Author: Gina B. Lalonde

I am feeling so cooped up right now. Not able to stretch, to speak, to cry. Things twist and curve and roll off my eyelids like the storm outside. I shudder when the ground does. I flash green when the sky does. There is mania in my eyes and a hole in my chest. Like the weather, I am futile, prone to moods, given to hallucinations, taken by my thoughts. Scott waited so I wouldn’t leave to go score dope on the hill. My roommates’ cackle. I drown in loathsome loneliness. Nathan bites the bait. I scuttle along like a beetle. The cats wrestle. SHUT THE FUCK UP! I feel like yelling at the black girl on the couch. But she is my roommate, so I can’t. The fat girl int he kitchen is cooking fish. She is my roommate too. One Fat and Finnish, one Black and Bi-Sexual, and one Funny and Fucked-up: Me. Annette searched my purse for dope or a needle. If only she knew the bag was stolen. It’s often not what’s in the bag but the bag itself. But that’s life. Tabitha, the cat, ropes Oliver in, ripping through the screen door, swelling with sex and shunning from the rain. I sit and hesitate, whether to call my sister again.

I.

Brief passages of time and rhythm, don’t rush don’t slow don’t slouch
Evolution can’t be forced into a dominatrix position.
We were wrong.
We were all wrong.
Time is not international enough yet for the Kama Sutra. Don’t sit back and error space correct until it is all over, your life flown by like a dry grizzle of emotion never emitted.

Never speak what falls from most eyes, my father taught me that of most things. A pained princess of hard times of brick walls careening off into waterfalls of those more dressed for the catillian.

Never forgetting to write on Christmas is a luxury only some can speak of and many forget. I was once barren in the desert too. Running man, burning man, blue man all not as important anymore than being here, alone with you. Never really able to break free of my own self-importance, you stare at me, from above and from below, bellowing my current into the vibrations of your own lust. I thrust at your eyeballs to stop, but, pained as you are not, the whimpering of loss continues.

I regret not coming home this Christmas, but I myself do not, not dully not wholly regret never having told you a story of mine. This one was good too. Set not in the desert, but in the rain of sea and streets from whence I came. My own sail set years ago but you still linger on in someone else’s mouth, foul and potent as tiny magnetic dots driven as nails, scuttering to my own metal’s surface.

YOU forgot to call.

And so, I drift, compelled towards nothing in your field of radiation. Helix, my father said, Huxley said others, driftwood now am I. You smiled at my backside and threw saddened wedges of smoothed bottle glass in my direction. Try lonesome next time.

II.

Bone dry and run ragged I now feel better.
You and I can resist each other. But the real question begins when we ask
who is the state?
Why even begin at all?
Because no one hears us
And everyone laughs at us
But you do it so well
Is not enough for me to open up, even a tiny bit

I remember the swing set story.
Do YOU remember the car rides?

Sleet and Chinese, never to go out on a Saturday night.
A girl without a daddy is a girl with tight shorts and too much tea in her brain.

Whips of soft curls cannot save her, and they will be bleached anyway by nightfall.
Time well spent, but on someone else’s account. Can YOU be accounted for anyways?

A world can be shut down with one voice drilling, THEY’VE HEARD IT ALL BEFORE. Heads of millions will turn, but there always has been and there always will be, those, plus ten million insects to conquer. Tell them something they don’t know about rain nine months a year, aching joints swollen like melon balls pressed into cages of twisted fig branches. Of party power stardust made on a rural rode where the sunsets
are pretty and the cool aid is not electric acid but usually served warm by a peyote girl shunned by her grandmother’s river for no longer being willow wolf but now being peyote girl.

She and all the others were sprung free one day when the moss was aggravating. Fishing boats teemed with jacking off kids away from their dry grass one-stories and slicked with salmon blood for the first time since preschool. Just wondering were you went, me again.

III.

This is not for me, I repeated a thousand times. I swear. It did not all
happen so fast that I have forgotten you. But, bloody battle after bloody
battle ensued and I wished that a wretched time with you had ensued.
Instead I flung heated dung your way with a distasteful smile of red punch
puckering my cheek corners. And then collapsed again into your stomach. A
fine place to drink and a night of roaring motors. By the time foggy
children lined on the curbs for morning rumbles of best friends and
seating assignments, falling into place at the exact alphabetical moment,
I pressed on, dimly lit by my own weight. Feeling shabby like the f*ck had
been but a scrap nearly hitting the bus. I tumbled and the girl in the
back spilled her English muffin.
THIS IS NOT FOR YOU
but she barfed anyways
losing her best friend seating partner,
and obviously her name in the alphabetically ordered line. Damn nitwit of
a troublemaking crash.

It was morning and I should have been in bed.

IV.

When asked by the people of the town how it happened, I can only say I
remember two things. Once, that I had ridden a poney which must have
contributed to it, and twice, that I had beaten the child on the head.
While still in your stomach?

WHY, YES! It is a nice place to rest but not for long, and besides, there
was an entire battle to be raging forward in the streets. THE STREETS?

WHY, YES! Can’t you see they are sinking like sand. But they are concrete
are they not? WHY, yes. They are. But you trouble me for the loss of your
mother when still somewhere thoughtless is a man who holds your blood.

I speak for my own will sir and I am driven by none other than myself to
accomplish this goal.

HA HA HA HA boardroom walls can clap with agony.
I do believe mam,
this interview is over.
We simply do not understand your story.

Do I not receive in your mind some compensation, some time for having
stopped by?

And break our code of ethics, sir, no mam, I think not. If we gave you
time, WHY, we would have to give it to all. As small endeavors go, we
simple couldn’t afford that risk. When you leave, I am sure you will find
it to be red.
Thank you, though, for taking the time.

V.

And where will this battle take place?
Is the sod yet laid?
I dreamed again of a car without gas, which was the ultimate salt and ice,
rubbed through on a hot skin.
If only we had that saying.

But the time to leave could never have been cleaner. It was not night,
now, although I knew night would soon return.
Get out while it is still day I was taught. Think before you leave though.
Never come close to getting what you want when you are thirsty-
because everyone knows you get thirsty-
you might as well be naked with a blade at your hole. If not ready to be
dug up, then throw some mud on and never turn away from the blade’s face.
It will slice you up the spine, but it will lodge in your skull for sure.
It takes a shotgun to shatter a skull. No wonder the Canadians leave their
doors open.

You could take it all in the end.
But not without your hands, pressing each pedal and guidance is not taken
lightly, there is a tendency with us for rubber to be not so softly laid.
I miss when I could eat a whole meal, real things unchilled.
A dime a dozen for lost people stuck in a one storie, waiting for those to
come home whom might have escaped might have been eaten up by two of the
most dangerous things. Fear bears and fear the world.
Never speak to a blanket three ways: when she doesn’t feel like talking,
when there are others about, and at night when her wife, the pillow or
anyone else is home.
Hug things often. But young man, don’t regret sunshine and funerals and
don’t ever
regret one thing: me.

I am fine and you are a museum of things gone fine. Now read to me or get
out.
Can I just make something up? Or should I make it quick.
Rub my temples and turn off the lights, anyway you do it.
Put your hands to your eyes and see if that relieves some of the pressure,
don’t push too hard though.

YOU may break down, but I will not. For YOU may be safe, hidden under a
blanket, but I live alone and free.

Love is a dog from hell. That’s what they say around those parts anyway.

I came out bleeding around 11:30.
By a quarter to ten I was shaking my head in disbelief.
Again with the red dwarf.
The horrors of himself at age 3.
Capitol it.

Sometimes I see bears AND funerals, sometimes on the same afternoon, but
nothing, not even the sunshine or you scare me anymore, just keep poking
and see what happens.
This bed is no longer my resting place and YOU no longer my protector. For
the first time in years the motor began to purr, even though it was night.

Jorjian Brown was born on the cusp of uproar and downfall. Only one year shy of nineteen thirty, to be exact. She was a slimy beast that had crawled out of the underbelly’s belly—as her father had put it. There was not much to Jorjian. Her hair was cropped short by the age of ten. She had a square jaw and a snaggletooth grin. Her comical side was limited. To her, funny was a rainbow screwed on backwards. To her, Buckley County was as flashy as the Rivera. And brut beer was as potent as a falsetto throat tightening to a muscly cord within the clasped hands of a purple coin ringer. Things looked pigeon-eyed to Jorjian. And life was a hijinx to Jorjian. And Moe at the corner pawnshop was never very far from her shoulder, careful to keep a watchful eye on the bird of his master’s protection. Moe and Mickey, they slithered through the grime of Boylston and Pine, knocking hoes and bunnies and boppin them on the head. Two hoes, three hoes, a pair of toes. Sold for a gold chain and a can of gummies. No one stopped to listen when Jorjian Brown tussled her head from side to side. She smiled and sat. Smiled and sat. Kissed and spat. Never looked back.

And from whence she withdrew a cornering stare, a young man approached, willing to try her. A Capitol Hill smacker with gums long and saggy. Jorjian would have none of it. But he commenced to concede Jorjian’s mind for her, a sly grimace paying no matter. What he willed to have, he certainly got. Her cropped bangs stuck to the cheek of her forehead. What a pallor she contained after such an affront. But Jorjian stared past her prowler. She put up an image of days in the valley. Alone with her mother, her maker, but sadly, things came crashing back as the wolf had just spat in the face of his prey. Jorjian wrestled with what to do, it was custom of her to ripen another with dew. She was trapped and saddened by her life’s noxious state. She lifted her skirt further and offered what of her was left. Jorjian Brown then caved forever into the hole in her breast.

It seemed there was no hope for a girl left to her own. Not in a city both gray and fertile. Not in a city full of fuel and rock. Ms. Brown had been left, alone on the beach. A forgetful image of a year downed by the dismal stocks of the east. The bells of New York ringing up and down as the markets sank and set forth. No one thought of Jorjian as her body grew soft. The ice salt of Alki washed her skin clean. And no one, not Moe, not Mickey, no one from home called out the name to which she knew best. It seemed she had never set foot in the barber chair that day. Never ate a lollypop from that corner store. Never drank a sticky drink from that barstool. She had never lived atop the hill that now rested in silence of fog and fall. It seemed Jorjian Brown, was never at all.

A black cloud has taken hold. We call it the Tunnel Of Doom. Anikke feels it over Jill. Meghan feels it over Mary. Kareem feels it over Kahlid. And I feel it over no one. Not for cancer, not for cat sh*t on the carpet, not for a spray-painted hate crime on the other side of town. T.O.D. for me is swelling like the Bering Sea. Over the lost fishermen. Their icy bodies pulled blue from the wreckage, salt lapping at rubbery skin. My dad went there as a young man. Alone, manic, then deep in T.O.D. I take after him. His white foaming darkness. My ma’s resolute calm; a little of both. He’s at the shelter today. Sifting through more wreckage of homeless fantasy. Brilliant plaids and sweat-stained whites. Maurice and Lewis dive deep in T.O.D. as Travis and Kirk try to pull out. Chester grimaces as a boy looses his gun in the leaves of Vietnam. He grits his smile and brandishes gardening sheers. I call the cops twice that night. They laugh in my face, tell me not to call talking about a gun. But I saw a man with a black beanie and heard glass breaking in the covered alley. I know what I heard. Car hoods thumped upon, a cigarette shoved against the wind. When I wake up I see no broken glass, just a window that’s been cracked for weeks. I must be loosing my grip. I must be in T.O.D. this Friday morning. Friday is my Monday anyway.

Things misspoken to Travis. If there isn’t a reason, I’d be abandoned by my own shivers. I’m pacing the roof. Again, I almost jump. But why not pull myself back from the edifice of eternal splatter.

I met Nathan when I went to read a story at the Hugo House. He read too. He has reddish hair– like copper flaking away its green. His teeth are wide. One is melded into another. I feel so much sadness for him. He will come meet my family tomorrow night. We’ll converge, at their apartment. Me, Nathan, Jim and Linda. No Jen, no Lauren, no Abbi, no Lewis. Just us. I’ve never done that with a boy before. But he’s the kinda guy that will let you stop his hand from traveling between you, not getting angry, not getting flushed. I tried to call Dad to cancel but he was too drunk to talk, incoherent really. Slurring his “See you toborrow.” My ma was too busy to talk. Nathan was counting on it. So I couldn’t cancel with him. So I’m writing this. For Meghan.

Skipping out from work to check my bank account. The deadly numbers scared me sideways. Slipping below pink zone. I end up shaking in an alley in early morning. Watching pigeons flip their wings diligently above church spires and telephone wires. The station looms next to the smell of the Hostess Cupcake factory. Should I return to work? Can I return? Or should I follow that man down the alley and make my own twenty bucks this hour? Hop on the number 28 towards downtown and slink back to bed where my neighbors sit screaming in their kitchen chairs above my roof.

I stop and call for coaching. Slap cold rainwater on my cheeks. Sip a coffee. Swear to go buy breakfast from the vending machine. Get up off the alley floor, drag my feet along Harrison, clenching my pepper spray. I burp up smoke. My pants sag. My urge to use has skyrocketed. When will I string together a few clean days? Days when my emotions are stable. A good one, a bad one, things seems so fractured. Meghan is gone this weekend, with Erin, mom, dad, bleeding. I’m here. Along by Slices Deli, along next to empty warehouses and the new shells of condos. What if I’m addicted to shame?

Man set his apartment on fire then shot himself in the head because he was slated to be evicted for condos. Kid shot to death for trick-or-treating. Hit the gym, hit the wall. Palin prank-called. We can never talk again Travis. Don’t call the mother police on Jill. Dinner with Maurice and Lewis. Stew and beans. Smelled Lewis’s feet from wearing heels, blistered. Would have gone to work with smeared make-up on if Jen hadn’t washed his face for him. This is today. Things will be different come four am tomorrow.

I spoke with Travis tonight. Told him I might be in love with him. He’s the first person who’s ever validated me. If only Patrick could be a shell and I could insert Travis’s empathy, wisdom, and sensitivity into him. ‘Kurt is a very lucky man,’ I told Travis. And then I hung up the phone, after he hushed me with, ‘It was very brave of you to call.’ I sunk back into my blue chair and typed this single message of the day.

I had a really scary dream. But not as scary as the sweating burned bodies of the past. This time it felt like I was sucked into a vortex of past nights crying. Like when I called that doctor woman– she had given me her card on my day-pass away from the psych ward. “I’m having a harder time than I thought I would.” She said, “I know.” That was on a Saturday night. I was crouched on the floor between two sets of bunkbeds and four female roommates at the Salvation Army– the “Salv”.

But this time, I hid in a tunnel. I battled six-hundred girls. I crashed a bus. I called for Travis, in tears, but I couldn’t dial his number, over and over I tried to reach the T’s in my phone-book. There was evidence that I had crashed the bus. My drawings from the students on the school bus. My pillow left behind. A soggy Cheerio’s box, yellow and bent, under my forearm in the rain. I was naked in a shower and a kid kept trying to buy a ticket from me, bursting into my tent, over and over like a gerbil.

I dreamed I woke up on the fancy lobby couch at work. With a vision of my boss bursting in, standing over me in a purple shirt and thick glasses, his ID badge hanging over his taught belly. Firing my ass to oblivion. To no health care. To more bad dreams and calls to Travis I could no longer afford. I was asleep on the job. He would be justified in letting me go. But he didn’t understand. It was four am, I had been plucked from my bed where a man with a pale wood baseball bat staggered outside my window. Where a spider turned the same color yellow as my bedspread and crawled over my fringe. I threw it in the toilet, carrying it in my thong, and didn’t wake up Nathan. Like the cockroach that had scurried over my black shoes– the ones with the socks attached– only moments later.

Nathan. Our legs intertwined. I didn’t know him well enough to know if he had a f*cked-up foot or not. My foot kept circling his, trying to detect a defect. Or were his feet just long and flat? Or was he missing a toe? He didn’t limp, I noticed when he got up to make coffee. I spat out the coffee because I coughed. But also because I wanted to seem vulnerable and cute, and his. He wiped my chin. We still haven’t been together– like that. I told him about Patrick and how I wanted to get to know him too, and he called him a douche-bag. I laughed inside.

But my dream– I woke up wanting to call someone. Not Travis at this hour. Not dad– last time he was scared I would go outside and battle the man with the bat. In my dream I had called my God-father by accident. That’s how I knew it was a dream. I didn’t have a God-parent. Except for Sidney. Or Scott. I texted Meghan, my make-shift sponsor, and waited. Thinking about her Erin story and one-thousand plastic bags. Thinking about Poppy and her incessant need to chatter. Waiting for either for a reply, or for my boss to come fire me. Or to return to the couch when an opportune moment arose, when Don the weather-guy and used car salesman wouldn’t be taking his turn sleeping there. A beautiful woman was on the news next to me talking about anti-American rhetoric.

I hope someone reads this. Then I’ll know I’m real. My phone is next to me. All you have to do is call. Until then I’ll be unsettled, like I forgot something. I’ll be here, drinking cold coffee.