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 Posted: Mon Sep 30, 2013 10:26 pm
Sometimes footsteps aren't enough to signify whether you came or went.
Sometimes they don't leave a mark at all. Not on the people passed, on the terrain crossed, on the sounds faded into white noise. Sometimes nothing feels a little more comfortable than your own skin.
Sometimes pain is the only lasting impression you have of yourself.
The wind painted the ground in shades of brown, of errant dust from construction sites, intermingled with still-damp soil wrenched from the earth only hours earlier. The wake of a storm lingered here, like the hours of twilight, like some surreal frame between moments of life. Maybe he lingered in some caustic realm between life and death. Fitting it would be, to stay in such a place. Maybe he died already. Maybe he didn't.
It hurt to breathe, but he didn't know why.
Sometimes the trees bent beneath their wages. They groaned, cracked, coiled, and scraped against the ground with roots churning in violence and uproar. Sometimes they screamed so thoroughly and scraped the sky that they cursed the younger minds with nightmares in the midst of their nocturnal solitude. And sometimes they pressed against windows, desperate and yearning, as if to find some coveted revelation with which they might enrich their lives.
And sometimes they simply sat in silence, lightly teased by a lilting breeze. And it hurt to think about these things. It hurt to walk, because his footsteps left no burden on the trees, didn't carry through the wind, couldn't reach the minds of those still fast asleep in bed. And he knew he was alone.
He knew he couldn't survive this.
Sometimes the sky burns your eyes because you can't stand the vastness, the emptiness. Maybe we're not meant to peer into the abyss, or the planets beyond us. Maybe we're meant for this fate, to toil and writhe in darkness.
I said I could do this.
I said I could take this.
I wanted to feel my skin wane, to feel it
crack and peel, ebb and flow
against what's left of me.
And I thought I felt it again. I thought I seethed and railed and screamed from it.
Sometimes we don't realize we're drowning.
Not until that last breath
Until your blood eats through your veins
seeks out the relentless oceans
And in those fading seconds you become the ocean.
It was autumn. The change of seasons lay evident in the leaves, tainting the chlorophyll with such reds and browns that the once-picturesque streets of Destiny City soon withered under the weight of fall. He, too, was stricken by the scene - even when wrapped in turtleneck and jacket, the cold peeled through his clothing and spiderwebbed across his skin. Bite into his flesh. Sank into his bones.
But he did not notice, for there were far more difficult endeavors ahead. To suffer in cold, to walk a trek spanning a thousand miles, to endure a week-long fast would not serve to alleviate the roiling seas of revelations plaguing his mind. Sometimes animals recognized their waning moments, the last dregs of their lives slipping like sand through a sieve, and they spent those few seconds searching for a meager resting place.
A modicum of comfort.
Perhaps Alois Scholz was no different. Sometimes even the idealists spread amongst the masses succumbed to the most basic needs. Sometimes, in that ephemeral void between wakefulness and sleep came a time to put those ideals to rest, to nurse wounds, to come to terms with the realities threaded through life in fits and starts, in waves threatening to submerge even the most relentless.
Maybe it wasn't far from the truth now.
Maybe Alois was simply looking for a place to die.
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Posted: Mon Sep 30, 2013 10:57 pm
Cast-armed girl drifted down the street like leaves floated down the gutter. Earlier a fisherman loaded a boat and that boat sailed to New York and a part-time taxi driver painted the boat then drove Ruthie's mother to her meeting and her mother called her to say happy birthday, and Ruthie could drink now, but she didn't feel like drinking because drinking made sad and sad she couldn't stand, not after the General or the bodies swaying back and forth or the books about falling down down deep down into the planet from sky woods with trees bright and gold and orange like fire like those trees the day she found Alois by the canoes. She saw him there. Wind bit flesh. Bones for bones for bones. Bones pressed against her in the clearing. Teeth chattered. Bones buried under their shoes reaching out for life like wilting bluebells, browning daffodils. The roses in her apartment shrunk. Even she felt cold, dry, shadowed by a bitter desperation. Depression, maybe. She wanted so often to die. Crumple up like a paper bag and dust away. Youma guy had it so easy. He could just
disappear.
Alois.
He came down the road. Turtleneck. Jacket. And yet...he seemed too cold. Not cold like chocolate in the fridge or iced tea, but cold like skeletons or Arctic Circles or alpine regions. Broken, frozen, empty colds, clean and simple like air. Bitter and fragile. Yet, Ruthie, sensing some indication of this shift, but unable to fully comprehend it--blinded by her sensitivity, her own melancholy--said, "Hey, my dear." She raised a hand in greeting, but felt like a robot. H4Y MAI D34R. She shuddered. H4Y. She closed her eyes. Brushed back a strand of hair. Cream jacket. Dark-washed jeans. Teal sneakers. She rubbed her arms. "Chilly, isn't it?" What more could she say? Even if she and Alois roamed abandoned factories, carved into concrete--She always feared him in a sense. He could hurt her. She expected that of him--that he would hurt her. What if she opened up and he stabbed her feelings or broke her heart?
Could Alois even break her heart? She studied him. No. Well. Maybe. Possibly. If she opened. Could she do that or would he hate her forever? Call her weak and needy? She wanted to tell him everything. Her longing to die. The kiss that should have never been. The smile that couldn't be. The bodies dangling from wire. Could he understand? Would he despise her? Perhaps...Perhaps that would disgust him. No, she couldn't. She'd remain Ruthie. Normal. Kind. Good Ruthie who no one hated and everyone loved. Yes. This was good. This was kind to Alois. Very kind to his spirit. She would spare him. Merciful, Ruthie. Very good. Very kind.
"Where have you been, my bookkeeper? Staying off the streets I hope." She shrugged and approached. "There's many a danger lurking about as you know." She seemed close now. Almost touching. She studied the dark of his eyes. "It's more prevalent now then ever."
For once she felt tempted to curl up with him--regardless of his comfort--and weep into his shoulder or pretend that he cared or drift her hand to his cheek and feel the coldness of his skin against hers. They could warm each other like the man lit the fire and the fire warmed the man, and she could laugh once more, but only, and only if, he preferred it because she didn't want to be alone like this. Not now. She reached so often--to agents, Senshi, guardian cats--to be held and cuddled and adored, but Alois...he wouldn't let her right? He seemed too bitter. Unhappy. He turned from her hand at the factory. He shuddered at her touch. Why would she risk their relationship like that? It seemed...illogical. Strange. She smiled.
She wouldn't hurt you Alois.
She liked you Alois.
She wanted to die Alois.
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Posted: Mon Sep 30, 2013 11:29 pm
Even piano couldn't whisk out these strips and stutters of sadder times. Each ivory key melted into the instrument seamlessly, queued only by a single note, a series of notes, a symphony built on its own white-washed waves. Sometimes he dreamed in piano, but even dreams didn't leave footsteps, and even footsteps faded to time.
But notes, keys, andante, allegretto, pianissimo, mezzo-forte... None differed from footsteps.
And sometimes he couldn't breathe. each respiration caught in his throat, a series of hooks digging into his flesh, tearing at him in defiant rage, as some means to seep back into his body. Retreat into the darker depths. All he could do was breathe in his surroundings - the sky, the trees, the endless sidewalk broken into seams and stained blocks. And sometimes he caught a glimpse of Hiroshima shadows, leaves ingrained into the street, sporting no more than a stain of what they used to be. Was he any different, or was he simply a dash of carbon marring a wall?
Playing cards beneath an awning. Laughing. Having tea. Discussing marriage venues. And nothing but a shadow.
Nothing remained of plans, of plots, of aspirations... Like footfalls.
I can't explain in better tongues
In baser tongues, in bitter tongues
The acts of bravery it takes
To breathe during these trying times.
But even vultures feel time in turns, in waiting for the last brazen death rattle
The last carrion caw, clarion call
Before the feast begins.
But even warriors suffer famine now and again.
He never heard her approach.
Maybe it's not so bad.
I don't need a casket. I don't need an urn. I don't need a funeral.
Tired, deadened eyes shifted to the girl in muted purple, in faded gold who assailed him with a pyrite tone. He whetted his lips, tried to breathe. Some efforts were better left as thoughts. Silently, he kicked himself. Silently, he evaluated his responses. Silently, he acknowledged his drowning exhaustion. "Yeah," he managed, in a meager acknowledgement to her meager remark about their meager weather.
It felt so painful to try right now.
And he didn't want her to follow, to tag along, to scurry at his side while he sought an outlet for his fatigue. Spindly arms wrapped around scrawny body, he heaved a sigh while wading through cold. Sometimes it hurt to move. Sometimes it hurt to think. Sometimes it hurt to breathe.
All things turn in time. Only the unnatural remain the same.
"Don't follow me. Don't ask me questions. Don't speculate over my safety. Please, just leaf' me alone." His words cracked and frayed along the edges. He fared little better; between prolonged exhaustion and heavy revelations, his thin frame held little budget for the weight of waves roiling in his existential turmoil.
In surreal realms, even death dies.
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 11:13 am
Cracked voice. Shrinking pupils. Ruthie wouldn't let it go. Couldn't let him disappear--not without her. Leaned forward so he would look at her. Look at her, Alois, wanting to die. Or something else. Maybe. She wouldn't let him slip away. Not now. She needed the creepy shadows. The rattling shutters. Something to take her away--to bury her--and you, precious, beautiful you, would be it. She chose Alois because Alois brought her to an edge, like...like...She couldn't name him, but he haunted her. Made her weak. Terrified. Hopeless. She wanted to collapse against him like she did once upon a run in the woods. Could he tear her apart molecule by molecule? Could he unbreak something fragile, cracked, shredded, by breaking it further--deconstructing it into nothingness...like...like a fairy! Her eyes lit up. She grabbed his arm. Yes! Fairies didn't exist, and yet, they seemed pure and wholesome and magical and good, like how she could be!
To stop existing. To vanish.
"Don't push me away, Alois." Feeling heavy. Smiling.Crickets sung their last. Minivans parked for the evening. Stars died and faded and butterflies vanished among the weeds. "Don't make me cry." She sighed and released his arm. She couldn't cling too hard or else he'd crumble. "I don't want to go home tonight." She hugged herself. Take her back. To the factory. To woods. Cut the cable. Eat your heart. Something weird. Strange. Existential. To make her realize-- "Something wrong?"
Red sun. Cold sun. Melt her away. Squeeze out the dreams. Mother and Father. Shatter into leaves. Drift on the lake. Goodbye. Goodbye. Little paper boat fight against the ripples. Tidal waves spill over into the sand. Dolphins leap and chatter. Glisten white and gold and blue and yellow and Alois, hold her tightly. Press her against your chest. Remind her of her mortality, or stand there, freeze her out. It didn't matter. What was on your mind, Alois? Could you be as messed up and strange as her?
Did it matter? Did anything really matter or were they atoms compiled by circumstance fated to die and live magically, scientifically, for no other purpose but to extend another's immortality--the queen's--the one long-lived entity. A concept. An idea past mortal bounds.
Could Alois realize it or would he push her away? Even as she smiled, egging him on, wanting to change. Paper boats and dying flowers. Dogs barked at strangers in black. Children wept. Ghosts vanished into mirrors. Ghosts of ghosts roamed the streets, leapt from rooftops, pretended to care, and if they didn't, well, at least Ruthie could trick herself into comfort, instead of greeting the unbearable loneliness that plagued her as she t-spun to victory.
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 12:15 pm
Maybe it was starting to rain. The sky teased the ground in fits of dimples, little freckled smatterings across the pavement while deep greys stretched far into the horizons. Grey trees, grey grass, grey streets, grey headlights piercing the darkness in passing glances. All these strips of reality formed a fabric that ostracized him greatly - this was where he lived, where he existed - in the suburbs, the manicured lawns, the endless veins of streets running cars into the beyond. And yet, he couldn't exist here, couldn't tolerate it. Couldn't stomach it.
With every breath he wanted to retch his organs until those last viscera melted into the pavement. Would Ruthie step in it? Slip, squirm, cry, bring herself closer to the place where she lived now? Could see feel reality with that much acuity? He wondered, considered, dismissed it.
Ruthie existed in a plane outside of now, just like he did moments before, surrounded by deep violet crystals and towers that threatened to scathe the sky in their blackened glory.
But he was not fated to become a monster. He could not join the land of nightmares, not in the method he yearned for so relentlessly.
Requital strained beyond his grasp.
She sought his arm, threatened to jerk him back into these fabrics, these plains, these stupid tales spun so long ago that everyone forgot the authors. Who was the first soul to lament existence? Who was the first maiden to seek love in those so far beyond her grasp? Who was the first to die by pining? No one knew, no one cared, but everyone played these roles with such glory, such passion, that they may as well have written it themselves.
And he wasn't any different. The thought of it caused his chest to heave, to shudder momentarily. Knowing this, knowing he couldn't retain his miseries for much longer, knowing the pavement would soon see the half-rotted viscera he constrained inside himself, he jerked his arm out of her grasp. She needn't seek him now, not broken, not like this.
Every breath drew poison into his body.
Into his veins it ran, into his eyes, into his heart it polluted so thoroughly and so effortlessly that he may as well have become it - a harbinger of eternal toxicity. But he couldn't contain it now, not now, not in front of her, not with the trees watching or the streets silent or the moon obscured by those clouds.
It wouldn't rain, but he couldn't control it nonetheless. That mediating stoicism cracked, it peeled from its grasp in capitulation, and he failed to maintain that eternal flatline.
He couldn't stay calm for long.
He couldn't stay suffocated for long.
He couldn't stay dead for long.
"Leave, already, please..." He tried once again, but forcing her away didn't work. Didn't help. Fingers curled into his jacket, always seeking for something always elusive. It didn't matter. There was a storm coming, but it wouldn't rain.
But it did rain.
No matter the breath he drew, the thunder started. Cracked against his ribs, distant and firm, but he knew it was moot to resist. The visage now broken, forked by lightning, Alois pushed from her and covered his face in his palms, fingers grazing into his hair. He cringed, breathed, shuddered, breathed, sobbed, breathed. Always human. Forever human. Damnation etched through him like existence - damnation was his existence now, for he would never realize those slighted ambitions. And that shattered what little resolve he had left.
There were no private places anymore.
The sky looked on in stasis while he burned himself to muddied ash.
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 1:09 pm
"Alois." Breathe. Lightning strikes. Water pours. Ruthie grasped his hands. Breathe. Could they drown in the rain? Could they evaporate into stars? Chase after each other like sun and moon? The snake and his tail? Who were you, Alois? Were you the caterpillar or the leaf? Children scattered indoors. Laughter faded. Starlight shifted into the dark. She slid his hands away from his face. For once, she didn't cry. She watched him watching her. Imagined him imagining her. Did Ruthie exist or was this all within Alois? What if only Alois existed, and the rest were puppets within his imagination, playing out these scenes, pretending? She pressed her face to his, studying, searching golden eyes for an answer. Did all begin and end with you? She slid his arms to his sides. Rain would mat her hair. Press the purple strands to her neck and back and forehead. Teal turned to navy. Navy to black. Jackets flashed white in the lightening. Water would seep into her sleeves, under her collar, into her skin. Her heart raced. Breathe. Her eyes bright yellow, matching his. Once upon a jump into the pool. Thunder crashed like waves on the shore. Drowned her out. Make this a fairy tale. Ascend. Deify. Apotheosize. Become a Senshi. Once upon a boy and a girl--She wrapped her arms around him. Once upon a storm--
Once upon a lightning strike--
"I'm going to save you."
And then she--
Alois. What did he mean to her exactly? He pushed her away at the bookstore. Asked her to leave. Ignored. Pretended. Guided her to a factory, showed her a sunlit city, asked her to trust, to cut threads with a knife, asked her to carve into a forgotten construct. Helped her through the wire fence. Showed her the way. Shoved her off, made her small. She followed him through the city into alleyways and forgotten buildings, to the political section of the bookstore. She followed him still, and he led her deeper and deeper, and now he cried, deeper and deeper into his hand. Rain matted hair matted and wet his face, and she--
She became a girl wandering the forest, scrambling through wires, watching men and women fall to their deaths--wire strapped around their necks. She fought for them, fought and kissed and fell. Now she would earn it. Wouldn't Bischofite be proud? She did it. Really. She succeeded. She won.
She kissed Alois.
She succeeded
xxxxxxxxxxxxand she won.
b r e a t h e
What if this storm ends and I don't see you
as you are now--ever again?
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 1:57 pm
Her touch burnt, like stars lingering in the sky, each waging their own quiet war on the darkness expanding outward. The universe cooled, unbound itself, but in each crevasse lay some finite fight against futility. These concepts, so far beyond them, only echoed their sentiments against each other. Unsettled, disheveled, besieged, he no longer denied her any touch. Maybe one star might light the darkness for a while. Maybe it can warm the earth, melt ice, encourage life in places so black and bleak that it may never grow, but linger eternally.
What's left to save?
Do you know me, Ruthie? Have you held coals in your hands, hot and half-melted? Have you tasted charred skin before? Have you seen the light leave someone's eyes?
No. And how could you?
How could you behave in such fairytale mannerisms when you've seen the depths of reality like I have? You watched me in the bookstore, you chased after me, you looked for touch that I didn't possess. You wanted something from me and I knew it.
But I denied you, and I don't regret it.
I denied you, and you knew it.
Are you searching graves for warm bodies now? What do you want from me? Do you think you can raise the dead, Ruthie? Do you think that people once perished can come alive again? Can love again? Are you so far gone that you've forgotten where fantasy ends and finality begins? Maybe you don't realize we're on the edge of a precipice, that with every passing second the ground crumbles beneath our feet. We're destined to suffer now, Ruthie. We're destined to fail, to writhe, to boil in our own miseries.
I am fulfilling my fate, so why do you try to wrench that from me?
I tried to stay you for a while longer, but you seek to kill me now.
I am not a phoenix, Ruthie. Tread lightly.
He couldn't speak, didn't need to. She felt it, surely, beneath his trembling skin. It felt so foreign now, so detached, so far beyond him that he couldn't map out where he was, how he felt. Who she was. But did it matter? In the middle of the night, with clouds lingering overhead like sand beneath the ocean, he cursed the ground with all his blood and plasma and bone marrow, but she sought to help him retain what little was left.
Or she wanted to taste the last vibrancies as they left his system. But he couldn't deny her that, couldn't force her away, for he lacked the resolve. He left it in the Rift, peeled it away in the midst of a promotion. Now destitute, he lingered beneath her touch.
Became solid.
No longer an echo,
No longer a ghost of a thought of an ideal.
He couldn't remain intangible any longer.
And she tasted like she was dying. They had at least that... So he could finally coil those seeking fingers into her shirt, too bright for the night, and her hair, too vivid for all the monochrome. The rain wouldn't let up for some time now. They both knew the forecast. She could taste the lightning in the air - abrasive, sharp, but strong.
And he could taste the death in her eyes. In her teeth. in her tongue. Felt it across her lips - not fleeting, but heavy and dark and caked like blood long after exsanguination. They met in terms of death and plague, of dying dreams, but at least it formed a meager basis on which they could finally stand up. They didn't have to crawl through the
muddied ash that he left behind.
So he closed his eyes, spoke against her lips in wordless explanations, in a solitary invitation. She could feel the thunder now. She could trace the lightning while it cracked across the skin. She could coil herself beneath the unrelenting rain.
So he would let her in now. Into the rain. Into the fury.
For there were no fairytales here.
And now, just for now, just in this moment, just for a minute...
Ruthie was no fairytale anymore.elza magica i am so glad we are not looping the exact same song to tag each other. neutral dat irony.
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 5:51 pm
She sighed and pulled away, rubbing his arms. She slid her hands to his. She squeezed to remind him that things would be okay, that she wanted him around--even if she didn't know how much longer she would be around--and the breeze lifted her curls and she said, "Is this okay, Alois?" She pressed against him briefly, relaxing, settling into a melancholy, content haze. She felt dreamy and soft. Wispy like a drifting feather. If she could relieve him--ignite a fire, unbury a body, then maybe they could-- It felt like a long time ago. Maybe he could help. She brushed a hair from his face. He seemed...changed. Storm clouds seemed warm and heavy and soft. Like her eyes as she watched. What did you think, Alois? Boy with raven hair? Did you like this? What changed? They joked about it in the woods. She thought about it on patrol, but now it seemed so...real. Present. Did she want this? She brought her hand to her lips. Should she want this? She twirled a curl behind her ear. Yes. With her bookkeeper. Hers. For a time. For now. Possibly. Maybe. Could anyone grasp a shadow? Could you catch the night in a jar? He never said her name. Why didn't you say it, Alois? You called her Eve and she fed you the apples, but what of Ruthie? Could you feel Ruthie? And what of Medea? Could you feel her too? Under the jacket, under her skin? She withered by daylight, asked to be saved, wanted to hide behind curtains and the screen, but she would come out for him. To protect him. To cherish.
Was that what he wanted? Something too strange to be ordinary? Far from reality? She wanted to help him--to show you it was alright, or that it could be, for him. For her it seemed unclear, like her morals, her ambitions. How could she survive in this war? He seemed strong. Uncompromising. He could protect himself--shot a golden-eyed glare, learn the way of battle through classics--but her. Petal-soft and marrow-strong.
He didn't have to cross the river. She could walk alone. Hop across the stepping stones into a reddish wood. Pick up her train so it didn't wet and laugh along the way, and he could watch from the city side, pretend she didn't matter, as he would. To him, she wondered if she did. If she could ever, or if she served as a battleground for his ideas--his beliefs. Even that seemed enough at times, but for now, she wanted more. A faint smile. A weary heart. She drew in and whispered:
"I know where we can go."
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 9:51 pm
She let go. Pulled away. Brushed the dust from his lips and said her goodbyes. Squeezed his hands in some echo of remembrance.
So he looked to the sky.
He looked to the sky and he strained beneath the weight of all those miseries. He closed his eyes to the clouds, the darkness, the fixed gaze overhead. But he felt them trace the contours of his sharp features, as if to bury them beneath emotions so unchained.
She let go, so he dug his nails into his palms. Bit his tongue. Tasted metal.
He thought about responding to her, about explaining the folly of her ways. He thought about pushing her away - into the distance, peel her away, drown her in white noise until she amounted to little more than a passing face - but she did not relent. She looked into him, looked through him, as the one person who ever managed such a feat.
Finally she settled in his wavelength. But to do that... Meant damnation for herself as well. Was this his fault? Did he somehow pull her down, strip her from the skies like a kite rent by gusting winds, and she now laid with him in this crumpled heap, ready for burial? What happened here?
What did he do this time?
"Why did you let go of me?" He wanted to say, but words came unbound halfway through. His voice wouldn't hold steady, breaths wouldn't die down for the span of a few chance seconds. Though he tried to maintain eye contact, it felt like staring into the sun. He would be blind soon - rendered useless to the Negaverse. Unable to see those deep violet crystals anymore, spooling through the Rift like her hair across her shoulders.
He saw the reflection of his failures in her. Bright, daunting, piercing they were, and they burnt through him so easily. He wanted to question his faults, all those bitter points that drove her from him, that drove everyone from him, but he couldn't even breathe.
Sometimes storms erased footsteps for miles to come. Sometimes whole journeys were lost through ravaging winds and raging rain. Sometimes people perished in the throes of nature, small traces evaporated through thunder and lightning.
Sometimes storms are the most violent form of capitulation.
But all storms end. All draw to a close, and the air hung with fresh static, burdened with the lingering scent of rain. And the destruction, wet and matted, buried beneath the muted light of clouds, echoed that same ghost of violence. He couldn't watch her anymore, couldn't meet her gaze, but her words still froze that moment.
The air still felt charged, even in the aftermath.
Even through the numbness.
Would her touch leave scars like lightning arcs? His veins burned, blood boiled.
He didn't respond. He just followed.
---
It felt strange, disjointed even.
Like her hand wasn't even there.
Did they hold hands on the way here? Did he say anything he never meant? Did she explain how she reached the same wavelength, how she read the graphs, mapped the stars?
How could she navigate the sea on a cloudy night?
The creams adorning her apartment echoed his sentiments, his numbness. They knew he couldn't feel, and he knew they couldn't either. Exhausted as he was, she stood beside him. Led him all this way. Led him into a nest littered with rose petals aplenty, with the perfumed scent that adorned all those thorns.
Did he remind her of a rose without petals then? Did she see in him all those tragedies that she yearned for? That she spread through her apartment so readily? Or did she just want to use him for her aims, her needs? She seemed so needy, so distant and lost and close and clear and clouded and aimless. He didn't know what to do with her.
What could he do with her?
What could she do with him?
Alois checked his back pocket with his free hand, traced the seams, felt the stitching against his fingernails. Nothing. No cellophane, no smooth box, no crushed remnants of a pack. No nicotine.
No coffin nails.
He wouldn't be building his own demise tonight.
Or maybe this place was no different than a mausoleum. Flowers abound. Could he die here?
He could die here.
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Posted: Tue Oct 01, 2013 10:38 pm
Alois you are the midnight cavalier. She wrapped him up. Pulled him close at the entry of the bedroom. She kissed him gently. Softly. Shut the door with her foot. "Thank you for being here." She squeezed him tightly. Brought him into a hug. A thank-you hug. A good-friend hug. An I-like-you hug. She released, "I know this is weird, but if we're doing this--" She cupped his face between her hands and pressed her forehead to his. "--I have to ask a few questions okay? Just for safety." She grasped his hand and grabbed the lighter atop her drawers. "Are you disease-free? Do you use protection?" She tugged him close. She lit the candles on her drawers. They turned the cream and pink and yellow roses golden. "When was your last time?" She set the lighter on the drawers and gently pushed him onto the bed. She kissed the top of his head. "Are you into pain? How painful do you like your sex? Cuddles after? Maybe please?"
She shut the curtains, but not before searching for a star--a single star--to make a wish.
She found it bright and small and faint and yellow.
"You make me happy Alois. You want this Alois? I want this Alois."
Do you want me as a friend? Only as a friend? Do you like me Alois? I like you Alois. We should be together Alois. Somehow. Someway. I want you Alois.
Star light. Star bright--
She climbed in opposite of him. Pulled him closer. Studied the sparks in his eyes. Brushed back his hair. Glanced at the cast. Leaned against the heart-shaped pillows, brushed aside the teddy bears and plushies. No playthings tonight. Serious business. Just for you, Alois. All this business just for you.
--The first star I see tonight--
"Do you like music Alois?" she whispered. Eskimo kisses. Breathe in. Breathe out. "Will it be okay Alois? I guess we'll earn our reprieve, Alois. Let's earn it now: Say my name, Alois."
--I wish I may, I wish I might--
She kissed him.
--Have this wish I wish tonight.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed against him and kissed to search for him among roses and candlelight, under starlight and the fading moon.
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Posted: Mon Oct 21, 2013 10:50 pm
Ashes came to mind when she kissed him. Not on his lips, not in her taste, not dusted across his fingertips from habits long ago. No, they lingered purely in his mind - on his thoughts, and smeared across his perception. Ashes - her ashes. This was little different. And perhaps Ruthie knew it. She felt the bleach humming through her veins, corroding her quiet vibrancy. Eating her away. Whittling her down into a filmy residue while she proceeded through her paces.
And ash formed her complexion, her features - the long, curling hair that cascaded down her back and the warm golden gaze that shifted between him and her minor tasks, her rapid-fire questions. She acted the part of someone full and complete, rehearsed or coerced, he couldn't tell. It didn't matter. What she sought he would provide in time, so his analyses were moot. Trash.
The wasted blue cap to her bleach and ash.
With candles lit, he could smell the smoke - and lingering on the horizons of his mind, the acrid scent of sulfur as well.
Her hair, like a sunset, burning to ash.
Perhaps she sought him in the grates of a crematorium. It proved a proper bed for such an occasion, for what they sought within each other was simply permission to die.
Bleach and ash.
"Are you really asking me zis?" His voice sounded displaced, strange - as if it didn't belong to him. He sat at the edge of her bed, at her behest. No complaints, he still lingered in that tired haze between wakefulness and sleep. Maybe he lost himself there. Maybe he lay dying in the Rift, dreaming these last moments before capitulating to finality. "Of course I'm not diseased." He huffed, an automatic reaction.
By kindling the pilot light, the fire must start.
Sometimes the bones lingered. Sometimes their calcium exterior stubbornly refused its fate. Alois knew of this - during these situations, they were plucked from the fine ash within and tossed into the trash. It was strange for him to see what little a human reduced to - only a small handful remained of her. It smelled of the lingering pungent scent that seared his senses earlier.
Only a handful. If he'd sighed, she would dissipate into the stagnant air. Gone now, gone forever. Out of sight, and soon out of mind. "I do when asked." And it was then that he'd learned, from a loose-lipped cremator, that they mixed wood ash with the human remains. No one could tell the difference. No one dared question such an act. "I can't remember - a week ago? Two?" And he knew that few even ate the ashes. He wondered if hers tasted different - like wood or like bleach? Like her lips or like dust?
Maybe there was no difference.
He sighed, found quiet folds beneath his fingertips. Squeezed them in his enduring replies. "Of course I'm into pain. Aren't we in it right now?" He wasn't blind, just distracted. Distracted by thoughts of bleach and ash and blue caps and lingering ghosts of feelings given over to time and bitterness. He wanted to live in the Rift - and, someday, those inclinations would succumb to roiling flames.
"Stop saying my name, Rus'ie." They often found teeth in the mix, embedded into the crematorium grate. Dust scattered when she kissed him again.
For a moment, she reminded him of his true location - in a bedroom littered with roses, awash with vanilla scents stemming from freshly lit candles, assailed by questions from a meek and uncertain girl. The air cleared momentarily, and he breathed a sigh. Her fingers found his hair, so his eyes found hers. His grasp lingered on the edges of her shirt, and his arms soon found her waist, solid against him.
She did not pour from his clutches, or disintegrate beneath a single touch. He sought to kiss her, to taste her, to clear his palette of dirt and uncertainty.
To entrust himself to her, to speak his mind onto her body. To etch her skin with the last brilliant fires of his feelings before they succumbed to decay.
Bleach and ash.
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