Exeunt omnes 15:14, July 17, 2011 (UTC)

I

I enter. The room is a mess. Victorian decor. There’s even a chandelier. I start putting pillows back. After the first few, I come across a gun. This makes me nervous. See, the author has been making Chekhovian references recently, so I’m not surprised. Unfortunately, I’ve only been fleshed out by a short introduction showing nothing of my character so far. So let’s get a fact straight: am I good shot?

I spot four wine glasses and a bottle across the room. I aim for one of the glasses, hit the bottle instead. This isn’t looking good. But predictable enough, given the author’s lack of strong protagonists. Always the unwilling hero, except there’s nothing to be saved. How he writes observant characters without having much of a cast is beyond me

So maybe I’ll only have to watch the gun scene go down. The second character to enter will probably be the willful individual with a personal mission with which I play a key part, even though I’ll realize more and more that their personal mission is bull as time goes on. But they’ll be persistent, and most likely of opposite gender. Kidnapping isn’t out of the question

Then it strikes: when the willful individual dies, the plot converges rather quickly to a close. What happens to me when the story ends? I die. Unless there’s a sequel, but the author has never written a sequel. So there’s my hook to help the willful individual

There’s something I’m not sure of, since my sentience is a novelty in the author’s style: will the other characters also be sentient? I’ll venture to say no, since that’ll allow me to become alienated from the rest of the cast more easily

I’ll mention a cat sitting outside the window, across from the grandfather clock

& I ask: why am I here? Do I live here? Such an awful scene writer

II

I’m riffling through papers looking for clues as to my existence, but everything’s illegible. Lorem ipsum be damned. When the door opens and who I assume to be the willful individual walks over the window and let’s the cat in. Only then does she turn to me, look at the shot bottle of wine, and say “Guess I can’t offer you a glass of wine”

The gun’s behind me, on the counter. “Sorry for the stain”

“It’s alright, dear”

Oh dear. Besides a most unrestrained piece, dear has only appeared once in the author’s published works. As part of a sonnet, and used for intimate effect

She approaches me, looking me in the eyes. This is ridiculous. & then I notice what bull the author’s pulled: she’s an effeminate man. Since when did he start writing homosexual Victorian romances? & what’s the age of this effeminate man anyways?

So I panic. I scramble back and hold the gun to him, asking “How old are you, anyways?”

His eyes are anxious and wanting, so he leans towards me without a step to ask “You can’t feel my youthful glow?”

The knowledge floods me: He’s 16, and I’m 17. The response floods me: Always glowing. But there’s associated thoughts that don’t make any sense, given that men don’t usually have pregnancies in their past

This isn’t making sense. There has to be some plot with which he wishes me to play part. I’ll cut to the point: “What do you want from me?”

I shouldn’t’ve been surprised when he tilted his head with raised brows, “What I want from you remains more than what I allow. So let’s have sex. Because sex is great. Put down the gun”

Such an awful script writer. This has got to be the most jejune sacrilege. I back towards the open window, stepping out while he tells me “I don’t know why I love you, but I do”

I mindlessly reply “I don’t know why you do either” before breaking into a run

& gone

III

Where do I run? I’m on an open grassy field with a blue sky. The stereotypical scene that everyone knows. Cloudscape barely matters, simply has to be light. There isn’t really anywhere to run

It’s dark. I’m in a large parking lot. Small convenient store behind me, construction laden road ahead. The phone booth stands alone, lighting itself. I’m cold. The road veers off in the distance. I get in, hoping for warmth. I’m urged to curl up. Take the phone and dial. Outside the scene changes. It’s at the corner of a plaza. There’s another phone booth beside me. A number is etched into the plastic plate. The phone book case is all that remains of the phone book. There’s a finished chocolate drink cup. Not having a number, I dial the etched number

Nobody answers. I’m in a car. One road trailing by the dash for hours. Yet the strip of road is a short one. Half an hour to bike it. A couple of overpasses. I flick a switch and suddenly it’s raining. I can’t turn my head to look about what I’m inside. If I try to speak, a drawling voice let’s out noise, and then stops to listen to a drawled reply

I open the door and jump out. Should I be hurt? Of course. I’m looking up through shadowed branches at the moon. In one direction I’m at a bus stop where a tall tree covers overhead. Maybe it’s raining in the dark, maybe it’s sunny and I have a new pink fridge clip. It’s just off a main road. If I keep looking further in that one direction, I’m at another bus stop. On a main road. A large plaza behind me. Gray haze. Raining. I can’t look around too much, there’s an umbrella in my face

I look in the other direction of the tree framed moon. Thick trees to my left, open gravel to my right. Is it dark or light? It’s as light as there is an abandoned outhouse. I’m lost. I walk towards the outhouse. Now it’s a cabin in daylight. Trees have moved in around me. Branches cover the sky, roots cover the ground. It’s at the bottom of a hill. There’s an old brown truck parked. Everything’s brown, it’s autumn. Low slant roof. Light comes through the door from an opening visible through the door. I know better than to go inside. This isn’t a place the author’s written about. This is a place the author created while reading asstr’s tmz’s Havik’a

I look back for the bus stop, but instead it’s a trail. Untended grass field to the left, simple two plank fence fencing off a tended field to the right. This place has been used twice. It hasn’t been touched in a long time. I walk into the untended field. The lighting changes. In the distance there’s trees. All around. Behind me is a thorn bush. Tilting my head one way or the other shows the field at various points throughout the year. There’s no snapshot of the winter. The winter is a winding path in open grass sprinkled with coniferous. It’s dark. I’m feeling anxiety. I can’t see far. My head only looks down

I look up. Long grasses are flattened to the ground. There’s concrete boxes scattered about the field. To the right is a river, to the left a road. Figures are walking along the sidewalk. I grip the gun I’m still bearing, so that now I’m in a park. Still dark. There’s a row of trees in the distance. An untended field behind them. Really there should be a fence. I calm my grip, flinging me onto a road where the field is no longer seperated by a row of trees. There’s train tracks to my right. The road is empty. Behind me, away from the field, seems flat dirt. A three way is in the distance to the left

Walking into the field, daylight returns. There’s a wide and low tree in the distance. The grass is yellow, but still lively. The road is a dirt road now. Across the road are trees. I start walking along the road, and daylight goes away. The field flips sides. The trees become more sparse, with houses in between. The field is farm plot. There’s a swampish cluster of trees in the distance. Cars drive by. Pockets of light

I shut my eyes. I’ve seen enough. I feel my eyes being pried open, yet only to complete darkness. Again voices drawl. I want out of this dark abstraction

I grip the gun. There’s no association to be made. I’m in the dark with a gun. There’s no preconceived script, no variations, no nota benes

I’ve found a place to write my own part

& it goes like this…

IV

A light turns on overhead. A notebook is thrust into my hands. I glimpse through. Phrases are listed, consistently followed by quod vides. I toss it away. I don’t want to fit these phrases together like a broken puzzle. Now headphones are shoved on my ears. I hear glimpses of mumbles, grumbles, sighs, whines, cries, and moans. My purpose is to decipher their subtle differences and capture those unique features in the more defined form of language. I bat the headphones away. I don’t want to capture ambiguous atmospheres

I want to take shots in the dark. Listen to random screams, but who cares what subtle difference they evoke in emotion from their subtle differences? They’re all a bunch of faceless voices in the dark

& then I hear myself

V

“Morning, dear”

My eyes open. I’m in bed. He’s kissing me. I roll back, not spending time to notice how similar this set is to the stereotypical hotel room set

“Did you sleep well?”

I’m only half dressed by the time I’m running down the stairs. The cat’s sitting at the window. Inside. I shove it aside. The window’s locked

He’s lazily followed me. He’s leaning against the door frame, saying “That was a nice stunt you pulled yesterday. It’ll be written off as some psychedlic coming to terms with your homosexuality”

Everything’s a double entendre. How awful an author. Never admit what’s behind the façade. Never admit the display of elements which are readily available to both construct and haunt. The maze with which these are easily retrieved, yet difficult to escape. I didn’t even get into the taglines which sound at sights. The view of facing the wall in bed and facing “Hey.” Those taglines get trigged by common talk. Everything collides

But there has to be more to this homosexual Victorian romance. Is it purely to throw a curveball at my assumptious opening? To show sexual tension needn’t be demonstrated through restraint? To generate awkward conflict? None of those seem worth the sacrilege

Avoiding plot avoids all it offers: I press him against the door frame with a kiss

Who are you? / Some guy

This is going nowhere. Here I am, trying to get out of the way for the author to explain this anomaly, and all that’s coming out is garbage

You’re garbage. That’s what you are / If you like it dirty, then that’s what I’ll be. I’d be a yellow feathered loon for you / & if I’d like you as a woman? / Why, what do you think I’m being? (His fluttering eyes make it obvious. He’s being a joke. Some shard of reality coveted so to be turned into whichever fantasy fancies, all the while staking a claim to being staked in reality) / Get staked / Couldn’t you tell by how all the places in the author’s head are mangled together? He does the same thing with people. & then it’s a wonder he has such trouble seperating concept from person, past from present. It’s dangerous to graft model with reality. Everyone has to eventually understand that their mental defects don’t actually translate

& there we go. That’s his line. Now what’s it cue?

VI

What’s it cue. That’s the very problem I want to avoid: how many cues are there before the end? Before I’m set to rest? I need to only collect the information to understand my world, and no more

There’s an wrinkle in his line: we only experience reality through our perception. Therefore, how is one seperate model from reality? I can only assume the answer will be that we must settle with being aware of this fact, and therefore remaining vigil in recognizing discrepancies. Understand that perception overrules prediction

He’s wrapping his arms around me, leaning against my back. Do I really want to stutter the plot here? Prolong this inevitable scene? He’s kissing the back of my neck. The door. Surely he won’t make a public display of this. I walk us to the door. It’s locked. He rests his chin on my shoulder, whispering to my ear “So soon?”

Too soon. But he’s implicating that a walk is in the works. I can only hope it can be cued through discussion

You didn’t factor in how we only experience through our perception / Perception overrules prediction / Yet Gell-Mann argues that aesthetical elegance exceeds perception. But it breaks down, perhaps because Leibniz was wrong, perhaps because one becomes incapable of judging aesthetical elegance as information becomes incomplete and their own mental defects become eager to serve as critic

My rambling grew quicker at the end as I became uncomfortable with how he’s pressing me against the door. Also my shoulder hurts. He only takes my pained gasp as encouragement. He pulls us crashing into the couch. The pillows I’d put back fall about. Figures this explains the mess. & like that, the memories of painful fellatio flood to give that much more kick to the experience

You know those scenes that cut off and leave the audience to fill in the blank? Just before the murder occurs, or just as two characters finally embrace and intend to embrace all the more? It’d be nice if that’s what this was, even if it’s already gone farther than is usual to then call “& cut”

& cut

VII

Unlocking the door doesn’t actually matter to the plot as much as it mattered to me. Especially since that’d make it obvious how I’m captured in this all. So the scene cuts straight to us sitting across from each other drinking tea. There’s a morning after feel. He’s sitting back, shifted so that he isn’t fully facing me. He blankly stares at me. I’m sipping my tea. His arm is extended, his thumb mindlessly petting the surface of the cup. His other arm reach along the back of his chair. He looks away, then back. Scowling “You aren’t the same. Get your act together”

I set down my tea, “When did you notice?”

I regretted asking that question after it was answered. The hassles of lazily evaluated memories. He continued, “Do you realize what you’re doing? You’re letting your petty self imposed conflicted plot get in the way of a homosexual Victorian romance. Your plot can’t stand alone, so you’re slipping it in here, where it doesn’t belong. Missing your lines to point out the implicit. It isn’t about what’s happening, it’s about doing it”

So here I am being chewed out over a poor lay. Breaking from the pose to try and get me to pose. I look inside the café, looking for what it’s made of. Soft golden yellow posts, very dark inside. The table we’re at has umbrellas. The chairs are smeared silver. It’s so generic. Then this place’s history floods: this place was made while imagining drinking tea after a long intercity bike ride. This place includes a phone booth

I raise my hand, both cutting him off and signalling the waiter. They’re the kind to ask “What can I get you?” rather than “What would you like?” or “What’ll it be?” or “May I take your order, please?” or “Yes?” I answer “We’ll both have iced teas”

The iced tea will have only a little bit of ice at the top of the tall glass with a half lemon slice to the left and a black bendable straw

I stare him down while we wait. Smiling. He’s got a bit of a confused anxiety. He’s still in his pose, but he isn’t looking back at me so much. When he does, it’s with poor focus. He’s watching me from the corner of his eye

I pay the waiter while they set down two iced teas with only a little bit of ice at the top of the tall glasses with half lemon slices to the left and black bendable straws

I never actually see the waiter’s face, their neck is always hovering over the shot which is focused on we who are sitting. They’re wearing black pants and shirt

Tip, sip, lick lip

& action

IIX

I get up and walk past him to go towards the phone booth. He follows. We had been sitting in the shade, even without the umbrellas, but the phone booth is just past the end of the shade. It’s clean. I dial the number that had been etched into the plastic plating. Someone picks up, but I don’t respond, only letting them listen to our kissing

We break apart and I hold the phone up to him. I watch him talk while listening to the sound of sucking on my straw, twirling it enough to hear the ice jingle. He takes sips from his own whenever he stops talking. He’s not listening to them. He’s listening to how our iced teas sound together

Eventually he hangs up. Now we’re not drinking from the iced tea anymore. Continuity error: where is his iced tea? I’m still holding mine, licking at the straw end. The ice isn’t jingling. We’re both smiling at each other devilishly. I’m leaning back so that for once I’m shorter than him

A phone booth which has never been cast floods: outside of a gas station, beside a four lane road, before an overpass. It’s by a fence. Beside two tall poles. A shopping cart abandoned by it

I have not explained the reasoning with which I acted. There is none

& so we kiss