The sun is out in the sky, making me squint as I move down Somerset Avenue. There are people outside in their yards, busying themselves with outside chores before winter hits. I pass by a man with hedge clippers in his tiny front yard. His house is rustic and stands on a slight angle. He's got a plaid shirt on and his blue jeans are covered in mud, working the clippers frantically against the rosebush that runs along the sidewalk. It takes me a moment to realize that he is chopping off all of the rosebuds.
"Why are you doing that?" I ask, stopping there beside him on the sidewalk.
He turns around startled and sort of shakes his head at me. I watch him chop off a couple more rose-buds before I ask him the same question again.
"I'm trimming the flowers," he says.
"Yeah, but you're cutting off all of the best parts."
He shakes his head.
"I don't understand." I say, desperately wanting a swig of the crown, and knowing that this poor bastard probably needs one as well.
"Well," he starts, wiping his forehead with a dirt-covered hand, "the roses attract the most problems. It's easier to chop them off. I have kids here - you got that, young ones, a little girl. And I don't need bees and other sorts of bugs and insects flying around all over the place?"
"I don't see?"
"Listen," he says, "don't try and tell me how to trim my garden. I know what you'd use these roses for - all you kids are the same. You see something pretty, you see something you want, and you take it. This is my garden - so if I want to cut off the goddamn rosebuds then I'm damn well going too, and Jesus Christ son - are you drunk?"
"Well?" I burp.
"That's your problem, you kids. Walking around half-hammered, trying to tell us how to live - like some miraculous change is going to happen in your generation. Everything stays the same, and it always will."
I shrug and take a swig of the crown. I offer him a drink but he scowls and shakes his head at me so I saunter off down towards the market. I try enjoying the rest of the day, the sky blue and clear, sparkling little diamonds in my eyes and a burning in my stomach from the Crown. But the streets are crowded and busy, which ironically makes me feel even more alone. I walk past this elderly lady and she stares at me gapingly while I take another quick swig of the Crown, which makes me feel sort of guilty I guess, and so I duck into the nearest bar, a place to drink in peace.
The Honest Lawyer beckons me forth with a florescent yet indifferent sign that says 'open'.
"CHARLIE BOY!"
Fuck.
Sylvester is in here. I should have known, since he always liked coming to the Lawyer so he can play the punching bag game that measures how hard you punch. I haven't seen him in months, ever since I found out that he fucked Samantha after we broke up. He's got a full-back baseball cap on backwards, and his shirt is probably two sizes too small for his large chest and biceps. He works as a bouncer down in the market, and the job was definitely making him an even bigger asshole than he was before. We spent a lot of first year getting fucked up together and partying, but I was so tired of all that now - mostly because of bastards like him.
The idiot giant comes tumbling over to me, knocking over a bar stool in his wake. I can hear that familiar clatter of drinks and loose lips lapping in the background. He claps his humungous hand on my back so that I fall forward a bit. I can tell that he is just plastered right now; shit-hammered. And as he's shaking me back and forth, howling out obscenities, my Crown falls from inside my shirt and smashes against the floor.
"No worries," Sylvester says, shuffling me off towards the bar, away from the broken glass and wasted liquor. "Plenty more where that came from."
"What are you doing here?" I ask him.
"Ah, me, Dennis and Brennan came down here to meet some chicks - those fuckers. They said there was going to be 3 chicks, but only 2 showed up. They left a little while ago. I tried convincing the one girl to let us Eiffel Tower her, but I think she thought I was just joking?"
The counter where Sylvester is sitting is covered with tipped over shot glasses, half-bitten lime slices and other miscellaneous booze splashed all over the place. There aren't really that many people in the bar, and its dark - thank god, which means Sylvester has been sitting here for a while getting drunk in the dark by himself. My head starts hurting because that old man was cutting off the roses from his rosebush, and my mom walks around the house with her inside shoes. There's an elephant sculpture sticking out of the wall behind the bar, and its black eyes are intense, staring right at me, through me, and maybe Sylvester will slip into one of his shiny tusks tonight.
"What's a dead baby in an oven smell like?" he leans over and asks me, his reeking breath fogging up my face.
"I don't know."
"Me neither, I was too busy jerking off." And the buffoon just bursts out laughing, nodding his head at me and the cute blond bartender. She looks at me and I smile but she turns away. Sylvester leans in to me and says 'I bet this whore will blow me under the bar,' and I say 'absolutely, why don't you ask her,' and so my magnificently classy friend leans his mammoth torso over the bar and whispers something to the blond bartender. She scowls at him and storms off towards the other end of the bar, which makes us both start laughing.
"What did you say to her?" I ask.
"I asked her what the best tip she'd ever gotten before was," he pauses. "Then I told her I'd give her my dick-tip."
Laughing loudly, I had to hand it to the bastard, he was a genius.
Thrusting the ol' tusk.
Sylvester laughs and scratches at his crotch. "Goddamn Steroids are making my balls itchy," he says.
"So, how's working at Pier 21 going?" I ask.
"Not bad, we had to kick this big gang of Serbians out the other night. The bastards all came back and jumped the bar, a couple of our busboys got fucked up big time. I got sucker punched and boot-fucked by about 10 guys."
"Ouch," I say. "That's the beauty of working at a bar, I guess."
"Yeah, and all the chicks."
"Naturally."
And Sylvester, completely consumed in his own inebriation and toxicity, stands up on the stool at the bar, pulls down his pants and yells out 'who wants to give me a blowjob!' The few people scattered around the place gawk towards the spectacle; cold suds with light heads, and I can't help but laugh. For a second I feel like maybe things aren't so bad, maybe it was still possible to feel young again - until I notice that some drunk looking chick is actually talking to Sylvester right now, his pants still hanging down around his ankles, and I watch in horror as the two of them scramble off towards the bathroom, the poor girl's eyes glazed over and oblivious while Sylvester's eyes sparkle with success. I sit there drinking my double rye and coke and after a couple more minutes the two of them get escorted out of the bathroom by the bouncers, Sylvester's pants still hanging down around his knees. And while he gets dragged out he tries slapping at my hand, but I ignore him. I look over at the elephant again but his eyes just don't seem as menacing anymore, 'thanks for nothing bud.'
Chapter 4
Reaching over in the radiant bright light pouring in through the parted curtains, and outside rustling and voices, cars moving by, a humming rush, inside my heart as well - and her face is closed and asleep, her arm hanging crookedly over the gentle slope of her head; moments so fleetingly slipping. Like a slit wrist - dripping wet and crooked; hauntingly swept away in the mist of my mind, always so fogged over and blurred. I stuff the wound with gauze; cauterize it with cigarettes and liquor, but the blood keeps flowing fast. And the river just keeps on roaring, swept up inside the current. A second can go on forever when elegant lips are dancing on the flesh of an emotional albino, my eyes blank and desperate in the soft white-light. The waves hanging above cast a heavy shadow, caught in the emptiness of eternity - shadows of the future and the past melding in the whirlwinds of my mind. But nothing will wait for me, nothing will bring her back, and in my little boat I feel it capsizing, and the rushing sound of the
pounding waves will swallow me whole, disorientation far behind me now, and far beyond recognition. But these little memories shift and fade - in and out - her brunette hair and the soft blue of her windows - they were always open to me, and like a fool I put a fucking black drape over them, blocked them out - the sun, the blue, the everything. And for what? But I think I can see. Like under the surface or something - and that's what scares me the most. Because really I know that things are the way they are for a reason. And there are rocks and other sharp things down there that bite and sting and twitch
Twitch
Twitch
And inside my heart beats because the best part of my day is usually that ten seconds before I'm fully awake, that limbo of consciousness when I'm still not sure where I am. For those ten seconds I can convince myself that I'm still with her. But the moment passes as my eyes focus in on the cluttered apartment; my kitchen, my bedroom and my living room are a single entity, and the half-empty bottle of Forty Creek sitting lidless beside my bed. Such wasted nights spent on the pursuit of yesterday. And in the end, all my dreams were for nothing, because she told me she doesn't feel the same way anymore?
Chapter 5
I'm sitting in my bachelor apartment wondering how people in California live. Like actually. We'd be aliens to them, I'm sure. My mattress is cluttered with school text books and essays with big fat 50s scribbled down on the front of them and I haven't showered in days, sleeping in my jeans and eating while lying down (it was a talent I had mastered over the past year). I think Paul would do well in Cali though. He did go out and buy a TWO-seated convertible when we moved to Ottawa. I mean what does that say? I guess I could ride in the trunk, but there really wasn't much room back there beside his golf clubs. Anyways, he liked cruising around with the top down and his goddamn Oakley sunglasses on, and I'm sure the way he grins at all the young girls makes them shiver deep down inside, but that fucking convertible has a pretty powerful spell over the placenta, so I've noticed, and goddamn it, maybe I needed a little cruise in ol' Paul's convertible, would be good for the soul I'm sure.
My apartment is a disgrace. A tiny square with the fridge, stove and sink all jammed into the far corner, and a bathroom tucked away in the corner opposite. It was in the basement too; my own personal dungeon (thanks again, Paul). I was planning on living with Sam, not this shit. I only have one bowl that I use for pretty much everything, ever since I smashed all my plates - but that was the beautiful thing about living on your own - you really only needed one bowl.
I can't sleep without whiskey and lately I've been waking up in the middle of the night thinking that there's someone in my room; that blinking red light from the phone, winking at me constantly from the floor. I haven't been able to get a hold of Sebastian since we last saw each other, and every time I see a grey car drive by I watch it intently before it turns out of sight. The Night Stalker broke into another home in Sandy Hill three nights ago, only two blocks away from where Natasha lives. He had a knife and molested a girl who was only 18. I brought my hockey stick over to Natasha's and left it lying beside her bed. Her and her roommates were all sleeping together for the next couple of nights, which meant I was left to my own miserable devices.
Septum's cell phone starts ringing.
"Doctor Mahon's office," I answer.
"Charles, please - be serious. Where have you been the past two days? And how did you get this new phone number?"
"Well? ummm."
"Never mind, I don't want to know, to be honest, but honestly, what have you been doing?"
"Helping the elderly across the street, saving the whales?" and the liquor flashes bright behind my eyes, making me dizzy. Glorious morning!
"I am dealing with a child," Natasha laments. "And why do you all of a sudden have a new cell phone? Do not tell me that you broke another goddamn phone Charles."
"Listen, my darling," I say. "I've been busy, made a trip over to where my mom lives - and Paul happened to stop by while I was there, believe it or not, and we had quite a long conversation - a riveting one at that. It really was refreshing. He told me he was going to lend us his convertible next weekend, and you better believe we'll be cruising down Rideau with the top down baby, you and me, and maybe you can practice on your stick-shift - orally of course."
"Jesus Christ, Charles?"
"Are your roommates home?"
"No?"
"I'm coming over now," I say.
"No, Charles, no really - I have work to do."
"Me too, we can work together."
"I know what you're working on Charles. It's not the same thing at all."
"I'm coming over."
She giggles and says come, and I will, and I can tell that she wants me too. So off I bound, rolling from my mattress on the floor of my shithole apartment, throwing on a t-shirt and strutting out the door like the handsomest bastard that ever lived.
In class our professor talks about violence. Political violence, which sort of makes me laugh. Any sort of violence can be political when it's traced back to the core. But that never seems to help any. I mean, some woman shoots her husband because he gets caught sticking it to his receptionist, or the babysitter, or the neighbour's cat. Either way, she shoots him and he dies but some professor down in Massachusetts says that it's not her fault because our Capitalist society advocates misogynistic tendencies, so the woman gets off on self-defense from spousal abuse. Meanwhile, some guy down in Detroit shoots another guy because he's sticking it to his wife. That guy doesn't get off though, he goes to jail for life. And it's the same thing, except we've made it different. That's what these philosophers do; they make up more questions instead of answering the one's that need answering. It's like standing across from one another in a giant, hollow room, and even though everything seems very formal and educated, nothing ever really gets done, and both sides just seem to yell at each other the entire time. People will shoot each other and stab each other and burn each other alive. We will punch, bite, pull and stomp - you can't stop it, but we can figure out how to best cope with it. When Colonel Williams confessed, he said he didn't know why he killed those women, why he did the horrible things that he did. He said it probably didn't matter anyways, and that's my point. The way it is now, nothing really matters. I could be sitting on a goddamn bus with my headphones on and my iPod pumping, meanwhile the guy beside me is getting his head hacked off and I wouldn't even notice. There's a disconnect within our society, and this brave new world of customized technological freedom is only making things worse.
Class ends and everyone filters out through the brown doors. I linger back awhile because there was an essay due last week that I haven't bothered starting yet. I come down the learned steps and stand stock still beside the blackboard behind ol' Tinninger, with his frazzled grey hair and hunched over back.
He turns around startled and jumps a little at the sight of me.
"Mr. Mahon," he says, "how are you this evening?"
"Oh, yea know, pretty tired and all?"
"Yes, I could see that," he nods.
"Hey, I love your lectures!"
"Don't worry Charles, I'm only joking."
"Does it frustrate you when nobody contributes in class?"
"Some people say things," he says, looking at me, "the ones who pay attention do."
"I would say stuff! It's just too embarrassing at this point, I mean, everyone is so busy playing with their blackberries or twiddling with their iPods? I don't think anybody wants to hear what I have to say..."
"I'm sorry you feel that way."
"I still haven't given you my essay?"
"Ah, I thought that might be what you wanted to talk to me about."
"Well, we could talk about something else?"
"Like what?" he asks.
"Huh, the homeless population in Ottawa, I'm sure that's somehow politically violent."
"You don't take this course very seriously, do you Mr. Mahon?"
"I take all my classes seriously Mr.
T, it's just, my life is serious too?"
"Make sure you get it to me by the end of the week."
"Thanks Mr. T, hey, what are you doing now, got time for a wee drink?"
"Can't help you with that tonight Charlie?"
"I pity the fool who don't get a drink!"
I'm walking to campus and the wind is slapping at my face, the sunlight slowly fading against the echo of an evening sky. Across the fields I can see tall building complexes piercing the horizon. The lights are on in most of the windows so that it looks like a million fireflies are dancing against the charcoal sky. They look trapped inside hundreds of little man-made boxes. A bus whizzes past me and I look at all the people crammed in against the doors, proverbial sardines. The other day I watched a homeless woman get on the bus, and she didn't look well, I mean, worse than the average homeless person looked, but either way, she is still a person, right? Anyways, she sat there on the bus rocking back and forth in her seat for a couple of minutes, and people were all staring at her until she finally puked all over the bus floor. And it was really sad because the noises she made were filled with whimper and scorn, and even though everyone on the bus was staring at her, well not staring, I guess it was something like how a person looks at road-kill - that look, no one would help her. I finally asked the homeless lady if she was alright, her puke snaking along the bus floor towards me, and she looked at me scared and nodded her head yes. I mean, yeah, she was probably drunk - but no one deserves what this woman had. Not even that filthy fuck Sylvester.
I walk past a couple of girls in tight black pants and smile at them as they hustle on their way to class. I see something shining in the snow along the sidewalk, and stooping down I scoop up what I thought was a Toonie, but is actually a piece of jewelry. It's a silver locket with the face of an older woman carved into the center. Her hair is in a bun and she's looking at me with this very stern countenance. I stick it in my pocket and keep moving. My phone starts ringing, and after fumbling with it for a few seconds, I answer.