Bag Serials: the Ineviable Treason of Thomas Arnold Haggard #4

A fifth gin and tonic in hand and his head full of fish, at 3 a.m. Thomas Haggard mused for the fifth time on how similar that intense Aryan-looking drummer was to nameless name he exchanged pleasantries with just before boarding that fateful train to Amsterdam and Nadia said, “Oh, him again. You never did tell me his name.”

And Mr. Haggard, being the honorable man that he is, mumbled something inaudible to which Nadia said, “What was that?” and leaned within an inch of his ear.

To which Thomas again said, “mumm fumUMtomm,” resulting once again in a soft questioning reply from Nadia, her lips now skimming the remarkable coarse hairs of his left ear, her broach blossoming to him from her tall, full, utterly unremarkable chest.

To which Tom,

(being a man never so rude as to ignore a pointed question)

took out a piece of paper and wrote the name and number and address of some contact in the small Russia town of Ertsventiva who may or may not have used an alias anyway. And he said some vague things about the time and place and reason why that contact needed to set up a internet filtering system on the Iranian consulate’s house and how pleasant, remembering back, those sad islamic zealots were dressed and how polite they were and unusually hospitable.

And that night, despite being a man who resist over-indulgences when not for sake and at the behest of his lord and savor Jesus Christ, Mr. Haggard, here in Amsterdam for the first time ever, was man who made love to a beautiful woman. He was a man who saw Finnish people play nigger music and mused almost arrogantly on the secret, juicy things he had seen and that laughed loudly with a mouth full of Spanish ice cream to a Russian train attendant that surely would have made a great government information technology expert give the chance, that shared his vision for use of such expertise to make for a more free and demcratic world, that stared mercifully into his eyes through every boring exploit, every degradation at the hands of (no less patriotic) world leaders, every tedious classified assignment with nothing more then patient, gentle kindness.

And staring out his hostel window into the crisp autumn air that evening, Thomas Haggard for once felt his name not so appropriate, perhaps his life not so wasted, as a small round bullet zipped silently through his toupee just as Nadia returned from the lue. For the first time in years and for the last time in his life, Thomas Arnold Haggard felt free.

Bag Serials: the Ineviable Treason of Thomas Arnold Haggard #3

Fortunately though, Thomas Haggard is not in Washington D.C. right now. He is, as mentioned earlier, in Amsterdam; in Amsterdam for the first time, in fact, and is now scoping large of spoonfuls of Dolce De Leche ice cream into his small, mouse-like snout of a mouth between long, rambling retellings of the proud events that brought to him to a Café’ de Hogedaz, with a folder full of classified documents, talking into an obscenely large broach that seems to be making feedback-type sounds now and then, that is the largest thing on the equally large chest of Nadia, the Russian stewardess, who is hanging on his every word, in middle of Amsterdam.

Thomas Haggard has never eaten Dulce de Leche ice cream before.

This was choice was Nadia’s suggestion, an advisement to compete with the rich red wine gravy she had given him extra portions of just hours before. For all his refusal to be captured too tightly in the pull of any strange advancing woman on this, his first government sanctioned trip abroad, he had to admit that Nadia was an interesting spesimen. Mr. Haggard never much gone for Eastern Europeans types, what with their questionable, flimy accents and the baggage of socialist propaganda still fresh in their sad, oppressed little minds. But Nadia was different. There was a softness to her english that belied the strains of the strict, soviet bluntness of her birth tougue. Her eyes were a startiling grey and were fixed directly into his as he rolled off tale after boring tale of supposed cia missteps, allegitly illegal torture proceding and decripts of the cute things Regain, Haggard cute little persan pussy, did in his tiny studio back home in D.C. It was almost as if she was interested in what he had to say.

Not that this Nadia was a passive.

Her encyclopedic knowledge of Internet security protocol astounded him and they found much in common, despite her lowly employment as a night train attendant just two day’s new to the staff. Stopping at his first jazz club visit after his first tight pull of what Nadia insisted was a just a freshly rolled cigarette, they traded algorithms for replicating the jazz solo with the innocence and wonder of teenagers. And in between sets, she told Thomas of her trips to India and Indonesia and Africa of all places and Haggard gapped that she somehow remaid alive through it all, actually seemed to enjoy these excursions among people so….so foreign.

Tom had no such stories to share. Well, there was that one very drunken night when he mistakenly stumbled into that night club in the far edges of D.C. And though the music was strangely releasing in a way he couldn’t quite discribe and he vaguely remembers being lost in the middle of the dancefloor amid a fog of forbodding dark bodies with his eyes closed and his limps flailing almost uncontrolable, it didn’t really make an impression on him. Mostly he’s just glad he got out alive.

Bag Serials: the Ineviable Treason of Thomas Arnold Haggard #1

This is a story I put together a couple weeks ago for a contest by nycmidnight. In it, contestants were challenged to make a story of 2500 word or less about a random topic in 10 days. In my case, the topic was a spy story about a one night stand. No word on the results, but I’m satified with what I made. It comes in four parts. Let me know what you think.

__________________

 Thomas Arnold Haggard is well aware of the appropriateness of his name and is not at all amused.

He doesn’t see the need to bother with vague acknowledgments of empty gestures, regardless of your supposed intent.

That passing stewardess, for instance.

Sure, weaker, naïver 43 year olds may have simply laughed off that (very subtle) stroke she gave to Thomas Haggard’s belly as she released his rich dinner plate of beef Wellington, stewed sweet potato dollops and streamed greens all soaked in thick red wine and peppercorn gravy.

Other dejected 40-something associates of his surely would have indulged in some ridiculously, degrading illusion that the slow drag of that young supple train attendant’s finger across their respective, rotund stomachs was purposeful in some way, that perhaps even what is CLEARLY just a…. an… innocent moistening of the corner of her mouth almost directly afterwards in some way illustrating some, some lewd act that she was inviting that respective associate to participate in…or…something.

Well, not Tom Haggard.

Tom Haggard is nobody’s fool.

I mean look at him!

That hardened second chin, fat and red like a proud cock’s giblet. His solid, Hitchcockian torso, wrapped so delicately neck to ankle in thick, black, breathable wool. An unassuming tweed jacket bowing graceful to his prominent middle; his chest lit softly by the laptop balanced to the left of his dinner, on top of a budging folder of important, classified documents, underneath his hacked iphone, and wedged beside a signed hardback copy of “300: the Novelization”.

Clearly this was a man who would not be distracted by this random, buxom stranger that has slowly waded past his isle for the fourth time now, who has 3 unfastened buttons (surely due to the heat) below the nape on her constricted uniform, who’s name is Nadia I have been told and who comes from the a city in eastern Russia around which much of Mr. Haggard’s research work has been centered, and who happens to be stopping over in Amsterdam as well and who has a tattoo of kitty on her back.

Tom has never been to Amsterdam. He has, surely, heard of Amsterdam, heard much in fact. You could say, I suppose, that Thomas Haggard knows intimately of Amsterdam actually, given the number of afterwork happy hour stories he had to suffer though in the drug obsessed underbelly of Silicon Valley’s old guard. Many were the friends who after rising to new stratospheres of wealth at the height of the web 2.0 years, took time off to pursue such pathetic diversions as drum and bass djing, massage therapy, mushroom cultivate or, at worst, travel. Thankfully, Thomas found a more honorable, more American path long before his college mates start wasting there live on the molestation dens they call the social networking revolution. These were just mindless diversions compared the true calling of the computer elite: government intelligence.

like this

There was a boy who worked so hard.
He fixed the all doors, cleaned all the floors.
He threw balls while scrubbing walls while racing up and down the street.
—-
And every day his mom would note:
“Son it’s ok, rest for today.”
But shake his head, “Prefer,” he said, “to finish before I sleep.”
—-
And days and weeks and months he moved,
Plaied every game, fixed every food,
Read every book, sung every song and then he found one more.
—-
Until, while trying every chair,
—
He settled on a seat of air
—
Perfectly firm and smooth and their he fell into a snore.
–
So deep, his dream, it started with the blackness of eyes
—
It startled him to be so still, so he saw white in surprise.
—
Then all the colors flashed in kind
until the boy saw dots and lines,
—
two circles eyelike, nose and chin, a voice that sounded just like him
a simple room he stood within and letters that spelled out what he cried,
“It’s me,” he said, “from the outside!”
—-
He shut his eyes and wished for home, opened them scared…and he was there.
—-
That’s when he knew it was a dream that he was trapped within.
—-
“Hey, maybe here,” he thought, “I can dream of all I wish to do.”
—-
So dream he did, up all his friends, he dreamed his street and mom and then
He dreamed of all the things he did and things he didn’t yet.
—
He dreamed of many far off lands, of songs he heard and one’s he planned.
—
Dreamed all the great things he could eat and dreamed that bad things tasted sweet.
—
And dreamed up villians full of fear and with a wish they’re eyes would clear,
they’d turn and smile, remember him and join along to play.
—

New worlds and moons and stars he dreamed while looking at the night.
—
And then he dreamed of sun and saw it rise and there was light.
—
And every person that he saw, he dreamed they knew them, one and all
But try as he might, he couldn’t dream a person just like him.
—
So finally, with so much done, he dreamed that familiar chair,
—
He remembered it so clear, the room around it reappeared.
—
And with his dream mom at his side, he waved his dream friends all goodbye
And remmbered all of his fun and all the things he dreamed he done
—
All the way back to black and white and dreamed the chair from that one night
Let go of sight and sound and touch and color, taste and thought and place
—
‘till slowly out of the dream he finally rose.
—
He moved his feet and felt his face and moved inside his clothes.
—
yawned satified with his long trip and wondered what to do,
—
but couldn’t think of anything, cus everything was through.
—
Mom said, “Finally! You were out deep! Where did you go when while you where sleep?”
—
He look around
and then at her
and tried to say the things he made,
—
But couldn’t get the color right
or anyone he dreamed that night exactly, or the worlds he saw
or shapes he drew or songs he called
—
At best he just could see the end,
when all the dreams came back again
And that his mom and street was there,
And friends were too and things he’d do
—-
So with a smile he breathed a sign
and licked his lips and said,
—
“I dreamed a place
that’s just like this
was all inside my head.”
_______

My first attempt at a children’s story, kind of a matrix lite type thing. It actually came to me on waking from a disturbing dream that I can’t remember anymore.  It had something to do with childhood though and was definitely dense enough to make me question reality for a minute. It made we wonder what it was like for a child to discover and remember the dream for the first time, and further if there is a responsibility for adult help kids make sense of this world (assuming we got a handle on that shit our damn selves of course) I have ideas for illustrations…but this may be a back burner for a little while….that is unless someone out there in the internets got some time for a collaboration

Bag Serials: Adam #5

“So how many we got today.”

“Slim pickens this time, mate. Just the one; and a little bugger at that. But it’s more paws for pickin, I guess.”

“Hmmm…that surprising considering how lush this area is. I will have to make a note of that. He seems pretty quiet back there.”

“Had to tranq ‘em. Three darts. Had the crazy eye, that one; all smeared with berry juice and shit like some kind of flower child. Just stared me down at first, too, up on his hunches, all calm… it was creepy mate. And he just went off after the first dart. Ran head long for me.”

“Wow. Quiet a find.”

“Maybe we can get more then usual for the brains, Eh? Most expensive part, you know. Used in some kind of chang chong healing potion or something.”

“Hey hey, no insulting of our costumers now.”

Clang

“Ah ha, here we go.”

Clang
Clang
“Want me to end it.”

“No, let him enjoy the ride. He’ll get the point soon enough. Hey! How’s junior?”

“Typical two year old. Eyes full of stars. Always exploring. ’slike he just touched down from space.”

Clang

Bag Serials: Adam #4

Though the thigh sized branches and wide thick leaves he climbed upward. Hand over hand. When no easy twig was within reach, he clamped to the bark and pulled on whatever finger holds he could find. Sometimes he had to let himself fall backwards while reaching for a mound just beyond his grasp, not knowing if the handhold ahead was simply a clump of dirt or a rotten piece of fruit ready to crumble between his fingers. It never was and even in the equal panic of grabbing slick moss instead of reliable rough dry bark, somehow his fingers always seemed to scramble to just the right places before he fell to the ground. After such a slipup, he would cling stiffly to the face of the tree, every muscle tense, breathing hard and wondering how it was he was spared from falling so often.

It was the largest tree he had ever seen. The trunk was light grey with wide, smooth lightly grooved bark. Its roots rose from the ground in tall thin waves like skin being pinched and pulled upward. Sometimes he would lie inside the small alcoves between them and admired its fruit. It too was like nothing he had seen before. It rose on thin white furry stalls and was capped with a brilliant flash of red and specks of gold. They grew all around it on the ground and ran up the trunk like gazelles scaling a mountain.

He played with them. Rubbed his fingers along the furry undersides and picked at the specks of sunshine along the top. The red rubbed off and he added it to his collection sometimes, smearing it on his chest and face alongside lines deep purple fig skin and thick black earth and green leaf from a particularly beautiful orchard he often visited during the day. At first these colors collected accidentally. But once, knelling above the river covered with all the forest and a fat black hand print across his chest, he was inspired to collect and explore and experiment. The fruit’s color, a red so deep he thought at first blood flowed from the ground, he saved for the forehead, in a round dot, just above the eyes and in-between a slash of limestone and black soil.

But he never ate one. He had a policy of only eating what he saw the other animals eat. Besides, there was an abundance of fruit here. He was never in want. They were tricks, hiding places and nooks everywhere to be found, all filled with food as brilliant in taste as they where in color. But this fruit seemed different. Despite it’s flower-like appearance, never once did a bee flutter above it. It stood like a tree the wind, yet it seemed so soft and tender. Its flesh was the dull white color of fish with gills tipped with dark grey. It was just too strange to be trusted.

And yet the thought of the fruit lingering in his mind as his palette expanded. Feeling the tender morsel of slug flesh slide down his throat effortlessly, he thought of it. He wondered about it while munching on a handful of clay, puffing out his cheeks as the wolves did and feeling it slowly decompose inside his mouth. He saw it clearly, or thought he did, floating in the middle of what turned out to be a deceptively deep pond. He was not sure what he swallowed along with the water that day, but whatever it was it’s taste was ignored as he pulled himself gagging back onto the shore.

The sky was grey above him. He had not reached the top, as intended. Instead, he stopped at a thick branch about half way up and a little above the surrounding trees. All the colors he meticulously applied from head to toe had rubbed off on the long climb up. He was sore.

Catching his breath, he looked at the crumbled fruit in his hand hoping for some comfort. It was mostly intact; the stem laid disconnected and the cap had broken in two but it was still recognizable. Even a golden shard or two remained on top of some of the caps. Good.

It was not the most bitter thing he ever tasted. That was reserved for a thick brown seed he spotted a medium sized rodent nibbling on several days ago. On trying that, it seemed his tongue shriveled inside his mouth and he drunk the river nearly dry. The fruit had none of the visceral kick of that. There was no need to run for water, which was a relief considering that he was so far above ground. There was just a vague discomfort. A disappointment really. Just like this night.

Washing out the remnants of the taste with whatever spit he could produce, he leaned back and tried to sleep. A broken line of indigo lingered on the horizon but above the sky was black. A faint breeze blew. He held up his hand to air as if giving up an offering and let it take the remaining red dust and bit of stem into the wind. He may have fell asleep a bit after. It was a long climb.

And indeterminate amount of time passed before he found himself staring out into the blackness wide-awake. No. It was not black. He focused his eyes and saw the clouds glide in grey translucent bundles; the flat windows of black sky passing by in-between. And even this was not black, no, the casting of brilliant points of light like glints of sun on water spread over the darkness, perhaps in front of the darkness, perhaps along the front of his eye or perhaps simply reflected off the hair flopping over his face. He turned his head and look, the moon, just revealed from behind a cloud the shape of a clinched fist, glowing full and round and white. Not fully white. It was dimpled with grey at times and then raised again brilliant and new like the speckled stones by his river. He held his hand in the ring above him, holding the moon inside it. He stood up on the branch. His bare feet felt each ridges. His toes melted into the smooth bark like water rolling over fish scales. He could nearly taste it. And the air: a slight warmth and wetness that went unnoticed before. Hand again to the sky, this dark night many hued sky, black of every variety, soil and pupil, panther fur and closed eyelid, deep water and blocked sun blackness, all in a rainbow above and below. He stepped forward foot beside foot with hands spread and arms outstretched and head erect and tall. He closed his eyes, opened his chest and roared into the night.

Wordsworth: Meaning to Persist

“Then arrest me.” I said, not know exactly what I was saying. My mind was blank at this point. I was reacting on instinct alone and in all honesty, right or wrong were not even questions anymore.

Maybe I was being unreasonable….why exactly was it that I was being so…is obstinate the right word?

Obstinate:
Agj.
a. Stubbornly refusing to change one’s opinion or chosen course of action, despite attempts to persuade one to do so.

b. (of an unwelcome phenomenon or situation) very difficult to change or overcome the obstinent problem of unemployment

from latin obstinatus: meaning to persist

I have been a University of Penn student for the past 7 years now off and on. Just this past December I finally succeeded in finishing up my two remaining classes. Got a A- in Game Theory, a pleasant surprise, and a C in Computer Graphics, a great, great disappointment.

I work at IRCS, the Institute of Research in Cognitive Science, doing flash programming for a group doing research in high school math education and I, on this particular day, I was planning on going into my office to finish up some odds and ends. Buuuuuut it’s had been a long week and I’ve been itching to write and it is, after all, the weekend. So after a short walk on a beautiful day I strolled up the stairs of Van-pelt library, through the penncard-activated turnstiles and into the elevator 5th floor bound.

At the last moment, a south Asian student snaked through the doors, took quick glance at me and hit the number 3. I cleared my throat and he looked at me, holding his gaze a little longer with a blank expression and then down at his feet. I cleared my throat again and again he looked.

“It’s this weather.” I said, “Body can’t make up its mind what to do, you know.”

“Ya man,” he said, smiling and nodding now, suddenly softened and rocking back and forth on his heels. “I hear it’s going to snow soon.”

“I wouldn’t doubt it,” as the doors opened on the 3rd floor and our eyes suddenly turned into sudden open space.

He motions his arm,
“After you,” and I point to the rows of buttons.

“Fourth floor,” I said, mistakenly actually and I correctly myself just as he left with a satisfied smile on his face saying, “take care man,” and then I smiled back.

Fifth floor, I said again inside my head. Fifth floor.

And then I was there and headed down the first row I could perceive had a desk at the end after the first moment some deeper uncomfortably with that exchange had past. Row F something G something. I still had a smile on my face but there was something about that moment in that tiny little room and my scratchy little throat and his eyes somewhere in-between emotions before I spoke. I would never be use to it (if it was indeed anything at all), I thought and then let go of it, taking a seat near a thin open window where the sun still over-powered the florescent lights.

I sat and took out Cornelius, my steady little powerbook, and a charger for what I knew would be a nearly dead battery and took of my wool coat and rolled up my red long sleeved undershirt. I wiggled my toes inside my oversized rubber soled shoes and fleered out my oversized black-t emblazed with an over-sized portrait of Red Fox and brightened my under-lit computer screen and signed deeply.

I was trying my hand at a spy story and had two competing ideas in my head, one personal and strange, the other more obvious but more interesting in its scope.

In one, a homeless women shuffles into the dilapidated front office of a non-descript city hall on the day after a new mayor’s inauguration. She asked the clerk to see the mayor, ask if the “chicken is open to sunshine. I have a telegram. Past the open slot there is a green mystery. Mrs. Obormen said so,” to which the clerk stares confused and then apathetically tells her the mayor is available only by appointment and he is not liable nor has security clearance to hold telegrams. It starts like “So there was this women this women walking into the mayor’s office…”

In the other, a haggard CIA agent is on a train to Amsterdam in search of his favorite whore. He is on a plush night train coming in from Paris but can’t sleep very well for some reason. Instead, he pushes budget numbers around on his blackberry, ordering new nanosized wiretapping transmitters for his man in the caves of Pakistan and a lipstick gun for his blond, bukka-ed plant in eastern southern Iraq. He knows Russian fluently, was in no end of unbelievable James bond type moments all through his 30s and 40s but has moved into upper management since then and now deals with new kind of war and new technology used in a place were black suits and bow ties where never in fashion. He may die of the gout by the end.

I look up my email first (nothing much to report) and then on and off gamespy.com and digg.com and then back into Microsoft word. I clear my throat again, write and erased a sentence then remembered….I really could use a cup of tea.

I look at my Cornelius of a long moment and thought:
Hmmmm…

Nahhh.
It’s cool. My computer will be fine.
No one’s around. Penn card only access.
Got money? Check. Off I go!

First try to the basement floor where Mark’s café lives most of the year. I had a feeling it was not open, what with winter break still in effect until the following day and yes, I was correct. So, I took a quick run to the bathroom, took a shit and then outside. I thought of Cornelius and then let go. It was slightly chilly and I realized I left my coat behind. Rolled down the red sleeves. Tugged tighter my black billed skullie and thought, “whatever…still a beautiful day.”

I hate going to starbucks, but my trust does have some limits and it’s right across the street anyway so I given in for what felt like one too many times this week.

Whatever.

Standing on the corner at a red light next to a loose ‘fro brother holding a sign that I couldn’t quiet see. He was strikingly dressed and had a dignity to him that made me lean obviously over the curb and stoop my neck toward his chest, trying to make out the sign and our eyes meet.

He said, “What’s up brother.” I said, “Chillin.”

The sign had red, light green and white on it and inside said “sgi-“ and another abbreviation I can’t quite remember. I asked what’s up and he replied, firmly but rapidly, that he was there for s.g.i.-or-Soka-Gakkai-International-A-buddist-organizastion-that-chants-for-peace-through-Nichiren-Daishonin and I blinked hard and then shook my head.

“Ya…sgi. That’s crazy man. I went to a convention of theirs in san fran a while back.”

Which was true. A friend of mine still goes to chant every now and again. It was a little to much like my old days with Jehovah’s Witnesses for my personal comfort, but I will always remember warm hum of all those throaty voices chanting in unison inside that beautiful hall.

“We are having a convention today.” He said, visibly excited now but still with an ever present lid of collected cool. “Right over in Logon hall.”

“Wow, I’ll have to make sure to take a look.” I said, and I meant it. In fact I still do. The feel of all those voices, the chance to hear that long, ephemeral gong waver in the air, the darkness of the room packed with people and be as one with them…it would be comfort today. It still would be. So I return to the story, anticipating the darkness through the now darkened, cloudy window above my desk on fifth floor of van pelt.

I arrive back at the steps of the library with a medium earl grey tea in hand a good 10 minutes after chillin with the Buddhist brother, after waiting in line and wandering the Logan Hall, looking in vain for signs of the convention and wondering several times how long was too long to leave my computer alone. Nothing would happen I thought again. Penn card access only anyway.

It was a thought I had forgotten by the time I walking up the steps, through the glass doors and then up to the turnstiles, feeling my pockets with the hand not holding the tea and felt almost nothing. I took out the cash (all loose bills…as I often tend to do) and take out open mic flyers and linted cough drops but no wallet, no id, no penncard. Damn it.

At the desk were two young black women staring deeply into paperback novels draped across signin sheets and scattered memos. I walked up to the one facing me, leaned straight-armed on the front desk and told my story. With any luck she would remember me, as I had just been through the gate not 15 minutes ago, more then likely only one of four or five students that hour, very likely the 3rd dark-skinned man all day, almost certainly the only dark skinned man wearing a over-sized black-t emblazoned with a larger then life picture of Fred Sanford on the front. Not a problem.

She stared at me blankly and reached for her walkie-talkie.

“I could just go up stairs real quick and bring my card back down if you want.”

“No,” she said lowly, not looking at me. “You have to just wait here” and then “one to base, one to base,” into the receiver weakly and then nothing.

“Ok.” I leaned on the desk and waited, checking out the book on the desk, scanning the reading room downstairs. There were more seats then I remember. Nice.

“I’m sorry, could you move back from me sir.” She said, suddenly raising her voice, meeting my eyes for the first time. “You are too close to me…I can feel your breathe too so why don’t you just step back for a second.”

Ummm.
ok

I let my arms hang slack at my sides and stood up but stayed in the same position, scanning the space between us. There was a good 3.5 feet from my waist, across the 2 foot long desk and her chin, resting an inch from her book. Given the 3 feet up to my forehead from there, it’s not a bad estimate to say we had almost a 3/4/5 right triangle going on from Fred’s mouth to my eyes to her’s, now visibly annoyed, waiting for me to move back. I cut the estimate to an even 4 feet when I told her this, now leaning back on the turnstile.

“I guess I must have some strong breathe. You know, for you to be feeling it 4 feet away.” She looked harder and then back at her book. Her friend stared at me for a second and I said hi to her. She was reading a book called, “Karma is a Bitch!” and made a face before going looking back down. I waited for a moment or so and then said,

“Just so you know…all my stuff is upstairs so I’m not going anywhere. I have to get my stuff eventually.”

The girl upfront craned her neck, burned into my eyes and said with fierce articulation, “Well then you would be trespassing. sir.”

I almost wanted to laugh for a second…as I didn’t really say anything that about going in at the time…just that I would be waiting there as long as necessary. But I let that go and said this instead:

“Well, I guess you will have to have me arrested then, huh.”

And for the first time, I saw something real in her eyes: she was confused or angry or something or other and she shook her head yes almost but not really and turned to her friend, who had since put Karma is a Bitch on her lap.

“Well ya, maybe I will.”

“Ok then.” I said. Stared at the ceiling for a minute, not feeling anything. I don’t know how long I stood there.

“You know what…fine. I’m trespassing. Have me arrested.”

I tried to pass though the secondary opening, usually used on weekdays to let anyone in with a valid city id, but it was locked from the inside I almost laughed again. Then I put a leg over and then another and headed for the elevator door.

“Fine you are trespassing. What floor are you on again?” said the women, then motioning to unseen Islamic guard dressed in a blue shimmering headdress, a blue uniform and polished black shoes.

I held up my hand with thumb pressed to my palm. and said, “Four.”

The officer stepped forward told me, “Sir, I’m sorry but you can’t jump the turnstiles.” And started my story and she said, “It doesn’t matter, I have to escort you up at least,” and that sentence filled me with relief.

The elevator doors opened as I said, “Fine, then escort me,” and I motioned to the open elevator. “That’s fine with me, let’s go.”

She shuffled and stared and said, “You know what…fuck it just go.” And I said thank you as the door started shut and I remember once again that I was on the fifth floor and the fourth. Damn it.

Out the elevator and toward isle F something and G something and then down to my untouched computer, humbling waiting with a blank screen ready for words. I took another sip and spilled a bit and looked up sgi on firefox. Maybe there was something on Penn’s website about it or a listing somewhere of a Philly convention but it was not there and if it was, I was not really lingering anywhere long enough to see. I was breathing fast. I had another sip of still hot tea. I closed my eyes.

I was still breathing and surfing mindlessly when the guardswomen from downstairs walked swiftly down the isle, much to swift to see me, talking into her walkie-talkie trying to confirm which floor I was on and I lean out and said, “Ms. It’s the fifth floor.”

She kept walking and again, “Ms! Are you looking for me? Here I am.”

But she had turned the corner by now. I breathed again. I opened word again but my mind was empty. I realized that I was kind of cold.

And minutes later, the guardswomen returned came down isle F something G something with a husky man wearing plaid and faded blue jeans and a Philadelphia police badge and I tried breathing again.

“Hello,” I said to them both.

The officer if I was a student and I said I use to be…that I graduated a few weeks ago and but I work at Penn as well. He said something about what he knew of my situation and I started again into my story and he said “No. You just listen to me,” and the guard women just rubbed her eyes and shuffled. Finally he asked for my Penn card and I said, “Sure. In fact, you take all my id,” handing him my wallet. “This is everything I have, look for yourself.”

And he said no and mumbled something about credit cards and I said, “It’s ok. I trust you.”

And he asked if I belonged here and I said no. That I just came to write.

And he said well, you where giving them downstairs a hard time and I went into my story again, asked if they had told him my situation and the guard just “hmmm, mmmm, mmm” and rubbed her smooth brown face again and again.

The policemen said, “No you just take out you id and give it to me, “ and I said ok. It was the fourth card from the front. I held it with my thumb and forefinger and placed it lightly in the policemen’s hand. I breathed some more.

And he asked the guard what the policy was for entering the library and she told her anyone with a penn-card can come in and I interjected that is how I got my stuff into the place in the first place but he wasn’t listening.

So I asked, “So. Are you going to arrest me?”

And he looked at me astounded and said, “well, I’m going to do a check on you and see what happens and you are acting ill-mannered so don’t make me lock you up,” as he took out his pad and a pen.

“Then lock me up.” I said.

“Do you want to go to jail,” and I said no.

“Then why are you doing this?” and I thought for a second and said the only thing I could think of:

“I want to see if you’ll really do.”

He was shook and that was good. It helped me calm down. 3 more officers crowded behind him. The guardswomen moaned into her hand.

“My name is Warren,” I told her as the officer spelled it out over his radio receiver.

Guardswomen’s tagname said something like “Shaya.”
“Where are you from,” I asked her, trying desperately to keep my voice steady. She just shook her head and looked into the sky.

“Why didn’t you just stay quiet?” she finally asked and I told her the first thing I could think of:

“Because I don’t do that. All I’m doing is telling the truth. If you can’t handle that it’s on yall.” I was trying my best to stay calm.

Nothing satisfactory came over the phone and the officer asked again what was my deal and I told him I came to write and he asked me if I was high.

I said no.

“Well, I’m going to have to ask you to come with me” and I said no.

“What,” he said, and I said, “For what reason?”

“Because I asked you too,” and I didn’t say anything at all. The other officers where exasperated. Some said, “Come on man,” and other, “it’s a big library,” and a third threatened to lock me up and I said, “then arrest me.”

I looked at the plain-clothes man turned from this radio and said something about how I just said did not work here looked at the guard (which was not true) but she said nothing. He said I had an expired id (which was not true) and turned to the guard beside him but he said nothing. I told him both things where not true, repeated that had just graduated and work at IRCS: the institute for cognitive research right across the street and I looked at my shirt. Red Fox’s eyes stared up kindly and I breathed again.

“Well,” I said, “what are you going to do?”

And he stared at me shuffling and I liked his face. I liked his voice too, except when he asked if I was high. It had a south Philly tang to it and was calm and even except when he asked why I was doing this. The guardswomen was still shaking her head. The officers kept shuffling, looking at me and the floor and the plain-clothes man and then me again.

“Well, you know what….there is no law for having a chip on your shoulder so…” and couldn’t hold back anymore:

“I have a chip on MY SHOULDER!”

“Yall are the ones with 5 cops here. How do I have a chip on my shoulder? What do you want to do here?” and they wear all backing off now, “Fine,” said the plain-clothes man. “Well I say it’s done, ok?” and I said, “Good. I’m glad. You all have a nice day,” and then took a sip of tea. It was getting cold now. I was realized I was cold too. I put on my wool coat. I breathed some more.

I couldn’t write for a while and thought of a lot of things. Why didn’t I just stay quiet? It could have been nothing? A million justifications and then nothing was justified and I did jump over that bar didn’t I but what about the 3/4/5 eye-waist-eye triangle that sneering face threaten me for asking her to do her job. And other times when I said nothing. The other officers and stories from friend of other officers and you know what…Karma is a bitch, you know and then that guardswomen, shaking her head, “ummm, ummm, ummm,” as she left because I guess I did something wrong today. I guess I was just overstepping…something and I have no right to get mad and hey! I got droopy eyes right. Maybe I was high…I mean I was wearing a oversized shirt with an oversized picture and I have darkened eyes, darken features like the bands 1 to 8, 10 to 20 year old “urban” males I keep getting emails are dangerous, I am that one of 4 but it could have been anyone right? Anyone right? Anyone.

I went to the bathroom to throw up after starting to write this all down and ran into an occupied sign. I leaned on the wall and hoped I could hold it down when a short man popped out, saw me, lowered his eyes, and said “sorry.”

I asked instinctively, “What are you sorry for?”

He laughs and I wanted to laugh too, but I couldn’t think of anything to laugh about.

In an unrelated note, two days ago was the first time a grown man looked me in the eye and said, “Nigger.” He was a nice man too.

Iccarus

“You can’t go home again,” he thought, stumbling forward on a directionless jumble of sidewalk. His sight slants sharply about every point of focus. He remembers an old kaleidoscope he use to play with. He takes another stiff swig from of vodka. It goes down easier then he thought.

It is night, though somehow despite his state he perceives an array grays and ambers and blues in the darkness. He is reminded of Hopper paintings; distinctly urban volumes of light flooding a small room through an open window. He makes out the sky above the flat silhouettes of city row homes and sees no clouds. He feels a warm breeze against his thigh. His zipper is down. He leaves it where is.

He breaks by playground 2 or 3 blocks away from his parent’s house and bends at the knees and waits. The waiting is the worst, all wet and aching with your mouth gapped, anticipating an unpleasant release. But this one at least did not take too long. He vomit was a full, low heave rooted in the diaphragm and flows in one uninterrupted gush. Bathed in an uncomfortable afterglow, his nose pulls into focus for the first time in hours and looms ghostly between the black asphalt and the yellow puddle just ahead. It is his father’s nose. At least that’s what people always use to say. Something about the way it tapers into the brow. He wouldn’t admit it for a long time. When asked, he would something like say, “It’s probably just the lighting in here” or “I’m sorry I just don’t see it” or “Do you know my father? Really know him? Well, I can grantee you don’t know him like I do, so how about you just shut the fuck up.”

In recent years he’s been away from his hometown. It was a comfort for him. People had no point of reference to compare. When questioned his family background, he was ambivalent. He kept the descriptions brief. He changing the subject quickly to some great new project he had on his plate. Once, while lying naked beside a dark haired girl from a party, he grabbed her sharply by the wrist as she traced her finger down his face. They sat frozen for a long moment. Standing up quickly and pulling on his pants, he turned for one last look as he left the room. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I just don’t normally talk about my family.”

He is lying on the sidewalk in a pool of urine beside a half finished bottle of Absolut. His stomach is empty. His breathing is slow. A fog materializes around him and above the sky transitions to day. A doorway opens and an older man stands staring. Kneeling down, he strokes the fallen boy’s head and sobs.

___________

An attempt at straightforward, no nonsense story-telling inspired by a late night walk back near my North Philly home late last year. I’m finally reading Slaughterhouse Five and felt compelled to revisit it after taking in Vonnegut’s simple, surreal style.

Tonight at 11:59 I will be getting the secret theme and style of NYC Midnight’s Short Story Challenge and thought this would be a nice way to get into the flow. The contest challenges writers to create a story of up to 2500 words on a given theme and style in one week. I’ll make sure to post what ever come out a week from now. Peace yall.

Bag Serials: Adam #3

How does anyone go anywhere? It was all so complicated. First there’s the feet, taught and then relaxed alternating right to left and back again. And they move in ellipses, oblong cycling into the air with legs following, arms balancing with elbows pistoning like the whistling wind; rise and fall and rise in periodic time. He always trailed the pack. There was just too much to consider. He couldn’t understand the effortless flow of the others, their bodies seeming to fall forward through trees. Most of the time he ended up tripping over his elbows or smacking headlong into a tree or having his ear snagged and twisted by a passing elder hurrying him along.

Such a comfort to run alone now. He walked at dawn every morning, washing in river and grabbing a fig from a nearby tree before venturing out into the forest.  Each day he went bit a farther. Sometimes he strolled, taking in the sounds, eyeing the scattering animals and noting landmarks for later investigation. In other times, remembering the shame of his lack of coordination, he ran, flat out and with his eyes closed as far as he dared to go.

Once such time, while hurrying back home in the face of impending night, he found himself just finding his stride when his right foot planted itself at the heel unmovable. Cradled under his instep, a delicate and smooth thing not quiet a stone. It felt damp against his foot. Leaning back off balanced half falling, he lined his eye with the round white thing and confirmed his suspensions. It was an egg; the color of sand; shell almost translucent and full of subtle raised waves when he rubbed it against his finger. He fell silent considering it.

After a little while, a faint night chill blew against him and he stirred. The night he was fleeing was upon him. And yet here he was sitting, his hand caressing the egg, staring into the specks of dusk sky shining through the near-black canopy. The last time he saw a sight like this he was back with his family,  nesseled between his mother’s chest and forearm after a large meal. Most times the pack moved to a clearing to camp, but the night was clear and lit bright by the moon and they where all too satisfied to move. Exhaling back into reality, he carefully scooped the egg into his right hand and starting walking back towards the river. It was not as far away as it seemed.

He thought of eating it for a time. Eggs where often stolen from nests and gobbled as snacks when the hunt was particularly long. He even tried one once. He didn’t remember where and when exactly, but wherever it was, he definitely did not like it at the time. There was something about the thick consistence of the yoke that made him shake his head wildly and let his tongue flap in the air to the laughter of everyone around him. Still, he was much older now. Perhaps times had changed. And so one mid-afternoon in a clearing filled with blue, he sat posed to tap the egg on a stone when he saw a burst of yellow just ahead and above. The yellow broke into 3 parts, each moving loosely together as if attached to the other by a slack vine. They recollected on a tree, preening each other’s backs and scanning the sky. He had seen birds of this type several times before, but never as a pack. Perhaps they where a family. They flew off again just as quickly as they came, but not before he noticed one among them wandering a bit off course, a bit behind, and smaller, it seemed, in frame. And then they where gone. The egg lay unbroken in his lap.

From then on everything was up. Short vines where gripped and swung on to the sides of stubby trees grasped with ragged fingernails and up. His head was locked backward while he jogged through the brush and each evening he knelled fetally under a nearby cascade letting the pouring water workout the kinks in his neck. He ignored the pain. He had a mission. Somewhere there was a home for his egg. On walks, he saw small scurrying insects made of pine needles and dried husks of seed herd tiny copies into hollowed out logs. And young antelope, so long nothing but a meal, here reared up on hind legs swatting each other much like he and his brothers use to do. Once he saw even saw a ragged skinned hyena pack tumbling through a field and thought, for once, maybe their laugh was not the worst of sounds. And just like for them, somewhere there was home for this egg, he thought while chasing birds through the jungle in search of a perfect nest.

Finally, on a day filled with a dense fog, he saw a small red bird tend to a scribble of brown and then bolt to the sky. He had been tracking it for an hour. He climbed up the tree quickly and scurried over to the nest with careful, but eager steps. There it was. A sharp tangle of branch and grass and stem and slimy green vines and strange furry leaves dusted with white and bright colored pebbles and more. It was made of everything. All this set against 3 small sand-colored eggs lying scattered across the bottom perfectly placed. He could not bring himself to touch them.

Weary of bring too much attention to himself, he brushed a days’ worth of dirt off his egg and careful placed it in an unoccupied corner. As he let go, a lingering fingerprint clung to the side, fully in sight. He wondered if it would taint the egg’s chances of being accepted. Who knew, for that matter, if the mother bird would accept a new orphan any way? Hearing a rumble, he left these thoughts behind him, hurrying down the tree and back towards home. He was uncomfortably aware of empty space in his hand.

Walking towards the waterfall that night, staring into the dusk night backlit canopy, he thought again of the warmth of his mother chest. He had not thought of home in a long time. Hopefully his egg had found home. Hopefully mothers are the same everywhere.

Redundancies

1
Every day is Monday. Mass additions fix split infinitives on 30 minute thesises spit out with a 90% accuracy. He sells them for pesos on an online word sharing colbrabotative editing co-op and invisible millions change all last names to “shithead.” Forum boards flame that, no, in fact Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers did not feature King Louie, the black male archetype from the prophetic Jungle Book, and thus the lessening of scale of the show does not reflect a change in racial dynamics within the Disney Corporation. See thesis #19247 “The Evolution of Gender Roles within Tailspin”, #23943 “Little Buddy: Latent Homoerotic Messages Within Disney Cartoons of the Mid-Nineties” and #95237 “The Politics of Pooh Bear: How the Hand Gestures of Christopher Robin Marked the Downfall of the Modern Conservative Movement.”

2
Cup of coffee #13. 4 clicks of a stylus on a cell phone screen 3 fingers wide and a female voice answers with a slightly southern huskiness “4:42.” 15 about to cube time. There, he moves virtual surfaces into the rough approximation of a human, point by point. Charged transistors represent elbows bound to hollow flesh gripping the bow of navy ship breaking in two from a storm. The simulations runs all night, testing different odd contortions of broken limbs as solders jump from all sides. It is concluded that in the event of such an emergency, everyone would die.

3
My laptop crashed.

Andre slouches in his chair. The Patriot plays in the background. Scattered tapping as class 102 picks out notes and surfs porn and ims their cousins. Tech support has been on its way since third period. The teacher stands, imagines taking an unread book in his hand and slamming it on the desk. Last night’s high lingers behind his eyelids. Turning off the plasma, he looks at his list of required questions and asks #25.

What is the name of British loyalists during the Revolutionary War?

His laptop light up with answers from 2/3 of the students. A quarter of those answers are correct. He stares for a moment, shrungs and pulls up a calculator over a sky blue official-looking background. “Microsoft School of the Future” it says, in bold Times New Roman.

4
Saturday morning preaching and Sunday morning meeting and Monday evening study and Tuesday evening revival and Wednesday night congregation and Thursday night bible reading and Friday night fellowship. And work Monday, work Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday and Friday, 8 hour full day concrete and wood and big trucks, wide loads, moving fast and to the next and all the while waiting, talking to others waiting, holding keepsakes of the dead for the next life, waiting to see them, praying you’ll get there, and in the meantime hurry, hurry, next and next and next and next.

5
Your knees are inches from your forehead. Periodic rocking.

I can’t see the face of God. I can’t see the face of God.

Nature told you to let go. He had thick brown dregs and did hand stands. You played chess together. They flashed a picture of a purple and blue fractal in your face. You ran outside. They laughed.

That’s why you only play this game when you are really zooted.
stoned.
baked.
blazed.

Noise hurts. There is so much. God, it is SO thick.
What is there left to dream about? Am I dreaming? Is this all a dream?
You vomit.

The next day.
You are handing a half-caf mocha no whip to a girl on a cell phone. Daemon taps you on the shoulder and laughs.

Hey, good shit no?

You nod.

__________

This is a piece made shortly after returning to Philadelphia a little more then a year back. It spoke to a feeling of useless with all the screens and gadgets and 9 to 5 do nothing jobs. A new version was made for publishing in Pax Americana, fantastic web journal back in San Francisco run by some friends of mine. It was also one of a few pieces I attempted to make into a piece of art. Kind of text heavy, but a nice attempt I think. You can check that out by hitting the thumbnail.