sunday prompt: yes

cold blue sky. naked trees and their sluggish blood. the careful step of pedestrians on ice-mottled sidewalks. two snowstorms that year, and now with trepidation, inching into February. even so, less than it has been. she remembers years with towering snowbanks, drifts up to the second story of houses. she mistrusts this memory, but sees the images with such perfect clarity that it's hard to remember otherwise.

she keeps her desk by the window. a small third-story apartment, looking down onto the street from a large gablefront house. a streetlight flanked her view and in the night provided a constant eldritch glow through her blinds. she slept to steve reich's 'music for 18 musicians,' lulled by the oscillations of tone. though it is a small town, no one knows her. she works alone in a silent bookstore with a silent owner and goes diligently home after every shift. she makes enough to live alone. doesn't even have a cat. goes back and forth to the refrigerator for a glass of milk. sits on the side of her bed and stares into the dark, not a thought in her head.

she writes at her desk. there is a small lamp that burns at 40 watts. there is a scattering of utensils, pens of many colors, pencils of varying lengths. looseleaf paper is piled in the left corner, written all over in her crabbed, furious hand.

she looks up. the snow is falling again, lazily, pinwheeling like performers through the limelight of the the streetlamp. she makes a note. lambent and then

0

oh moon
your sad face brings down
the whole sky:
he discolors his cheeks
with soot & ashes
for you

o

she taps the side of her face with the capped black pen. stares into the outside. across the street there is a fenced-in playground. the metal of the swingset pokes through the snowdrifts like the bones of a mammoth skeleton. she can feel a cold coming on. she feels unsettled and uneasy. the windows are ill-set in their frames and the wind sneaks in. she wears sweaters and blankets to bed but wakes up sweating, fighting with the tangle of sheet and leg. she dreams she is boiling in an Arctic sea. her eyes dart from wall to wall, finally settling on the closet door. dark leaks out around its edges.

it is four in the morning. she is far enough past the winter solstice that the days now elongate instead of contract. this is a source of relief for her. she feels relaxed, as though the hours of the day are rooms that get bigger with each sundown, giving her more room to stretch out. she feels comfortable in large spaces - so long as she is the only one occupying them.

o

she has discovered something. she likes to go for small walks. just around the block, down to the park by the water, then up the street again to her apartment. she is most frightened coming out of and coming back to her doorway. before she exits, she looks cautiously down the stairs, listens for the sound of the other tenants rustling around like badgers in their burrows. she can see the line of boots and sneakers outside - this is how she knows if they're home. counts the pairs. today - all of them, present. everyone is home. this means she runs down the steps quickly, trying to avoid the ones which squeak - bypassing the second floor, then tiptoeing down the second flight, peering at the last obstacle, and then flings herself out the front door, around and past the gate before the screen door slams threateningly behind her. once down the sidewalk, she lifts her eyes and tumbles her hood down, breathing in the sharp, cold air. the world around her bristles with white.

it is sunday, just around noon, and most people are either still at church or brunch. the streets lay as quiet as a holiday. she likes to think of this time as her church. the crunch of her footsteps on fragile ice-pools. the cold warmth of the sun. she tilts her head back and shades her eyes with a mittened hand. when she arrives at the water, she finds the solitary park-bench and leans against the back of it. the harbour glitters like a garrison, armed to the teeth. seagulls describe lazy, huge patterns over the trees, calling idly to one another as if gossiping. all around, the despoiled snow, marred with the long slashes of footpaths, the brown crud splashed up from the road. she knows what she will write about. it slides easily into her like a cat creeping into a room. she watches the idea prowl around inside of her skull. waits for it - then she is gone, fairly dashing along the sidewalks to get back to the house, inflamed with the idea, her whole body fevered with it. she shakes with it. the blocks go by quickly and before she knows it, she's standing in front of the gate again. staring up at her window. her heart is hammering - this is the other end of the walk, the time which sometimes makes her stay in bed in lieu of her sunday walk, if the stairs are too busy or the streets are occupied. she advances. stealthily.

the door opens with its requisite metal shriek. she hates it, wishes it death, thinks briefly of being possessed of some unnatural demonic strength and wrenching it off of its hinges, crunching it, twisting it. her hand lingers on the handle of the doorknob as she shuts it quietly behind her. she proceeds up the stairs, gripping the rail as she goes, passing the first door, heading up the way - fifth stair, sixth stair, seventh stair (there are eleven) - she feels she is shrinking with trepidation, as if she could hide behind the rise of the stairs if threatened - and, suddenly overwhelmed, bolts. she can hear the sound of someone behind apartment 2, rattling the knob, but she is safe, behind the corner, back pressed to the wall, chest heaving with fear. she looks around the corner, peers at the man who is exiting. he is lingering on the threshold, sliding into a pair of boots. is her age, she thinks. wearing a plaid flannel shirt and a winter hat. fingerless knit gloves. he is sniffling slightly - perhaps afflicted by the same germs she feels percolating inside of her own body. he laces his boots up and stands, glancing in her direction. she flattens herself against the wall anew and holds her breath, not releasing until she hears the sound of his tread down the stairs. the screen door's obligatory slam is her starting gun - she flees up to her door and unlocks it with trembling fingers, letting herself in and shutting it closed carefully behind her. she leans heavily against it, allowing her breath to slow, her eyes sewn shut against the world.

o

her desk is her refuge. she pulls the chair in close, tucks herself in, turns all the lights down but the 40 watt lamp. the day is getting dark, the hours winding down again. she feels the angry tectonics of her empty stomach and ignores them, instead picking up a pen and arranging a sheaf of paper in front of her. she chews on the cap unthinkingly. his face. his gloves and boots. she is imagining pieces of him. she writes broad, honest face

his name is max. he works part-time as a waiter in a small restaurant and he hates his job, but he's good at it. lately his hatred for his job has been bleeding into the rest of his life. he has been drinking alone, at home, sequestered in his room with a bottle of whiskey and endless repetition of Nick Drake on vinyl. he lives alone, prefers his own company to the company of others, but isn't above going out to the bar for a drink or two. he can be prompted by the urging of his friends, who are constantly egging him on to find a woman - even though they themselves are all single or in uncomfortable relationships. he is awkward, though not without his charm, and often blows a conversation with a woman just by lapsing into an introspective silence. he has a dog that he takes for walks every morning and every night. it's a golden named Danger, though the dog's disposition is largely only for frolic and play.

he lives below her, though they've never met. once he thought he saw her leaving the apartment from his window, watching her turn down the sidewalk. she looked mistrustful. sad. almost panicky, like a squirrel attempting to cross the road. he's always wondered about her.

she stops. scowls at the paper as if it were a mirror. her left hand flashes up, about to crumple it and lob it into the wastebasket - but she doesn't. she lingers on it. closes her eyes for a moment, then picks up her pen again

he is curious. doesn't even know her name - but knows a way he can find out. he waits behind his door, eye pressed to the peephole, watching her pick her tenuous way down the stairs. he waits for the sound of the door downstairs to slam closed, and then he makes his way down the stairs after her. it is cold in the hallway. the building is old and drafty. he can feel it runnelling up the arms of his sweater, up the cuffs of his pants. the row of mailboxes - he's never bothered to check the others. lifts the tongue of apartment 3 and squints at the name printed thereon -

her name is Yes Mayberry. he blinks and lets the box close, standing there for a long second that turns into a longer minute. whose parents name someone Yes? a weird urge coruscates through him to change his own name to No. he gets a thrill from the thought and can't help but suppress a light laugh. what a weird girl.

she stops again and shoves her chair back from the desk, biting into her lower lip like biting into an overripe fruit. a tiny scarlet thread of blood makes a rivulet down her chin, but she doesn't notice. she paces around the room, murmuring senseless words to herself, almost as an incantation to keep the crushing loneliness at bay.

she can hear the stairs, creaking again. the sound of a key in the lock. she rushes to her door, fitting her eye to the peephole. watches the motion of his shadow on the wall as he fumbles with his boots. hears each thud as he drops them to the side, and the sound of the door as it meets again with its jamb. the light in the hallway goes out. she does not move. breathes in dust. exhales Yes.

sunday prompt: the good old days

black ash on the white snow. smoking an american spirit down to the tip of the wing and then carefully putting it out in the ashtray. sun's been gone for days. days and days. the weekend late-wakers saw snow slammed down like a white hand overnight, smothering the earth.

the din of gray and winter all around, a constant static. he thinks about his unfinished tractatus, ink-stained and beleaguered by scarlet marginalia. it is scattered now over his desk, which is a set of 2x4s propped up on milk crates. a simple lamp. a cigar box full of writing implements. an old inkwell with no quill. he is rather full of himself and spends most of his time alone. there is a small framed picture of Thomas Edison on his wall. beside the bookshelves - milk crates, again - stuffed to groaning - with kierkegaard and hume and hegel and freud and kant, et al. his facebook profile lists his occupation as Philosopher Errant. he thinks he knows Latin and speaks it floridly, with accompanying gesticulation. wears tweed jackets with suede patches at the elbow. has a tendency to become astoundingly and suddenly bland when confronted with someone who might know more about something than he does.

he retreats indoors, stomping his wingtips off on the mat outside before entering, fussily, a bit rather like an elderly gentlemen, brow creased and sniffling slightly in disdain for the whole process. once inside, he unlaces his shoes and leaves them properly by the door, pointing resolutely east. like vassals waiting the return of their lord. he pads back into his room and further into his studio, rubbing at his eyes and yawning. he is constantly aware of himself. as though there is an invisible camera floating around him at all times. it has a tendency to make him feel paranoid and egocentric. at times causes him to be spectacularly impotent.

he hasn't always been this way. he can remember another time. the halcyon days, he calls them. recalls fondly, goes through a whole litany of fondness. takes off his glasses, rubs at them with his omnipresent handkerchief, stares off distantly. the very height of pretension. he talks about his wayward youth, of his maturation from those things. he finishes off the telling with the same phrase every time. "ah - those were the good old days!" and those around him suppressing their laughter.

this is of course when he comes to the bar. every once in awhile he'll jaunt down to the local saloon - that's how he'll say it, "the local saloon," and "mingle with the commoners." airily. everyone knows he's hiding something. he knows he's hiding something. but nobody knows what it is. there's theories. he's one of those people that is easy to hate. he asks for it. begs for it. he can be arch and aloof. he tips well, but it's kind of the kind of benevolence that you hate because of the person behind it.

he does this tonight. plans on it all day. can taste the rough burn of the scotch he's going to drink all day. thinks idly about switching to a martini. or a manhattan. he knows that what he will drink will have to correspond with his manner of dress, and so he invests a lot of effort into the process. by sunset, he has donned a brown vest over a white shirt and a corduroy blazer with elbow patches, tilted a hat just-so over his eyes and picked up his meerschaum before lacing up his wingtips and exiting the apartment smartly. at seven minutes past the hour, he arrived, carrying a satchel of books he didn't intend to read but carried with him nonetheless.

as he walked into the bar, he couldn't help but notice his least favourite bartender standing in front of the array of bottles. the proper amount of disdain pasted itself on his face and he sat down properly, hands folded in front of him while his eyes darted around to see who was around to see him. just once, his nervous tongue flickered out to moisten his lips.

"what'll it be?" the man loomed over the bar, or seemed to. his sleeves were rolled, exposing a frenzied array of tattoos that coiled, snaked, exploded, or leered out of his skin. his eyes were hard and his jawline was harder. he always seemed to be cracking something - his neck, his knuckles. popping his jaw.

"glenlivet, neat, if you please." was the kind of guy that chose a poison and then learned everything they could about it. he could even tell you - and would, at length - about the battle of glenlivet. the drink arrived and he sat it in front of him, relishing the picture he imagined the omniscient camera was recording. the amber glint of the single malt, the oscurro of his silhouette against the lowlights of the bar.

there is a table tonight against the wall filled with three ruffians. they don't consider themselves ruffians. they lounge easy and lanky over their chairs. one picks at his teeth with a splinter of wood. their eyes rove endlessly around the place, sometimes colliding with someone else's. sometimes their conversation picks up and then falls off again. there is no real rhythm to them. they simply exist wherever they are and are completely unaware of it. from time to time, one blinks. they are all dressed in plaid button-down shirts and practical winter boots and plain knit winter hats. thermal shirts. one of them has a sister who recently died. his face doesn't show it, but he in fact is the reason they are congregated - he hasn't left his apartment in six days except to go to work and they are worried about him. they figure a night on the town - such as it is - is what he needs. unfortunately there are very few people here tonight. and then that guy walks in. you know that guy. there's one in every bar with their important looks and their expensive drink and their newspaper or textbook. the three ruffians have a small, match-sized fire of hate for that guy. they are drunk, but not enough. nate - the grieving brother - orders three shots of Bushmills. they quaff it in a disinterested hurry and nate stands up. now he is drunk enough. he sniffles. wipes his nose on his sleeve and approaches the bar.

"hey." he leans against the empty stool adjacent. "what you readin?"

he blinks at the interloper and then blinks again. re-places his glasses on his nose and squints through them. "do i know you?"

nate thinks about it for a second. "sure. remember?"

he blinks, then blinks again, then blinks a flurry. "no. what is your name?"

"c'mon man." nate is having a bit of japery. "we met a long time ago. surely you didnt forget?"

he scratches his head, then cautiously presses a well-worn but sturdy bookmark between the pages of his book, closing the cover with care. both hands lay on top of it, one over the other, as if protecting it. "how long ago?"

"i dunno man. a long time ago. c'mon, man. how could you forget me?"

"... the good old days," he mused, a hand lifting to his chin in the requisite manner of those reminiscing.

"yeah, man." nate is starting to slur slightly but keeps his game face on. he ups the ante, extends his hand. "the good old days. how could you forget your old friend Gus?"

a flicker of something riots through his eyes and his spine goes ramrod straight. "Gus! oh my goodness. i ... i did know a Gus, once ... but very briefly, and not for very long. a party ..."

"right! the ... party." the bartender slides "Gus" a bottle of beer and "Gus" nods his approval, flashing a thumbs-up. takes a hefty draught and leans in closer. "i knew i knew you. whass your name again, man?"

"August," he replies, then, slightly lamely, shoulders inclining, "... but back then they used to call me Augie."

"Augie! That's right! you old son-of-a-gun!" nate slaps August heartily on the back and August nearly chokes. "hows it been?"

August reassembles himself, eyes swirling around inside of their sockets like a shaken doll's. struggles to get a grip on his bearing. "fine, fine. just fine. working. a lot."

"thats right. you work a lot."

"yes. i am diligently completing my tractatus."

nate blinks and steps back. "your ... wha?"

"my tractatus," August says again, this time a bit stiffer, defensive engaged.

nate can't help it - he explodes into laughter, staggers backwards and claps his hand over his mouth as if to stuff the noise back inside. he's let up on his game now. he can hear the fellas in the corner laughing at his laughter. maybe he can get it back. "right ... your. sorry. i just - wow. whoo. oh wow." August is offended. if he had feathers, nate thinks idly, they'd be ruffled. "sorry man. just a funny word."

"it is the perfect word for my undertaking." he looks almost birdlike in the dim light of the bar. nate rights himself.

"right, right ... your undertaking. so. how have you been? mind if i - " nate gestures to the stool.

at first, he seems outraged, then seems to fold down and inside of himself and shrugs, gesturing broadly. "it is, after all, a free country," he adds as if by way of afterthought.

"thanks man. you're a sport." he claps August's back again. "do a shot with me, huh? for old time's sake?"

"a shot. oh, no. i don't think so. sorry, Gus."

"c'mon. it'll be fun. here - " the bartender had overheard and ambled over. "two shots of jager. for me and my friend Augie here."

an arched eyebrow and amused expression later, two small glass shots appeared in front of them and were filled with the dark, viscous liquor. nate clinked August's closer to him. "asses up, man."

August's eyes went back and forth, from shotglass to book, to bartender, to "Gus," to the shotglass, to nate's shotglass, to the bartender - who was walking away, towards the newest entrant, a pretty girl with blonde hair and a black shirt, covered in ink - and felt something drop out of the bottom of his stomach. he watched his hand extend forward, like an antenna, and pinch the shot awkwardly between forefinger and thumb. he held it up, staring at it, squinting at it. nate reached in and clinked his glass with August's and downed it in a flash. August took a moment, sniffed, wrinkled his nose, glanced back at "Gus," and drank it in a pained hurry. the cold seeped into him first, then the burn. he gagged, then coughed, grabbing his chest with one long-fingered hand. starting to double over, his other hand shot out to fumble at the nearest person. nate, in bewilderment, seized it and dragged him upright. weakly, August arranged his glasses and stared ahead, clearing his throat, gasping just once, like a fish newly out of its water -

"hey man - you ok?"

August nodded and retracted himself back into himself, hands fluttering at his pockets, withdrawing his pipe and tobacco. gingerly, he packed it. nate watched, a mixture of amusement and concern muddled in his eyes. "my. it has been a long time."

"a long time?"

"yes. well. those were the days before. the .. ah .. golden oldies. you know. you were there."

"before?" nate was losing ground. the jager had dulled him slightly and he felt his face turning gray.

"yes, of course," August said, rather impatiently. "before the accident."

"right ... " nate blinked, slurred, and confused time - "she was too young."

"she? to what are you referring to?"

"my ... sister."

"your sister?" August stood up, a bit unsteadily. coughed again. "my dear man. i have, quite frankly, no idea what you're talking about. i was speaking of something entirely different. perhaps we don't know each other at all." he was feeling a bit of fire. perhaps it was the shot. perhaps it was how pallid "Gus" had become. a triumph of reversal. "if you will excuse me. i am going to step outside for a brief puff." and exited fluidly, pulling his longcoat over his shoulders as he went.

nate blinked, slumped against the chair, staring blankly at the bottles. his eyes unfocused and then refocused. his hand came up as if of its own will and slammed down hard on his face, where it remained before sloughing off like skin from a molting snake and dangled, useless again, by his side. "c'mon nate. let's go." the fellas were punching at his shoulders, lightly, as if he were a punching bag. feigning being boxers. dancing back on their feet, laughing with one another. drunk as he was, if not worse. he was an angry whirl of remembered grief. didn't give voice to it. peeled himself from the chair and staggered at them. the three fell like bowling pins, scattered, motionless, on the floor. a second or two elapsed before their laughter - sick and wheezing, snaked out of them like air from a pin-holed balloon. then the shoving, the struggling, the mock-fighting - the at-last bartender finally hollering that they had to leave, the dubious faces, the shuffle to the door. the first white blast of snow and wind in their ruddy faces.

August leans against the side of the building, tucked in a small lee from the weather. he puffs on his pipe and watches them go, shambling like B-movie monsters into the snow. the fire in his stomach has increased, has stained his throat like soot stains a chimney. he has a terrible case of heartburn. nostalgia creeps up on him, ambushes him

"AUGIE! WHERE ARE YOU?" he is wandering around blindly, hair obscuring his vision. he's lost his glasses somewhere. they're broken, on the floor of someone's party house. his heart is clogged with something terrible. he can feel it thudding like a small giant inside of him. he is in an unfamiliar basement. there are cobwebs everywhere and they snag on his face and clothes. he shivers but can't tell if it's out of fear of spiders or being totally, eternally lost.

"AUGIE" the voice is strained, getting further away. the basement seems Byzantine, a weird gray labyrinth of filmy casement windows and raw concrete walls. he is spinning around, trying to re-orient himself. he bellows out but no voice comes out of him.

when he wakes up he is lying in a froth, contorted, screaming, in the back of an ambulance, strapped down, connected by plastic veins to plastic bags. he has become an octopus, a squid. he pisses his pants and passes out.

it had been laced with something. the pot. what a funny joke. Augie loves a good joke, they'd said. watch what happens. you'll see. it'll be fucking hysterical.

August smiled bitterly and tapped out the pipe. the three figures had long since vanished behind the veil of snow. the wind slapped him in the face as he stepped out of his cranny, as if reprimanding him. he sighed. stared off into the distance. returned inside, thoughts returning to his work, his brow strained by the passage of the slippery eel called memory, twining around and around in the murk of his skull.

sunday prompt: extreme

unsurprisingly, he was wild. she always went for the wild. the caged. could see it in his eyes the night she met him. both of them, a tableau of lonely outside the theater, on either side of the entrance, smoking casually.

he wore a stained parka, one of those oversized puff jackets that ostensibly kept one warm in the winter. caused one to look like the michelin man. perched on his head, a lumpy winter hat, black, that somehow looked wrong on him. he wasn't small, but the way he hunched his shoulders and slouched slightly against the brick made him look smaller - younger. she couldn't help but look at him, pretending to look beyond him, at the darkened shopfronts and frosted streets with a variable number of slow-moving headlights. he either didn't care, or didn't notice. she was hoping it was the latter option, preferring to observe clandestinely.

it was going to snow. she could feel it in her left knee, the one damaged in a car accident years ago. a weird throb that felt like a muffled drumbeat and rioted all the way up her thigh and into her pelvis. upon slipping on a patch of ice earlier that evening, she had stumbled and gasped, experiencing a frisson of pain - and then, abruptly, pleasure. the feeling had remained with her the whole walk down to the movie, finally subduing to a grumpy murmur as she purchased her ticket.

he had been in the same cinema as she, sitting just a few rows back. she was in the habit of swivelling her head round to see who was around her. was in the habit of checking for all available exits and entrances. carried with her in her purse a small handbook of survival techniques - mostly for the wilderness, in the woods, but refused to leave the apartment without it. in idle times or waiting in lines, she would pull it out and leaf through the pages, lingering perhaps more on those describing knotwork and cordage. since the car accident she had darkened, slightly, charred around the edges. everyone had noticed but no one had said anything. a few of her good friends moved away and she had as of late been swallowing the bitter fruit of solitude. in an effort to shake it, she went to the movies.

he had sat a few rows back. had entered the theater with no trepidation whatsoever, walked right to a chosen spot and sat. didn't take off his jacket or his hat. the heavy thud of his workboots down the aisle had aroused her interest - or fear - and she had turned, ever so slightly, to watch him. he sat and fixed his eyes on the screen without a flicker of interest. his whole demeanour spoke of anomie. she toyed with the instinct to use the bathroom - or pretend to - just to walk past him and get a better glimpse. he fiddled with a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, arranging them in his pockets. kept his hands in as the lights dimmed and the prerequisite admonitions flashed gaudily on the screen. no smoking. turn your cell phones off. no feet on the seats. a few dutiful patrons pulled out their glowing devices and switched them down. he did not. the trailers began.

the movie was terrible. she had felt herself distracted from the predictable and formulaic plot, only drawn in at the gory scenes. it was some horror film. she hadn't even bothered with the name, just saw the picture in the paper: some man's face, distorted and staticky, with lambent eyes. WRAITHE. that was the name of it. it didn't matter. she was only looking to be diverted. had even had a few shots before traipsing down, felt the whiskey burning in her stomach mid-way through the story.

"did you like it?" she asked, abruptly.

he blinked, turned, stared at her. "huh?" his voice was unnaturally high-pitched. she hadn't expected that. the way he walked. he seemed so tough.

"the ... movie."

"oh. uhh. yeah. sure."

"i thought it was shit."

it was like he couldn't speak the language. he blinked at her, uncomprehendingly. "want to get a drink?"

then it was she who experienced brief aphasia, caught in the limbo of inhale & exhale. "sure," she said, exhaling. "where?"

he jerked his head to one side. "round there."

she nodded. reflected briefly on the process of symbols they were using. recycled the notion. "let's go."

he nodded, too, dipping his head just slightly, reached up to fix his hat unsuccessfully, and they walked together, side by side by not at all the same gait. he fell behind almost immediately and she had to correct her stride to match his. he was pulling up the waist of his pants almost constantly, tripping over the cuffs just once. he walked wide, perhaps to compensate, and she almost laughed. "what's your name?" she asked, feeling bolder than usual.

"mal," he replied, turning his head to look at her. she took the opportunity to observe the sides of his face - he was unshaven and the black hairs stuck out short and straight like tiny quills. he was the kind of guy who didn't shave that often, or forgot.

"i'm gretchen," she said without waiting for him to ask. "what do you drink?" the words flew from her like migratory birds with no pattern, helter-skelter across the space between them.

he shrugged. "beer."

she nodded. "do you like whiskey?"

"i'll drink anything." he narrowed his eyes. "you buying?"

she snorted a laugh that sounded more condescending than it was meant. in an effort to mediate, she said - "sure."

they entered a dingy, run-down dive. loosened their tongues further. he sat beside her on a stool - he was carded, she was not - and drank, first in silence. he kept that slouch. halfway through the third round of Bud Light and Jameson, she said - "sit up straight."

he appeared noncommittal. "what are you, my mom?"

she shrugged and looked away. "just a suggestion." when she looked back, he had straightened his spine and sat taller. looked older than he was, with the scurf of mustache, and slight sheen on a malformed goatee. sitting closer to him, she was able to observe the rips and tears on his jacket. he struggled to maintain the pose and looked somewhat defeated when eventually he sank back to his default slouch. she laughed, but kindly this time. "so what do you do, mal?"

"what do you mean?" he countered with all the vim of someone who doesn't do too much.

"for ... work. i don't know. do you make art?"

"i rap," he said, shrugging, casting his gaze down the bar. at the end there were a couple of blonde girls, the kind to which she referred as Frosted Flakes.

"you do. that's something."

"yeah. i guess."

"what else?"

"what do you mean?" he turned back to her, clearly uncomfortable with the interrogation. "what's with all the questions?"

"just curious. can't a girl be curious about a guy?" inwardly, she was horrified by her discourse. she felt freer than usual. a strange sense of cruelty grew inside of her like a weed. took root in her stomach. she slugged the rest of her whiskey down and ordered another. the bartender gave her a glance, but nodded.

mal watched her empty her glass and did the same, pretending that he wasn't trying to catch up or stay in the race. pushed it aside a bit clumsily. it rattled like a warning on the bar. "i work. what about you?"

"me? li'l ol' me?" she slurred slightly. "i work. i rap, too."

he laughed, a mean sound that serrated against his teeth as it made egress from his mouth. "you? sure you do."

she bridled, even though she had lied. "what? you don't think i can?"

his eyes were bright, burnished and seemed slightly fevered. "no. i don't."

"well. i've never been so offended." she turned her back in mock-umbrage, waiting for him to recant. he didn't. eventually, she turned around, when the glass was filled again. "i work in a bookstore. shelve. books. you know."

he shrugged. gulped down some more beer greedily. "sounds boring."

"it ... " she stopped in her defense and mirrored his shrug. "... can be." took a slug of the whiskey. "so. you asked me for a drink. what's your deal?"

"what? can't a guy be curious about a girl?"

her breath snagged in her throat. "oh. clever. very fucking clever. using my own lines against me."

"fair game, in'it it?"

"you were curious about me."

"sure. saw you sitting alone in the movie. thought, what's a good-looking girl like that doing alone at a horror movie?"

"what - a girl can't go see a horror flick alone?"

"you got a boyfriend?"

she was again taken aback by his forcefulness. her eyes lingered, perhaps a bit too long, on the set of his shoulders. wondered what his body looked like underneath all the layers. she reached over and took his hat off. he swiped for it, but missed, and stood up, glaring at her. underneath his hat, his hair stuck up haphazardly, thin in places, uncombed for probably months. possibly unwashed. "it's polite," she said, taking the hat out of his reach, "to take your hat off inside."

he growled at her and sat down, keeping his eyes on her. they almost seemed black. feral. "and no," she replied, setting the hat down on the bar on her left side, away from him. "i don't." picked up the beer bottle by way of punctuation. by way of an airy dismissal.

"are you a lesbian?"

she choked on the sip of beer she had been taking. she'd tried. hadn't done anything. didn't much like girls. their tawdry talk. their squeals and giggles. their neediness. if anything, their neediness is what drove her back into the arms of Brandon, now her ex. he'd taken her back and then dropped her rather unceremoniously on New Year's Eve, twenty-two seconds before the ball did.

"no," she said.

"you look like a lesbian," he said, crassly and out of the corner of his mouth.

"well, you look like a fucking hobo."

"at least i don't munch carpet."

she stood up violently, knocking over her stool with a clatter. "fuck you," she breathed, hands fisting at her sides. "i - " she was dumbfounded. the bartender was standing in front of them. her attention swivelled.

"i'm going to have to ask you to leave, please." the words came from him but she didn't hear them. all the whiskey blinded her as easily as a rainstorm blinds a motorist on the turnpike. she had turned deathly pale, but rummaged through her purse and slammed a wad of bills down on the bar before turning on a heel, snatching up her belongings, and exiting without a word of goodbye.

a block down the street, the tears came. she stumbled, listed, and leaned heavily against a lamppost, sobbing, uncaring who saw. minutes - maybe more - passed, and finally, she regained control of herself, wiping at her eyes, staring blankly at the deserted sidewalk. how was it that no one had stopped, she thought bitterly. the tears had frozen on her face. ''HEY!" she heard, dimly. "HEY YOU!"

she turned, and staggered again, falling heavily against a newspaper stand, flinging out both hands behind her to catch herself. it was mal, running bareheaded down the street after her, cheeks ruddy and stride gangly, one hand at his waist, tugging up his unbelted jeans. "you still have my fucking hat!"

he cut such a ridiculous, comedic figure, puffing and puffy, breathless and ruddy, struggling with his choice of wardrobe, that she burst into a gale of laughter that hurt her way more than it should have. clutching at her sides and her purse, she leaned, twisted, into the newspaper stand, staring at the headline of the last paper available. recognized a name or two. something about the weather. BLIZZARD IN MIDWEST. something something.

mal loped up to her, just as drunk, if not more, and leaned one palm against the lamppost. "give it back. it's fucking cold out."

"you'll have to find it," she said, between fits of giggles. that was when she felt his hands, cold and bare, against her, frenziedly tearing her purse away from her, rifling through it with grunts and snarls like a boar. "not in there," she wheezed, and he threw it from them, attacking her with his hands again. she felt him shove her, tear open her coat. she felt the pain in her knee flare up again and crazily thought it's going to snow and then the rush of winter against her skin. she had shoved it, perhaps without thinking, into the space between her breasts. she could feel the knit of it rubbing against her skin. he was invading her, ripping her, tearing her wholly asunder, and -- she was enjoying it. she was laughing. her neck flew back and her hair flew back and her tears kept coming and she was laughing and he was grunting and it felt so fucking good and yet horrible, awful, terrible, at the same time -

he ripped it out of her and she heard the snick of her bra strap coming undone. it fell off of her, out of her shirt, and landed on one of his boots. the pale pink of it like a newborn baby in the harsh street light. he stood back, stared at her. watched her insanely laughing. "you're a fucking loon," he muttered, but didn't move. perhaps didn't want to kick off the bra from his foot. "jesus christ."

she mumbled something, tried to collect herself, but collapsed in another fit of laughter. it was all boiling inside of her head. forgot to eat today - the horrible imagery of the movie they'd seen together, yet apart - the extreme nature of the moment, jarring and so, so present. him staring at her uncomprehendingly. dully. completely unaware of what to do. she thought of attacking him with her fingernails, with her teeth. of pummelling him. he was slouching again. she could get him - he wasn't bigger than she was. she could take off a heel, stab him in the eye with it. her fists clenched involuntarily, then relaxed. she closed her eyes. breathed.

when she opened them, he was gone. no sight of him. not even a sound. no underbrush rustling. no heavy thud of his tread on the street. a dark, huge sadness spread like an inkblot inside of her. she looked down. her purse was there, ajar, contents spilling out. still no one had walked by.

it wasn't until she stumbled to her front door that she realized - the bastard had taken her bra.

her whooping laughter echoed up and down the street. it sounded like a bird loosed from a cage, bouncing madly from rooftop to rooftop, cascading, intensifying, and finally, fading away.

doldrums

nothing to do. while the white world outside lays still. tap fingers, move toes. crack neck and cough and swallow. drink orange gatorade. smoke a bowl of fine grape diesel. tick off seconds on the clock. what's next what's next. if you don't think too hard about it it'll happen. if you don't think. a watched pot does not boil. boils slower. seems to. anyway.

i get asked by this girl i work with. tell me a story, she says, and she doesn't want me to tell her a story like Tom Nero. she wants a funny, sick, perverse or entertaining tale. she wants a blockbuster and i want to tell arthouse. she asks me what i'm reading and i tell her it's Ulysses. she has never heard of it. i show her some and she shakes her head. her forehead abruptly furrows downward. she doesn't know. doesn't much care.

so there too. standing. wasting time while the people chew contentedly. chew and drink. masticate and gorge. margarita, glass of water. rocks - no salt. most people don't say rocks, but this one did. says it so quick it's like a little switchblade coming out of her mouth. her companion - middle-aged, barn coat, wisping white hair and aviator-frame bifocals - purses his jowls (or tries) and orders a non-alcoholic beer. she is agitated. fingers and toes, tapping. biting around her nails, the skin, tugging with first her dextral incisor, then the sinistral. her eyes lock on the old man. he is full of rheum and coughs like a bellows. i have the image of Stephen Dedalus and his room full of students in my head. discussing the Pyrrhic victory. it is not easy to read James Joyce in that room. i try anyway. once i even lay it out so that someone can see. this is vain and causes me to turn gray on the inside, just slightly, and later out of guilt tuck it away. ashamed.

a cigarette, every hour. more standing, close-mouthed, but at least i'm outside. i like the cold. relish it. the gradual numbing of my ungloved fingers, the sting of an impish wind lashing at my bare face. some people walk eyes down, neck bent, hooded and gloved. older folk do. walk slowly over grayed-out rises of ice and tamped-down snow, clutching to one another as though they were enduring their own private earthquake.

she laughs at me and tries to rile me up while we are in that stasis of customers. we lean against the station and keep our eyes on our tables. she tries to tickle me but i'm not ticklish. she whispers, low, menacing, in my ear, "fuck you." but i can't help it and i laugh. she could mean it. she could hate my guts. but it's unlikely. i drift into an alternate world where what i fear is real and unravel the consequences and ramifications. it is entertaining for a second but ultimately i abandon it.

they say only boring people get bored. i have heard that humans are the only thing to experience boredom. some people glamourize it and give it a stage name: "ennui," or "accidie." which makes it sound less banal, i think. a tinge of Keats in the sound. a fragile sigh.

it is a slow night and the bartender's been playing cannonball adderley for a while now. it's pleasant. there is a dull uproar which swells and falls like waves from the intoxicated crowd at the bar. they are all friends, or at least, they seem to be. the roar and thud and smash of the kitchen, a tumult of frenzied activity. i imagine it as a pit of wild dogs, all howling and snarling and raging against their short chains. i know that this is hyperbolic but i enjoy the image anyway. i am aware of every sound. when the hush of closing sweeps the floor, we carry out our duties. fill the sauces. called 'marrying' them. replace the napkins, switch the menus. i am tired and so is she. we can - both of us - taste the alcohol sparking in our mouths, feel it white-hot in our skulls.

we will turn the lights up and do one last sweep. sit in a makeshift counting-house, multiply and subtract and divide.

end up drunk and high and white-faced in the yellow wash of the desk light. enumerate all the things i could be doing but which i am not. not just in this one night, no. in my whole life. from now to finish. feel like an elastic band and can see one in my mind's eye, collapsing, tautening, collapsing again. then the deluge of exhaustion, tumbling down like Jericho. breath suddenly deeper, as though my body's pneumatics are forcing me to sleep, urging, inveigling. one more cigarette. standing. thinking. the muffled tick of my shitty watch, sharp and martinet-like in the dark. the stars above and their vague intimations. standing in the gray waste of days-old snow and thin, brittle tree-branches. count the bricks on the building in front of me. put the cigarette out. return indoors. sleep. always, at the end, sleep.

sunday prompt: new leaf

they say this is how Tom Nero disappeared: he pulled a small length of string from his pocket and smiled sadly at nothing in particular. they had all been smoking cigarettes in front of the bar, mute, watching the wind whip up drifts of snow like shaving cream lather. they had all heard him say it before.

someday i am going to vanish. don't you ever just want to vanish? disappear? drop off the face of the earth? go off the map?

he had said it with varying degrees of self-loathing. had punctuated it differently each time, once with furious, drunken spittle. once with tears streaming over his cheekbones and runnelling down the natural lines of his face. they were all used to it by now. knew enough to nod and smile and stay away. he drank oceans worth of alcohol and vomited hurricanes.

it was shortly after the passing of the old year that Tom Nero disappeared. at first, no one noticed. then he didn't show up for his job and the requisite phonecalls were made. no answer on the other line. he was fired in absentia and rumors spread like the contagion of ice on a frozen pond. small town - people talk. they have nothing better to do. some had grudging respect for him. "He went and did it. Disappeared," they'd say. everyone knew how much of a drunk Tom Nero was. he had a reputation for anger and intolerance. was quick to judge but it pained him to be judged by anyone other than himself. he would explain at great gasbag length how fucked up he was to anyone who was fucked up enough to listen. he could be found sitting alone most nights with a pen and a notebook, dreaming up other realities he could live in for a time. his modus operandi was escape, escape, escape. he drank, he wrote, he smoked pot, he smoked cigarettes, he watched TV and movies unceasingly. rarely left the house except to go to the bar and to go to work.

"sometimes people just need a change," said Gary, a regular at the One Horse. "happens all the time. slip right through the cracks. though it's not like he killed himself or anything." he had paused, rubbed his chin, and laughed. "more like he killed what everyone knew of as himself!"

"took himself right out of the picture," mused Rebecca, a friend. "it doesn't surprise me, but i'm sad to see him go. he hated himself so much."

"how does someone hate themselves so much that they just disappear?"

Rebecca shrugged. "like spontaneous combustion or something. just need the right combination.... and boom."

Tom Nero left everything behind. a single tall bookshelf crammed so tightly with works that it was difficult to retrieve any one title without a struggle. his wallet and cell phone. his bottle of marijuana, his pipes. his sneakers and clothing. his laptop computer and external hard drive. his backpack, still occupied with notebooks and a copy of Paul Auster's New York Trilogy. his savings, all in cash, totalling just about a grand.

"it's the right time of year for it," said Frank, another regular at the One Horse. "everybody's turning over new leaves. i always thought that meant leaves on a tree. Tom told me it was like turning a page in a book. That was called a leaf, too. Makes more sense when you think about it that way, doesn't it?"

efforts were made to track Tom Nero down, via every sort of technology possible. Facebook proved useless. he hadn't signed on in months. his roommate scoured his hard drive for details but found only endless documents of unfinished stories. characters who were miserable and who met characters more miserable. "he could've given me some notice," groused his roommate. "at least he left enough money to cover this month's rent." she reflected for a moment, then came back to her sentence. "i hope he's okay. wherever he is."

yes, wherever Tom Nero had gone to. wherever had he gone to.

the interest in his story died down after it became evident he wasn't going to return. it became another quirk of the small town, revived only in jokes or in side-stories about the past. Tom Nero became another ghost on memory's highway. the secret was how many envied him. the telling was in how much they drank the night after he was discovered gone. how fiercely they all spoke and clenched their bottles. the shots they swilled and the fights they got in. Tom Nero would have been proud to know he had such an effect on them. but Tom Nero never knew.