Anthology Complex VII by M.B. Julien - HTML preview
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M.B. Julien
Volume 3 - Composition 1
(3:1 / 7 / VII)
Part 1
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 1
ACIDICA
3:1:1:1
THE ground beneath Lucifer slightly crumbled as he moved forward toward the cliff to observe the flames who surrounded him. Once an integral part to an ambitious project, Satan was now cast into the lowest level of Acidica. It is true that Satan had traveled this plane before, but each time it was a traverse through the highest level which was an easy way to access the realm of his project. But now Satan was to traverse all of the levels, beginning at the lowest and most difficult.
At present, Satan was surrounded on most sides by six groups of fires that averaged flames six feet high.
Watching these fires grow and move, he wondered how he might survive and make it to the new world that was being created by God. Never had he known Acidica to be so dystopic. It was like a ruined land perished by nightmares. It was a place of constant death and darkness and desolation. Most of all, it was a place void of souls or spirits or any type of beings external to the traveler. Those who went about it were utterly alone, accompanied only by deep caves and mountains and fires all within some type of underground underworld. There was no sky, there was only the next level of death.
As Satan continued to observe the flames, he now began to see a fast-moving lava slide down the hillside which was connected to a cave-tunnel that would lead to where he was now. It was only a matter of moments that this lava would rush into the cavity and destroy without mercy anything in it.
To the right of Satan was a cave opening that led to the view of another cave opening adjacent his current location, and if one could jump high and far enough, one could leap from one cave opening and into the other.
Satan could feel the intense heat of the new lava and knew it would be soon. Taking a few steps back, and then peering through the cave opening and into the other side, Satan prepared for a jump that would either lead him to his fiery death or to his escape. And in hearing the sound of fire, he knew that it was time to go. He ran with a great speed and leapt with a great force, only mildly clearing the distance required to live and land inside the neighboring cavity.
Turning around immediately, Satan dodged a small volume of lava that splashed off of the wall and toward him, just missing his horns, and then watched as the remaining lava fell downward and into a lake of fire.
Satan eventually left that cavity and began walking through yet another cave opening, this one that lead him into a field of boulders.
Satan, who was very observant, noticed one of the boulders to be intentionally placed 1 | ACIDICA
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as to obscure either an exit or an entrance, and in moving this boulder, Satan found an area that was to be hidden. He peered inside where he saw it was possible to drop down a few feet into a tunnel.
Dropping town into the tunnel, Satan proposed this was a hidden way because it was indeed the way itself that led out to the new world. And so he walked through it, and began his tour out of Acidica.
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Chapter 2
OCIDICO
3:1:1:2
THE ground beneath Terrell slightly creaked as he moved forward toward the window to observe the bounty hunters who were searching for him. Rock, by now, was the most wanted person in Ocidico by criminals and police alike. His popularity was bolstered by the riot shotgun and glock he went nowhere without and used as incentive to steal from drug dealers.
At present, Rock was surrounded on most sides by six groups that averaged six men.
They knew him to be in the vicinity due to a murder committed by Rock himself only a few short hours earlier.
Watching four men speak down below from above, he wondered how the hell he would ever make it out of Ocidico City, which itself was a Hell to anyone not accustomed to it. And Rock was far from accustomed to Ocidico City, as it was the first time he had ever been in it and wished it to be the last. Ocidico to him, and to anyone outside of it, was like a ruined land perished by nightmares. It was a place of constant death and darkness and disease. Those who ran Ocidico, whether it were the government or the outlaws, were corrupted to an unrecognizable degree, and it was their decree to make the law unidentifiable itself, formed only by vague shadows and silhouettes.
While still observing the four men, Rock saw that a vehicle was approaching them.
When the vehicle stopped to obscure his sight of the men, Rock moved closer to the window and broke one of the blinds so that he may see more clearly. When the vehicle sped away, the count of four men had increased to six and one of them had brought with him a canine who was now sniffing the inside of a bullet-proof vest that was previously owned by Rock.
He was eternally curious as to whether or not the dog would lead them to their prey.
The dog, who must have been trained by law enforcement and stolen, began following the scent which led it toward the direction of the building that Rock was currently cached in. This surprised Rock, that the animal had already begun traveling in his direction.
This forced Rock to reposition his shotgun and his pistol and to grab what little he had. By the time he was done doing this, all of the men and the canine were inside the building.
Inside a room in the apartment there was a damaged wall that led to the view of another damaged wall in an adjacent apartment building, and if one could jump high and far enough, one could leap from one building and into the other. Damage like this was prevalent throughout much of Ocidico City, which gave its character to that of a land of ruins.
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Rock could hear the men and the dog downstairs and knew they would be soon.
Taking a few steps back, and then peering through the hole in the wall and into the other building, Rock prepared for a jump that would either lead him to his death or to his escape. And in hearing one of the men opening the door to the apartment, he knew that it was time to go. He ran with a great speed and leapt with a great force, only mildly clearing the distance required to live and land inside the neighboring building. Once inside, he ran downstairs and out of the backdoor and to an area he was familiar with that would give him refuge in the underground. It was a giant depression in the earth's ground that would lead to the sewers, which to a person's observance would only be slightly less appealing than the wasteland that was above ground.
Dropping down into the sewers, Rock figured this was a place where a smell could not be isolated. And so he walked through it and began his tour out of Ocidico.
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Chapter 3
DREAMER
3:1:1:3
THE apartment building stood three stories tall and was as many tales. Lynne had made her way inside the building and traveled up the stairs and to the second floor, which in apartment C2 was where she lived. She retrieved her keys and opened the door to her apartment, but peering inside she felt something strange. Something was not at all right.
The place and the time was deliberate and yet the feeling was disproportionate.
As she walked into the apartment, the entire living room seemed to slowly fill with black waters. Kneeling down, a cup suddenly appeared in her hand and she scooped a good amount of the black water into the cup. She drank the water, and in doing this, she awoke from a confusing dream.
The alarm clock told Lynne it was one in the morning when she awoke and was at first confused of where she was. Being in a new home, her mind had not yet adjusted to the environment.
She arose from out of her bed which laid in the living room and turned on the dim light to see only a few boxes that remained unpacked. Stretching, she walked over to the large window-panes that gave her a view of a large portion of San Rashida. “How many years had it been since she was back living in the city?,” she asked herself. The answer didn't matter, what mattered was that she was a different person.
By three in the morning she had; showered, eaten, dressed and checked in on her sleeping kids. And now she was prepared for the long day ahead of her.
Exiting her apartment, she found the elevator that dropped her down into the lobby of the tall building. Now exiting the building she found herself outside in a dark and lonely city. It only took a few moments for her to make her way to the subway, and this subway took her to the airport in which she was currently employed.
Working the graveyard shift currently was a young man she had hired named Logan.
She sat down as if a customer and spoke to him about how she was taking a flight out of the state to go to a conference, and especially about how she was nervous of it all. The young man assured her that she would be fine if she was just herself.
Her flight had arrived on time and Lynne walked quickly through the airport to find it. She had worked at this airport for so long but it was only now that she was boarding one of its airplanes.
It was to be a relatively short trip, yet Lynnette managed in that short amount of time to rediscover an old trade. Drawing with black pens seriously was something she had not done since she was much younger, but seeing as she traveled outside of her home state so infrequently, she decided to capture her travels down onto paper. Her first drawing was 5 | DREAMER
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that of the Earth below which featured clouds floating above an unknown city.
After the plane landed, she took a mode of public transportation to the hotel she was to stay in. This time the elevator lifted her upward through a tall building that was not entirely unlike her residence. She entered her small hotel room and from the first sight knew that she liked it.
She went to the window and looked out of it and saw a family of three walking toward the street. Then she took out her cellular device, pointed it up above herself, and then took a smiling photograph of herself with the room behind her. She sent the photo along with a heart character to three recipients.
After finally settling in, Lynne went over again the conference activities, where she would meet other branch managers from the company she worked for who came from all over the United States. This was to be a social and business event which spanned the entire hospitality industry.
At sundown as the dissipating Sun slowly disappeared behind one of the buildings in her view, she became bored all alone in a room by herself. She thought to watch a film on the television set but did not want to pay for such a thing, so instead she sat on her bed and let her mind wander. This wondering landed on her mate and the time he told her that rare events may actually be bugs or glitches in a data simulator such as our universe.
While Lynne coveted the common items from love, one of the things she yearned for most were strange ideas.
By the time night had fallen Lynne was under her covers. In the morning she awoke on time and took public fare to the large office building where the convention would be held. There she met other managers like herself and paid attention intently to the presentations given by corporate employees.
While the events were fun, she was glad to be in her hotel room later in the afternoon where she read various documents she received at the conference. Going onto the balcony after reading to stretch, she noticed an electrical sign in the distance; 32 OR 3 TO 1.
Walking back inside the room, she was in the mood to again draw. She fixed the chair and desk to face toward the large window and began to draw what her sight beheld.
When she was finished, she thought it to be a bit bland and decided to draw a few plants on the sides of the windows. But, in making swift deft movements of the pen, she drew something strange. Curiously examining it and having to decide if she would draw over it or not, she decided not to. To her, it looked like a strange and unknown species of flower, and this very thought gave her an idea.
She got up and walked nearer to the window and looked out, then began to think what it would be like to design her own flowers. She wondered what it would be like to name them and nickname them. She dreamed of them being out in the world where people 6 | DREAMER
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could see them and marvel at them and use them as symbols and gifts and acts of love.
She thought of the prospect for a long while until she settled on the idea that she would start the project when she returned home.
Now laying in bed, she saw that she was far away from sleepiness. She gave in. She turned on the television and browsed through the many movies and television shows.
Only really one caught her interest. It was a movie named “The Harvest Moon” and reminded her of a poem she had written long ago. Playing the trailer, she saw that it was narrated and this excited her deeply as she loved the concept of voice-overs.
“A woman moves back home after the death of her mother to care of her grandmother and begins to suspect the town is haunted by the winter each year.”
After reading the description, Lynne rented the movie and clicked play.
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Chapter 4
THE HARVEST MOON
3:1:1:4
THIS place has a history. In the springtime of 1504, the Spaniards settled here with a desire in their heart to conquer it. But like all things that are intangibly perennial, in the wintertime of that same year, it turned that desire on their heart and this place conquered them, and inevitably the Spaniards went away from here after they burned down the fields and the town they had built.
In the summertime of 1938, my grandmother move to this place with a similar desire of the Spaniards, though it was not to conquer a place but to conquer her own life; she came here with a dream that most all settlers arrive with, a dream that, just like the Spaniards, was morphed into a nightmare when the perfect cold settled that same year.
"This place was peaceful when I first moved here," my grandma often told me, "But the war took all the vigor. It came and took the best from here." The war she referred to was not an actual war, but the war among the townspeople to survive during that particular winter season after the start of a real war which was affecting their daily lives.
I did not experience my first Harvest Moon in this place until my late twenties, when after my mother died I moved here to take care of grandmother. I came in the springtime and immediately this town was the most peaceful place I had ever known. The day was filled with a natural Sun of eastern qualities; when it rained it was a place of one's fantasies; and during mild windstorms that blew a warm cool air, it was readily a person's wish as a final eternal resting place. But when came the Harvest Moon is when those same winds turned. In my mind the changing of those winds was comparable to a dream changing into a nightmare; where trees were blossoming for so many months with fresh new leaves suddenly that wind was blowing dead leaves onto the ground.
After the Harvest Moon, I felt this place changing internally. I go without noting the obvious external changes that come with the changing of seasons, but when I say internally, it was something I felt in my soul. I saw the days grow shorter and I felt the nights grow colder. Any observer could see within this town the restlessness of its youth and the old age of its old. A quality of this specific changing time seemed to siphon certain things while it would let other things die. If you were young, there was no concept of age, you sprung into life. If you were old, there was no concept of vigor, you withered into death. In the same respect, this place, or this time, rather, siphoned from the light to create darker and colder days.
And with this I too was affected; after the Harvest Moon I could sense the darkness clearer. I could feel the intangibly perennial presence here. The changing of the weather was only the physical representation of what was happening to this place. What was 8 | THE HARVEST MOON
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happening to all of us, to each of us, individually. Yes, I must admit it, I love this time of year.
In the springtime of the same year I moved here, so did the Cobys who worked the valley. That family must have been one of the most hardest working farm families I've ever seen. I would not say the Cobys came with the same desire to conquer this place as the Spaniards did, but they really gave that land a go. The Cobys, for a long time, flourished as well as any dream garden. They built a great and thriving business, but then came that early snow.
They lost all of their livestock that year. They lost every sheep and goat. The mother and father both went into a deep depression only comparable in magnitude to the great success they were finding before the Harvest Moon. Similarly, the winds that propelled them forward were no more, the winds had turned on them, and after the wintertime, in the springtime, rather, they sold the farm and went down south to work the boats.
A killing that occurs in this place in the wintertime is still a killing, but a death is not a death at all. The people and dreams that die here, for lack of a better artistic depiction, do not go to Heaven but to Hell. After many years of living here, there is a way of knowing when it, I say "it" because that is what it is, is coming. The winds will turn. The leaves will blow from the trees. The days will become shorter. They will become colder.
Young people will become restless. Old people will suddenly feel old. And just like there is a way to know when it is coming, there is a way to know when it has gone; after the discovery of the tragedy it has left behind.
What to think of this intangibly perennial entity, I do not know fully, but I know that it arrives in the winter and disappears in the spring. The Spaniards came here and up until the winter, they were prosperous. When the cold came, they became frightened and began to see many things die. If it were true that these Spaniards had traveled mostly the equator, it is possible they were inexperienced with such an entity as winter and it would make sense for them to see it as some kind of "evil" entity that descended upon their newly found land. And in the same instance, it would make sense if they burned it down and left it, never to return here again.
I suppose my line of thinking is not far from the Spaniards, or anyone for that matter that thinks this place is haunted, whether by the dead people and dead dreams it houses or the haunting that comes from the presence of winter. Ten years in this farmhouse, ten years come this May, and now my simple needs are covered since grandma passed away.
"It's been a long time since there's been trouble, that's what the people have said anyway,"
I told the new man when I sold the farm today. And with that transaction I have been granted the permission to abandon this place and return to my former life.
No longer will I have to watch the wind turn and blow the leaves from the trees. No 9 | THE HARVEST MOON
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longer will I have that sense of clarity from the darkness where I can feel the presence coming after the Harvest Moon. Perhaps I will travel to a place where the season does not change at all and the knowledge of winter is completely unknown. Too often I have felt an evil here. And too often I have heard frightening noises. As a matter of fact, I have heard one tonight, and these noises in the darkness have made it so that I no longer go out at night. This has been especially true since Bobrow's youngest daughter has been reported as missing.
Many have symbolized spring as a picture of hope and rejuvenation, rebirth, but very few things are meant to survive the harshness of winter. There is a reason why it has very little light and very little warmth. The winter comes to claim the weak, and while some things are strong enough to survive, such as the trees but not the leaves that fall and wither from them, winter will come to kill many of the dreams made in spring, summer and autumn. Those lost in the vast encapsulation and obscurity of winter need not hope, for it will put them to rest soon. In my heart I know they'll find her some day, because they seem to find them all that way. After the thaw in springtime, and the snow inevitably melts away.
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Chapter 5
NIGHTMARER
3:1:1:5
THE following morning, Lynnette woke up early to begin her yoga routine as she thought more about the film she had watched last night. A few hours later she attended the second day of the conference, and then the day after that the third. After the fourth and final day, she checked out of the hotel and went to the airport which would board her back to her home state, but she did not know how difficult a recent government shutdown would make this venture.
The government shutdown had first affected her flight for a few hours, second for a day, and when she finally called her boss, Junior, from a hotel room she had booked without prior intention, she complained to him that she was stuck.
Junior had seen this before, that it sometimes took longer than a week for the issues to be resolved, and advised Lynne to take a train home. He assured her that any expense made would be reimbursed.
At midnight, Lynne finally made it to a train station and waited in one of its shops for her way out. Among the many products she found a series of books and took interest in some of them. Being mad at the ordeal of her lost days, and seeing a book she had always wanted to read, she purchased it and had plans to put it on the company's dime.
When the train came, she boarded with the others and found a place with few people.
As the train started up, she looked out the window at the darkly passing trees and silent town buildings. There was not a soul outside and there were only a few inside her train car. She liked the colors of the interior of the train, it was almost classic to her; and the lights otherwise were somewhat dimmed but still bright enough to allow reading. Taking her purse, she felt inside for the book she had just purchased and opened it to its first page:
Thanksgivings weren't always hard for the Holloways, in fact, in the early years they often embraced relatives they would only see once or twice that year. The home was lively, lovely even, and all around, lacey. Twenty-seven thanksgivings, but with each Thanksgiving times got harder. Hurtful. Hasty even. Mister and Misses Holloway would collect their damaging vocabulary throughout the year only to express them during Thanksgivings, or at the very least days surrounding the holiday. It wasn't always like this, though, there was indeed a time when times were swell. This, of course, brings us to the very first Thanksgiving. The Thanksgiving that started it all...
Lynne lifted her head from out of the pages and looked out of her near-window at the dark passing town. She thought about the many Thanksgivings she had as a child and even served as an adult. She laughed when she remembered the time Emily was stuck at 11 | NIGHTMARER
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work and rushed home to prepare Thanksgiving dinner for herself, Claire and some distant family.
Kristen Holloway, who was mother Holloway, had been driving home one night during a snowstorm on the eve of what was to be the first recorded Thanksgiving of twenty-seven. This was a quiet suburban town in Minnesota where mostly everyone knew everyone and Thanksgivings were celebrated as if the most important day of the year.
Because the Holloways were not grateful people at all, they seemed in line and in tradition to fit into a culture that did not feel gratitude any day of the year except on the fourth Thursday in November.
Lynne again lifted her head from the pages and thought about the last sentence. Then she looked to the left at the dark trees and the dark quiet town. Then she looked within the train car, at the few and lonely passengers, and of the one man who was reading a newspaper as his small child sat across him. The sounds of the train now came into Lynne's concentration, and she thought more on the final sentence, and again lowered her head into her new book.
When Kristen finally made it to her home and drove onto the driveway, she popped open her truck to retrieve a box to bring into her home. Kristen turned toward her massive home, box in hand, and felt a great pride in this possession. She had worked a great deal to obtain it with her husband, Morty, father Holloway, and had done so much work on it to improve its foundation. And so, because she did very little to improve her character, she made plans to improve her home, and walked into the home with a box from a home improvement store which read “Never stop improving.”
Lynne lifted her head again in small laughter. Thought of many things and looked once again at the passing town, but soon the town was replaced with wilderness as the train passed through forests and lakes. Looking back down at the book, she could already feel the empty nightmare this book was going to end in.
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Chapter 6
CITY BOY
3:1:1:6
DAVID'S room had finally been set up to his liking. It was your typical adolescent boy's room; almost colorless with blacks and whites and browns. But in it he had every thing he needed, which was especially his DreamCube, which at the very moment he was playing with old friends through the internet.
“I bring the mothafuckin' ruckus!,” Dave shouted into his microphone. Of the people who heard him were Kane, Dam and Gun, who each now lived miles and miles away from him but were connected through frequencies.
Dick_Handler, which was Dave's account name, could be seen at the top of the scoreboard as he had killed the opponents the most amount of times in a new game each of them had recently acquired. Though the others were glad to have won as a team, they were also tired of hearing Dave shout over the microphone at such high volumes. And Sara, too, was annoyed at the yelling, as she opened the door to tell him to be quieter, and that she also needed him to go to the foods store for some ingredients she needed for dinner.
“Give me five minutes,” Dave responded to Sara. Ten minutes later Dave placed his video game controller onto his desk and put his pants on, walked through the living room and into the kitchen where his mother had left a few bills of currency. Grabbing some, he then left the apartment and began walking down the long hallway toward the elevator.
On his way there, he walked past an old man who used a cane to get around. “Hello young man,” the old man said to Dave. “Hello,” Dave responded and continued walking.
Finally making it to the elevator, Dave called for it and it arrived quite quickly and gave him a chance to witness the old man entering an apartment.
Dropping down to the ground floor, Dave walked through the huge lobby and past the glass doors that led him out into the great city of San Rashida.
He walked only half of a mile past parks and intersections and whatnot to finally reach the grocery store. There he bought the ingredients which his sister required to complete dinner.
Upon returning, he walked through the lobby once again and this time checked the mail and found only a few envelopes, most of which consisted of junkmail.
Returning home he shouted to his sister that he had left the purchases in the kitchen and she shouted back to him of her hearingness, and soon David returned to his video games and his friends.
When the day was almost over and the night had settled into his window, Dave was done with games for the day and felt compelled to watch a movie. Going to his laptop 13 | CITY BOY
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computer, he browsed various websites until he found something he thought he might like. It was a movie called “Philosophy's Accident” and seemed to feature child soldiers who upon them came a philosophical dilemma.
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Chapter 7
PHILOSOPHY'S ACCIDENT
3:1:1:7
THE boy with the pistol stopped in the middle of the woods and then asked the boy with the map bluntly, "Are we lost?" The nine boys were sent on a mission by their commander to detect mines in a field they would have to eventually cross, but hours had passed and the boys seemed to be lost. "No," Map responded to Pistol, just a few hundred more yards and we should be out of these woods." Pistol was not at all convinced.
Two hundred yards later and the boy with the radio was now certain they were indeed lost. Attempting to radio in their current status, he could establish no contact. When the boy with the smoke walked toward Radio to ask him for the radio, Smoke suddenly heard a sound moving through the trees. For all of three seconds the sound moved through the trees until there was a shot. It was quick and nearly fatal. Pistol had shot another child who was approaching them.
When the boy with the binoculars came running down toward them to find out what happened, he saw Pistol, Map and Smoke all slowly walking toward the shot child. The boy with the automatic also came running toward the situation. Realizing that the boy was just a boy and not another child soldier like theirselves, they were relieved.
Inspecting his wounds, they noticed he was shot in the thigh and was currently unconscious.
Then came the boy with the gauze. After asking if he should apply the gauze to the wounded boy, he was told no by Binoculars, who in this group of nine children was respected by all of them and this naturally made him the leader. Followed was the boy with the grenade, and then the boy with the machete. The decision of Binoculars was soon changed when Machete informed him of who it was that was laying on the ground beneath them.
The shot child was the son of the president their military opposed. Like the occasional child, he had run away from home after a dispute with his mother. Finding him here meant that the boys weren't just lost, but they had also ventured into enemy territory. An enemy of whom currently was engaged a type of cold war, where the two nations were not exactly at war with eachother, but were preparing for the onset of it. As were several allying nations of each nation who preferred not a world war.
After Machete had told Binoculars of the boy's identity, he allowed Gauze to work on him and stop the bleeding. And as Gauze went to work, the philosophical accident came to be. The boys at first discussed how to proceed ignorantly, but as each child chimed in with an opinion, the less ignorant the options became. It was proposed by Radio, who among this small group was deemed the smartest, to find the boy's home and tell the 15 | PHILOSOPHY'S ACCIDENT
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adults of the accident that had just occurred, although soon after Radio abandoned this option as he supposed it could escalate the tensions between the two nations and cause war.
Soon, Binoculars made the decision to bring the boy back to their base, as their commander was well equipped to make the right decision. The boys now looked to Map, who after studying his map, told them which way it was back to the base. Map, who was the most tactical out of the boys, was leading them the wrong way, but in his defense, he was given an incorrect map. As they headed out, Binoculars ordered Grenade, who was a bit of a comedian, but also the largest and somewhat overweight, to pick up the president's son and carry him for the assumed short duration.
By the time the boys made it out of the wood, night had fallen. Another attempt by Radio had failed. The president's son had awoke once but soon fell back into sleep. As the boys followed the advancement of Map, they all soon became tired, hungry, thirsty.
And it was soon that they happened onto a house in the middle of a field.
Automatic, who was known to be delinquent, came up with the idea that they should rob the home. Pistol, who was regretful of his action of shooting the boy, wanted no more unnecessity to come from his action. Binoculars thought of the idea, and suggested to Pistol that no one would be hurt. Map quickly designed a plan for the non-lethal attack and all of the boys assumed their position.
The attack, they later learned, was on that of a doctor and his family. Binoculars, however, elected not to tell the doctor of the wounded child outside being watched by Gauze. They simply stole everything they needed, which included a new way of carrying the president's son, and then vanished. Headed back into the wood, Binoculars divided the food among them. Machete had taken his share and left the group to eat alone while all the others attempted to wake the president's son. When they saw that it could not be done, they ate fast and then went through the woods faster as Smoke and Pistol carried the shot child. As time went on, the less likely it was that the boy would survive, and for all intents and purposes, the bullet that struck his leg could have been the first bullet shot in a cold war.
When the boys finally exited the woods for a second time, they did not realize it but they had finally entered the minefield they were commissioned to explore. They missed the first few mines in the field by pure luck, but soon Gauze, the most musically oriented of the group, noticed a wild animal in the field and began telling Grenade of a dream he had of a wolf. As the animal walked around, the kids approached it, and when the animal noticed the children, it stared at them and eventually ran off. But in its run, it triggered a mine that took its life.
Shaken by the explosion, the children now realized that they were in the very 16 | PHILOSOPHY'S ACCIDENT
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minefield they were to inspect. "What should we do?," Smoke asked Binoculars. Smoke, who was the coolest of the bunch in every way of the expression, was the least cool when it came to deathly predicament.
Some were of the opinion that they should travel backwards the way they came, but they were so close to the end that risk was equal moving forward or backward. And so eventually, the kids decided they should move forward as the field would soon end. But as the kids went to move slowly and sweatily, Map came up with an idea.
All children now were layed prone on the ground in the night. Map's plan was to wait for wildlife to come by and show them where the mines were and weren't. Every time an animal walked by a child, that child was filled with fear until the animal walked off and didn't set off a mine nearby to them. An animal came by perhaps once every six minutes, and while none of them detonated any mines, they were not going in the direction that the children needed to go. It wasn't until a group of deer came from the way the boys had come from that they received real help. Every child watched the deer as they walked slowly from one end of the field to the other, and after all the deer had passed, all the children stood up and talked to eachother on which way was the right and safe way to proceed after studying the path of the deer.
The first to get to the end of the field was Automatic. Once escaped, Automatic directed Map, then Map directed Smoke and Pistol, then Smoke and Pistol directed Grenade, then Grenade directed Binoculars, then Binoculars directed Gauze, then Gauze directed Radio, then Radio directed Machete who was last in the line. After each child made it to the other side, discussions were then had on which way they should go. They knew at least they were now out of enemy territory but only one way would lead them back to the base and time was of the essence.
Radio tried again to make contact and on his third attempt he was able to radio in to their commander. Binoculars, taking the radio, informed his commander of the events that had transpired. After learning of the delicate situation, the commander asked them where they were. After detailing their location, their commander told them to remain where they were and that vehicles were being sent to their location.
As they waited, each child wondered about the president's son. He had been unconscious for most of the time, but hadn't seemed to be mortally wounded. And for the nine boys, considering the circumstances of their lives, seemed not to be morally wounded. And finally, only after a short while, Binoculars could see three military vehicles fast approaching their location in the dust of the night.
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Chapter 8
CITY GIRL
3:1:1:8
SARA'S room had finally been set up to her liking. It was your typical adolescent girl's room; a primary color of pale purples and seconded by many whites. But in it she had every thing she needed, which was especially her cellphone, which at the very moment she was using to connect with old friends through the internet.
In their own private chatgroup, Sara, Pattie and Kristi spoke about the television shows they were watching, the books they were reading the music they were listening to.
When hunger struck, Sara exited her room and entered the kitchen through the living room and took out several items to begin preparing dinner for herself and her brother.
There was a pause when she realized she was missing a few ingredients and at the same time heard David shouting from his room about ruckus.
Sara walked over to his room and opened the door, first telling him to keep quiet, and second telling him she required certain ingredients from the foods store.
“Give me 5 minutes,” Dave responded to her. She then returned to her cellphone and read all of the messages that were sent in the chatgroup, seeing that Kristi too had disappeared and Pattie was left basically speaking to herself.
Sara soon put her phone back down and went into the kitchen where she grabbed a full trashbag. Opening the door to her apartment, she made a left turn and began walking opposite the way of the elevator which would lead to a garbage-shoot and a great view of the city of San Rashida.
Returning back home and waiting for David to return she flopped onto her mother's bed in the living room. Looking upside-down into her mother's closet, she suddenly had an idea. She got up, walked into the closet, and in a drawer she found her mother's brassieres. She took two that she liked and went back into her room where she looked at her mirror as she held them to her chest.
She wanted to see how some of the others looked, but as she went to leave her room she heard Dave entering the apartment. She could hear him walk through the living room and into the kitchen where he placed down two bags. Suddenly she heard him shout and she replied that she had heard him, and soon she heard walking back into his room.
Entering the kitchen, she began preparing dinner. Into the kitchen as well she brought along her laptop computer. Once she had settled everything and there was only a time to wait, she began browsing through her computer for a file she had downloaded earlier in the week. It was a re-imagining of a classic tale but she had not the time to read it until now. Finding her glasses, she put them on and opened the file named “How the Kakabus Stole Valentine's.”
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Chapter 9
HOW THE KAKABUS STOLE VALENTINE'S
3:1:1:9
DOWN in Amortown were the amors on February the thirteenth, and the day coming next was a day where fairy love was chief. Indeed it was the day of Valentine, an historic amor who in love placed all of his belief, and on a day that love tested him a life was given and so grew the legend of the red leaf. And now every day on this day of the year a celebration of romance is in highest regard, and every amor no matter what receives a happy Valentine's Day card. All except one, who in the dark caves has refused the celebration all of its life, and no one knows why the Kakabus to Valentine's Day would put forth a sharp knife.
"Valentine's Day is coming," the Kakabus thought to himself in his lonesome, "a day for young hearts who have yet to have grown some." And what did the Kakabus mean when it said this in a way so shoving? Just why did the Kakabus hate so much a day much so for loving? Maybe it was so that the bottom of its pants went up too high? Or maybe it was because it could not bake the perfect sweet potato pie? But I think that the most likely reason in fact, was that its heart was just two shades too black.
At the stroke of midnight all the amors and in Amortown were fast asleep, but the Kakabus stood above in its cave and on the amors it did peep. "Tomorrow they'll wake up and exchange gifts of love, some even over miles, and Jesus, my God, there will be so many smiles!" And one thing the Kakabus hated perhaps above all, was the great shape of an amor smile shaped in awe.
"I've got to find a way to stop Valetine's from coming, surely I must, and find a way to change its meaning into nothing but dust. If I do not by tomorrow I will be on my last hinge, and I'll suffer through a holiday fastened in cringe. He-amors waking up to buy their she-amors cut flowers, and the giving of sweet candies will go on for hours!
Romantic dinners given to the shadows of the moon, and more cut flowers given then and suffocated their bloom. And again, my God, the kissing and that smile! And the she-amors will tell their he-amors 'I was missing you for a while!' Oh, what is left of me will be finished in that fight... I must find a way to stop Valentine's Day from coming...
Tonight!"
Sitting in the cave the Kakabus thought long on its plot, but each plot undoable because of a logical knot. "I could do this, but then eventually a feasible not, and I could do that, but it would only tangle the plot." But suddenly as it stared into Amortown, the Kakabus thought of something that would work all-around. "I will tread into Amortown and steal all the flowers, the cards the sweets. There will be no love in this town and it will be one of its greatest defeats. And as long as I'm alive, of Valentine's Day there will 19 | HOW THE KAKABUS STOLE VALENTINE'S
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be no repeats. And only the river of pain will run through in the paths of these streets!"
You're a sad one, you Kakabus. You're such a wretched curse. You're as cute as an ingrown toenail, you're as pleasant as a cancer, oh you Kakabus. You're a used up brown toothbrush with a bit of mysterious hair. You're a miscreation, you Kakabus. Your heart is a black hole. You're as jaded as frozen glass yet your blood runs hot as heated gas, you Kakabus... I wouldn't breathe in the same place you breathed even if it was a hundred years later. You're a creature, you Kakabus. You have roaches in your laugh. You have all the soft warmness of a cloudy funeral, you Kakabus. And if I had to witness that cloudy funeral or spend ten seconds with you, I'd choose the cloudy funeral. You're a scab, you Kakabus. You're a cut that simply will not heal. Your home is filled with mucus-stained underwear and your mind is filled with brown snow, you Kakabus. There is only one word in the dictionary of all languages that can describe you, and it is as follows: Kaka!
The Kakabus rubbed its hands, and like so treaded into Amortown in the dark night.
And all throughout Amortown, the amors did rest, and so tread lightly did the Kakabus, to rob the town in the west.
The thief of love entered into any store with an icon of red leaves, and planned to steal from them all the great assortment of lovelies. "What did it matter if in the morning there was no celebration? This holiday is a fraud, I'm just trying to expose the injustification!" And with swift feet the Kakabus went to many stores in the town, and with swift hands he stole any lovelie that was around. Off the shelves it took the cards, the sweets, it left nothing for Amortown! Even the dozen cut flowers were taken in stealth and without a sound!
And in the final hour, in the final store, the Kakabus with its Kakabus hand swept the final red rose, "Haha! I am finished with this town, and how they will react tomorrow?
I'm the only one who knows! They will wake up and see that everything has been taken from them and there will be no Valentine's Day. And the anger from the loss of their material way will make them bitter in say. And because they are such simpletons with no idea of what love is really, they will have no way to express it to eachother, and they will see that this holiday was always just silly!"
And as the Kakabus turned to leave quick the flower shop and into the night, on came a light in the back which was at first out of sight. And the Kakabus tried soon to move swiftly to get away, but the amor who had woken saw it first hiding behind a display.
And when the amor was visible it was just a tiny amor-she, and the Kakabus revealed itself from behind the display and showed itself to some degree. "What happened to all the flowers? And cards? And sweets? Tomorrow is Valentine's Day, a day when no matter who you are, together in love we are all elites." The Kakabus who at first did not 20 | HOW THE KAKABUS STOLE VALENTINE'S
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know how to respond, thought quick an excuse in the subtle way of the wronged. "Hello little she, I am here to help you! It seems a thief of love has stolen lovelies to sell at retail price times two!" "Oh no, oh no, my mom says the most profitable day of the year for our family is Valentine's Day. We are so poor, if we have nothing to sell we will have to beg on the street and may starve away." "Don't you worry, little she, I will find who has done this! And then I will bring back all of your lovelies in full, you will see, little miss!"
The Kakabus watched as the tiny amor-she went back to bed, then the Kakabus left itself with a smile on its head. It made it back home to its house in the cave, and it turned out the light and thought about how the the town would behave. Never once did the Kakabus think of the hardship coming forth for the little amor-she, but then again the Kakabus was not one to care for the plights of such amor-thee.
When came morning the Kakabus awoke to a terrifying sound, and when it looked down from the cave, onto its face crept a smile all the way round. The amors in Amortown down below, were puzzled indeed horrified by what was missing and where it was they did not know. "This should teach them that love is more than a single day, it is a life long mission because it is unique that way. And in taking from them the easy gesture, they will be seen for themselves and are now without vesture."
But only a second after what it said and its thoughts, a tiny amor-she appeared to him dressed in polka-dots. "Oh! It's you! Little she from the flower store! I am still working on finding the thief from before!" "Yes, I know, this is why I came. I wanted to thank you for helping my family, and whether you brought us back our lovelies or not, to me, it was all the same." "I appreciate your gesture, say, how did you find me anyway? No one ever comes up here." "When I woke up and everyone was mad, I followed your tracks until it was you I could hear." "Well, run along now little amor-miss, I am going to go back on the hunt for the one who has caused all of this!" And as the little amor-she turned 'round to go, suddenly she remembered what it was to the Kakabus she wanted to give. "This is not much, my friend, this much I know, but I wanted you to have this flower for your efforts, because it has not much time left to live. I grew it myself and was waiting for someone special, someone who saw that Valentine's Day was about more than just flowers and cards and sweets, and you have set out on a journey to find and return our lovelies, this is a gesture that often is not set on repeats. Please accept from me the final flower left in Amortown, I want you to have it because you are the kindest soul around."
For the first time in its life, the Kakabus accepted a flower on Valentine's Day, and it was completely confused as the little amor-she walked away. "What is this feeling? It is so strange. So bewildering. I feel humbled by what the amor-she has done, and with it a feeling of great admiration for all this way that she has come." Then the Kakabus called out to perhaps the only person who had ever been its friend, and with the virtue of truth 21 | HOW THE KAKABUS STOLE VALENTINE'S
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explained to the amor-she its plan to bring Valentine's Day to an end.
"But you have shown me that this day is as much about friendship than just romantic love, it is indeed the celebration of expression and this nothing is above. You see, I once was alone in this cave, repressed, and allowed dark feelings to control me, but your gift of love was like a light that opened me up to be, to simply just be. My goodness, forgive me, I have never spoken so much before, but little amor-she, come with me, we have a holiday to restore!"
And all through Amortown walked the Kakabus and the little amor-she, who while smiling told the Kakabus that her name was actually Amur-Bee. And the legend, if I remember it right, that day it was said, was that the Kakabus's black heart turned two shades toward red. And to each of the amors were given a lovely or two, and Valentine's Day had arrived in a way that was new.
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Chapter 10
BLEEDING JOURNAL
3:1:1:10
INSIDE the Parker's residence, sublocated to David's room, sat Lynne with her feet up in the air and on his desk as she played his DreamCube. She was perpetually fascinated by a game in which the player traversed a 2D world as any color rose they chose. It was a game of mystery as the entire game was in black and white save for the color of the player's affection. And too was it a game of puzzles that the player had to solve.
Sublocated to Sara's room was David, who sat in a purple chair that faced a desk with one plant on it. Sara had challenged him to listen to something other than rap and hip-hop and to broaden his musical tastes to include pop and romance. As David sat and listened to the songs from her computer, he simply could not relate to Sara's choice of music, telling her that it was just too soft for him.
Sublocated to Lynne's quarters, which was the living-room itself, laid Sara on Lynne's bed who was browsing through Lynne's fashion catalogs. At the time she was also cooking dinner for the family of three and she could smell the aroma of the food from the distance.
An hour later, dinner was complete as Sara called out to her mother and brother.
Starving, all three of them, they all relocated to the kitchen and each made themselves their own plate to eat.
Carrying his plate, David returned to his room, and carrying her plate, Sara also returned to her room. Finally, carrying her plate, Lynne went and sat down on the couch in the living room and placed her plate on the table to allow it to cool. But in putting down the plate her mind wandered. She realized that she was alone and lonely, in every sense and facet of either words, and while it was a feeling that had come and gone throughout the years, the feeling suddenly came over her immensely. She let out a low sigh of frustration, and followed this a single tear. “Control yourself,” she said softly.
But she could not control herself, the impulse to check her phone for new messages came over her. She had no new messages, and in putting the phone back down on the table next to her food she laid back on the couch.
She took hold of a note that said “I'll be back in a month.” But it had now been two months. Unlike Kristen, she had no desire for home-improvement, she wanted self-improvement. If her pseudo-husband was going to disappear for months at a time, she needed some way to be more content alone.
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(3:1 / 7 / VII)
Part 2
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 11
FROM HELL TO EARTH
3:1:2:11
SATAN walked forward until he came to a way that was split off and to the mind very confusing. Satan saught to escape from Hell to Earth, but he had now come across what he assumed to be a maze. Of seven entrances he could choose to engage.
Peering into the seven entrances, Satan could only see complete darkness ahead. He did not know that deep within this maze were two pockets of energy that induced insanity, and if an entity were to attain the same position as one of these pockets of energy, their mind would be eviscerated by driving thoughts of madness.
Walking to and fro the entrances, Satan thought upon which course of action was best. Finally, he decided to engage the entrance that was most-left. He walked through it for some time and saw that the tunnel split-off into two ways and was forced to make another decision, and it went on like this until Satan became utterly confused.
In his confusement, Satan suddenly began to hear a whispering in his mind. While Satan was a conscious being capable of immense thought, he knew that the voices coming to him in his mind were not his own. They were of another era and from another place.
Hearing them, Satan began to run so that he would not become mad, but the voices followed. They followed until Satan has successfully escaped them, and it was at this moment that two more pockets of energy appeared in the maze. One energy, however, was quicker than the others. Much, much quicker, and almost as if it had the scent for evil, it found Satan and came to him quickly.
With no recourse, Satan had no choice but to attempt to rebuke the voice, and for a long time there was a sharp battle that bled in the mind of Satan. With a strange power, Satan defeated the voice, but others were following.
Satan ran and he ran through the tunnel as the thoughts followed by in dim whispers.
Hiding behind a wall, he used all of the energy that had remained in his being and finally shut out all of the voices. Unknown to him whether he had defeated them in full, Satan began running again. He was yet to know that one voice remained alive, and this one voice was not far behind.
In his trek, seeing a wall with a circular exit, Satan ran this way and leaped out of the exit. In his fall, he had partially escaped madness and landed in a lake of ash.
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Chapter 12
HELL ON EARTH
3:1:2:12
ROCK walked through the city's sewer system until he came to what appeared to be a boulder that intently hid a door. This intention was committed decades earlier to inhibit an individual from opening the door, which was a door that led to a confusing place.
Rock pushed the boulder just enough that he could enter through the door, and in walking a great distance past it, he came to see many pathways that one could take. Rock sought to inspect each of the seven tunnels but could not see very far into the darkness which they led to. On the other end of that darkness, however, were two bounty hunters who had knowledge of Rock's whereabouts.
These two bounty hunters were no stranger to Rock, they had tried to kill him many times before, first in a convenient store, and multiple times in various other places, but each time they found that they had failed.
Now the place was Ocidico, and this time, they would either kill Rock or Rock would kill them. Rock did not know it but months prior, after a close encounter with the duo, his police issued riot shotgun had been bugged with a location-tracker device. This told the hunters exactly where Rock was if they were close enough to him, and being only on the other end of the middle tunnel, they were close enough to know that this hunt would soon come to an end.
Walking back and forth between the tunnels, Rock finally decided to take the tunnel that was to the most-left. He walked through it for some time and saw that the tunnel split-off into two ways and was forced to make another decision, and it went on like this until Rock understood that he was in a maze. Whoever had obscured the door that led into this maze had done so with great intention and to save a person from being lost in the city's sewer system.
While this was frustrating to Rock, he could not know that the bounty hunters who tracked him could not keep track of his positioning because they too were constantly blocked off by the maze walls. Their device would ping his location, but often there would be a wall that restrained them from attacking him, and so in Rock's displeasure was also his fate.
This perhaps went on for an hour, just long enough that the bounty hunter's device would lose battery-power and now the playing field was mostly balanced. The field became completely balanced when Rock could hear a pair of feet walking, and then another pair, and he knew that he was not alone down under.
For a long time Rock was cautious, and it was only a small time after this that he could hear a dog barking. Another pair of aid to the bounty hunters was a third man and 25 | HELL ON EARTH
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his canine. The man released the canine who had already known of Rock's scent. And as the dog ran closer and closer to Rock, he had no chance but to fire his shotgun and disable the canine, and at the same time he had given away his position. The three men who were not too far behind the canine could see Rock running in the distance. They began shooting at him through the sewer tunnel, constantly illuminating completely the dim lit sewer and showing the shadows of the now deceased dog.
Finding a wall to cover behind, Rock returned fire at a position of great advantage.
His aim with his handgun was far superior than that of his foes, hitting each one multiple times until they were wounded or deceased. When the constant illumination of the sewers was over, Rock put away his pistol and continued running through the sewer system, and seeing a way out through a circular exit system, he barreled toward it until he finally jumped out of it and into a body of dirty water.
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Chapter 13
THE CONSTANT DREAM
3:1:2:13
IF our dreams are our psychology in the dreamworld and separate from the real world, what does that make this world? The constant? The same way we wake into a dream is the same way we wake into reality, the only difference is that when we wake into a dream, there are so many variables that can determine what we wake into. But when we wake back into reality, we resume where we last left off and that dream of reality is given to us in a straight-forward chronological order. I think maybe life is the one dream that is given to us free of the chaos of disorder. The one puzzle you don't have to figure out with so many moving pieces, and yet within it there are people and stories you must navigate.
There was a dream I had many years ago where I was living on the snowy mountains in a log cabin. I step outside into the cold and the blaring Sun and the feeling of cold yet warmth causes me to become lucid. Realizing that I am dreaming, I think of a wolf I had seen earlier and I am drawn to begin walking toward a field.
Underneath this land there is a pocket of energy, which is the energy that stabilizes a chaotic reality and keeps every thing chronological. The release of this energy, as I am told, would result in the fracturing of the dreamworld. Because I am lucid, and because I am aware I am dreaming and not in my reality, the idea tells my mind that it would only affect the dreamworld and not the realworld, but I wonder if I had not become lucid and not known I was dreaming, and instead was under the assumption that I was in my actual reality, if I would wonder if the release of this energy would fracture the real world.
I knew from another dream that I would eventually have, that a wolf would come and would eventually release all of the energy into the universe where therein the universe and its reality would become fractured.
When this energy is released, it not only fractures the universe but also the mind of the dreamer, and a fractured state of mind that leaves one world and wakes into the other remains fractured even in its travels through worlds.
If you got to watch one of your dreams through video, you would pay keen attention to every detail of the dream because you possess the knowledge of knowing that this video is your psychology and consciousness at work, and that every small detail in it is a construct that your brain developed. You would also possess the knowledge of knowing that all of these small details are influenced from the realworld; from what you have experienced in your waking life creates the small details in these dreams. And so you would naturally wonder, after waking back into reality, what is it that influences the realworld? What, in its deeper state, is a person? What is a story? What are ideas and 27 | THE CONSTANT DREAM
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objects? What am I for you, and what are you for me? Am I a construct for you? Are you a construct for me?
It is a powerful thing to pay deep attention to reality but see it through the lens of a dream. It can bring a person so much energy. Enough energy to fracture the mind.
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Chapter 14
COLOR MY HEART
3:1:2:14
I lifted the door to the storage unit and saw that it was night. I had no devices to tell me the time and I rose so that I could stretch my legs. I paced back and forth from 44 to 42, there and back and there back.
When my legs were stretched I stopped to stare at the sky as I always did. In the cloud-filled dark sky I saw a patch of light which I knew was just the Moon in secrecy.
And as the clouds moved and the Moon revealed itself, I saw that painted on the Moon was a black rose. And this black rose slowly detached itself from the moon and began floating toward me. When it reached my hand, it reminded me of Lynne, and even a lucid dream I had of her some time ago.
Lynne had just moved into the townhouse next to me and gradually I became obsessed with her. I never spoke to her directly, but at one moment when I was lucid I became more aware of her and watched her intently.
My infatuation with her grew to the point that I could no longer satisfy the obsession with voyeurism and I ordered a replica doll that bore exactly her image. It was identical to her in every way; height, weight, skin; and I bought wigs and outfits to customize her, and I had dinner with her, took photographs of her, watched movies with her, went to bed with her caressed in my loving arms. In the morning I would wake up and I would tell her that I loved her, and her still face would think it back to me, telling me I was the only one for her. And then I would wake up again.
Back when I was fourteen, something happened to my mind, and I would say these were the moments that shaped not just who I would become but also the figure that my mind would take. These moments were my travels to and from high school, the path remembered best because each day I would past the same park twice.
I began to talk to myself a lot. More often than I ever did. And after my mind developed the idea that all humans were driven by the abstract beast, I developed the aversion that I have to humans to this day.
Many years later, well into a mind afflicted with disgust, I saw one time the moments of a teenage girl who was given to by her father a little piglet. And I saw the teenage girl for a moment cry, because she was given companionship. A friend. Perhaps she no longer felt alone, I don't know.
But this is not so much about her reaction to the piglet as it was my reaction to her response. The same disgust I felt for humanity was not limited outward, but was even moreso inward, for I also was disgusted with myself as I too was human. But I felt a bit of humanity when instead of judging the girl for her need for companionship, I was just 29 | COLOR MY HEART
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simply glad for her.
After a month of having the Lynne doll, I became aware that I had lost my mind to a perverse desire, and so to dispose of the doll I cut it into pieces, first starting with the feet, then the thighs, then the arms and hands, the head, the torso, and eventually the hips.
I placed the collective in four trash bags, and also there was the bag that collected her outfits and wigs. Then I went outside and threw them away. In the distance, I saw the single object of my desire walking toward her home. Without a single word ever spoken between us, she colored my heart.
Seeking companionship makes a person human. There is no need to debase the desire.
People who need others are not weak. They aren't inferior. But in the same regard, we must also be open to the idea that rejection of others, namely humanity, also makes a person human. Wanting to become a first responder to save lives is a very human reaction to living in the world that we do, but we must also understand that an individual who has been driven to murderous rampage and has the desire to kill is also a very human reaction to living in this world.
The moment we begin to irresponsibly pick and choose what makes a person human, we will inevitably turn certain individuals into beasts.
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Chapter 15
STATISTICAL TEMPERATURE
3:1:2:15
STATISTICS are a record of events. Taking in the prior sentence as a whole, we will usually mean things like the amount of babies born in the past year, the number of touchdown passes a quarterback has thrown in the last four games, how many times a person of a certain background has been elected into office in the past half-century. But anything can be interpreted as statistic. After defecation, the amount of toilet paper ply, or square sheets, a person uses can be recorded over the duration of a decade to determine how many sheets they use on average per use.
That being said, any and every event can be recorded as a statistic. While we cannot record every possible event to later analyze, the universe itself may be capable of doing this and may present it to us in the form of heat. The higher the number of possible recorded events is, the higher the temperature of that region will be. This number I would like to call "statistical temperature."
Basically, the higher the temperature in a place is, the more statistical data you can derive from it. The way I've envisioned this is in the way of the Sun, the Earth, and Pluto.
The Sun, which would have an extremely high statistical temperature, is just chaotic heat that we can't make sense of and has so much data we can't interpret it or analyze it. When you have so much information and are unable to organize it in an effective way, it becomes useless. If the statistical temperature were lower, say that of the Earth, this type of statistical overload would cause the interpreter to naturally categorize the recorded events. It's like when a region becomes so unstable due to atomic radiation and extremely high temperatures that in order to stabilize, it splits itself into two to cool down. In this regard, instead of having all of the statistics in one column and nothing is organized, you are creating multiple columns to better categorize the information into groups. If the statistical temperature is too low, for example, Pluto, there will be so little data output that there is essentially nothing to analyze because there is very little activity.
In the case of the Sun, it is a large fireball to us because its volume of statistical data is so dense we cannot interpret all of its information. In the case of the Earth, we have actually utilized the concept of data analysis and archiving statistics to be a record of events because it is possible here. The amount of possible events to record is substantially lower than on the Sun which makes record keeping a stable task. In the case of Pluto, well, it is a small iceball to us for reasons opposite of the Sun. It should also be noted that a black hole may have a higher stat temp than the Sun.
The last thing I would like to mention falls again on the vision process of this that humans use to "see" the statistical temperature. If you start with a single unique sound, 31 | STATISTICAL TEMPERATURE
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say the sound of a person talking, and you begin to add random sounds to that initial sound, eventually you will get to the point where it just sounds like white noise. In the same way, if you just keep adding possible events to a region, it will always begin to look like the Sun the same way if you keep adding sounds it will eventually begin to sound like white noise. Likewise, if you keep removing possible events, you will always eventually get to the state of Pluto, the same way if you keep removing sounds, you will always find silence.
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Chapter 16
BLOODCLOT
3:1:2:16
OPERATION Duskfall was an immense success. Most of the people who took the vaccine did not show any side effects, but a small percentage of the population of Vondopolis was left with deadly illnesses.
The entire Osis family had been diseased with bloodclots, all of whom which had died in a short span of time except one. His name was Throm B.
Throm too suffered from the bloodclots, but something strange occurred to him biologically. He should have died with the rest of his family, but he didn't. His blood became so coagulated that it literally stopped pumping, did not circulate, stopped flowing altogether, and so technically, he was deceased yet he lived.
After losing his entire family, Throm investigated the proceedings of the vaccine, and eventually he gained access to the classified documents from the government concerning Duskfall. This revelation of knowing and understanding the conspiracy, and knowing that Senator Dusk was responsible for the deaths of his wife and his children, it sent him into a murderous rampage. He became a villain in every sense of the word, wearing mostly black and red disguises to gain access to his victims.
His goal was to kill every single person responsible for the release of the vaccine, and he did a pretty good job in doing so because he is so damn hard to kill. No law enforcement was able to either apprehend him or kill him, the latter because he was basically already dead so bullets and knives were very ineffective.
I, however, was able to imprison Bloodclot to help remedy the situation. In this dream that I have become lucid in, I watch him as he sits in a cage I have secluded him within.
Can psychopathy and memory be linked? The recollection of memories tends to evoke an emotional response in most people. Average people... And the ability to interpret and categorize that memory, as, say, desirable or undesirable, perhaps may be a privilege of the moral and not a privilege of the immoral.
In psychopaths, the creation of memory will occur as it would in a non-psychopathic brain, but perhaps the inability to interpret and derive an emotional response from memories is default in a psychotic brain. This would mean, after, say, committing a murder, when a psychopath attempts to recall the memory, there is no emotion that comes with the recollection or any interpretation that makes them feel one way or another. It is simply a memory; nothing more, nothing less.
I looked at Bloodclot, who was awake in my cell, and I wondered if the lack of bloodflow to his brain stopped the operation of emotion and memory. He was now only a machine driven by hate and anger and an inability to interpret his own memory.
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In the privilege of the moral, where their non-psychotic brain is able to produce an emotion of remorse when they recall a memory of committing a murder, this very act of interpretation for that particular memory allows them to develop a conscience. This conscience can help them to avoid committing the same action in the future. However, in the unprivilege of the immoral brain, there is never an emotion or interpretation that comes with the recollection of that same memory, and so no conscience is ever developed. Individuals who cannot derive emotion or any type of interpretation from their memories can allow themselves to continually commit atrocious acts.
Using the basis of these ideas, a far scarier question you must ask yourself: Do psychos make the same mistake over and over again?
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Chapter 17
ELECTRIC FAITH
3:1:2:17
INSIDE the storage unit I sat with the gate rolled up. I become aware of my senses and in looking outside from inside I see that autumn is approaching. From a great distance I admire the trees with their greens and oranges and yellows and reds and browns.
More than two decades ago I remember a time when I would lay wide awake in my bed next to a window that allowed me to see an adjacent tree. I used to just lay there, watching the green leaves speak to the wind in bright sunlight.
This was something that made me happy. And if it wasn't exactly happiness, it was contentment. Peace. I wondered sometimes if it was without meaning or purpose or if I was missing out on life because I should have been studying and preparing myself for successes and a family. What was the point of staring out at nature? It was a happiness that would leave you the moment you joined the world.
I cannot say if it was something spiritual or not, if nature was something I had an intrinsic connection to, but I had a sort of faith in nature.
Two of the most powerful feelings a human being can feel are tied to faith. To have one's faith proven, and to have one's faith disproved.
Before I begin on the matter I'd like to say that the use of the word faith is not related to religious faith as that, to the holder of the faith, never needs to be proven or disproved, but rather related simply to a held belief. This has so little to do with religion in fact that I will not mention the word religion again.
I believe, by a small margin, that to have your faith disproved has the edge in regards to impact or power. That is, the feeling of being disproved outweighs the feeling of being proven. So with that, I will illustrate the matter with three examples, detailing how a faith proved or disproved can have great influences on our worldview.
Imagine a mother has lost her child for six hours, but she has a strong faith that she will find the child alive. For another six hours, she searches for the child with every thing she has, mentally and physically, to the point she is exhausted and can barely think or move. In her search, on the mental side, her mind has thought various thoughts; this is a neighborhood with virtually no crime, all of the people are extra nice, her child is innocent, she herself has been a good person her entire life, her child has only been missing for a short period of time.
The mother will eventually find that her child was attacked by animals and eaten.
Though it would have been a great impact if the mother had found the child alive, finding the child dead is obviously a much greater impact, and to have her faith disproved as 35 | ELECTRIC FAITH
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opposed to being proved after literally exhausting herself both mentally and physically will bring about that powerful feeling: every effort you make in your life, including a 12-hour search for someone who is lost, is not always rewarded. And if you allow your mind to think this way definitely, you will find yourself believing in things less and less until you are derived of faith completely.
The example of the mother was to illustrate how a faith disproved had a greater impact than a faith proven, this next example aims to illustrate how sometimes regardless of the outcome, proved or disproved, the impact is equal.
Imagine a defendant in a court of law who is being tried for murder and the potential sentence is death. The defendant has an incredible faith in the country's legal system. For the matter of repose we for certain know that the defendant is innocent. And the defendant, having knowledge that they are innocent of the crimes brought against them, has faith that the correct verdict will be read.
The defendant first goes through a year of preparation, and then goes through six months of trial. In all that time, the defendant, much like the mother who lost her child, exhausts himself mentally and physically. Has numerous thoughts on justice and at some moments even declares, perhaps just to himself, that he will lead a better life if allowed to retain his freedom. And the moment of the verdict comes, still mostly steadfast in his faith in the legal system.
In the case that he is found innocent, there will be a great feeling that comes from staying the road of conviction. A great satisfaction that comes from never wavering and always keeping the firm belief in not only the legal system and in yourself and your own innocence, but keeping the belief that if you work hard at something, it will eventually pay off. If you are loyal, you will be rewarded. If your faith is strong, what you reap will be equal in strength.
In the case that he is found guilty, that feeling will be similar in magnitude but inverse in reception. If you work hard, it may not pay off. If you are loyal, you may be abandoned. What you reap of faith may not be equal to the strength of your faith itself.
The next example is to illustrate the dynamic between a faith proved and a faith disproved and how faiths disproved may have very little impact compared to faiths proved.
Imagine a gambler purchasing a lottery ticket. The mindset of the gambler, whose faith is in fortune, is that they may eventually win and all of their prior losses will be covered from the big win and more. And when a person does finally win big, their faith in fortune will be vindicated and they will have defied mathematics and everyone who told them they had a problem. The feeling of winning through faith will be awesome. But hey, you know, another loss is just another loss; disproving my faith in fortune barely 36 | ELECTRIC FAITH
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matters.
Looking still at the chattering leaves, after more than two decades, I feel that I still find peace in them. I still feel the same way, and in some ways the feeling is even greater.
There are few material things that can do the same thing and for so long. I can't think of anything, really.
People that you love could perhaps do this, but I'm not even sure that is the case. I love Sara and David, but children will grow old and move away, whether that be physically or mentally, and as much as you love them you have to let them go live their own life. I love Lynne, but she can lose interest in me, and I in her. It's incredibly rare that you find someone who surprises you every day. Every week. Shit, every month.
Partners may grow apart.
After all these years, a faith in myself and in nature and thinking, it's the only thing that has proved reliable and lasting. If you don't have yourself in this world, then who do you have?
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Chapter 18
THE FALSE IDOL
3:1:2:18
KID Nosleep was now in the storage unit with me. I had to close the gate because in the night it began to storm and the raindrops were bouncing into my asylum.
Closing the gate reminded me of a lucid dream I had many years ago where I finally saw the face of a man I was prohibited to see. Or at seeing? I don't know. If you do know and ever see me on the street, let me know.
Anyway, I was lucid and was with a man inside a holy chamber. I had visited him every day for months, telling him each time “either peace or war.” And yet in all this time I had never seen his face because it was covered by a dark cloth.
When I became lucid and realized I was dreaming, I got up and removed the cloth from his head and saw him for who he really was. I realized then that the man was none other than the antichrist, and suddenly he began telling me of his traversal through Acidica and his entering into Earth to cause sin and chaos.
I had been fooled, deceived, yes by a man full of wisdom, but also by a man full of folly. This excitement caused me to awake, and after thinking about the dream for a while, I thought of something I had read long ago in a book.
"Be not too hasty," said Imlac, "to trust or to admire the teachers of morality: they discourse like angels, but they live like men." I have always liked the "they discourse like angels but they live like men" part of this sentence. It speaks to a certain irony in wisdom and knowledge, that it is a strange phenomenon to have a direct answer to a direct problem but not have the ability to carry out that solution.
How many times has a friend come to you with a problem and you have the solid answer or solution for your friend's problem and once you tell them of it they go and carry it out and solve their problem? And how many times have you had the same problem yourself but were unable to carry out that solid solution? It almost goes hand and hand with the idea that you might have a problem in life that you allow yourself to indulge in, but you would be damned if you would allow a dear one to suffer from that same problem. A clear example is suicide; one might contemplate it, but if given the opportunity to talk someone else out of it, they would do so and perform at the highest order.
If we cannot rely on the words of the wise who speak to us as if they were angelic, what can we rely on? Perhaps we rely on the fragile complexity of understanding.
Nietzsche was liked not because he knew things of philosophy and could explain them which would demonstrate an ability of understanding; no, he demonstrated his understanding by his reaction to life and its woes, which was to become sad, because 38 | THE FALSE IDOL
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philosophy is in many parts the study of truth and more often than not the truth hurts and makes us sad. His reaction tells us he understood such a human element of being, and we can see this not by his explanations but by his reactions.
Even though he came to us and spoke to us as if from an otherworldly place, he suffered like man and therefore lived like man. We can be extraordinary in our words, but none of us can ever become angels.
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Chapter 19
BORROWED LIFE
3:1:2:19
THE afterlife, whether it exists or not, has influence and dictates many actions and lives on Earth. Of course if you don't believe in an afterlife, it will have no bearing on how you choose to conduct yourself on Earth. However, for anyone who does believe in any kind of afterlife that resembles the ones depicted in the popular religions, the concept of an afterlife based on your morality on Earth should and will largely determine how you behave.
So what about the beforelife? It doesn't seem like there is much documentation on the notion of a beforelife, at least not nearly as much as there is on the afterlife, but there is one way the beforelife could dictate actions and lives on Earth even though one has not even come into existing yet and there possibly couldn't be reward nor punishment for the way you act in life; if we receive the eternal return as gospel, that is the old idea that every thing repeats itself, then that would actually make the beforelife the nowlife.
If you live a complete life, die, and then are reborn into the same life, technically your beforelife would have been the nowlife. If we believed this type of beforelife reloop, suddenly it would begin to dictate all of our actions and lives on Earth because what we do from then on is what will be written into the stones of history.
The thought of the ability of an afterlife or a beforelife being able to affect the nowlife is strange, isn't it? All three life states seem so separate from eachother, so far away from eachother, and yet through the mind, or the soul, or the spirit, or the whatever, they seem to be connected.
They seem to be connected not through any type of divinity, but through the human realization that what one does now will affect their future and their past. Despite the fact that there is no real proof or evidence of a life outside our current one, the concepts of beforelives and afterlives play such a huge role at the macro level of the world and the micro level of the human.
Another thing that I would like to think about is the life of a human being not on such a grand scale of life and death but on the much smaller daily scale. Every day, you are doing things that set up the “afterday.” What you did today will of course affect to some degree what happens to you tomorrow. This reminds me of that old saying from a book I can't currently remember the name of, but it said to “Live each day as if you were already dead.”
I have to say, that's a hard way to live, but it always makes me think of the people who have attempted suicide but fail. In some way those people are special; they have failed so miserably that they have even failed at failing, but now they live on borrowed 40 | BORROWED LIFE
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time. They are supposed to be dead and having survived their life should be without purpose. It should be empty and without a soul. But that's the irony, you are now free to do anything as a dead soul. You have brought the afterlife into the nowlife.
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Chapter 20
STREAM DREAM
3:1:2:20
I am in a dream. I know that I'm dreaming right now because the sky is on fire and seeing this has caused me to become lucid. I get up from off my chair in the storage unit and walk outside to see the skyfire more closely. Suddenly I begin to elevate and I knew this would happen because if you are lucid in a dream why wouldn't you try to fly? I rise and I rise without ever looking down but only up toward the sky. When I get close enough I begin to see a city forming. A city on fire in the sky. Now I am suddenly in the city, the fire is gone. “Where did it go?,” I think to myself. Why is it night now? Don't wake up, don't wake up. Stay in the dream. I wonder, does lucid dreaming interrupt the flow of another life? Does becoming aware of another self in another reality disrupt the flow of that being and that world? What if you became aware in the real world? What if you became lucid in your actual life, and became so aware that it felt like a dream? I am in an apartment now, still lucid. I walk a step and a woman appears with two children. An adolescent boy and girl who are now capable of a better understanding. They can understand pain, they can understand joy. The girl appears before you. You want to hug her so tight but you can't tell her why. You want to hide behind the hug so she can never see what goes on in your mind. The boy watches from a distance. You know that he knows. And he knows that you know that he knows. The boy has disappeared. You run out of the apartment and into a forest where you hope you will find the boy, but I can't find him. It is now dark, but you are not sure it was ever light. After a time of searching, you find the woman and her children, the same children, in a cabin on a snowy moutain.
They are cold, and through the cabin runs a stream.
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Chapter 21
THE HELL PATH
3:1:3:21
SATAN swam to the top of the ashes where he found a natural ladder made of crevices in the rock. And in his mind he could sense that there was still a terrible thought waiting to strike. This thought sought to trouble the mind of Satan into rot, but as Satan climbed higher and higher into the next level of death, the thought's powers grew weaker and weaker until Satan made it all the way atop the natural ladder.
Now in front of Satan was a narrow way. And walking toward this narrow way he squeezed himself through a narrow gap and saw that what was before him was a sort of triangular pathway. He had stood at the triangle's tip and it opened up on the flat ground before him where he could see the two distant edges who were far apart.
This triangle was Satan's sin. Long before, he had argued with the one they call God on the subject of free will and was negative on its privilege. And now an act of free will stood before him; on this grounded triangle were patches of stone, and as the triangle progressed and widened, there were more patches of stone on each layer, or each row, to choose from. Choosing an incorrect path meant falling through the ground and perhaps into death.
Satan looked at the first row, which of course only contained one patch of stone, and yet he was suspicious of it. It was the only one to choose, and yet he feared it. He lifted his left foot, placed it on the stone, and saw that nothing happened, and so he brought along his right foot and began his decision on the next layer, which contained two patches of stone.
After a time, he decided on the left stone. Just like before, he placed his feet on them one foot at a time, and when he was settled he saw that he did not fall through to his demise.
The next layer was unlike the previous layers; now and for the rest of the layers he would be given a safe landing zone which was a horizontal stripe that allowed him to walk across it and to reach other stones. This was useful so that he could traverse the stripe and choose between each of the three stones.
After a time, Satan chose the middle stone, and when he had both feet on it and did not fall through, he saw that all was well and began his march along the next stripe. There were now four choices and only one of them would guarantee his safety. His thought process was much longer than the others, but soon he chose the stone most right, and in the end he was right again.
Walking the stripe, Satan saw that there were only five more levels to complete until he would reach and be able to walk across a bridge that led to a stone door.
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After a time, Satan made a decision on which stone he thought was most likely to be safe. He chose a stone that was second from the right and he placed his left foot on it. It did not budge, and he decided to confirm his selection by placing his other foot on it, but the moment his other foot touched the stone he suddenly fell through into a great fall.
The fall had left his right leg broken into pieces, but in his pain he saw that he was now on a ramp that led to utter darkness. Satan now came to understand that had he fallen on any of the first three layers, he would have rolled into the darkness, but because he made it so far, he was left only with the pain that came from a shattered leg.
So Satan lay there, grateful to be safe from the darkness, and yet with a passion for vengeance toward the light.
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Chapter 22
THE WAR PATH
3:1:3:22
ROCK swam to the top of the dirty pool of water where he found a ladder made by man. And with his ears he could hear that one of the men was still alive and was now shooting at him. With each shot, Rock climbed faster and faster and just as he went to reach the top, a bullet had struck his leg, shattering the bone and breaking it apart.
Despite the awesome pain that Rock had felt, he made it atop the ladder and out of the sight of the bounty hunter.
Now before Rock was a bridge and under the bridge a current of water that went by so rapidly that to fall in it meant almost a certain doom. Rock looked over the edge and watched as the water sped by, but he knew he had no time to waste as the hunter was well on his way.
Rock began walking on the bridge, and though the beginnings of it felt sturdy, Rock soon learned that the mid-area of the bridge was weaker and may have been given to collapse if enough weight was on it. And still, he knew he had no time so he walked slowly with only one healthy leg. As Rock continued to walk further into the bridge, medical attention grew dire. And to add to this, the tension on the bridge grew stronger, so much so that a part of Rock wanted to turn around and find another way. It was near the end of the bridge that was incredibly weak, and with each fated step Rock felt it would be his last, but perhaps luck was on his side as he made it to the other side.
Looking around, Rock saw that the bounty hunter was no where in sight, and that to walk a few hundred yards meant he would be back into the heart of Ocidico where he could find the medical attention he needed.
Finally making it back into the city, Rock saw the desolate souls who walked this city; this was a city of complete poverty. Those who lived in it were like ghosts of passion. There was a time when this city was alive, just like those who dwelled in it, but corruption and greed had bred urban decay, and so no one found it strange to see a man hobbled on one leg in need of medical attention. All they saw was another ghost in the nightmare, for Ocidico was as close as a human could get to Hell on Earth.
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Chapter 23
A LOVELY FAMILY
3:1:3:23
I am walking down the street I recently moved to. It has been a long time since I've lived in the city. Loud. Much louder than the suburbs.
I open the door to the front lobby and walk inside. I go to my mailbox and see that I have no mail, but this is probably because Lynne checked it for me while I was away. I take a deep sigh and look past the glass doors that lead into the hallway. This is going to be in the top three most difficult things I've ever done in my life, but I have to do it. I owe it to them. They oughta know. They should know.
I walked through the doors and found the elevator, and in turning around I heard a shout. A man was walking toward me and soon I placed my hand in front of the censor.
“Thank you,” he said politely, and pressed for the 21st floor. We went up twenty-one floors together in complete silence until he told me to have a good one. I said the same and went up one level higher towards Hell.
When the elevator opened I saw Lynne way in the distance throwing garbage into a garbage-shoot. I began walking toward her and after a moment she finally noticed me.
She didn't say a word to me. She only looked at me as we both walked closer to her door.
“I need to speak to you. All three of you.” Confused of course, and seeing as she didn't say a word as she opened her door I think she may have been a bit mad.
“Sarah, David,” she shouted from the living room and waited for her children to appear. I walked past her and sat at the table in the kitchen, looking out through the large windows and into San Rashida.
First came Sarah and Lynne told her to sit down at the table. David took a bit longer, but eventually appeared at his door and asked what she wanted. She tells him to sit down but he begins to complain, telling her he was in the middle of something with his friends.
“David,” I looked up at him, I was staring at the table before, “sit down.” Hearing the sternness in my voice, he walked over to the table and sat down. Lynne was the final one to sit down and they waited for me to say something.
I look back down at the table. I know I have nothing to be ashamed of, I know they won't think differently of me, at least not in a negative way, but I am unable to look them in the eyes as I speak.
“Dave, Sara, you guys are getting older and I don't want you to wonder things about me and start making assumptions. And I think you are old enough now to understand.”
Respectfully, they stayed silent. “I have obsessive-compulsive disorder.” I could feel Sara's head turn from me to her mother's. I wanted to say more but was unsure how to continue. Lynne, almost hesitantly, asked me if I was diagnosed with it. “No, but I know 46 | A LOVELY FAMILY
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I have it.” “What is that?,” David asked his mother.
Again she was hesitant and I could feel her looking at me, “I mean I'm not really sure, I think it would be better for you and for us if you told us more about it so we can understand it.” I nodded my head then thought briefly, and finally I said:
“It's something in my head that makes me have to do things. But it's different things for different people. Some people have to wash their hands over and over again even if they're clean and they can't stop themselves from doing it. Some people have to check if their doors are locked over and over again even if they are sure the doors are locked. But I'm not like that. I mean I am a little bit, but for me it's something more mental. It's something that is more in my mind. I have thoughts that I can't stop. They just keep repeating in my head over and over and over. When I was your age some of it was physical, but now for me it is mostly mental and I can't stop it sometimes. But when I was your age sometimes I had it in the worst way. I had an album case when I was like eleven or twelve I just kept opening and closing it over and over and over again and I couldn't figure out why. I think it was because I wanted it to close perfectly and making the right sound, but it took me over two hours of just opening it and closing it over and over again until I was just too mad to make it close the way I wanted it to. One of the times it got really bad when I was a kid but a little older than you guys was when I said something mean to someone else. I can't even remember what I said, but I felt so bad and so low that it bothered me for like a year. I think that's why sometimes I need to be alone, because I'm afraid of hurting people's feelings. I know that the people who love me really love me and I know that what I say to them has weight. I feel like if I yell at them or make them feel bad it will have weight and it will hurt and that's the burden of being loved. It's such a burden that I would rather not be loved at all. I would rather be hated by someone so that my words and my actions mean nothing to them. Then I wouldn't have to worry about overthinking things so obsessively. I obsess over these things so much that it feels like the top of my brain is raw and is actually bleeding.”
When I stopped talking I realized that there were tears going down my face. I don't know if I was crying from the anger of having this illness or if I was crying from shame and embarrassment, but I had been so submerged in my thinking and my expression of my thinking that I hadn't realized it.
I could feel all of their faces turning every which way toward each other and the shadows of their faces on the table before me. Lynne suddenly got up and moved towards me and hugged my body, massaging my back and telling me that she loved me. When she removed herself, she told Sara and David to do the same.
Sara moved forward towards me and hugged my body, saying “I love you,” and then after let go to sit back down. “I love you too,” I said to her. David did not get up at all as 47 | A LOVELY FAMILY
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he and Lynne stared at each other. “David,” she said outloud and waited for him, but he nodded his head in fear. “Lynne, it's all right,” I began saying, but suddenly she snapped at him. She slammed her hand on the table and said something to him in a language I did not understand. But David, he understood it clearly and got up to hug me, saying “Love you” in the process. As he went to sit back down I said “Love you too.”
“Does it come in episodes?,” Lynne asked. “The really bad parts do. It's there all the time, and I can live with it most of the time. It's just when it gets really bad that it's really bad.”
“...Is that why you're shy sometimes?,” Sara asked. “I'm not shy,” I retorted. Lynne placed her hand on my forearm, “No, no, she means is that why you're quiet.” “Quiet, yes.”
“...So you're like, crazy?,” Sara continued asking. Lynne said Sara's name outloud in a tone that told her that this was an inappropriate question. “No, no, I am crazy though,” I looked at Lynne, then at Sara, “I used to do some messed up things. Like if I stubbed one of my toes, I would stub the other one so they both hurt. I haven't felt the need to do that in a while though. But now that I think of it, I haven't stubbed my toes in a while either. I have an obsession of organizing things. I used to do weird shit as a kid, like suck on my shirt. I used to count trading cards over and over again. I would do this thing with my hands where I would put it up to my face while I'm looking at someone and I would cover the lower half of their body with my hand, and I couldn't leave until I did that.”
“Have you ever been to jail?,” David asked. Again, Lynne said Dave's name in that same tone she said Sara's, but slowly she turned her head toward me, “Have you?”
“I plead the fifth,” I joked, “But no, seriously I haven't. You know what I've done though?” “What?,” David asked. “I used to eat people.” I sneaked a look at Sara and found her laughing. For some reason I knew she would find that funny.
“Do you ever see things?,” David asked another question. “Only when it's really bad, but I don't know if that's OCD. Sometimes I see like this shadow figure but it only shows up when I can't sleep.” “Do you see it now?,” Lynne asked. “No, I would never bring him here. And even if I am crazy you guys know that I would never hurt you guys, right? I used to go to therapy and I used to take drugs, but you guys are my therapy now. You guys are my drugs.”
“...Mom, what about you?,” Sara asked. “What do you mean what about me?” David interrupted, “Sometimes we hear you talking to yourself in the kitchen.” “I do not!,”
Lynne laughed. “Yes you do,” I said. Lynne definitely became shy at this moment and found herself coming to an admission.
She admitted to us that while she didn't know what it was, there was something definitely wrong with her and there were times when she felt immensely depressed. So 48 | A LOVELY FAMILY
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depressed that like they all said, she would sometimes talk to herself, whether within her own mind or outloud for the world to hear.
“...So you guys are telling us that both of our parents are basically insane?,” Sara asked. “What's that number for child's services?,” Dave joked. We all laughed.
As we laughed, Dave saw it as a way out, an exit back to his friends as he laughed and slowly walked back toward his room.
Sara stood up and placed her hands on the table and told us that she was going to go as well, and even made a joke about how she was in the middle of eating baby feet before we called for her. Of course, looking at her when she said it, she couldn't help laughing.
Lynne just thought it was strange. I thought that was the funniest part.
“Speaking of feet, I see you got a new shoe.” Lynne raised her left leg onto my thigh so I could see it more clearly. I looked at it but was confused. “I have one in each color,”
she removed the yellow casing from her foot to reveal the silver under, and then placed the yellow casing back onto her foot. “So it's like an actual shoe, then,” I commented.
She explained that while silver was pretty decent at matching her outfits, she felt she would be more comfortable wearing a blue casing with blue jeans or a red casing with a red skirt.
“You know, I'm glad you told us about your thing. When you were gone, I was kind of disappointed, and then when you were gone for two months I became angry and lonely. I was planning on giving you the silent treatment, but now I understand that you just need your space, and I understand why you need it. Was that why you disappeared that other time?”
I nodded my head.
“Well you don't smell as bad,” she joked and laughed. “Excuse me?,” I asked. “I said you don't smell as bad as last time.”
I got up and walked to her and grabbed her by the side and picked her up, she struggling and laughing and trying to get away from me. Ring around the rosie, pocket full of posies, if I smell we all smell we all fall down.
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Chapter 24
THE UNNATURAL DESIGN
3:1:3:24
WHERE do we stand as human beings in the battle between nature and nurture? If we learned things of the seven vices, things such as greed and wrath, from a source that was nurture, that is from authority, society, parents, and it did not come from nature, that is basically biology, then that means we live in an unnatural world. It started with perhaps one person, or one idea, or one action, maybe even all three, and it spread through nurturing the idea into the collective consciousness.
If, though, we learned things of greed and wrath because it is in our nature, then we live in a natural world. The evil we see every day is a natural component of humanity.
But if we were to transform ourselves and commit actions of the seven virtues, that is patience, kindness, and this did not come from nature, we would become unnatural.
Something unusual, like a bone healing in a strange way.
“Do I still stink?,” I shook Lynne while she was in my arms. She was in so much pain and yet laughing, saying that I no longer smelled and that on the contrary I smelled very pleasant.
I let her go and she landed on the couch beside her. I tell her that I was now going to go back into my own apartment so I could take a shower and finally sleep. She seemed kind of sad that I was leaving.
Walking through the hallway and toward the garbage shoot, I saw from the large window that San Rashida was now in full darkness, and even more I saw the reflection of Lynne behind me on the glass. “So you're just going to follow me home like some kind of lost puppy?” “Woof.” She was funny like that.
I opened the door to the stairs and we went down one flight. Walking toward my door, I saw the same man I saw in the elevator earlier leaving his apartment with a woman. I take my keys out and open my door and Lynne follows me inside.
I went to take a shower but cut the time in half because I knew she was waiting for me. When I walked out into the living room I didn't see her, but when I entered my bedroom I saw that she was laying on the bed using her phone.
I learned that she was looking up facts about mental illness because every once in a while she would ask me about symptoms.
When I laid down next to her I said “No, I'm not suicidal. I've had very passive thoughts about it, though.” Passive? “I've never attempted it, but I've gone to sleep some nights wishing I didn't wake up in the morning.” She looked at me with an expression and I could tell that at some point in her life she had thought the same thought, but she was definitely shy about admitting this.
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“You want to know something funny?” Yes. “When it gets really bad, to the point that I cannot control my thoughts or the same thought just keeps repeating itself, I repeat the words 'Blue Raspberries' in an effort to cancel them because it's a neutral statement.”
That works? “Not usually, no, but it helps to numb it.”
“It probably sounds awful, but there are some things about it that I like. There are places that I have been to you wouldn't believe. There are times in my life when I can't beat it, so I just become it.” Is that why you sometimes talk about those strange ideas?
“Besides you, that's what I'm most obsessed about.” She smiled.
She stretched her arm to reach around my body and pulled me into her. For a long time we just laid there in complete silence.
“Do you think this is weird?” “Do I think what's weird?” “Just laying here in silence and not, like, fucking.” “You're my mom, we shouldn't be fucking anyway.” She pulled me in closer, “Mama's boy.”
Falling asleep in her arm I began to dream. It was a dream of Satan who stood before a lake of fire which had a large staircase made of rock behind it. With great diligence and patience, he was able to part the sea of fire as he made motions with his arms. When the terrain was now safe to walk, he dropped down into it and went forth an unnatural way.
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Chapter 25
THE PERPETUAL FORCE: I
3:1:3:25
SCRIPTURES of John the Citizen
P FORCE 1
It is well documented that all living things reproduce. This observation is an effect that must be studied deliberately and with keen eyes.
The theory I have formulated postulates either an invisible field (i.e. gravity) that permeates throughout the universe or an invisible source of energy (i.e. a star) that gives off electromagnetic radiation but has limited reach.
In this rationale, I propose the idea that the field or the star produces “pertrons” which influences any matter within reach to reproduce.
From a rock to an animal, anything affected by the pertrons, or by the perpetual force, will show similarities of the law of inertia; that is, a rock will perpetuate its motion (or lack thereof) and an animal will perpetuate its existence (through reproduction).
We have observed that even viruses, who are very basic living organisms, are affected by pertrons and seek to reproduce by attacking cells and making copies of themselves. This would in consequence give us some direction in figuring out why humans have a natural drive to reproduce that is outside the knowledge of biology. A pertronic field or pertronic radiation influencing our makeup for thousands of years.
This force may have at first been invisible and then became visible in the form of circles, spheres and spirals. Similar to how gravity causes things to fall, the perpetuation force may cause things to circle; this can be seen in orbits and in DNA.
One will wonder if pertrons are emitted from a “star,” if the need for a human being to reproduce will vary based on the proximity of the person to the source. If the Sun itself was emitting pertrons and one traveled to Pluto, would they then feel no desire or urge to reproduce? Perhaps we have such drastic reproduction from all living things on Earth because we are stationed very close to a pertric star. One should research birthrates throughout the year and see if there is a consistent rise and fall.
This perpetuation force, with respect to death, would actually seek to cancel out death as a means to perpetuate life (but when death occurs, it would seek to cancel out life).
This idea, a desire for the pertrons to influence a deathless world, it might suggest the concept of an afterlife. That would be so because the pertrons, through nature's strong-will, would seek to keep the soul conscious in any format that it could. One might find that even after death, they persist in one way or another because it is nature's will. We might also consider the fear of death to be a product of the perpetuation force, a side-52 | THE PERPETUAL FORCE: 1
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effect to influence the body and the mind to stay alive and reproduce and stay alive and reproduce. And too, the wish of an afterlife by many religious followers may be a side-effect of the perpetuation force. I am still trying very hard to articulate the concept of the afterlife, but imagine a rock moving in space, which we will say is a metaphor for the existence of a human being, and that same rock bumping into another rock of similar size and then beginning to go backwards. The change in direction is symbolic of human death, but pertrons seek to keep the rock moving because it was in a state of movement, or life, already.
With this, I must believe that the perpetuation force seeks to keep beings who are alive, alive, even if it is in a different format.
John the Citizen, 2123
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Chapter 26
GARBAGE CODE
3:1:3:26
EVERYTHING in the universe has a garbage version. A garbage version will be defined as: the most recent version of something prior to its production version (which is its current version). An example of this could be: you are creating a digital calculator.
You create a few lines of code that are sufficient in adding together two numbers. But later on in your programming, you update some of those lines and create a few new lines that result in an even more efficient way of adding together two numbers. Some of the old code remains but it not in use in the final product. This old code is what we would call the "garbage version" of the addition system in the digital calculator. It is still in the system, but it is basically useless and removing it would not affect the updated production version.
This concept can be seen in other places: under the regardation of biology in human beings, one could consider the appendix a garbage version, although I am not sure if there is a newer updated version of the appendix. But the appendix within the human being is something that may have been useful in the past but is no longer relevant. The point, though, is the idea that everything in the universe: matter, energy, ideas, everything; they all have garbage versions.
I watch as Lynne fills my fridge with perishables. A few hours ago Sara was cleaning their apartment when she bumped into a piece of furniture and knocked over a lamp that was turned on. The moment the lamp smashed into the ground, all of the lights went out which also tells them that a fuse had been blown. Their neighbor, Elway, heard the smash, but would not have knocked on their door if his power too hadn't been cut. They learned that in the entire building, their two apartments were the only ones affected, and in calling the building owner, since it was so late already, were told that he would be there first thing in the morning.
Of course this is Lynne's second home without my sayso. At least she asked me if I didn't mind if Elway could stay as well, seeing as he was old, walked with a cane, and had like twenty bottles of medication. Nothing against the old man, but I don't want to be alive when I'm in that condition. I also suppose now that he's been in my home I will have to say something to him every time I see him in the elevator or the hallway. You have to be careful who you engage with in this life.
When she was done we went to sit down at a table with Elway. Like a lot of curious people Lynne wanted to know a lot about him, and like a lot of lonely people he wanted to tell her a lot of him.
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me. He made a comment on how the current generation of adults, no offense to us he added, lacked the work ethic that his generation had. And he said to us that life was about working hard every day for your success, even if it meant risking your health.
When we were done talking with him, Lynne said the living room was his for the night, as if it were her fucking apartment. We walk into the bedroom where Sarah and Dave are already established and using their laptop computers.
It's a good thing my composition notebooks were all still in several boxes, otherwise I don't know where I would have put them. It's also good that I've finished transferring them to my computer, it's so much easier to type them when I finish dreaming. I have always been glad that they are like a scientific journey. I mean journal. Wait a minute. Is that why it's called a journal? Because it's like a journey? Damn. I never realized that shit.
I watch as Lynne takes off her red pants and her red shoe as I lay on the bed, and begin to say at Sara and Dave, “Turn the light offwhnougusg.” Ah, tongue tied. “Turn off the light when you guys go to sleep.” “Ok Spooker.” “Ok Spookie.” … “Ok Spook.”
“You guys are acting like I won't actually kick you out.” Sara looked back at me and dared me to do it. She's so lucky she is actually like a daughter to me. Fucking four-eyes.
A moment later I could hear Dave saying something as he typed. “Richard Holder.”
For some reason this made Lynne laugh as she tried to sleep.
An hour must have passed when I awoke to find the lights off and Sara traversing between me and Lynne, and when I looked downward, I found that Dave was sleeping perpendicular. And I must have stayed awake thirty more minutes trying to dream.
I've often thought of the strange reality of dreams. While in them, it is almost impossible to tell the difference between the matter in dreams and the matter in the real world. Even the abstract matter that comes to us in thoughts can be indistinguishable if we become truly lost in it. The ability to create these worlds in our minds has, in a drastic way, makes me question if this form of "matter" is a garbage version of the matter we interact with every day in the real world.
And on the subject of matter, and by way of matter, energy, I have wondered if dark matter and dark energy are garbage versions of matter and energy. Perhaps they are not, and in reverse, they are actually the production versions of matter and energy, which would make the matter and energy we know to be the actual garbage versions of such.
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Chapter 27
COURTYARD CONFESSIONS
3:1:3:27
AT the bottom of the highrise is a courtyard located within it for use by its residents; it contains of course some of Lynne's favorite things. We sat on a bench opposite two statues of a king and a queen while flowers gathered around them. King Brian Flanagan and Queen Brigid Flanagan.
Before sitting down we had read an inscription near to them, saying “Irony is fates subtle way of letting us know it exists.” I thought about how sometimes we don't know something was ironic until many years later.
With her black shoe atop her knee in black jeans, she was drawing some type of make-believe flower, “...I never mentioned this to you but a way whiles back Silvio told me that he had remarried and was having a child.” “...Why are you telling me now?”
She begins speaking about how sometimes she regrets the time lost with Silvio at the tailend of their relationship, specifically the time around when she met me. “I could have been further ahead in life by now.”
She finished with a deft movement of her black pen and saying she was over it, she doesn't hate him, she is just indifferent towards him now.
“I'm not,” I said, “...like David says, if I ever see that nigga again it's on-sight.” Lynne began laughing pulling her head back. “You think I'm playin',” I gently pushed her shoulder, “that dude punched me in my head,” I finished. Laughing wildly she made note of the fact that one thing we had in common was the fact that we were both punched in the face by him.
After a brief pause, I admitted to her that there was a time way back then that I wanted to punch her in the face as well. “Excuse me,” she looked into my soul.
I tell her about how when she went back to Silvio I was frustrated and heartbroken for a while. It was the first time I had ever seen her wearing make-up and she looked so beautiful but it wasn't for me. It was for my nemesis. And then when I went to go fight my nemesis to defend her honor all I got was beat-up. No one ever made me feel the way you did so I was pretty bitter having to watch you and him go out.
I could tell she felt bad, but she replied soon after. “Well you never showed me any affection,” she shrugged, “I couldn't tell if you liked me or not.” … “Yes. No,” she said in a deep voice mocking me. It was kind of funny. “And what about when you came back and told me you wouldn't stay with me, and I had to go hide somewhere else. You don't think that hurt me? I was crying the whole time.”
“You wouldn't call the police, what else could I have done? Staying with you wouldn't have solved anything. I was in love with you but I wasn't about to deal with 56 | COURTYARD CONFESSIONS
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Silvio. No way.” “Well I forgive you for leaving me out in the cold if you forgive me for breaking your heart.” “Whatever.” She took her black pen and proceeded to draw a heart broken into two on my arm.
She was going to start saying something else when we saw David approaching us. He walked over to us and told his mother that he needed the bank card for something Sara was preparing. She handed him the card and he walked opposite the way he had come.
After a while she started again, but I knew it was different to what she had planned to say before Dave made his appearance. “You might not know it, but you are the closest thing they've ever had to a father. Silvio was never really around and barely knew them, but to hell did he think he owned them just because they came from him. If he saw either of them today he wouldn't recognize them, that's how little he knew them. I mean honestly, at this point, by year count I think you have known them longer than he did. If they ever saw him again, I don't think they would really know who he is to them and it would be depressingly awkward.”
What she said made me think of the people who, whether by decision or indecision, bring humans into this world.
It's almost a paradox. Some people who have given thought to bringing a person into this world never have children and that conscientious consideration probably would have made them a wonderful parent. Of course, though, there are people who don't have children who are still awful. And some people who never develop that same conscientious consideration do bring children into this world and that very lack of consciousness could be the reason why they are a terrible parent. Of course, though, there are some parents with unplanned children who end up being wonderful guardians.
The paradox, I think, is that people who choose not to have children would have been great parents, and the very decision to bring a child into this world makes you a bad parent. People like Silvio are proof of that, but at the same time, people like Lynne are proof that that notion is wrong. It's complicated, but I hope if you ever decide to have children, or if you already have children, that you understand the magnitude of the human condition.
“I already know I'm the father of the decade,” I looked at her, “but how am I doing as a husband.” I could tell the question caught her off-guard.
“...Well, I know I just talked about your affection, but if you showered me with love and flowers and poems and serenaded me I'd eventually get sick of you,” she laughed,
“so we'll say you're the husband of the week.” I nodded my head. “What is that, anyway?,” I pointed at her drawing.
Her reaction following the question told me she had been waiting for me to ask because she suddenly gained a burst energy.
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“I was thinking about glitches in the universe. That thing you were telling me about before. And I started to wonder, what if flowers glitched? Like in their design and eventual evolution, they began to take on designs of worldly things? What I'm drawing now is supposed to be the fusion of a woman's eye in the natural design of a flower.”
I looked more closely at it, and I couldn't tell that it was supposed to be an eye before because it was well hidden in the design of the flower, but since she told me, I don't know how I missed it.
“You anthomaniac,” I told her. “I know.”
There is a brief pause that leads to a question. “When you were talking about mania last week, I wanted to ask you, how do you know when you're in it?”
I thought about the question and had a pretty good answer. But as I went to answer it, something suddenly hit Lynne on the top of her forehead. She was confused, as was I, and slowly she turned her head toward me. It was the most confusing look I had ever seen from her. After looking at me, she looked behind herself to see if someone had thrown something at her, but there was not another soul in the courtyard with us.
And then suddenly I was struck in the same manner, and when she saw this, she looked up into the sky and this is where we found our answer. A great hail began to fall onto the courtyard, overtaking it like the angry voice of a god.
We both got up and grabbed our things and began running through the courtyard for the entrance of the building all while being pelted by what felt to be small rocks.
She got to the entrance before me even though I had a headstart, and when we got inside the building I commented on how freaking fast she was, and that if she had a shoe brand named Lynne's I might buy a pair.
As we rose up in the elevator to the 21st floor, I think of the icerocks and the eventual integration of winter, which surely was coming to claim the weak.
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Chapter 28
PURPLE PROPHECY
3:1:3:28
THE genius behind our dreams has a way of putting every thing together seamlessly.
And it is strange to think that this artist, like the heart, works every second of every day of every year almost without fail.
Dreams can be combined by the dream genius to produce new things. My dream last night took place in my most previous apartment, but the apartment was located in a different town and I was older than I am now. In that there were three mistakes of physical location, time and age, and this told me of the intertwining a dream can create in the subconscious that won't be noticed until I wake up. And it also told me of the simple fact that dreams are like a hypothesis or prediction made with a certain amount of limited information.
If you have one result for an event with variables, you will not be able to accurately predict the next one thousand results. If you have one thousand results for that same event, you will be able to reliably predict the next result. A way to imagine this is to picture a person shooting a free throw in basketball. If you have no information, or past statistics, on this particular free throw shooter, it is impossible to know whether this person will make or miss the free throw. If, however, you have data of the free thrower's last one thousand attempts, you can make a reliable prediction as to whether they will make or miss the shot.
When matter was introduced into the universe, it is possible that at that exact moment a sort of database was created that would log every result that occurred in the universe. It is also possible that, much like how we can predict if a free throw will be made or not based on information that we have, the universe acts as a data simulator and provides predictions for events that follow. In short, this would mean each event in our universe is actually a calculated prediction rather than an actual action. If you woke up this morning and immediately brushed your teeth, it was because the data simulator used past information about your life and predicted that you would wake up and brush your teeth.
Of course, while we see this as an actual action in real life, we assume currently that this is taking place in a data simulator, and so it is actually only a prediction by the simulator.
The universe, or the simulation, will have a certain amount of data and predict what should happen next, and because we are in a data simulator, everything we do is a prediction by the universe's calculations.
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much data is available, the simulation will present an action, assess the available data, then make a prediction.
Returning to the example of the free throw shooter; let's assume the amount of available data in the region is the last thirty-thousand shots by the free throw shooter.
This is a wealth of information, and it is likely the simulator will make an accurate prediction. But, let's now assume the amount of data available in the region are the last two shots by the free throw shooter. There is very little data here, and the simulator is likely to make a prediction that may oppose the prediction made when there was thirty-thousand pieces of data. This makes me think of all the places in the universe where there is consistently less than ten percent of data available to the simulator. The predictions made there would be wildly inaccurate and it would be an interesting spectacle.
Another topic on the prediction theory is that as the universe ages and collects more data, it would become more accurate in predicting events in general. Ideally, it would become better at predicting itself as it accrues and builds data about itself. But as the universe logs more and more data, and as it uses this data it literally just stored to make new predictions, it presents the idea of the loop returner. If the free throw shooter makes a shot, and it is logged in the database as being made, it is likely the simulator will predict another "made shot" in its next result. If this continues, the free throw shooter will increase their chances of continually receiving "made shot" predictions from the universe, in which case you will begin to see a form of repetition.
Because we live in such an aged universe, or aged simulation, we have already begun to witness the effects of the loop returner. Just take note of all the things that are repeated each day. Even the process of having days and nights itself could be considered an effect of the loop returner. It makes me wonder if this is why our universe is so cyclical. And it also makes me wonder about what the early universe would have been like as there would not be enough data available for it to be cyclical. History does repeat itself, but only if it has repeated itself enough times before.
Now to get into the contradictions of this supposed data simulator and prediction theory. How do you get the first action? How is the first prediction made? This would be a simple answer if the option of God or a creator or creators was available, but let's give God the day off. The reason why this is a tough thing to answer without the option of God is because it proposes a logical fallacy; predictions are made based off of accessible data, but the first ever event would have no data available to assist in predicting its result.
The best I've come up with in answering this dilemma is using Newton's third law; for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
It is important to note that prediction in this sense is reactive and not proactive.
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takes a shot, the universe learns that it can result in either a "made shot" or a "missed shot". But even before the shot is taken, things are being recorded. Just before the shot is taken, with the aid of the third law, the universe learns that the free throw shooter either
"takes a shot" or "doesn't take a shot." The simulator can learn that another action of the particular action is its opposite action. If we return to the dilemma, "How is the first prediction made?", we can now see that the action of the free throw shooter doing nothing is a result in of itself, and can start the simulation by proposing the opposite of that action, which is shooting the basketball. This answer, however, does not address the fact that there is still no data prior to making the prediction, which is why it is not necessarily a totally acceptable answer.
The third law in this proposition also makes me wonder about something else; if the universe does not exist, can this be considered an action or even a result? If so, to the data simulator, the next proceeding could very well be to establish the prediction that a universe does exist. I truly do ponder if the creation of our universe is simply a prediction calculated by a simulator. Imagine that, the start of all things was an educated guess. In a cosmos of mystery, the greatest hypothesis is that our universe exists. And with that mystery, the universe remains forever hypothetical.
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Chapter 29
COMPLEX ANTHOLOGY
3:1:3:29
SARA has basically become my roommate. Ever since she learned of my mental illness, she has had the instinct to become a caretaker. It's a nice gesture but it really inhibits my private customs. And I can always feel, even from across the living room and without actually looking at her, when she is staring at me.
“What are you looking at Sara?,” I asked while still staring at my laptop computer.
She came to and suddenly looked away, going back to her own laptop. But only a minute and five page loads went by until she began looking at me again, and this time her stare came with a question.
“Is it weird if I can hear myself in my own head?,” she asked. I looked at her and then back at the screen, “How do you hear yourself?” “Like if I'm reading something, I can hear my voice in my head.” “Do you hear your voice when you're not reading?”
She paused for a moment, and then I asked her another question, “Did you just hear your own voice just now when trying to answer that question?”
And then something weird happened. She said for the question before the last one, when I asked her if she heard her own voice when not reading, in thinking about it she did not hear her own voice at all, but for the last question, when I asked her if she heard her own voice when thinking about the prior question, she heard her own voice as she asked herself “Wait, did I hear it?” I realized that this sudden awareness confused her.
Answering a question about whether she hears her own voice when not reading didn't bring out the inner voice, but answering a question about a question of consciousness did.
After some more questions on the matter, I learned that she did have an inner monologue but being her age it was not fully developed and it came in fractures and fragments. Since her and David would have been biologically close, and knowing Lynne definitely talks to herself, out loud even, and also knowing that Silvio is a fucking sociopath, I diagnosed us all to be among the ranks of the insane.
“Come on,” I clapped and stood up and went to put on my shoes. “Where are we going?,” she asked putting on her shoes as well. “I want to show you something, but you can't tell your mom.” A smile crept onto her face like the Grinch's before Christmas as she rubbed her hands together.
We left my apartment and took the elevator to the ground floor and then went all the way to the end of the lobby where we found seats for our behinds. From this location, we could watch as residents of the building entered and exited.
“In school, have they taught you about hypotheses?,” “Yeah, science class. It's when you make a question about something and then test it.” “Okay, so there is this game your 62 | COMPLEX ANTHOLOGY
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mom taught me called Gumshoe. I'm not good at it but the rules are you have to make three guesses about what you think will be true about the next person who enters or leaves the building.” “Ok, are we going to play it?” “No. Well, maybe later, but I wanted you to know that part so you can better understand this next part. This is the part you can't tell your mom about.” “Okay...”
“You see how we are able to make predictions, or hypotheses, because we are conscious and aware? Well I think the universe does this, too. Every thing that you experience might be a prediction that the universe makes. It has some data, and based off of that data, it makes a prediction, such as the next person to enter the building will be a man wearing a green shirt with a baseball cap.” As soon as I said this, a woman wearing a purple and red shirt with a backpack entered the building. “Close,” Sara joked.
“So you see,” I continued, “the universe, based on past data, predicted that someone like you would be born and live. It predicted what kind of music you would like. The universe predicted the remote we use for our TVs. It predicts everything.”
I could see that her mind was having trouble grasping the notions I was telling her, but she was holding on to something. After talking about it for a few minutes more, she admitted something to me. “Dad, my head hurts,” she said, and this told me she needed a break from the exercise.
For a while we played Gumshoe with the residents of the building, which was the break she needed from the hypothesis. Many people came and went, some we knew but most we didn't. Even Elway waved when he saw us. The last people we saw actually came walking in our direction because they needed to check their mail. They were two women who came near enough for an introduction, telling us their names were Kiana and Evelyn, that they lived on the eighth floor, and that they were happy to meet us.
When we were done Sara and I took the elevator back to the twenty-first floor and she was filled with energy because she beat me at Gumshoe, which honestly wasn't a great feat because I told her beforehand that I wasn't good at it. She was jumping around all through the hallway and at one point jumped onto my back and stayed there. “I guess the universe thought I would win,” she said into my right ear.
I dropped her off onto my couch and went back to my computer screen. The entire time, she did not stare at me once, and eventually she fell asleep where she sat. I went into my bedroom and got a blanket to put over her.
She was getting bigger, taller, smarter, and only slightly shorter than her mama but every bit as beautiful. Probably moreso, Lynne be trippin' sometimes.
Looking at her computer screen before I left, I saw that she used the moniker Sofia instead of her given name Sarah. Not as creative as Dick Handler or Rich Holder, but David is a weird ass kid.
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Venturing back toward my seat, I instead gazed out of my window toward the city who held a low autumn Sun. The universe's predictions that manifest into our world are always correct predictions, but where do you think an incorrect prediction goes? I guess this is a stupid question because the universe is incapable of making incorrect predictions, but let's say it could, where would they go? I know what you're thinking. I know what you think I'm thinking, and I know you've already predicted what I am going to say, but I won't say it. You were thinking I was going to say they go into dreams, weren't you?
That's too easy. Memories are too easy as well.
Let's be more creative even if we are completely wrong; what if the place these incorrect predictions go is into the land of art? What if they can be found in books and songs and films and paintings. Wouldn't that be wonderful, that every thing so wrong in the world could be cached away into the anthology complex.
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Chapter 30
GANIGEN'S DIALECTICS
3:1:3:30
IN a large black box, a large number of men woke up all at the same time uncertain first of who they were, and then of where they were. And it only took but a moment of time for them to begin asking how they had arrived where they were.
"I am beginning to remember something," one man said excitedly, "I was dragged here by many guards." And when he said this, they all noticed that they were all wearing a sort of uniformed clothing. Each man in the room had on only black attire.
"I remember only being dragged here by one guard," another man insisted. "Me too,"
said another. "What was he wearing?" "A blue uniform." "The man I was dragged by was wearing a red uniform." Then said another man, "I too was dragged here by only one guard, but he was wearing a green uniform." After a discussion between these three men of the guard's facial qualities, they realized they had each seen the same guard but wearing three different uniforms.
"I was not brought here by anyone," said another man. "Then how did you come to arrive here," replied one of the men. "I do not know," he answered. In his confusion, another man stood up and said the same thing, "I too was not brought here by anyone."
Suddenly a few of the men in the room began to wonder if they were brought to this black room by a guard or not.
"It seems possible that we may have or may not have been brought here by a guard, a number of guards, or no guard at all," deduced one man. Then without warning, one man suggested, "Perhaps the guards who brought us all here are in this very room." Now everyone became suspicious.
"That does not make any sense!," said one man, "All you will do is bring fear into this room." "Then who were you brought by?," asked one man. "It does not matter who I was or was not brought by, all that matters is that we escape," he answered.
"I had a strange thought," said one man, "what if it was the black room itself who brought us all here?" "How?" "I do not know, but so far we have not even come close to an answer!"
"What if we are all the guards?" Everyone in the room laughed at the notion, asking if they were as such, why would they be trapped in the room. Then, very subtly, each man began to look through their attire for keys.
"He just gave me an idea," said one man, "what if we are all the guards, but have made ourselves to be prisoners for an exercise in prison procedurals?" "Do you mean we are prisoners and we are tasked with breaking free to better understand the prisoner's mind?" "Perhaps..."
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"What is this? We are all theorizing on the absurd, and it seems whoever brought us here is much too mysterious for us to know for sure." "It just occurred to me," said now another man quickly, "I was not brought here by anyone, but I do remember dreaming of a place like this prior to now. What if we are not in our actual realities, but dreaming?
Isn't this all so strange?" Everyone began to wonder.
"I was definitely brought here by one guard, but I recall him telling me that there were guards more powerful than him," said a man. Now remembering, another man began to speak, "I too was definitely brought here by one guard, but it was not a man, it was a woman." They further began to think until one man began speaking, "I seem to recall being brought here by many guards, of whom were both men and women."
"I was brought by no one, but I agree with the man from before, we must stop speaking and begin searching for the true reason as to why we are here," said one man.
Now stood a man who had not spoken, but perhaps had the most important thing to say, "I do not recall whatsoever the events that have led me here, but it is clear that among us there are a multitude of varying accounts. I believe the best course of action is to collect each account and discourse amongst ourselves, investigating thoroughly each account and adding it to the pool of knowledge in order to find common truths."
And with that, each man told of his account in detail, and in the pool of knowledge, a super-account was being formed.
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Part 4
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 31
AS ABOVE, SO BELOW
3:1:4:31
SITTING on Lynne's couch waiting for the three of them to get ready, I watch out the window as a light snow begins to fall. My mind wandered.
When you wake up from a dream, any faces you saw, unless it's someone you know in waking life, you don't ever really remember them. Even though within the dream, and through dream memory, it was a face that you recognized. And the same can be said for places. Unless it's a place you've been to in your waking life, you won't know where it is.
And now that I think about it, even time, that is the year of the dream, is usually unknown.
It seems as though, if I were to reason, that the questions we ask ourselves in waking life, and the questions that we don't ask, they seem to follow the same pattern in our dream lives.
When was the last time you asked yourself what year it was? If you don't ask yourself this question in waking life often, if ever, then why would you ask it in dreaming life?
Here is another way to put it: if you go on vacation to France in waking life, you will never ask yourself “What country am I in?” You already know where you are because you know how you got there. And in a dream that begins in the middle of your vacation to France, you will never ask yourself what country you're in, because you would have never asked that question in your waking life.
This might be why so many of our dreams are so seamless, because they reflect waking life so vividly and can impostor psychologies. Perhaps this is also why they say if you want to lucid dream, you should keep asking yourself in waking life “Am I dreaming?,” so that when you actually are, you will become aware of it.
David was ready now and took a seat one cushion away from me. When I looked in his direction as he sat down, I saw him staring at me almost the same way Sara did. After a while I apologized to him that his mother forced him to hug me. He didn't respond, but after a bit I continued.
“Hey son, let's make a pact never to hug again.” He looked at me, first with confusion then with contemplation, then said “Deal... Dad.” And then we shook on it.
Why do females take so long to get ready. I found that my mind wandered again.
At some point in time the universe must have predicted that living organisms who could make predictions would exist. Once you are able to collect data, analyze it, and make a prediction, you operate as the universe does. Kind of strange. For a system that makes predictions to predict it would create a subsystem that could make predictions of the original system, or of itself.
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I remember reading somewhere that among people, among the human species populous, our genetics are 99% identical, but the tiny 1% is what makes us so unique, each one of us. So similar yet so different. This is compared to--“Okay, we're ready to go,” Lynne said. Looking at her I had lost my train of thought. What was I thinking about? I got up from off the couch and saw Sara also come out.
We all left the apartment, Lynne was the last one and she locked the door behind her.
Today she was the purple prophecy. Her prophetic foot case shoe was purple, chosen so to match her purple coat and the purplish rose shaped scrunchie in her hair.
We all reached the elevator that was on its way down and found two men inside it waiting for us.
I said hello, Lynne said hello, and we all voyaged downward toward Hell.
When we made it outside the clouds covered the sky and the light snow was still falling. We began our journey toward the Paradise Port bridge where we could walk along it in our efforts to reach Emily's apartment. Since we lived closer to her now she asked us if we didn't mind visiting. The walk was by no means walking distance, but it wasn't so far that walking was out of the question.
Not too long after we made it to the green bridge, and a few steps onto it we felt, saw and heard one of the trains that ran alongside the bridge go by. It was at this moment that Dave said something outloud.
“I think I know how we can beat Nightmarer.” “How?,” Lynne asked. “Sara was playing yesterday by herself and realized that the Omega Sword does more damage than the Zion Sword.” “Yeah, I accidentally equipped it and and was wondering why I was killing enemies faster with it. But the only problem is when you use it you also take more damage,” Sara finished.
“How many Omega Swords are there?,” I asked. “There are only two, and I think since me and mom are the best at close-combat we should use them while you and Sara go around locking the doors,” Dave said.
“But every time I lock a door it drains my energy,” I told him. “Wait,” Lynne thought of something, “what if we left one door open and that forced all the enemies to go through there one by one and we could knock them off that way?” “That might work but I think friendly-fire might happen, the Omega Sword's swing radius is too high,” Sara replied.
“Okay,” I cut in, “you two use the Omega Sword and each of you pair up with either me or Sara, and we will go around opening and closing the doors as you guys take out the enemies with the swords, that way we aren't all crowded at one door.”
“I think that's a good idear,” Sara added. I looked at Lynne, and then saw Dave look back at me, and then Dave looked at his mother. And then I just had to ask.
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“I've never heard you say idea like that,” I said. “Like what? What did I say?,” Sara asked. “You said idear,” Dave cut in. “Idear? No, I said idea. Didn't I?,” she looked at her mother. “You said idear honey.”
The moment Lynne finished speaking another train passed us and we saw that we were at the end of the long bridge. We were finally on Paradise Island and shouldn't have been too far away from Emily's residence. Only a short duration through one of the towns of the island did I begin to notice that darkness was falling earlier than usual.
As we continued to walk I put my arm around Lynne's shoulder like one of those cool high-school quarterbacks. “Ay,” I said in a not-so-cool urban-American accent, “what's a guy gotta do tah get a pretty girl like you??” She started laughing and so did the kids.
“Wha? You got a boyfriend??” “Yes I do, mister,” she laughed. “He bigger than me?”
“Yup.” “He smahter than me?” “'Fraid so.” “...He better lookin' than me?” Lynne looked at my face. “Definitely.”
“Okay well, can I at least be yah side-piece?” A pause, and then she adopted the same stupid accent that I had, “Ay, he don't gotta know nothing.”
Only a block away from the residence, I thought on the joke before and the Flanagans in the courtyard. I wonder, what are the differences between the marriage of royalty and the marriage of peasantry.
For those who are married, or even those who are just boyfriend and girlfriend, will their wealth and how much they can spend affect and impact their happiness? I think yes, but it results in a very superficial happiness. You can take a vacation with someone and see the world with them, and I do think this can bring about happiness, but I do know that I have spent moments of poverty with Lynne and she has shown me a happiness that I have never known.
This truth of me is good for me, because I honestly don't like traveling anyway. I would travel with her though; I would go anywhere she would want to go. The destination doesn't give me pause as long as she is there. I know that wherever we are, whether in the grand rooms of a rich palace or in her simple living room, she is a woman who can feed my intellectual desires. People want to discover the world but half of them don't even want to discover themselves.
Lynne calls Emily when we are a block away, and after we enter her apartment building we make our way to the fourth floor to find Emily's door opened. She was in her kitchen preparing a meal for all of us knowing we would be hungry.
“Wassup G,” Dave said walking directly to turn on the tele. He was excited for the final episode of Spacetime Eternal, which was a science-fiction show they were all watching. Even I kind of liked it. Emily loved it, and I wondered if sci-fi was one of her favorite things.
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Emily set up the meals for herself, Sara and Dave as they ate in front of the television and watched the show from the couch. Lynne and I sat behind them at a table with our own foods but could see and hear the show clearly.
Lynne took the time to also work while the show aired, and sitting close enough to her I sometimes watched as she did things like order new inventory or set schedules. As she worked I happened to look downward at her purple shoe, and beside it was her purse which had a book with a belt and butterflies all over. I reached for it and saw that it was already unlocked. I open it but at the same time she snatches it from my hand and gives me a serious face expression. And after setting it on the table away from me she gently backhands my chest.
My eyes wander to the screen where I began paying attention to the show again, but she must have felt bad because after a moment and out of the corner of my eye I see that she is offering me the private book. After I open it and begin to read it, she opens up a notepad on her screen and begins typing so I can read it: i got lonely when you left so i started writing things about you to feel closer to you until you came back this is what you have reduced me to its healthier than just keeping the feelings inside
I laughed and opened the book somewhere in the middle. “Where are you? What do you do when you disappear? I know you're not being unfaithful because if you were you would try to hide it, but you do this with my knowledge of it. So then, are you a serial killer or something? I won't tell anyone if you are.”
I flipped through the book and saw that it was nearly fully filled out. I got up and told Lynne to follow and we left the apartment and stood just outside the closed door. Before I could start talking a man walked past us.
“This thing is almost completely filled,” I handed her back her private thoughts, but she didn't really understand what I was trying to say, so I clarified. “I didn't realize my absence would cause this,” I pointed at the diary, but she was unconvinced. “Yes you did, what else would you think would happen?” “Not that,” I pointed at the diary again. “It's not a big deal,” she replied. “If you don't want me to do this,” she lifted the diary, “then maybe you should answer your texts or pick up your phone sometimes when you're gone.” “But I don't even bring that thing with me, that's the whole point.”
She leaned her head back and for a moment and I thought she was going to headbutt me, but she brought it back down and her face into my chest. And then she started to slightly bite down on my chest through my shirt.
“Owe, what are you doing??,” I somewhat pushed her away from me. She smiled and 70 | AS ABOVE, SO BELOW
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started laughing. “Are you crazy?” She continued laughing.
“There's one silver lining from you being gone. It makes me more appreciative and grateful when you are here,” and she lunged forward and began biting at my arm.
“Man you better stop,” I warned her. “What are you, a little girl?,” she asked. One final lunge and I found myself opening the door and walking back into the apartment to sit down. Lynne followed and sat at her chair, returning to her work.
I eventually take her diary again and begin to read through it, seeing the many things she has wondered and the many things she has asked, and a part of it has made me wonder of the black and white notebooks I have boxed away in my apartment.
All this time that you've been reading these composition notebooks, I've been learning about you. And at this point, you have read so far that I probably know you better than you know yourself.
I can guess that you probably aren't a materialistic person, or at least are not as materialistic as the average person. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think I am.
As for me, I am fortunate. I am not immaterialistic because I have the constitution to refuse materialistic pleasures, I am immaterialistic because I have always received my pleasures from contemplation. I don't have much, I never have, and yet I have the universe. What I have gained below, what I have gained down here, maybe I will take with me above.
I do not fear death because every thing that is important to me here is also in my mind. My love for the universe. My love for Lynne and Sara and David. My love for you.
And perhaps in death, where I am going, they will allow me to retain these things.
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Chapter 32
ANGELS OF DESIGN
3:1:4:32
IT was a cold morning in San Rashida when I awoke to find Lynne sleeping partly on me and her arms wrapped around my neck.
I was reminded of a dream I had nearly a decade ago. I never spoke to the archangel Michael, but I saw him from my mind's eye as he worked on genes, an assignment assigned to him by God.
In ways genetics are tied to destiny, tied to fate, because your genes are a map of who you are. They have importance in determining how you look, how you behave, your diseases and your strengths; so in a way your genes are an outline for your path. This notion would impede the designs of free will, as God would later find out that free will was the only solution to the problem he encountered after Satan was removed from the project.
And so Michael, a genius artist, designed the naturally selected concept of binary systems. That is, something could be “on” or “off,” 0 or 1. With this, a life form could control its destiny. While you are given to the path of your current genetic structure, or your current genome, you can alter your genome with various practices. You may have a certain genetic combination of specific genes that are expressed or unexpressed, but with these practices you alter the combinations and cause certain genes to turn off and others to turn on, thereby transforming the organism and ultimately changing its course.
What is a practice you could do, you may ask. Well, just living life itself transforms you. Little transformations every day. But one way to reach gigantic transformations is in the irony of Michael himself; creation and art; the creation of art and the experiencing of art.
“What are you thinking about?,” Lynne startled me. After a moment of waiting she removed her left arm from around my neck and scratched herself, and as she brought her arm back around my neck I saw again her pink nail polish which matched her pink shoe.
“You know one time I had a dream about you where we were in a jazz club and you were singing... Now look, don't get all soft at what I'm about to say,” she agreed, “Yeah so, I was staring at you. And I felt like the only thing I knew that was real at that moment was your beauty, and it felt so real to me that I felt as if I could have held your beauty, and a part of me wanted to find it somewhere in the universe and protect it.” “Aww!”
“What the fuck did I just tell you?” “...Sorry, damn.”
“I've been thinking about that dream on and off ever since I had it, but one thing I could never figure out is what you were singing about because I was so focused on your appearance. But yesterday I finally got it.” “What was I singing about?”
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“Borrow me your eyes, so I can see what you see. Borrow me your ears, so I can hear what you hear. Borrow me your mind, so I can think what you think. Borrow me your soul, so I can feel what you feel.”
I can feel her thinking, and may have asked her the same question she asked me a little while ago, but she said something before I could. The words were strange to her because sometimes that was exactly the way she felt. Not then, but moreso after she got to know me.
After we were done talking about it, she got up and began to put her clothes on, but I asked her where she was going.
She tells me she has work to submit. I tell her that I'll pay her double what she would get had she gone to work if she just stayed to keep me company. If she left me, my loneliness gene would turn on and I would be prone to the crying disease.
She agrees to stay and I tell her to lay down next to me. We lay there silently for about ten minutes, and then I get up to go use the bathroom. In the toilet I see stains that need to be cleaned, so I use the scrubber to scrub them away. On my way back to her I see that she has fallen asleep.
I look over the side of her face, a work of art. The part of her face I give the most attention to is her left ear. On her earlobe a small piece of clear jewelry. I traced my eyes down the side of her neck and saw a necklace, which at the end of that too a piece of jewelry; a golden butterfly in the shape of a heart.
I reached out and placed my hand on the side of her neck. I pet her with my thumb. I do it again and again until suddenly she wakes up in a shock and asks me what the hell I'm doing.
I put my arms around her ribs and force her up from the bed, her arms naturally clinging my neck the way they had before but this time her legs doing the same to my waist.
I walk her out to the living room and we sit on a chair. I assumed she would eventually ask me what had gotten into me or why was I doing what I was doing, but she never did. She just put her forehead to mine and didn't say a word.
I have it in my mind that beauty always starts out as confusion and then eventually transcends into inspiration.
“I love you.” “I love you too.”
After a while she removed her face from mine and started smiling, saying “Ay, what's a girl gotta do tah get a handsome guy like you??” I laughed. “Wha? You got a girlfriend??” “Yes I do, miss,” I laughed. “She kinder than me?” “Yup.” “She smahter than me?” “'Fraid so.” “...She prettier than me?” I looked at her face. “Definitely.”
“Okay well, can I at least be yah side-piece?” A pause, and then I adopted the same 73 | ANGELS OF DESIGN
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stupid accent that she had, “Ay, she don't gotta know nothing.”
She smiled again and kissed me, making a womanly sound that told me her emotions could not be contained, then again removed her face from mine. “I go where you go, forever,” she told me. “But I don't go anywhere,” I replied. “So then I guess we aren't going anywhere, then,” she finished.
As she smiled and stared at me, I made note of the fact that I currently didn't smell.
“Good job,” she said, and this for some reason made her remember the drawing she made yesterday.
She told me of a flower that looked like a rose but the stem was in the shape of a triple helix. The top part of the flower came in the form of a rose and of any color, but the stem was twisted to look like three helices spiraled together. The name of the flower was Dina, its meaning was good fortune, and its small backstory was that it came to be from a small defective mutation.
Dinas, she said, came mostly in three colors; blue, red and green, and they symbolized good fortune through peace, good fortune through love, and good fortune through hope, respectively.
I told her it was interesting but also asked why she was making these things? She told me she wasn't really sure why, and that it actually started out as a mistake. This made me remember the thought I thought only a few moments ago, that beauty is first confusion.
“Well, you're an antho, you'll figure it out,” I told her.
She suddenly hopped backwards and off of me all while grabbing my hand and lifting me out of the chair. She brought our hands up over her head and spun around in three hundred and sixty degrees, telling me in no words that she wished to dance. She spun around again, and then again before she finally brought her body in close to mine. There was no music but indeed I could feel her rapidly drumming heart. The rhythm in her was soulful, the search for love within her powerful. As we swayed slowly, I told her again that I loved her, and that I always did, and in a soft voice, she says “Okay.”
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Chapter 33
PLASTIC LOVE
3:1:4:33
I walk through the doors leading into the Lynne's hallway when I see Elway walking toward his door. I can already tell he has plans to stop me in the hallway for small talk.
What I feared most has happened to me.
I must have spent at least five minutes talking to him about work and laziness, and I wonder if he brought those things up because it was what we last left off of. Does he think I'm lazy or something? I mean, I am, but he couldn't possibly know that. I wonder if he's already made assumptions about me based off of my apartment.
I use my keys to open Lynne's door and walk inside. Walking in I hear music, and after talking to Lynne who is working in the living room I learn that this was the family playlist; they each chose their favorite songs, as many as they wanted, and added it to a playlist that would play throughout the house; in the living room, in Dave's room and in Sara's room, which was played at a time when they were all expected to be working, whether that was work work or homework.
“Isn't that distracting?” She said she didn't feel it was and neither did the kids, and made note of the fact that there was a volume button. Yeah I know there's a volume button. Does she think I'm stupid or something? I mean, I am, but she can't possibly know that.
I sat down next to Lynne to see what songs were coming up on the playlist. Reading over the titles and genres and artists I saw that the three of them had a wide array of tastes. “Do you want to add some songs?” I looked at her and suddenly I was reminded of a thought I had earlier that was never finished.
I remember reading somewhere that among people, our genetics are 99% identical, but the tiny 1% is what makes us so unique. So similar yet so different. This is compared to one's life. We all live basically the same life, but small variations in our lives makes a person's life so different.
It seems to me that 99% of the time, you will make a decision in your life that will be 99% identical to 99% of all of the people alive on Earth, but every once in a while, you'll make a decision that is in the 1%, and these moments surely must define who we are and the course of our life.
Lynne shoves me and asks me again, “Do you want to add some songs?” “Maybe later.”
I went back into my mind and thought more. This idea can be regarding the individual, but I wonder if it can also regard two people, say, two people who are in a romantic relationship. I wonder if Brian and Brigid Flanagan ever made rare decisions 75 | PLASTIC LOVE
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that decided the course of their marriage. The relationship that I have with Lynne I know for a fact, and for better or for worse, is not a normal relationship. She wears a ring on her hand that I gave her but we are not really married, and yet this is a fantasy played in her mind that I know she won't let go of. And I wonder if her being a part of something that is only 1% has had a negative impact on her mental health. I wonder if we met under normal circumstances, and I married her like a real husband, and took care of her children like a real father, if she would be, not exactly happier, but more content and less vulnerable to depression.
I know her, and I know that she would smack me for even thinking these things, but I also think there are parts of her she has yet to discover.
I know that if you could talk to her directly, she'd tell you that she wouldn't trade the relationship we have for anything else, no matter how unusual it is. We live in a world where not caring about what others think of you is a bad trait, but caring about what other people think is the exact reason why we live in such a fake world.
By the time I was re-immersed into the fake world I found Lynne trying to light a scented candle with a lighter that wouldn't ignite. Just sparks.
I kissed Lynne's hair and got up to leave. Before leaving, I peeked into the hallway to see if anyone was there. Seeing as there wasn't I was free to leave.
On my computer I went through many files because I believe I had a dream last night that was the missing piece that would connect several dreams.
The first in the series of dreams was one where I cut off my own finger while interrogating someone. This was followed by Sid and I, well, Sid, beating an old man to death with a small baseball bat. Followed were me and Sid waiting to kill a woman who seemed to be intoxicated. Because we were known now, I was given a dream of the two detectives who were trying to apprehend us, January Levinson and her partner, Jeremy Watson, as they walked through a winter woods scene. Then I saw the pair find a set of fingerprints as they came closer to discovering who we were. Then I had the dream last night that was a missing piece to this, which I will get more into very soon. Then I turned on Sid and we became enemies and I found myself stalking him through the desert, where eventually I would catch him and saw off his head and eat some of his flesh... Sara would love this shit.
The missing dream was tense for everyone involved. It took place in an elegant hotel.
The hotel was also empty because a manhunt was issued and everyone was told to abandon it. In the hotel there was me, carrying my shotgun and hunting down Sid, who currently had had an arm detached and was running through the hotel to escape his hunter. Also in the hotel was January, who had somehow discovered who we were and had caught up to us and was trying to either execute us or apprehend us both for 76 | PLASTIC LOVE
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punishment.
I walked through all around the maze of the hotel, through its many hallways and looking into its many rooms. And so did January, who did the same exact thing but in a manner opposites, and so because of this we were on a collision course. It was at the corner of one hallway where it would naturally bend when from only a few feet away from eachother, we became aware of eachother. In her sudden reaction, she pulled the trigger of her pistol but to her dismay the gun had become jammed. And so when I fired a shotgun round into her, she flew backwards into the wall and then all 132 pounds of her dropped to the floor, slouched, and I could see the trail of blood of from where she had made impact lead down to her now lifeless face.
The incidence of rare events is a thought provoking premise. For all odds, there is always one result that is the least likely to happen, and yet on rare occasions it is fulfilled.
How does that happen? Why does that happen? Following the thesis of the data simulator, as data is complied, at some point, the incidence of the rare event should basically never be realized. It should never happen. And yet it will, at least mathematically, at some point, occur, because it can never reach zero.
How to explain away the persistence of the rare event... The first recorded instance of a bird being killed by a baseball was in 1981. By my unresearched and poor calculations, that would mean about 100 million pitches would have been thrown by a pitcher before one finally hit and killed a bird. That doesn't seem surprising because a baseball pitch hitting a bird is an extremely rare event. But what if this extremely rare event is actually a glitch, or a bug, or what I most like to call, a contamination of data, inside the data simulator?
A common event is a hunter shooting a bird. This happens every day, multiple times a day, in various places on the planet, and it would not be a stretch to assume that the data in a simulator can be contaminated by other pieces of data. In effect, when the data simulator is calculating a prediction with the supplied data, say for example, a baseball pitch, any prediction that is not contaminated will end in a successful pitch. If, however, somehow the data is contaminated with data from other events and predictions, say, a hunter shooting and killing a bird, you will receive that extremely rare event; a baseball pitch striking and killing a bird. In other words, every time a hunter kills a bird, it increases the chances of it happening elsewhere, i.e., a baseball game.
Rare events at large are not rare, they happen all the time, but of course the individual event itself can be rare and only occur once every millions of predictions. But the rare event is something to give pause; when it happens, whether to us or someone or something else, it is a spectacle to behold.
When I finished with the dream tracking, I was reminded of a TV movie that Lynne 77 | PLASTIC LOVE
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suggested I should watch. The link she had supplied to it was still in service, and reading the description, I saw it detailed the strange life of Boden Valade.
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Chapter 34
SOON DARK
3:1:4:34
IN the evening as it were with sun setting in a dusk horizon, former thoughts took hold of my mind that these dwelled often. Of what importance is it to a man if not the greatest he is at what he does? Lesser values may have brought ease to the lesser artist, and I am not sure with totality and convicted not that higher values, such that they are these; values of importance and of works that remain in the realm of eternity, I am not sure with totality that these values are the price of life in gold worth their consequences.
Now am I the age of thirty-three in 1751, Boden Valade, of all who roam the Earth known as the greatest living composer. Of wealth my seams are endless, and of fame second only to the King I have come to be. The importance of my living designated by he himself, the King, who my position he has decreed among the people by offering me the chamber of the First composer. In his tall and mighty castle, a chamber in place set for, again, the greatest of all living composers.
And yet as I stand here, out of a pale glass window do I look, at the evening into dark it radiates, the same thoughts of form begin to dwell twice and three times into my mind.
For this astonishing ability paid as I have the dearest price. Birds, no longer do they sing but hum. Wolves, no longer do they howl but growl. And humans, no longer do they speak but whisper. In my ears has the old world become silent, and it was the price of life in gold paid years many ago that had begun this great deafening.
1735, a young man was I who sifted through the isles of life with a passion yet unknown to me. Raised was I by mortals. Of a man and woman with lesser values whose worth would cease when their own bodies ceased. But not was I crafted of the same instruments of life nor death. Indeed, the piano with its contrast of light and dark told to me the oldest story of the universe. It conveyed beyond to me the battle between good and evil, the struggle between God and Satan, and the ultimate war between himself and man. And it taught me deeply more even, for each story there is a composition. For each defeat, for each triumph, a song is there.
In 1737 became one of the most prominent musicians I was and as it were like the strike of lightning notoriety had called upon me. Brought before the King himself was I to play for his heart and his delight, and too even the Queen, who upon dwelling with her and her King delivered upon me had she the flattering of kind words. To me, she had said, "At night you rest me to sleep." And despite this triumph, I was not at this point considered the greatest of all living composers, for even Boden Valade as it were was rivaled by other composers. It is without doubt that for one to be the greatest, no rivals must he have.
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And so this story, begins does it really, with my meeting of Malenko, who in the same breath of hello told to me that for six surocs grant me my dream would he. And as we two stood in the Flanagan Forecourt, to him I delivered the six surocs and to him I also requested that he make me of all who roam the Earth the greatest of composition.
And to me, Malenko said, would he make me not only the greatest of living composers who roamed the Earth, but the greatest of all composers who ever lived and would ever live after ceased being was I. And with that remark, last was this I ever saw or heard of Malenko.
In the morning next following, compelled was I. This compelling was of such nothing before had I ever felt. To describe it could only be the words one would feel in the wake of starvation and near death, of what one might be capable of doing if only to survive.
The desperation of the needy which compel would them into action and into any action regardless of its morality. This was what I felt as compelled was I into creation of my next musical piece. It was only a matter of moments before finishing did I what I declared to be my most important work. And immediately did I request the attention of the King. So amazed was the King did he believe I had become suddenly possessed in the days between our interactions. But assured him did I that I was not related to devils or demons and that I was only compelled by a guiding spirit.
The time had become 1738, and formally the King had declared me the First composer. In the time preceding creating great works and having masterful performances had I, and this efficiently executed I, Boden Valade, as "one without rival." The greats there were, the geniuses there were, the sublime there were, and there alone there was Boden Valade. But then in my prime came did 1741. It is to me demarcated as the year I began to lose my hearing.
To what do we owe our passions that they should leave us? And if not it is a price to be paid, of what have we done to fate should it crush us beneath its frigid fist? Despite 1743 still I continued on the craft of my masterpieces. It was a year in which indeed possessed had I become, but again not of devils and demons, but alas no longer of the spirit of guidance. It was of possession by fear, for in 1742 as gradually declined did my hearing I became vulnerable to past abuse of alcohol.
This second bout of addiction greatly did it reshape my perception on my affliction.
At night when stupid with liquor was I did the thoughts of squander repeatedly phase my mind. Self of pity did it bring me to drinking, but on a fateful night was it that realized did I was I putting to no good use the talents within my hands and my mind. And for this reason alone did I seven or eight years ago smash every bottle in this very chamber I am in now. This great act preceded the great acts of my masterpieces in 1743, the year which for me was gold, where infact possessed by fear was I in making little use of my talents 80 | SOON DARK
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that I should create at a purposeful rate the fruits of heaven.
By 1745, now was it a time in which had I produced so many great works I was known to be the greatest composer who ever lived, and known only to myself and Malenko that no one should ever surpass my greatness. But by this time was I almost completely deaf. It was now that sing did not birds but did they hum, howl did not wolves but did they growl, speak did not humans but did they whisper. No longer play could I the instruments of my passions. Even my piano, who taught me that dark it would be soon, could not remedy the still pain suffering of silence. And soon was it decided by me that exclusively would I compose and no longer play, but irregardless of this concedement, practice did I alchemy in efforts to restore my hearing.
For the years of 1746 to 1751, as declining gradually did my hearing was I concentrated on the art of alchemy, whose mystery was as captivating as the sounds of music. But my drive into alchemy even less social had it made me than I was before.
Since 1735 at even a young age was I reduced to solitude to focus on my craft, and now was I reduced to a man who knew only one place in all of the Earth. This chamber, to me awarded by the great King, left it I have not in years.
The journey to the gods leaves one with either silence or music, but as a mortal for one I cannot trade the other. These years in 1751 left me of nothing but an observer have they. In the day watch do I the common folk from the pale window I do as they live out their lives, and in the night do I walk about this chamber thinking of remedies to restore the spirit which is fast descending. And each night which passes by that I go deafer and deafer do I feel the hands of darkness becoming like dark keys who in transit expand dark minds. For the ultimate greatness have I achieved in this life, but for it paid the price of life in gold have I.
On the table which did sit next to me was there a box of powder created had I and stored for use now. Taking the box of powder as I did I soon passed my fingers through it and on and in both of my ears did I pass the powder on and through. Believed did I was this a good solution to restore possibly the ability of hearing. And if it should work, should I know this by the hour.
And back to the pale window did I go to again see the darkness in the skies. Lost again did I become in the thoughts of former years. It was in a book years later that I would read the misgivings of Malenko, who was a man who against the ego he would play the soul. I came to understand that my deafness a product was it of my demand to be heard. In my desk is there a composition currently I am working on that no other piece will rival. All of my masterpieces fall short will they to this composition whose night knows no darkness, whose morning knows no Sun. It is as unique as the faces in a crowd and as ordinary as the lives they lead. But its power is unrivaled like that of God to his 81 | SOON DARK
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better angels. And in my demand to be heard, perhaps myself should I never hear the arrangements of my greatest composition.
And as it were, this hour it had gone by. Became aware did I when I fell into lucidity and noticed the rain splashing on the window. And above my eyes did I see great lightning strikes streak against the sky. It was now that I learned I was completely deaf, for even just one hour before I could have been able to hear the faint sound of thunder.
But now, gone in total silence was even the greatest sound in nature, a sound that has demanded to be heard.
Taken with grief did I my composition and pen out of my desk. And continue did I the work of my greatest composition. I ventured back toward the pale window and looked out once more again at the rain and lightning. Onto the page did I write, every once in a while cautiously and curiously seeing with strong eyes the vision of storms.
Again, I must ask... Of what importance is it to a man if not the greatest he is at what he does? What might a man sacrifice to have no rival? And of this sacrifice, will it be suffice to his thirst and hunger? Or shall his passion envelope him with darkness? We must know, now or never, that as men driven by prophecy, even from the beginning our fate has been decided. Those are there that are blessed with many purposes in life, and those are there that are cursed but with one.
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Chapter 35
SILENT THUNDER
3:1:4:35
WHEN my buzzer went off for the first time, I had forgotten that I even had one. But I was not at all in question of who it may have been. I walk over to it and try to figure out how to use it. These things have changed drastically. “Sara?” “Spookie?” I buzzed her into the building.
I unlocked my door and it was only a matter of time that she walked into my apartment and sat her bookbag down. She then left, I assume to get her laptop, and would return soon enough.
I hear something that sounds like a phone notification. I hear it again a few seconds later, and on the sudden third sound I realize that it is Sara's phone and that the sound is that of a quick thunderstrike. And it continues to strike. Over and over again. It must have been her friends sending her numerous messages on the coordination of their sleepover party.
Ironically at the production of this thought I received a message from Lynne, who was currently filling in for someone at work. The snowfall, we are supposed to get twenty inches tonight, had begun long before and prevented Logan from being able to make his shift.
“Thanks for filling in and watching them today,” she texted. Sara soon came back and just as I had presumed it was with her laptop. She told me that all of her friends would be here in about an hour for the sleepover. When that hour had passed, she went back up in preparation to meet them, and a little while after she texted me that they had arrived. I told her to let me know if they needed anything, and also told her for them to try to not need anything.
Amazingly, it has been three hours and they haven't needed anything and adult supervision may not be needed this entire night. That would be excellent.
Now that the light was fading in the evening sky, I took a seat near one of the large windows that looked out into the city. Living here was not that much different than living in Chase; if I removed all of the windows infact it would be exactly the same, and so that makes these windows and the view of San Rashida truly the only difference. And only after a few minutes of staring out through that distance did I see a silent lightning strike.
And then another, and another. And they continued into complete darkness.
One of the most common designs prevalent throughout nature is the illustration of lightning. It is that line design which is also seen in the likes of cracks on the street, lines on a leaf, fractures on glass. I have often wondered what the core determination of the line's structure is and a part of me believes it may have to do with thermal equilibrium, 83 | SILENT THUNDER
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which is the state of balanced temperatures. Is it possible that when lightning strikes, or streets crack, or leaves form, or glass breaks, that the line design it carries is a product of thermal equilibrium and that its sight is literally a visual indication of that area's current outcome potential?
That would be to say, as the line is being formed, the atoms and molecules and particles, what have you, of its makeup are arranged in such a manner as to reach thermal equilibrium. This desire to reach thermal equilibrium would determine its direction of formation and would therefore determine the complete direction of the line itself. This would mean when you are looking at a lightning strike, every position that the lightning strike occupies (that is every unit of measurement, i.e an inch, of the lightning bolt as it is being generated) was a position where the outcome potential was lowest in the area, and the high energy from the lightning would have sooked to warm that position up to reach a thermal outcome potential equilibrium. In the sky, and really anywhere in the known universe, I would propose that even within millimeters there are subtle temperature variations, and we know this because of the simple fact that the overall temperature in the US is not the same as the overall temperature in the UK. And so even within these tiny spaces there would be temperature changes that would help direct the lightning bolt as to which areas are furthest from thermal equilibrium. I have also noted that when these designs splinter, it is possible that the outcome potential, or the temperature in an area as compared to a neighboring area, is exactly the same.
This phenomena would have too implications on other aspects of variety. For example, this is a physical matter that would also have implications on the physicality of existence. One might start to wonder if all of the atoms in the universe are designed to desire thermal equilibrium, and that this visual image of a lightning bolt is the very symbol of things like fate and chance. Imagine tracing back your life and being able to determine where the lowest outcome potential points were. Imagine knowing that every decision, every action, conscious or otherwise, was a divine act to balance the universe.
If such is the case we must come back to the concept of the splinter, or where a line separates into two. Paired with the notion of a lightning bolt, it is simply the point where temperatures are identical in two areas, but paired with the notion of fate and chance, perhaps this is where the dynamic of fate and chance are created. When there is one temperature different from all, there is one clear direction for the universe to choose, and perhaps when there are two or more temperatures that are identical and closely related in regards of position, this creates the opportunity of chance.
My phone rang a default sound and I knew I had received a notification. When I looked at it, it was a message from Sara telling me to come up immediately because Pattie had accidentally cut off her thumb. What the fuck? I place the phone in my pocket 84 | SILENT THUNDER
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and in a haze head for the door. I go up the stairsteps by twos and threes and as shocked as I am I still find the mental space to hope Elway isn't anywhere near here. I open the door to their apartment and I see Pattie sitting at a table holding her hand and with blood on the table below.
I walk past Sara and then past another girl and ask Pattie to let me see her hands. This is when Sara begins laughing, and this laughter jolts to her other friend, and finally Pattie is the last one laughing, saying “Ketchup.” I admit I was confused but only for a second until I realized this was a prank.
I wasn't laughing. When they saw that I wasn't laughing, not at all, the three of them stopped laughing as well. I looked at Sara and then pointed at her, “You got me this time, but don't do it again,” I told her. She was disappointed that I didn't find the ordeal funny.
“Sorry, I was just trying to be funny.” “It wasn't funny,” I told her. My phone made a sound. I took it out and at the same time spoke again, “If you guys do anything like that again I'll cut all of your fingers off and eat them.” Sara let out a small sigh of laughter.
The other two girls were just confused.
I sat on Lynne's bed and read her message, saying she was going to be relieved in a few hours and would be home as soon as possible.
From the television suddenly came on a music video of which all three of the girls were in love with. I could tell because of the automatic glue that formed between their eyes and the television set.
I noticed straight away that the female singer they all loved had fit the demographic standard of beauty set by the industry. And you know, this gave me pause. Sara nor any of her friends were fat, but I don't think I would be wrong in assuming this celebrity singer has thousands of fat fans everywhere around the world, adolescent and adult. And the point I'm trying to get at here is that even the average fat fan supports the generally accepted image of beauty. And this is why we seldom see celebrities who do not fit that standard of beauty reach stardom. I wonder, if a fat person rose to fame, and obviously there have been some who have, and then that person lost a lot of their weight, how would their fat fans feel? Body image is such a sensitive issue. Lynne is a confident person most of the days, but there are some nights I have to remind her that I love her body.
I sat there and watched the girls as they watched girls. How could a father or uncle or brother molest or rape a young girl who was their daughter or niece or sister. I suppose all three of these girls must have tight vaginas. Definitely virgins. Their breasts are still underdeveloped, although the one of which I don't know the name of is beginning to show.
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followed by three more boys, all three of which I remember from the old apartment. The chubby one walked up to me and told me he was Kane and that today was his birthday, which is why they had all decided to reunite this day for the sleepover. I told him it was nice to meet him.
“That's Sara, Pattie, Kristie, Dam, David, Gun, and that's Nixia, Gun's sister, but we call her Soon Park,” for some reason he felt the need to tell me everyone's names.
Nine o'clock was rolling around which I learned was the time they were all waiting for because one of their television shows would be airing. They all gathered in front of the set, on the couches and on the floors, to watch what their young hearts desired.
I still sat on Lynne's bed from a distance, hardly able to hear or see what was on the television, but the room was completely dark save the light from the set and other small lights so I just stayed and relaxed. After a while, Lynne sent me a message saying she was on her way home, and as I went to close the phone I got a spam advertisement which read “Sexy Moms In Your Area.” Sexy moms?... I wonder if they're sexier than Lynne...
I'm just kidding.
When their show was over, they watched another, and then another. And one by one, each child eventually fell asleep where they sat. Even I almost fell asleep if I didn't become aware of someone using their keys to unlock the door. Half in a daze I saw that the shadowy figure had the shape of Lynne and this eventually woke me up completely. I watched as the shadow walked toward the bathroom and then out of it and back to me.
I got up and stretched, then yawned. “You taking over?,” I asked. I saw her head move in the darkness toward the kids, then back at me, “No, I'm taking you away.”
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Chapter 36
SNOWING IN SAN RASHIDA
3:1:4:36
PEOPLE, while seeming or thinking they can be both, tend to usually be one of two things; either grateful or greedy. Do I believe in absolutes? Under the context of the grateful and greedy I do. Do I believe it is impossible to be partially grateful and partially greedy? Absolutely.
The world in terms of morality is complex and has many gray areas, in fact it is commonplace for an evil act to be passable as good and a good act as evil. But the difference between good and evil is much closer than the elaborate difference between the grateful and the greedy.
To the grateful, their behavior of gratitude is accessed by all aspects of their life and personality, to which you will find absolutely no greed at all because such a component of greed will diminish the value of their gratitude. But to the greedy, a component of gratitude is necessary. What is so deceitful about greed is that once a greed has been satisfied, one begins to feel grateful. But that is hardly the definition of greed, someone who is greedy cannot be satisfied, and so the next greed is waiting just around the corner.
This is in opposition of the grateful, who not only possess the ability to be satisfied, but are eternally satisfied in their own right.
Despite the grateful having a simple air about them, it is endlessly difficult to correctly target someone as a grateful, and it is much easier to target the greedy as they encompass most of the human population. But then again, the greedy do a great job of appearing as grateful.
Lynne took me away to the hallway of her floor as we planned to let the kids sleep over their sleepover.
We make a left toward the stairs and immediately we hear a low rumble. We both knew that it was the thunderstorm rolling toward us, and it wasn't until we neared the door that led to the stairs that we saw a near lightningstrike and right after a nearer thunderstrike.
“You ever see a thunderstorm while it's snowing?,” she asked me walking to the window pane instead of the door. Thinking of the question and walking up beside her, I notice the window ledge of another building that must have had ten inches of snow and counting. “I have not.”
“I haven't either, but I have this weird memory from when I was a child of seeing a lightning sprite. I feel like it really happened but it's been so long I can't remember if maybe it was actually a dream or if it was real life or if it was in a movie or something and I'm just confusing everything.” I asked her what a lightning sprite was and she 87 | SNOWING IN SAN RASHIDA
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showed me an image of one on her phone. It looked like a red explosion of lightning, but it wasn't in the line format. It was more like an explosion.
We now had our elbows resting on the surface before the windows and each lightning strike was closer than the last and louder as well.
“I know this view is wonderful but we should really do this on my floor, just incase Elway wakes up.” “Elway? He's probably asleep at this time,” she assured.
So we stayed on her floor, in front of the window, watching the snowfall fall harder and the lightning light closer and the thunder thund louder.
I knew that her favorite season was spring to my fall, but I wondered if her favorite time of day was dawn to my dusk. And so simply I asked. What was her favorite time of day?
I saw her look out deeply into the city with its falling stars and its rolling thunder and eventually she finally answered. “My favorite time of day is death--dawn. I mean dawn.
My favorite time of day is dawn,” she laughed as she looked at me, very conscious of her unconscious.
“Death huh, you been thinking without me?,” I laughed. In the minute following we heard a door shut on the floor above us. A tenant of the 23rd coming home late on a snowy thunder Tuesday.
It became silent between Lynne and I as she moved closer to me and in front of me forcing me to hug her from behind. I wrapped my arms around her and she placed her arms on my arms and the back of her head on me.
A person walking by would have thought we were both enjoying the view of the weather in the city, but they would have been wrong. With intentional eyes Lynne looked at me through the dim reflection of the glass before us. And it felt like every other blink a strike followed, and every blink after that its thunder.
She told me she loved her dad, and I told her I loved my mom. And soon after that I realized something. “Your father died when you were young and my mother died when I was young. We might have issues.” “...Oedipus Electra complexes,” she laughed. After a while we took our eyes off of eachother and put them back into the dark city. I thought about death and about how Lynne was probably as crazy now as my mother was back then.
I wonder, what is the strange result of data contamination? There will be so many unusual occurrences we experience throughout the course of our lives, and for the most part many of these occurrences will come forth without any kind of explanation. And while many of these can be explained away through mere investigation, we will hear of extremely bizarre occurrences, the ones we cannot fathom or believe unless seen with our own very eyes. Stories of a person levitating, someone disappearing right before your 88 | SNOWING IN SAN RASHIDA
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eyes, the world, flashing from night to day for a split second and returning back to night.
Data contamination, or data compromise, is when the system is in the routine of processing a result, but along the way the result is contaminated, or compromised, by another result, returning one result that is accurate but also one result that is inaccurate. It may even be that the system never returns the correct result and just simply returns an incorrect result.
This type of behavior could appear in a data simulator that processes data to form predictions, resulting in strange occurrences and inexplicable phenomenon. Let us say, for example, a person is walking. A simple operation that is done by billions each day, therefore the simulator has an extremely large data-collection on the concept of a human being walking. But maybe, every so often, because the dataset is so large and complex and because it is more likely for a miscalculation to occur, the simulator missteps and predicts an operation more akin to a person hopping and then soon corrects itself.
This miscalculation would result in the image of a person, though only for a mere second, levitating. In its routine process to predict a forward step, the prediction is contaminated or compromised by either an incorrect selection altogether, or perhaps contaminated or compromised by the inclusion of an incorrect selection.
This data contamination and compromising may appear in many operations of the universe and may be responsible for many things. Imagine the idea of evolution in biology and pair it with this data miscalculation. This data miscalculation could be responsible for the evolution of man, responsible for the very first thought that propelled man into what he is today. A prediction mutation, or result mutation, that can change the course of whatever it invades.
“Clap” said thunder that must have been as close to us as it could have been without harming us. And my God was this strike perhaps the loudest thing I had ever heard. It made Lynne jump. The energy from it must have poisoned her mind because suddenly she decided it an interesting idea to see the thundersnow from outside.
She went back into her apartment and I to mine and grabbing my jacket and my shoes I met her at the elevator on my floor.
Going down we heard two strikes that were twins of the one we heard earlier, and reaching the quiet and empty lobby we walked out into San Rashida. Not a soul was around, and this was probably thanks to the snowfall and the cold weather.
Lynne ran into the street and in the middle of it looked up, and I watched her as she waited for a bolt. When a bolt finally came, it was behind her and every bit as loud as its siblings and cousins. She turned around in the falling snow and began running in that direction, literally chasing thunder. I shrugged and ran after her. Every so often a snowplow driver would force us onto the sidewalks, but after it passed, we would return 89 | SNOWING IN SAN RASHIDA
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to the street, waiting for bolts of lightning and running in that direction. To my nature I was mostly silent, panting sometimes because I was out of breath, and to her nature she was much more audible, acting like a child, giggling and smiling and using her natural foot to jump over mountains of snow, painting sometimes the illustration that someone had been here sometime before.
After much running we found ourselves chasing the escaping thunder through a public park. It was lower now and we knew soon it would be gone. We ran through the playground apparatus and into a field where a lightning strike went off in the distance and took many seconds to thunder. Not wanting to go on any longer and running out of energy I tackled Lynne onto the freezing snow. I laid on top of her and she knew I did it because I needed to stop.
She turned over but I stayed on top of her, not allowing her to escape. I tried to kiss her but she kept turning her face away from my advances. “Someone help,” she whispered. “He'll never know,” I assured her. And this made her look at me the same way she looked at me through the glass reflection. Finally she didn't move away as I kissed her. Secrets I have held in my heart are harder to hide than I thought.
I wonder, did Brian and Brigid ever spend nights like these. A king and queen relinquishing work for a day to play. Did they have time to? Could their kingdom allow moments of vulnerability and make their royal romance ordinary?
Turning from being naturally greedy to consciously grateful must have been a data miscalculation. At some point in our lives, something clicked for Lynne and I; first individually, and then together, where we traded the natural design for the unnatural design. The way I see it, if you're not practicing gratitude, then you're practicing greed.
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Chapter 37
APARTMENTS
3:1:4:37
2113: Daughter and father work together to keep life in order. Mother died last year, a rare disease. Tonight they are watching their favorite show. The apartment is dark except for the light the TV casts who as well creates the silhouettes on the wall behind them.
Their ghosts move in projection to the energy the TV radiates. There is nothing solid in this universe that chose anything about itself before its inception. Not a human, not an animal, not an atom. And this makes one wonder if this is extended to the abstract as well.
2213: Recovering drug addict. Reads chronically to keep the voices at bay. San Rashida has always been home and loves to walk its streets but only after midnight when the world has gone to sleep. Has and never will vote in any type of election. Often meditates on their death, and has wondered if there are a finite number of ways to die.
Assumes that there are, because in deep space where kelvin is close to zero, there are only so many ways to die.
2214: And if there are only so many ways to die, this neighbor assumes there are only so many ways to live. Her and her three roommates. They used to party but miraculously all four of them at the same time said they had had enough. No one went on too fast and no one lagged behind too slow. None of them like science though. That's why none of them have ever wondered if the universe has a timed expiration date. If they did, one of them would have wondered if the speed of time could be measured because of this. They watch a lot of videos and the bar on a five second video goes by much faster than the bar on one that is five minutes.
2114: They have been married for twenty years. They used to sit in the courtyard every Sunday in front of the statues of Brian and Brigid Flanagan. They talked often about the religion they shared. Some people are alone because they hate humanity, and others are alone because of an ideal or purpose. These two, it is for the latter, and they are alone together.
2128: This man is a programmer. He has often felt that when he writes programs, he is as close to God as he could ever get. A bit of a night owl. Sleeps during the Rashidian sunlight and is awake during the Rashidian darkness. Has a theory called “Selective Impact.” His theory states that certain actions can only affect certain particles in the 91 | APARTMENTS
M.B. JULIEN
universe.
2228: This woman is a writer. She is not that much different than the man who programs below her, and yet she is different in every way. She is a romantic. Where he sees numbers, she sees words. Where he sees projects, she sees stories. But often she has a debate in her head. What is more important? A story or the people in them? Should they be equal, or should one be given majority. Maybe she needs to learn how to find a balance that allows them to compliment each other.
2227: A mother and her two children. No father to speak of. He is out somewhere in the world perhaps starting a new family. The children are a lot like their mother. In appearance they also favor their mother as well and look almost nothing like their father.
We often think genetic memory but what about social memory? A memory field which cannot be seen with the eye, but those within it behave alike.
831: A pair of women. They both used to be in the adult entertainment industry but that is a composition of their past. One of them has always been attracted to the other, but it is a complex attraction of love and lust. A desire of mother and lover. The woman she loves looks like an older version of her daughter who died when she was young. And to this woman she wants to be both a mother and her sexual release, and many times these feelings have made her feel like a motherfucker. Tonight, she will reveal her ultimate feelings for her. She walks into the kitchen where her roommate is cooking dinner. She tells her the food smells good. She sits on the chair at the table and continues to talk her until she tells her that she loves her. “I love you, too,” her roommate repeats. After a small silence, the roommate turns around and sees the facial pedigree of her roommate. It takes only a moment for her to realize the implication of her love. Evelyn explains to Kiana the past of her daughter and the likeness that Kiana has inherited. This is a revelation that cannot be undone, but Kiana's understanding opens the door to a romance that will not be unsung.
92 | APARTMENTS
M.B. JULIEN
Chapter 38
KING DAVID
3:1:4:38
WAITING outside the hardware store for David in a rental rented by Lynne, my ears began to listen to a preacher who spoke of king David. I thought it was pretty boring after a while, but my mind stayed on the thought of religion.
Before Jesus, Solomon was considered the wisest person who ever lived. This according to the Bible; we won't count other figures like Socrates and such. As to who was wiser, Jesus or Solomon, I don't think that really matters much, but I can honestly say that while Jesus changed my heart, Solomon broke it.
Whenever you think of the wise men of the old, you always think of them as being patient and understanding, but we all know that there is also a component of anger to patience. It's why patience is a virtue and so revered; there is a mercy in it that displays understanding. When a person like Jesus got angry, it was of the anger of stoics. If I were to philosophize on it more, I would say Jesus learned how to transform the anger disease into something that was powerful and useful, and in effect made it less of a disease and more of a tool.
I now see David walking back to me, trying to find his way through the mounds of dirty gray snow mounds. He must have found what we needed. I owed Jose and last week he claimed his payment.
“We good?” “Yeah man. Dude said if you want to shoot nails this 'ere is the Cadillac, man. He meant Lexus but he ain't know it.” “Hold a charge better?” “Man fuck a charge, this 'ere a gun-powder activated 27-caliber full-auto no kick-back nail throwing mayhem, man. Shit right 'ere is tight.” I laughed. “For real. Fuck this nailin' up boards. We could kill a couple motherfuckas with this right 'ere. You laughin', I been schooled dog.” I couldn't stop laughing, “Aight, aight.”
When we were finished with the job I paid David for his help and we returned home.
Getting in front of our building, I realized that I had left my keys in my apartment. “Do you have your keys?” “No...” “Fuck.”
I looked at the device and wondered how to use it, but eventually I learned and hoped to hell that Sara didn't have her headphones on. It seems she did. “Text Sarah,” I told David. He did and she never replied. “2. 1. 1. 2,” I threw up a mail hairy and pressed my own apartment's number. Sara must not have known how it worked but she pressed the button that would buzz us up.
We entered the building, and upon passing through the second door which would lead us into the hallway, we heard a pounding on the entrance door behind us. It was Lynne who must have seen us entering and tried to run to catch us before we entered.
91 | KING DAVID
M.B. JULIEN
Dave and I stood there looking at her. “Should we open the door for her?” I could tell that she could tell that this is what me and Dave were speaking of, on deciding whether or not we should walk the few yards to let her in or keep walking. “What happened to your guy's keys?” “Don't know, she usually has them.”
David decided finally to open the door for her. Going up the elevator I asked her what happened to her keys and she told us that she left them at the airport. “Do you use your keys during work?” “No but the food storage keys are attached to it.” Ah.
When we got into their apartment Lynne told David that he had one hour do to whatever he wanted, and then it would be artistic endeavors time. She sent the same words to Sarah in texts.
And for that hour laundry was to be done. I went to my apartment with one large trash bag full of clothes, found Sara on her computer in the living room, and then left with an additional trash bag full of clothes. Standing in front of the elevator on my floor was Lynne, with her own pair of trash bags, and soon we entered the elevator to drop down to the ground floor.
After we sat the bags down, I noticed how the black trash bag made a contrast against her white shoe, and after this short moment she began speaking, and I knew that her mind was still on artistic endeavors when she told me that she started practicing singing when the kids were away at school. She tells me that she gave up on it a couple of years ago when I politely told her that she was trash at it, but that after I told her about my dream she was inspired to try at it again.
I told her that maybe when she was well and done she could record a song for me.
She turned her head and looked up at me with a smile.
There is nothing special about her eyes, nothing rare about her hair, and nothing exotic about her skin, and yet I seem to be so drawn to her the same way you might be drawn to the way that I write, which, in my opinion there is nothing exotic about my sentence structures, nothing rare about my vocabulary, nothing special about my grammar. I am simply a man thinking, and she is simply a woman being.