIGHTS INTO DREAMS...
M.B. JULIEN
is a story of a woman who forgot the English language after being hit by a car, and the only words she knew were the words she heard. She wouldn't remember the word
"hypnosis" until you said it to her, and only then would it be part of her vocabulary again.
The philosophical concept of the story is that we only know and understand what we have experienced.
After his reading, Latasha raised her hand to give her analysis of the text. She spoke to the tune of all peoples of all backgrounds being separated by social constructs, using the term “social constructs” deliberately and accurately, which prompted Paxton to ask her where she had learned that phrase from. He was both impressed and a little excited.
The bell ringing signified the end of the school day, and after Latasha had eaten and left Paxton's class, Paxton sat down to read a few pages of Paradise Lost. Lost in its pages, he was suddenly pulled out of the universe after hearing the sound of an explosion, followed by loud screams and yells, and after running into the hallway, found a gulf of smoke coming out of a locker.
He ran, running up to the victim who was already being calmed down by Mr.
Howard. When the smoke cleared, he saw that the victim was one of his students; Christopher Bell.
The explosion had done very little damage, but had torn across his left eyebrow and left behind a small trail of blood.
Mr. Howard continued to support Chris, holding him down, as Paxton got up to look inside his locker. There he found something of a homemade bomb which was connected by yarn to the locker's inside doorhandle. Further inspecting the locker, he found another book, which was a companion textbook for Anthology Complex, annotated by G.
Matthew McClane to help one understand the puzzle more easily.
Looking down at the companion book, as a human being, Paxton felt sorrow, and as a teacher, he felt alone. Excluded from his contemporaries. But from this sight, he also understood that students were not divided by their class, but divided only by their growing thirst for knowledge.
212 | NIGHTS INTO DREAMS...
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 36
THEN CAME THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN
2:1:4:36
ANDRE, deciding to attend first period English, was delighted to see a substitute teacher. Carson, trying to obtain information on Chris, sat in second period Biology confused. In third period Art, Monica was half-asleep. Becca, with her head down on the desk, learned nothing in fourth period Health. Latasha, wondering more about Paxton than Chris, grew evermore curious in fifth period Lunch. Cedric, on his way to sixth period Sociology, wondered if goats saw in color. Audrey, playing tennis during seventh period Gym, couldn't stop thinking about how close she was to the locker-explosion.
Sandeep, in the school's library during eighth period, though he should have been in Geometry, played endlessly a game called “Super Monkey Ball.” In the ninth and final period of the day, all of these students, including many others, did not meet in the classroom that they normally met in, but instead journeyed to an abandoned classroom where they attended an investigation by a former police officer.
There, they are asked many various questions, namely the subject matter of the things they had learned about and discussed in Critical Thinking. Anthology Complex had been challenged by the school once before, and in a way, was being challenged once again. Of the matter most concerning to the officer, and which would be relayed to the school's board, was the study of that of a man who had a deep hatred for the entire human race.
A day later, Chris laid wide awake inside room thirteen of Harry S. Truman University Hospital. In the afternoon he was visited by James Paxton, and sometime into the discussion, Chris revealed to him that he had been colorblind in one eye. The stress of this, combined with the stress of racial tension that came from a relationship with Becca, a relationship he only a few moments ago had ended despite her cries for a non-secretive relationship, carefully constructed his next words to Paxton.
“Julien was wrong... Black people... White people... Don't matter how long we're in the same room, it ain't ever gonna work.” After Chris saw a specific expression on Paxton's face, an expression as if Paxton felt he had failed Chris, Chris continued. “We cool though,” Chris asked for a fist bump, which Paxton returned.
Establishment and teachers had begun discussion information provided by a former police officer, and more importantly, had begun discussing Paxton's future with the school, despite the fact that there were no connections between the attempted murder of a student and a novel he had been reading for a particular class.
By the end of the week, the entire class would be completely canceled with the help of nine cautious and concerned parents.
“...Some people think you have only have one chance to succeed, but this is not true.”
213 | THEN CAME THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN
M.B. JULIEN
… “We lost our first game to them, won our second, and a couple of days ago we eliminated them from the playoffs in the conference championship game. A shootout, 43
to 39.” … “Sorry, 42 39.” ….. “One game away from winning it all and somehow I feel too calm about it, like it isn't real.” …....... “I think I will try to get down to Cop next weekend during dawn to look down the field one last time before the league's championship game.” …....... “A teacher must always remain a student of the game.”
Last evening, I had a nightmare in the desert. I stalked through the sand and the night following Sid's trail. Eventually I got to the point where I could see him crawling, disabled by a missing arm, the sand clinging to his face.
After he had realized I was behind him, he stopped and turned over, pleading for his life. I grab him by his long hair, force his body upright, and I hear the sound of mete as I tear off his already wounded right arm, making him now completely armless.
It was now time for him to pay for his sins. I put the dull saw up to his neck, and still yelling, I go back and forth to dull out the screams until his body falls forward and all that is left is his head in my hand, his life depleted.
What is a lifeforce? What is life? Scientist argue over the definition of being “alive”
and cannot come into agreement on whether a lifetype like a virus is actually alive or not.
So what constitutes livelihood? Is it consciousness? The ability to move? Should life be defined as the capacity to reproduce? Is the universe itself able to reproduce forms of matter? Maybe life, or “alive,” should be defined as the ability to measure stimuli in any capacity.
After I had placed his head inside a paper bag, I went to his fallen body and began to cut pieces from it. One by one, I ate parts of him; his fingers, parts of his liver, his gallbladder. I wanted his lifeforce, his genotype, I wanted him to be a part of me. When an animal dies and rots into the soil, its remains can help fertilize a new life. I believe the same can be said about cannibalism.
At about two-thirty or so, with a light drizzle, I found myself helping Tao move a large fishtank into a moving truck as his barely pregnant girlfriend watched... How sad, a mini-tao... Man, she's a high maintenance bitch, but I guess she's exactly who Tao deserves. I wonder if she is forcing the move into a home on him. Does he even have the expenses for that? His job also recommended that he move, so maybe it's that... Who knows.
With their truck now completely packed, a third of their possessions in the truck and a fourth still in the apartment, it was now time for Tao to say goodbye. He extended his hand out to me, and I guess I had to shake it. Without saying anything at all, he turned a professional handshake into a thuggish one, and he was out of my life forever.
As I entered the building and as they drive away the rain grew heavier onto the 214 | THEN CAME THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN
M.B. JULIEN
colored leaves. I sat down on my couch. That lovely couch. I thought about Lynnette.
I picked up my telephone and called Famous Max's Diner, and then I asked for her.
When she took the phone I said hello and eventually asked her if she could leave work to come home. She laughed at me, saying this was not how employment worked. “Just tell them it's an emergency, I miss you.” “You do?…” “Thugs get lonely too.” A very hoarse laugh came from her end, trying to conceal the laughter from others. “And I want to tell you about some new genetic information.” “Really? What is it?” … “I have to physically show it to you.” “Okay, I can't leave now, but I will try to get out early, under one condition. Only if we can talk about the philosophy and mathematics of intimacy.”
“Deal.”
A couple of hours later I heard Lynne's familiar knock on my door and I opened it to let her in. She was still dressed in her work uniform and partially wet from the rain. She walked in and sat her purse on my kitchen counter and eventually I asked her if she was going to go home to change, to which she replied by going into my bedroom.
I followed her into it and saw her going through my drawers of perfectly crumpled endless black shirts. I watched in complete silence.
First, she took off her work pants, revealing basketball shorts I had seen many times before, and second, she took off her work shirt, revealing a brassiere I had seen many times before, then turned around as she began to put on one of my shirts. “Got all my clothes here,” she joked.
Walking towards me, I stopped her from putting on my shirt after seeing those veins on her chest. Attraction is a strange thing.
I put my index finger on one of the veins and followed it passively until it ended abruptly. I was going to tell her that if you completely sever the carotid artery, the victim will bleed out, on average, in forty seconds. But that was not what she came to hear.
“The ancient Chimanian culture thought veins were passage ways for emotions to travel through. Love, hate, anger, joy, sadness. They imagined that these same things existed outside of people, invisible passage ways, so that love or hate could travel from one person to another, or so that two people could share the same emotion.” ….. “Does it work over long distance? Like, could I be in another state and we could share the same feeling?” “The brain moves the foot, doesn't it?” She laughed. “It sounds like a telephone,” she finished. “Telephones, quantum entanglement, it's all the same thing,” I laughed.
“This is exactly what I chased down the bus for.” “You ran after a bus?” “...That would have been another fourty-five minutes of waiting. And I knew you couldn't live without me.”
Silence came upon us as she sat down at a desk and began using my computer. I stood 215 | THEN CAME THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN
M.B. JULIEN
behind her until she told me she found a website last night that dealt with the most important unanswered questions in science, then I got another chair and sat beside her.
Somewhere in the discussion there was a pause and she told me that she had begun practicing yoga. The cancer scared her and she felt like she needed a tool to help ease her mind. “I think if I have whatever this is, this objectivity thing, and yoga, I can stop tripping over my own feet.” “You don't trip over your feet,” I told her, “it's me. My feet move too slow.” “That's what I mean. I mean no, that's not what I mean. What I mean is...” She didn't know what she meant, and under her breath in her frustration I heard her say “passion flower.”
“I want to show you something,” I got up and she followed me. I opened the door to the composition notebook room and she followed me in, curious and confused. We moved closer into the room until we were standing directly in front of two bookcases.
She stared at them for a little bit, trying to figure out what they were supposed to be.
“These books were my father's, he left them for me.” She didn't respond, but she moved closer for a better look.
“Your dad read everything from Ulysses to The Cat in the Hat?,” she asked, looking at the books behind the glass. I laughed, telling her that these books were worth thousands, and that this edition of The Cat in the Hat was a rare limited edition that was never published and was still in its original packaging.
The sound of two keys came out of my pocket and I handed them to her. “I'm showing you this so I can give you these keys for my apartment.” “I don't understand...”
“So you guys can come over, even if I'm not here. All that I ask is that you tell them not to come anywhere near these books, and that you yourself don't touch them, because even I can't touch them.”
“I don't want them,” she said, “I don't want them if it messes with your privacy.”
After going back and forth she eventually took them, but was intent on never using them.
“You're the first person I have ever shown these books to,” I slowly put her hand in mine, “because I trust you, and because you understand my distorted mind.” When she looked up at me, I could feel the same trust radiating from her body.
“There are so many worlds in those books and we are going to visit all of them, Lynne! We are going to go on all types of adventures! One hundred days adventures! Me and you forever! Ninety-seven years and fifty-five thousand seasons! Haha! We're never be apart! Everyminutemeandyouadventuresdotcom!”
Suddenly the buzzer went off and I found I had been clutching Lynne's head against my chest, her hair in a frenzy. It was Dave and Sara, whom I'd met in the hallway and showed into my apartment where they saw their mother with neck-pain.
Sara, for some reason, walked around very carefully, finally saying “This is weird...”
216 | THEN CAME THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN
M.B. JULIEN
It was the first time we had all ever been in my apartment.
Dave walked into the kitchen, telling Sara they had to finish their drawing. Lynne followed them, then did I, asking about the drawing. It was a project for school concerning family matters.
He took out first a finished picture of a family of four, it was himself, Sara, Lynne and Silvio, and he took out second an unfinished picture of a family of three, himself, Sara, Lynne, and the beginning of me.
Lynne and I watched over them as they finished drawing me, and the whole time I could feel Lynne's mild anxiety. As they finished me, Lynne invited me to the backdoor and we sat down on the top step, a slight autumn breeze and early dusk. I guess you could say I felt like a backup to a starter.
I nodded my head in protest, telling her she need not say anything. We stayed completely silent, something we learned to do well, as these silent moments brought out the most affection.
When the kids finished, Sara came out and gifted me the drawing. “He's using the bathroom,” Sara told me. The both of them began walking in the direction of their home and I watched as they entered through their backdoor.
I go inside to find Dave coming back into the kitchen. He glanced at me but didn't say anything, then went to retrieve his backpack. Something fell out of it, a water pistol, and he bent over to pick it up. He looked at me once more, then tucked it inside into his underwear.
Putting on his backpack, he began to speak. “Spooker... I did not choose the thug life, the thug life chose me.” And he vanished into warm darkness. I really wish they'd stop calling me that...
I walked back into my composition notebook room and slid the glass that led to The Cat in the Hat, and I removed it from its spot, and hidden behind it I found a composition notebook that dealt with cannibalism and dismemberment.
I read through it, but what I really thought about was Lynne and the fact that she was nothing like May-ling. There may have been a time before when she traveled down the same path, maybe not, but if she were, I have saved her from that doom of insatiable material desires. And in that same salvation, she has taught me how to love, because I can say now, with all of my heart, that I love her. A non-material woman in possession of the rare diamond rose.
But... I am slow thinking... And I am still afraid to tell her that I love her directly.
Even so, I know that I have told you this, at the very least, so that someone might have some record of my passionate love for her.
217 | THEN CAME THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 37
DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
2:1:4:37
I stepped out the shower, the towel around my waist into a foggy mirror scene, and I took the comb to comb my hair, then I took the deodorant, it was strange and foreign to me, and I rubbed it against my armpits, and I later walked out and then back into brush my teeth, only a moment later would I leave to go into the bedroom and into the closet to remove a suit and place it on the bed to spend a minute or two ironing the pants and the shirt and the coat, and suddenly it was on me, the same regular fit it had had before some time ago, though going back to the closet I had to decide, “Which tie should I wear, the black one or the gray one, I don't know,” and I eventually choose the gray one, and now I had to clean my dress shoes, so I did, spending five minutes a piece on either shoe, and hereafter I put them onto my feet and looked at myself in the mirror, I don't remember the last time I made myself to be so presentable, when could it have last happened, I wonder, I ponder, but I cannot remember, who cares, I walk back into my kitchen and open a top cabinet where I find a miniature cardboard box, taking it out I put it into my pocket, far away into the dreams of paradise, where summer sets and winter rises, where dark bloom fields reach the green skies and when there is light in December, “A million miles of yellowish red cellar door,” and I am not who I told you I was, and I am not who you think I am, and I am on my way to the altar.
When I entered Lynne's apartment I found her sitting in the living room watching television. After she turned back to see me, she smiled and asked me why I looked so handsome. After I had asked her where Sara and Dave were, and after she told me they were in their room, I asked her to join me in her own bedroom.
Once inside, I glanced outside through her window and into a painted scene, then turned around to meet her, a confused yet excited look on her face.
Closing my eyes, I kneeled down on one knee and rested my left hand on my left knee. This was not a sort of kneel towards a higher creature, but was so a sign of admiration for her feet. From the soles to the toes, to know the mystery and the unknown around them. And as I went from them to her legs to her face, I took out the cardboard box which inside was a golden ring, and I moved closer with the desire to know her philosophically.
All that was left now, for everything to be accomplished, was correspondence. The only ingredient which was missing, for this odyssey to be completed, was unity. The gap had now been bridged, and for all to be known, for it all to be absolute, it had to be understood that in the entire universe, which stretched as far as the human imagination, there was now one simple question which had to be asked, and so I asked while showing 218 | DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
M.B. JULIEN
her the piece of jewelry, “May I marry you in philosophy?”
A sort of calm and stoic smile grew upon her face. “Stand up,” she said. I stood up, and looking down at her, she finally answered, “...Yes, you may.”
I immediately removed the ring from box and she then stuck out her hand. It felt like eternity as the ring slid down her finger, and then, stopped. When it was on, she raised up her hand to her face and stared at it, studying it, admiring it as the symbol of cell fusion.
I cleared my throat and began speaking, “Before this can be official, I have prepared a document you need to read over and sign. If you agree to the terms of the contract, then we can move forward with our arrangement. If you do not agree, changes can be made provided I agree with the changes.” I handed over the contract to her and she began to read its contents:
CONDITIONS
A. You will make sure:
1. that my clothes and laundry are kept in good order; 2. that I will receive my three meals regularly in my apartment; 3. that my apartment is kept neat, and especially that my desk is left for my use only.
B. You will renounce all personal relations with me insofar as they are not completely necessary. Specifically, You will forego under my instruction: 1. my sitting at home with you;
2. my going out or traveling with you.
C. You will obey the following points in your relations with me under my instruction: 1. you will not expect any intimacy from me, nor will you reproach me in any way unless asked;
2. you will stop talking to me if I request it;
3. you will leave my apartment immediately without protest if I request it.
D. You may speak to me regardless of whether you are first addressed or not, though I will not guarantee a response or even acknowledge that you are speaking, and if I ignore you, you will not persist or seek out attention.
After reading, she found a pen and bent over to begin signing her name. “Wait what are you doing?,” I asked, “We need at least one witness present at the time of your signature.” She stopped signing and then thought for a moment, then said, “If you want me to sign this, I will sign it, but only under one condition of my own.” I sweated a little bit. “We have to have at least some kind of ceremony,” she finished.
A red rug had been laid out, stretching from the apartment's front door to the inner living room. On either side were flowers that had been temporarily taken from Spookie 219 | DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
M.B. JULIEN
Garden, Lynne's garden around the apartment building.
The first to walk down the rug was the narrator, accompanied by Sara, who wore a bright green dress. After the two had reached the television, they turned around and waited for the bride and her son to make the same walk down the same road.
Dave, who previously had on a full suit, had taken off the pants because they were causing irritation, and now wore only a suit jacket, dress shirt, dress socks and underwear.
He accompanied Lynne, who wore an ivory dress and an onyx necklace.
When the four were finally standing in front of the television, Dave switched into his role of the marriage officiant while Sara switched into her role of the document bearer.
“Not all ride into the sunset, for some must ride into the harvested moon,” Dave recited. We all looked at him strangely. “Please allow the groom and the bride to present their pieces,” he finished.
Lynne wanted to go first, and at first she simply closed her eyes. I waited, and waited, and waited, and then the slow humming of a song began. It caught me by surprise, a weird revelation, and it was not too long before I realized that this was not exactly a song, but a siren. I knew this because I had to physically stop myself from moving closer to her.
Her humming was sad and lovely, with bright things in it, contrasted by a ghost who had a secret in the dark. For some reason, it reminded me of Misses Nosleep.
As I listened, illustrations played out in my mind, and I envisioned her as a mermaid who hummed a mystical siren and whose intent it was to lure me into her waters. Then I saw her as a bird, a new bird, named a lynnette, the same size of a humming bird and the same wings of a singing bird. In my mind, a lynnette came in many colors, but this one was specifically blue.
I wondered how she almost sounded like a violin, and one of my first conclusions was the fact of her small stature, that perhaps this was how she created such notes. “My God,”
I thought, “a swan violin.”
When she was done, she opened her eyes and looked at me. Her singing, which at best was sub-par, was easily surpassed by her surprising ability to hum, and I didn't quite understand it. Her humming was strange, but great, and I didn't have words because I was speechless, but because I was caught so off-guard I didn't know how to compliment someone who had just hummed a perfect song.
Staring at her, I realized that I had heard this song before. It was called “Vadean Waterfall,” composed by a violinist a long ass time ago, and only now have I just remembered it.
After the silence, she told us she hummed it because she was so bad at singing. I told her that she sounded like an opera chorus and that she should definitely pursue a career in professional humming.
220 | DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
M.B. JULIEN
“That's what it sounds like when my teacher plays clavicle music on the computer,”
Sara complimented her without knowing it.
Shortly after, she told me it was my turn. I hesitantly took out the poem I was forced to write for her and trembled as I began reading it. A part of me wanted to tell Dave to leave the room.
¶ Down by the river, I saw you in sunshine, where yellow was the color of your hugs when you gave me golden friendship. Over the short bridge, I felt your beating heart, where red was the color of your love when you gave me ruby kisses. Among the ash-heaps and millionaires, I heard your singing voice, where white was the color of your siren-song when you gave me diamond smiles. Under snowfall in January, I wanted you at twilight, where purple was the color of your sky when you gave me crystal desires. In the city of darkness, I saw you in the night, where black was the color of your spirit when you gave me onyx butterflies. A lady in my mind, I followed you in mysterious dreams, where blue was the color of your beautiful dress when you gave me sapphire muses.
Across the grass fields, I was influenced by your femininity, where pink was the color of your softness when you gave me spinel feelings. Under rainfall in April, I saw you drown in sorrow, where peach was the color of your cry when you gave me pearl tears. By great folly, I grew with you on the farm, where orange was the color of your fruit when you gave me amber passion. Around our home, I smelled your garden roses, where green was the color of your poverty when you gave me emerald treasure.
“...I'm finished,” I told them. They stayed silent for a moment, then Lynne finally asked me if I named it. I hadn't thought about a name for it as it was the first poem I had ever written. Not wanting to look like an amateur, I quickly said it was title “My First True Friend.” When I realized what I had said, I quickly snapped at the three of them, saying if they tell anyone about this, I will simply deny it.
“...That was beautiful, Spooker,” Dave reassured me, and just then Lynne reached forward, snatching the poem out of my hand, folding it, and holding it warmly in a fist.
“Okay, you guys have to stop calling me those names,” I insisted.
After clearing his throat, Dave began again, “Let us continue our ceremony in matrimoney... I'm not really sure what comes next, but I think I am supposed to ask you both if you agree to be man and wife. “I do,” Lynne answered quickly.
The three looked at me. “I do,” I answered. And Dave finally said what Sarah had been waiting for the entire time, “You may now sign the document.” Sarah approached us with the document and a pen on a pillow, and as Lynne went to sign it, Sara put on her glasses and monitored the signature. Thereafter, Sara signed the document herself as a witness and the union and was complete. The only thing left was for me to snap my fingers, commanding her to dance with me.
221 | DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
M.B. JULIEN
After the ceremony the audience had gone home, and the bride and groom found themselves in a odysseus bedroom.
“How do I look?,” I turned around so she could see the whole suit, “I put it on by myself.” She laughed and joked, “Oh wow, really? Good job.”
I told her I also had a little plastic rainbow rose, but I forgot to put it on. She suggested that I should put it on now, so she could see how it looked. When I came back she couldn't stop staring at it. “It's so pretty!,” she declared girlishly. “It's so pretty!,” I repeated in a mockingly girly voice. I took it off and gave it to her, telling her she could have it.
She took it and immediately sat on the bed, raising her foot to adjust her silver side. I saw her do something, sleight of hand, and then watched as the rainbow rose floated around in her sole with a Fadean butterfly. She later told me the prosthetic was hurting her knee so she had the sole section modified to encase some kind of silver liquid, which would allow for softer steps.
Then, finally turning around, she said that she wanted to give me something in return, but couldn't think of any items I would want. She was wrong.
“There actually are two specific items in your possession that I do wish to acquire.”
“What are those?” “With your permission, I would like to procure one of your panties.”
“One of my panties?,” she asked confused. After she thought for a moment, she said,
“Well, I have more than I need, so you can have one, but only one,” she wagged her finger.
She went over to a drawer and one by one took panties out and showing them to me, asking if I wanted this one, or that one, and I nodded my head at each one until she was finally out. “Those are all I have, you have to choose from one of those,” she told me. I nodded my head again.
“I don't want clean ones, I want the one you have on right now.” For a moment she looked out of the window, and when that moment was over she raised her dress and took off her panties, throwing them at me. Her panties had the image of what looked to be that of a pink cartoon kitty cat's face with a ribbon or a bow on the side of its head.
“What's second?,” she asked quickly. “I want one of your heels,” she became very suspicious, almost disturbed. Going into her closet, I told her that this time, any of them will do. She eventually pulled out a purple pair of heels and threw them at me. I threw one back at her, telling her I only needed one. “Spookie, you are deranged, did anyone ever tell you that?” She left the room after saying this, and watching her leave, I couldn't help thinking that her beauty is what poets write about. The poets who dare to capture her.
Outside we heard Sara humming the same siren of her mother, and Dave laid out on 222 | DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
M.B. JULIEN
the floor watching cartoons. On the wall in the kitchen, my spirit jumped a little when I saw two theater masks on a wall. I asked about them and she told me that she got them at a thrift store. I took the happy theater mask from off the wall and put it on my face, then turned around slowly to stare at her. With bizarre laughter she took the sad theater mask and put it on, and she said something to me that I will never forget. “Today, two faces have become one.”
She then went to the living room table to sit down and eat. I stayed in the kitchen, the mask still on my face. And at some ghostly hour, I snuck up behind Sara and Dave with a knife in my hand, just standing there waiting for them to turn around. Dave turned around first, after maybe four minutes, and the sight of the mask and my proximity to his face sent him into a sort of horror. When Sara saw this, she too turned around, also frightened by me ghostly appearance.
The both of them laying on the ground, half-scared and half-relieved, I took off the mask and said the only thing that now needed to be said. “...Boo.”
223 | DÉIJÀS ARE FOREVER
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 38
ALL-PRO
2:1:4:38
¶ CLAYTON ERA BEGINNING OF DYNASTY?
..."Many people erroneously think they have only one chance to succeed, and if they miss that chance, they are doomed to failure. In fact, most people have several opportunities to succeed." These words were famously said by Henry Bill Clayton and they have never been truer as he is shown here kissing the league's most prized trophy. The season had...
¶ OKADIGBO'S FINAL GIFT OF THE SEASON
...Okadigbo, after scoring his first touchdown in the second quarter, runs over to the crowd and hands the ball to a child. Okadigbo has given away touchdown footballs every season since his second season in the league in memory of his newborn son who died shortly after childbirth, and now he has finally given away a championship football.
Declarations have been...
¶ THE CLAYMEN ARE CHAMPIONS
...In stunning fashion, the Pirates have conceded in what is certainly one of the biggest upsets in sports history and one of the greatest Cinderella stories you will ever hear about.
Starting off at a record of 0-3, the...
¶ CHIPPER (QB) IS FIRST ROOKIE TO WIN LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP
...Bradley Chipper has made league history after winning his first league championship.
Chipper, who started the season as a backup to Sammy Nordstrom, played well enough to keep his job despite a later injury. No other rookie in the league's history has ever won a championship in his rookie season, and perhaps this is...
¶ TAYLOR LAWRENCE KICKS EVENTUAL GAME-WINNER
...Early in the fourth quarter, Lawrence kicked a field goal which would be the last score of the game and which would win his team the league's championship. Lawrence, who went 35 for 39 in FGs, ended as the league's top kicker. Boe also...
¶ LATERALS THE FUTURE OF THE LEAGUE?
…Calvin Marshall lateraled the ball to fellow receiver Michael Cunningham, confusing the defense and gaining more than forty yards. Clayton has devised a playing scheme that incorporates lateraling (which has become his trademark and was inspired by Ed Deer) in a way we have never seen before, and could possibly be adopted by other teams if...
224 | ALL-PRO
M.B. JULIEN
¶ RICE POINTS, SHOUTS, “ALL-PRO, BABY!”
Rice (middle) shouting after team's victory, shortly after dumping water on Coach
¶ COACH MASTERSON ON NOT USING FINAL CHALLENEGE
...Many viewers are questioning why Masterson elected not to use his final challenge during a play that included referee interference. The rules state that any involvement where a play is affected by an official may be reviewed, though Masterson chose not to challenge this, perhaps confident that his team had enough time to score more points. The office of officiating is looking into this matter to...
¶ TAMANA CHASES DOWN PASTO TO SAVE TOUCHDOWN
...After a second quarter interception thrown by Chipper, Boe Tamana chases down Heire Pasto to help prevent the Pirates from scoring a touchdown. This effort would lead to the Pirates walking away with only 3 as opposed to 7. The succeeding play...
¶ STADIUM OVERTAKEN BY TEAM AND FANS
...The benches cleared and the crowd spilled out into the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum stadium after the final play had been played and the officials called for the end of the game. An unknown number of fans are being treated for minor injuries currently, though...
¶ KEVIN FAULKNER HELPS TAYLOR LAWRENCE FIX HELMET
Faulkner (left) helping Lawrence with helmet
¶ REGGIE GIVEN SPOTLIGHT UNBEKNOWN TO HIM
...came roaring out of the tunnel Sunday night in what would be their first league championship appearance in well over a quarter of a century. Shown here is Bert McCormack, holding teammates back to give the spotlight to veteran linebacker Reginald Rice. Rice is expected to...
¶ CLAYTON & CO. WIN, 20-17
…“Only in sport are there clear winners and losers,” and Sunday turned out to be a winning night for Henry Clayton and his “Claymen,” winning twenty to seventeen against the New York Pirates. Among the broken records...
225 | ALL-PRO
M.B. JULIEN
¶ FAILED HAIL-MARY ENDS GAME
...In the final seconds of the championship game, the Pirates, in desperation mode, attempted what would be a seventy-five yard touchdown pass. The ball fell short of its mark, indicating the end of the game. One wonders if adopting the strategy of Clayton in lateraling would have proved a better effort, but...
¶ PIRATES, FIRST SEED, LOSE TO SIXTH SEED OPPONENT
...have completed their historic run, defeating the heavily favored New York Pirates in an upset for the ages. The Pirates fell behind early in the second quarter and would never regain the lead they acquired late in the first. Football enthusiasts and theory specialists are digging deep to understand...
¶ CONTROVERSY IN USA'S MOST WATCHED GAME
...scoring a field goal early in the fourth quarter to go up 20 to 17, the Pirates would attempt a quick reply by driving down the field to reach field goal range only a few plays later. However, controversy would break out during the field goal try that would tie the game after an umpire, for safety purposes, interacted with a player who was in position to receive a penalty. The umpire, correcting the player's position, should have resulted in a penalty, however this was not the case and the Pirates' attempt was blocked only a few seconds later. The Pirates elected not to challenge the...
¶ RIOTS AND LOOTING PLAGUE CITY AFTER CHAMPIONSHIP
...Damage totaling up to 140K has plagued the city after winning its first championship game in twenty-eight years. Fans and opponents alike took to the streets in destructive emotion over what would, no matter the case, be an historic event. Police were called to multiple locations after several injuries were reported, one injury eventually leading to the death of...
¶ LEE'S MOM WATCHES SON FROM CROWD
...Joseph Lee's mother, for the first time, watched her son play in a football game.
Margaret Lee, who is very concerned with her son's decision to play a heavy-contact sport, normally would not watch, but this was unlike...
¶ CLAYTON CARRIED OFF BY HIS PLAYERS
...Amid the chaos on the field, coach Clayton was picked up by several teammates and carried off the field. With a smile on his face and one arm in the air, Clayton becomes the first coach in the league's history to defeat a first seeded team with a sixth seeded team.
226 | ALL-PRO
M.B. JULIEN
Early in the season, football spectators referred to Clayton as the mad scien...
¶ FAULKNER OVERCOME WITH EMOTION
...After the most important game of his career, Faulkner's exhaustion was accurately portrayed just a few seconds after the game had ended as he fell to his knees, his helmet pressed against the turf. As he raised his head, a frenzy of fans erupted onto the field, and it was at this moment a photographer caught the professional athlete crying. It had been nearly thirty years since...
...I'm certain now, that the only way to win at life is to live it as if an experiment.
Coach Clayton
227 | ALL-PRO
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 39
CLASS OF 2014
2:1:4:39
CARSON met with Cedric at his locker to discuss the school schedules they had received for the semester. “Who you got for ninth?,” Cedric asked. “I got some nigga named Paxton, you?” “I got him too! Critical Thinking?” “Ooohhh yeah yeah fo sho fo sho,” finished Carson. “I heard he's new and he's white, we ain't gonna learn shit, and we ain't gonna have to do shit.” “Yeeeeeah.”
“I read some of it,” said Sara, “I think she has to always do his laundry now.” “Did he give her a ring?,” asked Christina. “Yeah, she has it on her finger now.” “I'm going to always make sure my husband is clean,” interrupted Pattie. “So all you have to do is sign a piece of paper and someone has to watch you and you are friends forever?,” asked Christina. “Yes, for the fifth time Christy,” replied Pattie. “Yup, they were flower friends but my mom says now they are lonely lovers, and she says he belongs to her now.”
With a dark face, Rebecca told Latasha that Chris's mother had him transferred to another school. When Latasha asked Becca about Paxton, she said she knew nothing whatever about his situation.
Later in the day, Latasha would continue to ask around for Paxton's whereabouts, but she would never be told that he had been fired and was now beginning his search for work in the tutoring industry as it was unlikely any schools would accept him.
The same dark face that plagued Becca now plagued Latasha, though where it was information that rooted in Becca's, it was a lack of information that rooted in Latasha's, and the feeling of never being able to give him the letter she had penned haunted her. To not be able to express how thankful she was for him and that she was hoping everything would go well for him.
The following week, the ninth period class would be told by a substitute teacher that Critical Thinking had been canceled completely after letters from parents, and each student would be given a substitute elective for ninth period.
Lynne traveled to the basement of her apartment building and to her storage unit.
Combing the numbers 11, 20 and 16, she opened her unit and retrieved a bicycle pump and oiling-spray.
Only an hour later would the bell for ninth period sound, the same time she sitting in the auditorium of Clinton Community High School, to the left of her her mate. Parents of students who attended South Kennedy Elementary School were invited to a children's play, of which Sara and Dave had a very minor role. As two astronauts landed on the stage floor, Sara, Dave and several other students all danced around them in “alien”
masks.
228 | CLASS OF 2014
M.B. JULIEN
The narrator eventually asked his mate if she saw the kids. “Sara is on the right, Dave is in the middle,” Lynne replied as she took a photograph.
In the crowd also was Karuna, sitting to the left of the narrator, watching her old students perform. She was now a tutor to blind children, reading aloud all types of stories to them and instructing them in the English language. Withholding a tear, Karuna thought of a sign that stood on the property of her previous employer. She contemplated it now, only because she merely over-sighted it before. “The soul is healed by being with children.”
At this same time, there were four empty classrooms throughout Clinton. Of the four was one in particular that at one point had the sound conversation of many subjects, including, but not limited to, art, science, romance and philosophy, and on one of its desks there was the carving of the words “fuck cridical thinking,” and just beneath them, with the same distinct style of carving, were the letters “P-trunk,” which was spelled out carefully in a new tan wood.
229 | CLASS OF 2014
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 40
¶ LOVE, LYNNETTE
2:1:4:40
¶ 12/18 – LAST night, I had a dream. I can't remember it fully, but I definitely remember being in the ocean alone in the middle of the night. I remember the waters gently pushing me back and forth. I remember the waters being a platinum electric blue, and sometime in the night I heard something coming towards me. I remember later that I saw a wolf paddling in the distance, but it didn't notice me. It continued on, and I watched it, and suddenly it stopped, dying, and its spirit rose.
¶ Yesterday was a sort of honeymoon for me. For us. I am writing this today so I can remember that forever, the amazing time I had and how it all felt like a dream. After much persistence and persuasion, I got my family to visit Cellardoor Lake with me.
¶ It was kind of strange, because besides being married there, every other visit I had to it I was always alone. After school, during my marriage, on work breaks, there were always other people there but I went by myself.
¶ Some time ago, I was left alone and by myself. Not because I chose to be, but because in a way I was forced to be. I had an accident that left me in the hospital for quite a while, and the whole time I was there I felt how I felt when I would visit Cellardoor. All I had was myself. I almost died, my love was angry with me, and all I had was my fucking self. And now I know, the only person you can depend on is yourself.
¶ At the lake, I watched him bury Sara and David on the beach. They had a great time.
Laughing the whole time. And the lake was so calm. Inviting. Sounds of the ocean are always soothing. And yet there is a tidal in him. Ripples and tsunamis. There is something wrong with him, and even if I feel like I know exactly what it is, I know that I really don't.
¶ Some point when he was burying them, he got up and began looking around. Probably for me. And after enough time our eyes met, and something inside me felt fear because he looked at me with the same eyes Silvio used to look at me with. I'm not sure how to explain it, but it is more an instinct than an insight.
¶ I wonder, what did he mean by he wanted to marry me in philosophy? It's such a strange way to tell someone that you want to be with them permanently. Whatever, I am not going to complicate this one. I am married in philosophy to my soulmate, my one true love, and that's that!
¶ I also want to tell you about what I wore on my honeymoon! It is an ebony dress. A dream dress. I also wore my onyx necklace, which is shaped like a butterfly and a heart mixed together into one, AND today I put a picture in it, it was a picture I took yesterday at the lake, my family playing on the beach! I've put a copy of it in this entry.
¶ Ok anyway! Why I chose an ebony dress, I don't know. If I were to take a shot at my psychology, I would say it was because part of me wanted to be. . Misses Spookie. I am his 230 | ¶ LOVE, LYNNETTE
M.B. JULIEN
lady, no matter what I will be by his side, rain snow sunshine and hail, because I know in some other life, the world left us both broken.
¶ I've seen him when he is alone and the thought of his solitude scares me. To think if I am ever alone, I could end up like that. So strange. And while solitude is scary and important, he has also shown me how powerful human connection can be. I've had four, maybe five bikes in my life, but only now can I see that the day you stop racing is the day you win the race. . If you know how to live, you don't have to be afraid of dying. That was a quote. I am not there yet, but I'm trying to get there.
¶ On the way to the lake, the radio said it was going to be getting colder and might snow around New Year's. This is good, because it means I will get more snuggling time, more cuddle sessions and longer hugs. I may have signed away some of my dignity, but he signed a contract that he is not even aware of.
¶ Just before the beach, there is this dress store that has been around since I was in high school. Passing by it, it reminded me of the summer and when I showed off my dresses to him. He made me feel so pretty and beautiful. Last night he slept here with me and told me that he sometimes has dreams of writing poetic books about me and showing me off to the whole world. He has never lied to me, which is why when he tells me something I don't take it with a grain of sand, I take it with the whole damn beach.
¶ Since he's been spending more time with me and sleeping more with me, I started to redecorate this bedroom. I added a desk and I mounted a plank of wood that will hold all of my diaries. Sara and David hardly ever come in here and I don't care if he reads them. .
Something tells me this is going to be a very sacred, memorable and important place in the times to come. . . A million years from now, when humans are extinct and aliens roam the earth, maybe they'll find things that proved we were here. And in those things, they'll find both the beautiful and ugly things humanity was capable of. Maybe not I don't know, I'm just talking out of my ass.
¶ . .When I lived deeper in the city, there was a year where my life was completely unpredictable. I spent my Saturday nights in the bathroom because those moments were sometimes difficult to bear. . But I always came back to the place that was, as best as I can describe it, tangible without being actual.
¶ I hope you ladies will forgive me for saying this, but romantic love is just one big lie that almost everyone of us women perpetuates. We delude ourselves into thinking that there is such a thing as unconditional love for a partner, but I don't think it exists. We see everyone around us displaying how happy they are with their lover, when everyone is just simply playing along with the huge scam. Worst are the people who don't realize they are doing this, but often they are the same people who believe in the illusion. I don't know if I'm one of them. I probably am.
¶ What I am learning, though, is that liberation from pain, finding peace, it does not 231 | ¶ LOVE, LYNNETTE
M.B. JULIEN
come from fulfilling a goal, it doesn't come from finishing a book or having a child or finding true love. It is a life-long process that concludes in death. Maybe death is the only way out. What do you think? My happiness will not last, nor will my sadness, someday I will die, but always know that I do love you. Whoever you are, I love you. I will suffer with you, but that's all right, that's okay, still, let's turn the page.
¶ For a splinter of a second, I saw what he saw in my lovely Cellardoor Lake, for my love is showing me a brand new world, dark, mysterious and cold, but beautiful, and where déijàs are forever.
232 | ¶ LOVE, LYNNETTE