Fuck and Destroy

By John Christy
© 2011 John Christy
ACT 1 – CONTACT .................................................................................................................................... 5

April ........................................................................................................................................................ 6

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 12

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 17

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 22

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 27

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 33

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 38

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 44

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 48

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 53

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 73

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 77

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 81

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 85

Avril....................................................................................................................................................... 87

John ...................................................................................................................................................... 92

Avril..................................................................................................................................................... 101

John .................................................................................................................................................... 115

ACT 2 – ORBIT ..................................................................................................................................... 119

John .................................................................................................................................................... 120

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 125

April .................................................................................................................................................... 130

John .................................................................................................................................................... 135

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 139
Avril..................................................................................................................................................... 141

John .................................................................................................................................................... 143

Avril..................................................................................................................................................... 145

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 154

John .................................................................................................................................................... 158

April .................................................................................................................................................... 166

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 174

John .................................................................................................................................................... 183

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 187

April .................................................................................................................................................... 189

John .................................................................................................................................................... 195

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 198

April .................................................................................................................................................... 203

John .................................................................................................................................................... 214

ACT 3 – SCHISM .................................................................................................................................. 221

April .................................................................................................................................................... 222

John .................................................................................................................................................... 253

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 256

John .................................................................................................................................................... 274

Avril..................................................................................................................................................... 278

John .................................................................................................................................................... 291

Mel...................................................................................................................................................... 292

Avril..................................................................................................................................................... 293
ACT 1 – CONTACT

It was the sea that made me begin thinking secretly about love more than anything else; you know, a
love worth dying for, or a love that consumes you. To a man locked up in a steel ship all the time, the sea
is too much like a woman. Things like her lulls and storms, or her caprice, or the beauty of her breast
reflecting the setting sun, are all obvious. More than that, you’re in a ship that mounts the sea and rides
her and yet is constantly denied her . . . Nature surrounds a sailor with all these elements so like a
woman and yet he is kept as far as a man can be from her warm, living body.
April
Avril was named after the popular faux-punk singer Avril Lavigne. At the age of sixteen, Avril

learned the origin of her name when her mother heard the hit song “Complicated” playing on the car

radio and casually remarked, “Honey, she’s your namesake.”

“Her?” Avril said, assuming her mother was joking.

“Yes, dear.” Once proud of her unique name, and instantly realizing her mother was speaking

without irony, Avril threw herself from the moving car. It was a stupid, ridiculous, and extreme reaction,

but then teenagers are often stupid, ridiculous, and extreme people. As Avril tumbled and rolled on the

pavement, the song’s chorus seemed to cruelly mock her: “Why’d you have to go and make things so

complicated? . . . You fall and you crawl and you break . . .” At fifteen miles per hour, the impact of the

fall was enough to cause a moderate sprain in both ankles and a significant bone bruise in the hip; Avril

was young—the adrenaline and emotion of the moment stifled the physical pain she felt.

Avril stood up and dashed in the direction of the city’s civic building. Though laid out in grids

and planned excellently, the city’s downtown area was confusing to a clueless young girl. Avril’s mother

pulled over, angry, hyperventilating, on the verge of a panic attack, and called the police on her phone,

partially out of concern for her daughter but equally to report her for leaping from the moving vehicle

and nearly causing an accident; already overburdened and underfunded, the police laughed at the

report of a missing sixteen-year-old, advising her to “check beneath the stadium bleachers.” So Avril’s

mother calmed down long enough to meanderingly drive a few blocks in search of her daughter for

some time but, noticing an increasing presence of “thug-like” black people, quickly decided the

neighborhood was becoming too rough and returned home, content in the assumption that Avril would
return safely—teenage girls were prone to emotional outbursts, but overall Avril was a smart girl; the

only question now was to plan a punishment.

Avril was raped an hour after leaping from the car. Harried by the injured ankles and totally lost,

she limped up to a pair of skinny boys who were leaning against the wall of a building and smoking

cigarettes. Though they were dressed similarly to the art students from any era, they most resembled

what had come to be inaccurately called “hipsters.” The boys had scruffy long hair, bright green eyes,

and a certain cool, disaffected countenance; they were virtually identical to the most popular and

sexually active boys at Avril’s school, only older and therefore more attractive. Seeing the boys, Avril

was able to ignore the pain for a moment and correct her posture in order to look beautiful and

worthwhile.

“Hello,” Avril said, flashing her most radiant smile. The boys had both spotted her long ago;

they competed to determine who could ignore the stupid-looking girl for the longest, since it was clear

she wanted something from them and there was something wrong with the way she walked. Neither of

the boys turned to her; one of them may have scoffed. Avril didn’t quite understand the icy response—

after all, the boys at school had never ignored her, not even once. “Hello,” she said again, feeling a little

disturbed.

“Hey,” one of the boys said, sneering at Avril. When Avril came to a stop a few feet from where

he stood, the boy turned to her and blew cigarette smoke in her face. A smile began to form on his face,

ironic but amused, as if he were thinking, This slut’s not so bad after all. “Are you hurt?” the boy asked,

turning his head away from her again.

“Sorry, I fell,” Avril said, wincing and suddenly aware of the stinging pain in her hip.

The boys both turned to her and laughed. “Oh, that’s too bad.”
 “I’m sorry to bother you guys.”

“Oh, that’s okay.” Both of the boys were suddenly interested in Avril, possibly because she was

rubbing her hip and making strange faces, suggesting possibly that she was looking to get fucked, or at

least that something interesting was going on. “Do you need something?”

Avril became embarrassed. She blushed; the boys moved toward her. “This is going to seem

really weird . . .”

“Sure,” one of the boys said, grinning and clearly feeling satisfied with his sexual appeal.

“Um . . . I’m trying to find city hall. It’s a long story.”

The boys looked at each other and back at Avril. One of them put out his cigarette and said,

“We don’t know where it is, but this is our apartment building, we’re upstairs, we can Google it for you.”

“Um . . . Sure,” Avril said, feeling embarrassed for putting somebody out of their way. Avril

wasn’t naturally shy, but her parents had raised her to be meek and polite. Her impulses were generally

a confused mess.

“Oh, it’s no problem,” the boy said. “Come on.” Avril didn’t plan on going into the building with

the two of them, but one of the boys put a hand on her shoulder and smiled, displaying a set of large,

white teeth; there even seemed to be a twinkle in his eye, and the way his hair was swept from his face

made him seem elegant, dramatic, and above all, beautiful. Walking toward the elevator, both boys

noted the strange manner in which Avril walked—it was almost a waddle, and her smile seemed to be

on the verge of breaking every time her foot fell to the floor. Though they were attractive and popular

with their female peer group, the boys were sexually inexperienced: in considering her strange walk,

one assumed Avril’s pussy was moistening, and the other assumed that she might have an STD.
 The building was old and had a large vintage-style elevator, the type that closes with a gate and

can be manually operated. The elevator could have been replaced, but it was kept around for its charm

factor: parents of art students pay a higher rent for their child prodigy’s apartment if it’s inside an “arty”

or “authentic” building. The manual operation of the elevator meant it could be stopped between floors

and locked, so that it wouldn’t move unless the fire department was summoned to use their master key.

Avril and the two boys stepped into the elevator. “Cool elevator, huh?” one of the boys said.

The first portion of the elevator ride was awkward and silent. Avril continued to rub her hip in

that bizarre manner; the two boys stared down at her hand. One of them had had an erection seconds

after speaking with Avril, but the other developed an erection while watching Avril roll and press the

flesh on her hip. At sixteen, Avril was a very attractive girl: she had been slightly overweight as a child,

but with puberty she grew taller, her limbs lengthened, and her features became sophisticated. What

had been baby fat transformed into bursting secondary sexual characteristics—prominent hips, shapely

calves and thighs, a large bust, and a vigorous stature; Avril could have been described as muscular but

delicate. The curves of her body were masturbation fodder for dozens of her classmates, and she had

been the cause of more classroom erections than any of the other girls in her grade. Well, that’s what

one of the boys had told her in an ostensible attempt at flirtation. In her own estimation, Avril had a

style of beauty that was popular in the 1950s—she certainly would have featured on pin-up calendars in

that era.

The clumsy first move of one of the boys was to take Avril’s hand and place it on his erection,

staring intently in her eyes the whole time. Avril didn’t realize this was a “move” at first; she wondered

for a moment why he was taking her hand. Feeling the stiffness of the boy’s penis, she glanced down

and saw the massive bulge straining against his tight black jeans; she quickly pulled her hand away. Not

wanting to offend the boy, Avril decided to affect a nervous giggle. Before she could think to do
anything else, the other boy took her hand in his and forcefully pulled it against his erection, and in

another moment both of the boys were holding her hands against their penises. Soon the boys were

grinding their erections on her legs.

Avril had been sexually tortured for a long time. She had entered puberty early and had become

fascinated with phallic imagery. To pass time in class, she drew penises in her notebooks, among other

things—anthropomorphized penises mostly . . . She’d even developed characters and plots. She was

constantly aroused, and she’d discovered a number of methods of subtle masturbation to use in class,

most of which involved tightly crossing her legs or rubbing her vagina against the curve in the school’s

chairs. She’d had a number of strange episodes during class where her body seemed to explode from

the inside and she would lose her breath—orgasms, of course, though they’d later take on a strange

quality in her memories as she’d never experience them again after the rape. Despite all of this, and

despite that it’s a natural occurrence in instances of rape for both men and women, Avril felt a deep

sense of shame for the rest of her life because she had become extremely aroused by the action of the

two boys in the elevator, so aroused that she’d had multiple orgasms, all of which coursed through her

as mechanical occurrences outside of her control. At times, she even doubted that she’d truly been

raped; after all, she had found the boys to be attractive. The stiffness, size, heat, and movement of the

cocks, all of which seemed to embody unrestrained desire, the boys’ pulses when she held the penises

in her hands, the shock of feeling an erect penis touch her vagina, the feeling of being penetrated, the

sensation of being filled up, the warmth of the ejaculations spreading deep in her stomach—all of these

things sent Avril’s heart racing, they were entirely new forms of physical sensation. It couldn’t be said

that she’d enjoyed any of it, even a single moment, but her body had acted on its own, had had its own

responses to the stimuli. For this, she hated it.

 Later, Avril would tell her therapists about the rape but not about being named after Avril

Lavigne. By then she was known as April—after spending the night in the boys’ apartment, where

they’d fucked her repeatedly through the night after the first time in the elevator, she went to city hall

and filed the documentation to legally change her name, writing, “Fuck the smelly old bard and his rose

by any other name! He didn’t know about Avril Lavigne!” in the margins of the form. Her

psychotherapists, invariably men, were obsessed with her story of the rape and constantly revisited it

during their sessions, usually flummoxed because Avril couldn’t remember most of what happened

during the night—her primary memory of the apartment was the colorful artwork on the walls, which

the boys claimed to have produced themselves. Perhaps because they weren’t psychiatrists, Avril’s

therapists often speculated that the rape was the trigger for Avril’s first manic episode and her

subsequent diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder II, as defined by the DSM-IV. In those days, Avril herself often

speculated that the cause of her illness was her mother, who’d ruined her life by naming her after a

shameless faker like Avril Lavigne. It seemed that nobody was willing to acknowledge the far more

plausible material basis of Avril’s illness, that her brain was simply defective, possibly as a result of

genetics or even pure chance, for instance the presence of a certain chemical in her mother’s womb

during gestation; this would imply a cruel determinism—could there really have been no separate paths

to take, no different choices to have been made . . . could Avril have been fated to be mad from birth?

No, that’s too depressing to think about.

John
Most of John’s adult life had been dominated by a muted dullness, marked by a tug-of-war

between fits of great desire and a strong predisposition to routine. Invariably, John curbed his desires—

alternatively to become a singer or an athlete, childish goals, and most often simply to have friendly

contact with another human being in a social setting—by returning to a crushing but comfortable

routine. For example, he would get it in his head to finally take voice lessons, find a tutor, decide on the

songs to learn, and then he’d imagine himself serenading a girl or impressing an old friend with a tune.

But if this plan materialized on a Tuesday, by 8 PM John would be in the gym, by 10:30 PM he would be

on a bus home, by 11 PM he would be instant messaging somebody, by midnight he would be watching

one of the many films he’d downloaded, and by 2 AM he would be in bed so as not to feel too tired for

work in the morning. And so the desire to sing was quashed without the slightest bit of disappointment;

John was happy he’d had a productive day and was able to do the things he enjoys.

For John, the one impossible task in the world was to strike up a conversation with a stranger.

The routine was the most effective deterrent to this, of course—there’s no time to waste having inane

conversations with strangers, as much as this seemed to be a worthwhile pastime. Conversations made

John feel good; they gave him something to think about, and all in all he wasn’t too bad at it—he was

young enough, there was still hope to have something like a life. Strangers often initiated conversations

with John. Usually these were men, but women too from time to time. As John had a distinctive,

interesting look, possibly owing to his multi-racial heritage, and an attractive body owing to his rigid

routine at the gym, a number of strange women smiled at him every day. Though he knew these were

often invitations to speak and sometimes even to initiate a courting ritual, he never once opened his

mouth, instead preferring to exult in the female attention which, on some level, validated his ego and

sense of sexual attractiveness, even if there wasn’t much tangible reward to show for it.
 The day was a Friday. As usual, John was sitting in the park outside of his office building at 3

PM. He would never have decided to sit in a park on his own, but there was a thirty minute company-

mandated break. Thirty minutes isn’t enough to properly read a book, write something, learn anything,

or work out. One alternative is to take a shit, which if drawn out can last as long as twenty minutes, but

a good way to pass a thirty minute block of time is to watch people. The park is a good place for this. In

general, John saw at least fifteen or twenty people per break he would have liked to talk to, but in two

years on the job he’d never initiated a conversation with a single one. On average, a person would

speak with him twice a week. About as often as not this person was a bum. But on this Friday, an

interesting and, frankly, attractive girl sat down next to John. He took note of the way she saw him from

down the path and immediately walked over to sit down on his bench. Obviously, she was interested in

speaking. John looked at her—she smiled and he smiled back. Then he turned and looked away. After

a few moments of silence, most women interpreted this sequence of interactions as a signal that either

John was taken or disinterested; rarely, a woman correctly assumed that John was chicken.

“Hi, my name’s April,” the girl said. April wasn’t making the usual value-based judgments of a

potential mate that are common in sexually-mature animals; instead, her thoughts were those that are

only possible in animals with a faulty and highly-developed frontal cortex: she was at that moment

perceiving the world as a set of perfect geometrical shapes in flux. In neurological terms her dopamine

levels were drastically low and her hypothalamus was exhausted. In psychological terms she was at the

tail-end of a manic episode, in the sort of “in-between” space of mania and depression; similar states of

mind have been observed in those who maintain wakefulness for a period of sixty to ninety hours

without the assistance of certain uppers—the mania resulting from sleep deprivation has mostly passed

and the body is simultaneously excited and exhausted. In plain terms, she was crazy.

“Um, hi,” John said, turning toward her and involuntarily laughing. It was hard to believe that a

girl was behaving like this; April was clearly not in her right mind, as evidenced by the off-kilter look on
her face and her creepy, insistent eye contact. Still, here was a person, an attractive girl even, initiating

a conversation. “My name’s John.” April then held her hand out. Without thinking, John took it, noting

it was unusually rough for a young girl’s hand.

“What’s wrong with you?” April said.

“What? Excuse me?” John said, surprised and a little confused. Their hands were still

intertwined.

“You seem very . . . sad. Oh, excuse me,” April said, pulling her hand away in a vague nod to

social custom. “You feel like you’re old too.”

John laughed. “Yeah, I guess I do feel old.” April studied John’s face for a few moments until he

turned away.

“Why are you shy?”

“Why am I shy?” John fell silent for a moment. He looked at his own shoes and then noticed

April’s, which were brightly painted Converse All-Stars; it appeared she’d painted them herself. His eyes

followed the natural path up her nicely shaped legs, the curves of the thighs suggesting themselves

through a pair of green tights. He noticed April’s ass filling out her skirt as well, but quickly shifted his

gaze back up to her face, which was nicely framed by her soft red hair. Yes, John was attracted to this

girl. “I’m really not that shy,” he said—this was something he honestly believed.

“You shouldn’t be shy, but you are. I know people,” April said with a wide smile on her face.

“Why shouldn’t I be shy?” John said, returning her smile and anticipating a compliment of some

sort.

“You’re not very good at this, are you?”

“This?”

“You know, talking to girls. You noticed me across the way, but I came over and started talking

to you, not the other way around.” Most conversations were notable for their incredible banality, but
here was a person who wasn’t normal or banal in the least. John was charmed. April went on, “Don’t

you know that girls hate that?”

“What, a guy that doesn’t talk to them?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, I know that.”

“So why don’t you talk to girls?”

“I don’t know . . .”

April giggled. “So . . . Do you want to fuck?”

Although John would have liked nothing more than to fuck April, something in him reacted

negatively to the proposition. Above all he felt something like disbelief. “Are you serious?” John said,

his mind racing through the logic and possibilities of the situation. He immediately regretted saying this,

wishing he’d taken some time to formulate a better response. With a proposition like this, you can take

a few moments to answer.

“Yeah. I’m not a prostitute,” April said, almost as an aside.

That much was obvious—no prostitute would be caught dead in April’s style of dress. John

made a sound: “Um . . .” Suddenly it became abundantly clear in John’s head that April was a mental

case of some sort, and that the correct course was to feign a sense of concern. “Well—”

“I just want to fuck somebody,” April said, cutting him off.

The situation presented a number of logistical challenges. First of all there was the matter of a

condom, and it would be embarrassing to rely on the girl to have a condom on her person; then there

was the issue of venue: surely it would be impossible to fuck in the park, that was for corny porn

movies; and then there was work—the thirty minute break was almost over, though it was unlikely

anybody would even notice if John didn’t come back in time. “I don’t know . . . ,” John said. April

responded by staring at him and smiling; this made John extremely uncomfortable—the intense
movements and vibrations of her eyes set off a shaking sensation in him. “Look, I have to get back to

work,” John said, standing up and quickly walking away without turning to look back.

John was in a state of shock until he made it back to his office building, at which point he felt an

incredible sense of relief, followed by an insistent sense of agitation. He had trouble breathing and

everything around him took on an edged darkness, as if his entire perception of the world had become

overcast and hazy. Walking through the office, he ignored the greetings and nods from his colleagues.

By the time he reached his desk, he had an unusually painful erection, its size and urgency far in excess

of the sad boners he worked up at home viewing the tube porn websites. John had inexplicably and

confoundingly walked away from the chance to fuck a beautiful girl; if he had seen Avril’s face or body in

the rows of previews on a tube porn site, he would have clicked it and masturbated to the video,

regardless of whether it was solo masturbation, vanilla boy-girl, or even a gangbang. So he stood up, his

erection sticking through his pants, and waddled to the bathroom, not taking any care to hide the

erection. It’s hard to say if anybody noticed it; even if they had, they were likely to push it from their

minds. John masturbated in the last stall with no mind for the guy taking a shit in the first stall, and

sprayed his semen all over the brushed metal door. It could be said that John was acting compulsively.

Afterward, while staring at the impressive results of his orgasm, John had some time to come to

his senses. The last five minutes had passed as if in a heavy fog, and he was almost surprised to find

himself in the bathroom. Still, this was the most he’d felt in months or even years. He pulled his jeans

up and stuffed his penis into his boxers, resolving to go back outside to the park and find this April,

who’d inspired him to such heights of passion . . . Before leaving the stall, John remembered to wipe the

semen off of his dick. Bending down to grab some toilet paper, he realized there’d been somebody else

in the bathroom the entire time, and he laughed. Such behavior seems incomprehensible . . .
Avril

Avril was disappointed when the boy so abruptly left her. Partially it was a joke, asking him to

fuck like that, but she knew she would have gone through with it if he’d obliged—he was pretty after all,

his face was nicely shaped, with sharp lines and a number of identifiable triangles. Avril wasn’t sure why

exactly she’d made such a provocative statement though, as sex was almost entirely joyless for her. In

the years since her first sexual encounter with the two art students, every one of her plethora of sexual

experiences had been emotionally painful. Something about male desire seemed to be supremely off-

putting, the way boys did nothing to mask their desires or intentions, their obvious indicator of sexual

excitement, their animalistic thrusts and humps, and especially their ridiculous grunts and facial

expressions at the moment of orgasm; it all seemed uncouth, a little uncivilized even, and not in a good

way, not at all . . . This was why she’d approached John in the first place—there was no shortage of shy

or uninterested boys, but John seemed doggedly interested and disinterested at the same time, as if her

presence had set off a deep-seated conflict that fought it out on his face. In other words, his demeanor

wasn’t so stereotypically human.

Surely there are many theories which deal with the contagious properties of thoughts. For

example, it’s well known that in a crowded restaurant, a topic of conversation, snails for instance, begun

at one table will soon infect the next table, and then the next table, and so on until every person in the

restaurant has formed the word “snail” with their mouths at least once—the word can travel so many

times faster than its slimy animal referent that the mucousy gastropod seems superfluous. Here we’re

dealing with sociology, but it seems at least plausible that there’s a psychic—or perhaps quantum, to

delve into scientific mysticism—phenomena of thought contagion, because at the moment John likened

Avril to a girl he might find on a tube porn site, Avril thought back to the long months of her most
recent manic episode. The memories were vivid—Avril had been fucked by no less than twenty-four

men and eight women. Four times the copulations had been taped, and twice the poorly filmed and

edited amateur videos had been uploaded to tube porn sites. Indeed, if John had looked closely, he

might have come across Avril on one of his cherished websites. As unlikely as that was, let us remember

that anything is possible.

It was difficult for Avril to contextualize or explain these memories. What does it all mean?

Avril often asked herself this, though she’d be the first to tell you it’s a silly question. We disagree

however; this question should be asked at all times: What does it all mean? For Avril, her manic

episodes were simply things that happened; one day her senses would seem to awaken, and the

intensity of her feelings would continually increase until she became a slave to sensation. Hence

anything that happened afterward, no matter how extreme or destructive, was decontextualized from

her life and didn’t fit into any kind of coherent narrative—there was no way for her to ascribe a higher

meaning to her behavior.

Avril read a book called Electroboy once that described mania like this: “. . . the most perfect

prescription glasses with which to see the world . . . life appears in front of you like an oversized movie

screen . . . When I’m manic, I’m so awake and alert, that my eyelashes fluttering on the pillow sound like

thunder.” Yes, a very accurate description of a manic episode, which unfortunately doesn’t even

mention the two most powerful sensations, those being the tactile and the sexual.

In any case, Avril wasn’t manic anymore. Lost in thought, she stood up from the bench and

wandered the park, taking in the sights of the trees, the squirrels, and the man-made monuments.

These objects seemed to be related somehow. In truth, the trees, squirrels, and monuments had all

been imported by the Chicago Park District. Mostly hailing from Georgia, the trees were apple trees

which had been bred not to produce any fruit; the squirrels, trapped and bred for parks programs in

western Kentucky, were of the species American Red (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus), and often attacked and
killed the Eastern Grey (Sciurus carolinensis) squirrels that were native to Chicago; the monuments were

commissioned to a certain Arturo Benici, a sculptor who lived in New York and charged $85,000 per

sculpture, most of which were simply lazy rehashes of aborted and long-dead ideas Arturo had had

while in college. In any case, the objects conferred a remarkable closeness to nature in the middle of

downtown Chicago—no easy feat, as Avril was thinking. She passed a couple of young men reclining on

the grass; one of them looked up and stared at her as she walked past. They were marginally

interesting, but dressed lazily in plaid shorts and polo shirts, so she continued on. Again a man noticed

her, an older one this time, a fellow with a square head and old-fashioned glasses sitting on a bench. He

looked over his book and over his glasses with somewhat of a judgmental, fatherly demeanor. It was

hard to say whether he was sexually attracted to Avril as the young men had been. At a certain moment

it looked like he might have harrumphed, but Avril walked straight to him; he didn’t have a stock

reaction to this unusual behavior.

“What are you reading?” Avril said. The man gave her a puzzled look; he was obviously

disconcerted. “It’s just that the cover looked interesting.” The cover was in fact interesting, since the

man depicted on the front of the book closely resembled the man reading the book. This is a rare sight.

The man raised his eyebrows and calmly closed his book, giving the impression he was curious

and annoyed at the same time. “Oh . . .” Avril looked and giggled. His reaction was amusing. “I

apologize, miss. Only people are so closed off these days.”

“I surprised you?” Avril said, leaning forward on her tip-toes.

“Yes, you might say that.” The man held up the book and continued, “This book is Memoir of a

Russian Punk. See?”

“Is it any good?”

 “Why, yes, it’s amazing. Right now, I’m writing an essay comparing the life in Khrushchev’s

Soviet Union as depicted in the book, which I have decided is the reality, to the official narratives

forwarded by the party, by the United States, by the official ideologue biographies, and so on.”

“That sounds pretty boring.”

The man burst out laughing. “No, no, the book itself is fascinating, it’s about a boy who decides

to become a petty criminal in the Soviet Union’s most prosperous era; the perspective is unprecedented

in literature. Do you know Eduard Limonov?”

“No.”

“Ah, but what’s your name?

Avril quickly went to sit down next to the man. She crossed her legs and oriented her body to

face him. “April . . . But do you want to hear a secret?”

The man lowered his glasses slightly on his face and raised his brow. “A secret? Ah . . .”

At that moment, John appeared. Seeing April sitting with another man gave him pause, but a

strange determination seemed to push him forward. This was probably the boldest and most confident

move of his life. “April?” he said.

“Ah, I see your boyfriend is here.” The man began to gather his things, sticking the book and a

pile of papers into a folder. “I’ll be getting on then. I’m late after all. Your friend is very charming,” he

said with a warm smile on his face, addressing John. He stiffly stood up, betraying a bad back and creaky

hips, and held his hand out for Avril to shake. It’s true that academics are often forgiving of mental

instability; what seems like an unhinged demeanor to most might seem like curiosity or ingenuity to an

academic.

For her part, Avril was shocked into playing along with the narrative the man had assumed. It

seemed the natural thing to do; why fracture a good narrative, especially one that’s sprouted so

organically? Anyway, the old geezer was cute with his abject shame over his lecherous attraction to a
girl so much younger than himself. Avril deftly stood up and took his hand, holding it in hers and lightly

running her fingers across the palm. “Well then,” she said, smiling, “good luck with your essay.”

“Mm,” the man said, turning and dreamily walking down the path. John and Avril watched him

without exchanging even a look; at the last moment, he turned around and hurried back, removing the

book from his folder. “Here, I want you to have this. I have another copy at home.” Avril took the book

without any of the socially customary protestations; nobody present at the scene noticed. “You will

enjoy it. I am here always; perhaps we will discuss it some time?”

“Sure,” Avril said. The man smiled at her and then John, and again turned and dreamily walked

down the path, disappearing around a corner this time.

John
“So . . . Do you still want to fuck?” Though John identified a certain absurdity in the situation,

the question was a few orders of magnitude beyond any recognizable form of social awkwardness. He

immediately corrected himself: “I’m sorry, what am I saying? I mean, you were saying before, about

the—” John cut himself off, getting the sense even more than usual that he was a confused and helpless

wreck of a guy. If nothing else though, he never could have imagined that morning that he’d later be

asking a girl in the park if she still wanted to fuck.

April looked him up and down, and then glanced down at the book in her hands. Memoir of a

Russian Punk . . . And who was that old guy? John looked off in the direction the man had walked,

pretending to be looking for him. The gesture actually did relieve some of the tension between the two

of them. “Oh . . . I was just kidding around,” April said.

John burst out laughing. He was embarrassed, but also relieved. “Oh, god,” he said, looking

away, “I mean, I’m sorry. Like, the way I . . . You know . . .”

“Yeah. I know . . .” John and April looked at each other and smiled. A charming moment, a boy

and a girl in a park connecting with a look—and damn the weirdness. There seemed to be a moment of

understanding between the two, though what it was that either could understand about the other was

anybody’s guess. Maybe it was the human condition itself that was understood. “I was just half joking

though, so if you really want to . . . I did offer, and you seem as nice a boy as any other,” April said.

Though her mode of communication and thoughts had mostly normalized compared to earlier,

her words set off panic and alarm in John’s head again. He couldn’t have articulated it in the moment,

but the girl had a knack for violently interjecting the real into the rigid mechanics of his consciousness.

In general, John’s life was simple; it was obvious that anything involving April would not be. His heart

pounded, his palms began to sweat. “No. I mean, I want to . . .” At that moment, a strange thing
happened: admitting out loud that he wanted to fuck April calmed him down. John looked at her and

was shocked to find that he could maintain eye contact. He went on, “I want to, but it’d be kind of

screwed up, don’t you think?”

April thought on it for a moment. “Yeah, it’s pretty weird to fuck strangers.”

They both laughed. “Yeah, it is . . . I mean, not that I haven’t done it.” A blatant lie. He couldn’t

have told you why he said that, though it’s well known that social pressure compels young men to

present themselves as sexual dynamos. John was intelligent; he realized that his earlier behavior

strongly suggested that he hadn’t ever fucked a stranger. “Actually, that’s a lie,” he said, laughing.

April didn’t laugh. “So maybe you want to try it? I’ve done it before . . . You know how

repressed gay guys who act straight need an experienced guide to introduce them into, like, the gay

world? It can be sort of like that.”

John didn’t quite get the meaning of what she was saying. “Repressed gay guys?”

“Yeah, it’ll be great,” April said, taking John’s arm and attempting to pull him behind her. The

next five or ten minutes played out in her mind—she would lead him behind a tree, pull down his pants,

grab his dick, take it in her mouth, feel it grow and harden between her lips, stand up, lower her skirt

and tights, guide him into herself and get savagely fucked—it would be great. In the vision, John was a

sort of Sadean protagonist, reacting like a stud, or even better a programmable fucking machine—inputs

in and outputs out. Unfortunately, John was neither stud nor machine; he reflexively balked at Avril’s

aggressive physical incursion, flailing his body as if he’d received a strong electrical shock. It appeared to

be a forceful rejection, at least as far as April could interpret it—for a girl of April’s beauty and

countenance, any reaction to a sexual advance except for eager acquiescence might seem to be a

rejection.

John felt a pointed shame for his body’s involuntary nervous twitch. For the first time, he knew

what people meant when they said their bodies were like coiled springs. It seemed that before long he
would eject himself from the situation again, overwhelmed by the utterly foreign and disconcertingly

violent emotions April inspired in him. He’d been with girls before, as hard as it was to believe, but the

settings and conditions were sterile and always seemed somehow inhuman, his experiences consisting

of ill-advised drunken ruts with coworkers, disastrous drunken screws with classmates at parties, and

the one relationship in high school that began when his best friend’s girlfriend gave him a brutish

handjob after they’d both gotten drunk for the first time. An objective analysis would show that John’s

entire sexual history was attributable to a combination of his pleasant physical appearance and alcohol;

by the standards of courtship in 21st century America, John was edging frighteningly close to abject

failure.

Through an uncharacteristic force of will, John was able to control himself long enough to take

control of the situation. After he’d flinched, April stepped away from him with a horrified expression on

her face. John put his arms up and said, “Wait, wait, you didn’t understand what I said. I meant that we

should get to know each other—that’s usually how it’s done, isn’t it?” It was unclear where he’d picked

up the expression get to know each other, since he’d never once used it in the context of a relationship

with a woman. All he knew was that in a way it was true—he really did want to get to know this strange

person even more than he wanted to fuck her. Perhaps in the time since he’d met her, she came to

represent in his mind an ideal, a chance for an interruption to the dull routine of his life, something new,

different, exciting, completely genuine, and in any case a welcome change to the crippling rut of his

listless and uninspired career. He had a feeling that any one of his male—or even female—colleagues in

the office would have killed for a presence like April in their lives. John also knew on an instinctual level

that if he fucked her right then and there any sort of relationship was unlikely; this instinct was

untested, there was no way to know if it would bear out, but he followed it anyway.

April replied, “Get to know each other?”

“Yeah. Like, we could go on a date.”

 “A date? Really?” April seemed to be totally shocked.

April’s shock infected John and nearly devastated all his previous optimism. What could possibly

have driven him to seek a normal relationship with April? A date? He’d never been on a proper date in

his life, and in any case, dates simply weren’t arranged through anonymous sexual propositions in the

park, at least not any dates in the real world. He pushed these ugly thoughts from his head though, and

in their place came visions of something like a happy future with this beautiful and charming girl he’d

been lucky enough to meet. “Yeah, a date,” he said with a smile.

John was on the right track, a good track in any case. The only solid things in life are

relationships: media, drugs, career, politics, hobbies, art, possessions, and so on only serve as

phantasmal reflections of life. It’s no wonder that those who are subjected to extended isolation and

loneliness become bitter and twisted, no matter the richness of every other aspect of their lives: they’re

dealing purely with images, never grasping with their hands or feeling in their hearts; soon, they lose

touch with what it means to be human, or even animal . . . Unfortunately, the first things to go in liberal

societies are relationships. They’re the necessary cost in order that everything else might grow and

flourish. The further progressed the society, the rarer are fulfilling social relationships.

“A date . . . What would we do?” April said with what sounded like genuine interest. John

couldn’t have known that she’d never been on a proper date either, but the enthusiasm in her voice

seemed to lift his very soul . . .

“Look, it’ll be a surprise. We can do it tonight, after I get off work.” John turned and pointed at

the skyline. “See that building, the one that sort of comes to a point? That’s where I work.” As April

nodded and affirmed that she saw the building, John began to feel for the first time in his life that he

had a semblance of control in a social situation; it was an empowering and liberating feeling. “I get off

at six. You can wait for me in the lobby . . . But here’s my phone number in case you miss me, and you

can look me up on facebook,” John said, writing down his number and his name on the back of a Caribou
Coffee receipt that had been in his pocket. He put the receipt in April’s hand and smiled. Their hands

touched for a long time; John felt April’s pulse in the tips of her fingers. It was exhilarating.
Avril
Sometimes, in her more depressive moods, Avril felt like she was dominated by her illness, that

she was a physical manifestation of a list of symptoms, that her self, her individual personality, even her

soul ceased to exist; her physical body seemed to float in a sort of void and she suspected her actions

weren’t those of a living, breathing, and thinking human being, but of a lazily written character in a TV

sitcom or a badly written character in a middling novel meant to enlighten the audience regarding some

pressing issue of the day. But then these were only suspicions.

Avril thought back to how she might have reacted to his request for a date while she was manic.

It would have seemed unbelievable—what kind of guy responds to a proposition to fuck by asking for a

date? She might have laughed in his face and hit him. Still, there was a certain charm in how ridiculous

he’d been. The sight of John walking back to his office brought a smile to Avril’s face—he had practically

skipped away from her. He moved as if he was being carried by a cloud; his step was lighter than Gene

Kelly’s, and that’s no small feat. Maybe the date wouldn’t be so bad . . .

There was still the matter of six o’clock. That was strange. Was it usual to make a date on the

same day you meet somebody? It couldn’t have been usual to meet the person in the lobby of their

office either. At best, these things were on the margins of social acceptability, though without the

frame of reference of a lifetime of adherence to social rules, Avril had no idea whether or not John had

pulled off the request for a date well. She did feel a powerful imperative now not to disappoint or come

off strange; the first order of business was the clothes. Avril resembled one of the many archetypes of

young girl there were in her society. At the time, the rich students in Greenwich Village were cultivating

a haphazard aesthetic, a jumble of disparate fashions from different eras, most often featuring the

styles of hosiery and undergarments from the 1920s, the functional, minimalist footwear and skirts from

the 50s, and the wide, flowing, colorful styles of the 70s, along with, now and then, modern touches like
wedge heels, halter tops, and designer bags, though these were often considered gauche. This sort of

“thrown together” fashion had already been en vogue for many years in the Scandinavian countries, in

Helsinki especially, but nobody in America could have known this or even cared about it. Avril didn’t

deliberately dress like this—her mind really was organized haphazardly, and her aesthetic had been

anything but cultivated. She didn’t have money either, so her fashionable appearance owed mostly to

pure luck. In any case, Avril didn’t feel her attire was appropriate for a date, and she wasn’t eager to

walk into an office building looking like she did.

She looked down for a moment at the book in her hands. Now that she had to change her

clothes, it seemed to be a burden more than anything else. After considering tossing it in the bushes,

she tucked the book under her arm and marched to the downtown clothing shops. Though there were a

number of appealing destinations, Macy’s was and probably always will be the premier target for

shoplifting. In its early days, the store had been intentionally organized in a maze that was meant to

disorient customers, impelling them to enter a childlike state of mind and seek out the assistance of a

sales associate. At one point, the sales associates were extremely well-trained; they effortlessly created

the illusion that all of their recommendations were crafted to the specific needs of the customer. With

this accomplished, the sale was almost guaranteed, regardless of the price or quantity of items being

sold; polling showed that most customers who entered the store ended up spending three to five times

as much as they had originally intended. After a succession of corporate buyouts, cost reduction

programs, and downsizing initiatives meant to wring profitability from the store, the training programs

were shut down and the average quality of sales employees plummeted. Nobody at the corporate

offices considered or indeed even knew about the deliberately maze-like organization of the store;

today, the store’s layout was a mystery to employee and customer alike. There was an unlimited supply

of dark, unmonitored corners, deserted nooks, and conveniently hidden exits. Macy’s was a favorite of

both the shoplifting syndicates and talented amateurs.

 Avril naturally took to the slightly schizophrenic atmosphere of Macy’s. Most people felt a sense

of urgent discomfort at the endlessly redundant displays, the ranks of idle workers, the jarring coldness

of the air, the overpowering perfumes, the loud pop music, and the total lack of logical organization;

upon entering the store, there was the distinct feeling of being stranded alone in a cold but bountiful

universe. Where the healthy mind shuts down and turns inward, the diseased mind launches into

action. Avril immediately turned left toward a display of jewelry. The sales girl behind the counter

became somewhat excited, as the usual customer was a retirement-aged lady rather than a fashionable

young woman. “Hi! Welcome to Macy’s! Can I help you with anything?” she said.

Avril heavily set the Memoir of a Russian Punk down on the counter. “Yeah . . . There’s a part in

this book. Here, look.” Avril opened the book as the girl bent over it and squinted her eyes. She

opened to a page somewhere in the middle, put her finger on the line, and pretended to read aloud:

“She wore opalescent earrings. A close look revealed a ruby, an emerald, an opal, and a pearl. Those

were the stones he recognized, at least . . .” The sales girl seemed confused, probably since the words

didn’t appear to look anything like what Avril was saying. Avril quickly closed the book and said, “I’m

going out with this guy tonight who’s like, obsessed with Russian stuff, and this book especially.”

“Oh, wow, that sounds exciting,” the sales girl said. She was even a little excited herself—most

dates aren’t usually that interesting; most guys didn’t really have obsessions. “Soo . . . You want some

earrings like that, huh?” Avril nodded, and the sales girl squealed. “Oh, wow, I think we even have

something like that!”

The sales girl turned around and studiously looked through the rows of earrings hanging on the

wall behind her. Avril took the chance to slip a few pieces of jewelry that were displayed on the counter

into her pocket. These usually weren’t the really expensive stuff, but each piece was worth a few

hundred dollars at least—real gold, real silver, real gems, and all of it was shiny and pretty, after all. The

girl finally reached up high and grabbed a pair of large stud earrings that prominently featured
gemstones of every color. She demonstrated the earrings to Avril and said, “Here it is, just like in your

book!”

“Wow, it’s amazing,” Avril said. “I’ll take it . . . Look, I’m going to get some new clothes for my

date tonight. I’ll bring it back here, so you can ring everything up at once.”

“Oh, wow, thanks so much,” the sales girl said with genuine gratitude in her voice. Avril knew

the people in jewelry worked on commission, and had managed to convey a casual and benevolent

attitude perfectly. As she walked away, she felt a little bad for the sales girl, but mostly she was

calculating how long until the missing jewelry would be noticed. Probably it never would be.

Now the goal was to appear to already have made a purchase in the store. You could even

make a little bit of money doing this. Avril moved onto the rest of the store; women’s clothes were

displayed in almost random fashion—there was no specified women’s section there was for men or

children, if anything the store itself was a designated space for women. Avril casually glanced into trash

cans until she spotted a sufficiently elaborate receipt. Pretending to throw out a piece of gum, she

reached into the trash and rooted it out. It was difficult to decipher what all the mysterious jargon

signified, but all it took was to recognize a single item. Brands and references to products were best:

picking out a “Vera Wang T-shirt” might produce a mismatch of products and a problem at the register,

but “Vera Wang Flyaway Wool Cardigan” almost always referred to a specific product. The receipt read

that the sweater was originally $47.99, but a 20% discount had been taken. Avril calculated whether or

not there would be a problem getting that additional 20%—a precocious customer might argue and try

to get the full $47.99 even if she’d paid less. Avril decided that today she might be more easygoing.

She spent ten minutes searching the store for the Flyaway Wool Cardigan. Unsurprisingly, it was

tucked away next to a display of Frango Mints. Why was it there? Who would look at chocolate mint

candy and spontaneously decide to purchase a cardigan? At least one person had done so, if the receipt

was reliable evidence. Avril picked through the cardigans, trying to find one in approximately her size
that also didn’t have an ink button attached. It was an interesting decision on Macys’ part to only add

security features to about half the total clothing in the store, but it’s not for us to question why. Avril

picked out a cheap shirt, also by Vera Wang, and took the two items to a bored looking black guy who

was lounging by a register. “Hi, I want to return this,” Avril said, presenting the cardigan.

The black guy jumped a little. He didn’t seem to expect any customers. “Oh, yeah, okay,” he

said.

“I’m gonna buy this too,” Avril said, referring to the shirt.

The guy keyed his identification code into the register. The display lit up and flashed a Macy’s

advertisement. “Do you have your receipt?” he said.

“Right here,” Avril said and handed the receipt to him. He looked it over, studied the cardigan’s

tags, and entered something in the register, self-consciously glancing up at Avril after every step.

“Shop here often?” he said.

“Not as much as before,” Avril replied.

“Yeah, this place is really going downhill.” They both laughed. “Okay, now for the shirt, do you

want to pay for that separately, or would you rather take it out of the refund?”

“Just take it out of the refund.”

“Yeah, one second,” the guy said, furiously entering numbers on the keypad. He scanned the

shirt’s tag, dropped it in a large plastic Macy’s bag, and handed it to Avril. “Okay, do you want store

credit or for this to go back to your card? Also, since it’s a return and the tags are still attached, I can

give you cash.”

“Oh, the cash would be nice.”

The guy laughed. “Yeah, of course, everybody wants cash. Lucky girl, you didn’t take off the

tags.”

“Yeah, I guess I’m smart like that,” Avril said.

 The guy laughed, seemingly to himself, while he continued to pound at the keypad. As if by

magic, the register sprung open. “Okay, your refund comes to $26.54 today,” he said, expertly counting

out the money while maintaining eye contact with the customer. After handing the money and a

second receipt to Avril, he said, “By the way, if you were happy with your customer service today, you

can call in or email Macy’s and mention your guest experience.”

“Sure, I’m happy,” Avril said. The somewhat strange nature of her response caused the guy to

look at her again.

“Oh, my name’s Tracy,” the guy said and held out his hand.

Avril took it. “I’m April.”

“I’m not supposed to tell you this, but if you mention my name, I get a $25 bonus. But don’t tell

them I told you that part.” He winked as he said the word ‘that.’ Avril laughed, as much at the cute

gesture as how much he seemed to trust her. This guy’ll be charming people with his wink even when

he’s 70 years old, she thought.

“Okay Tracy, I’ll mention your name,” Avril said. As she walked off, she wondered whether

Tracy was gay, or if he liked white girls. You never could really tell with black guys . . . In any case, Tracy

had just handed her the store—she spent the next hour methodically dropping items into the Macy’s

bag, until it seemed like the weight might cause the bag to break. The elaborate receipt she’d found

would even get her by the security at the main doors, in the unlikely event that she tried to stroll out the

front door with thousands of dollars in stolen merchandise . . .

John
John knew the next three hours would be simultaneously torturous and productive. The

anticipation of having a date wrung his guts, but the time could also be spent planning and learning . . .

His constitution didn’t deal well with uncertainty: he only felt comfortable when he had a handle on

every possibility in a situation, in essence when he knew where things stood and where things would

end. It was almost a miracle he had acted so spontaneously with April. In fact, he’d never been happier

or more content with himself; now he knew what was meant when people said to “enjoy yourself”—it

wasn’t the simple consumption of pleasure that was enjoyable, but the capability to create the

conditions for pleasure. This was an important distinction. In this respect, John realized it was possible

to enjoy the self, despite a lifetime of contradictory evidence. On the elevator up to his office, he gave a

charming smile to a middle-aged woman. She practically melted, and even this gave John a great boost

of confidence. He strutted through his office, puffing his chest out and raising his shoulders more than

usual; the women noticed him—he did seem to be more attractive than usual today.

Back at his desk, John leapt into his chair and spun around a few times before turning on the

monitor. Anne immediately noticed his unusual behavior; she was girl at the other desk in their small

room. “What’s up with you?” she said.

“Nothing . . . I just feel great.”

“Come on, you usually look like you’re bored to death. I can’t remember the last time I saw you

smiling just to smile.”

“Alright, yeah. I met a girl.”

“Just now?”

“Yeah, outside, in the park. I arranged a date for tonight.”

Anne laughed. “Wow . . . No offense, but I thought you were gay.”

 “What? Gay?”

“You know, you never talk about a girlfriend or anything like that.”

John looked at her funny. “But I don’t talk about my personal life at all.”

“Yeah. Most people do . . .”

“I guess.”

“You’re all muscley too. Like, no one works out that much.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“I don’t know. It’s like you think of yourself as an ancient Greek or something.” Anne didn’t say

anything, but the revelation that John was capable of sexual desire seemed to violently alter her

perception of him. If nothing else, this was a sign that his mode of relations with others was extremely

dysfunctional.

“Well, overall I’d say I’m pretty normal,” John said. This was clearly not true, but as long as he

said it, it could be accepted somewhat at face value. He regretted responding with quiet seriousness

instead of humor, which might have done better at communicating a sense of normalcy . . .

“Damn, okay,” Anne said with a funny look on her face. “Well, good luck with your date . . .”

“Thanks.” John thought for a moment to lie and claim that it had been years since he’d been on

a date, but decided not to pursue the conversation now that Anne apparently viewed him as more of a

human being. “Well, I’m finishing this special project. So maybe I can distract myself from being too

nervous . . .”

“Yeah, good idea. I’m always a wreck when it comes to dates,” Anne said. That was hard to

believe—Anne was tall, blonde, attractive. John laughed and pretended to focus on the Excel file on the

screen. In reality, the nearly infinite possibilities arising from the date were playing out in his head . . .

Smiles, looks, touches, embraces, kisses, conversations; sex, pleasure, another’s body; togetherness,

contentment, devotion, affection, joy; a future, a shared destiny, a reason to live—all of this seemed
possible. It’s amazing that so many things can be missing, often without any knowledge of their

absence—only madmen have the vision to see what isn’t there. The vast majority of human activity

was, for a moment at least, a little more comprehensible.

John had some ideas for the date. He didn’t want to make it seem like it was too big of a deal,

but he didn’t want to seem lazy or disinterested either. Conversation, of course, had to be possible.

The focus should be on the couple, and not on somebody else’s work, production, or performance.

Most restaurants were designed for this purpose, with the added benefit of a shared meal, which is the

most common human bonding activity; the best restaurants additionally fostered a festive, bountiful

atmosphere, though certain chains like TGI’s perhaps had gone too far in this pursuit. It’s tempting to

look beyond the obvious, to seek out something fun, quirky, or unusual. This is precisely what John was

attempting to do. He loaded up Google Chrome and typed in “date ideas Chicago.” Unsatisfied with the

cheap copy meant to serve targeted Google ads, he searched instead for “date strategy.”

There are some putrid tracts and philosophies on the internet. John was confronted with an

endless supply of training manuals, strategy guides, flow-charts, and methods—especially the methods.

There was the Mystery Method, a step-by-step guide that navigates men through the “nine stages of

seduction,” replete with an arsenal of lines, routines, gambits, and moves to use at every step. To go

into the individual stages would be too much, but we can rest assured that the creator of this method,

Mystery, has seduced hundreds of women and so has a trick to bypass every pitfall and roadblock on the

“Path of Seduction” for the interested practitioner of the “Venusian Arts.” Results and satisfaction are

guaranteed. There was the Fast Seduction method, a compendium of hypnotist’s and magician’s

routines relying on an elaborate branch of pseudoscience called “neuro-linguistic programming” in order

to confound and trick women into bed, and quickly throw them out afterward if necessary. There was

“Double Your Dating,” a set of prescriptions for men who wish to change their attitudes and behaviors

to mimic those of classically attractive men throughout history—the hallmark of this method is the
concept of “cocky and funny,” a style of humor that is simultaneously cocky and funny, which women

are purported to find delightful. There was the Gunwitch method, a style of seduction based on working

yourself into a “sexual state” for a particular woman and putting yourself in close physical proximity

with her until she herself enters a sexual state, at which point she can be isolated and fucked. Under no

circumstances does the seducer eject himself from the situation; Gunwitch’s motto was “Make the ho

say no.” Unfortunately, Gunwitch, the founder of this method, was accused of rape on numerous

occasions and was finally imprisoned when he shot a woman in the face. The circumstances of the

shooting are unknown.

Six o’clock came astonishingly fast; time does fly when you’re plotting. Loaded down with

strategies and various tips and tricks from the internet, John bid Anne farewell (maybe someday he

could try out the methods on her too?), shut down his computer, and left the office. No amount of

strategy can overcome human physiology though—John began to feel a little sick on the elevator ride

down. Obviously all that reading was a bad idea—he had no idea what method would work, or which

was best, or if these things had ever been tested, and now his thoughts were a jumbled mass in his

head, and all this when the anticipation on its own would’ve been crippling. So he felt a little relieved

when he came upon the lobby of his building and April was nowhere to be found. He should have been

crushed; he was happy. What happened to all the stuff about life? His heart rate slowed and his

breathing returned to normal. Well, maybe she was somewhere . . .

He looked everywhere he could think: the bottom floor, the escalators, the elevators, the front

desk, the sofas, the side exists. The lobby was quite large after all, and he was nearsighted. Maybe he

was missing her. There were a number of attractive girls lounging around, but obviously none of them

were April. After ten minutes of this lackadaisical, confused search, one of the security guards asked,

“You looking for something, boss?”

“Yeah, a girl,” John said.

 “Aw man, you get stood up?” the guard said.

“I don’t know. I mean, she was supposed to be here at six. What time is it now?”

The guard glanced at his watch. “Six fifteen. Shiet.”

“Maybe she’s late . . .”

“Could be. Maybe I seen her. What’s she look like?”

“Average height, a little on the shorter side, nice curves, red hair, long hair, she wears bright

clothes, she was wearing green tights and painted shoes earlier today.”

“Man, I would’ve noticed her. I didn’t see no one like that all day.”

“Shit . . . Maybe I’ll wait.”

“Yeah. You know how girls do.” John looked at the guard and grunted something. He stared at

the doors, half-expecting April to walk through. By this point, it didn’t seem likely . . .
Avril
As it would happen, Macy’s was having a special loss prevention training session that day. This

meant that while there were usually two to four loss prevention agents working the entire store, the

entire loss prevention staff was on hand, including a number of interns, trainees, new recruits, and the

regional loss prevention manager for the Midwest area. They were standing in front of a wall of

monitors, going through the basic functions of the closed circuit monitoring system when one of the

trainees happened upon Avril slipping a pair of jeans into her large bag. “Is that something?” the trainee

said.

All of the men—as loss prevention agents are almost always men—looked at the small screen

featuring Avril. “Okay, put that one on the main monitor,” the manager said. “And play it back . . .” The

monitor played back Avril’s act of petty theft in gruesome, life-sized detail. She incriminated herself for

sure; now all that was left was to catch her attempting to leave the store. “Jesus, look at the size of that

bag. I’d say she was syndicate if she was going for something bigger than cheap jeans. Still . . .”

All of the men craned their heads forward. “She’s pretty cute,” one of them said.

“If she really is syndicate, that’s one of their tactics. They use harmless looking girls, fashionable

little sluts who look like rich students. Get used to the type, because it’s more common than you think,”

the manager said. His disciples all nodded and made affirmative sounds. He thought to himself about

the incredible luck of catching a syndicate operation during a training session. Once word of this got

around, he’d be a shoo-in for national, maybe even global. A break like this makes careers . . .

“I’ll bet you anything that bag is full of jewelry or perfume . . . Hell, for a while they were stealing

Crest Whitestrips. The jeans are obviously to cover up the real loot. You,” he said, pointing at the agent

on the system’s controls, “set up a track on her. She’s moving pretty slow.” The agent typed a few

commands into the keyboard and soon the array of monitors showed Avril from every conceivable
angle, from every possible distance. As she moved throughout the store, the monitors followed her and

displayed additional angles as she came into the view of other cameras. It was all done by algorithm,

with as little human input as possible. The philosophy of the software’s designers was, “Leave the

people to do the chasing, we’ll gather the evidence.” Unfortunately, the software’s license cost more

than the salaries of all the men gathered in the room, and the actual incidence of successful loss

prevention hadn’t improved whatsoever since its implementation. It was still true that preventing theft

came down to blind luck, as it happened that day and as it always had been.

“Alright, Johnson, Murphy, take a couple of guys and cover the main exits on the ground floor.

Stay on the radio, we’ll update you if she moves vertically or she goes for a side exit. Actually, she looks

like she likes the side exits, keep a guy on each one. I’ll stay here and teach the kids a thing or two about

loss prevention.” The manager smiled to himself as Johnson and Murphy gathered their men and sallied

forth from the stinky little backroom. It was real commando shit, and all the newbies were clearly

impressed at how exciting it all was. “Hey, what’d you kids think if we brought her back here and had a

little fun after we catch ‘er,” the manager said. All the guys laughed, a few loudly agreed, a few others

were slightly perturbed by the suggestion.

“I like the way she moves,” one of the guys said.

“Yeah . . . She’s a nice one. Little thieving bitch,” the manager said. “Always remember: when

they steal from Macy’s, they’re stealing from you. Every loss bumps down our wage. Sluts like that

don’t have any goddamn morals, they think everything in the world’s sitting there for them to lay their

filthy paws on, for them to take a great big shit all over everything while honest folks suffer. Society

crumbles when people like that get free reign. Then she probably goes home, hands over the merch to

some smirking piece of shit, and waits for him to fuck her up the ass. And like it the whole time.”

As the monitors followed Avril, some of the men did imagine fucking her. They focused on her

ass and legs, the swell of her breasts, her facial expressions. She was an attractive girl, so attractive she
distracted loss prevention professionals from their important work. The manager went on, “Syndicates

are usually run by ethnic groups, Russians or Gypsies, Italians and Chinese sometimes. Once in a while

it’s a bunch of shithead kids, I’d bet anything that’s what it is this time. There is such a thing as the

shoplifting industry; Macy’s loses a million dollars a day thanks to theft, and the vast majority of it is

syndicate. Always remember, an arrest is built on a solid foundation of two pillars: concealment and

intent. We’ve already observed concealment when she dropped the jeans in her bag. Now we’re

waiting for intent—that’s when she leaves the store. Then we nail the bitch.”

“What if she tries to pay?”

“It’s rare . . . That definitely clouds things if they pay for one or two things. That’s important, if

she tries to pay, we let her go. False arrests lead to lawsuits, so remember, we only make the arrest

when the two pillars are rock-solid. Remember that, keep that image in your head, two pillars—

concealment and intent.” The room fell silent for a few moments. The men watched Avril steadily

walking around the store, dropping things in her bag. “There she goes, on and on. It’s a shame, none of

it’s a crime until she tries to leave the store. We know exactly what she’s doing, but we can’t act.” The

manager then got on his radio and said, “Make sure your men are only on the exits. Don’t tail her, she

might get spooked.”

“Got it,” Johnson said through the radio.

The manager continued into the radio: “She’s near the Randolph street exit right now. I want

your men to have a perimeter set up around the store, this is a big one. If she gets away on foot, I’ll fuck

every one of you.” The men fanned out around the store, imagining themselves to be elite soldiers on a

top secret mission. There’s Navy SEALS, Green Berets, SAS, OMON, and then there’s Loss Prevention.

Avril couldn’t have known she was the focus of so much attention and excitement, or that she was

potentially making a man’s career with her petty thievery. “How much do you kids figure’s in that bag?”

the manager said.

 “I don’t know, a thousand bucks?”

“The average syndicate haul is between $7,500 and $10,000 of merchandise,” the manager

recited. “On average, a well-trained syndicate shoplifter will hit five stores in a day. Macy’s is a popular

destination for syndicates, as we’re a prestige retailer and so don’t employ certain draconian security

measures, which can detract from the luxury branding of our locations. As loss prevention specialists,

we are the last line of defense against organized criminal shoplifting rings.” Saying these words filled

him with ascendant pride, and he imagined the trainees and interns were filled with a crude, unformed

sense of duty that would eventually become pride, even if they were only dumb kids for now. Looking

again at Avril on the screen, the manager took the chance to say, “Remember, the key to successful loss

prevention and the avoidance of litigation is constant contact with the shoplifter. Keep your eyes on

them at all times.”

“It’s not that hard with this one,” one of the interns said, to the laughter of the room.

“Okay, okay, cool it, look—she’s heading for an exit.” The manager got on the radio and

shouted, “State Street exit, she’s moving. Thirty seconds!”

The call went out over the radio. This was probably the most excitement on the job in months—

a real syndicate bust! The syndicate shoplifters had so refined their techniques that it was more than a

year since Macy’s had captured one, and more than three years since an actual arrest was made. Last

time around, the arrest didn’t go through due to a physical scuffle; the police on the scene had

witnessed one of Macy’s’ loss prevention agents physically harassing the girl, and the charges were

dropped for fear of a countersuit. The manager probably should have realized that Avril was only an

amateur, given her carelessness and almost too casual demeanor.

Six overeager agents waited outside of the State Street exit for Avril to walk through. The alarm

system would have buzzed, but it was out of order—loss Prevention hadn’t properly connected its

cables. As Avril exited the store, she noticed the group of strange men watching her with aggressive
postures but she had no idea what it meant. She walked a few steps and one of them charged forward,

grabbed her around the shoulders, and shoved her into the wall; the bag fell to the ground and spilled

its contents, nothing more than a densely stacked pile of clothes, along with the Memoir of a Russian

Punk. “Didn’t he say something about jewelry or perfume?” one of the agents said, sifting through the

clothes.

The man who’d tackled her held Avril against the wall and put her in a poorly executed arm bar.

“My arm!” Avril gasped. A piercing pain went through her shoulder. The men surrounded her and went

through her pockets. A few of them took the liberty of touching her, putting their hands on her breasts

and thighs. In that helpless state, with strange men’s hands intrusively exploring her body, her thoughts

and mental state went back to the first time she was raped and she began to cry.

“Look at this, the bitch’s pockets are full of jewelry.” One of the agents took the jewelry she’d

stolen and shoved it in her face.

“I should make you eat it, you cunt.”

“When you steal from Macy’s, you steal from me.”

“How’s it feel to be the victim this time?”

“She thinks she’s hot shit.”

“Those are some tits.”

“I think you can see her pussy through those tights.”

“You’re gonna get what you deserve.” And so on and so on the men said. They didn’t go

beyond touching Avril’s body, opting to wait for the manager to show up. In any case, it’s better not to

go too far in public; they could take care of her later. In five minutes, the manager showed up with the

entire crew of trainees and interns. Two of the veteran agents grabbed Avril by the arms and dragged

her forward, presenting her as a sort of prize to the manager. She had already mostly shut down, only

sobbing and whimpering to herself.

 “Nice work. Gather up all the stuff, it’s evidence. As for you,” he said, putting his hand on

Avril’s chin, “the crying act won’t get you anywhere. We’ve got you on tape, we’ve got you leaving the

store, hell, we’ve even got you putting up a fight and assaulting an employee if that’s what we decide to

put in the police report. You’re going away for a real long time. Come on, fellas.” The manager turned

and triumphantly marched through the store, the men following behind, half dragging and half carrying

Avril by the arms. The procession turned into a sort of parade; the men made sure to make as much

noise as possible and stare down the customers, emphasizing the spectacular nature of their work. It

was disgusting, and it can’t be said for sure why they did it. All we say for sure is it vaguely resembled

something from feudal times, or an age of war, famine, and pestilence: the captured peasant thief on

display in the market square for all the village to see; now all that was left was to chop the hand.
John
John stood alone on the train platform, watching his breath disperse in the chilly night sky. He

was sure something important had happened, but he couldn’t articulate what exactly it was or what it

meant. It seemed like absurdity was the defining characteristic not only of what happened but of his

life. Anything sensible had to be subterranean; it would take a lot of digging, or possibly even a lot of

analysis to identify any sort of narrative or logic. How could April have stood him up? Only a few hours

ago he was contemplating the possibilities of life; now he was on a train platform staring at the tracks,

figuring which one was electrified—of course, you could always jump in front of the train as it

approaches. These thoughts weren’t really anything new. They weren’t dangerous either: he always

contemplated suicide while waiting for the train, and April’s not showing up didn’t particularly influence

him in a more sinister direction than usual. They were idle thoughts; the thoughts about possibility

were gone though, probably forever.

The call came at eight o’clock. He answered without thinking. A slightly robotic man’s voice

greeted him: “This call originates from a prison. This is a collect call. The charge for this call will be four

dollars for the first minute and one dollar for every additional minute. This call is from: *April’s voice:+

‘April.’ *The robotic man’s voice again:+ To refuse this call hang up now, or to accept it press one now.”

John stared down at his phone; whatever was happening, it didn’t seem possible . . . The voice repeated:

“To refuse this call hang up now, or to accept it press one now.”

John squeezed the phone in his hand, considered hanging up for a moment, and then pressed

one. “John?” April said. Her voice didn’t sound quite right; it was meek and small, with no trace of its

previous assertiveness. There was a long pause . . . “Hello?”

“Is this—”
 “It’s me . . .” Shock could have accurately described John’s mental and physical state at that

moment. He’d already indulged all his nihilistic impulses, gone through the purported five stages of

grief, and written off his experience with spontaneously dating strange women as something never to

be repeated again, a valuable learning experience serving to further complete his total isolation from

the world. There was something to be said for solitude, after all. “John? Are you there?” April said.

“Yeah. What, prison? A prison call? Collect?” John sputtered. He was dumbly cycling through

the key words that were coming to his mind. He said, “April?”

“Sorry, you were the only number I had. And they said I only get one call . . .”

Somehow, John processed all of the implications of this information, that April had no family, no

friends, nobody to rely on—in a way, he represented a sort of lifeline to her; she relied on him. It’s not

always possible to toe the line between good and evil—of course, you could do the right thing and help

somebody in need, but there was also the tempting opportunity to take full advantage of the situation,

exploiting the desperation of another person, a beautiful girl in particular, in order to sate your

emotional and sexual impulses. An identical sequence of actions can be imagined in two opposing

lights: first, the hero selflessly plucks the troubled damsel from her predicament, whereupon the two

embrace and together indulge their shared joy; second, the villain cynically profits when he is given the

chance to take a despairing and hopeless girl into his custody, whereupon he demands sexual favors in

return for his meager efforts—in either case, the physical chain of events and the relations between the

two people could be exactly the same. We read far more into intentions than we even realize; who

could have predicted humanity’s moral development would follow a hermeneutic path? We willfully

ignore the simple material facts signified by our words and deeds, for the better to be sure; a true

utilitarian is a simple sociopath, as Zizek observed. However, it’s also been observed that whatever is

done out of love takes place beyond good and evil. Did John love April?

“So you called me,” John said with a grin; he was brimming with joy; he couldn’t help himself.
 “Yeah, sorry it’s so expensive,” April said.

“That’s okay. It’s not like you had a choice, right?” John said. April made an affirmative noise.

“Okay . . . Okay, so you’re in prison.” For all its gravity, the situation suddenly seemed trivial, even

whimsical. “That’s amazing,” he said.

“What?”

“At my job, we just did a project for a bail bondsman. I met him, talked to him, I’ve even got his

number. Those guys work twenty four seven . . . Okay, I need you to tell me what jail you’re at, and

what they set the bond at.”

“Wait, I need—”

“No, it’s really simple, it’s the simplest thing in the world, they walk in, file some papers, and

you’re home free, just like that. Look, I’m gonna bust you out of there . . .”

John’s enthusiasm somewhat infected April. “Okay, um, I’m at Cook County jail. The bond is

$5,000, but I can’t ask you to pay that much money for me.”

“That’s not how it works. I’d only have to pay ten percent or something like that. Look, I can

swing it no problem. You can pay me back afterwards, don’t worry about it.”

“Well . . . Okay.”

“I just need to know your last name so I can tell the bondsman.”

“Fontagne.”

“Alright, April Fontagne.” He smiled, and he could feel her smile through the phone. “Just sit

tight, that’s all you have to do . . .”

“Okay, John . . .” At that moment April felt like a child again. Fittingly, John felt like a man. Yes,

it did feel good to control a situation. In his excitement, John hadn’t even bothered to ask April what

she’d done to land in prison. As far as he was concerned it was irrelevant; he liked her. Do we call it

naiveté on his part, or benevolence?

 What April had tried telling John earlier was she had been raped in the security room of Macy’s.

The manager had done it himself after dismissing the trainees so that he could conduct an “interview.”

If April didn’t seem especially distraught on the phone, it was only because she had long ago come to

accept that evil would be done to her in this world . . . It was a matter of course.
Avril
The manager came inside her. It was the first time he’d had sex in more than three months.

Really, it was surprising that the girl hadn’t put up any resistance or reacted to what was happening. He

had the somewhat morbid thought that this was like fucking a high-class Realdoll, though he’d only ever

a normal Realdoll; his knowledge of the upscale sex doll market was extensive, however—the industry

was evolving, the technology had advanced far beyond Realdolls; now there were life-sized models

made of plastic with a flesh-like consistency, the same thickness, elasticity, weight, and general feel, and

the coup de grace, the true innovation: prosthetic self-lubricating and heating vaginas. At some point, it

can be imagined, these dolls could be upgraded to breathe and respond to external stimuli, perhaps

displaying outward signs of sexual excitement. Unfortunately, even the rudimentary fuck dolls cost in

excess of $25,000, far beyond the pay grade of the manager.

While fucking Avril, he realized he would come too fast and promised himself that he’d keep her

around and fuck her again, but immediately after ejaculating he became disgusted with the lack of an

expression on Avril’s face. He stayed inside of her for a few moments, feeling the walls of her vagina

contract slightly and his semen oozing down and around the shaft of his penis. Really, this wasn’t worth

the potential jail time. He pulled out of her and cursed himself for not using a condom. “Pull your pants

back on,” he said. Avril didn’t respond; she only lay on the floor staring at the same spot on the wall.

“For Christ’s sake, what are you, a kid? You should learn to enjoy yourself.” The manager gruffly pulled

her tights back up from the middle of her thighs and her skirt back up from her ankles. Good as new, he

thought. “Okay, I’m calling the police. You can stay there like that, see if I care . . . Fucking lump.”

When he left the room, Avril moved to the wall and leaned back against it. She wondered how

she would have reacted if all this had happened even a week ago. Back then she was a subject, acting

and projecting force—the world was small, sensible, and tangible enough to hold in her hands. True,
she’d been manic . . . Was that a bad thing? Now she was an object, buoyed by forces and wills far

beyond her comprehension—the world resembled a gargantuan steel machinery, complex and powerful

beyond belief. Avril could feel the beginnings of a long depression coming on. She knew about these,

she was used to them . . . How long would it be this time, eight months, a year? It’s like a massive chunk

of your life simply disappearing. She wondered too if the manager had impregnated her. Maybe that

would be good enough to fundamentally change some aspect of life. Then there was also the possibility

she was going to jail . . .

Some time later the manager and a bored-looking policeman came into the room. “Is that

her?” the policeman said.

“Yeah. We literally had to drag her back here.”

“Okay.” The policeman looked at Avril. He recited her Miranda rights and then said, “He wants

me to take you to Cook County. Do you consent to that?” Avril shrugged her shoulders. “Ma’am,

unless you tell me otherwise, I’m—”

“Who cares what she thinks,” the manager said, interrupting the policeman.

“Excuse me, I took your statement. If you have anything more to say, you can tell it to the

judge.”

“But—”

“You’ll get something in the mail about the court date. Now if you’ll let me make the arrest . . .”

The manager grunted and left the room. Avril looked up at the policeman, a younger guy, about thirty,

or maybe even younger. He had blond hair.

The officer looked down at the girl he was arresting and muttered to himself, “This is insane . . .”

Was it really insane? Avril had been committing a crime after all. The officer asked her, “Will you

answer some questions?” Avril didn’t respond, which annoyed the policeman. He decided to take her
to Cook County Jail after all, though he’d been willing to keep her at the police station, at least until the

arraignment. She looked innocent, that much could be said about her. “Okay then . . . Stand up,

please.” Avril stood up and the policeman put her in handcuffs, taking special care to come across as

gentle and accommodating. While leading her out of the room, he spotted the Memoirs of a Russian

Punk and a wallet sitting on a desk. “Are those your things? You almost left them behind, miss . . .”

After a silent ten minutes in the squad car and while approaching the jail, the idea that Avril

might have been abused came into the policeman’s head. Her behavior just didn’t seem right; it seemed

like she was in shock. Some people don’t expect to be arrested, but it doesn’t strike anybody this badly.

“Ma’am, if you want to make a statement . . . If there’s anything you want to say . . .” Avril again didn’t

respond. “I’m not trying to incriminate you or anything like that. It’s just . . .” The policeman didn’t

continue his thought. He’d never been able to articulate his thoughts very well.

They arrived in the jail’s parking lot. The place didn’t seem that frightening. It was distinguished

from normal bureaucratic structures only by the high fences, barbed wire, and guard towers that could

be seen further back into the campus—this was the maximum security wing. The policeman tried one

last time: “You really don’t want to be processed here. It’s not as bad since the lawsuit, but . . .” He

trailed off.

In the end, the cop did Avril a good turn. He brought her into the jail, possessively holding his

arm around her shoulders as they passed by the inmate traffic going in and out the large doors. All of

them, the suspects, their police escorts, and the prison guards lecherously stared at Avril. One of them,

a guard, began to stick a hand out to pinch her, but got looked off by the policeman. The normal

procedure is to go to holding, where you’ll be put in a pen with up to thirty other inmates until pre-

sentencing; then you’ll be put into another holding cell until you can be processed, at which point you’ll

be photographed and fingerprinted; finally you’ll attend a video bond court with at least a dozen other

suspects, which takes place in the filthy basement of the prison—the inmates appear in court through a
dark, grainy video feed, and on the small black and white monitors in the courtroom the inmates are

easily mistaken for the denizens of hell. This process can take between 8 and 72 hours; until you appear

in bond court you’re technically not a citizen but a highly organized piece of meat waiting for society to

once again legally recognize your existence. You’re treated as such—the Cook County Jail is notable

specifically for its inhuman treatment of inmates. The pieces of meat are provided with a single

individually-wrapped bologna sandwich every eight hours, and in case the single water fountain in the

holding cells breaks, the pieces of meat receive an eight ounce Kool-Aid juice box, usually grape-

flavored. Dehydration is a major issue to this day in Cook County Jail, and an astonishing six percent of

inmates experience seizures while they’re being held. The guards are among the least-trained and least-

paid in the world, and behave accordingly. The lawsuit the policeman had referred to was specifically

aimed at reforming this holding process; it was alleged that correctional officers had raped inmates; that

the food was inedible; that rodent infestation was endemic; that overcrowding bred disease, with

specific references to both staph infections and tuberculosis; that invasive strip searches were often

sexually charged; that medical care was inadequate or nonexistent; and that waiting times were

excessive and constituted cruel and unusual punishment.

The policeman marched Avril past the intake desk and straight to a special processing room,

usually reserved for white collar crimes, major homicides, and celebrity arrests. It’s a contentious issue

that the vast majority of people who receive special processing are white. Due to the preferred

treatment, Avril jumped ahead of 325 inmates and received her bond hearing almost immediately. It

could be said that despite her present unfortunate circumstances, Avril was incredibly privileged. Can

this be attributed to simple luck, the good fortune of being arrested by a kind-hearted policeman? Or is

something more insidious implied, that Avril, as a pretty young white girl, was afforded special

treatment by a deeply corrupt society? It doesn’t seem controversial to say that if Avril were a

homeless, sixty-year-old black man, she would’ve certainly gone through the standard Cook County Jail
inmate processing system. She would’ve been exposed to physical harm, sexual assault, unsanitary

conditions, and 19th-century diseases. Instead, Avril was bailed out by John’s bondsman within an hour.
 John
John waited outside in the bondsman’s car. He’d insisted on coming along, despite the

bondsman’s insistence that this was a “rough neighborhood.” The bondsman had accepted the job

without any qualifications and without taking any collateral because he’d been impressed with the

grade of young professionals he’d met in John’s office—they’d all seemed young, rich, attractive, smart,

and stable. If he’d known that April wasn’t John’s girlfriend but a mentally unstable girl John had just

met that day, he never would have accepted the business. In the likely event that the maniac missed

the court date, the bondsman would be stuck for the entire amount of the bail and be forced into the

relatively unsavory business of bounty hunting. But without any information to the contrary, the

bondsman’s assumption was that John’s girlfriend was a dizzy kleptomaniac, a rich girl who was too

dumb to even shoplift properly. It was a natural enough assumption to make; we shouldn’t take

anything from the bondsman for making it.

All around there was a constant parade of police cruisers going in and out of the parking lot,

shuttling what seemed to be an endless stream of arrestees into the prison. It’s amazing to think how

much crime there is in a metropolis of more than three million; then again, it’s not like this in every part

of the world. Cook County Jail houses approximately 10,000 prisoners today and once hosted many

more. By contrast, the entire French prison system only has capacity for 58,000 prisoners in the entire

nation. There are only 4,000 prisoners in all of Ireland; are there really more than twice as many

criminals in the Chicago area than there are in all Ireland? In this respect, the United States resembles

Russia or China—those inhuman nations—more than the nations we consider to be more civilized—in

fact, the United States imprisons more people at a higher rate than the GULAG system in the USSR ever

did. There are 92,000 juvenile prison inmates in the United States, and 90,000 prisoners in all of Poland.

It’s hard to believe that we consider our juvenile population to be more criminal than all the men,
women, and children of Poland. John looked at the men being dragged into the jail closely and was

reminded of BB King’s album, Live in Cook County Jail, performed in 1971. That was a great album. It

represented popular music’s capacity for spectacle, though ultimately it didn’t deliver a great blow

against the United States’ cultural hegemony. Perhaps the concert was not violent enough; perhaps

they should have opened the gates of the prison afterward, for the injustice of the prison system in the

US has only worsened since the early 1970s, and popular music has been further incorporated into the

cultural logic and is less capable of delivering truly subversive messages. Still, the photograph on the

cover was a classic, featuring BB with his semi-hollow Gibson ES-355 guitar performing in front of the

imposing architecture of the prison. We imagine that his audience, the murderers, rapists, thieves,

muggers, arsonists, and so on were delighted for the chance to hear live blues music at its best. The live

recording is worth a listen. The most convenient way to purchase the album is through Amazon MP3,

ITunes, or by a monthly subscription to Rhapsody.com. Please don’t steal music—support your artists.

In a few minutes, the bondsman and April emerged from the jail, walking almost arm in arm.

April seemed frightened. John perked up; his heart pounded. The sight of April was almost too much,

particularly after an entire day’s worth of psychic terror and neurotic anxiety. It was probably lucky that

things had taken such a strange turn; it’s easier for an alienated person to behave correctly in a strange

and unprecedented situation than a socially acceptable situation. At least this way, there was no wrong

way to act, though you did have to rely on your wits to some degree. John hopped out of the car and

quickly approached April and the bondsman. The bondsman took April’s arm at the elbow and slightly

pulled her forward. “Here she is, kid,” he said.

“Thanks so much,” John said. He looked at the bondsman and then at April. She regarded him

with a slight smile. John wasn’t sure what to say; he looked her over—she had clearly been crying, her

clothes were messy. She still held that book. “So you held onto that Russian punk book through it all,

huh?” John said.

 April glanced down at the book. “Oh, yeah . . . The policeman caught it at the last second. Look

. . . I don’t know how to thank you,” April said. She stepped forward with some consternation, and then

moved forward and hugged John. He stiffened up only a little bit, and then accepted the hug, which was

probably a bit overzealous given the situation and their relationship—full body to body, genital to

genital. John couldn’t tell how long she hugged him; first he smelled the flesh of her shoulder and neck,

and the slightly greasy scent of her hair; then he took in the full press of her body, the firmness of her

abdomen and thighs, the softness of her breasts, and finally he became aware of her pulse, which

quickened along with his. He was a little excited; April didn’t seem to notice.

When they broke apart, the bondsman said, “I’ll let you two kids sit in the back. What was your

address again?”

John told him, and then he and April piled into the backseat of the bondsman’s old BMW. The

ride was uneventful. There didn’t seem to be any words to exchange, none of any importance at least.

April moved closer to John through the ride, first resting her leg next to his, then scooching over so they

sat thigh to thigh, then resting her head on his shoulder. She seemed to be extraordinarily tired, beaten

down by the world even. “I don’t know how to thank you,” April said again, almost whispering.

“Don’t worry about it . . .”

“I’d still be in there . . .” April whispered. These were the only words that were exchanged.

John couldn’t quite tell if she was sleeping. Her breath was readily apparent in her body; her chest and

shoulders rose and fell with an easy rhythm. From time to time, the bondsman snuck a glance at the

two of them in the rearview mirror and smiled. He kept thinking about what sweet kids they were.

Usually the job was hellacious—you dealt with hysterical families, crazed drug addicts, violent

sociopaths, and you almost always had to coerce them into paying. At least he made enough now that

he could hire the bounty hunters out instead of doing it himself. This bail would haul in a nice fee too,

the bondsman thought. All in all, this was what made the job worth it—this and the money.
 The car stopped in front of John’s building. “Okay kids, here we are. I guess you’re going up

together?” the bondsman said.

April didn’t respond; actually, she didn’t react to his voice at all—she seemed t o be totally at

peace, though she clearly wasn’t sleeping. “Um . . . Yeah, I guess so,” John said.

“Well, she has another address on her ID, that’s all. So the two of you live together?” the

bondsman said.

“Oh. Uh, sure, yeah,” John said. It seemed easier this way. April looked too messed up and

tired to let her go home alone, anyway, and it would be too much effort to explain to the bondsman

what was really going on. “Yeah, we’re going up together.”

“Alright. Now listen, your girlfriend’s had a rough day, I won’t wake her, but I’m relying on you

to relay this information and make sure everything is handled smoothly. There’ll be a court date.

Something will come in the mail to me and to your girlfriend’s address. I’ll add yours to the court

register, since you live together. I expect it’ll come in a few weeks or so, maybe a little more, and the

court date will be some time in the next two to six months—they work slow like that. It’s nothing

serious, just an arraignment, and any time between now and then you and your girlfriend need to figure

out how you want to handle this legally. I can’t tell you anything other than that you should get a

lawyer. What I can tell you though is not to miss the court date. Got that? If she doesn’t show up, I’m

on the hook for the entire bail, and I’m comin’ after you, and I carry a gun.” The bondsman laughed.

“Just joking, I don’t expect any problems, hey?”

“Sure,” John said, a little worried about the bondsman’s joke.

“Great. Stay safe, and tell your girlfriend to try to stay out of trouble, alright?” the bondsman

said with a big smile on his face.

“Yeah,” John said.

 “Then I’ll let you two kids go.” The bondsman pressed a button on the dashboard and the door

on John’s side opened.

John lightly shook April’s shoulder. “Hey, April, hey, we’re here. Come on, let’s go . . .”

April’s eyes blinked open and she shook her head. She seemed to be surprised by her

surroundings. “Oh . . . Okay.” She reluctantly let go of John’s hand, which she’d been holding, and

started feeling around the car’s backseat for her wallet and book. Her movements were dazed and

slow.

“Find your stuff okay?” John said, stepping out of the car.

“Yeah. Hold on,” April said. She began to climb out of the car, stopped, and held her hand out.

John regarded it with confusion for a moment and then took it; the damp warmth surprised him. She

smiled at him and stepped out. John closed the BMW’s door behind her. The bondsman nodded to him

and sped away.

They silently stood together for a while, watching the car disappear. The night seemed to be

exceptionally dark and quiet. There was a chill in the air despite the slight humidity. April moved closer

to John. “Well, this is where I live . . . You can stay for the night, my roommate won’t mind. There’s a

pretty nice couch, you know, that is, you could sleep on it . . . Or I could.”

“Can we just go inside? It’s cold,” April said.

“Sure, yeah.” John walked up to the door of the building. For a moment it seemed like April

wanted to walk arm in arm, but he only noticed once he’d started walking. She followed closely behind.

“This neighborhood’s not so bad, despite what the hysterical yuppies write on Yelp,” John said,

unlocking the door. He immediately regretted saying it, though he couldn’t say why.

“Oh,” April said.

“I’m on the second floor,” he said. April went in ahead of him. It seemed disrespectful, but John

couldn’t help noticing the way April’s ass and thighs worked climbing the stairs. Well, it was right there
in his face. How could you not notice it . . . He unlocked the door and let April in, saying, “Here we are.”

He quickly scanned the inside and was slightly disappointed that his roommate wasn’t home. Her door

was wide open, so she wasn’t sleeping either. It had been a long time since he’d brought a girl home.

The place wasn’t nearly as messy as it would have been if John lived alone. Since his roommate

wasn’t messy, he felt a general sense of obligation to keep things relatively clean himself. “Nice place,”

April said.

“Yeah, it’s not so bad.” April walked in and looked around, staring for a while at the old

television in the corner of the room. “Yeah, that’s like from the early 90s. It doesn’t even work.” John

had never articulated the notion, but the old, non-working television in the living room seemed to be a

sort of anti-consumerist, anti-capitalist statement, otherwise he or his roommate would have thrown it

out long ago. “There’s the couch. It’s, uh, not bad. You can sleep on it for a while, the only problem is

you get kind of sweaty after a while. I could get you some sheets or something, I don’t know . . .”

“This place is really homey, I like it,” April said.

“Yeah, the atmosphere is mostly thanks to my roommate though. It was like this when I moved

in.”

“Oh, you’ve got a roommate?”

“Yeah, she’s not here right now though. Too bad. Her name’s Mel, well, Melinda really.”

“That explains a lot,” April said, laughing. John wasn’t sure what she meant. April ran her hands

through her hair and said, “Do you mind if I clean up a little?”

“Oh, sure . . . The bathrooms right over there. Do you want anything to drink? I bought this

cappuccino thing a while ago, and there’s tea, I don’t know, Mel’s got a lot of wine and stuff too, hard

alcohol, she likes Johnnie Walker black, at least I think that’s what it is.”

“No, that’s okay,” April said. She walked to the bathroom and closed the door behind herself.
 John listened to the faucet start up in the bathroom. Alone for the moment, he wasn’t sure

what to do with himself. Normally, that is if he was truly alone and a girl wasn’t here, he would have

gone to his room and turned on the computer. But that didn’t seem appropriate, no, it didn’t seem

appropriate at all. He sat down on the couch and thought to himself. It was still early, barely ten

o’clock, and a Friday night at that. There was no way he could get to sleep. Maybe he could take April

out to get something to eat, or they could talk . . . Or what? What else was there to do? No matter

what else, it seemed like it might be prudent to talk to April about the court dates, especially in light of

the bondsman’s comment about the gun. In this way also, it appeared that John and April’s fates would

be inexorably linked for the foreseeable future. Something in this made John happy, despite that the

link implied a great deal of stress and negativity—but what was this in comparison to whatever John felt

in the car? With April snuggled next to him, something deep inside slowed down, the world stopped

with its furious spinning for a single sublime moment, the webs of anxiety in his head melted away; it

could have been called serenity. Then there was the matter of the shoplifting; the bondsman assured

John that a lot of young girls do it, only most don’t get caught, and that he shouldn’t worry about his

girlfriend, that this will be a good lesson for her. John wasn’t so sure about that—at the very least, there

was nothing really worth stealing in the apartment.

April stuck her head out from the bathroom and said, “Do you think your roommate would mind

if I borrowed some clothes?”

“Uh . . . Actually, I think she might. She’s like, well, I wouldn’t risk it . . .”

“Okay, I’ll wear yours then.”

“Mine? Like what?”

“I don’t know, some shorts, a t-shirt. Anything, it’s up to you,” April said and laughed.

John jumped to his feet; it seemed that April was back to attacking his safe little bubble. “Let

me see what I’ve got . . .” John ran to his room and dug through the shelves. Some pajama bottoms?
Boxer shorts? Basketball shorts seemed like a nice compromise between prude and indecent. He pulled

am old, black, embarrassing Tool t-shirt from the back of his drawer as well, and made his way back out

to the living room. “Okay, tell me if this stuff works,” John called out. “I haven’t got any, like, women’s

panties, so, yeah . . .”

“I didn’t think you would,” April said and stepped out of the bathroom. Was that supposed to

mean something? She had stripped down to her leggings, pulled high up to her waist, and her bra,

which was clearly too small and barely held in her breasts. April’s state of undress spooked John a little.

He had no idea how to react—it would be ridiculous to look away, she wasn’t naked after all, but how

much would he give away by staring lecherously down at her body? John’s eyes did drift down; he

noticed her vagina showed through her tights, her stomach was perfectly flat, and her breasts were, in a

word, beautiful. John realized he might have been able to move forward and put his hands on her

breasts, kiss her, run his hands down the small of her back and over her ass; but he didn’t, it almost

seemed out of the question. He quickly looked back up at her face. April was smiling, not embarrassed

in the least; she took the clothes from him. “Thanks,” she said and went back into the bathroom, closing

the door behind herself.

John caught a fleeting glance of April’s feet, which he couldn’t help thinking were impossibly

sexy. He took a deep breath. Okay, he thought, it’s time to get a grip, you’re twenty-four years old, girls

shouldn’t have an effect on you like this. You’re an adult, right? He paced back and forth, slowly making

his way back to the living room and the couch; he could hear April’s movements from inside the

bathroom from time to time. If he had a braver constitution, he probably would have held his ear to the

door, and stared down at the crack at the bottom of the door, since the bathroom light cast a slight

shadow out into the hall—he might have been able to catch a glance of something, a titillating

movement or body part. Instead, he sat down on the couch and waited. The bath and the shower in
the bathroom started for a moment, stopped, and started again. What the hell was she doing? John

was struck by the temptation to root through her wallet and find out more about her . . .

April finally emerged from the bathroom, dressed only in the Tool t-shirt and basketball shorts;

it was clear she had on nothing underneath. Something about the outfit and her demeanor in it was

irresistibly sexy, cute, and energetic in its strange synthesis of boyishness and girlishness. The clothes

were too big, which made her arms and lower legs seem ridiculously thin, but her breasts and hips

brushed lightly against the loose fabric. John resisted the urge to comment on how cute he thought she

was. She probably would have gladly accepted the compliment. “I soaked what I was wearing in the

bathtub with some soap, I hope you don’t mind,” April said.

John looked at her funny. “We’ve got laundry machines here, you know,” he said.

“Oh . . . That’s how I usually do my own laundry, so . . .” April lied. How are you supposed to tell

somebody that you were raped earlier and want to wash the semen off your clothes without their

noticing?

“No, that’s okay. It’s cool.”

April paused for a moment and then sat next to John on the couch, tucking her legs under

herself. John took her physical proximity strangely; he seemed to flinch, or at least he seemed to do

everything possible to stop himself from flinching. April touched him on the shoulder. It was hard to tell

if this calmed him or made him more nervous. “I want to thank you again for everything you did . . . I

mean, you don’t even know me, I’m just this crazy girl . . . It has to feel like I’m intruding, right?” April

said.

“I don’t know. Not really,” John said.

“Usually a guy does things for a girl because he thinks it’ll get him laid. I can’t figure you out,”

April said and lightly pushed John on the shoulder.

I’m a fuck-up, John thought. “Well . . .”

 “And the whole thing with the bondsman . . . You’re like, my hero,” April said. She couldn’t tell

herself if she was being serious or not.

“No, it’s nothing. I would have done it for anyone, really . . .” This was clearly a lie; John

wouldn’t have done it for anyone. He realized this right away: “I mean, anyone who’s my friend. I felt

like I knew you . . .” There was a pause, and a silence for a while. April looked at him and smiled,

somewhat crookedly. Again, John had the feeling he could have kissed April, pulled the Tool shirt off,

and things would have proceeded effortlessly. “Look, I was gonna ask if you wanted to go get

something to eat, but now you’re undressed, it’d be ridiculous . . . Do you want me to go get something?

Or we could order . . .”

“No, that’s okay,” April said and fell silent. Yes, she’d been traumatized, and she was feeling

slightly nervous and disoriented, but in a way she did want John to touch her, kiss her, do something, at

least. She couldn’t predict exactly how she’d react; she’d probably let him fuck her. It seemed the

natural thing to do. “Do you know why I talked to you, at first?”

“Why’s that?” John said, genuinely interested.

“You have an interesting face, it’s beautiful, exotic in a way, but familiar too. You struck me

right away . . .”

“I think you’re beautiful too,” John said. That seemed like a major step . . . John never

complimented anybody . . .

“No, I’m just plain, average, but you’re like an alien.” April touched him on the shoulder again.

“I mean, not in a bad way, but in a way like . . . You should be preserved.” April laughed and went on,

“Oh my god, I’m embarrassing myself.”

“No, that’s okay,” John said, smiling in spite of himself. It did feel nice to have your ego gratified

...

“I mean, you—”
 John’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his pocket and looked at the caller ID—it was his boss.

“Oh, Christ . . . Hold on,” he said. He answered the phone. “Hey, Stephen.”

“John. Sorry if I’m interrupting anything, I’m still at the office. These batches of results are

taking longer than I’d expected. Can you come in tomorrow morning at eight? The sorted results need

to go out before two in the afternoon.”

The way Stephen phrased the question made it clear there was no choice in the matter. “One

second,” John said. He held the phone in his hand and looked up at April, who watched him intently. He

covered the phone’s mouthpiece and loudly sighed. “Yeah, no problem Stephen” he said.

“Great. See you tomorrow morning,” Stephen said and hung up.

John stared down at the phone. “That was my boss. I need to go into work tomorrow at eight.”

“Do you usually work on the weekends?” April said.

“Well, not usually . . . The way it works is it’s usually casual, but during a special project, they’ve

got you on call pretty much any time. It’s not a bad deal, usually I don’t mind . . .”

“Can’t you tell him you’ve already worked enough?”

“Theoretically, yeah, but like I said—”

“Or he could call somebody else. What a prick,” April said indignantly.

“No, he’s not a bad guy, really . . .”

“Sorry, I don’t want to seem crazy, and I don’t know you, but it’s like, you’re so caught up in all

the shit . . . I mean, you just gave up your weekend like it was nothing at all.”

John wasn’t sure how to respond. It was true that he gave it up without any protest, but he’d

never placed a lot of value on weekends in the past anyhow. It was just a lot of time to kill . . . Still, it felt

good to have somebody sticking up for him like this, and this time maybe he should have argued, after

all, he had a girl over, she was sitting right next to him . . . “Anyway, they pay me a lot to come in on the

weekend,” he said.
 “It’s wrong. You’re a young guy, it’s like they’re trying to sap you. Don’t you get any time to

yourself?”

Time to myself, that’s exactly the problem, John thought. He stood up and said, “Uh, look, if I’m

going to go in tomorrow I need to set my alarm, brush my teeth, get some things done.” In the back of

his head, something seemed to click—he recognized it as the routine coming back; instantly, all of the

chaos and disorder with April became incredibly dull, sensible even. Suddenly things were simple, and

something like a plan began to formulate in his head, a way to manage time, April, and this entire affair.

“Give me a minute. I’ll get you some sheets, pillows, a blanket, you can sleep on the couch. I need to

catch up on my own sleep, I worked last Sunday, and I’m already way behind on sleep. It’s kind of late.”

John walked over to the closet on the other side of the apartment in order to get some sheets.

April stood up and followed him, shuffling with her bare feet on the hardwood floor. She

seemed to be slightly panicked. “I’m sorry, John, wait.” He turned around and she went on, “I shouldn’t

have judged how you run your life. I’m the one who’s all messed up . . .”

“No, you’re fine, I just really do need to sleep. Listen, I’ll help you deal with the bail and the

court date and all of that tomorrow, it’s no problem.” John had taken on a business-like tone. He

realized it might come off as anger or that he was offended to April, but this way, with things being

pushed out of the emotional and personal space, the entire situation was easily manageable. The

potential for a violent event—granted, in the form of a sexual encounter—had seemingly disappeared

entirely from the apartment. This way, everything would be as simple as, for instance, going into work

in the morning. “Okay?” John said.

“Okay . . . ,” April said. She didn’t know what to think. The phone call had seemingly changed

him entirely—or maybe it was something she said? In truth, the likeliest explanation was this was

simply the way he was and his behavior up until this point in the day had been extremely aberrant by his

own standards.
 John turned and went to the closet. He came back with an armful of blankets and sheets and

mechanically passed by April. Spreading the sheets out, he said, “This should do for one night. I guess

you’re pretty tired, after everything that happened today; you were practically dead asleep in the car.

Yeah, it’ll be good enough.” He wasn’t sure if he entirely trusted April to be in the house alone during

the day; probably Mel wouldn’t be good with it either. He thought that he might have to kick April out

in the morning, for the day at least. That would be pretty awkward.

“Yeah, it’ll be fine,” April said. She was sure now she said something to piss him off; she

admonished herself for her stupid, unhinged behavior. She’d probably never know what exactly she

said that turned him off. “Again, thanks a lot. I don’t know . . .” She cut the thought off and tried to hug

him. He moved his body back a little bit, so she only lightly wrapped her arms around his for a moment.

Their relationship’s dynamic had taken an almost miraculous turn for the worse . . .

“Yeah,” John said and retreated into his room. It was much messier in there than the living

room; it’s a good thing she didn’t see in here, he thought. He turned his computer on and changed out

of his clothes as it booted up. He impatiently checked his email and a couple of his regular sites. He

loaded AIM and Google Talk; a number of offline messages had come in. He looked over who was online

and felt an overwhelming eagerness to tell the story of his crazy day to a few of the people he regularly

chatted with—how utterly strange, considering the principle subject of the story was in the next room

over, and the story still was in the process of unfolding; perhaps his zeal to relay the story through a

textual medium to a faceless online contact suggested a major theme in the story. John even realized

this much, and turned the computer off with some shame, not even taking the time to read the

messages he’d received while offline.

He went back out to the living room on his way to the bathroom in order to brush his teeth.

April sat up and smiled at him as he passed; she noticed he was wearing only his underwear now, boxer

shorts and a wifebeater. He was incredibly muscular—his body flexed and contracted as he walked,
giving the sense of a great deal of movement. April felt an urge to tell him that he was a sexy boy

despite his overall weirdness, but she became intimidated. John nodded and smiled back at her, but

didn’t say anything. John spent an inordinately long time brushing his teeth, wondering what the hell

was going wrong with him and looking at April’s clothes floating in the bathtub. He spit the foamy water

and saliva out of his mouth and noticed a great deal of blood—he’d nicked his gum. “Shit,” he said.

Smacking his lips, the taste of the blood seemed extraordinarily strong; it even made him a little dizzy.

He swished water around his mouth and spit it out until there was no more blood. April said, “Good

night,” as John passed by on the way back to his room.

He stopped and said, “Well, good night. I’ll see you in the morning, I have to get up pretty early,

especially since the buses and trains run slower on the weekend.” April made a kind of tentative,

affirmative noise. John went into his room, closed the door, and turned off the light. He set his alarm

for 6:30, enough for about seven hours of sleep and enough time in the morning to get ready. Now the

world had order; because of this, an incredible wave of comfort and relaxation washed over John’s

entire being. The only problem was John never really had liked the order of the world . . . Why was he

so insistent on maintaining it? He climbed into bed, angry at himself for blindly enforcing the order of

things, for warming to his torment, for embodying so completely a sad scenario Dolan once wrote:

“Imagine a prisoner condemned to be tortured to death, huddling in a cell waiting for the next call to

the bloody floor where his teeth are extracted, one by one. One day someone slips a knife under the

door of his cell. For the first time, he has the option of ending a life of pain. And, like a true slave, he

throws the knife away in horror, hands it over to the guards so that he may continue to be dragged out

and tortured at their pleasure.” Maybe John simply enjoyed his isolation.
 About an hour later, as he was entering the deeper stages of sleep, the door to John’s room

opened, there were footsteps, and a weight threw off the balance of his bed. Something touched him

on the leg . . . “John!” April whispered.

“What . . . ,” he said, barely conscious.

“I’m cold . . .” John didn’t respond. “Can I come up there with you . . .” John grunted something,

and April climbed up onto the bed. She crawled somewhat awkwardly next to him and rested her head

on his chest, put her arm around him, and pulled her legs up, pressing them slightly into his abdomen.

There was an incredible closeness, an incredible tenderness in her gesture, almost that of a child’s; John

shifted slightly and his arm came to rest on April’s shoulder.

They lay like this and time seemed to stretch, arc, and curve on an infinitely extending plane

that obliterated the present moment, destroyed the past, made the future superfluous, that ended the

cycle of becoming and faintly suggested the possibility that they could be a single being. Neither body

stirred; and somehow, this was good. April couldn’t believe it, but she felt safe, calm even. Usually a

sense of paranoia gripped April as she tried to sleep, and she would slowly become aware of menacing

sounds, flashing lights, aches in her body—she would regularly black out and just as soon jolt back into

consciousness, panic-stricken and terrified, until eventually she was overcome by an uneasy, nightmare-

plagued sleep; but now, aware of the heat of John’s body spreading through her limbs, the world slowly

faded away as she watched the steady rhythm of John’s chest rising and falling.

It’s true that John did wake up at some point during April’s incursion. She wasn’t excessively

graceful or stealthy about it, but even then it’s hard to ignore a body coming into intimate contact with

you like that. The fact is that it felt good, intensely and insanely good; he wasn’t fully awake, nor was his

cognitive functioning at its full capacity, but something deep inside—an animal sense perhaps—

decisively affirmed the arrangement. John had been sleeping alone for so long that it had to be

affecting him in some way. The solidity of another body, sharing a bed with another living creature,
another animal’s breath and scent—it had all been missing for so long . . . It was almost enough to make

him weep. They write songs about it—there are hundreds, probably thousands of pop songs about

sleeping alone; artists fixate on it, and most people at least think about it from time to time. Looking

over the lyrics of personalities as diverse as Moby, Cher, Paul Anka, and Natasha Khan, we can see that

the common themes include loneliness, darkness, atomization, the sense of touch (or loss thereof), and

the general hope that none of us should ever be forced to sleep alone. Eventually John drifted into a

restful sleep.

At about six, the sun began to rise; John’s room faced east and the sun shone right in every

morning. April wasn’t used to it—the sun got in her eyes and irritated her. She partially woke up, got

her bearings; she felt slightly sweaty, a little damp. Neither of them had moved all night, their bodies

had stayed in constant contact, perhaps even excessively so—their breathing was perfectly synced; their

bodies were so close that it would have been hard to determine where one ended and the other began.

April moved her knee and felt John’s erect penis through his underwear. Guys get morning wood, it’s

natural, she thought, it probably doesn’t even have anything to do with me. In a way, considering they

were one body, this was her erection too; she couldn’t help but to look down at the cock straining

against the fabric of the boxers—it looked kind of pleasant. She moved her knee, touched it again. It

was especially stiff. She looked up at John’s face; the soft sunlight dulled the sharp angles in his face, he

looked nice, he seemed to be at peace. April reached down and touched it, felt its shape in her hand,

and then pulled his underwear down; the cock sprang up, wobbling back and forth. The light from

outside beamed over it, lending it something like a holy quality; never before had a penis seemed

beautiful to April. She still wasn’t sure if it could be described as beautiful, but the sight of it gave her a

positive feeling at least. At that moment, she understood somewhat what other people meant when

they talked about penises being gleaming monuments erected out of desire . . . idols, towers, spectacles,

objects of worship . . . She brushed her fingers against the head, pressing lightly into the smooth, milky
skin; the penis reflexively twitched and John’s body contracted a little. Encouraged, she ran her hand

over the shaft and gave the head a little squeeze.

Suddenly, John bolted upright. He seemed disoriented, confused . . . “What . . . ,” he said.

“April?” April didn’t say anything; she barely even reacted when he jumped. She squeezed his penis

again and jerked it off a little; at the new angle, with John sitting up, the penis seemed a little less

exciting, less virile. She moved closer and brought her face closer to his. He was breathing heavily; April

kissed his chest and continued to jerk him off—she could feel his heart beating in his chest, and she

gradually became aware of his pulse in his penis as well. As April pulled her face away from his chest,

John looked down at her. He still seemed disoriented . . . “What are you doing?” he said.

That was a dumb thing to say. What does it look like I’m doing, April thought. She lowered

herself and adjusted her body, trying to look as seductive as she knew how, which meant that her back

was arched and her ass was sticking up in the air. She put her lips on the head of John’s cock; it

twitched, it was pleasantly warm in her mouth, only slightly warmer than her internal temperature.

John closed his eyes, and his head fell back a little—it seemed possible that he would give himself up to

the pleasure of the situation. April took the penis deeper into her mouth, pulled her head back, licked

the shaft and the head, and then put it back into her mouth and lowered her head all the way to the

base. She held her breath a little and felt the inside of her mouth and throat close around the cock,

engulfing it completely. She lightly held his testicles in her hand and repeated the movement; John

clenched the muscles in his legs and abdomen more with every motion, making little sounds now and

then, mewls and moans, sharp inhalations followed by infantile sighs. At some point, without any

warning, a spasm ran through his body and he thrust his pelvis forward.

April’s head jerked back slightly, but she kept his penis deep in her mouth as he came, closing

her lips tightly around it as it contracted. At the first contraction, the semen forcefully struck the back of

her throat, and then came bursting out in heavy gushes, finally dribbling out slowly and falling onto her
tongue as the contractions weakened. April gave a little cough, and a bath of saliva and semen poured

from her mouth and onto John’s cock. She started laughing a little, at the incredible amount of fluid

really, as well as the motions of John’s lower abdomen, the muscles dramatically pushing against the

skin as he caught his breath, creating the somewhat ridiculous image of a close shot of an excited stud

horse’s heaving abdominal wall. Still laughing, she began to lick the fluid off of John’s penis.

John felt weak, but not so weak that he couldn’t perceive a potential threat to his ego. “What’s

so funny?” he said. Until she started laughing, he’d been feeling something like a combination of bliss

and infinite gratitude for this girl, a floating sensation replete with soft, heavenly lights and dreamy,

fluffy clouds. He could get used to this; he’d actually been able to let go of himself for a moment.

“When’s the last time you came?” April said without looking up.

“Uh . . .”

“You spouted off like a firehose,” she said. “At least you taste good.”

Christ, John thought. “I don’t think anybody’s ever told me how I taste before . . .”

“Well,” April said. She kissed his penis then crawled forward on the bed, pulled his shirt up, and

began kissing his stomach. “Everything about you is beautiful . . . I want you all for myself.” John looked

down at April; he didn’t really understand what she’d said. Either from a lack of self esteem, or a simple

inability to comprehend female desire or aesthetics, John couldn’t allow for the possibility of somebody

else finding him beautiful. For a moment he was embarrassed that he’d mistaken April for Mel at first—

what did that mean? He put his hands on April’s head and ran his fingers through her hair; he looked

over her body and thought about how sexy she looked in his clothes. Strangely, John still felt bashful

about looking at her, like there was something lecherous about staring too long at a woman’s body.

As April worked her way up, now kissing John’s nipples and feeling the outlines of his pectoral

muscles, John tried to think of something to say. He was getting excited again. He put his hand on one

of April’s breasts and gripped it for a moment. It came as a slight surprise that she didn’t protest at all;
in fact, she moaned a little. He ran his hand down her side, pausing momentarily at the curve of her

waist and hip. Suddenly, the alarm he’d set for 6:30 blasted. John jumped straight up, turning his body

to get out of bed and nearly kneeing April in the face—the alarm was exceptionally loud and John had

trained himself to jump out of bed instantly; it was reflex. He dashed across the room and shut it off. So

refined was his instinct for silencing the alarm that he didn’t give a single thought to April, and neither

did he account for the circumstances or state of his body. Standing over the alarm, John’s knees gave

out, the muscles in his legs suddenly useless. He caught himself on the desk and bent over. “Oh, shit,”

he said to himself.

April sat up on the bed. To her surprise, she had been getting genuinely aroused during the

blowjob. She only realized it when John touched her hair; something ran through her body, an

electricity of sorts, and suddenly she wanted to be touched more. She couldn’t remember the last time

she’d wanted to be touched; usually, a man’s touch filled her with unease, a tingling of the bad sort that

sometimes grew out of control and became an itch, a cold sweat, tremors. Most of the time though she

was simply ambivalent toward sex, it was one of life’s offerings that she could take or leave. Even when

she was manic, she couldn’t say why she fucked so many people; maybe it was simply the ultimate way

you could relate to another person, the most extreme act that was possible outside of murder. She

wasn’t manic now though—how could she explain what she was doing with John, and why she was

aroused? April was shocked too by John’s violent reaction to the alarm; he’d nearly hit her. Now she

watched him as his knees buckled—it was cute. “What are you doing?” she said, laughing.

John turned around, leaned back on the desk, and pulled his underwear up. The image of April

on the bed—his bed—was amazing to him. He contrasted it with the grind of showering, getting

dressed, spending an hour on the bus and train, another eight hours at his desk in his backbreaking

chair, shuffling meaningless data in Excel, and finally the commute back home. He had no use for it

today, either for the mind numbing boredom or the pointless exhaustion. He worked long hours—it was
melodramatic, he knew, but most days he got into the office the sun was high in the sky, and by the

time he left the sun was sinking under the horizon; staring out the window from the 40th floor as the

hours passed, he got the sense that he was witnessing the day slowly dying. “Fuck it,” John said.

“Fuck it?” April said.

“Work—fuck it, I’m not going in.”

“Can you do that?”

“I don’t know, really. It’s the weekend, they won’t take it from me, just like you said.” John

sprinted back to his bed and jumped on top of April. She shrieked and laughed, and they rolled over one

another. She kissed him on the mouth, slipped her tongue into his mouth; it felt good.
Avril
It was noon, Monday. Avril lay in bed alone, drifting in and out of sleep. John had left for work;

he’d decided to go into work after all. It was one thing, he said, to blow off the weekend and make up

an excuse, but it was another thing entirely to also not come in on Monday. Avril wondered if that was

a good or a bad sign for their relationship; at least he wasn’t too clingy, but then maybe it meant he

didn’t want her as badly as it seemed. Avril pushed the thoughts from her head and sat up, vaguely

aware that wanting him to stay home on Monday was a sign that she was clingy herself. Well, what’s so

bad about that?

Avril walked out of John’s room. Good—the roommate wasn’t home. What was her name?

Monica, Melanie, something like that. She got really mad about the clothes in the bathtub, left a passive

aggressive note for John about it, screamed at him about it later. Fuck her . . . What, was she jealous?

She’d probably had her chance many times before. Looking around the house, Avril realized that John

had absolutely no mementoes to speak of—that is, there were no pictures, letters, papers, or anything

of that nature to speak of; he may as well not have existed. The roommate didn’t have much of

anything either. Who were these people? Avril had managed to at least keep some journals and

pictures, despite not having any sort of permanent residence. That reminded her—she was glad he let

her stay for the day and the weekend; she didn’t want him to see the dingy hostel where she was

staying. In fact, they were probably wondering where she was, since she washed dishes and cleaned up

for a couple of hours a day in order to stay there for free. Anyway, it didn’t matter too much, screw

them.

Avril went to the kitchen; as she opened the refrigerator, John’s roommate walked through the

front door. “Oh, hey,” she said. Avril turned around; the roommate regarded her with something like

disgust. “I see you finally got up.”

 “Um, yeah,” Avril said.

“What was your name again?”

“April.”

“Oh, yeah. I’m not sure I’m comfortable with you walking around here half naked.”

“Oh, sorry,” Avril said. She glanced down at herself; she wasn’t dressed too indecently. She was

wearing John’s boxers and a t-shirt.

“Did John say you can stay here by yourself?”

“Yeah.”

“He didn’t give you a key or anything like that, did he?”

“No . . . Don’t worry, I’m going home in a little bit. I need to get some things.”

“Get some things? You’re not staying here, are you?”

“No—I mean, I don’t know . . .” Avril was struck by the fact that she and John really hadn’t

discussed this at all. Actually, seen through the eyes of a normal person, their relationship so far was

incredibly strange, abnormal even. Here were two people who were terrified to get close to others,

John with his determined avoidance and Avril with her affected brashness; they had almost instantly

taken to one another. It almost seemed like they were reacting to something, like they’d been

chemically bound together by the terrifying knowledge that neither of them would find somebody as

pleasantly broken again. In short, they had compatible dysfunctions, or so it seemed to Avril. Instantly,

the boundaries between Avril and John had seemed to dissolve. Well, there were still some boundaries.

Avril hadn’t told John she’d been raped by the manager earlier that Friday, for instance, or that she was

bipolar. Sometimes people in the “mental health community” objected to classifying a person as

bipolar, instead making the distinction that a person suffered from bipolar disorder; that was bullshit,

Avril thought, how could people try to separate themselves from something so life-consuming, life-

defining—every moment of Avril’s life could be related in one way or another to the disease. Actually,
her current mental state was probably as close to “normal” as she got, in her estimation, and it was only

when she was normal that she felt her life was defined by any sort of disease. Perhaps this was a

deficiency with normalcy.

Avril had expected a depression to come on, but after the weekend she felt pretty happy,

content at least. True, mostly all they’d done was fuck, but still it was good; she was happy that she was

happy; she was happy that John seemed happy; she was happy that he saw her as a normal girl. Minus

the shoplifting . . . How could she explain that one? But still, Avril was happy. She wasn’t even bothered

too much by the roommate’s obnoxious questioning. Avril said, “I was just staying for the weekend, I

think. I’ll talk to John about it later. I’ll get dressed and get out of your hair.”

“Well, okay . . . It was nice to meet you,” the roommate said.

Avril realized she hadn’t shut the refrigerator. She regretted being caught rooting through it—

that’s something you don’t do in anyone’s house, especially when they’re not inclined to like you. Even

if they don’t consciously realize it, it’s offensive on a primal level: you’re casting yourself in the role of a

rodent attacking the food supply. Avril closed the refrigerator door and said, “Sorry, I forgot the door

was open. By the way, what’s he like?”

“Who, John?”

“Yeah, I mean, what’s he like when I’m not here? You know, like every day.”

“Uh . . . I don’t know, I’d say he’s really together. He doesn’t stick around here too much, only

at night really. He’s working, I guess. He plays the guitar sometimes.”

“What? He does?”

“Yeah, didn’t he—”

“No, he didn’t tell me, I didn’t even know he had a guitar.”

“Oh. I assumed he would’ve, like . . .”

“Yeah. Does he play it for other girls?”

 “I don’t know. He played for me once, I had to bug him about it though.”

“Does he sing too? Is he good?” For some reason, Avril felt jealous. Apparently she didn’t

really know anything about him at all. She glanced up at the roommate, who seemed to be enjoying

Avril’s ignorance.

“Yeah, he does. That’s really funny, you’d think he’d be like, showing off. I guess not?”

Here comes the passive aggressive crap, Avril thought. She really did prefer male insecurity to

female cattiness. Most women would attest to that though, if really pressed about it. Avril stomped

past the roommate and said something, half under her breath. She wasn’t sure what exactly it was she

said.

“Well, see you,” the roommate said.

Avril shut the door to John’s room. She scanned the small room—there was no guitar in any of

the corners; she wouldn’t have missed it anyhow. She checked the closet and there was nothing.

Where would a guitar be? Avril glanced at the bed—it was obvious. She crawled to the bed and pulled

the guitar out from underneath. It inside an expensive-looking unlatched case; the guitar itself was

scratched up, dented, with old strings that were covered in grease and dirt—obviously John played it.

Avril stared at the guitar. Was it silly that it seemed to represent distance?
John
He knew it had been a mistake to skip out on work on Saturday without saying anything. He’d

promised Stephen the night before that he’d come in. It was fairly irresponsible to not at least call,

email, chat, or anything like that; then again, he didn’t much care—once he’d fucked April, once he got

around to exploring her body, holding her, kissing her, he was able to put work out of his mind

completely. It wasn’t so much the sex that did it, but the togetherness and the mutual affection. With

April he’d been free; his stupid anxieties had melted away and he’d been able to live almost wholly

inside of and through his body. In a way, John thought, that’s paradise. He’d never felt that with

another girl; he wondered why. He was certain that he’d have traded anything in the world just to have

felt that once, and now he was planning on having it again; now he counted the feeling he’d had with

April as his sole worldly possession. It’s hard to believe, but something like that can even make life

worth living . . . How come nobody had ever told him that life might be about pleasure?

When John first went into the office, things seemed entirely normal. He killed time, mostly

browsing dumb news stories and thinking about his weekend with April. About an hour later, Stephen

sent him a message on Gchat. “hello” it said. On the next line: “please come into my office”

Here it comes, John thought. He stood up and walked down the hall into Stephen’s office.

Stephen was a relatively young guy for a project manager, mid-30s maybe. It seemed to John that

Stephen favored him by a lot compared to the other employees; it was probably because they were

fairly similar. Stephen didn’t say a lot, he was steady, he assumed other people worked hard but didn’t

do very much himself. John could see himself being in Stephen’s position in a few years. “You needed

me?” John said.

“Yeah, I did, on Saturday. We missed our project deadline.” Stephen looked at John.

“Uh huh,” John said.

 “Where were you? Did something happen? If you had an emergency, I understand.” It became

clear to John that Stephen still trusted him. He seemed to be expecting a story about a death, a

hospitalization, something along those lines. It would have been trivial to make up a lie. Stephen went

on, “It’s just that there are penalties built into the contract. I know, part of it was my fault, I misjudged

the scope of the project. I shouldn’t have relied on you to come in with less than twelve hours’ notice.

Actually, it’s mostly my fault.”

“I was . . . mugged,” John said.

Stephen immediately stood up; his chair quickly rolled back and slammed into the wall. “Oh!”

He paused, seemingly unsure of what to do next. He took a tentative step toward John, stopped, and

then walked around his desk and mechanically put his arms around John’s shoulders. Ostensibly, it was

a hug. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah . . . ,” John said.

Stephen stepped back, keeping a hand on John’s shoulder. “Look, forget about this project for

now. This is real life. Why didn’t let me know? I would’ve told you not to come in today, or any day this

week. I can assign people to your work, John, it’s no problem. I can’t believe this . . .” He looked away

for a moment and then back at John. It seemed like Stephen was staring deep into John’s eyes . . . “I’m

going to tell you something . . .”

“Okay . . . ,” John said.

“I’ve always seen myself in you. Now this confirms it . . .”

“Uh huh . . .”

“I was mugged when I was younger. I was 26. How old are you now, 25, 26?”

“24.”

“Oh, wow. Anyway, I was walking home , it was night time. Some Mexican guys came up on

me, I’ve got no idea where they came from . . . Were they Mexican?”
 “I don’t know . . . Hispanic I guess.”

“Mexican, probably. They came up behind me and one of them pushed something into my

back, and the other put his arms around my neck. I could barely breathe I was so scared. They called

me a faggot then asked me what I had.”

“Yeah, that’s about how it went . . .”

“They dug through my pockets, I didn’t say anything and they called me a faggot again. I tried to

say something and they told me to shut up. Then they took my wallet and the phone I had—back then,

cell phones were amazingly expensive, and I could barely afford it. I couldn’t make rent that month

because of those guys, I had to borrow from my dad. Assholes . . .”

“Yeah . . .”

“And I went into work the following Monday, and the rest of the week. I didn’t dare say

anything to my boss, and there was nothing like sick time, vacations, it was just like here, you know? It

broke me up, it was torture, I was a mess, but I needed the money. I bet that’s how you feel, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” John said.

“Look, I understand what you’re going through. Don’t tell anybody I’m doing this, but I want

you to take the week off. I’ll put down forty—no, fifty hours on your timesheet and file it with ADP

myself. Nobody will know about it, it’ll be between you and me.” He patted John on the shoulder and

said, “Okay?” He’d related his entire story with his arm on John’s shoulder.

“Wow, thanks,” John said. “I’m speechless . . .” He really was speechless; he couldn’t believe his

amazing luck. He’d expected to be lectured, to give Stephen a few apologetic responses; this went

beyond his expectations.

“Go home. Decompress. Figure things out,” Stephen said. He gave a genuine smile; probably it

was the first time John saw him smile like that. It seemed that they’d shared a moment of bonding.

“Thanks, Stephen,” John said and left Stephen’s office.

 Stephen called out after him, “See you next Monday!”

John walked out of the office without saying anything to anybody. He rode the elevator down in

a daze. He finally realized how free he was, how lucky, how good life is, when he stepped foot outside.

April was waiting for him at home, the weather was beautiful, the sun shining, the birds singing. It was a

new day. He raised his arms to the heavens . . .

Avril
Theirs was a relationship that was primarily erotic, that is, based on physical signals, facial

expressions, movements, postures, gestures—in short, nonverbal communications. Yes, sexual

attraction existed to a great extent, but Avril got the real sense that what was going on was something

other than that. True, they fucked, but more simply they got along as animals. Their bodies gravitated

to one another, and it wasn’t exclusively the sex causing the pull, as is the case with so many other

bodies. It was imaginable that a similar relationship could exist between a father and daughter, mother

and son, siblings, and most especially twins. She realized she and John hadn’t had a real intellectual

conversation, a “meeting of the minds” like you see in haughty art films, typified, for example, by Before

Sunrise, where the primary connection between the boy and the girl is intellectual, closely followed by

the emotional, biographical, and circumstantial, and almost lastly realized in the erotic space. Avril

remembered that through most of the film, Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy barely touched each other,

even during the sex scene; no, most of their touching involved the words they spoke and the stories

they related, their shared viewpoint and conception of the world, along with the instances where their

opinions and upbringings charmingly differed—the fact that they were both lone travelers in Europe

brought them closer together than their nervous systems ever could. You might’ve called their

relationship a mindfuck. In a way, transplanting eroticism from the physical body into words and

abstract concepts seemed to be typical of neurotic, over-cultured westerners. Later, as these same

people age, as predicted in “Before Sunset,” the emotional and intellectual connection is still there, but

their bond becomes constituted primarily of a shared life circumstance, a bond based on failure, dashed

dreams, frustrated hopes, fading sex lives, ever-increasing alienation, and the general malaise that

comes with old age, though they were only in their early 30s when they were depicted in the second
film. You got the overwhelming sense that Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy’s lives were over, even as the

film desperately tried to establish hope and possibility.

Avril cursed the name of Richard Linklater as she walked back to her hostel. She supposed also

that Linklater, who wrote and directed both films, had intended the relationship to be erotically charged

but the actors failed to connect in that way. This was unlikely to be something that could be corrected

in the editing process, and the project likely got to a point that it was impossible to replace either actor.

Unfortunately, the “Before Sun” franchise was probably one of the better love stories to be put to film—

a failure of art, if there ever was one. Gathering her thoughts, Avril decided that it was ridiculous to be

angry at John over his secret guitar-playing ability. There were a number of reasons why he might have

hidden his ability that also befitted his character—modesty, shyness, embarrassment, disinterest,

apathy, it all seemed possible. Still, it made Avril wonder what else she didn’t know about him. That

could be a problem . . .

Avril arrived at the hostel. The place was a mess as usual. She tried to sneak past the front

desk, but the guy caught her. “April? Where have you been?”

“Out,” she said.

“You know you’re supposed to work every day. This isn’t a storage locker . . . You didn’t get

hospitalized again, did you?”

The question annoyed Avril. That was months ago, and she hadn’t bothered anybody at the

hostel . . . “Mike, I’m really tired. Can I just put my stuff down and we’ll talk about it later?”

“No, this is becoming an issue. We talked about it and decided you can’t continue to flaunt your

responsibility.”

“Flaunt? You mean flout, you moron.”

“You know what I mean. We decided you can’t stay here unless you can pay for your bed.”

“What? You know—”

 “Right, that you can’t pay. Me and Audrey gathered your things, so . . .”

Avril turned her head away from Mike. She could take most things in stride; why was this

affecting her? Her eyes began to burn, her face flushed; she couldn’t look him in the face. “Okay . . .”

she said.

Avril knew that Mike was genuinely surprised. He was sure that she was going to flip out,

maybe even get violent; he was expecting a scene. He probably remembered back to the last time they

had a problem, when April kept screaming that they didn’t see her as a human being but as a problem to

be dealt with. “Okay?” he said. “So you don’t have anything to say?”

“Don’t be an asshole,” Avril said, still looking away from him. She was concentrating on forcing

some saliva past the pain in her throat. So they were finally wiping their hands of her—she didn’t

expect it ever to happen. The people who worked at the hostel liked to think of themselves as liberal,

accepting, open-minded. In a way it was true: they let certain things go, they avoided conflict, they

took an interest in people, and so on. Still, they weren’t much different from anybody else. Mike, for

example, fucked Avril at every opportunity he could, even going so far as to feed her alcohol and cocaine

whenever he could get her alone. She always knew what he was doing, but she let it go on anyway.

Actually, it was surprising that he was giving up this little pastime of his.

“Um . . . There’s somebody in your bed, you probably shouldn’t go in the back. I’ll just get your

stuff.”

Avril tried to say something but found that she couldn’t open her mouth. All she could think

was the bed sucks anyway. Atonally whistling, Mike stood up, turned around, and strolled to the back

hall. A vision of pushing a dull knife into Mike’s back, of decapitating Audrey with a rusty scythe, of

torching the hostel with everybody inside entered Avril’s head; she saw herself doing it all

dispassionately, smirking now and then, bust mostly with a hateful look signifying vengeance on her

face. Her body and her emotions betrayed her though—tears filled her eyes, a burning, itching
sensation ran through the core of her body and into her extremities. She left the hostel before Mike

could get back; he couldn’t see her like this. She wanted to scream at him that she’d found somebody

who cared about her, who treated her like a real person, but she knew it was useless. On her way out

she kicked one of the hostel’s stupid third world sculptures and hurt her foot.
John
John was bursting with anticipation as he walked into his place. This was an entirely new feeling

for him. It’s astonishing the way that tired old clichés take on new life in people who are utterly

abnormal. The romantic authors made their living this way, peddling their hysterical takes on

commonplace subjective experiences to the masses. Nobody ever had an unprecedented feeling; it

almost seems unlikely that it took so long for authors to discover the value in committing stylized

accounts of banal psychological minutia to paper. John hurried to his room, only to find that April

wasn’t there; he’d planned to announce the exciting news that he had the week off. When he walked

out of his room, Mel was waiting for him.

“You’re home early,” Mel said, her arms ironically crossed. “Couldn’t wait to get back to your

little girlfriend?”

“What . . . Where is she?” John said.

“You’re really screwed up, you know that?” Mel had clearly planned out what she was going to

say to John. “What, you couldn’t play a ballad or a love song of some kind for her? You fucked her

enough—god knows I had to listen to the two of you all weekend.”

“Did she say she where she was going? She—wait, what are you talking about?”

“She was really upset, I could tell. You really let her down,” Mel said.

John pulled out his cell phone and scrolled through the call log—April hadn’t called. “Upset?

You talked to her? What about?”

“Yeah, she seemed agitated. I think you’d better see what’s wrong . . .”

“Mel, what the fuck are you doing to me? Why was she upset?” This was the first time John

had ever displayed anger or anything of the sort to Mel. She was visibly amused.

“I can tell you two are going to be great together.”

 “Mel, seriously, why are you doing this?” Mel stared and then looked away. She seemed

irritated. John went on, “Please, if April said anything about where she was going, just tell me.”

“She just stormed out. Anyway, I don’t want to interfere in your relationship.” John regarded

Mel with suspicion. Why did she say that? Their relationship had been fine before this; they drank

together now and then, talked, got along, it was a perfectly healthy relationship between roommates.

The thought that Mel was jealous passed through his head for a moment, but he pushed it out—it was

too ridiculous. With something like this, either something happens right away, or almost never at all;

the precedent is set early on.

“Okay . . . ,” John said. He left the apartment and slammed the door behind himself.

Outside, he got on his phone and called the number that April had given him. “Hello, Purple

Porpoise hostel, this is Mike.”

“Hostel?” John said.

“Yeah. Normally the front desk is closed between noon and three, but I can take a booking if

you’d like. Do you have a credit card?”

“Do I have the right number?” John said and recited the number into the phone.

“Yep, you got it buddy.”

“Huh . . . So, do you know an April? She lives there?”

“Um . . . April. No, there’s no April here.”

“Then what—” There was a click on the other line and the phone’s lights flashed. John stared at

the phone for a moment, yelled, “Fuck!” He called back a few times; there was no answer.
Avril
People sometimes talk about feelings of self-worth as if they’re things that can be controlled.

This point of view is self-evidently ridiculous to anyone who’s ever suffered self-esteem. These things

are determined on a subterranean, unconscious level; as anyone with personal experience can attest,

self-esteem has nothing to do with rationality. Avril knew on a rational level that John would have

welcomed a phone call; but then he was in work and his job seemed to be somewhat important even

though he complained about its irrelevancy. For example, maybe he forgot to turn off his cell phone

and she called while he was in a meeting—it was too much of a risk, Avril wouldn’t dare to make John

look bad. She convinced herself that she’d better not call until he was out of work, which was many

hours from now. Well then, all there was to do was wander the city. She considered reading Memoirs

of a Russian Punk for a moment—she’d taken it out of John’s apartment; in fact, Avril had removed all of

her stuff from the apartment, fearing that John would perceive her personal items in his space as

emotional anchors. She even rationally knew that he would have welcomed an anchor of any sort . . . I

guess I’m just a freak, Avril thought.

Walking down the street, Avril thought about what it had been like to fuck John. He was

energetic, vigorous most of all, but what set him apart from most was his attentiveness. He—no, his

body, reacted to her body; the excitement and pleasure Avril felt seemed to infect him. She had noticed

something peculiar: as the hue of her skin reddened, so did his, and as she calmed, so did he; it was

odd, but sexy in a strange way. All in all, Avril thought, they were very compatible. His penis had a slight

upward curve, and thickened a little bit in the middle; it felt good inside of her, it subtly imparted a

sense of blooming that was pleasurable.

Still, she bemoaned that she still hadn’t been able to have an orgasm, though she’d come close

more than a few times. Her heart sped up, her breath caught in her throat, her muscles tensed, but
then somehow things would taper back from the heights; it was like approaching a cliff, peeking over

the edge, but ultimately never going over. She remembered back to those times in high school when

her body could barely be controlled—the orgasm came within a minute most times, and that was with

simple self-manipulation, her own fingers absent the excitement of another body. Back then she’d stop

breathing and tense up, and there’d be a slight pinching, or a minor explosion, giving the impression

that she’d blinked out of existence for a moment; afterward gentle waves would run through her body.

It was pleasant. How many years had it been since she’d felt that . . .

Fittingly, she’d come the closest when John fingered her—it even happened in a public space.

Avril remembered a theory she’d read once, that the sexual experiences during adolescence inform the

adult’s sexual experiences for her entire life. In the high school days most of her orgasms had been in

public, at least within the confines of a classroom, or outside in a secluded corner on the school’s

campus. More recently, John and Avril had been in a relatively dark restaurant, sitting next to each

other on Sunday afternoon; they’d been kissing and holding hands for a while. Avril began rubbing her

thighs together. John put his hand between her legs; Avril could feel herself getting wet; she started to

lose control of her breathing. John put his mouth on her neck, touched her through her pants, rubbed

her labia, manipulated her clit. The waitress came by and noticed how flushed she was, even going as

far as commenting on it; Avril couldn’t tell if the waitress had noticed John’s hand in her crotch. The

moment the waitress turned and went back to the kitchen, John slipped his hand under her pants and

slid his finger into her vagina, steadily rubbing the finger on the upper wall and gradually pushing it

deeper. Avril thought she was losing her mind; she used her hands to cover her mouth, afraid that she

might start to squeal. Eventually the waitress came back and it had to slow down—the food came, the

waitress lingered. By then, Avril was almost doubled over and panting. They had to cool it down—

maybe it was for the better not to have had a screaming orgasm in a restaurant.
 Thinking about the scene, Avril became aroused right there on the street. It was a residential

area, sparsely populated; there were “For sale” signs on about half the lawns. Avril looked ahead and

behind: there was nobody to be found. She could almost feel John’s hand between her legs. She

tentatively reached down and touched the front of her skirt, pushing her knuckles into her pubis; the

pressure felt good. What harm could it do, she thought. After looking around once more, she quickly

walked to a little alley between two abandoned houses, put down her things, pressed her back against

the wood paneling of the house, and eased her hand under her skirt and tights. The moment she

touched herself she gasped. It was so exciting she could almost feel her chest expanding and

contracting outside of her body, the way people describe major heart trauma and things like that; she

closed her eyes, felt the warmth in her body quickly rising.

“What are you doing?” The voice seemed to come from another universe. It was a man’s voice.

Avril froze. Her eyes were still closed, her hand in her tights, her fingers in her vagina. She quickly

pulled her hand out and looked up—it was a pretty big guy with shaggy brown hair, wearing a leather

jacket. He was tall. It was kind of exciting, actually, but she didn’t want anything to do with him.

“Go away,” Avril shouted. The guy stepped back and away, began to turn, but then stopped

cold and stared at her. “Get the fuck away from me! Where did you come from?” The guy continued to

stare at her; Avril stared back. She stayed like that for a few seconds, and then kneeled over, collected

her things, and hurried past the guy. He didn’t move or react at all. She bumped her shoulder against

him and he didn’t budge. Avril walked as fast as she could down the street, turned at the intersection,

walked further, spotted a proper alley, and jogged down it. Here were more abandoned houses;

nobody was around again. She hid in a little alcove where garbage cans usually go and peeked around

the corner for a while—the guy was gone.

That was kind of exhilarating. She was still panting, out of breath, her chest was a little tight.

She was still excited; she reached into her tights again—her pussy was wet, slick, now she was sweaty
too . . . Avril rubbed herself again and fell into a rhythm; suddenly, the guy showed up behind her, not

more than three feet away. Avril stopped, didn’t say anything; they stared at each other. The guy

approached her; for a moment her impulse was to hit him. She did nothing. The guy was inches away

now. Avril stopped rubbing herself; the guy picked it up, forcefully pressing his big thumb into her pussy

through her tights. He had big, meaty fingers, like sausages, and as he rubbed her, Avril realized she had

stopped breathing, she was looking dead into his eyes. She took his hand by the wrist and helped him

masturbate her, increasing the pressure and force; his fingers began working on their own, manipulating

her and pushing the fabric of her tights deep into her pussy. Avril was more aroused than ever. She

took her hands off of his arm and rubbed her breasts, then touched the guy’s crotch, gripping and

squeezing his cock through his pants. He suddenly stopped masturbating her and pulled his cock out

from his pants, moving forward and pressing it against Avril’s hip. He stepped even closer and rubbed it

between her legs; it was a huge dick, bigger than John’s. The sight of it excited her. The guy pulled her

skirt and tights down, trying to push his huge cock into her in a single motion; Avril resisted it, though

she couldn’t say why—she nudged him away a little bit. He didn’t push it, so Avril began jerking him off.

With her hands safely on his dick, the guy took the chance to look around behind himself and to the

side; all of a sudden he seemed to be extremely worried about being caught.

Suddenly, the desire and the excitement began to fade, even as she was jerking the guy off.

Suddenly, this was about the guy and not Avril—she realized he was going to get off, and she wasn’t.

Avril slowed down, but the guy grabbed her hand by the wrist and used her to jerk him off. Avril

brought one of her hands down to touch herself, but now she barely felt anything; in fact, her pussy

seemed slimy now. The guy stared at her and, seeming to sense something was wrong, tried to kiss her

on the neck. Avril pushed him back with her free hand. This pissed him off—he rushed forward, gripped

the back of Avril’s head with one hand and her jaw with the other, squeezed, pulled her head to one

side, and ran his tongue across her neck. It felt like a slug. Satisfied, the guy let go of Avril, jerked
himself off some more with her hand, and started softly grunting; soon enough, he pulled his shirt up,

revealing a paunch. He moved forward and pushed against her again with his penis; this time Avril let

him inside of herself—there wasn’t any choice; she parted her legs slightly. The guy humped her slowly,

pushing the tip and a small portion of his penis into her with light thrusts. In a few moments he pulled

out of her and placed her hand on his cock; a little dribble of semen spilled out. It was gloppy, chunky, a

dull yellow color; in a word, disgusting. It smeared on the side of Avril’s hand; she instinctively shook it,

and a few heavy drops flew onto the exposed skin of her hip. The guy said, “Agh! Oh shit, baby.”

Avril looked away from his face and pushed him back with both hands with as much gentleness

as she could muster. The guy started to laugh. He pulled his dick back into his pants, zipped them up,

and strutted away, swaying somewhat. He turned back to look at her for a moment and spit on the

ground as he left the alley. This is the last straw, Avril thought. She felt like she was going to puke,

there was a knot in her stomach. Getting a whiff of the semen on her hand, she retched, realizing it

smelled strongly of caffeine; she couldn’t tell if she was crying or if there were tears in her eyes because

she was getting sick. She wiped the semen off of her hip, and bent over and rubbed her hand in the dirt

. . . I hate myself, she thought, I hate men . . . She didn’t know why she did anything, what purpose her

existence served. She wished she didn’t even have a cunt, that she could pour cement into the void in

the middle of her being and be done with it once and for all.
John
The Purpose Driven Life, released in 2002, sold more than thirty million copies in the first five

years of its print run. Since then, it’s been translated into dozens of languages and has become a

missionary book, commonly being distributed by well-meaning evangelists in the jungles of South

America and the deserts of Africa. Though the book claims universality to the human experience, it’s

difficult to imagine God’s five purposes for man as outlined in the book applying equally to a middle

aged American southern woman and an African pygmy hunter of the Mangbetu tribe. Actually, the

book likely never would have found notoriety at all if it weren’t for the story of Ashley Smith and Brian

Nichols.

In an Atlanta courthouse in March, 2005, Brian Nichols was to face trial for a rape he’d

committed. After his girlfriend had dumped him, and upon finding out that she’d been sleeping with

another man, Nichols had tied her up with duct tape and raped her by gunpoint. The first trial had been

botched by the district attorney; they’d failed to present key evidence and a number of witnesses had

balked on the stand. Additionally, Nichols hadn’t been the standard black defendant in Georgia—he was

a Unix systems engineer, eloquent, articulate, church-going, respectable; in his first trial, Nichols had

been a hit with the jury, commonly seen to be winking at the women and nodding at the men. On this

sweltering March day, Nichols was to face his second trial—in essence, a case of double jeopardy. In the

south, trials are run smoothly; and Nichols had already upset the system once—this time, Nichols’

conviction was all but assured and the only real question was the length of his sentence. Nichols had

other ideas. When the judge had first declared that a retrial would occur, Nichols had been heard to

declare, “I’m not going to go lying down.”

Nichols spent a lot of time building trust with those around him. A handsome, well-built young

man, Nichols had a knack for building rapport with sheriff’s deputies, women in particular. On the day
of his trial, the deputy, a certain Cynthia Hall, 51 years old, decided to bring him to the court room from

the basement detention center without the customary leg shackles. “I got him,” she said with a wink to

her commanding officer, brusquely patting Nichols on the shoulder. Both Hall and Nichols laughed a

knowing laugh. They’d been friendly with each other; in fact, Nichols had probably been the first man to

flirt with Hall in years. This was flattering, even if Nichols was a prisoner and a rapist. We live

desperate, alienated lives; for a lonely woman in her fifties, a few flirtatious words mean more than

God’s most radiant light. Hall and Nichols arrived at the holding area together—this is where prisoners

change out of their prison jumpsuits before entering the courtroom; it’s considered to be more humane

this way. The moment that Hall unlatched Nichols’ handcuffs, he viciously hit the deputy on the face,

launching her off of her feet and into the air. Hall was knocked unconscious by the blow; the front of

her face caved in, and so terrible was the wound that the doctors initially believed she’d been shot in

the face. Nichols then pushed the unconscious Hall into an open cell and requisitioned her gun belt,

which included a number of extra magazines for Hall’s .40 caliber Beretta. Afterward, Nichols spent

close to five minutes changing into his civilian clothes—this is not a very long time to get ready, but an

eternity considering the circumstances: perhaps Nichols wished to appear dapper for his court

appearance, or else we imagine he took a moment to say a prayer.

What happened next was truly bizarre. Nichols left the courthouse’s holding area, crossed the

skybridge to the courtroom where his trial was to take place, and entered the judge’s chambers. There

he found a number of case managers, an attorney, and the court bailiff. He wrestled with the bailiff and

eventually disarmed him; then in a somewhat comical scene, the bailiff followed Nichols’ instructions to

handcuff the case managers and attorneys to a railing on the wall and finally handcuff himself in place.

During all this, the bailiff heroically managed to sound a silent alarm in the judge’s chamber; however,

Nichols realized what had happened and used the bailiff’s radio to call off the alarm, even going so far as

to disguise his voice. Afterward, Nichols calmly walked into the courtroom where the judge presiding
over his case was hearing a civil trial and shot him once in the back of his head, killing him instantly.

Witnesses remarked that the judge never became aware of Nichols’ presence even as the court’s

attendees began to clamor on account of the man with the gun. Nichols then searched for the

attorneys prosecuting his case—it was time to remedy injustice: the constitution clearly forbids double

jeopardy. Unfortunately, the attorneys were nowhere to be found; so Nichols turned elsewhere in a

search for his list of targets, chief among them his ex-girlfriend. Unfortunately, she was running late

that day, probably caught in traffic. Atlanta has terrible traffic.

What followed was the standard courthouse chase scene. The words “shots fired!” went out on

the radios, the police were called, and alarms sounded throughout the building. The courthouse

became a madhouse. Nichols attempted to use the chaos to escape; an observant officer noticed his

erratic behavior and gave chase. The officer pursued Nichols down a number of flights of stairs; the two

men burst out an emergency side exit onto a crowded street. Nichols fired shots in the air and the

crowd panicked and dispersed. In a situation like this, it’s better to blend in with the movement of the

crowd; the officer opted to continue his pursuit and was subsequently shot several times by Nichols. He

died.

Now fully embracing his role as the dangerous fugitive, Nichols dashed through the fleeing

crowds to a parking garage, where he carjacked a lawyer, pointing a gun into his car and saying, “Give it

up, motherfucker.” The carjacking was witnessed, and a number of police squad cars gave pursuit in

what was initially thought to be a separate incident. Nichols wisely abandoned the car and eventually

stole a tow truck, an SUV, and a number of sedans, each time changing the manner of his driving,

sometimes driving calmly and at other times recklessly speeding and crashing into other cars. Nichols

finally escaped by melting into the chaotic scene at the Georgia Dome—it was March, meaning the

NCAA’s March Madness was on and thousands of rowdy out-of-state students were in town. In the

hours following his escape, Nichols even stole the clothing of several people, wildly altering his
appearance numerous times to frustrate the police’s description. Perhaps Nichols saw a great

basketball game that day as well—the tournament that year featured a number of high-octane

basketball teams, eventually being won by the North Carolina Tarheels, who employed an aggressive,

deliberate bullying style that in a way was reminiscent of Nichols’ escape. It’s tempting to think that

Nichols’ actions willed the Tarheels to victory over the Illinois Illini, who employed a delicate brand of

finesse-oriented guard play, unbefitting of a courtroom escape scene. Nichols himself was somewhat of

a postmodern antagonist, the anti-villain dripping with an aggressively uncool kitsch sensibility, begging

to be rooted for as he uttered a number of great one-liners that could only be interpreted ironically by

the viewer such as: “I’m not playing with you, can’t you see the blood on my hands?” and “Give me the

keys or I’ll kill you.” We’ve seen similar scenes numerous times in films; the episode was even

reminiscent of a playthrough of Grand Theft Auto in the sense of the pragmatic criminality employed by

the player character. Nichols truly was an action hero, a video game protagonist—larger than life. It’s

impossible not to admire his perverted brilliance, ingenuity, style, and charisma. We’re forced to

wonder if he planned the escape in advance, given the sophisticated strategy in play and the cinematic

qualities of the tactics.

Unlike the movies, Nichols’ story ended in tragedy and the unlikely promotion of a truly putrid

book in The Purpose Driven Life. The manhunt was standard-fare, Nichols’ behavior after his escape

relatively boring. These are the elements in film that are left on the editing room floor, or more

accurately these days the deleted scenes portion of the bluray disk. Nichols broke into a number of

apartments, beat some people up, shot a federal agent, terrorized the Atlanta suburbs—standard stuff,

in short. Finally, as the story went, Nichols came across a white woman in her late 20s, Ashley Smith.

Nichols roughed her up a little after breaking into her house and tying her up. Confident in the knots

he’d undoubtedly learned to tie as a Boy Scout, Nichols decided to take a shower. Somewhat bizarrely,

he covered Smith’s eyes with a towel so that she wouldn’t see his private parts, confirming perhaps that
shame is a powerful emotion even for murderers and madmen. In the official version of the story, this is

when the miracle occurred: though it was never accounted how she lost the blindfold or how she

accessed the book, being tied up as she was, Ashley Smith began reading passages from The Purpose

Driven Life to Brian Nichols as he took a shower. The shower apparently went on for a great deal of

time, as Smith was able to read a great deal of the book to Nichols. We imagine Nichols in the shower,

butt naked, bloodied after his numerous scuffles through the day, water cascading down his beautiful

body, his face pressed against the wall; we imagine Nichols in the shower listening to Rick Warren’s

prose read aloud, and the image in our mind is beautiful. It wasn’t long before Nichols began to break

down, having defied God; Smith continued to read from the book as Nichols leapt from the shower and

went on a hysterical, weeping rampage through the house. It was at that moment that the news of

Nichols’ crime was reported on the television, at which point Nichols fell to his knees, raised his arms to

the sky and begged the Lord for forgiveness. This went on for many hours, the rest of the night in fact,

Nichols weeping and Smith reading from The Purpose Driven Life; early in the morning, Smith cooked

breakfast for Nichols. A new man, Nichols allowed Smith to leave the apartment to be with her

daughter; then he turned himself in by placing a 911 call and confessing over the phone. After being

brought in, Nichols gave a three hour videotaped confession, recounting his crimes in explicit detail, and

outlining something of a manifesto, which established that the hegemonic judicial system of the United

States was little removed from the dark days of chattel slavery, committing violence against African

Americans in the name of capitalist profit; Nichols further clarified that those he killed in his escape

were complicit in the endemic machinations of societal injustice, and so could be considered enemy

combatants. In this respect, Nichols saw himself as a soldier on a mission. “I declared war,” he

triumphantly stated. Nichols was able to render a number of poetic images in the confession . . . It’s

highly recommended viewing—emotional, powerful, spoken from the heart. Even the arresting officer

was moved by Nichols’ rousing confession. Truly, Brian Nichols was a higher form of man.
 The Purpose Driven Life, as a result of Brian Nichols’ and Ashley Smith’s story, immediately

rocketed to #1 on the charts. “Wow,” people said, “this book pacified a crazed, murderous black man.

There must be something to it!” Unfortunately, the real story of what happened that night is ridiculous

and much closer to a sordid, ironic reality. Ashley Smith was a crystal methamphetamine addict,

tweaking so heavily and so often that she was regularly driven to psychotic episodes. She was prone to

taking meth and driving at high speeds in her car with her daughter, crashing into trees and other

vehicles numerous times. Ashley smith was a blight on society, a danger to herself, her daughter, and

everybody around her. Brian Nichols had never done meth; that night, before he took the shower, he

asked Ashley Smith for some marijuana. Instead, she surreptitiously gave him the crystal meth. This

drove him to an acute psychosis; Nichols took Smith’s usual dose, which was extraordinarily large for a

first time user. While it’s true that Smith did indeed read from The Purpose Driven Life, it seems the real

hero in this story is not Rick Warren or God’s words but the crystal meth. It can be imagined that Ashley

Smith could have read anything to Nichols and had a similar effect, given the influence of the drug. One

potential effect of amphetamine overdose is partial regression to childhood—that is, Brian Nichols was

extremely open to suggestion and would have followed any directions provided to him by an adult. In a

way, there has always been a link between amphetamines and southern Baptism. Take meth and read

The Purpose Driven Life—a prescription for peace.

The book did hit on something of a nerve in western society though. Most of the time we feel

purposeless; purpose is good, regardless if it’s dictated by God, meth, or anything else. This is

approximately how John was feeling that day. Normally he went through life feeling buoyed, pushed

about, helpless; now he wasn’t going to take any shit from the asshole at the Purple Porpoise. It was

trivial to find the place’s address. John made his way there, full of anger, driven by something like a

higher purpose. April could be a higher purpose—for young men, a girl can often be a purpose-in-itself.
 It feels kind of ridiculous to head to this place on a bus, John thought. Anger and purposeful

movement is better portrayed by driving a car, or stern walking, not sitting passively on a bus. On the

bus ride, he repeatedly called the Purple Porpoise; each time, the phone rang endlessly. Well, he’d just

have to bust in there himself. He knew the number was legitimate, April had given it to him and told

him that’s the only way to contact her. After the weekend, she wouldn’t lie, wouldn’t avoid him—it was

unthinkable. The entire time, he also hoped she would call him.

It got into his head that April might try to come back to the apartment. He called Mel. “Hey

John,” she answered with a giggle.

John had the impulse to say “Don’t fuck with me!” but checked himself, realizing he was falling

into an archetype of some sort. “Mel,” he said, “can you please call me if April shows up at the house?”

“I don’t know . . .”

“She doesn’t have a cell phone. I’m not asking a lot, just do this for me, okay? And tell her I’ll

be back at the house in no time, I’ll take a cab.”

“I don’t want that girl living here.”

“What?”

“She doesn’t need to be moving in to our place . . .”

“What—” For the second time that day, somebody hung up on John. He couldn’t remember the

last time that happened. John held the phone at arms length and stared at it.

An old man with a bald head was watching John. “Girlfriend troubles?” he said.

“Excuse me?” John said.

“From the sound of the voice on the other end and the look on your face, I’d say you were

having troubles.”

“Troubles? No, that wasn’t my girlfriend, it was my roommate. I mean—actually, it’s personal.”
 “Ah, your roommate. You kids get a job and all of a sudden you think your life is an episode of

Friends.”

“Friends?”

“In the real world, you can’t sleep with your roommates and get away with it.”

“I didn’t—look, first of all, this is none of your business. Anyway, I was a kid when Friends was

on the air, I’ve never even seen an episode.”

“Your phone is loud. I could hear every word clear as a bell.”

“So what, is this you making a stand against loud phones?” The situation was quickly becoming

ridiculous. Most days John went through his life without a single incident or encounter worth

mentioning; today he was a target for every person who wanted to start getting weird.

“Not at all. I’m concerned for your generation—you have your nice gadgets, that phone for

instance, but you’ve forgotten how to live. You can’t relate to your fellow human beings.”

The man crossed his legs after making his grand statement. “I think you might be projecting,”

John said.

“Not at all, not at all, my friend. Would you like to hear my analysis?”

John pretended to look out the window. The bus was mostly empty; everybody was staring at

John and the old man. “Look, my stop is coming up, it’s the next one . . .”

“Then hear me out. I heard the woman on the other end of the phone distinctly say, ‘our place.’

This suggests to me that there’s a bond between the two of you. Now you have met a girl, and your

roommate feels this bond is threatened. At first, I assumed that the voice was your live-in girlfriend

objecting to the idea of taking in an old female friend of yours for some time. This is a more interesting

situation, I’d say.”

John glanced around at the other people on the bus. They seemed to be watching with rapt

attention . . . Did this guy think he was some kind of a Freud? “It’s really nothing like that . . .” John
paused, hoping that the bus would stop so he could make a quick exit. The old man stared at him with a

benevolent smile on his face; the silence quickly became intimidating. John went on, “You don’t know

my roommate . . . We’ve lived together for a long time now, if it was like that between us I’d know.”

“Would you?”

No, John thought. “Yeah,” he said.

“Let me give you some advice.” John didn’t say anything. “The woman you were just talking to

on the phone loves you. I heard it in her voice.”

The ridiculous fantasies of an old man. Heard it in her voice? “That’s ridiculous,” John said.

“Your worldview is a lot closer to Friends than mine.”

The old man laughed. “No, no, not like Friends; you could call me a romantic though. I know

love when I hear it, and I know a man who’s blind to love when I see him. But I thought you’d never

seen an episode?”

“I lied, actually I’ve seen every episode.” A middle-aged woman laughed and quickly turned

away when John looked at her.

“You can hide behind sarcasm and irony if you’d like. I only hope for the sake of the women in

your life that you’re capable of making a decision,” the old man said. The bus stopped and the exit door

opened. Everybody on the bus stared at the door; John didn’t move.
Avril
There’ve been a number of famous suicides throughout history; perhaps none embodied the

glory and irony of self-termination so fully as Yukio Mishima’s. There’s always something of a tragic

component accompanying suicide, so for now it’s best to ignore that the 20th century prematurely lost

its best writer outside of L.F. Celine with Mishima—after all, who are we to argue with our betters?

Mishima’s motivations reveal themselves somewhat through his jisei, that is, his death poem.

A small night storm blows

Saying ‘falling is the essence of a flower’

Preceding those who hesitate

What was Mishima’s life? A series of hesitations. As a young Japanese man during the early

1940s, Mishima dodged the imperial army’s draft, opportunistically portraying the minor cold he had at

the time of his medical inspection as symptoms of tuberculosis. How ironic then that Mishima killed

himself twenty-five years later in the Japanese Army’s headquarters after making a speech to the

enlisted men, inciting them to assist him in his project to restore the divine Japanese empire. It seems

possible that Mishima hesitated for twenty-five years in his death, existing on the earth as an apparition

for all those years, a soul whose end was meant to come in 1944 by the means of an American or

Chinese bullet. What an elegant explanation for the remarkable insight and sensitivity of Mishima’s

work: he wrote from the spirit realm . . .

Mishima’s suicide was conducted by the rites of seppuku. In the bushido code, seppuku can

serve to give a warrior an honorable death, or alternatively can serve as punishment to a warrior who’s

committed a great crime. The primary difference between the two cases is kaishakunin—the beheading
of the samurai at the end of the ritual. Kaishakunin is the highest honor a warrior can receive; it’s the

difference between great honor and great disgrace. The beginning stage of the ritual is performed by

plunging a short blade into the left side of the abdomen, inches from the navel, and then drawing the

blade from left to right—mere inches tend to suffice, though some warriors have been known to split

their bellies open from end to end. When an honorable death is meant for the warrior, his second will

perform the kaishakunin, cleanly beheading him at the moment of agony. Without kaishakunin, the

warrior becomes a spectacle, writhing in pain and emitting guttural sounds. We all wish for a clean and

dignified death; the adherents to the bushido code are no different.

Beyond the morbidity inherent to seppuku, the actual performance of Mishima’s suicide was

itself extremely gruesome. On that day, Mishima calmly plunged the blade into his abdomen and gutted

himself; however, his second was not trained in kendo and botched the kaishakunin. The second, a

man named Masakatsu Morita, was confident and carried out his duty bravely, but Mishima’s neck was

tougher than Morita’s honest convictions were strong—Morita attempted to behead Mishima multiple

times, but each time the sword caught in the flesh. The interior of the room was bathed in blood;

Mishima screamed in agony, his neck and shoulders cleaved partly through at as many as four separate

points. Morita’s composure left him and he began to clumsily hack at Mishima, even hitting him once

on the side of the head with the broad side of the sword, and with another blow shattering Mishima’s

collarbone and rending his prominent trapezius muscle in two. It was a grisly scene, supremely

embarrassing for all its participants.

Mishima’s behavior in the moment approached the superhuman. Enraged, Mishima screamed

insults at Morita and demanded that another man, Hiroyasu Koga, perform the kaishakunin. Koga then

beheaded Mishima with a single stroke from Morita’s sword. Later, Koga also beheaded Morita—

Morita had also intended to perform seppuku; but at the last moment Morita hesitated and lost his

conviction, stopping the blade just short of his belly. Koga finished the ritual for Morita, prematurely
performing his duty as kaishakunin so that Morita could leave the Earth before the shame of his

cowardice set in. For rendering assistance in ritual suicide, Koga was sentenced to four years in prison.

He was released at the age of 26 after serving the entire sentence.

Obviously, Mishima had meant to die with honor and grace. His partners instead made the

death into a spectacle bordering on the ridiculous. Mishima died a man’s death, a warrior’s death, but it

wasn’t clean, wasn’t dignified—where does it stand?

In the man himself we may glean some information. Mishima was obsessed with glory. His

death was glorious in a sense—his choice seemed incomprehensibly brave to our modern sensibility, but

in the end it’s difficult not to find any humor in how it played out. Mishima predicted that Japan would

never find glory again, never win anything, never rise again to any great deed; he saw that at bottom,

Japan was lost to modernity forever, its ancient noble soul buried under the temptations of consumer

capitalism, and forever would his people, once the bravest warriors in the world, be cursed to lives of

degenerate cosplaying, anime fandom, tentacle perversions, office ennui, and bad teeth. Of course,

Mishima was right in the end, but in the crushing liberal decadence of postwar Japan he was laughed

and jeered at. While he lived he was a testament to everything worth hating by the cosmopolitan

citizen of modernity; and in his death he dispelled the possibility that any of it might be an ironic

façade—that he took his convictions seriously was his greatest crime. Mishima made a good choice

ducking out in 1970: it would only get worse from there on out, and it gets worse by the day. He was a

flower from another time—in the end, he fell.

Avril, too, fell. She couldn’t tell just how long she’d lain next to the trash cans in that alley; but

no matter, she was in a state of emotional catatonia. A heavy truck rumbled past . . . the vibrations

jolted Avril up. She pulled her legs close and made herself small, dreading the possibility of being seen.

When it passed, she rose to her feet. It was dark out now, cold; her fingers and toes were numb. How is

it that she just now noticed? It downright hurt—she could’ve developed frostbite. Avril tried to replay
the previous few hours in her head and found she couldn’t; in fact, the last thing she remembered was

being in a restaurant with John . . .

Avril looked around, noticed her wallet and Memoirs of a Russian Punk lying on the ground near

her. She sniffed the brisk night air—it was refreshing. Her fingers hurt like hell; she shook them out and

noticed they were crusty with dirt. However they became dirty, it happened a while ago. She brought

her hand to her nose and sniffed—there it was, the pungent caffeine-laced odor of the guy’s semen.

The memories rushed back into Avril’s head, of masturbating on the street, being caught, getting fucked

by the guy, the way he laughed at her. It didn’t affect her so much now; it seemed annoying more than

anything else. What an asshole . . . How long ago was that? The sun had been up, it was warm out.

What happened to me? Avril thought.

She remembered it all now. Avril Fontagne had decided she was going to kill herself after the

episode with the guy. She’d ended up considering it for hours; eventually it became too much. Her

death, like everything else in life, would be incredibly sad and pathetic. She couldn’t even bring herself

to move. How pathetic . . . How are people like Mishima so sure about something like suicide? How do

they bring themselves to do it? Avril couldn’t find any answers . . . Maybe one day they’d be revealed.

The thought to call John came immediately. Yeah, he could pick her up, it’d be okay after all.

Avril gathered her things and left the alley, heading toward a main street where she could find a phone.

However, as she walked, she came to dread the prospect of making the call more and more. How could

she tell John that she’d fucked a guy off the street, and then right afterward she’d passed out in an alley

because she’d been so gripped by despair. Of course, it was possible to lie about it all, but that didn’t

seem like an ideal solution. He’d be able to tell she was lying anyway. She knew he’d be able to. God,

Avril thought, I’m a fucking crazy slut.

At that moment, a passing car beeped its horn at her. Avril stopped, looked up, and gave the

guy the middle finger. The car’s window rolled down and the guy screamed, “Fuck you whore!”
 Avril held the finger up as the car rolled away. Well, this is Broadway street, what do you

expect, she thought. Passing by the phones, Avril became more confident she wasn’t going to call, at

least not tonight. But then what could she do? With no money, nowhere to stay, and no contacts, there

weren’t many options. There was always the hostel . . . But she couldn’t see Mike. A shelter, maybe.

She couldn’t think of any shelters nearby. They were somewhere around here . . . You could

always ask somebody, but then they’d know you’re a homeless loser. That wasn’t gonna happen

tonight—Avril didn’t want to talk to anybody, much less be judged by anybody. The street was mostly

empty. A few cars passed by now and then in waves. Nobody walked past. These were ideal conditions

to get mugged. Avril ducked into one of the Vietnamese restaurants lining the street and sat down on a

chair by the cash register. One of the girls working at the restaurant spotted her and lazily walked over

to the register. “You have an order?” she said.

“Um, no,” Avril said. She dug through her wallet, pretending to look for something. “Give me a

minute . . . Do you have a menu?”

“Would you like to sit down inside? Or you’re placing an order to go?”

“To go,” Avril said, and then remembered that she didn’t have any money or anywhere to go.

“Actually, I’ll eat here.”

The girl looked at her funny. “Okay. Come with me,” she said. The girl half-heartedly took a

few steps into the restaurant and waved her arm at one of the empty seats. “Sit where you like.”

“Thanks,” Avril said and smiled at the girl. As she walked to the table, the Vietnamese waiters

and bus-boys watched her. One of them rushed over as soon as she sat down. He was short and stocky.

He looked a little bit like a young bull.

“Hello miss. You want drink?”

“Slow night?” Avril said.

 The waiter nervously looked side to side and behind himself. “Yes. Slow. Monday night.

Boring.” He smiled.

“Uh huh. You guys look really bored,” Avril said and winked.

The waiter pretended to laugh. “Yes, bored . . .” Avril crossed her legs and the guy pretended to

laugh again. She wasn’t sure why she was doing this—she hadn’t seen herself in a mirror all day, but she

was sure she looked horrible. For god’s sake, guys are pathetic; I just came from an alley, she thought.

“You want coke? Chinese beer?”

“The Chinese beer is good,” she said and winked again.

“Yes, good.” The waiter quickly turned and went towards the back. He stopped for a moment

to talk to one of his colleagues and gestured toward Avril. What could he be saying? The waiter

disappeared to the back.

In a few moments, the other waiter came by and placed a Tsingtao Chinese beer on the table.

“Here, on the house. From Andy,” he said.

“The little guy? That’s Andy?” Avril said.

“Yeah, that’s him.” The waiter turned and walked to another table.

Avril opened the beer and had a sip. It was cold, it had that much going for itself . . . Andy

appeared out of nowhere with a menu in his hand. “Good Chinese beer. You enjoy it?”

Avril looked up at him and took the menu, saying, “Thanks, Andy. You didn’t introduce yourself .

. .”

“Yes. No. My English, very bad. Hello!”

Avril laughed. “Hi . . .”

“Hello, I am Andy.”

“April.” She shook his hand and he smiled at her. “So . . . What’s good here?”

Andy seemed to jump a little. “I know! Just for you, banh tam ka ri. Very spicy. Hot.”
 “That sounds pretty good,” Avril said.

“Chicken, you like chicken?” Andy said.

“Sure.”

“Good. It makes you sweat,” Andy said. He snatched the menu off the table and went off

toward the back again, calling out, “I bring you pho!” Avril couldn’t believe this guy—it makes you

sweat? She wasn’t sure she was supposed to read anything into that. Probably not . . .

Andy came back with a bowl of soup. He carefully placed it in front of Avril and watched her,

seeming to gauge her reaction. “Thanks,” she said.

“Go on, taste.” She thought he’d leave, but he just stood there. Was he really going to watch

her eat? Once Avril sipped the broth, he said, “See? Meatball pho, very good.”

Avril looked up at him. “Thanks Andy,” she said. He made a sound and disappeared again. Avril

ate the pho; it wasn’t that bad, a little bland maybe. The meatballs seemed a little raw on the inside.

Oh well—it was gonna be free.

Andy came back in short order with the entrée. The dish was a kind of dark and oily sauce over

noodles, decked out with lettuce leaves and bright yellow flower-shaped vegetables. “Banh tam ka ri,”

Andy said, presenting the plate with pride. “You like it very much. Very hot.” Somehow Andy’s hand

brushed Avril’s and it lingered there for a while. They smiled at each other.

Avril had a bite. The sauce really was hot; it was so hot it seemed to ignite her mouth. She

washed it down with the beer but it didn’t help much; only the lettuce leaves dampened the heat. As

Andy predicted, she was beginning to sweat. Andy came back and asked if it was good. “You weren’t

kidding, this is really hot,” Avril said.

Andy laughed. “Yes. Eat lettuce,” he said, smiling at her, somewhat paternally it seemed. He

left again. Avril was glad that he wasn’t acting too weird; she hadn’t really meant to flirt with him or

anything like that. His recommendation was good, he was a nice guy, but she wasn’t going to do
anything with him. Avril ate the entire plate of food. She waited for Andy to come back and thumbed

through Memoirs of a Russian Punk, looking at the words on the page but not reading any of them.

“You full?” Andy said, appearing again out of nowhere.

“Yeah, it was really good. Um . . . Can you tell me where the bathroom is?”

Andy pointed to a staircase near the restaurant’s front door. That was good—Avril could go to

the restroom for a minute and then quickly sneak out. “Yes. Upstairs.”

“Thanks. I’ll be a minute.” Avril gathered her things, got up, and walked to the bathroom. Andy

respectfully stepped out of the way. She looked back; he was watching her and smiling. She made it up

the stairs to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. Her face was flushed, dirty, her hair a wild

disheveled mess; she couldn’t comprehend why he’d been attracted to her. Maybe he was like that

with everybody, though that didn’t seem likely in light of the complementary beer. Avril noticed a small

pimple forming on the bridge of her nose; she contemplated squeezing it. There was a light knock at the

door.

She knew it was him; so it was no surprise at all when Andy pushed the door open. He

approached her and she took a step back. Who knew Vietnamese guys were this aggressive? Avril half

smiled and said, “No, no . . .”

Andy didn’t understand it, or took the smile as an invitation. He moved in closer with a stern

look on his face and put a hand on Avril’s hip; it was a far cry from the harmless smiling guy down in the

restaurant. He pushed against her and she felt his erection with her leg.

Avril shoved him back. To her surprise, he actually toppled backwards with a shocked

expression on his face. “Get back!” she screamed.

Andy raised his hands and backed away. “Okay, okay miss . . . ,” he said and quickly retreated

from the bathroom.

 Avril realized she was out of breath, panting. She could sense him standing just outside the

door, the little prick. It’d be for the best if his balls were cut off—that goes for all men, actually. Avril

paced around the bathroom, her anger slowly turning inward. It’s me, she thought, it’s my fault, I’m

inviting it. If they’re disgusting, it’s because of me. At some point she noticed there was a window in

the bathroom. She opened it and breathed the cold air. There was no fire exit or anything like that, just

a sheer drop from the second story. At the bottom was another alley—that’d be fitting, Avril thought, I

could jump, break my legs and bleed to death in another alley. Actually, now that she’d been sexually

assaulted, Avril didn’t feel too bad about eating their food. She turned and threw her shoulder into the

door. The door swung open and she stomped past Andy, who stood there and looked down at his

shoes. As she left the restaurant, the cashier girl watched her and didn’t react at all.

Outside, Avril began feeling vulnerable again. She just wanted to go to sleep but she walked and

walked without thinking. Before long, she was standing outside the Purple Porpoise hostel. There was

music coming from upstairs; the steady rhythm of a bass drum and the rudiments of a bass line leaked

outside onto the street. Mike was inside for sure, but maybe Audrey would be at the front desk. Avril

went inside; of course it was Mike. “Hey, April! You’re back!” he said, standing up.

“Yeah . . .”

“You disappeared earlier.”

“I had to go somewhere . . .”

“Hey, there’s a party on, you won’t believe it, there’s this guy here, he’s fucking amazing.” Mike

walked around the desk and stood closer to Avril, touching her on the elbow. “Come inside for a

minute, it’s no big deal.”

“Um . . . Did a guy come around, he—”

“Hold on, I want you to meet this crazy guy who checked in today,” Mike said. He gave Avril’s

arm a little tug and she followed him into the hostel’s common room. Dr. Dre’s “Fuck wit Dre Day” from
his album The Chronic was playing loudly on the hostel’s cheap speaker system. The bass was distorting;

one of the notes rattled everything in the building. A lot of people were sitting around and excitedly

chattering—there was an atmosphere of hysteria. At the center of the room a tall, dark man wearing ski

goggles was sitting with his back perfectly rigid and his arms fixed on the table—he looked like he was

going to explode. His stiffness was a sharp contrast to the rodent-like excitement of everybody else in

the room. Mike walked straight to him and shouted, “Hamid! I want you to meet April, she’s the girl I

was telling you about!”

Hamid turned his head; the rest of his body remained absolutely still. Something like a smile

played on his lips and he stood up, towering over both Avril and Mike. He held his hand out. When Avril

took it, he pulled her closer and kissed her hand. His facial expression subtly changed as his nose came

closer to her hand; Avril thought of the smell of that guy’s caffeine-tinged semen. She wondered if the

Syrian recognized such a bizarre smell. “What charm,” Hamid said.

“Excuse me?” Avril said, raising her voice.

Hamid moved closer and whispered in her ear, “You’re very charming.” Mike patted Avril on the

shoulder, shouted something, and disappeared. Now she was alone with this freak, which was still

holding her hand; in fact, Hamid was intensely rubbing her hand with his fingers. “I’m from Syria,”

Hamid said. “The beauty of American women continues to astonish and surprise me.”

“Are you okay?” Avril shouted.

“Okay, yes, excuse me, I took a new drug. It’s my first time—2ci, have you heard of it? My

senses are . . . Exploding.” Hamid said, dramatically raising his arms with the palms of his hands turned

upward. He could touch the hostel’s ceiling with the tips of his fingers. His voice seemed to rise above

the din of the loud music; its rhythm and tone found its own unique place in the frequency spectrum, a

sort of counterpoint to Dre.

 “You remind me of Moses—Moses with ski goggles in rave gear. All you need’s a staff,” Avril

shouted.

Hamid raised the ski goggles from his head for a moment and looked at Avril. Suddenly, he

pulled them outward and they snapped back into place over his eyes. The goggle’s lenses were red.

“You . . . You’re different. What do I detect in you? A schism in the database, an error in the code,”

Hamid said.

Avril wasn’t sure, but the guy seemed to be talking like a character from The Matrix. “You

maybe need to sober up,” Avril shouted.

Hamid smiled. “Yes, sober. Okay. I’ve been thinking about Americans; I’ve an insight—you

people above any others exhibit the same banal series of patterns. You are not individuals; I liken you to

machines with a stock database of patterns and responses to draw from when interacting with your

environment. Individuality as it’s commonly known consists of separate models of said database, which

can properly be labelled archetypes. One of you speaks in a certain manner, thinks a certain way,

responds to certain stimuli, and those other people there fall within this same relative range of

response—call this archetype 1. Each archetype with its associated patterns can be identified and

codified until a genome of the American people exists; truth be told, there are only maybe fifteen

archetypes of you people. It’s very sad. In Syria too it’s like this, but less so—there are some fifty

archetypes that I can name right now from the top of my head. In the most advanced societies, there

may exist as many as a hundred. Such is human life. If you believe that your subjective experience is

unique or non-archetypal, it’s only because you don’t know any better. But this could be the 2ci

talking.”

“Right,” Avril said. She suddenly felt small; she noticed she was standing in this man’s shadow.

The music seemed to be even louder now, yet she heard every one of Hamid’s words. “That makes

sense,” she shouted.

 “As I said, you are different. Perhaps I’ll base a new archetype on you—I’ll call it ‘Spring,’ in

honor of your name. Come with me,” Hamid said and forcefully grabbed Avril’s arm.

At the same moment, Mike took her by the shoulders and led her away; Hamid stood

motionless, helplessly watching Mike and Avril leave the room. They walked into the common room’s

side room; it was about the size of a large broom closet, but there was a little hallway that led to

another room with a pinball machine and a window overlooking the street. Mike closed the door

behind them; Avril had forgotten how soundproof this room was. “Thanks,” Avril said, “that guy was

starting to creep me out.”

“Yeah, he’s awesome. He’s like the terrorist Hunter S. Thompson.”

“Hunter Thompson? I didn’t really get that vibe,” Avril said.

“No, before you say that you need to see this. Remember that part from Fear and Loathing,

right at the beginning, when he’s talking about all the drugs he’s got? . . . Here, I’ll show you.” Mike took

Avril by the hand and led her through the little hallway into the other room. On the pinball machine

there was a gigantic pile of cocaine, with lines neatly partitioned out over the glass surface. “Check it

out. He gave coke to everybody, and he’s got a briefcase somewhere with all kinds of exotic shit. Here,”

Mike said, pulling Avril to the pinball machine.

It was totally quiet in the room. Only the vibrations in the floorboards suggested there was a

party in the other room. “No, Mike, I don’t think so. I just wanted to see if I could sleep here for the

night, and get my stuff,” Avril said.

“Forget that, come on. We’ll kiss and make up,” Mike said. “Sorry for being a dick earlier.”

“I really can’t do any coke. I’ll get sick.”

Mike smiled at Avril. “No way, it’ll make you feel better.” He produced a straw from his pocket,

bent over the pinball machine, and snorted, drawing the straw across the lines almost at random and

then vacuuming up a chunk of the pile. He threw his head back in a way that implied he was
abandoning himself, or if not that that he was abandoning something. “Oh my fucking god!” he said. He

straightened out and turned to Avril with a big grin on his face. “Come on, hurry up, so it can hit us at

the same time,” he said, pushing the straw in her face.

“Well . . .” Avril took the straw and looked at all the cocaine on the pinball table. How could you

say no? She bent forward, urged on by Mike, and snorted one of the smaller lines.

“Come on, more than that. Hurry . . .” Avril bent forward again and snorted some of the stray

stuff near the pile. “That’s it. Perfect,” Mike said.

Avril was accustomed to this feeling—a ball of energy was centered in her body, sort of like a

compressing star, moments before the supernova. Mike put his arms around Avril; she pressed herself

into him. The star was condensing, gathering energy for the explosion. Mike’s hands began to shake;

soon it spread to his entire body. His eyes were rolling into his head. Avril sensed the heat in his body

rising. A few spasms of joy ran through her body; it was coming on.

“Oh, God,” Mike said. He squeezed Avril’s body tight, and then blindly began rubbing his hand

on the pinball table. He brought his hand up to Avril’s face; a dusting of cocaine floated in the air

around their faces. He ran his hand across Avril’s lips, slipped his fingers into her mouth, rubbed and

massaged her gums and teeth, pushed against the inside of her cheeks with his knuckles. His fingers

were shaking, jerking around in her mouth. Avril let him do it—hell, she downright wanted him to do it.

She felt happy.

Then the star exploded. It’s a flash that runs through the entire body: the exact moment can be

seen in those nuclear bomb videos when the screen blinks white—a nanosecond of nirvana . . . The

human body can recreate the sun; it’s down to the scientists to harness it. Even the feeling afterward

follows the same trajectory as the bomb—it spreads out and clears everything in its path, leaving

something like bliss in its wake. Mike started babbling something but she ignored him, taking his hand
in hers and sniffing and licking at the coke that she could spot left over on it; she wanted to see just how

high she could go. Mike pulled his hand away and kissed her, biting her lower lip. It felt amazing.

It’d been a ploy—Mike grabbed the straw out of her hand and stepped back, wildly laughing. He

grinned and held the straw up in the air like a scepter. The image was funny. Suddenly he threw the

straw behind him. Avril went for the straw; Mike rushed forward and caught her in his arms. “Hold on,

check it out.” He backed up and undid his pants. His cock was half erect. “I’ve always wanted to do

this,” he said. With one hand he jerked his cock, and with the other he gathered up some more coke.

Avril said something, but it came out as a kind of noise. Her mind was racing, going over the

Matrix stuff the Syrian said and how important it was, Yukio Mishima’s suicide and how important it

was, Brian Nichols’ rampage and how important it was. “My name’s Spring,” Avril said, among a lot of

other nonsense.

Mike ignored her. He clumsily spread the coke out over his cock in something like a line. “Get

over here,” he said. Avril didn’t exactly want to, but then she didn’t really care either; she wouldn’t

have been able to stop herself even if she did care. She walked over to Mike and got on her knees,

pulling her shirt off. Mike bent over a little bit to grab her tits, but seemed to remember the cocaine,

steadying himself to prevent any of it falling off his cock. Actually, it seemed to hold pretty well,

partially bound as it was by the moisture of his penis. Avril ran her nose across the length of his cock,

sniffing as hard as she could. She felt like she could go higher, much higher . . . A lot of the cocaine was

still on Mike’s cock, so she began to lick it away. Some of it had fallen to the floor, so she pressed it to

her fingers, spread it on Mike’s cock, and sucked it off. He was subtly humping a spot in the air the

entire time, thrusting his pelvis forward more every time his cock could fit into Avril’s mouth. Before

she knew what was happening, Avril was bent over the pinball table getting fucked from behind and

snorting more and more coke. At some point, the Syrian seemed to show up in the room . . .
John
John walked back into his apartment alone; his heavy footsteps were those of a defeated man.

Mel popped her head out from her room. John turned away from her and trudged into his room,

slammed the door behind himself, threw the bag of April’s stuff down on the ground, and lay down on

his bed. He closed his eyes. They’d only been apart for a day, but it seemed entirely possible he was

never going to see April again. Why hadn’t she called? There was a knock at the door. John didn’t

move; after a moment, Mel pushed the door open and stuck her head into the room. “Go away,” John

said.

“Here,” Mel said, walking in and holding a glass out in front of her. “Vodka, our special

formula.”

John groaned and sat up. “I really thought at some point you’d stop making that shit.”

Mel laughed and sat down on the bed. “You taught me well. Now it’ll never stop, at least as

long as Nolte lives.”

“You really don’t have to console me, you know. I’ll be fine.”

“Just take the drink. See, I have one of my own too,” Mel said, holding up the glasses of red

liquid. Both glasses were filled almost to the top—it was a drink better suited to college kids than

degenerating adults in their mid-twenties, even if they were alcoholics; the formula was based on a

spectacular candid video Nick Nolte had once recorded: in the video, Nolte angrily bought a 64 ounce

bottle of Ocean Spray cranberry juice and the cheapest liter bottle of vodka he could find, poured out

half the cranberry juice, and filled it back to the top with the vodka. Nolte’s specific method was to

situate the bottle of vodka upside down, joining the necks of the bottles together so the vodka would

pour on its own; thus he could use the small period of free time to accost passersby on the street,

making obscene gestures with his hands and drawing attention to the self-concocting mixed drink. Then
he threw his head back and chugged the whole bottle in a single go while sitting on a curb on Sunset

Boulevard, a good quarter of the liquid pouring onto his face. The event is chronicled on Youtube,

though the video is taken down every time it’s spotted by an administrator; usually a kid somewhere will

upload it again—it has to be imagined that the video will live forever.

“Anyway,” John said, accepting the drink, “she’ll probably call tomorrow.”

“Aw, you really did spend all day looking for her, didn’t you?” Mel said.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

Mel laughed. “Well, I don’t blame you I guess. You know, it’s been more than six months since

you brought a girl here, and none of them ever stayed this long. Three days! So come on, drink . . .”

“That’s not as bad as drinking alone at home,” John said.

“Hey, I didn’t pour it until I saw you slink into your room, and now we’re here together, aren’t

we? It’ll be like old times, the loser alliance.”

“Jesus, Mel. Anyway, I can’t even remember the last time you’ve had a guy here.”

“Hey, this is about you,” Mel said, laughing. “So where did you find that chick? Ugh, what’s her

name . . .”

“Aren’t you supposed to be working?” John said.

“I mean no offense, but she seems crazy. Like, literally crazy—it’s in her eyes. She’s got crazy

eyes. Oh, they cut my hours, like usual. Yeah.”

“So you just stuck around here?”

“Yep. What else would I do?”

John drank some of the vodka. “I don’t know. April’s not crazy though, I mean, I don’t know,

I’ve never met anyone like her.”

Mel bugged her eyes out and shook her head. She was making fun of him . . . “A once in a

lifetime connection! . . . A love for the ages!”

 John pushed her on the shoulder. “Come on, quit giving me shit,” he said.

“It was destiny! Ooh, like a Tom Hanks movie,” Mel said, pushing him back and poking him in

the ribs.

“Alright, alright, yeah, the whole thing was kind of ridiculous,” John said, embarrassed.

“No really, where did you meet her?” Mel said.

“Honestly, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Mel calmed down a little, crossed her legs, leaned in, smiled. John couldn’t tell if she was being

sarcastic. “Really . . . Now you have to tell me,” she said.

“Okay, look, I have to ask you something. I’m being serious now,” John said.

“Uh huh.”

“Remember when I called you earlier and you hung up on me . . .”

“Yeah.”

“This is gonna sound crazy. Okay, this old man overheard the conversation, he heard everything

you said. He told me a bunch of crap about not knowing how to live, and how our generation hides

behind irony or something, but then he said something about you.”

“About me?”

“Yeah . . . He said that you loved me, and I’m blind to it.”

Mel frowned. “He said that?”

“Yeah . . .”

“Why are you giving me this shit about an old man? That’s bullshit—”

“Okay, forget the old guy.” He moved closer to Mel and set the drink aside. She didn’t react; she

seemed to be shaken. “Is that true? Then why didn’t you—I mean,” John said.

Mel stood up. “John . . .

 He realized how close to Friends the situation was becoming; it was even bordering on the soap

opera. He stood up, took Mel’s arm, and sat down. She sat down with him; she didn’t say anything.

She was watching his face. “Okay, I shouldn’t have said love, that’s crazy. But there’s something, isn’t

there? Why didn’t you ever—”

“You didn’t need to make up anything about an old man.”

John wanted to protest for a moment, insist the old man existed, pursue the question of why

she never acted on anything—he’d always been attracted to Mel after all—but then he flashed back to

last week on the couch with April when he thought that she’d accept a kiss. It’s true, it’s the most banal

of observations: if the possibility of a relationship exists, the situation comes to resemble a home with a

gas leak—the lightest spark ignites a much larger event; the honest gesture, the bold act, the

spontaneous kiss, even a touch on the arm can set into motion everything that comes after. Nobody’s

certain how exactly any relationship begins; there’s no prescribed set of behaviors and rituals, no

generally accepted rule for a tender moment or a first kiss. It just happens—that’s enough. In short, the

bold and the courageous are rewarded. It seemed almost like a tragedy that his relationship with April

was initiated at every point by April; he wouldn’t make the same mistake now. John even realized that

neither the truth of the old man nor his relationship with Mel up until this point mattered. He put his

hand on Mel’s arm and lightly rubbed the skin; he moved forward, his body slightly shaking. Mel closed

her eyes and dipped her head forward. He kissed the corner of Mel’s mouth, then her lips. She opened

her mouth and returned the kiss. In a twisted way this was John’s first kiss, the first one that was part of

a narrative like you see in the movies. Maybe there’s a reason they keep using the same tired formulas

over and over . . .

ACT 2 – ORBIT

“She had not kept a diary and was now denied the pleasure of assiduously rereading her record of the
happiness of the past few months and consigning each page to the fire as she did so.”
John
The call came late at night. The Nokia ringtone cycled through twice and John didn’t budge. At

some point Mel stirred, but the ringing stopped. A few minutes later it started again; Mel sat up this

time. “John,” she said, shaking him lightly, “your phone.”

John rolled over, muttering, “Oh, Christ.” He reached out and tried to silence the phone, but it

wasn’t in its usual place next to his bed—he’d taken his pants off and threw them to the ground too fast

earlier that night. He sat up and looked at Mel, smiled at her, looked down over her naked body. It

seemed unbelievable that he’d slept alone in this apartment so long, separated from something so

beautiful by a hallway and a couple flimsy slabs of drywall. The phone kept ringing—it was too loud a

thousand times over. “Christ.” John stumbled out of the bed and fished the phone out of his pants. It

was an unlisted number.

“Who is it?” Mel said, whispering for some reason.

“Shit, I don’t know. Not listed, screw it.”

“Maybe you’d better answer it. It’s really late, what time is it?”

John glanced out the window—it was pitch black outside except for a few scattered, dim street

lights. He answered the phone. “Hello?”

“Hello. This is Hamid Hanna, calling for John Fontagne.” The voice was deep and assured; it

woke John up.

“Who?”

“This is John Fontagne?”

“John, yeah, but—”

“Hello, John. I am Hamid. I’m sorry to disturb you so late in the night. I assume you’re the

husband of an April Fontagne?”

 “What?”

“April Fontagne.” The words seemed to hang in the air . . . “I’m sure you are worried, your wife

has not come home.”

“Wife? I’m not married, wait—”

“So it’s as I thought. I see. Sorry to disturb you.”

“Wait!” John screamed into the phone. By then, Mel was sitting next to John and attentively

watching him; by contrast, he didn’t even notice her presence.

“Yes?” Hamid said.

“What’s as you thought? Who is this?”

“As I said, my name is Hamid Hanna. I did not believe the young lady was married, though she

has listed you as her emergency contact, her husband in fact.”

John stared at the phone. Mel touched him on the shoulder and said, “Who is it?”

“Emergency contact? What are you talking about?” John said, ignoring her.

“I apologize if I’m not completely coherent. I’m calling from a hospital; the situation was frantic

and I did not have total control over my faculties. April has suffered from a cocaine overdose. I believe I

may be at fault.” John didn’t say anything. Hamid went on, “Though I brought April to the hospital, they

will not release her to my custody, only to yours, since she has listed you as her husband. Otherwise

they will keep her, I believe, in the psychiatric ward.”

John stood up and looked for his pants. “Listen, where are you. So she’s okay then. I’m on my

way . . .”

“John, what’s going on?” Mel said.

“There is something else. April has been sexually assaulted. I stopped it before it could get out

of hand,” Hamid said.

“Fuck! This was at the hostel, wasn’t it. Was it Mike?”

 “Yes, I believe he instigated the situation. Please, come to the hospital and I will explain

everything. It is St. Joseph’s, on the DePaul campus, in the psychiatric wing.”

“Alright, I’ll be there. Thanks, Hamid.”

“I will be here as well. Thank you for answering your telephone. I’m soon leaving the country,

and I would prefer not to leave a desperate situation in my wake.”

Hamid hung up. John rushed to turn on the light and began throwing on his clothes. Without

looking, he tossed his phone to the bed and, as the phone sailed through the air and smacked Mel on

the cheek, he realized for the first time since the call had come that she was there in the room with him.

“Oh shit, sorry,” he said. Mel didn’t move; she had covered herself up with blankets, hiding everything

but her face; she looked angry. The phone sat idly in her lap . . .

“Is this about April?” Mel said.

“Yeah, but it’s a long story. Look, she’s—”

“I thought so,” Mel said, and backed up on the bed until she was sitting against the wall. It

finally occurred to John that perhaps by some standards he’d committed a deeply immoral act by

sleeping with Mel. It instantly became clear that he didn’t care for Mel as much as he’d thought—the

simple mention of April’s name had annihilated Mel’s existence. It happened before anything about the

overdose or sexual assault was mentioned. John couldn’t deny it, but he could lie about it. He felt bad;

he felt pity for the girl, and realized how disgusting a feeling pity is for both parties. Mel seemed to

sense this too; she’d probably sensed it much earlier than John had. She looked like she might cry. In

any case, she was quickly withdrawing, staring at the corner of the room, clenching her teeth, making

sure to keep John out of her field of vision. But what could he really do? He couldn’t control his

feelings.

“Look . . .”

“Don’t say anything,” Mel said, her voice on the verge of breaking.
 “April’s in the hospital. I’ll be back, okay? I’ll put her up in a hotel or something . . . I’ll—”Mel

kicked his phone off the bed. He picked it up and said, “I was half asleep, it had nothing to do with you.”

“Yeah, it never did,” she said.

“Did you hear any part of that conversation? The guy was calling from a hospital, he said that

April overdosed on cocaine and somebody sexually assaulted her. So you’re going to sulk because I

didn’t nod to you while he told me all this?” John was genuinely angry, even on the verge of self-

righteousness. More than that, he could feel himself taking psychological control of the situation—Mel

was right to be angry, but she was still reading a world of intentions and feelings into a subtle gesture

during a moment of crisis. There was the strong possibility that she was overblowing or misreading

what had happened even if she was absolutely right, and so her position was weak.

Mel looked up at John. “I didn’t know . . . I’m sorry,” she said. She was crying now.

John couldn’t say why he was behaving like this, but he had the sense that he’d won a battle of

some sort. It was probably the same feeling as doing a crime and getting away with it. It felt good. He

climbed onto the bed and took Mel in his arms, ran his hands over her hair, kissed the tears away from

her cheeks, saying, “It’s okay, it’s okay, baby.” The blankets had fallen from Mel’s hands and lay

bunched up around her waist. In this position, her body was incredibly attractive; there was a sad

quality about it, like she needed to be protected, or enveloped somehow, or at any rate to be held

closely and kissed. Her back was hunched slightly, her head bowed, her neck incredibly long and

delicate, her breasts heaving, her stomach soft and round. John put his hand on the side of her neck,

running his fingers over the tendons and feeling her pulse with his thumb. He was getting hard, and he

had a great impulse to somehow “cure” Mel of her sudden melancholy. He put his arms around Mel,

held her. This seemed to be a classical embrace between two people, though neither could say what

exactly was going on.

 “I’m sorry,” Mel said. “I shouldn’t be so emotional.” What a strange thing to say. She brought

her hand to her face, partially covering it.

“That’s okay, you’re really cute. You’re really cute when you’re crying,” John said, pulling her

hand away from her face. Mel smiled a little bit; John kissed her. She suddenly turned her face away

from his and started laughing—it was a really humiliated, self-conscious laugh. “What is it?” John said.

He moved closer, but she put her hands on his chest and held him off.

“John . . .”

“What’s wrong?”

Mel turned her face and looked at John for an instant before turning away. “It’s nothing, forget

it,” she said.

John backed off. “Are we okay?”

“Yeah.” Mel kissed him on the cheek. “I just had a funny thought.”

“Okay. It’s all just a rush, you know? No one’s ever called me from a hospital in the middle of

the night before. I don’t even really know what to do, like, how are you supposed to act? I’ll get a cab, I

guess . . .”

“Yeah, there are a lot of them around this time,” Mel said.

“Listen . . . Do you want to come with?” John immediately regretted saying that. He may even

have cringed a little, especially when she didn’t answer right away.

Mel pulled the blankets up from her waist again and covered her chest. “No, you’d better go

alone, go on,” she said.

Mel
Mel was totally humiliated. She didn’t hate John, not really. He’d thrown the phone at her

nonchalantly—he’d negated Mel’s physical, emotional, and spiritual existence in the world with a literal

throw-away gesture. It had been a ridiculous moment, bordering on the obscene—if anything could

destroy a person that was it. Then to make it worse she’d given into him without the faintest hint of

struggle; she’d let herself be held, she’d smiled, kissed him. She could possibly justify it all as her having

been horny; she hadn’t been laid in more than a year before that night. It seems impossible but it’s not,

not really: it’s the easiest thing in the world not to have sex. After an extended period of involuntary

celibacy, you regress to approximately the same emotional state you were in as a virgin, so the crying,

emotional swings, silliness, and everything else was almost to be expected. Mel couldn’t believe she’d

told him she’d had a funny thought . . . In fact, it wasn’t funny at all—she’d had the impulse to say, “I

love you.”

Mel stood up and walked to the window. John was walking down the street now. He walked

with steady determination, leaning forward slightly and taking perfectly even steps. She had no idea

why she’d wanted to say that she loves him. After all, things had turned out horribly; everything had

gone all wrong. Since the first day she’d met John, she’d been physically attracted to him, upon first

seeing him actually, and she’d come to like him as a person in the fifteen minutes she spent interviewing

him as a potential roommate. Somehow, despite all she’d learned in two years of cohabitation, John

had turned out to be a completely different person than Mel had thought he was. She’d been sure John

would be the absolutely faithful type, the puppy dog type, devoted and caring; but in reality he'd tossed

her aside like it was nothing, disposing of her not heartlessly so much as thoughtlessly. He seemed to

realize on some level that Mel was hurt, but there obviously wasn’t anything to be done—it simply

wasn't going to work out.

 Mel walked through the apartment from John’s room to the bathroom. It was strange—she had

never spent much time in John’s room. The walk seemed foreign, unusual, and not any more so

because she was naked . . . She began to draw a bath, thinking about how that girl soaked her filthy

clothes in the bathtub. April was plain dirty—who leaves their clothes in a soapy bathtub like that?

April was a strange one. She was young though, probably 22 or 23, so probably a better fit for John than

Mel, age-wise at least.

Mel was 29 by now, almost 30. By contrast John was 24, almost 25—a baby. There's never any

hope for relationships like that. About the time she turned 26, Mel began thinking it was impossible to

meet anybody and that she'd probably die a spinster. She dreaded making do, testing the dating waters

north of thirty. In a way, turning thirty would be something like the end of Mel’s life. There really was

no hope—she was similar to many of those of her generation in that she didn’t have any real passions,

any skills, any talents, there weren’t even any obsessions or real objects of desire; there was only time

and boredom and relationships. She imagined meeting some guy she found on an internet dating site in

a restaurant—he’d be in his late 30s, balding, pot bellied, nervous, with a bunch of pre-rehearsed lines

and little anecdotes ready to go. Similarly, Mel would be dressed more provocatively than is

comfortable, a scheme meant to cover up for her wrinkling and increasingly unpleasant face.

Underneath the slutty clothes would be an arsenal of body-shaping compression garments, twisting and

squeezing her body so its silhouette would resemble a much younger girl’s, at least until the clothes

came off and the raw, pinched flesh could sag and droop freely; it wouldn’t matter though—the guy

would be as ashamed of his body as Mel would be of hers. After an uneventful date, they’d go back to

his house and awkwardly sit around before having bad sex; it would be a minor miracle if either of them

could move well enough to achieve penetration. Neither of them would be satisfied. They might stay

together, they might not. It probably came down to chance. Love as it happened in our fantasies simply

didn't happen anymore if it ever really did. You didn't just "meet somebody" on the street, or in a class,
or while walking the dog. She confirmed her thesis every night by reading the missed connections board

on craigslist. There were no more men, no more women, only boys and girls crushed under the twin

jackboots of neurosis and anxiety. Even posting a futile missed connection was a braver act than most

could muster. We’re all afraid of each other, Mel thought . . . and for good reason . . .

Mel stepped into the bathtub as it began filling up. She poured some soap in, lay back, and

closed her eyes, letting the warmth envelop her body. After two years, why had she let it happen with

John? She’d played the scenario out in her head a million times, and it always started approximately the

same way—in fact, her fantasies were close to how it’d actually happened. One day they'd be talking—

usually on the couch though, not in John’s room—and suddenly they'd look at each other, kiss, begin

feeling each other's bodies. Sometimes when they watched movies together she'd throw her legs up

onto his lap, or they'd sit next to each other with their legs touching. She loved the firmness of his

body. He had a strong heart—you could always feel it pounding away if you touched him in the right

spots, not the usual ones like the wrist or the neck, but his hip, his thigh, his knee. In any case, at some

point Mel had decided it would never happen—why? She had to have a reason, a great one. It was

even a point of pride for Mel: John was the first male roommate of hers she’d never slept with, despite

that he was easily the most physically attractive of them all. It always made perfect sense never to sleep

with John—she sensed it'd be trouble somehow. She even figured there were a lot of potential

scenarios which ended in her death after it all went down—a romance that kills, that sort of thing. Now

she could see it happening, she saw her body sliding into the bathtub after downing a bottle of aspirin

and an entire bottle of Nolte cran-vodka, her head sinking under the water’s surface and never coming

back up. Well, maybe it wouldn’t happen like that—drowning was supposedly a horrible death.

Finishing another glass of vodka, Mel was surprised to find that she’d brought the bottle along with a

glass into the bathroom without ever noticing the objects were in her hands. She laughed at herself, at

the rank alcoholism. The Nolte cran-vodka was an amazing concoction though—you really couldn't
taste the vodka. That's a good thing when you're buying $8 liters of vodka with nothing but Cyrillic

written on the bottle.

So it’s come to this, drinking alone in the bathtub, Mel thought. There was also the role that

chance played. What if she hadn't told John to answer the phone? Probably April would’ve spent some

time in the hospital with her coke overdose, they'd release her, she'd get in some more trouble, forget

about John, and neither John nor Mel would have ever heard from her again. Instead, here she was,

alone in the bathtub with her roommate-turned-lover chasing off after another girl.

Biology seemed to have its role too. At one point, while John had been inside of her, she’d

wanted more than anything for him to come inside of her. She’d even begged him to do it, though in

the end he’d pulled out and came on her pubis. In the moment, a flash of anger ran through her and

she’d wanted to slap him. She couldn't remember a single time in her life that she’d wanted a guy to

come inside her. She sort of liked seeing ejaculations, they even felt pleasant on her body sometimes,

but she'd never wanted a guy to come inside of her. Was it possible she wanted a kid, or had it just

been an erotic flight of fancy? It was still possible that he'd impregnated her even if he hadn’t shot it

into her womb . . . The child would be beautiful though. She decided that if she really were pregnant,

she'd ask John to let her raise it on her own. He was too young, still not quite a man. He had nothing to

teach a child; then again, neither did she. She couldn't claim to know how to live any more than John or

anybody else could.

Mel once read that women who have children past a certain age put their offspring at risk of

genetic defects. The chances were low, but the possibility was grim to think about. If a kid was going to

happen, it had to happen now before the thirties set in and her womb became poisonous, or whatever

happened. If you waited too long you risked dealing with a kid with Down’s syndrome or something

even worse. She remembered back to high school, she must have been fourteen, or fifteen at the

oldest—there were these special needs kids who she and her friends would make fun of. There was a
boy, a real mean one, who’d said, "Why do they even let those retards live? They should kill the

motherfuckers. It's cruel not to." Back then, she’d agreed with that a hundred percent . . . Did she still?

The kids constantly shit all over themselves, had emotional outbursts, hurt each other, hurt themselves;

they seemed to be less human than dogs. And most of the time they were uglier than dogs with their

defective faces, always twisted into a senseless grin or a painful grimace. She knew that their mothers

still loved them, even that she'd probably love her own kid if it turned out that way. Regardless, it was a

cruel fate to inflict on a human being; maybe the broken ones should be killed before they’re allowed to

get too big, too wretched, and feel too much pain.

Anyway, Mel had never liked children too much. She looked down at her body. What had

changed? Nothing that she could see; maybe John had changed. Maybe meeting the crazy girl

emboldened him. Or it might have come down to something as simple as basic jealousy. Maybe Mel

had wanted to sleep with John all along and it took April’s appearance—a sexually attractive girl if

nothing else—to spur her into doing something. There was something different in John though. She

could never have imagined him making a move on her like that, and then suddenly it just happened, he

was right there jumping on her. Maybe it’d been in him all along, but then why had he waited for

years? She’d never quite sensed how much desire John held inside until the moment he’d held her

body. She’d instantly known that he wanted her. His fingers were greedy, his hands covetous, his arms

possessive, his eyes aggressive, invasive even. Even if he were to stay with that girl April forever, Mel

could imagine a number of scenarios where the she and John continued to see one another. Did she

really want to do that, knowing how much trouble it’d be? Sure, why not.
April
Avril woke to the sound of voices outside the door of the room. She instantly recognized them

to be John’s and the Syrian’s. Another hospital, she thought, staring up at the fluorescent light. What

did I do now? She tried to sit up but her body didn’t cooperate, the muscles were unresponsive. It felt

like there was a great void deep in her chest. She contented herself with listening to the voices.

“It lent me false insight. The thoughts which had seemed so profound turned out upon sober

analysis to be fraudulent, or to be very generous undeveloped. I would not recommend it,” the Syrian

said in his deep and assured tone.

John laughed. “I don’t think I was any threat to take it. I wouldn’t even know where to get any.”

“Yes. I’ve found that fringe drugs are generally that way for good reason. Take a popular drug

like cocaine for instance: it is so good and so pure that, given an infinite supply, a person will ingest it

until the point of lethality, regardless of their intelligence or level of education. It’s not a mysterious

phenomenon—why do people use drugs? Because they’re fun.”

“Yeah, I guess so. I’m at a point where I just don’t really care about preserving myself, so it’s

like, bring it on.”

The Syrian laughed. “That’s a particularly western attitude. In a society like mine that believes

it has access to objectivity and truth, people generally throw themselves into debauchery and hedonism

not so much out of resignation as out of rebellion, a mad, hopeless flight to subjectivity, to find, so to

speak, our own individual truth, something that is taken for granted in cultures like yours. It doesn’t

succeed, it never does—the prize for endeavoring on this quest is inevitably destruction; we all know

this, and yet we still embark. In the end it’s deeply embarrassing: the most common case resembles

mine; the young men of Syria go abroad to destroy themselves rather than do it at home as you do. The
west is already lost in the eyes of God; perhaps, we imagine, his eyes will not focus so sharply on what

happens here. I no longer believe this is true.”

There was a long pause, and then John said, “So why do you do it?”

“I will quote scripture, if you will allow me to?”

“Sure, I don’t mind.”

“This is from the hadith: ’One day the Prophet was standing beside a garbage dump when he

called to the companions and said, “Pursue the world.” Then he took a smelly piece of garbage and a

rotten bone and said, “This is the world.”’"

“I’m not quite sure I get it,” John said.

“It continues, ‘On another day, the Prophet saw the cadaver of a young sheep that had been

thrown away by the owner. Then the Prophet turned towards his companions and said, “Have you ever

thought how worthless is this cadaver to the owner. By Allah, the world is more worthless in the eyes of

Allah than this cadaver in the eyes of its owner,”’” the Syrian said. “Are you beginning to see? God has

no use for the material world, nor does he have any use for how we interact with the material world. As

a warrior, one must love death and hate life; this is how we may serve God. Finally, there is one more

step, that is—”

“That’s it!” Avril shouted. The Syrian stopped speaking, there was a silence, and then she heard

John arguing with what must have been a nurse. John insisted on going into the room; the nurse

insisted he wait for the doctor. Suddenly, the door opened and the Syrian walked through. He looked

stern and powerful now that he wasn’t wearing ski goggles; his posture was more normal, more human,

stronger, his facial hair was neatly trimmed, his clothing business-like. He was followed shortly by John

and then the nurse, who was loudly protesting.

“You’re awake!” John said.

 It took all of Avril’s strength just to prop herself up on her elbows. She ripped the IV tubes from

her arms; the sharp stings barely registered. “That’s it,” she said again. The nurse rushed over and

grappled with the IV apparatus, pulling the tubes toward Avril and hysterically muttering. “What you

were saying just now . . . What’s your name again?”

“Hamid,” the Syrian said. “But shouldn’t you preserve your strength?” One of the IV bags fell to

the ground and the nurse dashed from the room, calling for a doctor.

“Never mind,” Avril said, “what did you just say?”

“The hadith?” Hamid said.

“No, after that, about death,” Avril said and rolled over onto her side. She was wearing one of

those ridiculous hospital gowns; her bare ass was probably sticking out. She threw her legs over the

edge of the bed and sat up, and then heaved herself forward onto her feet. For a moment there was a

sensation of triumph, as if she’d conquered the debilitating force of the drug cocktail they’d put her on,

but as the weight of her torso oriented over her hips every joint in her lower body buckled; the muscles

in her legs hadn’t worked and she collapsed forward like a doll. John dove forward, but wasn’t able to

reach Avril before she smacked into the floor on her stomach, her forehead following by heavily landing

on the hard tile; a dull, vacant feeling took up in her head.

“What are you doing,” John said, turning over and cradling her head in his arms.

Avril thought she might have been laughing. “Just set me down, set me down there on that

chair.” John dragged her carcass over to the chair and dumped her into it. She could feel her body

flopping around, and she had the keen sensation that it was dead weight beyond her control. Oddly,

she didn’t feel embarrassed about any of this. “Hamid,” she said.

“Yes?”

“Say that again, it began, ‘As a warrior . . .’”

“As a warrior, one must love death and hate life.”

 Avril straightened her body out; she sensed that the throbbing in her head was focusing her

thoughts. “Yeah, that makes perfect sense, I get it now, what Mishima was doing.”

“Mishima?” Hamid and John said at the same time.

“When he killed himself. I see why he did it.”

“You do?” John said.

“Mishima had a purpose, and when he killed himself he wasn’t losing anything; he was serving a

purpose that meant more than his existence. So he didn’t waste his life at all, what he did couldn’t be

taken ironically—he died to raise his art, which had always been closer to some kind of an objective

truth than his physical bearing. The statement couldn’t have any weight unless it was paid for with his

life; if he’d kept on into old age he’d have only degraded everything.”

“That’s right,” Hamid said. “You’re very much closer to Islam than you think, April.”

“Except your purpose isn’t art, it’s God,” April said. “I guess I can accept that.”

A doctor rushed into the room. “For God’s sake, for God’s sake,” he was saying, “why are you

out of bed?” The doctor looked at John and Hamid. “How could you two let her tear the IVs from her

arms? She put herself at great risk.”

“We came into the room and she was already doing it,” John said.

“She is very strong willed,” Hamid said.

“Okay, help me get her back into the bed. I don’t understand it, she was on some powerful

sedatives,” the doctor said, grabbing Avril under the arm. John rushed to her other side and helped pick

her up. Her head flopped to one side; she was disappointed to find that she couldn’t stop it from doing

so. She felt like a ragdoll.

Once Avril was back in bed, the doctor said to John, “So, you’re the husband?”

“Um . . . Yeah,” John said.

“Come with me please,” the doctor said, putting his arm around John’s shoulder.
 Once John and the doctor left the room, Hamid bashfully smiled at Avril and said, “I’m sorry.”

She couldn’t fathom what he had to be sorry about—he might have saved her life. “What for?”

Avril said.

“I saw Mike take you into that room. I assumed he might have sinister intentions, but I couldn’t

have known he would invite all those men in. Had I been more alert I could have foreseen it.”

“No,” Avril said, “it’s my fault. Nobody forced me to snort that much coke.”

“I understand you suffer from—”

“That’s bullshit. The only time you pull the mental illness act is when it’s a lie, if you’re trying to

garner sympathy or deflect responsibility. You’re still in control, you don’t suddenly become a lamb at

the mercy of the wolves just because of something going on in your head.” Avril felt her strength

returning; she was getting angry. Worst of all, she felt like she couldn’t stop herself from talking—even

this felt like an act, a way to impress Hamid. It wasn’t true at all that you’re in control . . .

“I don’t believe that’s quite true,” Hamid said.

Avril pushed herself up on the bed and sighed. “You’re right . . . I just don’t want you to feel

sorry for me.”

Hamid sat down in the chair next to the bed. “I do not. It’s my obligation to act with honor.

Mike was clearly in the wrong.”

“That motherfucker,” Avril said. “Somebody should take care of him.”

“He will answer to God,” Hamid said. It didn’t seem like he believed that.
John
The doctor took John far down the hallway, holding him around the shoulder the entire time.

Finally he stopped and looked at John for a while before saying, “I understand, I understand it’s very

difficult. I’ve had a look at Avril’s medical history.”

“Avril?” John wasn’t sure if he’d misheard that. “You mean April?”

“Did I misread that? I’m sorry. April, excuse me.”

“Uh huh.”

“Yes, so I’ve had a look at April’s medical history. Diagnosed bipolar, first manic episode at the

age of sixteen. Those are tough, even tougher than cases which manifest in adulthood. People who first

experience the illness during adolescence generally tend to associate it strongly with their identity; it’s a

real tragedy. But I’m not here to talk about her. I want to discuss what you can do differently to

prevent occurrences like this in the future.”

“What are you—”

“Please, don’t take any offense. I don’t mean to indict you or judge your character. I’ve lost a

loved one to the disease, and I know precisely how difficult it is to cope, particularly when the mania

gets going. The Greeks referred to bipolar as intermittent madness—it’s not politically correct, but

there really is no better description. The change in a person is so total, so complete that you don’t

recognize them. But I’m sure you know exactly what I mean.”

“Uh . . . ,” John said. The doctor had a nervous, fast-paced, overwhelming way of speaking.

“Now as I said, I want to talk about you. April overdosed on cocaine. She was sexually

assaulted. I would hesitate to press charges, as the sad truth is people put themselves in these

situations when they’re manic. April hasn’t been on her medications. We learned that she stopped

taking them some months ago, and her manic episode has been going on for some time. She even
claims it’s over now, which is reassuring, though you can never be quite sure. My question is: where

have you been? You should know that as soon as your wife even begins showing signs of mania that it’s

best for everybody involved to have her institutionalized. If your doctors haven’t advised you thus so

far, they’ve failed you.”

“Right,” John said.

“So they haven’t. It’s as I assumed. People think it’s harsh, it’s punitive, but I don’t think we

should run from the truth. Institutions aren’t just ‘nuthouses’ anymore, they’re compassionate, they’re

understanding, and they can work miracles, particularly in the case of bipolar disorder. Now I trust you,

Mr. Fontagne, you have a good look about you. It isn’t your fault that the doctors in the past have been

too liberal as regards your wife’s disease. I’m going to give you a choice: we can release her to your

care tonight, or we can keep her for observation for a few days, a week maybe.”

“Well—”

“Wait! I want you to promise me, promise me, that if she shows symptoms of mania from here

on out that you’ll bring her right back here to me.”

“Um, sure, that’s fine with me,” John said.

The doctor slapped him on the shoulder. “Great! Listen, that’s real great. So it’s a promise.

Anyway, she’s not a great candidate right now. I think the mania really has subsided to some degree in

light of the tests we’ve just done. She’s got the classical signs of transition—dopamine exhaustion,

serotonin depletion, even some preliminary adrenaline poisoning, all of which are heightened beyond

the levels associated with sniffing a little too much marching powder. So you promise you’ll bring her

back if, you know,” the doctor said, spinning his finger around his ear.

“Yeah,” John said. He wasn’t quite sure what he was promising, or why the doctor was so

insistent on bringing April back to the hospital. “What’s all this about adrenaline?”
 “Oh, it’s nothing to worry about, nothing to worry about at all. Your wife just needs rest and a

little TLC. She needs you to care for her and show her you’re there for her more than ever now that

she’s coming down from the mania. When you’re manic you feel invincible; it’s a shock to understand

fragility again. Come on, let’s go back, it’ll be the triumphant return of the husband. April will be glad to

know we’re letting her go.” The doctor hurried back to the room and burst through the door. John

followed him and pushed the door open. The doctor was already saying, “Okay April, we’re releasing

you now that your husband’s showed up. Be a good girl, you hear?”

“Just like that?” April said.

“Yeah, I guess they think you’re okay,” John said. “Listen, we have to talk . . .”

April looked up at John and smiled. “Sure.” John felt a rush of emotion at April’s smile. So what

if she was bipolar? She was the sweetest girl he’d ever known. He could be happy with her; he could be

happy with that smile of hers.

“So then. I wish you kids luck. And remember the promise you made, John,” the doctor said

and quickly left. He popped his head back in after a moment and said, “I filled out the release forms for

you. Pretty slick, eh? I knew I couldn’t keep her away from you. The forms are at the front desk—just

sign out with the nurse and you’re free to go.”

The room was filled with an awkward silence. It was finally broken by Hamid. “So what will the

two of you do now?” he said.

The thought of bringing April back to the apartment and seeing Mel was almost too much. In a

way, it was almost impossible not to compare the two girls. Mel seemed to represent stability, but she

was too close to John, too similar; she was boring and antiseptic, as much as it pained him to think of

her like that. It was also impossible to deny that April was physically more attractive than Mel—the first

point of comparison was the hair, April’s long shock of red hair compared to Mel’s dull and mousy

brown, usually pulled back in a ponytail, and then there was April’s lean body, almost totally devoid of
fat and full of wild energy, which sharply contrasted with Mel, who had put on a few pounds over the

years and whose body seemed to be constantly weighed down, loosening at the seams, and incapable of

real movement. The differences went beyond the purely physical: excitement and drama swirled

around April—outwardly it was jail and then the hospital, but there was also her brash personality and

her penchant for public sex, which John could never imagine Mel getting into. True, most well-adjusted

men would probably consider these things a turnoff, or excessive at the very least; but for somebody as

far gone as John, it was simple passive excitement—entertainment, almost. Even then, if it hadn't been

for April, nothing would have happened with Mel. In a roundabout way, April was to thank for his

newfound sexual success, even what could have been called his actualization as a human being. Before

April, and since moving back into the city and finding employment, John’s experiential outlook could

have been described as ennui bordering on pain; after April, whatever was going on could have been

described as life. Most importantly, he felt important, needed, and that he had the capability to act, the

empowering sense that he could affect the world and was in control of his destiny. Even all this was

nothing compared to April's presence—her simple physical existence in the world affirmed everything;

she was a fully embodied reason to continue that losers’ game called life. John thought back to his

hours with Mel and realized he hadn’t felt that with her. “Well,” John said, “I thought I might put April

up in a hotel for a little while. My roommate had some reservations about her staying with me, and

now that all this has happened I think it’s better this way.”

“Are you sure?” April said.

“Excuse me, but I have a hotel room booked until the end of this week. It is downtown, at the

Wit. The two of you are welcome to use it if you’d like,” Hamid interjected. He went on, “Please, don’t

object. I have paid for it and have yet to occupy it. They still charge me money, it is shameful. Better to

put it to use.”
Mel
Mel wrote him off with a joke. That’s a world record, chasing your roommate off—forever—by

sleeping with him. When John didn’t return on the first day, she figured something had happened at the

hospital. When he didn’t return on the second day, she got a little worried—after all, John had always

been stable and reliable. She began calling him. At first the phone rang and rang, but after a few days

of calls and texts, the phone went to voicemail quickly. She put this down to chance, a phone

malfunction or something, but then it kept happening—he was ignoring her calls. What could he

possibly be doing? She began telling herself that something strange had happened, something big,

something important; but after a few days of sleeping on the thought, she realized that he was gone and

it really was as simple as that. There wasn’t any recourse: she knew she could call his parents, continue

to pebble his phone, send him emails maybe, call his job, but all in all it didn’t really matter. He turned

out to be a jerk in the end—that or he’d got too close and realized she had a funny smell. Probably John

was with his little girlfriend, happy as a clam. There was even the possibility that sleeping with Mel was

such a sharp contrast with sleeping with the other girl that that’s what drove him out for good—bad sex

for life is a heavier sentence than any guy is willing to serve, even if there’s only the slightest possibility

that it’ll happen, so they run away, that’s what they all do, it’s their only response, doesn’t matter who it

is.

Mel laughed every time she thought about the whole affair. A sort of nihilism had gripped her

life, the sort of nihilism that accompanies the realization that you’ll probably never have another sexual

relationship for the rest of your life. This is usually something you suspect, but it takes an event to really

make it clear. This was as clear an event as anybody could ever hope for—it broke her, broke something

inside her: she’d always drank on the job, but now it was getting to the point that she was slobbering

drunk by the end of every shift. The truth was Mel had never been a good bartender: she was a little
too awkward, a little too shy, she wasn’t particularly intimidating or even nice—both of which could

work—and worst of all she refused to either get breast implants or wear pushup bras and skimpy tops.

Still, the work had always been able to sustain her before this; now she was getting less than $30 in tips

by the end of the night. That wouldn’t even be enough to cover the rent every month, especially now

that John was gone.

So something had to happen . . . The final explosion came when one night a customer started

harassing Mel, buying her drinks, asking her out, hanging around the bar; it got to the point that he was

reaching his hands out and trying to touch her—usually she’d tolerate this quietly and have the guy

thrown out, but that night she threw a drink in his face. The guy went crazy, came after her; one of the

barbacks stepped in and it led to a huge fight with the police and even the fire department showing up.

That was it for bartending.

The joke got a lot less funny a few weeks in when Mel woke up and her breasts were swollen.

The lightest touch sent waves of pain through her chest—this is what they always warned you about.

Later in the day she threw up, and that night she couldn’t shit. She was pregnant with John’s child . . .

For fuck’s sake.

Avril
Avril had had it with the world. It was time to beat a hasty retreat, cede all the ground and

advance ever backwards, preferably to the womb. Anyway, the land was poisoned through and

through, there was nothing to salvage. Avril’s life was a territory littered with landmines, barbed wire,

latent radiation—mutated beasts and evil monsters even skulked the countryside. As Billy Corgan said:

The world is a vampire . . .

Avril said as much to John in the car ride to the hotel: “The world is a vampire.” These were the

first words either of them had said.

“What?” John said.

“Aren’t you sick of it all? The bullshit, the lies, working for a living, the endless, monotonous

death march. Just . . . Life. What does it all mean?” Avril was sadly aware that she was being less than

eloquent; she couldn’t seem to find the right words.

“I don’t know . . . I’ve always had the feeling that I didn’t know how to live, I guess, but then I

always assumed that was specific to me.”

Avril thought on that for a moment. “I think you might be smarter than me,” she said. “Sorry

I’m not making sense, this drug they gave me is making me crawl out of my skin.”

“Shh,” John said, putting his arm around her shoulder and kissing her on the cheek. It seemed a

little patronizing at first, but it felt pretty good too. She realized that she could peek out from under his

arms and spy the city passing by outside the taxi’s window; for a few moments she pretended to be a

frightened little rodent watching the world from its burrow. That’s not too unpleasant a way of life,

Avril thought. Just have to watch out for owls, snakes, and other predators of that sort. Then again,

rodents were well adapted to avoiding predators but not perfectly adapted; it seemed that nature had
consigned them to the somewhat tragic role of a food source. Avril was breathing rapidly, her heart was

racing—that drug was really doing a number . . .

“April . . . ,” John said. She made a sound to acknowledge him. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she said.

John
April was acting bizarre. She’d asked him for $5 bills to hand out to the hotel help, saying that

she had always wanted to tip people at a fancy hotel, and now she was methodically going to everyone

who’d helped them and distributing the tips. He chalked it up to the drug—the doctor said that it was to

counteract the tranquilizers and that she might get a little hyped. He’d held her in the car for a while;

she had been jittery and clearly on edge. Still, it was hard to ignore the new information that April was

bipolar, though he wasn’t sure exactly what that meant. It felt strange to question the motivations

behind somebody’s behavior, like it was stripping them of a vital part of their agency. April was cute at

least, throwing herself so enthusiastically into tipping the help. They seemed to be charmed by her, as

obviously out of place as she was in her bright, mismatched clothes. The clientele at the hotel seemed

to fit a certain type—early 30s to mid 40s, clearly rich, elegant, dressed in expensive clothes. The men

were muscled-out business executives and the women seemed to be socialites of some kind; John had

never interacted with people like this before and he doubted April had either. So he hurried with her up

to the room.

April dashed into the room and jumped on the bed. “I know!” she called out. “I’m acting like a

kid . . . I feel like a kid again!” John watched her as she rolled around on the bed; he wasn’t sure how to

react. April sat on the edge of the bed and motioned for John to sit down next to her. He couldn’t

fathom how she could be like this after what had happened to her. As if anticipating he would say

something, April shushed him by bringing her finger to his lips. “I’m really happy to be here right now.

With you,” she said, putting her hand on his cheek and then running her fingers through his hair. “Do

you want to hear something crazy?”

“Sure . . .”
 “A few hours ago, I wanted to die. I think I’ve had a death wish for most of my life.” April

suddenly stood up and turned her back on John. “Sorry if this doesn’t come out right, my mind is racing.

Just tell me to shut up if, you know . . .”

She was silent for a moment. John didn’t know what to say; he felt helpless. “Go on,” John said.

April turned around; there were tears in her eyes. “Do you know what happened? Did Hamid

tell you?”

“No, he only said that you’d overdosed.”

“Yeah, but I did it on purpose. I felt so dirty and alone, even with Mike there, or especially

because he was there, that I took enough coke that my jaw was clenched shut and I couldn’t breathe,

and I’d been sure that if I put enough into my body that I’d die, so I was forcing it in however I could,

shoving it into my nose even when I couldn’t inhale . . . Then everything melted away, and Hamid’s face

was floating over me, he was talking to me and holding me; I thought he kept shaking, but it must have

been me that was shaking. I remember being really angry with him, like, I genuinely wanted to hurt him

because he wouldn’t let me die—I even wanted to kill him. He kept saying my name and wiping the

sweat from my forehead; his hand was red and bloody, it was like a bleeding angel was delivering me. I

started jamming my eyes shut, trying to will him away, thinking, Go back to hell you bastard, but then I

started thinking about you. That’s when everything sort of slowed down, things were calm, and then

the next thing I remember is hearing your voice. So I’m happy.”

“You’re happy?”

“Because I’ve been blessed. This is a second chance and most people don’t get one. It feels like

I’ve already died, so now everything I have is a boon. And you’re here with me—how could I ask for

anything more? Look around at this room. It’s like a palace, there doesn’t have to be a world outside if

you don’t want there to be one.” April sat down next to John. He smiled at her; she had stopped crying.

“That’s what I want,” she said, “to blow up the outside world. And for you to hold me.”
Avril
After they’d fucked, Avril ‘s mind was still racing. She lay on her side, running her finger across

John’s chest and kissing the flesh of his upper arm where the triceps came to a head. She recalled

Bataille’s solar anus; the strange verses came into her head easily and irresistibly:

Love and life appear to be separate only because everything on earth is broken apart by

vibrations of various amplitudes and durations.

Love then screams in my own throat; I am the Jesuve, the filthy parody of the torrid and blinding

sun.

Without knowing it, he suffers from the mental darkness that keeps him from screaming that he

himself is the girl who forgets his presence while shuddering in his arms.

I want to have my throat slashed while violating the boy to whom I will have been able to say:

you are the night.

The Sun exclusively loves the Night and directs its luminous violence, its ignoble shaft, toward the

earth, but finds itself incapable of reaching the gaze or the night, even though the nocturnal terrestrial

expanses head continuously toward the indecency of the solar ray.

In opposition to celestial fertility there are terrestrial disasters, the image of terrestrial love

without condition, erection without escape and without rule, scandal, and terror.

Vegetation is uniformly directed towards the sun; human beings, on the other hand, even though

phalloid like trees, in opposition to other animals, necessarily avert their eyes.

Human eyes tolerate neither sun, coitus, cadavers, nor obscurity, but with different reactions.

The terrestrial globe is covered with volcanoes, which serve as its anus.

Although this globe eats nothing, it often violently ejects the contents of its entrails.
 Love then screams in my own throat; I am the Jesuve, the filthy parody of the torrid and blinding

sun.

Those contents shoot out with a racket and fall back, streaming down the sides of the Jesuve,

spreading death and terror everywhere.

The earth sometimes jerks off in a frenzy, and everything collapses on its surface.

The Jesuve is thus the image of an erotic movement that burglarizes the ideas contained in the

mind, giving them the force of a scandalous eruption.

This eruptive force accumulates in those who are necessarily situated below.

Volcanic deflagrations antagonize the heavens.

The Jesuve . . . The Jesuve—the objective image of the earth as seen in the context of the sun's

full sphere of light; seen from this perspective, the earth is only a fleck of darkness, barely perceptible

and resembling an anus, but within that fleck is the entirety of the world’s movement, violence, energy,

and beauty, every glance, caress, and kiss, every eruption and every orgasm; there in that fleck is life

itself. Properly, the bright, monstrous, blinding sphere of the sun's light could be taken as misery and

pain, washing down in steady waves, and that fleck of darkness, that backside of the earth, that small

black spot, that solar anus could be taken as joy and pleasure, erupting in violent shocks. Yes, an anus

was worth preserving. I am the Jesuve, the filthy parody of the torrid and blinding sun, Avril thought

again, though she wasn’t sure why this image kept playing in her head.

Why an anus, why would Bataille use this term? Avril considered the gastrointestinal tract—

whatever a mouth consumes, an anus excretes in equal measure; a mouth is large, an anus is small.

Consumption occurs in large quantities, steadily, irrepressibly; excretion, on the other hand, is irregular

and occurs in eruptions and explosions, owing to the small size of the anus. The solar anus describes the

body’s experience—a long march of pains, aches, and troubles, giving way from time to time to

eruptions of pleasure. Pleasure seems impossible without the constant input of pain; perhaps this is
what Nietzsche meant when he said that one isn’t possible without the other, that science’s mission to

eliminate pain and displeasure is futile, for the greatest pleasure can only exist in the context of the

most terrible pain. Recall Icarus, who flew too close to the sun and expected not to be burnt. Taken in

this context, the trajectory of Avril’s life at least resembled something normal, something that could be

justified . . . Only why did there have to be so much more pain than pleasure? “John,” Avril said.

“Yeah?”

“I want to stay like this forever, just like this.”

“Yeah, me too.” He laughed, his chest pleasantly rising and falling, and kissed her. His lips

tasted a little salty. Avril held John’s face in her hands; she studied his large brown eyes, which seemed

to shake under her gaze; she ran her fingers across his cheek bones, feeling the contrast between the

tenderness of the flesh and the hardness of the bone. She kissed him on the forehead, realizing she

could watch and touch this face for the rest of time.

“John,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“My mind’s racing . . . Make it stop . . .”

He propped himself up on an elbow. “What’s on your mind?”

“Nothing . . . I can’t get it to shut up though. I want things to be quiet . . . And I want you to be

happy.”

“I’m happy,” John said. He seemed to start reaching out to touch Avril’s face, but then his

phone started ringing. He rolled over to the bed stand where he’d placed it and looked at it for a

second. He let it ring.

Avril listened to it ring for a while. “Who is it?” she said.

“It’s, uh, never mind . . . Nobody, just a friend,” he said.

 The obvious lie sent Avril’s mind reeling in dozens of separate directions. She was almost a

compulsive liar, lying as a matter of course except when the truth might serve better; she'd been lying

so long and so regularly that, when asked a question, she could compose a lie in less time than she could

reproduce the simple truth. It's false that liars require a good memory—Twain, who this quote is often

attributed to, was a liar himself and so had no qualms with telling such a shameless lie. In fact, to lie

requires simple intelligence—it’s best not to stack lies one upon another as it’s believed compulsive liars

do; it’s better to advance a story which can always be plied and edited into the wide realm of

plausibility. John was a terrible liar; Avril thought this was pretty sweet. You want to aggressively forge

a narrative rather than denying and deflecting—John was already making denials without the slightest

bit of pressure. Avril had always been able to easily sniff out the lies of others. She never once

interrupted a person to say, “You’re lying,” but she kept a mental inventory of the lies that people told.

She never was quite sure what to do with this information; she’d rarely been able to use it to her

advantage even though most people feel an intense sense of guilt upon being found lying and will go to

great lengths to atone for their moral transgression. The phone finally stopped ringing. John looked at

it with a sense of relief and shut the phone off. Avril watched him, running down a list of the

possibilities of who it might have been—the most obvious answer was that it was another girl, although

John was strange enough that it could have been anybody. She could simply have a look at the phone

later; but she knew she wouldn’t do this . . . the feeling was strange and inexplicable. Avril thought

about confronting him about the phone call but her conviction left when he looked over at her. She

decided to change the subject. “That’s what I mean,” she said.

“What’s that?” John said.

“Just then there was so much worry and doubt on your face, and all it took was a phone call. I

know you’re happy, somewhat happy, but you’re not really happy, and we both know you won’t be

forever. That’s gonna drive me crazy,” Avril said.

 “What about you?”

“Me?”

“Are you happy? I want you to be happy too.”

“No . . . Never,” she said. John looked at her strangely; she corrected herself: “I mean,

sometimes I feel like things are quiet, calm, but not in a sense of oblivion, you know? Sort of like the

difference between a quiet beach and empty space; but I think I’d prefer oblivion.”

“When do you feel like that?”

“Like . . . Remember that first night, when I crawled into bed with you? The moment I woke up,

I had this feeling like our bodies were one, like we were the same being, or the same animal. Like

Siamese twins.”

John looked at her strangely again. “Like a sexual thing?”

“No, I mean it’s that, but it’s separate from that too. I thought about it for a long time but it

doesn’t really make sense. I like it though. I like it when we’re close,” she said. John moved closer to

the center of the bed, pushing his arms into the mattress to propel himself. Avril loved the strength in

his body. She crawled over to him, orienting her body to make as much contact with his as possible; she

pressed herself into his side, their flesh seemed to be touching at every possible point. See, they’d have

to saw us apart, Avril thought.

They lay together for what might have been hours. Avril could feel herself falling asleep; she

might have even slept for a while. John never really moved, he seemed content to just lie there. She

couldn’t even begin to imagine what he was thinking about. At some point, Avril became agitated. She

began to shift around; then she hugged him and brought her hand down to his penis. He got an

erection, brought his hand to her vagina and traced a finger around her labia. April started to jerk him

off. She stopped and said, “I think most of my problems come from sex.”
 John pulled his hand away from her crotch; the gesture seemed to have been done out of

politeness. “What do you mean?”

Avril thought for a moment about telling him about how she lost her virginity, how she can’t

have orgasms, about how many guys she’s fucked, and what happened in the alley and at the hostel.

She got the sense that he’d accept it all and nothing would change, but something kept her from spilling

her guts—it was probably simple shame. “Actually, forget it. Let’s just fuck,” she said.

“Well . . .”

Avril had a sudden impulse to tell John everything; she would have if he’d pushed it . . . But he

had a maddening ability not to push anything. She narrowed her eyes at this strange creature—it was

placid and intense, content and disturbed, simplistic and tangled, all at the same time. Though

outwardly and functionally it was a male of the species, it seemed not to be all there: it was capable of

desire, but did not actively desire; it had a strong will, but made no attempt to shape reality; it could act,

but chose to observe. John was a strange one—he seemed to share some qualities with the immortal

man Avril had read about long ago in Beauvoir’s novel, All Men are Mortal. Perhaps they shared the less

desirable qualities . . . What’s left for an immortal being but to forever wait for death? Yes, John was

very similar to the immortal, a man waiting for death despite having the capability to live. “Yeah, forget

it . . . I just want to forget everything . . .” A thought suddenly occurred to her: “Did you ever see Last

Tango in Paris?”

John rolled away from her slightly. “Uh, yeah. That Italian director, right? Bertolucci?”

“Yeah, with Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider. Do you remember their room, the place

they’d meet . . . It was a sanctuary suspended from the world in space and time; they didn’t have names,

their outside lives were irrelevant, their past and their future didn’t exist. They were in that room

together, a pair of bodies, like a couple of warthogs meeting in the jungle—there was only the present

moment . . .” Avril fell silent.

 John sat up and seemed to consider what she was saying. “Yeah . . . But the moment wasn’t

forever, I mean, didn’t both of their lives eventually intrude into the room?”

“But it doesn’t have to be like that for us—they both had strong ties to their past lives, she was

engaged and his wife had just died. What’s holding us to the outside? I’m not just being an idealist,

John, I know you’ve got your job and everything, but I know you don’t like it. It’s joyless, and you’re not

happy . . . So why can’t we just forget everything out there and focus on making each other happy?

What’s stopping us?” Avril said. John watched her and didn’t say anything . . . She stood up and walked

over to the dresser where John had put his jeans. She pulled them on and raised them high on her

waist; she looked ridiculous.

“What are you doing?” John said.

“Your pants are too big,” Avril said, laughing. She spun around once and went on, “Remember

the scene where Maria Schneider was wearing high-waisted jeans and nothing else? I always admired

her breasts, and the way she wore those jeans. My breasts were never as big as hers; she had such a

beautiful body. In her nude scenes, she had this amazing ability to transform herself. One moment

she’d be like a witch, aggressive and seductive, toying around and smirking, absolutely confident with

herself, and in the next moment she’d be as vulnerable as an abandoned orphan. Remember when she

rolled across the floor then sat up on her knees with her back to the camera? It made me want to cry, it

happened so suddenly. Her body had been a crackling livewire and then suddenly it was the most

fragile object in the world, isolated in the middle of the room like a precious vase. The camera stopped

for a moment and it looked like a painting. Do you think I’m as pretty as her?”

John had rolled over on the bed so that he was lying on his stomach with his chin resting on his

forearms. “As Maria Schneider? I think you’re easily prettier than her.”

“You don’t have to flatter me. Do you think I could recreate that scene?” Avril buttoned the

jeans and lay down on the floor, contorting her limbs in approximately the way she remembered
Schneider having configured her body. She rolled across the room, freezing in dramatic poses with

every revolution of her body. She felt self conscious, like there actually was a camera in the room; she

fought the impulse to cover her breasts with her arms. She spied John intently watching her; he seemed

to be deep in concentration, or else confused. Finally, at the far end of the room, with her back turned

to John, she sat up on her knees and bowed her head as far as she was able. It felt like she was waiting

for an executioner to chop her head off. After a few moments she felt so ridiculous that she burst out

laughing and turned around. “Admit it, you hated it," she said.

John hadn’t moved an inch; he seemed a little shaken. "No, I thought it was beautiful . . ."

Avril walked over and sat down on the edge of the bed, taking John’s head in her hands. He

shifted slightly and his head was in her lap; he’d probably never had his head in the crotch of his own

pants before. She petted his hair, wondering what he was thinking about. “You remind me a little bit of

Marlon.”

“I do?” he said, looking up at Avril. He’d turned his body slightly and had been looking up at her.

She couldn’t tell if he was watching her face or her breasts; it didn’t matter, she supposed.

“You always seem sad, even when you should be happy. He had good reason to be a mope in

the movie. What’s your excuse?” John shrugged his shoulders. “The other thing he had was a physical

presence to go along with his melancholia. It was a strange combination . . . You've got that too, I think.

Hey, remember Maria’s pubic hair? She had a great big bush. It surprised me when I saw it . . . She was

still beautiful though. Look, I shave myself clean every few days." Avril pulled the jeans down and ran

her fingers over her bare pubis. "Well, I guess you already knew that. Do you think I should stop

shaving it? Would you mind, would it disgust you?"

John raised one of his arms and ran his hand over her back. “I wouldn't mind at all. Nothing

about you’d disgust me.”

“Really?”
 John suddenly spun around and was on his feet in an instant. He bent at the hips, grabbed Avril

around her stomach and around one of her legs, and raised her to his shoulders. Avril screamed and

clung to him, pressing her fingers into his chest; as soon as he stood up the whole world seemed to turn

upside down. Pressing her face into the pocket between his collarbone and trapezius muscle, Avril

deeply inhaled the slightly sweet odor of John’s flesh. The room started spinning and she instinctively

closed her eyes; at the last moment she opened them and saw the bed, the plasma TV, the door, the

paintings on the walls, the window and the view of the city flying past. At the same time, she could feel

the muscles in John’s body working to support her weight and spin her around. He stopped and

dumped her down on the bed. Avril was laughing, disoriented, excited; the room still seemed to spin a

little bit. Her throat was a little hoarse—she realized she’d been screaming the whole time. “See? I

remember the movie,” John said, sitting down on the bed. “Your laugh is just like hers.” He was a little

flushed, with beads of sweat forming at his hairline. He was smiling.

Something about this made Avril incredibly happy. She sat up and kissed him, wiping the beads

of sweat away with her hand. “I love you,” she blurted out. To her utter shock, she didn’t feel a single

pang of shame or regret, though the words “love is the infinite placed within the reach of poodles,” once

jotted down by Celine, came to mind immediately. John kissed her, told her he loved her. There was a

feeling of lightness in her chest, like she could start floating at any moment and soar off into the sky with

a single flap of her arms . . .

Mel
The situation was getting desperate. Mel refused to continue embarrassing herself by calling

John; she knew he had money, she even knew for sure that he’d take responsibility and help out,

regardless of what she said or did to him. This is about what Mel expected to happen; all in all, she’d

never been too willful. She’d always taken things passively, even to a fault; her friends in the past, when

she had friends, had always said she was too passive, especially when it came to guys jerking her

around. Well, anyway, Mel supposed that in the end she maybe just felt insulted . . . But still not

insulted enough to take serious action.

About a month into the pregnancy, after confirming it with a doctor, Mel went back to the bar

to talk to her old boss. She had planned to be as charming as she knew how, but her plan fell apart

upon seeing him and hearing his voice. Walking into his dingy office, her heart sank—Frank didn’t even

look up at her or acknowledge her presence. “Um . . . Hi, Frank.”

“You want your old job back,” he said. He looked up at her and went on, “Are you crazy?”

“Well—”

“Do you know who that guy was? He was a cop . . . Now we’ve got to settle with the city, and

the police and fire departments are billing us; one of our barbacks is in prison for assaulting an officer.

This thing you got us into’s gonna cost us a few months’ profit. Do you know what Jimmy said?”

“No . . .”

“He said, ’Don’t you ever let that bitch step foot into my bar for as long as she lives.’ Excuse the

expression, but Jimmy’s pissed, Mel, there’s nothing I can do.” Frank closed the accounts book he’d

been looking at as if to add finality to what he’d said.

Mel wasn’t sure what to say. “Can’t you talk to him?”

 “Are you crazy? He’d kill me for even mentioning your name. I actually had to talk him down

from suing you. Mel, I always thought of you sort of as a charity case anyway. You’re not cut out to

tend bar. I was even thinking this’d be good for you, that maybe you’d find something else. You’re a

smart girl, Mel, you should have a real career.”

Mel found herself on the brink of crying. “That’s the thing . . . That’s why I’m here . . .”

“What are you talking about?” Frank said.

“That is . . . I’m pregnant and I need money. I don’t have—”

“For Christ’s sake,” Frank said. He threw his pen to the ground and looked away from Mel.

“And you’re keeping it.”

“I don’t have any insurance. So . . .”

Frank looked up at her and shook his head. “What about the guy?”

Mel didn’t say anything for a long time. “It’s—”

“I understand,” Frank said. He swore under his breath . . . After a moment he said, “There’s a

special place in hell for me just for suggesting this. Now listen, Mel, I don’t want you to get offended or

anything . . . It’s just a suggestion . . .”

“What is it?” she said.

“My friend works at this punk club, it’s a sort of punk and goth biker thing, I don’t know, it’s

confused about its identity. They have this fetish thing once a week. Usually it’s standard stuff, girls in

leather leading fat guys around by leashes, people hanging on hooks from the ceiling, torture, feeding,

things like that. But now they’ve got this big idea to add . . . Uh, pregnant dancers. Now, uh, I’m not

sure what exactly it is they’d want you to do. You’re not showing yet—that’s good, they want girls

who’ve just been knocked up, to sort of acclimate them with the place and what they’d be doing . . .”

Mel was silent. Frank went on, “I know, this is some really sick, decadent shit, fall of Rome type shit . . .

But they’d set you and the kid up for a few years at least. You wouldn’t have to work for a while . . .”
 “What’s his number?” Mel said.

“Just like that you’re gonna do it?” Frank said. “That’s, well, that’s surprising.”

“Why?” Mel said. She was surprised at herself. For the first time, she knew what it was to

subjugate yourself entirely for the sake of somebody else; there was no thought of dignity or shame at

what she’d be doing, only the thought that her child would be provided for. It’s a pretty standard

thought to have . . .

“Honestly, I don’t know. I thought you’d tell me to go fuck myself. Alright then . . . The place is

called Exit. Here’s the number . . . By the way, it’s not a guy running it but a girl, Kathy, a real nice lady,

if that makes you feel any better.” Frank wrote the number on a post-it and handed it to Mel. “Call her

later tonight or tomorrow. I’ll talk to her about you first. Look . . . Do you need anything? Help?

Money? Some of the guys here could chauffeur you around a little bit, pick things up for you, and we

could start a pool for you, throw a few bucks your way . . .”

“No, please don’t,” Mel said. There was that stubbornness again. She regretted saying the

words as they were coming out of her mouth; she barely had any money, and getting around by the bus

was hell.

“Well, alright then. Good luck, Mel. I’ll put in a good word for you.” Mel turned and began

walking out of Frank’s dingy office. He was always a good guy, she thought. “You know,” Frank said,

“that was classic when you threw the drink in that prick’s face. These coppers think they own the city.”

Mel smiled at him and left without saying anything. She felt a little bit like skipping down the hallway

and out of the bar, but thought that she’d better preserve her energy now that she was going to be a

“pregnant dancer.” It was strange to think about what Frank had said—what did the use of pregnant

dancers say about our society? Obviously, pregnant women have been heavily sexualized for most of

human history; after all, what could embody sex more than a woman with child? Liberal magazines

have always suggested that pregnant women regularly engage in sexual intercourse in order to maintain
their mental health and happiness, in addition to the hormonal benefits; but surely they, along with the

conservatives and other moralists, would draw the line at pregnant women dancing for the benefit of

various drug-addled underworld degenerates. It’s true that the Romans were obsessed with

pregnancy—would they have approved or disapproved of pregnant women dancing in fetish clubs? It’s

easy to imagine an emperor like Elagabulus, who forced senators to watch while he danced around the

altar of Deus Sol Invictus to the sound of drums and cymbals, enthusiastically supporting pregnant

dancers; on the other hand, Elagabulus’ moral outrages were so total that a conspiracy involving his own

family, along with senators, generals, soldiers, noblemen, slaves, and seemingly all the Roman empire

was quickly organized for his assassination. Elagabulus’ murder went off without a hitch. In the entire

empire the only point of resistance was Elagabulus’ mother, who clung to the boy’s chest until the final

moment. They beheaded the both of them and dragged Elagabulus’ naked body through the streets by

chariot; stones were handed out to the rabble with special instructions to take aim at the genitals.

There was particular shame associated with this—the most famous case in history was Mussolini, who

was similarly dragged naked in the streets and whose headless corpse was strung up and abused.

Surely, Mussolini’s crimes were greater than Elagabulus’, which mostly consisted of transgenderism,

prostitution, drug abuse, sexual excesses, and religious blasphemies. It was reasonable to expect that all

of this and more awaited Mel at Exit.

John
Probably one of the great paradoxes in life is how quickly happy moments pass, how they slip

through the memory with little of substance that can be grabbed onto and held. Given their rarity, it

only seems natural they would be resilient against fading and being erased from the memory. At the

risk of resorting to hyperbole, the week in the hotel room was for John a sort of paradise, a floating in

the clouds somewhat akin to inhabiting the kingdom of heaven. Time assumed a strange quality when

he was in bed with April—romantic poets and excitable preachers have at times described this as

“touching eternity.” Klaus Kinski was once heard to describe the phenomenon: “I could be with a

woman in a bed, for weeks even, and it would seem to me like three seconds. Or 300 years.” That’s

exactly the way it felt; there was an incredible slowness in the moment, an absolute placidity, and yet

the whole experience seemed scarcely to have happened at all.

The one and only source of tension was a sort of insistent tic in John’s constitution that

developed as the week wore on, a sense that he was slowly succumbing to idleness and decadence.

Eating the hotel’s rich room-service food day after day, he noticed his stomach was getting a little

bloated, and with no real stimulus or activity other than April, he began to feel a sort of mental bloat, a

slothfulness that was disconcerting. This generalized feeling of unease and sloth was what stuck in his

mind the most; and other than the first few moments when April stripped off her clothes, or the

triumphant feeling he got every time he penetrated April, he had no real memories of the happy times,

the laughter, her smile, lying in bed, sharing a meal, a bed, a moment . . . Yet he remembered with

clarity the bad times, or the trying times, so to speak—the venture to Cook County Jail, the late night in

the hospital and his conversation with Hamid, the masturbation in the office’s bathroom, the terror in

those first few moments of meeting April. So despite his happiness, or perhaps because of it, John knew
that he had to reassert a sense of regularity in his life, a sense of routine, discipline, control . . . This is

what led to the first blowup.

It must have been Saturday sometime in the afternoon. John casually said, “I think I might go to

the gym today . . .” In order to add weight to his remark, he walked around the room looking for his

socks and shoes; neither of them had left the room all week, so at least the gesture was genuine.

“What’s that?” April said dreamily. She was lying on the bed; she propped herself up on an

elbow and watched him hurrying about the room. “What are you doing?”

“I thought I’d go to the gym. It’s been a while since I worked out.”

“Come here,” April said, sitting up. John moved to the bed and sat down near her. April

extended her leg and put her foot in his crotch, fondling his balls lightly with her toes. “Don’t go . . . I’ll

suck your dick.”

John laughed nervously. “Really, I’ll be gone, like, three hours at most.”

“I don’t want you to go . . .”

John couldn’t understand why she didn’t want him to leave. “I’m feeling kind of fat, and I’ve got

a lot of energy. It’s no big deal, really. Like I said, three hours at most.”

“Can’t you work out here? Come on, I’ll watch you, what do you do, pushups, squats, look, you

can bench press me,” April said, moving closer to him.

“Eh, no, what I do’s pretty specialized. I need certain equipment.”

“Okay, you can use the hotel’s gym.”

“No, I saw it on the way in, it’s really bad. What’s the big deal, April?”

“I just want you to stay here with me . . .”

John frowned at her. Her voice sounded nasal, whiny; he had the impulse to tell her to quit

acting like a child. The hotel room was only paid for through Friday, and they’d called him yesterday—

the room was on his card now, at more than $200 a night. On top of that there was work . . . His week
off was coming to an end and he was supposed to be back in on Monday, though he didn’t look forward

to that at all. He decided that he had to have a serious talk with April . . . It seemed unlikely to happen;

they really were living as children. “Look, I’m going to the gym,” John said, slightly raising his voice.

April pulled her leg back and seemed to withdraw into herself; he regretted yelling at her. “Sorry. Okay,

I get it, you don’t want to be here by yourself. I can—”

“No . . . ,” April said.

John went on, ignoring her, “I can give you my card, maybe you can get some clothes, get

something better to eat than the hotel food. Or, look, you can come with me if you want; I usually don’t

like it when somebody’s watching me. It’s annoying.” John stood up and went off in search of his pants.

“No, if you don’t like for somebody to watch I won’t impose myself on you.”

John pulled his pants on. “Do you want my card then?” April didn’t respond for a while. He

went off to the closet where he was pretty sure he’d left his shirt. Luckily he had a change of clothes in

his locker at the gym—he wouldn’t have to buy anything new, or worse yet go back to the apartment

and face Mel. He hadn’t thought too much of her and wasn’t prepared to start doing it now. He looked

back at April. She was sitting curled up on the bed, her back bent unnaturally forward, her legs folded

up in front of her and her head rested sideways on her knees. He could see her vagina; it was a pose of

dysfunction, of anguish. He felt annoyed and a little disgusted. “This is ridiculous, I could’ve gone and

come back before you even woke up and you wouldn’t have even known about it. Okay, come on, I’ll

take you out to lunch, and then you can hang out in the neighborhood or even come in and watch me. I

won’t mind.”

“No, you can leave your card. It’s fine, I’ll get something to eat just like you said,” April said.

She seemed to be on the verge of tears.

“I’m not going anywhere if it’s gonna be a problem,” John said. This was John’s attempt at

conciliation. It seemed to be the wrong tack to take; a real manipulator would’ve disapproved—never
confront, never give ultimatums unless you’re gearing for a showdown. Still, even if John had been

experienced with relationships, April’s behavior at this point surely wasn’t normal, and neither were the

circumstances.

April perked up a little and sat normally on the bed. “It’s fine,” she said and smiled.

Her response was surprising. John regarded this with suspicion. “What’s on your mind?”

“It’s nothing . . . I just don’t want to put you out of your way. You work out, it’s what you do. I

shouldn’t interfere.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, you can go, I’ll be fine.”

“Well, okay. Here,” John said, reaching into his wallet and pulling out his debit card, “we’ve

been cooped up in this place for a while, and I know you left a lot of your stuff back at the, uh, hostel.

So, you know, just pick up whatever you need.”

April looked at the debit card. “Well . . .”

John placed it on the table next to the bed. “Really, I don’t mind at all. I don’t want you to think

of it as like a big thing . . . Come on, we can leave together. Get dressed.”

April wrapped herself in blankets. She smiled at him and said, “You go. I’ll stay in bed a little,

then go out.”

John got the sense that something was going on beyond his comprehension. There was

something going on with her, with her demeanor, the way she was conducting her body, almost like she

was hiding from him. “Are you absolutely sure?”

“Yeah . . .”

“Well then, look, I’ll be back here in about three hours. I haven’t lifted any weights for about a

week, so I’ll be taking it easy a little bit. I’ll probably be hungry; we’ll get something to eat, okay?”
 “Yeah,” April said. She seemed to think about it, and then she rose up and kissed him on the

cheek. If there was anything going on in John’s head, any suspicions, any doubts, any consternation,

unease, distress, or anything else of the sort, the kiss dispelled it all; he was genuinely happy to be

leaving now. In this respect men are incredibly simple-minded, even the smartest and best among

them, though John couldn’t exactly be counted in those ranks.

Very little occupied John’s mind on the way to the gym other than the planning and thought

required to structure a workout. Exercise was one of the few pursuits for which John had a mind for

posterity. While he hadn’t been entered into any specialized athletic training programmes as a child and

so had little hope of ever becoming a professional athlete in the increasingly diversified and ultra-

specialized geography of modern sports, he had, like all talented athletes, a sense for pushing his body

to its furthest limits. Before April entered his life, he’d been focusing on replicating Kobe Bryant’s famed

“666” offseason training regimen. The regimen was named for its particularly intensive time

commitment: six hours a day, six days a week, six months a year. In serious-minded fitness circles, the

666 program was famous for the change it produced in Bryant from the end of the 2002-2003 NBA

season to the beginning of the 2003-2004 NBA season. Bryant’s transformation was almost

miraculous—he went from a typical lanky basketballer’s physique to resembling the gods in classical

Greek sculpture; his play improved as well, as he was able to bully and outmuscle opposing shooting

guards and even small forwards while maintaining his famously low stance and preternatural quickness.

Working in an office, it was difficult for John to fit the full six hours into each day. In the

morning he’d shoot some baskets and work on agility drills, and from time to time do some plyometric

training; this occupied an hour and a half on average. After work he’d go straight to the gym and lift

weights for somewhere between one and two hours, perform some more plyometric drills, and finally

cool down by swimming and, from time to time, using a cardio machine. Later on he’d play pickup

basketball, measuring his progress by how well he was able to beat defenders to the usual scoring
positions, either off the dribble or off the ball. It was true that running the court well or a good cut

often weren’t rewarded in pickup basketball, but on an organized team or with reliable teammates both

were guaranteed scores. This routine occupied more or less six hours each day . . . John had been

initially unprepared for the first week, going through the motions and drudging his way through the

workout on the fifth and sixth day, but after the one designated rest day he’d felt rejuvenated and once

again ready to dive into Bryant’s regimen. He’d been through two months, a good 33% of the full

program, when he met April; it was actually really surprising, even a little disturbing how quickly he’d

dropped it . . . Now he was ready to resume the training, maybe with some modifications now that he

had something else to occupy his time. All in all, it was pretty nice to have something to do other than

work out for six hours a day—and unlike Kobe Bryant, John wasn’t being paid millions of dollars to work

on his body. Still, Bryant’s level of commitment, focus, and dedication was unusual even among the

elite athletes of the world. He was the world’s finest display of all that was possible simply by

outworking the opponent; nobody in the league before, during, or after Bryant’s career could match his

technical mastery of movement, though there were many who had more natural athletic talent, or who

were simply taller, bigger, or faster. To find analogues, it was necessary to go into the steroid-soaked

world of the Olympics, or better yet to delve into history, where there might exist samurai warriors or

German officers whose taste for work and training equaled Kobe Bryant’s. In another age, we can

imagine lyric poets and travelling bards writing odes to Kobe Bryant; these days, the best that’s

managed are references in rap songs and the occasional amateur effort dedicated to the man, along

with the usual mix tapes and highlight reels that can be found for any and every minimally accomplished

athlete.

John motored through his workout. He’d decided to simply lift weights and avoid plyometric

work for his first day back in the fold, calculating that his joints would be unhappy with the violent

shocks resulting from the unnaturally forceful jumps and landings required by plyometric training. Most
athletes find plyometrics to be revolutionary in the development of their ability to generate force. The

concept is simple: induce muscle anabolism by adding elastic energy to the movement. This involves

depth jumps, box jumps, sprints, long jumps, triple jumps; less often plyometric training is applied to the

upper body, and usually only in the case of gymnasts whose strongest routines include the pommel

horse and rings . . . Even then, the majority of force is generated by the core, more specifically at the hip

joint, by the muscle groups centered in the buttocks and abdominals; a man on a bench press is a man

wasting his time.

Regardless of the program followed, the one requirement for a good workout is a constantly

elevated heart rate. There are interval programs which are specifically tailored to manipulation of the

athlete’s heart rate, but this axiom can be applied to all forms of training. For this reason, vigorous

fucking is a better workout than most would be willing to admit, though there are many athletes who

swear up and down that sex can be a negative distraction from training. John realized this somewhat as

he was working out; he laughed about what his heart was doing while he’d been fucking April. In the

past, his relationships had been too stilted, too beholden to alcohol or other drugs to get serious about

the fucking; it had been enough to wrest a little bit of pleasure and drift off after coming. Never had he

been well-fucked, or left any of his partners well-fucked; in fact, it seemed that nobody much cared

about this anymore, so neurotic were people about their bodies, about physical contact, about their

inability to experience intimacy; there was even the possibility that the simple quality of the sex acts

they engaged in had never been a concern for a large subset of people. It was encouraging that his

relationship with April had come to that point. Sexually speaking, their relationship was approaching a

certain ideal. There was only one problem . . . It was quite a large problem, though it was difficult to

ascertain exactly how large—April didn't, or couldn't have orgasms, and it didn't seem to be for lack of

trying.
 There’s an essence to every physical movement. Just as with a perfect swing in baseball or a

perfect jump shot in basketball, there's an unmistakable set of physical indicators and movements that

occurs during and after orgasm that only adds up to the complete movement when it’s in perfect

synchrony. Put simply, April wasn't having orgasms, not even one, even if she was trying her best to

fake it. It's possible to imitate the rote motions of the jump shot—a bend at the hips and knees, a light

hop, the ball rising up in a straight line and out toward the basket with a flick of the wrist, but without a

seamless coordination between the individual motions, the ball doesn’t go into the basket; in fact, a

jump shot which lacks that coordinating physical essence is plain ugly. Everybody knows this, of course,

but many claim that it's simple to fake an orgasm; on the contrary, this is an impossible feat when

judged by anybody with even a rudimentary sense for the vital. John had seen an orgasm before; he

had even given them to girls who were far less physically attuned and open than April. True, their little

gestures and reactions had often been shy and abashed, but an orgasm was unmistakable, and exactly

alike in its essence in every human being. There's individuality, sure, but the forms and routines of the

body cannot be escaped.

April was capable of pleasure—that was the strange part. It was unforgettable the way she

reacted to penetration, even by a finger; her entire body jumped, her legs came together, she raised her

hands in the direction of her mouth . . . It was like a small shock would run through her body. She’d

become excited; her breathing quickened and her skin reddened. Sometimes her eyes would even roll

into her head . . . But she never came, there was no doubt about that. It seemed like something they

should discuss, even if it'd be difficult to bring up. Sex without that final release, it seemed to John,

would be insufferable; even if the journey there was basically pleasurable, what good was it if it never

came to anything?
April
John came back to the hotel room still sweating, still glowing, extremely happy; his workout had

been amazing. He found Avril lying in exactly the same position he’d left her. He seemed to panic at

first, and then regarded her with what appeared to be incomprehension. “What . . . What are you

doing?”

Avril had had a lot of time to think in the preceding hours. She had turned on the television for

a moment and heard a story about Kobe Bryant being fined $100,000 for saying the words “fucking

faggot” to a referee during the game; he additionally received, as was to be expected, the blanket

condemnation of every LGBT rights, progressive, and left-liberal group that was available for comment.

Getting worked up over words is the sign of the utter degeneration and complete irrelevancy of the

western left—when the words are the issue, your privilege and your life are as good as they can possibly

get. What more could you possibly ask from life, why even bother demanding anything more when you

have everything? If it’s really a problem, take up arms; until that point nobody’s got any rights, it’s all

meaningless blather. Angry over what Kobe said? Put a bullet in his brain! Of course, this would never

happen—they would never resort to extremism, nor would they ever die for their various causes, as

they had too much to lose; whereas the truly wretched of the earth take to extremism as fish take to

water . . . For the dispossessed, extremism is not only natural but inevitable. It was just as Badiou said:

“Westerners in general are afraid of death. They are no longer able to imagine how an Idea might be

something for which risks are worth taking. ‘Zero death’ is their most important desire. They see

millions of people around the world who, for their part, have no reason to be afraid of death. And

among them, many die in the name of an Idea almost daily. For the ‘civilized’ this is the source of a

most intimate sense of terror.” Avril shifted slightly, acknowledging John. “What?”

“April . . .”
 “I decided I didn’t want to spend your money,” Avril said with what seemed to be a lot of effort.

John moved to the bed, sat down, and touched her on the shoulder; she recoiled a little, but

mostly she didn’t move. Her reaction frightened him as far as she could tell. He didn’t say anything for

a while. A sense of crippling inertia gripped the room. Finally: “Did I do something? What’s wrong?”

Avril mulled over all the possible responses. It became clear that she’d paralyzed herself with

her own thoughts. If you couldn’t speak openly with your lover of more than a week, the boy you’ve

been arm in arm with for what seems to be an eternity by now, there wasn’t much hope for anything.

She decided to be brave; she cursed herself for needing to be brave. She sat up and gazed at John’s

face. I can’t read him, she thought. There were little beads of sweat on his brow; she ran her hand

across his forehead, gathering the warm liquid on the side of her finger—his body was so much warmer

than hers, a furnace compared to a formica table. A commanding voice spoke in her head: “I know your

deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are

lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I am about to spit you out of my mouth." Avril vaguely remembered

performing the same gesture some time long ago; back then she hadn’t noticed such a stark difference

in temperature. She felt like a kind of ghoul, or some other tragic, monstrous creature. “When you left .

. . ,” she said.

“April, you can talk to me . . .” John smiled at her. He seemed to be uneasy, unsure of himself;

but the smile was genuine. It was reassuring, even tender.

“Once you left, the moment the door closed behind you, I—John, I don’t want to treat you like a

therapist, or something like that.”

He touched her on the knee. “Don’t worry about me, I’m fine.”

Avril laughed a little bit, she wasn’t sure why; John screwed his face up a little—he had the

obnoxious habit of matching his expressions and gestures to the people he was talking to. “Sorry, it

feels like it’s impossible for me to be serious or honest,” Avril said.

 “I feel that way sometimes.”

“You don’t have to liken yourself to me.”

“I don’t mind being like you,” John said, smiling.

He was being obnoxious, but at least he’d done it quickly, charmingly. Avril laughed and said,

“It’d be a mistake though.”

“That’s fine with me . . .”

Avril hit him on the arm, playfully kicked him; he dove forward and began tickling her. She

broke up laughing and did everything to push him off, but he was too strong . . . “Okay, stop, stop,” Avril

said breathlessly. John rolled off of her and lay to her side. “You make me feel good.” Avril surprised

even herself by this child-like remark.

“Uh . . . Thanks,” John said. “You too.” He put his arm around Avril’s shoulder and his hand on

the back of her head, insistently pushing his fingers through her hair. Avril got the sensation that he was

possessing her; his thumb dug into the flesh on her neck and his fingers gripped her skull. It felt good,

actually; she breathed deeply, became aware of a tingling in her hands and feet . . . Then as suddenly as

he’d clutched her he let go and said, “This is going to sound silly . . . But you can tell me anything. It

doesn’t matter what it is, I won’t stop loving you . . .” The words harked back, it seemed, to older

notions of romance and love, though unfortunately filtered through the hyper-conscious and ironical

voice of a guy who grew up surrounded by media. At least he set it up with a little bit of animal

domination, Avril thought . . .

“Okay,” Avril said, drawing herself up on the bed, trying to position herself in a way that seemed

dignified. “That doctor talked to you, right? How much did he tell you?”

“What about?”

“Forget it—I may as well tell you now so you know. I’m bipolar, I was diagnosed when I was a

teenager, when I had my first manic episode.”

 John didn’t seem to react; in fact, saying it out loud, it didn’t seem to be revelatory or shocking

at all. “Yeah . . . The doctor told me,” John said.

“And?”

“And what?”

“Don’t you think anything about that?”

“I think, well, I think it’s part of you—you know, what could I do about it even if I wanted?”

“It’s like . . .” Avril felt a flash of anger run through her. “It’s like if you told me you had a brain

tumor and were going to go insane and die. I’d be pissed . . .”

“What do you mean?”

Avril looked at him in disbelief. “Okay, you think it’s part of me. I’ll tell you who I am then. Not

even three weeks ago I couldn’t be in the same room as a TV, or anything else with a screen, because

they’d talk to me. I’d hear voices which told me people were after me, famous people, or people I’d just

met, and so I wanted to get back at them and hurt them; then the voices would tell me to go out and

fuck people on the street, steal things, destroy things. Usually I’d ignore them, but sometimes I just

couldn’t . . . And I became convinced they were going to start telling me to kill people, so to avoid

screens I’d stay outside all day and night . . . I couldn’t even tell you about most of the things that

happened to me. What about that?”

John watched her, comprehended her; the expression on his face was unchanging. The room

was absolutely silent. She went on, irritated, “Does it matter to you? I wasn’t living like a bum, I was a

bum. That wasn’t even the worst of it—before things really started breaking down, with the voices and

the pounding in my head, I had been high for about a month.”

“High?”

“High—manic. It starts up slowly—by the way, when I’m not manic I’m depressed, clinically

depressed, worse than anyone you’ve ever seen. So when you’re depressed, one day you wake up and
instead of lying in bed all day you’re suddenly motivated to go out, meet people, be social and get things

done. So I woke up one day and took the first shower I’d taken in a week, went straight to the library,

and talked to people for a few hours, convinced that I was making contacts and building resources for

my project, whatever it’d be. Then I read for about ten hours straight, just like that, when I hadn’t read

anything in the last six months. I came up with all kinds of theories, decided I’d get a doctorate. I did

that a few days, socializing and reading, then I started to get really horny so I found people on the street

who’d fuck me. Pretty soon all these guys were inviting me to parties, giving me drugs, coke, pills, I

don’t know, and then I did some acid and by then I was in full gear—fifty or sixty hours straight I’d be

fucking, reading, lecturing on the street; I was a crazy woman basically. Then I’d sleep for about four

hours and reboot . . . I’m not even sure how long that went on, since I either don’t or can’t keep track of

time when I get started like this . . .”

“Is there anything you can do to stop it?” John said.

“That’s exactly it . . . Yeah, I’ve got medications, but as soon as I start feeling the mania, I don’t

need them—and no matter what they say, there’s no amount of mood stabilizers that can prevent the

onset. You feel great, better than great . . . I honestly can’t even describe it—it’s the most powerful,

wonderful, life-affirming feeling in the world, I’m convinced that every one of the ancient poets who

described the gods experienced a manic episode, it’s an entirely novel perspective, like there’s power

coursing through your veins and you can shoot lightning from your fingertips; you become a being

higher than this world . . . It’s great at first . . . Then, well, things start fraying at the edges.”

“But—”

“That’s what I mean though. I’d like to say, ‘Oh I’m not myself when I become manic,’ but the

truth is nobody would ever turn down that high; they’d have to be insane to deny those feelings,

regardless of the consequences, no matter how much it hurts later. Who’d turn down the chance to be
a god?” Avril stopped speaking; she could hear a whispering: “All experiences shone differently because

a god shone through them . . .”

John watched her, seemingly taken aback. “Well . . . I mean . . . We could work through that

when it comes, couldn’t we?”

“That’s only one half of it. I was saying earlier that as soon as you left I realized the depression is

coming on. The moment the door closed behind you, I felt so utterly alone; I was tempted to go running

after you but I couldn’t even bring myself to move. I recognized that weight . . . John, you don’t even

want to see me when I’m depressed; I become so disgusting and lazy. I sit around all day, eat now and

then, don’t talk to anybody. It’s like my mind turns off and I cease to be human. I’ve been on a long

series of anti-depressants over the years—none of them really help that much. I become a zombie no

matter what; the medications are the difference between lying in bed all day or functioning as a barely

coherent ape. Neither is any good for the people around me . . . You wouldn’t be able to stand me.”

“I think I would . . .” There wasn’t a lot of confidence in John’s voice; then again Avril couldn’t

read him very well anyway.

“You don’t understand. You met me like, when I’m normal, just a little normal. I was coming

down from the mania, the voices had gone away but my thoughts were still racing . . . So I could at least

pretend to be normal. And like, meeting you, it’s kept me a little normal, at least for a week so far,

which has been wonderful . . . But now I feel the depression coming on, and I don’t want to put you

through it. You shouldn’t have to endure me.”

John took Avril’s hands in his and said, “Look, if you’re going to be depressed, I’ll be here for

you.”

“Oh my god,” Avril said, standing up and throwing his hands off, thinking, Corny motherfucker.

She was suddenly aware of her nakedness and felt ashamed for herself. She had to move away from
John . . . “My own family couldn’t deal with me. They threw me out when I was eighteen just as my

second manic episode was ending. What the fuck makes you think you’re so great?”

Though she wasn’t facing him, she could sense that John shrugged his shoulders. “Nothing,

really, but I wouldn’t abandon you.”

“Everybody says that . . . People think they’re noble but it’s just idealism, they think they can

withstand everything, but the simple truth is they don’t, not once they’re subjected to it, not if they

have any choice.”

“Then I won’t give myself any choice.”

Avril turned around; she wanted to spit on him. “You don’t even know me. Would you stick by

me if you knew how many guys I’ve fucked? You remember on Monday, the day I left your apartment?

I wasn’t even out for more than a few hours and I let a big guy in a leather jacket fuck me without a

condom, he came on my legs and stomach and it got all over my hands. His semen stank like caffeine . .

. Then later that night I took enough coke to kill a horse, you know, I snorted coke off of Mike’s cock,

that’s who I am, and I’m such a filthy fucking slut that Mike was calling guys in from the hostel’s

common room to fuck me up the ass before that Syrian guy put a stop to it. That’s not even unusual;

what’s unusual is it was stopped. I’ve been raped so many times, and not once, not once in my life have

I been sure I didn’t want it, or that I didn’t encourage it somehow. The moment I get near a man

something horrible happens, and it’s not gonna stop for the rest of my life. Anyway, that’s all tangential

. . . I don’t care about you, not really—look at how selfish I am. I can’t remember thinking about you

once that Monday . . .” She was shaking by the end of what had almost become a soliloquy. Its power

was diminished in that words poorly expressed the pure hatred she felt for herself; as such, the venom

was base and unrefined, better transmitted through action, not quite suicide but rather submission to

the worst humiliations possible—public sexual torture, gang rape by elderly men, persisting with life

after mutilation and maiming; it was easy for Avril to imagine herself as one of those Muslim women
who’ve had acid thrown in their faces, undergoing operation after operation only to continue to look

like a tumor-ridden abomination reminiscent of the fucking Toxic Avenger. John was reacting strangely

to her; he was getting slightly red, but otherwise he was calm. Avril wasn’t sure what she’d expected

out of him though.

“I’m . . . Look, it’s—you can’t always control what you do.” He fell silent for a moment. “Shit,

you approached me in a park asking me if I’d like to fuck you, so . . . You know, hopefully I had some idea

what I was getting into. I like you, love you, and I want you to love me.”

Now the crushing immensity of the universe closed in around her; this was the moment you

pass the event horizon and break apart, settling into harmony with infinity—even an emotional child can

accept unconditional love; maybe that’s the only thing that ever could’ve reached her. Avril started

crying; she tried to control the sobs but it only choked her. She crumpled to the floor . . .
Mel
Exit was about as bad as Mel had imagined, as dingy, tacky, bizarre, and cheap as anybody

could’ve wanted; there was even a chance she might fit in there. The place had a funk—a funk in the

sense of an odor as opposed to a groove or a vibe. It was dark, dark and smelly—grody. The night she

went—Wednesday at 10 PM—there was an extremely unfortunate steampunk-themed party in full

swing. Among the porn on the old televisions, satanic decorations, idiosyncratic furniture, and oddly

placed spikes and forks jutting from the walls, there were a few nods to steampunk hung on the walls,

for example a pressure gauge, a pair of goggles, and a robot with a large penis wrapped in tinfoil . . . The

club itself though was teeming with steampunks. The men were wearing vests and collared shirts

adorned with valves and pipes, top-hats, monocles, and canes; the women were in sluttish corsets or

else they had the 19th century urchin look, sporting multiple layers of cheap rags. The steampunks

weren’t doing a whole lot, sitting around and looking like steampunks mostly. Mel wasn’t sure whether

the clientele constituted good or bad steampunks . . . There were also multiple references to a dungeon

upstairs; it seemed like an odd place for a dungeon, but who was Mel to question the club’s logic? She

quickly noticed another type of person among the steampunks: these were punk rockers, heavily

tattooed and pierced, some of them wearing skimpy clothes to show everything off and others dressed

head to toe in leather—everything about them was stereotypical and seemingly calculated to destroy

their chances of finding employment in anywhere but a club like this. These were clearly the employees.

The girls all had colored hair, whereas the guys had more extreme piercings; passing by one of the guys,

Mel noticed he had a stud in every one of his knuckles and silver bands intersecting the veins in his

arms. Mel couldn’t quite tell if the punks were talented at cultivating their look. She’d rarely seen

either of these types of people in her life and couldn’t remember ever having interacted with any of

them.
 Mel walked around the club in a sort of daze. There’s an expectation that in a place like this a

normal person sticks out like a sore thumb, but actually Mel was totally ignored by everybody, the

steampunks and punk rockers alike. It was a little humiliating, although she was glad that people

weren’t staring at her. There was some kind of music playing loudly, some kind of orchestral heavy

metal shit . . . Mel approached the bar and a bored looking punk rock girl perked up and ran over to her.

This one was almost indistinguishable from the others: near-white hair, tank top, tattoos covering the

chest, shoulders, and arms, ultra cute in her own way. “Oh, god! This your first time here?” she

shouted.

“Uh,” Mel said.

“Sorry! You’ve gotta shout! Look at this shitty music!”

“I need to speak to Kathy!” Mel shouted. Though she raised her voice, the girl still couldn’t hear

her. She was probably deaf—the music was about a thousand times louder than the music that played

in Mel’s bar.

The girl turned her head to Mel and put her hand up to her ear. “I’m deaf!”

“Kathy!” Mel shouted as loudly as she could.

“Oh, Kathy! Yeah!” The girl pointed at the stairs which led up to the dungeon. “In the back!”

Mel turned and began to head for the dungeon; the girl touched her on the shoulder. “Hey! These

people are freaks! Steampunk! What the fuck is that! This place is usually cool!” Mel smiled at the girl,

who oddly seemed like she was trying to make a good impression. Mel doubted that Exit was usually

cool; in fact, it was clearly a place for the chronically uncool—why else would steampunks hold a private

party there? Not that the uncoolness would be a problem; uncool was something Mel could deal with,

something even that she felt comfortable in.

“Thanks,” Mel shouted and ran upstairs. The dungeon wasn’t too impressive. It was a large,

dark, somewhat moldy room with black carpet on the walls and vague torture devices strewn about. In
the middle was a carved out pit surrounded by a fence; signs reading, “DANGER: Unguarded Pit” hung

on the fence. Clearly, some sick things had happened in the pit—its floor was covered with mostly dried

up organic matter of various texture and color. The pit was the first thing in the club Mel encountered

that didn’t smack of kitsch; it was the only thing that was authentic or dangerous in the least. There

were real torture devices in the pit, regular, every-day mechanical implements: hooks, clamps,

gardening shears, power drills, nothing like the archaic Rube Goldberg devices strewn through the rest

of the dungeon which desperately alluded to the inquisition. Well, this is interesting, Mel thought. She

crept toward the pit, self-consciously looking around for other people, and then went through the door

of the fence and down the stairs, realizing that the pit was more of a cage from the inside; when she was

near enough to the garden shears, she knelt down and tentatively brought her finger to the blade.

Repulsed, she jerked back and nearly jumped out of her shoes—the shears were greasy, and a little

smudge of yellow gunk had smeared on her finger. “Eugh!” Mel said, wiping her finger off on the butt of

her pants. “Gross . . .” The whole place was gross. Mel had never been too much into the whole BDSM

or torture scene—it seemed like the last resort of the sexless, a sad pastime for people who see a

subversive ideal in sex but whose bodies have lost any semblance of desire or even the ability to feel

pleasure, in short the reduction of sex to a cerebral, intellectual curiosity. It was no wonder the

dungeon felt almost like a museum piece. That’s funny, Mel thought, I’m pretty much sexless and I’m

not interested in BDSM at all . . . Perhaps what set Mel apart from the BDSM devotees was that sex had

never taken on an intellectualized component in her mind, though it was also possible it simply didn’t

suit her tastes. Mel explored past the rest of the cage, looking closely at the staining on the power

tools; there was blood, obviously, but then there were all kinds of mysterious goos and cruds, most of

which seemed unfathomable. She’d have to ask Kathy about this, since there was no way she was

submitting to torture.
 Mel found Kathy’s office in the back, just as the bar girl had told her. She knocked lightly, heard

some rustling from inside, and then pushed the door open. The woman inside was hysterically shuffling

papers on her desk; she looked like an older version of the punk girls downstairs, complete with the

shock of unnaturally colored hair, tattoos, edgy clothing . . . Though she was obviously past her prime,

she seemed to be extremely vigorous and energetic; she could have been anywhere between thirty and

fifty years old. “My god . . . You’re perfect!” Kathy said. Her voice was loud and a little obnoxious, even

by the standards of club managers.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re Melinda! Franky told me all about you, but he didn’t do you any justice. None at all.

Turn around, turn around, let me make sure,” Kathy said. Her excitement was mounting.

“Um, okay?” Mel said and did a little spin.

“You haven’t got any ink at all under that shirt?”

“No . . .”

“No piercings?”

“My ears . . .”

“Beautiful! Beautiful! Sit down, sit down right away. I don’t normally interview the help—I can

tell everything by the first impression, but you’re so, you’re so . . . innocent! You’re too pure! Perfect! I

want you to know what you’re getting into, sweetie.”

“Sure,” Mel said, stepping into the office. The place was an absolute mess, which was to be

expected with a club’s office. Mel stepped around boxes and even empty cans of beer on her way to the

little chair across the desk from Kathy. Sitting down, she glanced down at the desk and saw The Curtain

by Milan Kundera lying there; she giggled to herself.

“What’s so funny, what are you laughing at, my desk? Yeah, it’s a mess!”

“Oh, no, I don’t mind the mess . . . Uh, it’s the book.”
 “What, this?” Kathy said, reaching out to The Curtain and picking it up. “You’re familiar with

this?”

“Oh, it’s not that, it’s . . .”

“So you are?”

“No, I mean, the other day I was on Craigslist, the, er, missed connections forum,” Mel said, a

little embarrassed to admit to reading missed connections.

“Yes, and?”

“And, well, there was this girl, she was in a bar, and she wrote that she was on the second floor,

looking outside, watching this guy in a purple scarf reading Milan Kundera. He’d smiled at her as she’d

walked into the club; she said she’s too scared to go out and talk to him so she’s writing a missed

connection post on her phone instead. So it was like the first time somebody was actually writing a

missed connection as it was happening. I saved the post, I couldn’t stop laughing . . . But it was so sad at

the same time that I felt like crying too.”

“That’s deep! No, I’m not saying that sarcastically. So, the book, what do you think about

that?”

“Oh, uh, well, my roommate has some books by him. But I haven’t actually read any of it . . .”

Kathy laughed. “Great! Me neither! I don’t actually read books—haha! Just kidding . . . But

seriously, one of the girls who works the bar left it behind, I’m only holding onto it until she comes

looking. But that’s good! You know about this stuff, you’ll get along here fine. Now that that’s settled .

. .”

Mel wasn’t sure exactly what had been settled. “Excuse me?”

“I like my people to be smart but not too smart. I like my people not to be pretentious—you

never read the book, and you admitted it! Great!” Kathy’s voice rose raised in pitch as she explained

Mel to herself. She ran a hand through her hair and some particles flew out; Mel wasn’t sure if they
were dust or dandruff. Her tattooed skin glistened under the harsh light in the office. “Now I need you

to tell me off if I’m getting too personal or too brash. Just tell me off, don’t let me bully you. I may look

tough but I’m not! Sometimes I step on peoples’ toes. I don’t mean to. No social grace, none at all,”

Kathy said, shaking her head.

“Sure,” Mel said.

“You’re pregnant. You need money. We both know that. Even if you’re a pervert, no pregnant

woman would dance in a dump like this for free. No illusions here, kid! . . . We don’t tell ourselves

happy little tales—so here’s how it’s gonna be. Pay attention. Ready?”

“Yeah,” Mel squeaked.

“We’ve consulted with doctors, we’ve even got one on staff to check you out and do all the

good stuff for you. Everything! A real professional . . . She’ll be helping to manage you throughout your

term. Now it’s like this—you’ll be dancing until halfway through the eighth month. At that point it’s

dangerous—I know—so you won’t be dancing. You’ll be more like a prop. If you can’t dance right now,

we’ve got classes, belly dancing, Latin dancing, classical dance, ballet, the whole works, whatever you

want as long as you can keep a beat. We’re working mostly through silhouettes, it’s dark in here

anyhow, so don’t worry your pretty head about your skin and your looks . . . ,” Kathy said and paused,

studying Mel’s face. Then she went on, “But you’re too too beautiful! The doctor will take care of you

as far as that’s concerned! The main thing’s endurance! We’re talking six, eight, sometimes ten hour

nights. Dance! dance! dance! that’s your life for as far out as you can see. This’ll shape you up like

noone’s business!”

It all seems really hectic, Mel thought. She nodded her head, mumbled something.

“Ten hours of dancing! I see it on your face, you’re worried, you’re peeing yourself! Now you’re

asking what’s the pay . . . Good question. Want to know?”

Mel nodded. “Yes . . .”

 “Good! First of all, we’ll handle every medical expense. Now listen, there’s a bonus in it for you

if you let us deliver in the club as well . . . That’s wholly optional, of course . . . We don’t want to be

abusing our girls. We’ve acknowledged that you might hurt yourself, hurt your little one . . . This will be

strenuous work, you’ll need days off, breaks, food—we won’t let you have any alcohol, obviously! Not

officially at least—haha! So . . . Here’s what we propose. While you’re here we’ve got you on salary at

$75,000. For about eight months, that’s $50,000, though there’s taxes, the crooks, then for a year after,

so you can take care of your kid and land on your feet, you’re on payroll at $45,000. It’ll be a steady

check every week for a year. If you agree, there’s a signing bonus of $5,000. You’ll walk out the day you

sign with the five grand . . . That puts the compensation at a cool hundred thousand. Is that fair?”

Mel was stunned—it seemed to simultaneously be a monstrous sum of money and not very

much at all. It was more than she’d ever made, but they were asking a lot. What choice did she have?

“I—”

“Don’t answer that yet! This isn’t some kind of high pressure sales pitch. You need to think

about this . . . I’m a mom myself! Frankly, if some ugly bitch had asked me to dance for her club while I

was pregnant I would’ve shot her. We feel awful that we can’t offer more. We’re a small club . . . We

haven’t got Jew financiers like some of the fetish clubs that spring up now and then, but that also means

that we persist, and that we’re a family. So you give us this time in your life, we give back to you, help

you whenever you need with cash, food, a steady gig. The hundred thousand on the contract is just

that, but you’ll be with us forever—if you want.” Finally, Kathy was speaking with something that

sounded like normal human speech. She pushed forward a piece of paper. “Here are the terms of the

deal. This is a contract, so look it over and read it through before signing it.”

“Um . . . When do you want it?”

“Honey, you’re pregnant now, so you could start as soon as next week. But please, think about

it.”
 “I have . . . I mean, I wouldn’t be here if—”

“Okay, okay, let’s not get too heavy. Sleep on it, baby. Now I want to know about you . . . Tell

me about yourself,” Kathy said, leaning forward, folding the contract up and deftly sticking it in Mel’s

shirt pocket.

“There’s not a lot to say,” Mel said. It seemed that everything that needed to be said had

already been established by the fact that she was here signing up to become a pregnant dancer. She

couldn’t pinpoint where exactly the shame came from; perhaps it owed to the latent Puritanism that

exists in most people. On the other hand, this woman Kathy had an entirely different attitude about it—

to her, this was normal.

Kathy laughed. “Then tell me what you do . . .”

Mel had the immediate impulse to say that she did nothing. She was approaching thirty now;

once upon a time she’d had interests but she’d never developed them. As children, we were offered

infinite opportunity, an infinite number of paths down which we could take our lives; but we were

loathe to decide on any one path, we refused to embark or even take one step, for in so doing we’d

destroy forever the rest of the paths . . . We didn’t have the guts to destroy possibility—so what

happened? We aged. Time did for us what we couldn't do ourselves; now here we are, no paths to

take, bereft of possibility, and what have we got to show for it? Look at us . . . In our hearts we still feel

as if our journey hasn't yet begun; we genuinely believe life will begin sometime soon, the moment we

muster the courage to take that first step . . . But we're old, unskilled, stupid, and useless.

Physiologically, we resemble our forebears—this is what hurts the most. Though our bodies are

developed and our minds are functional, our souls are stunted: we're the ugliest generation of people

to ever stain the earth, the saddest, the ghastliest; at some point, we will be regarded with horror.

We're the men and women without qualities and we’ll die like dogs, having seen nothing, having felt
nothing, having done nothing, and yet still clinging to life . . . Mediocre is too strong a word for us—

we’re nothing. “I don’t, I mean . . . I guess I’m a dancer.”

Kathy burst out laughing. “You’re a sweet girl . . . A really sweet girl, Melinda.”
John
April was clearly a deeply wounded girl. It went beyond her biographical details, her

relationship with her family, her illness, her isolation, all the times she’d been hurt; it had something to

do with her demeanor, a defiant sort of hatred she aimed at herself. That hatred was laced through

every part of her; and because she confronted herself so angrily, there was nothing sad or tragic about

April, there was no instinct to pity her. For instance, the night she broke down she mentioned that

she’d been raped . . . John tried to question her about it but she remained cryptic, only claiming that she

was a somewhat willing participant each time. John wanted to tell her she was wrong; but how could

you dissuade somebody of something like that? Even if it weren’t true—and he had no way of knowing

either way—it wasn’t the sort of thing that was solved through argument. In a way, it seemed like a sort

of gambit on April’s part—if you didn’t object to being hurt, then nobody’s robbed you of your agency.

It was also clear that April’s mind worked on a very high level—it was impossible for John to tell what

was being rationalized, what was true, what she held back, etc., which wasn’t to say she was lying either

to John or herself. In this sense, John felt like he’d learned something from his relationship with April so

far—he wasn’t aware of everything that passed through her head and he could accept that . . . So it

seemed like all there was to do was to go forward and try to live . . .

It was Monday, a strange one. John had called in to work and told Stephen he was out

searching for apartments. “That’s good, you take your time, you lived in Humboldt Park didn’t you?

Yes, it’s better to get away from the Mexicans,” Stephen told him. So John had some more time off,

even if Stephen was confusing Puerto Ricans for Mexicans. John’s story was true this time—he and April

really were out searching for apartments. Since they were now a “couple,” it was simplest to eschew

Craigslist and use one of the many apartment leasing agencies. While it seems the agencies serve a

ridiculous, decadent purpose, extracting a month’s rent both from the landlord and renter for what
amounts to simple matchmaking, their excessive fees are justified when you consider the banal and

harried daily life of the apartment leasing agent. The realities of the market dictate that the leasing

agent drives the prospective renters around the city to show off potential apartments, arranging at

every stop for the landlord not to be present at the time of the showing—the goal as far as the industry

is concerned is to convert the usually painful apartment search into a simple and replicable process.

This means that the leasing agent acts as chauffeur, bureaucratic functionary, and salesman all at the

same time, while also assuming most of the stresses of renter and landlord alike. Most leasing agents

work nine to twelve hours a day for a salary that barely amounts to the minimum wage. The hellacious

working conditions and the vicious competitive nature of the market for rental properties mean that

employee turnover in the industry is legendary, far in excess of either retail or food service operations.

It’s hard to believe, but the average leasing agent can tell war stories for hours on end.

When considering an apartment, it’s important to keep in mind neighborhood, public

transportation, commute time, parking (if applicable), price, living space, year of building construction,

utility costs, nightlife, noise levels, views, racial composition, class composition, safety, community,

school quality, hipness, closet space, bathroom size, appliance quality, flooring, construction method,

landlord compatibility, pet friendliness, proximity to nature, yard size, deck size, laundry facilities,

athletic facilities, storage space, and any possible association fees. The leasing agent, one of the

“Apartment Warriors,” conducted a long interview of John and April concerning each of these aspects of

life; it seemed that living was a complicated business. John couldn’t seem to give a damn about any of

it; for her part, April threw herself into the interview and seemed to be developing a jovial relationship

with the agent, a tall blonde woman named Lynn. The image John and April projected of their

relationship was probably a pretty standard one: the mostly disinterested boyfriend, the enthusiastic

girlfriend . . . Maybe they were even engaged. To her credit, Lynn did her best to involve John with the

interview, even deftly acknowledging from time to time the silliness and inanity of the questions she
posed. “I think I’ve got some amazing apartments for you guys. I’ll have to check in, but I think I can

even show three or four of them today, if you have the time,” Lynn said.

“Sure,” John said. The apartment search reminded him of Mel—he really was going to attempt

to disappear without a word; he surprised even himself with his insipid cowardice. For some time he

considered casing the building, waiting until Mel left, and sneaking in to get a few things. There was a

chance she changed the locks though, and the possibility of being caught and facing her was unpleasant;

it was easier to disappear, and it was true he didn’t have much in the apartment. Everything but the

guitar could be replaced cheaply, and even that had been the cheapest one he owned. Like most of the

people of his generation, John hadn’t fully moved out of his parents’ home when he got his first place.

His father was still holding onto the “important documentation,” i.e. passport, birth certificate, etc., and

what few valuables he had were stored back at home. He had been living in the world sort of like a

ghost. There was no sense of permanence; in a way this was intentional . . . Other than that he worked

and there were far fewer social opportunities, his life after college was identical to his college life. His

peers at work were no different; most of them lived with roommates, they were obsessed with games,

movies, television shows, or other media, and they instinctually hated the idea of settling in or starting a

family, even the ones who were approaching their forties. The best among us could lay claim to

interesting lives, filled with regular outbursts of fun—good times at the bar, a parade of sexual partners,

for example; but as Zizek reminds us, “There is nothing ‘spontaneous’ in such transgressive outbursts.

For example, we truly enjoy drinking and smoking only in public, as part of a public ‘carnival,’ the sacred

suspension of ordinary rules. The same goes for swearing and sex; neither, at its most intense, is an

activity in which we ‘explode’ in spontaneous passion against stifling public conventions—they are, on

the contrary, both practiced ‘against the pleasure principle,’ for the gaze of the Other . . . In

contemporary society, the predominant stance is: ‘I believe that repeated hedonistic transgressions are

what make live worth living, but nonetheless I know very well that these transgressions are not really
transgressive, but are just artificial coloring serving to re-emphasize the grayness of social reality.’” The

best among us realize this, even if it’s rarely articulated, so there was no precedent for John to feel bad;

everybody reveled in their collective return to childhood and he was no worse than the rest. Still, it

seemed a little wrong to simply disappear on Mel . . . But Mel was only a roommate after all . . .
Mel
“You’ve got another brain and heart in you,” the doctor said. “The embryo is progressing

normally. You’re in good health. How are you feeling?”

“Fine, I guess. My breasts are really sore, otherwise I seem okay . . .”

“A lot of women find that wearing a sports bra to sleep helps with this. Anything else?”

“My body’s sore from the dance lessons . . . I feel happier though, I thought like, I’d be loopier,

or I’d be getting mood changes.”

“The muscle soreness is to be expected. As for your moods, we’ll wait to see what happens in

the second trimester, though many women report increased happiness and even an increase in their

libido. Tell me, how’s your sex drive?”

“Well, um, it’s there . . . But I don’t have any outlets.”

The doctor looked genuinely flummoxed. “Oh. Er, I don’t mean to prod. Sorry, excuse me.

Well then, we can wrap this up. You’re absolutely clear to continue with your dancing. Actually, it’s

doing wonders—you look ten times healthier than the day you came in.”

The doctor was amusingly awkward. She was youngish, couldn’t have been much older than

Mel. She’d never been pregnant—when they’d first met, she’d confessed this with something that

seemed like shame and envy. “Okay. Thanks,” Mel said, shaking the doctor’s hand. She left the office

with the little packet of test results and brochures the doctor had given her and walked outside, where

Kathy was waiting in her car. Another brain and heart was growing inside of Mel now. There should

have been some metaphysical significance, some existential dilemmas rising up maybe, or some new

and unprecedented perspectives available for exploration. A great mythos of beauty and miracle

surrounds pregnancy—Mel was cut off from all of this, though she didn’t feel bad about it. She didn’t

feel much different than usual; her daily existence wasn’t much changed—you sleep, eat, shit, various
feelings overcome you from time to time. Mostly she just felt normal, and that was good. The dancing

really was doing wonders though: she was younger, sprightlier, energized, and these things she could

see in the mirror. She couldn’t remember feeling bouncy since the earliest days of college, or maybe

even some time in high school. Then afterward were alcohol, unhappiness, ennui; Mel was ten pounds

heavier than before the pregnancy but she felt light on her feet, capable of navigating physical space

with ease.

Kathy rolled down her car’s window and shouted at Mel as soon as she spotted her. “Melinda!

Get your little butt in here!” Mel laughed and jogged toward the car. “Hey! Don’t hurt yourself!” In

the car: “So how’d it go! You’re not dying, are you?”

“No, the doctor told me to keep dancing. She cleared me for the club.”

“Beautiful! Come here! . . .” Kathy leaned over the seat and kissed Mel on the cheek. She had

become something like a mother to Mel, as well as the other two pregnant dancers. This created

something of an odd dynamic between the three of them—a natural solidarity should have developed

between the women, all of them being in unusual but identical circumstances; instead, they mostly kept

apart and interacted with one another almost exclusively in Kathy’s presence, competing for her

attention and approval—instead of friendship, there was rivalry, a vicious sibling rivalry at that. Mel

didn’t think about it too heavily; she was focused on getting her body in order and improving as a

dancer. Anyway, Kathy was nice, there was something real about her. It was like she was from another

world where things like malaise, sadness, and self-awareness didn’t exist. Kissing Mel on the forehead,

Kathy said, “I love you, kid.”

April
If nothing else, the past months had proved that contingency plays a far greater role in mental

health than Avril would have previously admitted and the sort of post-mortem analyses of her own

psyche she’d continually engaged in were riddled with error. Unfortunately, life cannot be run under

experimental conditions. For example, during Avril’s last depression she had been living in a hostel, cast

off from her family, with no real social outlets and not even the faintest glimmer of outside support.

She had been woman-as-an-island. Now, today, there was no doubt Avril was depressed; but she had a

home, a safe space where she was accepted, a steady boyfriend . . . She truly felt she was connected to

something, even something human, like she had a life.

There were, of course, internal contradictions: she was financially burdensome, emotionally

dependent, not going anywhere; eventually these problems would need to be resolved. John didn’t

seem to notice at all though. He seemed to have entered a state of stupid happiness, almost like that of

a dog. Sociologically speaking, there was no reason for him to behave otherwise. His salary at work had

been raised. Their apartment was great, a relatively upscale renovated one-bedroom unit in Wicker

Park, a neighborhood full of affluent artists, hipsters, and yuppies; they fit in perfectly, as sad as that

was. Avril thought with amusement about that real estate agent, the big, tall, blonde one with an easy

smile—had Avril been manic at the time, she definitely would have seduced her . . . although she wasn’t

so sure about that now that her deterministic conception of mental illness had been shaken to its

foundations. Their sex life was excellent; she’d assumed she would lose her sexual desire and grow

bored, but even that hadn’t happened—she came to realize she’d cultivated a perverse attachment to

his body, its fluid mechanical grace, the terrain of the muscles, its slopes and curves, and even, or

especially his penis. She read a line in Mishima over and over again—“the lustrous temple tower soared

triumphantly erect.” It was cheesy, but she understood perfectly; John’s body was something she could
be dedicated to, even if she couldn’t necessarily be dedicated to John. There was also, of course,

herself: Avril discovered something she’d overlooked her whole life, possibly out of simple ignorance, in

a pair of pictures from an old 1950s-era book. The text reads: “Wrong way to perform coitus. Double

arrow shows distance separating penis from clitoris.”

For contrast the book demonstrated the right way. The text reads: “Proper contact at base of

penis with clitoris. The forward bending of the penis near the base is slightly exaggerated:

There was a simple beauty in the pictures. What a difference in connection between two bodies

with only a slight bend; in application it elevated intercourse almost to the transcendental. None of the

men she’d known in her life were aware of this minor difference. It turned out that everything was

about the clitoris; this much she’d always suspected, but drawn out and diagrammed it was deadly

obvious. It was even a funny thought, given that the clitoris is a sort of disused and shrunken penis:
everything in nature could be reduced to a pair of penises rubbing together. All in all, this was a strange

period in Avril’s life, almost like a tepid flirting with happiness. She was terrified of losing it; this fear led

to a faint compulsion to write again, something she could barely manage to focus on in the past. To her

amazement, Avril was writing; it was all dreck, but it was something.

It was 11 in the morning. John was at work again. Even after the months they’d spent together

so far, Avril still wasn’t entirely sure what he did. Whatever it was, it appeared to be absolutely

alienating; it was ridiculous and unproductive even by the standards of the information economy. From

the sparse information she’d gleaned from John, she determined he was working on a zombie project, a

tech product that was doomed to failure but which carried a large budget—hence the entire staff and

even the highest tiers of management put in the minimum amount of effort to bring the project to

completion while milking the budget for as much as they could, entirely conscious all the while of their

wasted effort. Michel Houellebecq once recounted a metaphor a journalist applied to him: “I am in a

telephone box, after the end of the world. I can make as many phone calls as I like, there is no limit. I

have no idea if anyone else has survived, or if my calls are just the monologues of a lunatic. Sometimes

the call is brief, as if someone has hung up on me; sometimes it goes on for a while, as if someone is

listening with guilty curiosity. There is neither day nor night; the situation is without end . . . Welcome

to eternal life.” Of course, Houellebecq likened himself and the act of writing to this person speaking

into a phone for the rest of eternity, unsure of whether anybody was on the other line listening; but

what John and his colleagues at work were doing was so much worse: they were speaking into the

phone with the dead certainty that nobody was on the other end. There was a paycheck involved, at

least, and it was supporting Avril, but the extent to which they cynically threw away their time and

energy was remarkable. They weren’t even under the illusion of a higher goal; they didn’t even feign

productivity. It was anti-human. Avril had no idea how John could go on doing it—lying in bed all day
seemed preferable to that. He didn’t have anything like a Protestant work ethic . . . What motivated

him?

Avril thought she might go to the café to kill some time. In the meantime she was listening to

poetry on Youtube. She’d had a bad experience so far . . . Listening to Allen Ginsberg read "Please

Master" filled her with horror—that squeaky little jew voice, the awkward inflections, the

mispronunciations, the disjointed rhythm . . . Ginsberg's voice was a meat grinder to his own verse:

enter vigorous, lively, flighty, nervous little creatures, exit a gelatinous, bloody mass of meat and sinew.

She loved the poem though; she liked the part where Ginsberg writes, "Please master . . ." The poem,

taken on its own merit, is a perfect expression of sexual submission. She tried with all her might to

forget Ginsberg’s voice, so that the poem wouldn’t be ruined going into the future . . .

Avril wasn’t entirely sure why she was going to the café. The people there weren’t particularly

smart or even attractive; they loved their macbooks and their liberalism—lattes are only mentioned as a

nod to the cliché. Nonetheless, they were coming to view Avril as something of a prodigal writer and

philosopher, their praise moving beyond standard-fare social validation to something approaching

adulation for the artist. In short, Avril was going to the cafe to feel better about herself, to feel superior

to others. She was going to show them her latest piece, a short pamphlet . . .

towards an aesthetic of insects

Children are drawn to venom. In venom there is life; consider the droplet of venom hanging

from the end of a stinger. This fluid teems with the fundamental components of biology—peptides,

proteins, acids, neurotransmitters. Seen under a powerful microscope, venom resembles a colorful,

bustling metropolis; injected into the structured and logical systematic orderliness of an organism,

venom induces a violent, self-destructive reaction—death is rarely attributable to the venom itself but

to anaphylaxis, hemorrhage, or pulmonary edema, particularly in the higher mammals and human

beings. We see this as the chaos of the insect world imposing the Real on the mammalian world. Chaos
does not wish to foster chaos; chaos only wishes to demonstrate all the facets of life to the orderly, to

show all that is possible, to cast eyes on things as they are without the handicap of subjectivity.

Inevitably, in light of this new information, the organism destroys itself; it does not know anything but

its processes, its safety, and its order, and hence cannot function.

honey bee: socialest bug

When a honey bee stings a large mammal, its stinger dislodges and the individual bee dies. This

is well-known. It is also well-known that a honey bee colony can be seen as an organism, the individual

bees serving as self-enclosed mobile limbs, sensors, combatants, and sexual organs; the honey bee is an

individual which has not been individuated. This is close to the ideal for a human society, only this as yet

is not well-known. For humans, community and not collective is the ideal: a community is an

interdependent group of actualized individuals; a collective is a mass of limbs. Communism follows.

a conversation between a male tarantula and a male tarantula hawk

"It is good that we are spending some time together," the male tarantula said to the male

tarantula hawk.

"Yes, the girls duke it out all the time. Nothing says we can't relax," the male tarantula hawk

said.

"Relax? You are serious? I have not relaxed once in my life!" the male tarantula said.

"That is because you are always chasing pussy. Why not do what I do? Find a nice, tall flower,

have a seat, and chill out. The purple flowers have even got a nectar that gets you drunk. Just lie back,

feel good, and the girls will come to you," the male tarantula hawk said.

"You idiot. I can not fly. I am too heavy to sit on a flower. Girls are elusive; they hide in grass; if

you do not chase them, you will die a virgin. Conversation over," the male tarantula said. He went back

to the grass and his chase; he had not been laid since the death of his wife. His body was going to

waste.
 "See if I care! You skinny asshole! Want to know what happened to your wife? My mom laid an

egg in her! It was I who feasted on her viscera! Her kidneys were particularly delicious, my friend!"

Having shouted all this at the departing male tarantula, the male tarantula hawk felt a pang of guilt.

The male tarantula's wife had, after all, served as his midwife and placenta. The feeling passed; he lay

back on his flower and sipped his nectar, waiting for the next female tarantula hawk to show up. He was

happy, at bottom.

why do i dress in bright clothes?

Because I am the aposematic girl.

The conversation between animals was obviously a nod to Houellebecq’s animal stories in

Whatever. Avril rather doubted that anybody at the café would catch the reference. There was also an

ironic critique of liberalism by way of the male tarantula hawk’s dialogue, which represented an

attractive paradigm of male sexuality. The Honeywell Corporation manufactured a UAV named after the

tarantula hawk for the Department of Defense; meanwhile, a UAV exactly resembling Honeywell’s “T-

Hawk” was concurrently and coincidentally developed by Valve to represent the invasive surveillance of

the dystopic fascist society in Half Life 2. Thus, by way of association and allusion, the reader is forced

to make her choice between the tarantula hawk’s appealing sexuality and the United States’ repressive

military apparatus on the one hand, and Valve’s insightful social commentary ensconced inside of their

tired liberal parody of fascism on the other hand—sexuality and fascism, or irony and liberalism? The

two pairings could not coexist. Surely nobody at the café would make the association; still, it’d be fun to

show off a little. If nothing else, Avril’s participation in the world at large demonstrated she was

progressing in her journey to defeat mental illness; Avril wasn’t elated nor was she despondent. Her

mood fell within the spectrum of acceptable mental states for the denizens of the post-industrial first

world . . . That was a change for the better.

John
We all cultivate a unique relationship with boredom. Michel Houellebecq once elucidated

perhaps the most common relationship, or at least the one most of us in the 21st century are forced into,

living at the profit center of empire as we do, in close proximity to the world’s wealth: “I’ve lived so little

that I tend to imagine I’m not going to die; it seems improbable that human existence can be reduced to

so little; one imagines, in spite of oneself, that sooner or later something is bound to happen. A big

mistake. A life can just as well be both empty and short. The days slip by indifferently, leaving neither

trace nor memory; and then all of a sudden they just stop.

“At times, too, I’ve had the impression that I’d manage to feel quite at home in a life of vacuity.

That the relatively painless boredom would enable me to go on making the usual gestures of life.

Another big mistake. Prolonged boredom is not tenable as a position: sooner or later it is transformed

into feelings that are acutely more painful, of true pain; this is precisely what’s happening to me.”

Before April, John was coming near to the pain that Houellebecq describes. He was obligated to be in

the office eight hours a day in addition to a mandated thirty minute break outside of the office. His

work was intellectual but required little effort; at a basic level, John assessed the categorization and

sorting efforts of others at the company. In real terms this meant that there was no work to do, as it

was possible to almost instantaneously judge the quality of somebody’s work; hence there were 8 and a

half hours of blank time to navigate every day. There were no deadlines, goals, obligations, or even any

hint of oversight; there was absolutely no stress, a bizarre stressor in itself. It helped to have a plan of

attack for the time—books, facebook, twitter, chat, forums, articles, flash games. Interactive mediums

were best for plowing through time, but with requisite focus a book or a set of articles served well.

Unfortunately, entropy always wins in the end; the soul can only endure so many eight hour blocks.

Part of the pain of boredom, particularly for those who confront it with activity rather than stasis, is the
scatterbrained fatigue that results. Though unsustainable for any length of time, this sort of fatigue is

unmistakably resolved by the prescription drug modafinil; this physiological reality is deeply unsettling

for those who’ve experienced it.

Before April, the boredom and the fatigue were wearing on John’s psyche; he had no idea where

it was leading other than that it seemed worse by the day. Now, as ridiculous as it sounds, he had

something to live for. It’s tempting to believe that having a fulfilling life outside of the office makes the

boredom of work harder to bear, but in fact the inverse is true. The feeling, actually, was similar to

modafinil’s mechanism—the happiness, or contentedness, or whatever it was he’d gained from his

home life with April seemed to wash over John’s consciousness and gently erode the nervous tension

and fatigue. He was having no trouble getting out of bed in the morning, no feelings of dread at the

commute on the CTA or the long hours in the office; he was even engaging his coworkers with more,

let’s say, humanity. There was one conversation in particular that seemed indicative of John’s improved

state of mind. One day, Anne came to his desk, leaned on it slightly half sitting down, and said, “Hey,

John.” They rarely talked since she had been moved to the other end of the office.

“Hey,” John said.

“I’ve seen you around, how come you don’t come hang out with us?”

“Ah, you know, I sit down at my desk and then I’m keyed in.”

Anne laughed; everybody knew that almost no work was getting done. “No, for real, I always

hear you talking and laughing over here.” She motioned around at the adjoining rooms in the office.

“Are they that much cooler than us?”

“Yeah, easily,” John said.

“Quit it,” Anne said, laughing and pushing John back by his shoulder. “No, you’re really

different, like another person. Let me guess—you’re finally getting laid.” She was actually blushing as
she said this; it was difficult to tell if she was scandalized by the thought or if this was a clumsy attempt

at flirtation.

John turned his chair a bit to face her. “What makes you think that?”

“I knew it! Who is she, does she work here?”

“Come on, come on, calm down, you know I haven’t sunk that low yet.” Anne laughed. “Do I

really seem that different?”

“Different? You seem . . . Fun. No, sorry, more laid back, uh, less serious,” Anne said.

“Thanks for the compliment, I guess . . .” At this point, John invited Anne to get lunch with him;

she happily obliged. While eating, John told her that he was in love, and he told her all about April.

Anne seemed to be genuinely happy for him.

Mel

Eyes Wide Shut is primarily notable for Nicole Kidman's world-historical bad performance; she

pauses for as much as a full second with a constipated expression on her face before delivering every

line, occasionally taking care to theatrically sweep her arms—these pauses are the longest and most

painful known to man. This performance contrasts with the excellence of Leelee Sobieski’s, who plays a

Serbian teenager who’s made infinitely more attractive by her sluttishness—in retreating from her

father's wrath upon being caught in a devil's threeway with a pair of Japanese businessmen, she

simultaneously hides behind and comes onto Tom Cruise's infinitely ridiculous caricature of masculine

weakness and desire; Sobieski's coquettish sideways smile in this scene can be accurately described as

the high mark of Stanley Kubrick's career. Finally we come to Tom Cruise’s farcical performance—he

plays a man who is surrounded by sex for thirty straight hours but never acts in a sexual capacity once

except to place a hand on a hooker's breast. In fact he never does have sex from the point he panics

over Nicole Kidman's marijuana-inspired admittance of once having a sexual fantasy about another man

(a separate interpretation might hold that this is the first time Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman have

smoked marijuana, and the entire film is a paranoiac reaction . . . it must also be said that in the scenes

that the script calls for her to be stoned, Nicole Kidman doubles and triples the length of her pauses

before delivering every line, a comic performance rivaling the likes of Chaplin and Keaton). It has to be

wondered if this is what Kubrick intended—a world that surrounds its denizens with sex but in which sex

is not possible, a leading man who immerses himself wholly in sex but who never takes the step of

performing a sexual act, a man who is shielded from the violent intrusion of bodies and sexual organs by

his career, his wealth, his bourgeois privilege, and the fantasy built around these institutions which

dominate his life. As Michel Clouscard wrote, “All is allowed, but nothing is possible.” In short, Kubrick's
world is one where sex is idealized but repudiated, where sex is all that remains, and thus we're beset by

horror. Nicole Kidman's last line, "You know, there is something very important we need to do as soon

as possible . . . Fuck," delivered with an insufferably wry smile after an insipid exchange concerning the

nature of love and reality, serves as modern humanity’s final sentence: Man (Tom Cruise) is condemned

to fuck, though he never asked to do so. It is a dialectical process.

Mel’s situation in Exit was similar to Kubrick’s vision of the world—sex was suggested and

celebrated all around, but as far as she could tell, nobody was actually having sex. Yes, it was true she

was pregnant, and so scared off many of the men who might have approached her; but after all, this was

supposed to be a fetish club. She was dancing mostly naked for hours every night but hadn’t managed

to meet a single guy. The male employees of the club, few as they were, kept a safe distance away; she

suspected this had something to do with Kathy. The clientele were pathetic as a rule, aging goths and

punks or whatever they were—most of them were too embarrassed to gaze at Mel, which in a way

signaled that the idea of pregnant dancers was disastrous from the start. By this point, despite the

pregnancy and her growing fatigue, Mel’s body was looking better than it ever had in her entire life. Her

stomach showed only a slight sign of the child; she weighed more but she was tighter and more compact

than before. Her weight was becoming more condensed and better distributed—she felt proud of her

body, really proud, maybe for the first time in her life. She was horny too; every night she masturbated

herself and came within less than a minute. This went a certain distance to satisfying her, but it was

coming to the point where she wanted to be touched and held, to have the weight of a man’s body pour

into her, pinning her down, to get properly drilled . . . But she didn’t have any idea how she’d approach a

man, or where . . . The club was tough luck.

As sad as it was, she was considering craigslist. Mel tried to envision what an ad might look like

but it was too embarrassing to put herself out there like that. There was a lot to be said for only fucking

around with acquaintances or going out to meat markets and singles bars—that way things could simply
happen; the encounters progressed as if they were on rails, there was an inevitability about the whole

process. With craigslist you had to be active at every step—first of all you’d have to photograph yourself

in some compromising “sexual” position, probably half naked; then you have to root through the list of

creeps who actually respond to those things, and then chat with them, call them possibly, and meet

them in a neutral place to minimize the chances of being murdered. That was the worst part: meeting

somebody from the internet in real life. Nothing could be more awkward or embarrassing, nothing.

So it was late at night and Mel was supremely frustrated. Mel browsed through the casual

encounters section, noting the two or three actual real women who were posting there. She wondered

what could make them so brave; maybe they were just crazy. Even then, she couldn’t be completely

sure they were real—assuming you were farming email addresses, a post that could pass for legitimate

was more valuable than one that’s obviously fake. One of them wrote:

“Seeking a stud in the Lakeview Area - w4m - 26 (Wrigleyville)

“My roomates are out of town for the weekend, so looking for a hot guy to come show me a fun

time. Would like to meet in public first to make sure we click, but if you're sexy enough in your pics, and

seem like a fun guy, we can meet at my place in Wrigleyville, a few blocks from the Addison redline. I'm

26, HWP, 5'9, long blonde hair, blue eyes, 34C, very sexy and very girly. A little shy at first, but definately

not behind closed doors. Plenty of pics after I see yours. Send some pics and tell me what you're into,

and when you're free? Put your favorite baseball team as the subject so I know you're real. Thanks

guys! ”

Underneath, she attached webcam pictures of herself naked with a hand over her breasts and a

series of goofy expressions on her face. Another wrote:

“Wanna Asshole Killer!!!! - w4m - 32 (chicago)

 “I'm a very attractive, discreet, down to earth cock sucker, that loves to deep throat, suck balls,

eat ass and SWALLOW. Looking for good looking White or Latin guys, I prefer circumcised guys, who love

a good blowjob on a regular basis. Please be ready to meet now, I'm for real and expect you to be too!”

Underneath, she attached a pair of pictures she took holding a camera up to the mirror in a

bikini in what looked to be a childhood bedroom. Both of the approaches seemed valid enough. Guys

appreciate clear instructions, directness, and the promise of swallowing . . . Actually, the second one

was probably too good, probably fake. At least Mel assumed so. Both of the girls were cute and

seemed out of place on the casual encounters board . . . But they were no cuter or sexier than Mel.

Everything was implausible and obnoxious. Mel sent an email to both girls asking if they regularly get

laid off the board; neither responded.

She drifted over to the missed connections board and found an amusing line, improbably

written by a girl: “On the train, we made eye contact several times (cliche) and you intrigued me (trite).

You were also very handsome (predictable).” This was the sort of girl that John liked, Mel thought. Even

the description of the boy in the missed connection almost described him.

Mel had been sleeping in and living from John’s room ever since he’d left; she was even using

his computer right now. She hadn’t thought about it too much, though she was at least slightly aware

that it begged a host of psychoanalytical interpretations. There was a sense that she was still holding

the torch, the suggestion of a lingering attachment, and obviously there was a familial link of sorts—part

of him was inside of her, after all. Mostly she liked that the sunlight poured into the room early in the

morning; it made her feel better. As far as John went, Mel felt an acute helplessness, a passive sort of

fear despite the anger she knew she should have felt . . . There was no way he’d be able to justify

himself. There wasn’t even an ounce of decency in him, he’d revealed himself to be a piece of shit,

basically; but then Mel would tell herself that he couldn’t have known he’d impregnated her. Maybe

something had happened to him; more likely he was with that other girl. The logical move was to find
him . . . But here inertia held Mel down, as it had with everything else in her life. If she hadn’t made an

effort in all these months she probably never would. She continued to browse craigslist.
April
A short survey of the Common Grounds Cafe employees and regulars who want to fuck me:

Nick: Barista. Tall, skinny, bearded, wears tight pants, outline of penis visible from time to time,

slightly yellow teeth. Shy, does not command physical space well, does not greet me upon entrance,

watches me whenever he believes I’m not looking. 50% chance on a given day he’ll build up his

confidence to make small talk—unfailingly excuses himself from the conversation at the first

opportunity, usually a waiting customer.

Andrew: Supervisor, barista. Tall, stocky, gross beard, thinning red hair, literally wears kilts.

Aggressive, enjoys relating stories pertaining to his apparent Scottish heritage, does not miss an

opportunity to flirt, jokes about the “prize” under his kilt. Interprets the slightest glance or attention as

an invitation to speak; will not give up a conversation willingly. Asked me out twice, played it off as a

joke both times when I turned him down. Has creepy habit of standing over me from behind my back.

Breath smells odd.

Noam: Regular, photographer, student. Tall, bad posture, boyish face, visible belly and love

handles, horrible fashion sense. Rich, liberal, Jewish, proudly displays toys (Macbook, photography

equipment, iPad, iPad 2, etc.), leaves “literary” books (Jonathan Safran Foer, Zadie Smith, David Foster

Wallace, John Updike, Don DeLillo, etc.) sitting cover-up next to Macbook, constantly on Twitter.

Initiates conversation by referencing pop culture. Unabashed about referencing the internet in normal

conversation—pointed me to an OKCupid profile, asked me to follow him on Twitter, will not fail to

awkwardly deliver a tired meme. An unfailing degenerate. Probably a virgin, read on his Twitter that

he’d never kissed a girl. Has alluded to his family’s immense wealth. Proudly related a story about

throwing an expensive digital camera into the ocean because of malfunction . . . Ridiculous. Once told
me that he "hates it when attractive girls are just fronting about their 'so-called' nerdy interests." Could

not comprehend how this related to me.

Freddy: Regular, “entrepreneur.” Older, early 40s, male pattern baldness, skinny, sinewy, small

stature, supernaturally bright teeth. Easy smile, approaches and flirts regularly. “Pickup artist,”

proponent and practitioner of the Mystery Method. Regularly discusses pickup tactics now that I’ve

“figured him out,” to use his words, and he wants me to be his “wing girl;” probably assumes I’ll fall for

him if we can work together at some point. Constantly refers to girlfriend but hits on every marginally

attractive woman to come through the café. Has had some success with some of the other girls. Is

absolutely unfazed by rejection. Cancer survivor, health food nut. All in all an interesting character, but

headed for a sad end.

Angel: Regular, waiter. Androgynously handsome, fashionable, possibly homosexual, hispanic.

Cryptically refers to a sex life without ever using gendered pronouns or names. Nervous countenance,

speaks and flirts without giving the impression of ulterior motive or agenda. Only drinks cappuccino.

Once mischievously referred to me as puta, was supremely embarrassed when I overheard and

confronted him. Women notice him, would go places with him. Underneath his confidence is an

underlying shyness, an almost profound vacuity. Can’t imagine Angel ever pulling a girl into a bathroom

or even asking one out. Strange guy.

There were more of these, a lot more. Avril was up to forty pages of these sketches in her

notebook. It was a wonder that anybody could ever meet somebody or have sex in the west. Sure,

women weren’t any more actualized as human individuals, but they didn’t project their personalities as

far out into the world and so to an extent they were less subject to criticism. There was little separating

Avril’s contempt for these men from an advocacy for outright murder; the men’s only defense was they

barely justified the cost of the bullets. “The male is a biological accident, an incomplete female, a

walking abortion,” Valerie Solanas wrote. Avril didn’t go that far—every criticism of men in the SCUM
manifesto was also applicable to women; we’re all products of our society regardless of gender.

Observe:

“The male is completely egocentric, trapped inside himself, incapable of empathizing or

identifying with others, or love, friendship, affection of tenderness. He is a completely isolated unit,

incapable of rapport with anyone. His responses are entirely visceral, not cerebral; his intelligence is a

mere tool in the services of his drives and needs; he is incapable of mental passion, mental interaction;

he can't relate to anything other than his own physical sensations. He is a half-dead, unresponsive lump,

incapable of giving or receiving pleasure or happiness; consequently, he is at best an utter bore, an

inoffensive blob, since only those capable of absorption in others can be charming. He is trapped in a

twilight zone halfway between humans and apes, and is far worse off than the apes because, unlike the

apes, he is capable of a large array of negative feelings -- hate, jealousy, contempt, disgust, guilt, shame,

doubt—and moreover, he is aware of what he is and what he isn't.”

Replace the references to men with references to women and every criticism still holds true.

Valerie Solanas was a simple misanthrope who got lost somewhere and found radical feminism.

Anyway, there was one guy who frequented the café who didn’t deserve death. His name was Anton,

he was young, his family was from the USSR but had illegally immigrated to Israel, which they hated so

much they tried to get back into the USSR. Having failed at that, they ended up in the United States.

“The Soviets did not forget our betrayal,” Anton made a habit of saying. He was interesting—he hated

everything, hated America, hated western Europe, hated Putin and the Russians, hated the Trots, hated

the cultic Marxist-Leninists, hated the effete greens and social democrats, hated the liberals, hated the

major political parties, anyone who could have been described as a parliamentary cretin . . . But he

loved Avril’s writing, and not in the kissass way that every man loves the creative output of an attractive

woman; he really understood it, he spotted the weaknesses and never shied away from criticism or

struggle. He called himself a National Bolshevik and spoke with a wooden accent; he knew about
Mishima and Nietzsche, Celine, Sade, Rochelle, Houellebecq, the French right wing. He was cute too—

middle-length brown hair, a neat beard, a compact body. One day Anton came into the cafe, slid into

the booth next to Avril, and plopped down a book in front of her, saying, “Here, April, read, you will love

it.”

Anton was dressed like Che Guevara but looked nothing like him. He’d placed the book face

down. Avril laughed. “Is this your idea of suave?”

“Suave? I do not know this suave.”

“It’s a word . . . Never mind,” Avril said, turning the book over. “It’s Me, Eddie, by Eduard

Limonov.” Saying “Limonov” out loud brought back the memories of the day she met John; she even

felt her mental state shift a little closer to what it had been that day.

“This book upsets you?” Anton said.

“No. It, uh, it brings back memories.”

“So you have read Limonov?”

“No. It’s a really long, crazy story . . .”

“Well? Will you tell me? How does Limonov, an author, relate to your memories if you’ve not

read him?”

Avril was uncomfortable. “Maybe some other time,” she said.

“We are friends, no? I am the suave Anton. Look – look, I buy your disgusting drink, what is it,

latte? Latte taken with sugar and chocolate syrup, yech, okay, I buy it for you, then you tell me your

relation to Limonov.” Before Avril could object, he bounced out of the booth and jogged toward the

counter, greeting the nerd Nick.

While waiting, Avril opened It’s Me, Eddie to a random page. “I am on welfare. I live at your

expense, you pay taxes and I don't do a fucking thing. Twice a month I go to the clean, spacious welfare

office at 1515 Broadway and receive my checks. I consider myself to be scum, the dregs of society, I
have no shame or conscience, therefore my conscience doesn't bother me and I don't plan to look for

work, I want to receive your money to the end of my days. And my name is Edichka, ‘Eddie-baby.’” This

was a pretty interesting perspective . . .

Avril paged forward: “Do you know the taste of semen? It is the taste of the alive. I know

nothing more alive to the taste than semen.” Interesting . . .

She flipped elsewhere: “Despite my everlasting honor and ironic mockery I was a hunted

creature, cornered and exhausted, and this was precisely what I needed — another man's hand stroking

my head, caressing me. The tears welled up in me, welled up and started to flow. His groin gave off a

characteristic musky smell; I cried, my face burrowing deeper into the warm jumble of his balls, hair, and

prick. I don't think he was a sentimental creature, but he felt that I was crying and asked me why,

forcibly lifted my face and began to wipe it with his hands. Chris had big strong hands.”

Further on: “I was raised in the cult of madness. ‘Schiz,’ abbreviated from schizophrenic, was the

name we gave eccentrics, and it was considered praise, the highest rating a person could have.

Eccentricity was encouraged. To say that a man was normal was to insult him. We segregated ourselves

sharply from the herd of ‘normals.’”

Near the end: “Despite all his ironic mockery and malice, Eddie-baby, like a lonely dog that has

lost its master, dreams of dogging someone's footsteps, devoting himself to someone. The dreams are

interrupted, as always in such cases, by harsh reality.” Avril was a little spooked at just how close

Eddie’s experience was to hers; then Anton came back with Avril’s latte and a drink of his own. “What’s

with this book?” Avril said.

Anton set the cups down and sat, this time across from Avril in the booth. “Ah, I think you will

love it. Limonov’s aesthetic is similar to yours. In this, his first novel, he is raw, passionate, and

despairing. Many girls, especially the silly Russian girls, blush while they read this book. You however

will read it as a writer and you will not blush; I fear I do not know what will cause you blush, April.”
 “What are you doing over there? Come here,” Avril said, gesturing for Anton to sit next to her.

“Er, I was polite,” he said. “Okay.” He slid out of the booth, came over, and sat down next to

Avril; she turned, leaned back slightly, and crossed her legs under the table, resting her ankle on Anton’s

knee. They faced each other; Anton nervously shifted his body around. Avril glanced up for a moment

and saw Nick staring at her and Anton. She smiled at him and he quickly turned away in shame.

Something churned in Avril’s breast. She made fists with her hands and smiled at Anton. He

shrank, probably menaced by the look. His retreating body language alerted Avril to a progressive

awakening of the senses, her chest expanding as she drew in more breath, her muscles tensing, her

vision focusing; the point on her ankle that touched Anton’s knee seemed to scream all through her

body. There was the simple desire to dominate a boy, any boy, and Anton was the nearest. “You want

to know how I know of Limonov?” Avril said, slowly rocking her ankle back and forth.

“If you like . . . ,” Anton said.

Avril leaned forward, pulling her leg up so it rested on Anton’s lap. Their faces were inches

apart; she could smell a slight hint of coffee on his breath. “An old man gave me one of Limonov’s books

on the same day I met John.”

Anton met her eye contact for a few moments, turned away, looked at her again. “Yes, that is,

your boyfriend,” Anton said, averting his eyes, “whom you told me you were very devoted to.”

“Want to see me blush?”

“I—”

Avril took Anton’s hand and brought it to her stomach. “I blush when John touches me here.”

Anton pulled back a little bit, but she forcefully pulled his hand up to her breasts. He cupped one of

them, brushing his index finger against her nipple through the thin fabric of her shirt. “And here . . .

And here,” Avril said, guiding Anton’s hand down under her skirt to her bare hip. “Am I blushing?” His

touch barely registered; Avril was aware of it, and that it felt good, but something much bigger and
more immediate was occupying her—pure anticipation, like the moment when the game-winning shot

arcs through the air: her breath had stopped in her throat, she was jamming her tongue against the top

of her mouth, her heart pounded in alarming fits and starts. To an outside observer—and a number of

people in the café were observing by now—it may have even looked like excitement or desire. “Touch

me.”

There was a long pause. Anton stared at her, stiff and frozen in place. “I am,” he whispered.

“You know what I mean,” Avril said, withdrawing her hand and parting her legs slightly. Anton

glanced down, swallowed, and quickly shifted his gaze back to her face; Avril was wearing a skirt without

any underwear. She smiled at him and moved her foot down his thigh, resting it lightly on his erection.

A shudder went through his body the moment she touched his penis. For a moment Anton’s eyes began

to look unfocused, glassy, milky; then there was a sudden change in his body: his eyes snapped to

attention, he frowned, sat up straight, pushed her leg away from his crotch.

“What you doing!” Anton frantically whispered, pulling his hand away from Avril’s hip; his accent

was coming on so thick that his words were barely comprehensible. Avril swung her leg back under the

table so that she could slide next to Anton in the booth and press her torso against his. The weight of

his body helplessly drooped into her, like it was trying to penetrate her through osmosis. Avril reached

down and put her hand on Anton’s hard cock, squeezed its head, rubbed back and forth across its

length; it was straining through his pants and she thought if she undid the zipper it might burst out from

the fly. She touched the zipper, paused, went back to stroking his penis. Anton nuzzled Avril’s neck and

mumbled something; his head weightlessly rocked back and forth, his mouth brushing against her skin.

Anton’s hopelessness and surrender gave her more pleasure than anything else . . . But again his body

became rigid. This time he stood up, his cock making a ridiculous tent out of his trousers, and quickly

whirled around and sat down in the booth across from Avril. She was shocked; she thought she might

have gasped. Leaning forward, Anton whispered, “You know my principles!”

 “Your principles!” Avril whispered, raising her voice.

Anton shook his head and took a sip of his coffee. He raised his hands with the palms facing

outward, as if defensively, and said, “I am not rejecting you!”

“Are you fucking serious!”

“What, you think I’m joking? Look around, I am not one of your hipsters, clowns, liberal with

themselves, stabbing each other in their backs because they are not men and women but children.”

Anton was making sweeping gestures with his arms; everywhere he looked people were averting their

eyes. Now this had become a scene.

“What are you babbling about? You’re not rejecting me?”

“April, you are extremely beautiful girl. Any man will be glad to have you, you think I don’t see

how the men watch you with fuckeyes? It is ridiculous. I am your lover, I will have words with them.

But I’m not, how many times is it you have told me about this John and your great devotion to this man.

I honor him and I honor your relationship because I honor you.”

He fell silent. Avril watched him and he stared back; the two of them sat like that for a while.

She considered lying, saying John had done something horrible and they’d broken up, or flying into a fit

of moral outrage, accusing him of denying her agency, but she knew it was useless. In a way, this was

what made Anton attractive; this was also what made him infinitely better than Avril. They shared the

same taste in literature and film; they had similar outlooks, politics, goals, desires, a zest for the real, for

integrity and strength and truth; the difference was Anton was dead serious about everything and Avril

was just another one of the backstabbers , just another child grabbing for the first thing that was in

reach. She was a fraud, basically. Avril had never felt more worthless. She sighed and leaned back,

defeated. “You’re right,” she said.

“I am?” Anton said, as if it shocked him. Avril laughed and then he started laughing; soon they

were both doubled over and gasping for breath. It was a sweet moment and one, Avril thought, that
would have made a beautiful beginning to a relationship. She wanted to kiss him, couldn’t think of any

reason not to, but instead they drank their coffee and talked, almost as if nothing had happened.

Before Anton left, Avril bashfully showed him a piece of writing she’d done earlier that day, a review of

Lars Von Trier’s Antichrist which doubled as cultural criticism in the style of Slavoi Zizek or even Patrick

Bateman (though she considered herself a better writer than Breast Eatin Alice):

“The basis of mainstream horror, fantasy, and sci-fi is the reminder that man is not necessarily

the master of the universe. These genres serve to confirm our suspicion that weakness is the universal

truth undermining all human effort, obliterating our notion of progress and especially tearing through

the veil of comfort and security that separates modernity from antiquity and global poverty. They’re

united in their obsession with the external; their fear arises from an irrational, destructive other, even

when the object of horror is a human creation: Jason from Halloween, the monster from Cloverfield, the

artificial intelligence from Terminator, the wizards and orcs from Lord of the Rings, and so on. Even

when the villain is obviously human, as in Norman Bates from Psycho or the inbred family from

the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the psychological punch comes not from their simple existence but from

their intrusion into the normal life of an average person, or in a word the audience; hence these genres

operate in the first person, we're challenged to consider our relation to an external menace. The best

horror, the horror that transcends genre, doesn’t empathize with the audience but attacks the audience

in order to transfer the horror from the screen into the physical world, indeed not even to inflict horror,

but to cast light on the nearly imperceptible, hidden horror that’s located in the hearts of our bodies,

our own evil that’s uncontrollable and excessive to the point that it emanates from within, broadcasting

to the world and those around us, much like gas escaping from the body, causing us to feel ashamed and

debased, causing us to understand that the horror in life is not an external menace disrupting our lives,

but a schism within ourselves—take Lars Von Trier's Antichrist, in which a woman goes away to the

woods to write her master's thesis criticizing the concept of gynocide, the idea that evil has been done
to women through history because they are inherently evil; the woman, known in the movie only as

‘She,’ is driven mad by the realization that gynocide has merit, that gynocide is true. Naturally we’re

quick to doubt this, as is She, but the theory of gynocide is rigorously tested through the events of the

movie.

“After the tragic death of She's son, her therapist husband, known in the movie only as ‘He,’

condescendingly attempts to cure her through psychoanalysis, using a bag of quack Lacanian tricks like

word association games and exposure therapy, all the while never turning down the chance to throw a

fuck into She. They isolate themselves in the woods, which He insists will expedite the healing process.

In the woods, He and She aren’t husband and wife but male and female animals, perhaps even without

the limitations of a prior relationship and a tragic past. Indeed, as husband and wife learn about one

another they become antagonistic and bestial; He seeks to intellectually, psychologically, and sexually

dominate She, who begins to question whether He is attempting to cure her or simply attempting to

assert his masculine dominance. In the woods, separated from civilization, among the animals, the very

nature of their communication changes: language is discarded for the physical; all that remains is the

violent sexual encounter.

“What follows is inevitable—sexual violence is followed by plain violence. In this regard, She is

the stronger of the two animals; at the moment in the film that She physically assaults He, She

completes her transformation to the bent-over movie monster, skulking in the shadows, screaming,

stalking, naked and vulgar, sexually menacing, and reveling in gore and brutality. She smashes He’s

testicles with a rock, drills a hole in his leg, and attaches a heavy grind-stone to his leg through the hole;

afterward He literally hides in a foxhole as She hunts him, contorting her face for the camera, maniacally

singing, ranting nonsense and gibberish, promising to reduce the severity of violence She will visit upon

He if only He will come out, all to the accompaniment of sharp angles, rapid cuts, and dissonant shrieks

from violins . . . So as we inhabit He's point of view as the horror protagonist simply fighting for survival,
She is the classical horror villain begging for divine retribution. As the audience we can't help but to root

for He. We cheer when He miraculously breaks free and chokes She out, a comforting reminder that

even a monster isn’t invincible.

“Thus through the conventions of the horror genre we're forced into accepting the monster's

own twisted philosophy; we're forced to cheerfully and whole-heartedly endorse the repellent doctrine

of gynocide: we're glad when the woman is murdered because she is evil; word for word, this is

gynocide. We the audience are cast into the role of the butchers of history, the witch-hunters, the

vaginal mutilators, the rapists; we're asked to read our own sentence, that the evil of the world is not

what comes from without, is not what is external, but is in a word: "Us." We hate women, and for the

duration of Antichrist we're convinced we're in the right for doing so.

“Unlike Antichrist, most genre work doesn't move beyond our struggle with the external. This is

why people who've generally tended to fail as human beings flock to these childish genre forms: the

worst human beings enjoy being reminded that man isn't the master of the universe. Dominated by

their peers from an early age, they like to think that we're all doomed and it isn't just them. They prefer

the zombie apocalypse, the alien invasion, the nuclear annihilation, the encroachment of Mordor to

their banal and humiliated existences . . . It's hard to blame them. In fact, the wild explosion in

popularity of kitsch genre work (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, World War Z, Twilight, Harry Potter,

True Blood, Left 4 Dead, Zombieland, etc.) among the youth of late capitalist societies is certainly a signal

of the growing degeneration within these societies. There are fewer and fewer losers because those

capable of making the distinction are disappearing; mediocrity has been democratized, thank god.”
John
John came home from work and April wasn’t there. Well, that was odd—she’d been there

every day for the last five months. At first he didn’t panic. It was a slight inconvenience, really. He got

something to eat, thought about where she might be, sent her a text, called her a little later. Okay, he

thought, I’ll go to the gym, she’ll be back later on. He went to the gym, came back a few hours later, and

she still wasn’t there. He slept alone, which shouldn’t have been remarkable after having done so for

the greater part of his life, but he’d been spoiled as of late. For months they’d slept interlocked,

sometimes on top of one another, sometimes in each other’s arms, sometimes back to back, sometimes

spooning; it was especially nice waking up in the mornings, when he’d have a hard time tearing himself

away from the warmth and firmness of April’s body. He would actually smile every morning upon

waking; he’d always felt a little bit like a douchebag when this happened.

He didn’t put any thought into where she might be because, obviously, he knew where that

train of thought would lead. He hadn’t forgotten what April had said about her condition, or what the

doctor had told him to do in case she begins to act bizarrely. Actually, the doctor had been in contact

recently asking for an “update” on April’s status; John told him that everything was normal. In a way it

seemed inevitable that his happiness’ time was limited; without knowing it, John had come to the

conclusion that love was doomed from the start. He’d expected the relationship to end badly, though

he couldn’t say why. He hadn’t fallen victim to the animal realities of living with a woman, the funky

smells, stray hair, and dirty clothes, nor had he grown tired of that intrusive, curious female presence;

instead, he lazily basked in a comforting glow of happiness—he’d neither been an idealistic dreamer nor

a cynical brat, he’d simply been happy. Perhaps he’d sensed this was too good for him. His life with

April hadn’t been much more exciting than his life before her, there was still the same rigidity of routine,

work, boredom, and so on, but in place of pain there was warmth—it was possible to live forever this
way. It seemed that April felt the same way, but he didn’t know for sure. For now she was gone. He

slept fitfully.

John woke up at 9 to the overly loud alarm; he’d gotten the same model as the one that he’d

scrambled to shut off on his first night sleeping with April. April still hadn’t shown up. He called into

work right away and told them he wasn’t going to make it in. He wasn’t panicking, not quite, but he did

realize there was a lot he didn’t know about April. Her disappearance didn’t seem to owe to another

guy; April was sexually promiscuous, or she had been, and she could always have been fucking around

while he was at work. That was doubtful, which was worrying—why had she settled down so much

since moving into the apartment with John? No good reasons came to mind; in short, John didn’t know

what exactly he was offering as, say, a man, and he couldn’t think of any good reasons for April not to

leave. Then again, there didn’t seem to be any good reason for her to leave; their life seemed to have

fallen into an easy stability. Living with April, it was impossible not to have learned a lot about her; in a

word, she was strange. She approached life with a sense of apathy for both herself and others: she

couldn’t give a damn where anybody was going or why people did anything. Naturally, April did scant

little herself; she was mostly idle. Very few people John knew could be said to be doing something with

their lives, but at least they deluded themselves with insipid fantasies, or otherwise aimed low. John

asked her about her goals in life once and she replied with a quote from a guy called Deleuze: "What do

you know about me, given that I believe in secrecy? If I stick where I am, if I don't travel around, like

anyone else I make my inner journeys that I can only measure by my emotions, and express very

obliquely and circuitously in what I write." In fact, John had been reading April’s writing. He wasn’t sure

what her writing expressed about her inner journey. A recent example:

“The 1970s. As the country goes up in flames, sabotaged from the inside by student protests,

black panthers, and countercultural hippies, the army reinvents its weapons development strategy . . .

“Fight the Cong” becomes “Fight the Bong” . . . Victory on the homefront requires the destruction of the
students, the blacks, the peaceniks, all of them traitors, all of them identifiable by their propensity to

gather in crowds and riot . . . Testing begins on wave-generating crowd dispersal weapons . . . A

breakthrough . . . Exulting in his brilliance, Adrien Brody as “Chief Scientist Joseph Banger” sodomizes

Topher Grace as “Assistant” in the laboratory when the High-Powered Microwave Antipersonnel

Weapon, codename MAW, is powered up for the first time . . . As MAW reaches its stated maximum flux

capacitance of 1.21 gigawatts, Topher Grace achieves anal orgasm . . . Everybody in a one-mile radius

becomes a cock craving anal whore . . . An extraordinary revelation . . . Testing reveals the psychic

energy of Topher Grace’s anal orgasm transferred into MAW and pulsed outward . . . The loss of Adrien

Brody and his scientific team is tragic, but a worthwhile sacrifice . . . Efforts begin to bottle the anal

orgasm for weaponized field application of the anal pulse . . . A grim discovery: the effect is only

produced by the live event; the anal pulse can only be recreated by a real-time proximal anal orgasm . . .

Department of Defense finds its solution once and for all: a miniaturized MAW accompanied by a team

of elite anally orgasmic operatives . . . The weapon and its operators are developed under codename

POOPFAG—Portable Operative Orgasm Potentiated Field Antipersonnel Generator . . . DoD deploys the

elite unit first of all in Berkeley, Harlem, Kent State . . . The results are devastating: fields of raucous

students and militant blacks reduced to groveling cock fiends buttfucking unto oblivion . . .

The operatives of POOPFAG come to be known as the Anal Orgasm Brigade. Brad Pitt plays

Commander Steele, the multiple orgasm giver, relentless, dominant—he’s never given a break in his life.

Johnny Depp plays Colonel Discipline, the power bottom, as paradoxical as he is handsome. Jennifer

Connelly plays Field Medic Mastupov, master testicle manipulator, able to reduce the refractory period

by as much as 90%–a medical miracle. Steve Buscemi plays Lieutenant Savage, the public face, famed

for his charisma and his encyclopedic knowledge of the anus. The unit harks back to the sacred band of

Thebes—camaraderie, brotherhood, and honor are the words that carry the day. The Anal Orgasm

Brigade distinguishes itself domestically, destroying the Black Panthers in DC, New York, and Oakland,
pacifying Berkeley, and eliminating the Mexican and Caribbean drug cartels, stopping the flow of

cocaine into the US. An era of spiritual and moral renewal is ushered into the United States. Now the

Anal Orgasm Brigade looks outward to the red menace. The highest minds at DoD realize that POOPFAG

upsets game theory, theoretically invalidating mutually assured destruction by negating the belligerence

of the enemy. An unprecedented path presents itself: the Cold War can be won in moments . . . A

strategic infiltration of the Anal Orgasm Brigade and a quiet application of POOPFAG in Moscow could

eliminate the Soviet brain trust without any outward indication of attack. The plan: as the Russians

succumb to irresistible anal cravings, a devastating nuclear first strike will be launched . . . Their eyes will

be watching cock . . .

But the strategy fails. We are betrayed: surely, a traitor in the ranks. The Soviets learn of the

plan and launch their dreaded full-scale land invasion of Western Europe. As the t-70s roll unchecked

across the plains of western Europe, an American general agitates at the highest levels of NATO

command for a nuclear first strike. Brad Pitt disagrees; Brad Pitt knows a first strike will end in the

nuclear annihilation of the world. Something must be done. The Anal Orgasm Brigade goes rogue—

their hand is forced. The Anal Orgasm Brigade parachutes into Brussels and attacks NATO high

command with POOPFAG, confident in the belief that conventional victory is the answer. “We cannot

risk annihilation!” Steve Buscemi announces to the world, backdropped by the gruesome image of

American and NATO commanders making love. The announcement is cheered in Paris, London, New

York. “We will stop the Soviets!” Buscemi continues. The Anal Orgasm Brigade flies to Berlin, where

POOPFAG is deployed against the advancing Soviet forces; Russian soldiers disembark from their

vehicles and chase their comrades through the fields begging for anal penetration. NATO begins its

counterattack. NATO soldiers, following in the wake of POOPFAG, make a game of killing the copulating

Russian couples by aligning the shot with the anus of the pitcher: "Two Shots One Kill!" is the motto and

the catchphrase, mimicked by children and gamers watching at home. But as NATO approaches
Moscow, the Russians put up a fierce resistance! They’ve become immune to POOPFAG! The Russians

reveal they’ve developed their own weapon: the Universal Butt Plug . . . It turns out game theory is

inviolable: the doctrine of MAD is updated to MAAD—Mutually Assured Ass Destruction . . .

The Soviets mount their counteroffensive, absorbing POOPFAG attacks with indefatigable

eastern resilience . . . Growing arrogant, the Soviets broadcast grueling images of Universal Butt Plug

test subjects . . . A wide shot of a grim factory full of naked Georgians, hairy, panicked, shouting in their

pig language . . . A handsome blonde-haired Soviet officer grins and presses a button . . . All at once the

Georgians seize up, arch their bodies, throw their heads back, and drop their hands to their butts . . . The

camera pans in . . . A close shot of the Georgians' asses . . . Where there was an anus, now there is only

a chocolate hammer and sickle . . . The blonde-haired Soviet officer throws his head back and laughs . . .

We are reminded of Ivan Drago . . . The camera now pans back to a room of barrel-chested American

generals watching the Soviet feed on a flatscreen television, squirming in their seats and tugging their

collars . . . “The Russkies have gone too far this time,” one of the generals mutters, crestfallen . . .

There is only one way out, a POOPFAG wave so powerful it will penetrate the Universal-Butt-

Plug-hardened Soviet infantrymen . . . This pulse will be generated by Ass 2 Ass 2 Ass: Brad Pitt, Johnny

Depp, and Jennifer Connelly construct a specialized three way dildo and plan to synchronize their

orgasm . . . The last stand is planned for Alsace . . . Pitt, Depp, and Connelly approach a column of

advancing Soviet armor and assume their positions in a field mooing cows . . . The Universal Butt Plug

team spots them! No! They prepare their infernal weapon! their hammers and sickles pulsate! Brad

Pitt, hurry with your orgasm! Hurry, Jennifer Connelly! Use your fingers! Johnny Depp, mug for the

camera! Our three heroes begin to pump their asses together . . . Suddenly, a close shot of the hatch of

a Soviet tank . . . Steve Buscemi’s head pops up . . . Steve Buscemi speaks, villainously: “I have never

been anally orgasmic! I have fooled you all along thanks to my training in Siberia! I fake the full body

anal orgasm with the assistance of inscrutable oriental mysticism!” (Buscemi laughs; a shocked
expression on the faces of Pitt, Depp, and Connelly) “Time to die!” . . . Cue the dramatic music . . . We

see a pained expression on Steve Buscemi’s face . . . Clearly he is resolving an internal struggle, the tug

of war between his disdain for anal sex (as he cannot reach orgasm) and his love of freedom, for after

all, what would a world be without anal orgasm, a world where all the butts were plugged? The Soviets

wish to curtail the freedom of the anus, the democracy of butt sex, available to all men, women, and

children—who are they to impose the absolute? what gives them the right? what privileged knowledge

have they? who gave them the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? . . . In the end, Steve Buscemi

repudiates his comrades . . . The Universal Butt Plug cannot, will not be allowed to exist . . . He emerges

from the tank and joins Pitt, Depp, and Connely’s tangle of limbs . . . The humping reaches a fever pitch .

. . Rapid cuts between the straining faces, wrinkling noses, gritting teeth, shaking eyes of our heroes . . .

The most powerful synchronous anal orgasm the world has ever known explodes from their bodies . . . A

ball of light . . . A concert of groans . . . The orgasm disperses into the atmosphere . . . Everybody on the

planet feels a slight tingling in the anus . . . Now we're all fags . . . A happy ending . . . World peace . . .”

April went on, now in her own voice as opposed to Deleuze’s, as if to clarify, “I don’t mean that

I’m keeping secrets from you, only that I don’t know how to express something so abstract. You know

more about me than anyone else . . .” She trailed off, and then sat down on John’s lap, subtly grinding

herself on his thigh, her light red hair hanging down in his face. He sought clarification, he wanted to

understand her, but he was getting excited; they fucked. In his heart John knew that she’d shut him

down with a combination of pretense and sex, but there was nothing he could do about it—and maybe

there was a lot of meaning in April’s presentation, an elusive core that he wasn’t smart enough to grasp.

April didn’t show up for another day. A week passed, a month. Not a word of contact. A

lackadaisical detective became involved. Nothing was produced. All things considered, taking into

account the great positive change April had produced in John’s life, he took the ordeal surprisingly well.

He never came close to a breakdown, never surrendered to despair, felt nothing approaching agony. At
worst there was a resigned acceptance; after all, he’d known passive longing far longer than he’d known

emotional contentedness. He went back to work; he unquestioningly returned to his senseless

existence, which so resembled a death march. April’s disappearance did, however, produce one great

change—John’s thoughts turned to Mel.

 ACT 3 – SCHISM

"Perfect purity is possible if you turn your life into a line of poetry written with a splash of blood."
April
For the world is Hell, and men are on the one hand the tormented souls and on the other the devils in it.

That tiresome old cycle was in swing again—the moment Anton left the café, leaving Avril sitting

by herself, a great sucking vacuum settled in over and around her body. It would have to be filled with

horrible things; nature abhors a vacuum, or so the saying goes. Alternately, her feeling could have been

described as agitation—her heart rate rose and her breathing quickened despite the lack of any external

stimuli. A long steel rod under enormous pressure seemed to run from one end of her body to the

other; it bowed and twisted, shaking, threatening to snap at any moment. The same feeling had come

over her earlier with Anton; it was as inexplicable as it was undeniable, and it needed to be resolved.

Avril glanced around the café and caught that little worm Nick staring at her again. She faced him and

sneered with, she knew, a sadistic glean in her eyes; Nick literally jumped, dropping whatever he was

holding in his hands. He picked the object up and hurried over to the sink to wash it off.

That little fuck, she thought, slipping her feet into her sandals and walking over to the counter.

Nick’s back was still turned, so she walked around the counter and snuck up behind him. “Hey, Nick,”

Avril said. Nick turned and bumped Avril with his hip; he jumped again and almost fell back into the

sink, making a sound that was a cross between a squeal and a croak. His face was embarrassed and

repulsive, his eyes were fixed on a point on the floor, possibly Avril’s feet. “Busy?” Nick was frozen in

place, stammering and terrified just as Avril had expected. She wasn’t certain whether the utter

predictability of how it was playing out or Nick’s deflated passivity was more disgusting. “Come on,” she

said, gently taking Nick’s hand in hers and leading him to the back room.

Once there, Avril pressed him back against a wall. She’d seen the outline of his penis through

his pants many times before; as bashful as he was, he had no reason to dress this way, it was beyond

stupid, maybe he didn’t even know his penis was showing, maybe he simply liked tight pants. It was
even visible now, curving around his thin leg, held in place and bound so tightly it looked like a sausage

in his pants—Avril put her hand on it and looked up at Nick, who breathed heavily and drove his back

into the wall. “Calm down,” Avril said, rubbing his cock with one hand and guiding his hand between her

legs with the other. There wasn’t even a twitch in the guy’s cock, it was a useless piece of meat; his

hand sat dumbly in Avril’s crotch. “Don’t be so nervous, baby. I see you staring at me all the time . . .”

“Y-yeah . . . ,” Nick said, bringing his face to Avril’s. He tried to kiss her and she turned her face;

his beard brushed against her cheek and she got a sense for how oily and prickly it was. “Let me . . . eat

you, out. Then I’ll get hard.” The words stumbled out of his mouth clumsily, like he’d been afraid of

saying them.

“Okay,” Avril said. Nick lowered himself to his knees, his back still to the wall, and pushed Avril’s

skirt up. Then he stopped, turned his eyes a little—it seemed he was averting his eyes even from Avril’s

pussy, and then she started imagining a pair of eyes manifesting in her cunt and wondering whether

they’d be intense eyes, or googly eyes, or crosseyes. She stifled a laugh, put her hands on his head and

pulled forward. There was actual resistance, involuntary as far as she could tell; his body was absolutely

stiff. His head began to make little movements, kissing sounds could be heard. His lips were moving

against the insides of Avril’s thighs, but all she could feel was his beard jittering back and forth . . . This

went on for a long time, so long that she began to space out and read the text on the boxes of coffee

stacked up next to them: “Kenyan Beans – Sorry I’m Latte!” written over and over in a whimsical font. It

didn’t make any sense, what the hell was going on . . . “What are you doing!” Avril said, placing her

fingers on the soft part of the skull behind Nick’s ears. This was the temporal bone, a particularly

vulnerable part of the skull which could be crushed by a child’s fingers; she’d had the habit as a teenager

of pushing against her own in order to induce a wobbly dizziness and pressure in the eyes. It helped you

focus. It would’ve been wonderful to drive her fingers into Nick’s skull and feel the warm jelly envelop

her hands. She squeezed a little . . .

 Nick looked up at her. “Uh . . . ,” he said.

“Get up!” He mechanically rose to his feet. “You’re still not hard?” Avril said, unbuttoning and

pulling his pants down. His dick flopped out and hung between his legs. She put her fingers around its

head, took the shaft in her hand, touched his balls; a sticky moisture clung to her hands wherever she

touched him. There was almost no response at all. Nick’s breathing was getting progressively heavier, it

could have been mistaken for a large animal’s, a tired mule’s, for instance . . . Something made Avril

bring her hand up to her nose and sniff. A little repulsed by the powerful musk, she turned her head to

the side and spotted a man’s face watching her and Nick through the little square window of the double

doors. The guy held her eye contact for a moment and winked, and suddenly Avril was transported

years back in time to the elevator with the two boys. They were holding her in their arms, one had just

come inside of her, and the other was rubbing his cock against the back of her ass getting ready to

penetrate her. At that moment, with a mischievous smile on his face, his penis still twitching in her, the

boy who had just come pressed his body against hers, put his mouth next to her ear and whispered,

“Your entire value as a living being is as a mere reproductive object to be acquired by the simian

monster that is the human male.” Then he winked, pulled out of her, and let his friend fuck her.

Why hadn’t she remembered what he’d said for all this time? She remembered thinking in the

moment that he wasn’t smart enough to have come up with that on his own. It was true though,

whether or not it was an original thought; of course it was true. She’d even seen it word for word later

on the internet—by then it’d already festered in her teenaged subconscious for years. The brutality of

the artist boy’s statement demanded an even more brutal response; Avril’s formulation was to destroy

the value she’d never earned—men wanted to fuck her and they’d give anything to do so, whether it

was money, attention, affection, or love, but then they didn’t mind too much if you removed the horse

trading aspect of the game and freely dealt yourself out to whoever’s available. There were then issues

of respect, dignity, emotional attachment, psychic trauma, STD, the divorcing of pleasure from the
sexual act, and other things of that nature, but at least the relationship between human value and

reproductive value had been upset. Avril’s rebellion had reduced everything to zero, but at least there’d

been an effect. Even in this Avril had failed: for all that she offered, John—and in fact everybody else—

would’ve had nothing to do with her if it weren’t for her beauty and her youth. And still Avril couldn’t

say whether she was promiscuous by choice or by compulsion. She would have given anything to go

back in time and gut that little motherfucker before he got his chance to shove his little cock inside

her—call it an experiment in fatalism, see if things would’ve turned out any differently.

By now Nick was also staring at the man’s face through the window . . . This was finished. Avril

half-heartedly pulled Nick’s pants up, adjusted and smoothed her skirt, and pushed through the doors,

bumping the guy with her shoulder as she passed. She’d never seen him around the cafe but he must

have watched Avril go with Nick into the back . . . Who knows how long he’d been watching. The guy

called out, “Hey, what about me, baby?” as Avril walked back to her table. When she realized all of her

things were gone, her jacket, purse, notebooks, and Anton’s copy of It’s Me, Eddie, she thought that

really it couldn’t have happened to a better person.

Avril burst out of the café, determined never to go back and aware that the next few hours

would determine the next few months, or even the rest of her life. Technically this is true for everybody

at all times, but only rarely are we aware of it. Avril had barely managed to walk half a block in a

random direction when a man on a bench said, “Excuse me.”

Avril stopped and looked. The man was familiar, older, wearing thick glasses and a leather

jacket. The day was too warm for leather. “Do I know you?” Avril said.

“In a sense yes. If you remember, I gave you a book last fall. I feared you weren’t going to come

back and discuss it.”

 Avril remembered perfectly now—it was the same day she’d met John. “Oh, god . . . Yeah. But

this isn’t millennium park, what are you doing here?”

“It seems Katy Perry had a concert to perform; I found it difficult to concentrate. But now I’m

glad, for it’s led me to you. Please, sit . . .”

Avril sat down next to the man. The man slowly folded his newspaper and then looked at her,

smiling warmly. “I guess you’re not a fan of Katy Perry . . . ,” she said.

The man laughed and slapped his knee. “Please, she is the voice of our times. Only it’s

unfortunate—the poor girl cannot sing in tune yet insists on performing her songs. I prefer the studio

recordings.” Avril couldn’t tell if he was being serious. He went on, “What brings you to this

neighborhood?”

“I live here now, a few blocks away with, uh, do you remember the boy I was with when we

met?”

“Why yes, in fact I remember his interrupting our conversation. I remember very well—your

name is April, and you were on the verge of telling me a secret. Am I correct?”

“Um, wow, yeah—”

“I also got the feeling your secret involved the boy. What was his name again?”

“John. Actually, it had nothing to do with him, I was gonna try to shock you because you looked

like you’d judged me when you’d first seen me, and then if you played along right I might have given you

a blowjob or let you fuck me, if you were up for that.”

The man looked over his glasses at Avril, smiled, laughed. “You are serious.” He held out his

hand for Avril to shake. “Delighted to meet you, April. I am Edward Veniaminovich. I knew there was a

reason I gave you Limonov’s book . . .”

“Why’s that?”

“To put it simply, there is something about you. You bear your spirit for the world to see.”
 “Would you have fucked me?”

Edward adjusted his glasses. “I’m an old man; an old man’s dream is to once again possess the

body of a beautiful young woman. I should say I would have.”

“I have another secret for you then.”

“Oh?”

“I think I’m about to leave John.”

The man studied Avril for a long time. “You are unhappy?”

“No.”

“He has done something horrible?”

“Not at all . . .”

“Then you are the issue. Tell me about it.”

Avril turned toward Edward and pulled her legs up onto the bench so she was sitting Indian

style. If Edward looked from the right angle, he would have been able to see her genitals; this excited

her—that is, whether or not he’d look. She thought she’d be able to see it in his eyes, that he’d betray

himself, but if he ever looked at her she didn’t catch him. “Well, yeah, you could say I’m the issue. Is

that—I’m not sure how to put this . . . No, it's crazy, if I say it out loud it'll just sound like navel gazing.

I'm being a brat, I think."

"Please, tell me, I'm no stranger to navel gazing. Your predicament likely only seems absurd

because it is trapped in your head. Perhaps by giving voice to your thoughts and feelings you will make

an intuitive leap?"

"Well, okay . . . It started, I guess, from when we first met. I was really, extremely out of line,

everything I did would have scared off any other guy. But he didn't seem to care, he went with it, and to

this day he hasn't changed."

"And this is a problem?"

 "Don't you see? That isn't any kind of human relationship, it's sick, he’s like a puppy dog. A dog

can’t do anything but love, it hasn’t got any choice . . . I don’t know, it’s just not right. What’s the point

if there aren’t any limitations or boundaries, why bother if you can’t disqualify yourself no matter how

far you go? I feel like I’d have to get rid of him by kicking him, throwing rocks at him, and then he’d just

slink away, not understanding, and then he’d love, or not love but devote with his last breath. That’s

perverse, isn’t it? That’s not any kind of human love, it’s like, it's intense, but in the wrong way,” Avril

said. At that moment a little blonde haired girl on a bike rode by the bench, followed by a couple of

boys a little older than her. She must have been about five or six, and the boys eight; after looking at

Avril and riding farther on, the girl stopped and waited for the boys to catch up. She turned to face the

boys, tilted her bike to the side, stood on a single foot, raised her skirt, parted her skinny legs, and

furiously scratched at the little slit. Watching the girl scratching herself, the boys stared at her without

comprehension, their mouths stupidly hanging open. The girl laughed and pedaled away on her bike;

the boys yelled and chased after her again. Avril looked at Edward . . . “Oh my god, did you see that?”

"Yes, the child is enjoying herself. Er, this John . . . Is he so canine and innocent, as you said, out

of desperation?"

Avril was confused for a moment—did Edward say the little girl was enjoying herself? The girl

didn’t look to be enjoying anything . . . And now Edward was deflecting the subject back to John.

"That's—I don't know, no. It's not desperation so much as that just being how he is. So, you know, I

guess he's innocent, and I need to get away from him so that I don't hurt him—"

"Hurt him? How will you do this?"

"I don't know . . . He works all day, and I get bored, sometimes I get things in my head and I'll

like to mess around with other guys, or disappear for a while, maybe take some of his money or things—

I have access to his bank accounts, I mean, I just don't know. I can't predict it."

"And these things hurt him?"

 "No, that's the crazy thing. Like I said, he just goes with it—it's bizarre."

Edward tutted; he actually tutted, scoffed, and shook his head. "I fear you do not understand

men at all, least of all your boyfriend who ostensibly you seek to protect."

"What?"

"John is happy when he is with you, despite your indiscretions or perhaps even because of them,

perhaps because they constitute your person and your identity. The only way you will hurt him is by

leaving him."

Avril was tempted to say, what do you know, but held herself back. What Edward was

suggesting wasn't possible; people don't sit back and let themselves be disrespected. At some point it

becomes a matter of pride, especially where romantic relationships are concerned, and if John wasn't

capable of drawing a line maybe she didn't have any use for him. "Can we talk about something else?"

Avril said.

"Of course, of course, these matters are difficult and there is never one correct course of action.

Sometimes we are motivated by mysterious forces, things unknown and unspoken, and which may

never reveal their nature. There is a part in Limonov's first book where, after meeting a bum and

following him around Manhattan all night, Limonov analyzes his reasons for embarking on this utterly

irrational course of action. Seven separate voices speak in his head and give seven conflicting reasons,

each of them valid; our motivations may be suspect and confusing, but at the least they should be

trusted. You should do what you feel is right. I'm sorry that all I can offer is this sort of masters'

wisdom, but as I said these matters are difficult."

Avril laughed; she knew exactly what he was referring to, one of Zizek’s old jokes: “The

tautological emptiness of a Master's Wisdom is exemplified in the inherent stupidity of proverbs. Let us

engage in a mental experiment by way of trying to construct proverbial wisdom out of the relationship

between terrestrial life, its pleasures, and its Beyond. If ones says, ‘Forget about the afterlife, about the
Elsewhere, seize the day, enjoy life fully here and now, it's the only life you've got!’ it sounds deep. If

one says exactly the opposite (‘Do not get trapped in the illusory and vain pleasures of earthly life;

money, power, and passions are all destined to vanish into thin air - think about eternity!’), it also

sounds deep. If one combines the two sides (‘Bring Eternity into your everyday life, live your life on this

earth as if it is already permeated by Eternity!’), we get another profound thought. Needless to add, the

same goes for its inversion: ‘Do not try in vain to bring together Eternity and your terrestrial life, accept

humbly that you are forever split between Heaven and Earth!’ If, finally, one simply gets perplexed by all

these reversals and claims: ‘Life is an enigma, do not try to penetrate its secrets, accept the beauty of its

unfathomable mystery!’ the result is, again, no less profound than its reversal: ‘Do not allow yourself to

be distracted by false mysteries that just dissimulate the fact that, ultimately, life is very simple - it is

what it is, it is simply here without reason and rhyme!’ Needless to add that, by uniting mystery and

simplicity, one again obtains a wisdom: ‘The ultimate, unfathomable mystery of life resides in its very

simplicity, in the simple fact that there is life.’” Again that girl on the bicycle pedaled back around, the

boys still in tow. This time she stared at Avril with a grave expression; as the girl picked up speed, her

skirt billowed behind her and her nakedness underneath became evident. There was a large, oozing

rash running from the inside of one of her thighs to her stomach. Looking closely, Avril could see worms

and maggots wriggling on the girl’s raw pink exposed flesh, and the end of a scaly lump of meat—a

tail?—dangling down from between her legs. There was even an unpleasant smell, slightly organic, a

little metallic, though Avril couldn’t definitively place the rash as its source. Once the girl passed by the

bench, the boys stopped chasing her and stared at Avril with their arms at their sides. Avril touched

Edward’s arm and said, “Oh my god, did you see that?”

“Yes, the little girl smiled at you—very charming, that one. You do not like children?”

“Smiled? No, I mean, did you see the skin under her skirt?”
 “Did you say skirt? She is wearing blue jeans. Look,” Edward said, pointing at the girl as she

moved down the street. Avril turned and looked—yes, the girl really was wearing jeans.

“Oh, no,” Avril said. She looked at the boys, who still stood in the same place. “You didn’t see

any boys chasing that girl, did you?”

Edward narrowed his eyes at Avril. “Boys?”

Avril stood up; the boys took a few steps toward her. She said, “It was nice talking to you,

Edward.”

“Wait,” Edward said, standing and grimacing.

“Sorry,” Avril said. She turned away and walked as fast as she could. Edward was shouting

behind her but she couldn’t make out the words. She glanced over her shoulder; the boys were clinging

to Edward’s legs, preventing him from following too closely.

A schizophrenic out for a stroll, as Dolce & Gabbana would say. At this point reality was to be

regarded with extreme suspicion, as Avril well knew. The vision was possibly a one-off incident, but far

more likely it was the beginning of a psychotic episode. Avril inspected the usual objects of the urban

landscape for irregularities: cars, sidewalks, grass, fire hydrants, post boxes, street signs, shop windows,

other people . . . Was anything out of the ordinary? As far as she could tell, no. Then she glanced down

at the sidewalk and saw a frenzied swarm of ants surrounding and pouring into a soda can, greedily

filling their bellies with the sugary water. As a kid, when she played outside, she’d spend hours and

hours killing ants, taking a special joy in it when they got together in those big pulsating clumps.

Breaking them up was like raining on a parade—it feels good to dampen high spirits, even if they’re ant

spirits. You develop terroristic fantasies about it, about the ants, about the way their feeding frenzy

devolves into a panicked scramble for life. There are the usual methods of destroying them: sticks used

to inflict ugly casualties, throwing a piece of cardboard on them and jumping up and down on it (ant
blood is green in large concentrations), drowning them in syrup, burning them for those satisfying pops

which sometimes launched the individual ant a full foot in the air, stomping with your bare feet in order

to get a real good feel for the mayhem (the satisfying crunches especially); best of all is collecting a big

group of a separate ant species, the big and ugly black ones, and putting them in close proximity to the

little red swarmers—both groups immediately drop everything and go to war. The smaller and meaner

ones win every time; they slice and bite with frightening energy, gang up, fight in teams against the

individualistic black ants—the little red ants’ signature move is tearing the big black ants into sections

and carrying them off in opposite directions, demonstrating that they’ve got a mind for the taunt, for

the spectacle, for the theater of victory.

It seemed the ants’ pain was a lot more tangible when they inflicted it upon each other, which

goes a long way toward justifying god’s perspective. But what Avril always imagined was that the ants

had their own little human-like societies, with families, politicians, hospitals, news reports, funerals.

When the ants carried their fallen comrades’ corpses back into their holes it was easy to imagine them

as ambulance crews with stern looks on their faces; and later the ant newscaster, dressed in his little

suit, would report on the mass deaths, the genocide perpetrated by the notorious villain Avril who

murders at will, and then President Ant would make a rousing declaration to the grieving mama ants,

promising justice, promising to avenge the deaths of their sons and daughters, promising total war and

nothing less than total victory. It was all very tragic, and Avril never did make the intuitive leap that they

were bringing the dead ants back to use as food—simple protein, that’s all.

One day, Avril’s father had told her that the ants are going to infiltrate the house at night and

bite her toes as she slept if she kept on killing them. In this, as with everything else, he’d lied—Avril had

kept killing the ants and they’d never marched into her room to take their revenge. Avril was just about

to give in to the impulse to start stomping the big patch of ants when a police cruiser rolled by, stopped,

and backed up; she didn't notice it until the officer called out to her, "Hello!" She froze in her tracks—
her foot was raised in the air, just about mid-stomp, and she looked up. She didn't say a word. "What

are you looking at?" the officer went on.

"Oh . . . The ants . . . ," Avril said.

The cop started laughing. Now he seemed a little familiar, especially his blond hair . . . "The

ants? Okay, I'll pretend you didn't say that . . . I know you."

"You do?" Avril said.

"Yeah, yeah," the cop said, beckoning her over.

Avril hesitated, but then she sauntered over; he looked harmless enough, even if he was a cop . .

. He was sort of leaning back in his seat, so Avril stuck her head into the open window and leaned

forward, resting on her arms and pushing her breasts forward. This clearly made the cop nervous. She

smiled at him and said, “You really know me?”

An arrogant grin came across the cop’s face. “I should say so. I was your arresting officer.” The

words struck Avril, and suddenly she remembered him perfectly; she jumped a little bit and backed off.

“Oh, god, I’m so sorry, I can’t believe how stupid I—”

The cop burst out laughing. “It’s okay, it’s okay. Shit, I’ve been arrested myself, I know how it

is—if you don’t hate the prick hauling you in you’re not likely to remember him . . .”

“You don’t know how much you helped me, I mean—”

“I know, I know how it is. Don’t mention it. Hey, hold on, give me a second . . . ,” the cop said.

“Avril! That’s your name!”

“Yeah . . .”

“Whoa, I don’t want you to think I’m creepy or anything, there’s, you know, the paperwork . . .

Well, I’ve gotta admit it’s not every day you arrest a pretty girl.”

“I guess not, officer . . . ,” Avril said. She wasn’t sure how to handle this one.
 “Hey, it’s not like that, it’s not like that at all. I’m married, look,” he said, holding up his hand

and displaying a wedding band. “The girl next door. Since we’ve been eighteen, yep.”

“That never stopped a guy before.”

The cop laughed again. “You’re pretty sassy, huh? You know, this is my beat these days, I’ve

seen you around recently and I’ve been meaning to talk to you. Just never saw a chance, really.”

“You’re a cop, you could’ve made the chance, right?”

“True, true, it just didn’t seem polite is all.” Really, polite? Avril thought. Maybe the cop was

one of the few good guys left in the world . . . “Anyway,” he said, “all I’ve been meaning is to see how

you’re doing, you know, with the case and all that.”

“Oh, it’s going well, there was a court date, and it got deferred for like nine months; my

boyfriend got me some kind of good lawyer. I just haven’t been thinking about it really,” Avril said.

“Ah, that’s good, that’s good, that’s the most you can ask for, that it doesn’t touch your life. It’s

good to see you in a good place . . . Ah, I almost hate to mention this. Maybe I’d better not . . . ,” the

cop said. Avril looked at his name badge—Krul. Officer Krul, the friendly neighborhood cop . . .

“What is it? Tell me,” Avril said.

“Well, that guy, the manager at the store, you know, the one who insisted you go to Cook

County, he’s been interested in the case, been asking about you, and I’ve always told him that I know as

much as he does. Anyway, one day, just offhanded-like to sort of rub it in his face, I told him I’d seen

you around, that you’re a free woman living her life—that was a mistake, tell me about it—and he got

all excited, real hopped up, and he started telling me all about how catching you made his career. Well,

so then he hands me this . . . ,” Krul said, his eyes cast down at his lap. In a moment he reached over to

the glove compartment of his car and grabbed a slightly crumpled section of newspaper.

Avril took the paper and looked down at a certain paragraph that had been circled: Chicagoland

Macy’s regional loss prevention director chosen to head national “Fight Syndicate Shoplifting” initiative
after major arrest of syndicate shoplifter, purportedly a woman in her early twenties. The director, 34,

will be speaking at McCormick Place this Saturday and Sunday at the sixty-first annual Major Retailers

Conference & Exhibition.

“Hello.”

“One day the prophet stood next to a garbage dump and called to his friends, ‘Pursue the

world.’ Then he took a stinking piece of trash and said, ‘This is the world.’”

“Who is this?”

“On another day the prophet found the cadaver of a young sheep which had been thrown away

by its owner and said to his friends, ‘How worthless is this cadaver to its owner? The world is more

worthless in the eyes of Allah than this cadaver in the eyes of its owner.’”

“Who—wait, you are that girl. What—”

“I did it, I found him. I want to get him back.”

“Who did you find?”

“Somebody that hurt me and wants to profit off of it. Can you help me?”

“How did you get this number?”

Avril wasn’t about to tell him that his number was simply in John’s contact list on his computer.

As she’d waited for the computer to boot up she’d treated it like a game of chance: if Hamid’s number

was there she’d launch herself on a mission of revenge against the Macy’s manager—torture, castration,

execution, nothing was too much for him; if the number wasn’t there she’d take a nap, wait for John to

come home, go on with her life as if nothing had happened. It had come down to the reliability of a cell

phone’s auto-synchronization feature; for once, maybe for the first and only time, it’d actually worked.

“It doesn’t matter . . . Can you help me? I got the sense from you that you would. I’m completely

serious, I’m not a scared little girl. I remember what you said—a warrior hates life and loves death.”
 “Okay. But let’s not speak on the phone. Do you remember the hotel room?”

“Yeah.”

“Meet me there tonight. I will be there no later than eight.” With that Hamid hung up. Avril

could barely breathe . . . This was it, it was on. Avril pictured herself in a martial arts training montage,

dressed in a tracksuit, air boxing, jogging, lifting rocks, with a nu-metal soundtrack playing, in a movie

titled something like Driven by Hate. There was even a quote from Celine that could be used as an

epigraph to give the film high culture credibility: “If you haven't been through that you'll never know

what obsessive hatred really smells like . . . the hatred that goes through your guts, all the way to your

heart . . . Real hatred comes from deep down, from a defenseless childhood crushed with work. That's

the hatred that kills you. There'll be more of it, so deep and thick there will always be some left, enough

to go around . . . It will ooze out over the earth . . . and poison it, so nothing will grow but viciousness,

among the dead, among men.” Even here Avril’s hate was more immediate and bilious than Celine’s—

this wasn’t a slow hate built from the fermented pain of a bad childhood but the sort of hate that claws

out of your guts and bursts screaming into the world, the hate for a man who forces his cock into you

and assumes you like it, who turns you over and smugly asks “if that angle’s working out better for ya,”

who tells you to enjoy yourself more after pumping his seed into your womb against your will, and who

after taking your humanity and dumping you in jail wants to use what he did to move up in the world.

Avril arrived at the hotel room a little earlier than eight dressed in a hoodie and baggy pants; the

hotel staff had regarded her with suspicion but let her pass. The door was open a crack; she pushed it

open and peeked inside. The room was undisturbed and Hamid wasn’t there, but this was definitely the

same room she’d spent a week in with John, with the same décor, view, and paintings on the wall. She

crept in and looked around, thinking that Hamid might be late; as she neared the bed the door quietly

shut behind her. She flinched and whirled around. “I do not believe you are serious,” Hamid said, his
arms crossed and a briefcase hanging down from one of his hands. He seemed even taller, larger, and

more impressive than before; seeing him walking down the street, you would have assumed he was the

VP of an international arms dealer.

“What?” Avril said.

“Firstly, you have never heard the expression ‘Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.’ You

were not suspicious at all of my invitation? An empty room? What if I had been police?”

“I mean . . .” Avril took a moment to gather her thoughts . . . “Uh, that’s not how police trap

people. You would’ve talked to me and tried to get me to incriminate myself, I think . . .”

Hamid stifled a laugh. “There you are correct, in a general sense. Okay,” he said, walking past

Avril into the room and placing his briefcase on the bed. He turned to Avril. “But more importantly, you

strike me somewhat as an exceptional girl, but I do not believe you know what you’re getting into. Most

people, even brave, stupid, and impetuous young men, believe themselves capable of staring a hated

enemy in the eyes and delivering a death blow, but in the moment of truth the norm is to falter. A

warrior is trained as much as he is born.”

Avril responded instantly, without thinking: “I’ve already stared this asshole in the eyes when

he held me down and pushed himself inside of me. It won’t be a problem, that’ll be my last problem.

Look at me, you think I’m going to falter?”

Hamid stared at her for a really long time, and then sighed and sat down. “Okay, who is this

man?”

Avril took the crumpled up newspaper and set it on the bed next to Hamid. “There, about

halfway down the page.”

Hamid studied the newspaper. “You are the woman in her early twenties mentioned here?”

“Yeah. They stopped me as I was going out of the store. They had me on camera or, I don’t

know . . . Anyway, after they’d all felt me up and shoved me around, they marched me through the store
to the back. After he dismissed his flunkies, we were alone; he started to ask me if there was anything

I’d do to get out of being arrested. I was really upset, I didn’t respond, I wouldn’t talk to him, so he got

testy, shouting at me and putting his hands on me. Then he just went from there. I didn’t feel like there

was anything I could do.”

“Was this man very much stronger than you?”

“I don’t know, yeah, I guess so. Why?”

“It is a practical concern. Listen, April, I can understand your desire for revenge, especially

considering the state’s ineffectiveness in prosecuting sexual assault, but you must know that this state

still levies the death penalty, and as such the severity of your punishment would be much greater than

normal. Even if you conducted yourself technically flawlessly, there is still a chance you would be

captured. You are still very young. I believe the risk is too great for you.”

Avril sat down next to Hamid. “What would you do if you were in my situation?” she said.

Hamid looked away without saying anything; it seemed she’d gotten through to him. “Why’s the risk

too much for me when it wouldn’t be for you? Or what would you do if I were your sister?”

Hamid turned back to her. “Okay.” He put his hand on hers and said, “All women are my

sisters. I understand. I apologize for treating you childishly.” He stood up and paced around the room;

Avril watched him. “He will be in McCormick,” Hamid finally announced, “so you will need a way in . . .

No, no, what am I saying—let me ask you this: Have you ever been in a physical confrontation?"

"What do you mean?"

"A fight."

"Well, no, not really . . ."

"Do you know how much physical force it takes to fell a man?"

"Well . . ."
 "Here," Hamid said, turning his back on Avril, "pretend I'm standing unawares. Strike me from

behind with the force you feel would be necessary to incapacitate me." He stood there with his

shoulders slumped and his arms crossed, rocking back and forth from one foot to the other. Avril wasn't

sure if he was being entirely serious . . . "Come now, aim for the area at the top of my spine, the base of

my head, use your fist," Hamid said. Avril stepped forward, raised her arm, and dropped it with as much

weight as she could muster, standing on her tip-toes in order to reach his skull. The instant her fist

made contact with Hamid, he whirled around, catching her forearm under his arm; Avril's wrist bent

back and Hamid stepped forward. It felt like an explosion blew her off her feet, she flew back, losing

contact with the ground, but Hamid was still driving into her body with his shoulder, twisting her arm

in two opposing directions. Then Hamid suddenly shivered his forearm and snapped his hip. There was

a weightless pause, like Avril was spinning in space, and then the back of her head slammed into the

ground with a loud crack. A vibrating numbness shot through her skull; the ceiling rapidly blinked in and

out of Avril’s vision, white lights floated in patterns. It took a few moments for her to realize her chest

was constricting and she wasn’t breathing. As she gasped and panted, trying and failing to raise her

hand to grab the back of her head, Hamid’s face hovered over her. "You lack the strength or the

conviction to kill a human being; either deficiency is disastrous. I cannot condone this. It would take six

months of training to prepare you for what you wish to do. I’m sorry, and I apologize if I hurt you. I

must go," Hamid said; his mouth seemed to move in slow motion and then his head disappeared. She

could hear his footsteps as they moved around her and approached the bed, a slight moment of silence

giving way to a ringing in her ears, and then his footsteps again. From the corner of her eye she saw him

walking past, shaking his head, a frown on his face; he seemed to be cursing himself for showing up in

the first place.

Avril could see a scenario where she raised herself to her feet by a force of will as Hamid

attempted to leave the room. A flash of anger would run through her and the adrenaline would take
care of the rest; this time she’d get a running start and leap through the air, clubbing Hamid with her

forearm and sending him sprawling to the ground. He’d be so inspired by her feat of heroism that he’d

fall in love, but being a man of honor he’d restrain his feelings, at least until their business was

complete. Hamid would take her by the hand to the bed and open the briefcase, revealing an arsenal of

melee weapons and firearms. He’d explain: “The gun is a simple tool; what you’re interested in is the

ammunition. After all, this is your delivery, correct? Perhaps you want a weighed round in order to

really make your point—these deliver a radiating shock from the point of impact which will often stun

and incapacitate the enemy, even before taking into account tissue damage and blood loss; this effect is

so pronounced that being struck in the chest by a weighted round will cause lethal brain hemorrhaging.

On the other hand, you might prefer a tumbling round—these are messy, ugly; upon impact the round

loses much of its energy, sharply breaking from its trajectory and losing much of its velocity . . . These

are known to shatter bones into a million pieces, tear up multiple organs, and sever arteries within the

body—all of these are incredibly painful, lending the rounds a sort of malice; assuming the skull is

pierced, the brain will be shredded to a pulp. However, tumbling rounds are not always lethal as you

rely on a certain amount of luck with the breaking angle . . . The bullet will not always bounce the right

way. Try these on: .357 magnum. These are used by serious killers, people who demand exacting

performance. Feel it, bounce it in your hands. The rounds are delivered with tremendous force; in

human flesh, the results are extremely predictable—an efficient entrance wound is followed by a rapid

flattening of the round, accompanied by very little loss of energy or velocity; the round expands to the

diameter of a golf ball by passing through even a few inches of flesh, and because there is little transfer

of energy, the exit wound is typically the size of a softball. This is consistent in the head, chest,

shoulders, legs, and even the arms; you don’t want to be hit anywhere by one of these, it will be a very

bad day. Very lethal, as you can imagine. Speaking of the imagination, creativity abounds in arms

manufacturers—observe the flechette round, which scatters twelve to fifteen small darts that inflict
grievous deep puncture wounds, or the bolo round, a pair of weighted balls linked together by a steel

wire, producing big channel wounds in flesh, made all the worse by the unpredictable spinning action of

the projectile, or my favorites, the flaming rounds, etched with white phosphorus, catching fire at

muzzle velocity and behaving like napalm upon impact, diffusing flammable material that sticks to

clothing and skin alike, producing a unique pain profile.”

But what actually happened is Avril lay there dizzy and hyperventilating as Hamid peacefully left

the room. She tried to roll to her side and raise an arm toward him but she couldn’t even do this. It

took a few minutes to realize she was crying, violently sobbing in fact, with tears and snot smeared all

over her face.

It had become a point of emphasis for Avril to destroy the Macy’s manager. For once, Avril’s

physical bearing hadn’t inspired sexual desire or nervous tension in a man, but a sort of abject disgust.

In an odd way this could be called progress, even if the man had ended up kicking her ass; now she had

something to prove, a goal to work toward, obstacles to overcome—realistically achievable goals are

crucial to the healthy psyche. According to the CIA manual of assassination, there are numerous

methods to overcome the comparative physical weakness of the would-be assassin. However, before

delving into the technical challenges of murder, it would be prudent to explore the theoretical questions

of the act; when confronted with an apparently clear choice, sometimes the correct thing to do is

choose the worst option, as Jacques Lacan explained—this will be our jumping-off point for the

discussion. In this case the clear choice is to “not kill,” but it would be reckless not to at least consider

the worst option, that is to “kill.”

As regards the justification of assassination, the CIA asserts: “Assassination of persons

responsible for atrocities or reprisals may be regarded as just punishment.” Amusingly, two sentences

before justifying the murder of nearly anybody for any reason, the CIA stated, “Murder is not morally
justifiable.” As concerns this, flexibility wins the day; anything’s justified, everything’s possible so long

as one acts unilaterally . . . since we’re speaking of “just punishment,” even the imperative is in play: one

should murder, one must assassinate. And upon hearing a reference to justice, who comes to mind

other than Maximilien Robespierre? “Terror is only justice: prompt, severe and inflexible; it is then an

emanation of virtue . . . To punish the oppressors of humanity is clemency; to forgive them is cruelty.”

With the question of justification settled, it becomes necessary to classify the type of

assassination being pursued. Again, the CIA: “Assassinations in which the subject is unaware will be

termed ‘simple’; those where the subject is aware but unguarded will be termed ‘chase’; those where

the victim is guarded will be termed ‘guarded.’” It was comforting to know that this’d be a “simple”

killing; it was unlikely the Macy’s manager would recognize Avril, and even less likely that he’d guess her

intentions. “Simple” is a more reassuring word than “chase” or “guarded,” which both seem to imply a

number of possible complications. “If the assassin is to die with the subject, the act will be called ‘lost.’

If the assassin is to escape, the adjective will be ‘safe.’ It should be noted that no compromises should

exist here. The assassin must not fall alive into enemy hands. A further type division is caused by the

need to conceal the fact that the subject was actually the victim of assassination, rather than an

accident or natural causes. If such concealment is desirable the operation will be called ‘secret’; if

concealment is immaterial, the act will be called ‘open’; while if the assassination requires publicity to

be effective it will be termed ‘terroristic.’”

Adding it all up, Avril was looking at a simple, safe, and secret assassination, if the CIA’s

particular system of classification was to be used. The CIA, ever mindful of history, offered these

examples to illustrate their classifications: “Following these definitions, the assassination of Julius

Caesar was safe, simple, and terroristic, while that of Huey Long was lost, guarded and open.” For a

more recent assassination, we can look to Osama bin Laden, whose assassination by the United States

could be classified as guarded, safe, and terroristic, though there is some dispute as to whether his
bodyguards were armed when the SEALS raided the mansion. In any case, the Macy’s director didn’t

have anywhere near as much standing as Osama, who was a genuine anti-imperialist fighter even if he

was a broken old grandpa by the time they got to him. The publicity was really great though; seeing

Barack Obama on television announcing, “Osama bin Laden is dead,” you remarked to yourself, here’s a

President, here’s a man who’s secured his re-election, this is even better than the phony war in Wag the

Dog—Osama’s was a worthwhile terroristic assassination if there ever was one.

“In lost assassination, the assassin must be a fanatic of some sort. Politics, religion, and revenge

are about the only feasible motives. Since a fanatic is unstable psychologically, he must be handled with

extreme care. He must not know the identities of the other members of the organization, for although

it is intended that he die in the act, something may go wrong. While the assassin of Trotsky has never

revealed any significant information, it was unsound to depend on this when the act was planned.” This

was troubling to consider; even if Avril was unhinged she didn’t think of herself as a fanatic. Actually,

the mission was entirely logical—it was as Hamid said, if the justice system won’t pursue it, what other

recourse was there? Terror, only terror, as Robespierre would’ve said. In any case, it was amusing to

see the CIA lecture the NKVD on questions of practical significance; the CIA were bunglers on their best

days, and the very fact that Trotsky’s assassin never revealed even a hint of a conspiracy is powerful

evidence of the superiority of the NKVD’s method. The conclusions confirm the process, if we’re to

believe Hegel, Nietzsche, et al. Anyway, Trotsky was an asshole; Stalin called him, in his usual gruff

manner: “Mug of a spy! Brazen spy of Hitler!” Stalin’s prognosis is well and good, but who better to

give the final elegy for the man but his killer? “. . . instead of finding myself face to face with a political

chief who was directing the struggle for the liberation of the working class, I found myself before a man

who desired nothing more than to satisfy his needs and desires of vengeance and of hate and who did

not utilize the workers' struggle for anything more than a means of hiding his own paltriness and

despicable calculations . . . It was Trotsky who destroyed my nature, my future and all my affections. He
converted me into a man without a name, without country, into an instrument of Trotsky. I was in a

blind alley . . . Trotsky crushed me in his hands as if I had been paper." Here were some useful

metaphors; how many men had crushed Avril in their hands as if she had been paper, and how often

had she found herself in a blind alley as a result? The manager was only the worst among all the

offenders, the model monster, and for this he’d pay. It feels good to plot your vengeance, to tally the

wrongs done to you, to add an entry to the other side of the universe’s moral balance sheet for once . . .

Simple, safe, secret—these were good words.

Notes on technique

When the decision to assassinate has been reached, the tactics of the operation must be

planned, based upon an estimate of the situation similar to that used in military operations. The

preliminary estimate will reveal gaps in information and possibly indicate a need for special equipment

which must be procured or constructed. When all necessary data has been collected, an effective tactical

plan can be prepared. All planning must be mental; no papers should ever contain evidence of the

operation.

The essential point of assassination is the death of the subject. A human being may be killed in

many ways but sureness is often overlooked by those who may be emotionally unstrung by the

seriousness of this act they intend to commit. The specific technique employed will depend upon a large

number of variables, but should be constant in one point: Death must be absolutely certain.

For secret assassination, either simple or chase, the contrived accident is the most effective

technique. When successfully executed, it causes little excitement and is only casually investigated.

The most efficient accident, in simple assassination, is a fall of 75 feet or more onto a hard

surface. Elevator shafts, stair wells, unscreened windows and bridges will serve. Bridge falls into water

are not reliable. In simple cases a private meeting with the subject may be arranged at a properly-cased
location. The act may be executed by sudden, vigorous lifting of the ankles, tipping the subject over the

edge. If the assassin immediately sets up an outcry, playing the "horrified witness," no alibi or

surreptitious withdrawal is necessary. In chase cases it will usually be necessary to stun or drug the

subject before dropping him. Care is required to insure that no wound or condition not attributable to

the fall is discernible after death.

If the subject's personal habits make it feasible, alcohol may be used to prepare him for a

contrived accident of any kind. Falls before trains or subway cars are usually effective, but require exact

timing and can seldom be free from unexpected observation.

In all types of assassination except terroristic, drugs can be very effective. If the assassin is

trained as a doctor or nurse and the subject is under medical care, this is an easy and rare method. An

overdose of morphine administered as a sedative will cause death without disturbance and is difficult to

detect. The size of the dose will depend upon whether the subject has been using narcotics regularly. If

not, two grains will suffice. If the subject drinks heavily, morphine or a similar narcotic can be injected at

the passing out stage, and the cause of death will often be held to be acute alcoholism.

Any locally obtained edge device may be successfully employed. A certain minimum of

anatomical knowledge is needed for reliability. Puncture wounds of the body cavity may not be reliable

unless the heart is reached. The heart is protected by the rib cage and is not always easy to locate.

Another reliable method is the severing of both jugular and carotid blood vessels on both sides of the

windpipe. If the subject has been rendered unconscious by other wounds or drugs, either of the above

methods can be used to insure death.

As with edge weapons, blunt weapons require some anatomical knowledge for effective use.

Their main advantage is their universal availability. A hammer may be picked up almost anywhere in the

world. Baseball and cricket bats are very widely distributed. Even a rock or a heavy stick will do, and

nothing resembling a weapon need be procured, carried or subsequently disposed of. Blows should be
directed to the temple, the area just below and behind the ear, and the lower, rear portion of the skull.

Of course, if the blow is very heavy, any portion of the upper skull will do. The lower frontal portion of

the head, from the eyes to the throat, can withstand enormous blows without fatal consequences.

Firearms are often used in assassination, often very ineffectively. The assassin usually has

insufficient technical knowledge of the limitations of weapons, and expects more range, accuracy and

killing power than can be provided with reliability. Firearms have other drawbacks. Their possession is

often incriminating. They may be difficult to obtain. They require a degree of experience from the user.

They are unreliable. Their lethality is consistently over-rated.

While the handgun is quite inefficient as a weapon of assassination, it is often used, partly

because it is readily available and can be concealed on the person, and partly because its limitations are

not widely appreciated. While many well known assassinations have been carried out with pistols

(Lincoln, Harding, Ghandi), such attempts fail as often as they succeed, (Truman, Roosevelt, Churchill). In

the hands of an expert, a powerful pistol is quite deadly, but such experts are rare and not usually

available for assassination missions. In all cases, the subject should be hit solidly at least three times for

complete reliability.

So it was decided—Avril would go about this on her own without Hamid’s help. She had only a

bare minimum of information to go on; according to the newspaper article, the manager was at the

conference for two days. The provisional plan was to gather intelligence on Saturday: find him, observe

his behavior, learn his mode of transportation and place of residence, if possible. It would be too

difficult to kill him in public without a firearm; as such, personal contact would be established—an

invitation for drinks, or better yet a proposition for sexual intercourse in a pre-arranged location. The

major question then would be Avril’s capacity for deception—how often does a man’s rape victim later

attempt to establish interpersonal contact? Only in Japanese pornography did women fall in love with
their rapists. The hope was that this Japanese theory had seeped well enough into the manager’s

consciousness that it would at least seem possible. There were many layers of uncertainty to confront,

but the plan would suffice for now.

The actual method of the killing would be much simpler . . .

Avril would obtain a small amount of cocaine . . . Before kissing a guy, rub cocaine into your

gums. He’ll hear bells, he’ll see lights, he’ll fall in love right away! He’ll follow you to the ends of the

earth! That’s the secret of a good kiss! . . . Imparting that special tingle! The effect was significant: Avril

had tried it out a few times and each time the guy fell into a state of stunned amazement. She’d tried it

on a girl once, too, and the girl had told her, “I’ve never felt anything like that kissing a guy before . . .”

Avril would obtain a large amount of heroin, which could be administered in a drink or passed

off as cocaine. At least one of these tricks would work on the manager. In private it’d be possible to

feed him enough to kill him; short of that, any amount would reduce him to defenselessness.

Avril would reserve a room in a hotel with an atrium. Assuming the manager went with her, he

could be tipped over the edge and plunge into the hotel’s lobby. This would ideally be accomplished

with the assistance of the heroin and alcohol.

Avril would purchase a small hammer to be hidden in the hotel room. This would be a last

resort, only in the event that he couldn’t be drugged or thrown to his death. The anatomical knowledge

required was trivial—a series of blows to the upper skull, the temple, the fragile bones beside the ears,

or the lower base behind the skull would suffice.

Each tool had a use at some juncture of the operation. This was a multifaceted plan with several

options for execution, prepared for any number of contingencies, exposed to drug possession charges at

the worst, and capable of being aborted at any point. It was good. The plan was good.
 At the convention. The collection of people, corporations, concepts, and aesthetics was truly

bizarre. The 61st annual Major Retailers Conference & Exhibition. For 61 years they’d traded business

cliches, exchanged useless products, and plotted lobbying initiatives with each other. This year the

theme was “Fight for Washington!” The retailers had been encouraged by the association to propose

political reforms that could benefit the industry; most of the presentations had a social media aesthetic,

packaging not-so-pithy one-liners like “Change the bottom line can believe in!” in facebook chat

bubbles. Most of the lines were plays on Obama 2008 campaign slogans, already sadly ironic after a few

years of shamelessly open corporatism and blatantly imperialist foreign policy, though some of the

marketers had more of a now mindset—Hobby Lobby’s PowerPoint was a collection of riffs on Lil B

lyrics. “Woo woo swag: Hobby Lobby,” “Hobby Lobby keeps ya customers close and ya based

customers closer,” “Hobby Lobby: Swag to the Maximum,” “Yung based god . . . Hobby Lobby!” K-Mart

was giving a presentation on “swipe fee reform.” K-Mart’s representative was pudgy and sweaty,

stuffed into a stained pink dress shirt, with his belly hanging over his belt. He passionately urged his

comrade retailers to pledge money to ensure debit card swipe fees remained low. A consortium from

Target, Wal-Mart, and Best Buy dominated the main convention hall; they distributed literature that was

hostile to the implementation of a value added tax in the United States. A three-pronged strategy was

proposed—first, a propaganda campaign aimed at the public using the standard canard that high prices

in Europe owed to the VAT; second, a sustained political campaign aimed at ruining the careers of

politicians who proposed a VAT; and third, the identification of academic economists who could be

commissioned to publish industry-produced studies hostile to the VAT under their own names. The

retailers even seemed to have their own parasites—every inch of the convention space that wasn’t held

by a major retailer was occupied by some shitty company hawking a gimmicky product or service. These

con-men employed high-pressure salesmen who spent all their time hounding the tired and harried

representatives of the major corporations.

 It was hard for Avril to make sense of this milieu. After spending about an hour in the chaos of

the main hall, she contented herself to wait in the lecture hall where the manager was to make his

speech later that night. In the meantime a number of insipid presentations on the topics of retail IT

challenges, internet sales tax, and mobile phone purchasing were made. Usually a pretty girl made the

presentation. Avril wondered about the backgrounds of these girls: none of them seemed to be

associated with the companies they represented—they weren’t models, nor were they business grad

student types. There was probably a specialized market for attractive female presenters; in fact this was

likely. To a woman, they had hideous fake tans, tortured high-heeled gaits, and a clichéd

overenthusiastic style of delivery. What was the source of these bizarre creatures? Was there some

Toastmasters affiliated organization producing these monsters? Finally, the last one, a coked out

woman in her thirties with an overbite and a small padding of fat around her lower abdomen, concluded

her speech with the bold prediction that the mobile phone would be the purchasing platform of the

future. The bored attendees quietly filed out of the lecture hall. One man stayed behind however; the

woman ran down from the raised platform and jumped into his lap. They chattered between one

another, the man rubbing his hand on the woman’s back and playing with the little folds of flesh spilling

out around her bra straps. Except for these two, Avril was the only one in the hall. They took no notice

of her, so she moved to a seat in the corner and pretended to read some of the literature she’d

received.

Avril glanced up at the couple just as the man glanced over at her. Her heart stopped; she

recognized him instantly for the manager. In the moment, something passed, but it wasn’t recognition

on his part, or at least it couldn’t possibly be—the guy smiled and winked at her, and then kissed his girl,

raising his arm and beckoning for Avril to come over. It didn’t seem possible that she’d missed him; she

didn’t even know how long he’d been in the room. In a few moments, the manager looked up again.

This time he grinned and stared, but then suddenly turned his head away. The cause of his averted gaze
wasn’t hard to identify—Hamid stomped down the pathway looking straight ahead, trying and failing to

appear casual. He was dressed again in his killer business suit; he was a terrifying vision, his movements

were so smooth and assured that he seemed to glide through space in defiance of his gigantic stature.

He calmly sat down next to Avril. Without looking at her, he said, “What is this . . . What are you doing

here?”

“Keep it down,” Avril whispered. The manager snuck a look at her and Hamid. “That’s him, right

over there.”

“Who is the woman?” Hamid said, placing his hands on his legs.

“She just gave a presentation. I think she’s with him, he was waiting for her, I think.”

“Okay. It’s time for you to leave. You should not be here for this.”

“You can’t—”

Now Hamid looked at Avril. She hadn’t known what soldiers meant when they said somebody

had a thousand yard stare; under Hamid’s gaze she retreated deep into herself, recoiled as if she’d been

burnt, felt totally and absolutely transpierced. Hamid had suddenly become something utterly beyond

human, and Avril knew those eyes had been to a place she’d never been, indeed another side of life she

hadn’t even known existed despite all her posturing, somewhere without comfort, softness, quiet,

warmth, safety, routine, and everything else she’d grown to hate about civilized liberal life; to her utter

shock she wasn’t sure that she liked what she saw. He spoke in a low, growling tone: “Are you stupid,

girl?”

“I—”

“I thought I’d scared you off. You’re already far too close to this man. Legally, you are entwined

with him; the police will look to you first. Any evidence, any evidence at all of your involvement will

incriminate you beyond doubt; now that you’re here I don’t know that I can safely harm him without

putting you at risk.”

 “Forget it Hamid, I’ve got a plan—”

Hamid laughed. The manager looked over again; now he seemed to be straining to listen in on

the conversation. “A plan? A plan? Don’t be ridiculous. You go, live your life. Be a happy, pretty young

girl. Enjoy the pleasures of your youth while you still can, build a career, a family. Enjoy the lazy

summer nights, the warmth of bodies in the cold, the love of and for another, the thousands of

copulations you have to look forward to, all that this world has to offer for one such as yourself.”

“But I don’t want any of that . . .”

Hamid laughed again, this time much louder and with a bitter, almost angry edge. He put his

hand on Avril’s shoulder and said, “You don’t want it? It’s a privilege to say those words, ‘I don’t want,’

it’s a choice you have, to throw away everything, it’s a mentality that arises only from profligate

abundance . . . Now look at me, look in my eyes—what do you see? That’s the desire for desire. I’ve

lost everything; I cannot live. You see a man who’s 39 years old, who’s been shot four times, stabbed in

the guts, come to the brink of death more than once. All but one of the boys I grew up with are dead,

the girls were not for us, we were warriors. I saw my mother die, run through with shrapnel from one of

your American missiles; trying to hold her, my hand plunged into her chest, it was warm; my father died

in the other room five minutes later as I fled my home. Once, on a windy night, I crouched to light my

cigarette with a match, and the man standing directly behind me was shot through the mouth; I did not

move or seek cover, I didn’t even think for my own safety; I stood and watched his brains float away in a

river of his blood. You haven’t lived a hell, April, you don’t know where the capability to extinguish life

comes from.”

As Hamid finished speaking, the manager jumped to his feet, shoving the girl off of his lap and

sending her tumbling in the aisle. The manager backpedaled, staring at Hamid all the while, and then

turned and ran toward the side door marked EXIT; Hamid rose to his feet and reached into his suit

jacket, taking off in pursuit of the manager with long, powerful strides. Almost the entirety of the
auditorium separated the two men, but Hamid overtook the manager like a cheetah running down a

fatally wounded gazelle. A few feet from the door, Hamid threw his arm out and struck the manager on

his left shoulder, sending him off his feet, veering to the right and crashing with his entire weight into

the wall. The manager’s body flipped up into the air, became suspended for a moment, and then fell

back to the earth with tremendous force; the entire hall seemed to shake. Avril stood and shouted,

“No!” but it was already too late—Hamid had pulled a gun out of his jacket and he fired three times into

the manager’s back. The shots didn’t seem to be loud enough; their effect didn’t seem to befit the size

of Hamid’s body as he stood over the manager, nor did they seem to affect the manager, who simply

didn’t move. Without looking back, Hamid casually walked through the side door. The manager’s

girlfriend had begun to scream . . . The wails filled the auditorium.

John
Without thinking about it too much, John went around to the old apartment one day. To his

shock, his keys still worked. The living room was exactly the same, the lighting still warm, the smell still

earthy, the atmosphere still homey. Mel hasn’t changed a bit, he thought to himself. Walking in and

looking around, he couldn’t help but to smile. It was 2 in the afternoon; if she were still bartending

she’d probably be asleep.

Mel wasn’t in bed. Mel’s room hadn’t changed a bit; in fact, her room was preserved so exactly

that he began to wonder if she didn’t move out. That wasn’t possible though—the landlord would have

cleared the apartment out. He went to the kitchen. The food in the refrigerator seemed to be

somewhat fresh; there was a single dish and a cup in the sink, as was Mel’s habit. She’s probably out,

John thought. That didn’t make complete sense: Mel wasn’t the type to make her bed, she was

perpetually sloppy, only maintaining the living room, bathroom, and kitchen because other people

passed through from time to time. John checked the bathroom, and sure enough there were fresh

toothpaste stains on the surface of the sink, which Mel took care to clean once a week; there was the

slightly piss-colored water, as the toilet was weak and would only produce clear water after three

flushes; there were the nasty clumps of Mel’s hair caught up in the strainer. Despite the presence of all

her little markers, there was no Mel. It was bizarre.

John decided to check out the old room. He’d even left behind his computer, which was

somewhat liberating. His old papers, reminders of his wasted talent, his archive of porn videos,

reminders of his frustration, the books he’d pirated but never got around to reading, reminders of his

sloth, his music collection, reminder of his bad taste, his old photos, reminders of bad mental states and

situations, his video games, reminders of countless thousands of empty hours, his old contacts,

reminders of a sparse social life—he’d let go of all these digital fragments of an unsatisfying existence
without once noticing they were gone. Usually it took a bad virus or a broken hard drive to achieve

something like that, although increasingly all of these things were being stored on centralized servers

accessible by user accounts rather than hard drives; John’s was the last generation to place great

importance on physical computer memory.

In a lot of ways, what John had done conformed to a romantic notion that nearly all men hold,

that is to disappear without a trace, even if technically the only person he’d left was Mel and the

circumstances of his disappearance were more selfish, pointless, and hysterical than romantic. All the

same he’d pulled it off, and all the same another view of romance might hold that it’s a selfish,

pointless, and hysterical pastime. So this was like returning to the scene of a crime. It felt good. John

walked into his room and found Mel in his bed, half naked, newly built up, a giant mass of flesh, a new

woman along with a new something else. She’s so . . . Big, John thought. She gave off the aura of a

powerful animal at rest: her body had become tanned, muscled, and curved; her posture had become

untroubled; her breath now had presence; and her rotund belly—well . . . John stood there at the edge

of the room staring at her stomach, which shifted the weight of the bed as it rose and fell in a deliberate

rhythm, producing a little tap on the floor at long intervals. There used to be a book propping up the

short leg, John thought . . .

The book was Gide’s Immoralist. He’d never read it; it was probably more useful as a leveler. As

he wondered what Mel had done with the book, she opened her eyes and stared at him. John choked;

this was more shocking than he’d expected, in part because he was developing an erection and had the

impulse the jump on Mel, but neither did he expect the sudden emotional punch. Something like a

moment occurred as the two watched each other in silence. “It’s not yours!” Mel blurted out,

addressing what had become the most apparent issue amongst a host of unspoken turbulences.

“I . . .”
 Bolting upright and flinging herself out of the bed, Mel took John by the shoulders and marched

him out of the room, making an effort to look away from his face and mumbling, “Let me get dressed . .

.” John shambled along; there wasn’t a lot to be done or said. He found himself on the other side of the

door to his own room. From inside the room Mel’s footsteps could be heard, the opening and closing of

drawers, things being moved and thrown around. Every so often Mel softly uttered something

incomprehensible: “John . . . You . . . I didn’t . . .” Then there was silence. He didn’t know what to do

other than stand there. Eventually, he sat down and pressed his back into the door; somehow, he

sensed Mel was on the other side in the same exact position.
Mel
“I have to get to work,” Mel said. That was true, though she already knew that there was no

way she was going to dance that night. It seemed impossible that she’d never considered the possibility

that John would come back; maybe nothing could have prepared her for that. It was easier to look

forward, healthier even . . . Looking anywhere else is paralysis—to look back you need to sever the

vertebrae in your neck. Now she almost wished she had, if only so she could have planned her reaction

better. It was embarrassing to be found like that, sleeping in his bed, naked, your fat belly totally

exposed . . . She had known right away it wasn’t a dream, that John really was standing a few feet away,

and that he probably knew it was his kid—it was right there to see. But she wasn’t absolutely sure that

he knew: there was some ambiguity, and the timing might not have occurred to him. She still couldn’t

say why she’d told him it wasn’t his. Maybe she wanted to punish him; but could that even be

considered punishment?

After a long pause, John said, “Still bartending?” His voice sounded strange through the door;

Mel realized that they’d never spoken to each other through a door before—even early on their

relationship had been comfortable, and eventually they’d had no qualms about walking into the

bathroom during showers.

“No. They fired me.”

John laughed. He’d always seemed to think of her as being funny, or ridiculous at least . . . “You

never were great for their bottom line. How many thousands of dollars of free drinks did you give to me

alone?”

Mel thought she might begin to cry again. She’d already broken down as soon as she closed the

door behind him. “John . . .”

“Yeah, Mel?”
 “I had everything under control. You shouldn’t have come back . . .”

There was a long pause. “I’m sorry.” It didn’t seem like he had anything more to say, but then

he went on, “I didn’t—look, can we talk? Can I see you?”

“John—”

“I miss you . . . ,” John said. Mel had thought he was gone forever, and now one day, seemingly

chosen at random, here he was telling her he missed her. She knew she should’ve been angry, but the

feeling wasn’t anywhere to be found. “I’ve got a gift for you.”

“I don’t want it.”

“Can I slide it under the door?” Mel didn’t say anything. In a moment a rolled up piece of cloth

slid through the crack in the door; Mel remembered that she’d promised herself to seal the crack with

soundproof foam if that girl April were to keep coming over. “Go ahead, unroll it,” John said. “I saw this

artist on the street doing these really wild paintings. About half of them were based on missed

connections, like impressionistic depictions of the scenes with the text embedded in the image, and I

thought of you right away, you always said, what was it, that there’s always a sad story to go with them.

I don’t know, anyway, I thought of you.”

It was offal as far as Mel was concerned. Now the anger flashed through her; it was an

unfamiliar emotion, new and strange, but welcome given the circumstances. She stood up, kicked the

painting away, and flung the door open; John was on his knees, in the process of standing up. “You fuck

me, disappear for half a year, and come back with a painting?” Mel said. He smiled a bit, the beginnings

of a crooked half-smile, like it amused him—the features of his face filled her with disgust, enough to

want to hurt him, destroy him. “You need to get the fuck out of here. Let’s go, get out!”

John backed up, shrugging his shoulders and raising his arms. “C’mon, Mel—”
 “No, you have to go!” Mel started forward, and now John fled to the door. She'd become

strong, strong enough not to let herself be bullied and manipulated by anybody. Even if he were

absolutely genuine in his intentions it wasn’t good enough. “Get out of my house, John.”

“Okay. I don’t want to fight,” John said, putting his hand on the doorknob and looking back. He

turned, paused for a moment, looked back, and went on, “We need to talk, okay? We’ll talk. Just not

now.” And he left, gently shutting the door behind himself. Listening to him descend the stairwell, and

despite her anger, Mel was disappointed that he’d given up that easily. Maybe she’d wanted a fight,

maybe a struggle would’ve been good, maybe they could’ve fixed the sucking emptiness of the last six

months with a grand blowup, which, at least, might have filled a bit of that space . . . So Mel had been

strong—all her strength had been for nothing, it’d been excessive; all she’d done was create a vast gulf

between herself and somebody she—perhaps—could have loved. The apartment was completely silent,

and a sort of withering sickness overcame her, almost imperceptible but heavy and exhausting; Mel had

never felt worse in her life. Everything was wrong. I was strong though, she told herself. What else

could she have been but strong? We’re reminded of Michel Houellebecq’s conclusion, that perhaps

surrender can be a curative in its own way: “There is no love in individual freedom, in independence,

that's quite simply a lie, and one of the crudest lies you can imagine; love is only in the desire for

annihilation, fusion, the disappearance of the individual, in a sort of what used to be called oceanic

feeling, in something anyway that was condemned.”

All the same, John hadn’t even asked if the baby was his. He had to have suspected . . . Mel

returned to her room, John’s old room that is, in order to get dressed for work. She found the painting,

which she’d kicked under the bed next to John’s guitar, and unrolled it. Well, it was cute, charming: it

depicted a hipster boy and girl sitting back to back on the train, each of them trying to sneak a glance at

the other; but there was a black space separating the two of them, a wall at first glance, where the text
of the missed connection was printed—the space, the wall, and the missed connection all could have

represented passivity, alienation, distance . . .

Exit was the sort of place where you didn’t forget. The people in the club wore their biographies

on their sleeves, literally most of the time, and Mel had picked up the habit of sharing; it eased the pain

of being a loser, or so the denizens of the club seemed to believe. Mel was sitting in Kathy’s office;

she’d just finished telling Kathy about what had just happened with John, leaving out that she was

carrying his kid, of course . . . “That’s the ticket, kid! . . . Leave ‘em high, leave ‘em dry, they’ll come

crawling back! . . . They’re dogs! Most of ‘em aren’t even dogs, they’re puppy dogs! Little wiener dogs!

Toy dogs! Rococo dogs!”

“Rococo dogs?” Mel said.

“You know what I mean! delicate! useless! ornamental! Men these days! . . . Are you going to

dance tonight, Mel? Don’t answer that! . . . Of course you’re not!”

“I could if you want. I think it’ll help take my mind off everything.”

“No, no, I forbid it. I’ll hear nothing of it! You take the night off . . . Go out, have a drink. I’m

kidding! Just don’t drink too much! Have a shot! Have a beer! Just don’t drink your kid stupid. Forget

it. Haha! You’ve got the night off, Melinda. Enjoy yourself, drink . . . I’m kidding. Don’t drink. But

what’s the doctor say? It can’t hurt too much! What’s one drink, or five? Enjoy yourself! But not too

much!”

“Um, thanks Kathy,” Mel said. She stood up, and Kathy slapped her on the butt and winked as

she left the office. Near the pit, a group of tattooed guys in their forties were smoking hash; otherwise

the second floor—the dungeon—was deserted. Mel had always felt a little separated from the people

in the club, but she recognized one of the hash guys as a bartender. She plopped down in the smelly
sofa next to him and the gaze of all four men fell on her as if she’d committed a terrible act of violence.

“Hey, guys,” Mel said.

The bartender stared at her, blinked his eyes, and said, “Kathy said, uh . . . That is, Kathy said . .

.”

“Yeah?”

“She said she’d throw us out if she caught us hitting on you.”

“You’re not hitting on me, are you? Anyway, she gave me the day off.”

The guys looked at each other. “Uh . . . Guess not,” the bartender said and laughed.

“What are you guys up to?”

The bartender half-heartedly stabbed the pipe forward and said, “You know . . . Killing time. The

usual.” He pulled the pipe back and shrugged. Mel gestured for him to hand over the pipe. “You sure?

You, uh, you know . . .”

“Yeah, it won’t hurt, my doctor even cleared it,” Mel said.

“Oh . . . What’s, uh, I forgot your name,” the bartender said, offering the pipe.

“Melinda.”

“You know how to take a hit? Oh, shit, here,” the bartender said, snatching a lighter from one

of the other guys and pushing it into Mel’s hands.

“Sure,” Mel said.

“Melinda . . . That’s cool . . .” With that, the bartender sunk heavily into the couch and looked

away from Mel; the rest of the guys seemed to forget about her at the same time. They were

completely at ease. She was one of them now, it seemed, and she hadn’t even taken a hit yet . . . She

looked at the guys, a bunch of burned out aging stoners, deadheads it looked like, with their stupid,

dirty beards and ugly, ridiculous piercings. Mel lit the pipe and took the first hit; it rushed into her

throat faster than she’d expected and stuck for a moment to all of her sinuses, inducing a violent fit of
coughing. The guys laughed and made commiserative remarks, one of them even waved a hand at her.

Mel took another hit, and another, and that old, familiar heaviness and warmth spread through her

body; now every part of her was leaden and locked down, rather than just her stomach—it was a great

feeling. She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, but pretty soon the bartender said, “Oh shit, I’ve got

work,” and left, and then one by one the rest of the guys left, one of them leaving some more hash with

her.

Through the night, a succession of guys sat down on the couch, attracted by the passive, stoned

pregnant girl. Some of them brought her drinks, which she waved off; some of them sat and stared;

some of them told stories; some of them asked questions. Their faces blurred together, their tattoos

became an undifferentiated smudge of color, their clothes were all black. Mel remembered feeling

horny, but then she couldn’t rouse the energy to tear herself from the spot on the couch. At some

point, the shitty punk music from downstairs started to sound good. At some point, Mel started feeling

more energetic and lithe, which caused her to bob her head. In the hours that had passed, the second

floor had filled up; Mel was monopolizing the couch, apparently having frightened off her share of

people—maybe they figured she was dead. There was a light torture show going on in the dungeon: a

fat woman dressed in leather and fishnet was leading an obese office worker around by a leash and

occasionally whipping him; the show was regarded with indifference by the patrons. The bartender

came back and sat down in his previous position next to Mel. “Feeling good?” he said.

“Yeah. This is good stuff,” Mel said. “Reminds me of college.”

“It should be. I made it myself,” the bartender proudly said.

“How come we never talk? Hey, what’s your name?” Mel said.

“Hey. Uh, hi. Excuse me,” John said, appearing suddenly out of nowhere.

“Oh, no,” Mel said.

“Can I help you?” the bartender said.

 “Yeah, hi,” John said, extending his hand. “John.”

“Brian,” the bartender said.

“I need to talk to my friend,” John said.

“What are you doing here?” Mel said.

“Your friend?” Brian said, shifting his body around to stand between John and Mel.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Mel said.

“Please, Mel,” John said.

Normally Mel would have let the bad feelings from earlier dominate the situation, but she was

feeling good on account of the hash, and in any case the bartender’s self-appointed role as the defender

of her honor was obnoxious—between him and John, she chose John. “Okay, Johnny . . . Sit down,” she

said, patting the space on the sofa between herself and the bartender. John squeezed in; Mel took his

hands. They were much warmer than hers. The bartender edged away and left after a few moments of

being frozen out. Mel started to giggle, thinking of how this would go in a soap opera; she’d slap him!

Then she’d say, “I hate you!” Then she’d embrace him!

“Are you high?” John said.

“Yeah . . . But I’m good now,” Mel said. “You followed me here?”

“No, I mean, in your room I saw a bunch of stuff from this place. So I figured . . .”

“Yeah,” Mel said. “You figured, right, so you followed me, basically.” Looking into John’s eyes,

Mel had something like a moment of clarity: he really was the faithful type, the puppy dog she'd

imagined him to be so long ago. The whole episode with April confirmed it doubly: all that had

happened was he'd found another piece of meat, a plumper cut, leaner and younger, throbbing,

bursting with tantalizing fluids and juices, the perfect cut for a puppy, and now that he'd lost it (of

course he’d lost it, that’s what puppies do), he was coming home to Mel, the familiar old bone,

desiccated and lifeless, but graspable. “Did April leave you?”

 “Yeah . . . ,” John said, pensively nodding. It was all so sad. John was as contemptible as he was

pitiable; in fact, those words meant the same thing, as Mel realized in the moment . . .

Mel wasn’t sure that she had anything to say to John. Her only impulse now was to gloat, to get

him back for his pathetic and selfish desertion so many months ago, to hurt him for having hurt her.

This wasn’t a healthy impulse—it was mean, it was childish, it meant she still cared about him. Before

Mel could say anything, Kathy strolled out of her office, spotted John and Mel, and rushed over,

shouting, “Don’t tell me! Don’t tell me!” Bombastically, Kathy went on, speaking over John, who’d

begun to say something: “This is the famous John! How’d I know it?”

“Um,” Mel said.

“Listen, have I ever got a job for you! You two kids will have the times of your lives . . . One of

you, at least . . . Melinda, you game?”

“Okay . . . ,” Mel said, a little worried. Usually Kathy was all sound and fury, signifying nothing,

but here she was, speaking with purpose.

“What about you, baby? Oh, you’re a cutey-pie! You’ll give the girls weak knees! Ready for the

time of your life?”

“What are you talking about?” John said.

“Oh! Oh, you don’t know what our dear Melinda does here at the club! Won’t this be a shock . .

. Oh my, oh my . . . So you’ll take a leap of faith! You’ll volunteer to help your beloved!”

“Beloved? I mean, whatever, sure, I’ll help Mel if she needs it . . .”

“It’s settled then! Come here, Mel!” Kathy stepped away and motioned for Mel to come over.

She took Mel around the shoulders, bent down, and clandestinely whispered, “The pit is free for the

next few hours . . . How’d you like to string your little boy up a little bit?”

“Oh, no,” Mel said.

 “Come on! Cassie went home. You’ll enjoy it, I’m sure. He’s a bastard, you told me yourself! I

know you’ll enjoy it. I would! You can start light on him. But make sure you draw it out, I want you

teasing him, torturing him, titillating him! Maybe it’ll reignite the old spark!”

“I don’t know . . .”

“Melinda, I insist! It’ll be good, sure, sure, I’m sure of it . . . It’ll be great!”

“Well . . . ,” Mel said.

“I knew you’d be up for it . . . Now come on, let’s get you changed!” Kathy turned to John and

shouted, “You wait right there! Don’t do anything, don’t move a muscle! Me and Melinda will be right

back. Two minutes . . . I’ve got my eyes on you . . .” John shrugged and then smiled when he looked at

Mel; his smile was cute in its way, innocent, a little goofy, and just arrogant enough to be charming.

Before Mel could develop too many sentimental feelings, she was whisked back to the office by Kathy.

In the back were the outfits the performing girls wore, trashy leather fetish numbers purchased from

Chinese mail order catalogs. It was a little strange that Kathy always watched the girls as they changed;

everybody mostly took it for granted by this point, not simply because the space was so cramped but

because it seemed natural that Kathy would take an interest in you, or to use a less generous measure

that she’d intrude on your personal space.

“Kathy, I’m not sure about this,” Mel said, sitting down on the bench and undressing. “I don’t

think I can hurt him, even with everything that’s happened. He’s not a bad person.”

“Give me a break, girl! You won’t be hurting him . . . Hell, he’ll probably enjoy it. I looked in his

eyes, he looks like a little pervert to me . . .”

“He’s not,” Mel blurted out, immediately realizing that she would have censored herself if not

for the hash.

Kathy bent over and pinched Mel on the cheek. “I see how it is . . . Okay, okay, sorry! I

apologize! You won’t hurt him, oh no, it’s safe, have you ever seen anybody get hurt?”
 “Some of those guys get bruised up pretty bad.”

“That’s because they get into it, they’re real masochists! But Johnny-boy can play along without

getting hurt. You just tell him you’ll keep it safe, conservative . . . Anyhow, you like him, right? You

learn a lot about a person by torturing them. Believe me . . . ,” Kathy said. Then she reached down and

put her hand on Mel’s bare stomach. “How’s the little one doing?”

“Oh, the same. I mean, at night I sort of feel it moving around, but otherwise the same.”

“It? Melinda, I told you to find out if it’s a boy or a girl. It, it, it . . . Funny. You’re a funny girl.

What about Johnny? What’d he have to say about it?”

“Nothing, I mean, I think it shocked him. To see me like this, I mean.”

Kathy rolled her eyes. “Nothing? Scumbag . . . The kid’s a scumbag! No congratulations, no

sympathies? Kids these days . . . At the very least, you say something. It’s a child, for Christ’s sake.”

“I don’t know. It made me feel pretty good, you know, that he didn’t push me about it . . . Like

he was going to wait until I was comfortable enough to bring it up . . . I don’t know . . . ,” Mel said.

Kathy burst out laughing. “You’re just like him . . . I see why you like him so much, not that it

makes any goddamn sense. That makes me wonder . . . Actually, forget it. I’ll get your prop, sit tight,

baby.”

Kathy turned and went to get the prop, or specifically the little leather collar that never seemed

to go on any of the other doms; Mel had never even considered the possibility that she could inflict pain

on somebody else, to torture, to be a torturer, furthermore to torture a friend, a lover, well, John at

least . . . Kathy’s departure brought a great deal of relief to Mel; she turned around and removed her bra

in order to squeeze into the clingy leather top, which was a corset with the bottom portion removed to

emphasize a pregnant silhouette. She wrestled with the leather, reaching around her back and tugging

the straps. “Here, I’ll get it for you,” Kathy said, silently returning and grabbing the straps. After

effortlessly clasping them together with one hand, she tied the loose leather collar around Mel’s neck.
“You’re losing too much weight, baby. You should be getting heavier! Two weeks ago this was a

struggle.”

“Thanks, Kathy . . . ,” Mel said.

“How are you feeling? Feeling strong? That’s the important part . . .”

Gide once wrote that he felt “if not exactly strong, then at least potentially so, harmonious,

sensuous, almost beautiful.” This was approximately how Mel had been feeling of late, the harmony in

particular. These feelings were new for her. “I feel pretty good, and anyway if I’m getting thinner that

means the weight’s probably going to the baby.”

“Have it your way,” Kathy said. She rubbed Mel’s shoulders and looked her in the eyes. “Your

tan’s coming along nicely.”

"It's the first time I've had one in more than ten years, really, it’s the first time I've had an even

one in my life.” Having a tan was a good feeling. Mel had never understood why people, girls especially,

bared their skin, exposing themselves to the desire of men, their bare midriffs or thighs serving as sexual

objects in themselves, separate from the whole; but in fact it wasn't about that at all, it was the simple

urge to let the healthy flesh breathe: pallid, sick, oversensitive skin found comfort in hiding under layers

of clothing; healthy, tan, vital skin yearned for fresh air, for the sun . . .

“That’s good. You’re a real beauty, Melinda . . . Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Now let’s

get you out there,” Kathy said. Maybe Kathy was right, maybe John deserved a bit of punishment, a

corrective for his sins, not unlike lashing a puppy to ensure obedience going forward, to show it what

happens when it follows its base nature . . .

John was standing next to the couch, exactly where Mel had left him. As she approached, shock

seemed to overtake his face—his mouth fell open, his eyebrows rose, his eyes widened, his forehead

wrinkled; the movement in his face grew more extreme the closer she came, like Mel in heels, Mel in
fishnet, Mel in garter, Mel in corset , Mel in collar were miraculous visions, like Moses coming down

from the mountain—maybe the old geezer had felt a little like Mel did in that moment: satisfied,

superior, powerful . . . John shook his head and blinked his eyes. John’s disbelief was a revelation—

nobody from Mel’s life had seen her in her club outfit, and now it dawned that she would have been

proud for anybody to see her like this, even her parents, that this wasn’t shameful but gratifying,

sublime even: now she stood upright, now she accepted the others’ gaze, now she was a complete

human animal . . . “What’s—uh, wow,” John said.

Mel did a little spin in front of him. “Like it?”

“I mean . . . Yeah, yeah. I just never—”

“Yeah.”

“What’s the deal with the outfit?” he said.

“It’s what you agreed to!” Kathy shouted, appearing from behind Mel and butting into the

conversation.

“I agreed to something?”

“It’s not that bad,” Mel said.

“What did I agree to?” John said.

Mel began to explain, but Kathy took her and John around the shoulders and led them toward

the pit. A few guys clapped and hollered as they passed, but most everyone in the dungeon paid them

no mind; the torture show, like the dancers, tended to be mostly ignored by the patrons of the club.

Kathy swung the door of the cage open and pushed John in, saying, “Watch your step!” He stumbled

down the pair of steps and oriented himself to the cage, turning around and meekly glancing at the tools

and substances on the floor. “Now listen—you’ve had it easy until now, but you know what’s in your

contract. Don’t go easy on him,” Kathy told Mel, referring to the stipulation that the refusal to perform

a show or an act was grounds for termination. This was the first time Kathy had ever threatened Mel in
any way, in fact the first time she’d shown her anything but maternal benevolence; Mel stepped into the

cage wondering if this was some inverted kind of mothering, and if maybe this way wasn’t better after

all.

From inside the cage, the second floor of Exit looked totally different. Though it was referred to

as the pit, Mel had always thought of it as a cage. As soon as you stepped in, everything outside became

large and hostile; it felt like there were hundreds of eyes on you, even if only two people were watching;

and the space seemed to be cordoned off into claustrophobic zones, depending on the placement of the

tools. “Don’t panic,” Mel told John, “I’ve danced in here dozens of times.”

“What the fuck is this?” John said. He flinched and jumped when the cage’s door slammed shut.

He sprinted over, grabbed and shook the door, and then jumped and climbed the fence, looking for a

latch or an exit. He fell to the ground, nearly slipped, and climbed a few more times before getting

discouraged; the slapstick expression of panic began to draw spectators from around the dungeon.

Mel calmly walked toward John and put her hand on his shoulder. “Calm down . . .”

“What the fuck is this place?” John said. There was a look of real animal fear on his face; Mel

couldn’t remember a time she’d seen him like this.

“Don’t be so excitable. The duller you are, the less people will watch—”

“Who’s watching? What the hell’s going on?”

“Let me explain—” Kathy began to say, but John broke away and ran to the other side of the

cage. He slipped on a greasy slick and fell on his ass, rolled over, and began to paw at his arm, which

had brushed the fluid. Mel walked over and knelt beside him. “Calm down, they’re going to think

you’re an actor or something. Just listen to me for a minute . . . ,” Mel said.

“What is this, blood?” John said, sitting up and rubbing his arm on his pants.
 “No, I think it’s grease. Listen, this is a real fetish club, you shouldn’t have come here . . .

There’s a thirty minute timer on the door, and by the end they’re going to give me a thumbs up or a

thumbs down.”

“So what?”

“If I get thumbs down, they hang me from the hooks for an hour. See?” Mel looked up and

John followed her gaze. There were a number of meat hooks hanging from chains.

“Hooks? I don’t even . . .”

“Normally it’s like a system, they give thumbs down to the girls who enjoy the hooks, and

thumbs up to the rest, they’re really nice about it . . . But I’ve never done a torture show, so I don’t know

how they’re going to react.”

“Hooks? You work at this place hanging from hooks?”

“No, I just told you I’ve never done this . . .”

John looked around; by now there were people standing along the outside of the cage, gazing

down at the two of them. “Then why now?”

“You. Kathy saw you and, I don’t know, just decided I should do this now or something. She’s

sadistic, just the sight of you set her off, she’s got something against guys, it’s like—”

“You’re dallying, Melinda,” Kathy shouted through a bullhorn.

Mel stood up. “Stand up, John,” she said. When he didn’t move right away she shouted, “Stand

up!”

John bounced up to his feet. “Okay, okay . . .”

Mel circled around him in a kind of strut, trying to appear menacing. “I tried to talk Kathy out of

it by pretending that I didn’t want to hurt you at all, but the truth is I kind of do. Anyway, I think that’ll

make it a little more authentic, and improve my chances, you know, if I put on a good show as a first

timer.” Though Mel couldn’t explain the origins of her anger or her current performance, she sensed
that she really was becoming menacing—there were at least two dozen people crowding around the

cage now, quietly clamoring.

“ . . . What about me? What if I don’t consent?” John said. Mel glanced up at the hooks and

John stared down at his feet, instantly understanding. “Okay . . . What do you want me to do?”

Mel strode up to John, taller than him in her heels, and put her face next to his ear. He was

actually trembling . . . “Just listen and follow directions. It’s simple. Are you listening?” John nodded.

“We need to establish a safe word. Any suggestions?”

“What? I don’t know . . .”

“How about ‘April?’” Mel said. John looked at her but didn’t say anything. He’d stopped

trembling now; it was difficult to tell when he’d stopped. “Is that good for you? That’s what you say

when you absolutely can’t take any more.”

“Yeah, I know,” John said. “I won’t need it though.”

“Keep it in your head,” Mel said. She took his hand and led him to the center of the cage. “Take

off your shirt.” John hesitated for a moment and then defiantly pulled his shirt over his head and tossed

it aside; the spectators began to shout and cheer, a few of them even gave catcalls when he rolled his

shoulders. As muscular as he was, his shoulders popping out and resembling armor plating, his back

rippling and stretching, his pectorals spanning wide across his chest, it seemed like he was about to

strike a pose. If he’s going to be combative, this might actually be fun, Mel thought.

“What now?” John said with a note of irony in his voice.

“Just sit tight,” Mel said. Since he was taking the macho route, Mel had no problem getting

rough. She went straight for the clothespins, the nastiest ones, sharpened and reinforced by steel

springs so they’d pinch with force, the ones attached to stones by long lengths of string. Some of the

spectators groaned and protested—there were veteran submissives who’d broke down crying after

being subjected to the particular trick Mel had in mind. Oftentimes it’s the case that a novice dominant
will get overexcited and dive into a torture too zealously, ignoring the powerful effects of anticipation

and suspense. Not only does this endanger the psyche of the submissive, it lessens the potential

enjoyment of each participant. All the same, Mel was diving in head first: she proudly dangled the

clothespins and stones in front of John, pulled a hook down from the ceiling, threaded the clothespins

over the hook, fashioning a sort of pulley, and lowered the clothespins down to the level of John’s chest.

A baited silence overcame the spectators . . . “Hold these, one in each hand,” Mel said, putting the

clothespins in John’s hands. The clothespins were pulled upward, counter-weighted by the stones, but

John lowered them back down to the level of his chest. Mel pulled John’s head closer to herself and

crimped the strings at a right angle with her hand. “Bite.” With the strings between John’s teeth, Mel

then took the clothespins from his hands and attached them to his nipples. A spark ran through John’s

body, he strained and gritted his teeth, but then he began taking deep breaths through his nose and the

tension floated from his body. Mel circled around him, paying close attention to his breathing. He was

remarkably controlled, almost excessively so; he didn’t understand the clothespin’s mechanism of pain .

..

Mel blindfolded John. She grabbed a few more clothespins and attached them at various points,

squeezing a bit of flesh and slipping them on, and waited . . . After a few moments, she pulled some of

the clothespins off, eliciting a gasp from John each time, making sure to rip one off now and then to

illustrate the difference between that and gently pulling it off; by now the pins on his nipples were

pinching the flesh real good . . . John’s breathing was still controlled, the strings still securely fastened

between his teeth, the only noticeable differences in him were the beads of sweat running down his

face, a slight reddening of the flesh where his neck met his chest, and the veins in his arms growing

more pronounced ; somebody in the crowd began to applaud, to Mel’s eternal annoyance. The goal

now was to get him to let go of the strings so the weights would wrench the pins from his nipples.

“Doing okay?” Mel said; he nodded. She yanked his arms back and bound them with a cable tie, fetched
the brush set from the floor and a stool, and sat down in front of John. She turned her body away from

him and crossed her legs, shaking them up and down with a bored expression on her face; the crowd

laughed. His breathing could still be heard, and it was getting progressively louder with each second;

still he wasn’t shaking, which Mel had seen so many others do in the past.

John began to grunt as he exhaled. Somebody shouted, “Get on with it!” to the approval of the

others. Mel sensed the sympathies of the crowd shifting; she stood up, pushed the stool away, and held

up one of the delicate brushes. She traced the brush along the line of John’s hip, up his side, and across

the front over his abdominal muscles, flicking away the beads of sweat. His body reacted to the

movements of the brush, the individual muscles flexing and contracting; he’d begun drawing in short

breaths. Mel threw the brush aside, unbuckled his pants, and pulled them down around his ankles. A

hint of musk and sweat escaped from his underwear, reminding Mel she was sweating herself—her skin

was hot, slick, coated with perspiration. She ran the back of her forearm across his chest and it slid

along, gliding on what felt like a surface of oil. She knelt in front of him, wiped their sweat on the front

of his thighs, rubbed it over and around his legs, brought her hands up to his ass under his boxer shorts

and squeezed. John began rocking his hips and making sounds, out of protest it looked like. Mel

brushed the back of her hand across his penis—it was completely limp, not even a hint of excitement or

life there. Though there were a number of potential explanations, performance anxiety for example, or

a public phobia, it seemed that he simply didn’t enjoy the pain, or in other words that he simply wasn’t

masochistic in the least. Mel hesitated, aware that this placed her below even the lowly sadist, who at

least inflicts pain in the belief that the receiver is deriving pleasure from the experience; but what could

possibly have motivated John to accept this sort of punishment, with humiliation on top of it all? Simple

altruism, guided by the mistaken belief that Mel would be hung from hooks in the event of his

noncompliance, wasn’t enough to explain it, particularly in light of his recent defiance and

showmanship. Mel stood up, removed the blindfold, and pinched the strings coming from his mouth.
“Let go, let go of the string,” she said. John pulled his head back and opened his mouth. When the

stones didn’t fall, he opened his eyes and stared wildly at Mel.

“Give it back,” he said.

Mel couldn’t believe it. “What are you trying to prove?” She put the finger from her free hand

on the small portion of John’s nipple protruding from the end of the clothespin. He flinched and began

to shake, his entire torso began to convulse, but he took a deep breath again and brought it under

control. Mel looked down at her finger and saw that it was stained with a little spot of blood . . . “Say

the safe word,” Mel said.

“No.”

“Say it.”

“No.” Mel pushed her finger into his pinched nipple, causing a trickle of blood to run down his

torso and mix with the sweat. He screamed and cursed, struggled with his bound arms against the cable

ties, and repeated, “Give it back!”

“Have it your way,” Mel said and let go of the strings. The crowd gasped; the stones dropped to

the floor and paused in mid-fall for an instant, tearing the clothespins off of John’s nipples with a loud

snap; John heavily collapsed to the floor, tilting over and landing on his flank and the side of his face.

The dungeon was absolutely silent except for the sound of John’s body grinding against the floor of the

pit as he writhed and twisted. His face was horrible, frozen in a bizarrely peaceful expression as if he

hadn’t had the time to scream; he clearly wasn’t breathing, his eyes were grotesquely large and getting

bigger by the moment. Somebody in the crowd booed and then everybody else joined him, and finally

John began to make sounds, croaks and gasps mostly, though they were barely audible above the

crowd’s din. Clearly Mel had broken some sort of BDSM code; she hadn’t let her counterpart exercise

his will to its limit; she’d conducted herself dishonorably . . .

John
John woke up in his old, comfortable bed in the old, comfortable apartment he’d shared with

Mel for years. Mel’s face hovered over him. She looked concerned. His body was sore; he brought his

hands up to his chest and found that his chest had been bandaged. “Don’t move, don’t move, no!” she

said, too late—John touched his nipple and a bolt of pain shot through his chest and diffused in his back,

radiating outward in waves; this was followed by an intense throbbing heat under the nipple,

concentrated in an area about the size of a marble. Unable to stop himself, John touched his other

nipple and the same thing happened. This time he couldn’t help it, he yelped and howled. “I’m sorry!”

Mel said.

“Jesus,” John said, sitting up. The movement seemed to change the nature of the pain; now the

little orbs of heat spun and gradually distributed a smoky, unpleasant warmth through the entirety of his

chest. He then noticed a number of welts on his body; there were so many that the raised, patchy red

skin around them covered most of his torso. “What happened?”

“You don’t remember?” Mel said incredulously.

“No. Wait, let’s see . . . We were at that club, in the center, the cage or whatever; you were

dressed up, like full-on leather, and you had to put on some kind of performance or else they were going

to hang you up.”

“That’s it? What about after that?”

“I mean what—did I faint?” John looked down at his stomach and recalled having flexed his

abdomen as hard as he possibly could for a long time, but he had no idea why he’d done this. He

remembered a tickling sensation, and sweating, and a sort of progressive fever. Then he looked at Mel’s

face and remembered that he’d spent a lot of time concentrating on the features. “Wait . . . You were

standing in front of me for a long time, and I was staring at you.”

 “. . . You were blindfolded,” Mel said.

“I was? Wait, the blindfold, yeah . . .” Suddenly the memory of the torture flooded back into his

head—the swells of pain that gradually intensified to a screaming pitch, that exploded in his head and

rose to a new peak every time it seemed they couldn’t get any worse, that eventually caused him to see

hallucinations, dreamscapes, and April’s face most of all, April’s smiling, sneering, crying, laughing face,

April’s face in repetitions and multiplicities, April’s face in every conceivable configuration and in every

possible space, April’s face surrounding him and collapsing into his being; but what he remembered

most of all was the anger he’d felt when Mel asked him to say April’s name. He felt ashamed; but he

didn’t know whether it was because he’d been angry at Mel or because April had left him. “I think the

night’s coming back to me, sort of . . . How did I do? Did they end up hanging you from the hooks?”

“No, you idiot, I completely made that up. Exit’s not some kind of evil torture dungeon, or

whatever you thought, no one has to do anything they don’t want.”

“Oh . . . ,” John said. “So all that—”

“Lie back, stupid. I need to change the packing under your bandages,” Mel said. John

obediently lay back and, shifting the position of his chest slightly, the bolts of pain returned. He

grimaced and sucked air through his teeth, trying to appear stoic. Mel began to unwrap the bandages . .

. “I’ve already done this twice, the last two times you were still sedated, so it might hurt, I don’t know.”

“It’s fine,” John said, although every movement of the bandages’ cloth shocked him; it felt a

little bit like rubbing sandpaper on an open wound. The heat under his nipples got worse.

“You’re the stubbornest, stupidest person I’ve known in my life. I can’t believe you. Kathy said

that I should marry you, that you’ve got a maniacal pain endurance and that says a lot. I think it says the

wrong things . . . You’re plain dumb. I guess it was a romantic gesture, romantic but stupid, doomed and

macho—who do you think you are? There’s something wrong with you . . . ,” Mel said. As the last layer

of bandages was removed, a slightly ripe smell dispersed in the air. John raised his head and looked
down at the wounds; they were pits in the flesh below the nipple, filled with a material that had soaked

through with blood and light-yellow pus. This was distressing, alarming even, but not nearly as

distressing or alarming as that Mel was quietly crying . . . He couldn’t remember a time she’d looked as

beautiful . . .

“Mel? Are you okay?” Suddenly, Mel pulled the material out from the wounds; there was a

massive depressurization, like a pair of giant pimples being evacuated, or teeth being pulled, and the

cool air rushing into the wounds numbed his entire chest; almost as suddenly, Mel began squirting a

fluid into the wounds and the numbness became a terrible stinging.

“Disinfectant,” Mel said. “You’ll never believe what happened to you . . . The meat under each

of your nipples was pulverized. I don’t even know how something like that happens; it was my fault,

obviously, but nobody could believe you held out for that long, you know, past the point where you

were seriously injured. Nobody believed it was your first time either. You could be a star, I guess. I

doubt you’d be interested in that though.”

“Yeah, uh, not—Ow!”

Mel stuck a balled-up piece of gauze into one of the holes, and then the other. “The doctor said

if it starts itching, that’s a good thing . . .”

“You’re crying,” John said, trying to sit up.

Mel pushed her forearm down against his neck. “Don’t move . . . I still need to bandage you and

I’m no good at it yet. Kathy was going to keep you at the club, but I took you home instead. Just be

thankful for that.” Christ, John thought, lying back and staring at the ceiling. He felt like he was being

bullied, but there wasn’t anything he could do about it. He wanted to know why Mel was crying, why

she’d brought him home, why she was nursing him, etc. . . . Mel began to apply creams, press strips of

cloth on his chest, tape them down; she moved deliberately and confidently, creating an atmosphere of

a serious medical operation—it was easy to lie back and accept whatever was going to come, despite
that a burning sensation was snaking its way through his chest. Finally, Mel finished up and said, “You

can’t move for a few minutes, the bandages need to set, and your heart rate needs to come down.” Mel

pressed a pair of fingers to the notch in John’s throat, making him suddenly conscious of how excited

and wired the pain had made him; then she gently touched his hands, brushing her fingers over the

knuckles. “Look—your knuckles are totally white. You’re making fists . . .”

“Uh . . . ,” John said, glancing down at his hands. He opened the fists and saw that his nails had

made deep indentations in his palms; Mel took his hands in hers and held them. She looked at his face,

and he felt himself slowly calming down . . .

“I’m really sorry,” Mel said.

“What for?”

“This . . . Everything . . . I don’t know, John. It’s like, well, it’s like I’m lost. Each moment is

terrifying . . .” There was a long pause. “I want to love you.”

John stared up at Mel; her breathing was calm, her expression almost serene. “But . . .”

“There is no but . . .” Mel watched him long enough that he began to feel anxious. Then she

craned her head down and pressed her lips to his, resting her arm across his chest. It wasn’t so much a

kiss as basic contact. After a moment she put her head on his shoulder, and he could see that she’d

closed her eyes. The pain in his chest was almost unbearable; Mel’s arm bored into him like a length of

superheated steel. He closed his eyes, focused on her breath . . . “John,” Mel whispered.

“Yeah . . .”

“The kid’s yours.”

“I figured . . .”
Avril
To know and not to act is not truly to know . . .

Months on the run. From what? It was hard to believe anything that had happened was real.

Somebody had died; by now it seemed like a fantasy. The events in the auditorium took on a sepia-

toned cinematic slowness in Avril’s mind; she could picture frames, poses, movements, all of which had

taken on a certain drama: Hamid closing the distance to the manager with his long strides, the manager

crashing into the wall and falling to the floor in a heap, the strong, masculine lines in Hamid’s body as he

shot the manager in the back. The only sound that remained was the woman’s scream. The feeling of

paralysis lingered—Avril couldn’t bring herself to move once she’d realized the manager really was

dead. It was only when people had begun rushing into the auditorium that she’d stumbled away in a

daze, against the current of the oncoming rush of the herd . . .

Before long Avril might have believed she’d imagined the scenario, but then the media picked

the story up. For some time, “Islamic Terrorism!” dominated the headlines. Evil! Random! Senseless!

Al-Qaeda’s new strategy in the wake of Osama bin Laden’s death! The stories went along those lines,

mostly owing to a pamphlet Hamid had dropped on the manager’s corpse as he fled. The pamphlet was

simply a reprinting of the polemic bin Laden had prepared for release in the event of his death. As time

passed and the gunman wasn’t captured, a few alternative media sources idly speculated that the

murder was the result of a lone maniac—the deceased wasn’t politically prominent and didn’t advance

any sort of patriotic or imperial ideology, nor did he have any apparent value at all; this viewpoint was

ignored. Avril did appreciate Hamid’s sense of timing and irony though—the idea that al-Qaeda’s

reprisal for the assassination of their elderly figurehead was the murder of a provincial corporate middle

manager was hilarious. Anyway, al-Qaeda was little more than a bloated fiction, a bogeyman that

captured the American imagination because of its similarity to outfits like S.P.E.C.T.R.E. and KAOS, so if
the manager ended as a casualty to the global war on terror that was probably a better death than he’d

deserved . . .

Hamid hadn’t been in contact. That was for the better. It seemed as if nobody had come

looking for Avril, made the connection, or found any evidence of her involvement; but why would they?

She’d gotten away with murder, even if Hamid was the one who’d pulled the trigger. He’d acted as a

vessel of her will, at least by a generous accounting of the facts.

Avril was in hiding, or so she told herself. It might have been more accurate to say that she was

up to her old tricks. She’d returned to the Purple Porpoise, where Mike was still working; as usual, he

was at the front desk. It seemed that nothing would ever change. Mike said first thing: “Whoa! I

thought you were dead.”

Don’t be an asshole, Avril thought; but she was feeling meek. “No . . .”

“So April’s back.” Mike stood up and came around the counter, putting his hand on Avril’s hip

and kneading the flesh. “You’re looking amazing,” he said.

“I’ve, uh, had a life,” Avril said. It seemed like an understatement. “Um . . .”

“Lemme guess: You need a place to stay,” Mike said, laughing to himself.

“Get your hand off me,” Avril said.

Mike left it there for a few moments and then pulled it away, stepping back and mockingly

raising his arms in front of himself. “Whoa! Okay, my bad. Personal space, boundaries, all that, it’s

cool. So you do need a place to stay though.” He laughed again.

“Yeah. Jerk,” Avril said. His arrogance, Avril thought, is at least justifiable, or if not justifiable

then understandable. She was crawling back to the bad old place, after all.

“No problem, no problem, cool,” Mike said, walking back behind the counter and writing

something into the log book. “Business is slow. It’s the summer, you know, what are people doing?

Where are they?” He looked up at Avril. “Hey, how are you feeling? I have to just say again, shit, you’re
looking great, damn girl. You plumped out since last time, got some meat on your bones, you’re looking

healthy, not so emaciated and shit, like—”

“Alright, I get it. You’re a walking boner and won’t shut up about it. You don’t give a shit about

how I feel.”

Mike pretended to be offended. “Hey, I care! I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t . . .”

“I feel like shit. I wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

“Well, you don’t look it. That’s a compliment . . . Hey, damn, check this out. You remember that

crazy Arabic guy, the one who threatened to kick my ass? Hassan or something like that, sure you do,

he’s the guy that took you to the hospital.”

“Yeah . . .”

Mike held his arm up and pulled back his sleeve, revealing an expensive watch. He pushed his

arm out and proudly displayed the watch. “Check it out.”

“So what?” Avril said, pretending to examine the watch.

“Don’t you see? That crazy fucker left behind that giant pile of coke . . . Hey, wait! You’re not

gonna tell anybody about this, are you?”

“No, of course not . . . ,” Avril said.

“Anyway, I’ve been selling the stuff out of the back room, I mean, I’m basically rich . . . Well, not

rich rich, but enough to be king shit in a place like this. Come on, check it out, we’ll share a line. So

you’re feeling like shit, maybe you’ve got some problems, I’ve got problems too, we can solve them—

tonight.”

Avril knew Mike was a pathetic braggart, she even knew he was plagiarizing a corny line from a

John Cusack movie, but she went with him anyway. They went back, took some coke, fucked, slept

together. That went on for a few months . . . That’s what Avril called “in hiding,” “on the run.” She
couldn’t explain her actions. She derived no pleasure from anything. She was broken—a degenerate.

She knew it.

The ideal—cretin and whore

The Entartete Kunst exhibition of 1937 was the greatest art project of the 20th century. Truly

great art is inseparable from politics; the Nazis proved that truly great politics are inseparable from art.

The Nazis worked dialectically in their way— just as the Jewish nation arose from the Nazis’ frenzied

attempt at the destruction of the Jewish race, the ultimate spectacle of modern art was created by the

Nazis’ effort to destroy degenerate art forms. Like most of the Reich’s brilliant ideas, the Entartete

Kunst exhibition was Goebbels’ project. The exhibition was a mess: reminiscent of an overstuffed attic,

thousands of paintings, sculptures, and novels were shoved into claustrophobic rooms and criticized in

the form of hateful slogans violently written in red paint; participants were encouraged to touch the art,

deface it, engage it at their will and on their terms. It was destructive, hysterical, and passionate—in a

word, beautiful; and modern and democratic in ways that art strives for. None of the works of art ever

achieved as much on their own as they did as part of Goebbels’ tribute to barbarism. The Entartete

Kunst exhibition was Goebbels’ proof of the triumph of collectivism over individualism; and we’re

compelled to agree—hacks like Kirchner and Klee were better off in the exhibition than they ever were

on their own. The highest artistic distinction of the 20th century was to be deemed “degenerate art.”

“Madness becomes method . . .”

Avril’s isolation was growing. Months spent drifting along, vegetating day and night, working on

nothing, eating poorly, trapped in a cage of radical thoughts, helplessly witnessing her senses and her

body degrade with each passing moment—it was a compact version of the life she could reasonably

expect from there on out; it was a freedom of sorts, but the empty liberty would be painful to bear . . .

Even Mike was growing distant, bored with her. She’d taken to reading ol’ Joey Goebbels’ diaries and
was, in her mind, beginning to understand degeneracy, her own in particular. As it’s always been, the

answer to lazy, liberal degradation was to look to the earth, to fire, to the regeneration of the human

soul through cause and purpose. She wished to engage in a struggle, to be criticized, to be purposed for

something, forged, aimed, and launched at something worth destroying, or failing all that to be

destroyed herself. Hers would be an individualistic revolution, she knew, but it seemed to be the only

path . . . Still, her malaise was traceable to a simple breakdown in her human relationships; without

John, without even the chumps from the café, she was on an island, and her one link to the world had

been Mike, a leech sapping her of any vitality she might have had. These wasted months made the time

she'd spent with John seem even more fantastic than what had happened to the manager in the

auditorium—anything resembling happiness seemed like a dangerous abstraction, and anyway, if

anything good had happened to her it was by a freak coincidence, since her situation now—wallowing in

the hostel—was no different than it had been before John's entrance in her life. There was nothing

remarkable about her present state of mind; if anything, the short period of happiness she’d

experienced only served to make the current pit seem deeper. It had become clear: misery was a

matter of course for Avril and that would never change.

It was a bright and sunny morning. Avril studied something from the internet she’d scrawled in

her journal the night before: “I think you should bend her over a park bench and fuck her with your

stinking, rock-hard fuck staff until she's dead. Use your keys to rip her creamy little dick cavity to shreds.

Smear the blood all over your face and shaft. Then, you should shit into her mouth. By this, you will

show her that you are in the dominant position, and that you don't care one way or the other about her

behavior. It's the next best thing to fucking severing, which you should promptly do while you upvote her

life and give her ass AIDS. Nuke her from orbit, but at the same time, make sure you're using fire. I am a

big fat faggot. I like to pick my nose and put the boogers into my erect penis. I like to pee out little rods

of my compressed penis booger. God is a faggot. God is a nigger. The Lord God Jesus Christ is a
worthless faggot. I kill everything I see. I can't stop fucking. I wish I could have sex. I want to fuck so

bad. I can taste your fucking vagina juice. I am a nigger. I am a stupid stupid fat fucking nigger. Give

me a Snickers bar, hot dog, and some Doritos. Anime ninja. Let's watch some Naruto. God is Hitler's

faggot. There is no such thing as a faggot. ‘On Hitler: He’s a rootin tootin high falutin son of a gun/He’s

a routine Teuton, Eiffel lootin sawn-off goon.’”

This passage indicated that the problem was isolation. Isolation. From people, the world, life—

but therein was everybody’s situation. Isolation isn’t unique to any one individual; on the contrary it’s

the one and only condition for individualism. The other societies, the old societies, maybe they had

another understanding of it. It wasn’t good enough to be a wolf of the steppes living in civilization, shy,

lonely, savage, restless, homesick, homeless. So we say rehabilitate the steppe: destroy civilization.

Something can be built from the rubble; but first there must be rubble. Limonov: “This civilization must

be destroyed everywhere on earth—in Russia, in China, and in America. Destroy it—this goal must unite

all those dissatisfied. Better is he who hates this civilization more. We don't answer the question—what

shall we build on the cleared ground? We say, ‘Destruction is our goal.’ And it's not just to the ground as

it says in the ‘International.’ We'll dig deeper, uprooting, leaving behind no trace, just dust—destroy it

like the conquerors destroyed ancient cities and then plowed them under.”

But even this goal, inspiring as it may be, is restricted in liberal society. We’ve been atomized—

totally, to the extent that reconciliation is a fiction. Bonding is an impossibility; attraction exists, making

existence all the more torturous. Destruction is no longer feasible, for it requires a united front,

organization, and shared struggle—picture the barbarian hordes; now ask yourself: where are the

barbarians? They don’t exist. Destruction has been excised from our logic like the tumor it is. Someday,

perhaps, chaos could be reintroduced into liberal capitalism’s homeostatic complex—it’d grow out of

control and metastasize, having captured the imagination of a discontent populace, and having done so

it would purify the world once more, hopefully for the last time: this would be no world war, leaving
behind remnants and pockets of humanity, this would be total massacre. Surely this would happen,

surely there’ll be rubble; but not today.

Today was about the individual. The early 21st century was the height of the individualistic

epoch; it was a low period, frighteningly vacuous, base and shameful, neurotic, alienating, degraded and

degrading to all involved, and ultimately likely to be forgotten by history. This was Yukio Mishima’s

insight; this is what he saw, and wisely he opted out. Mishima wrote: “Let us picture a single, healthy

apple. At the heart of the apple, shut up within the flesh of the fruit, the core lurks in its wan darkness,

tremblingly anxious to find some way to reassure itself that it is a perfect apple. The apple certainly

exists, but to the core this existence as yet seems inadequate; if words cannot endorse it, then the only

way to endorse it is with the eyes. Indeed, for the core the only sure mode of existence is to exist and to

see at the same time. There is only one method of solving this contradiction. It is for a knife to be

plunged deep into the apple so that it is split open and the core is exposed to the light—to the same

light, that is, as the surface skin. Yet then the existence of the cut apple falls into fragments; the core of

the apple sacrifices existence for the sake of seeing.”

Did Mishima discover the way out of our degraded existence? It seemed possible—it seemed

that he’d stumbled upon something the old societies knew all along. Just as with Avril, Mishima’s

society had repudiated his unique vision; and cut off from a collective societal ideal, he had to find

solace in an individualistic revolution: this was the only way to catch a glimpse of the real, the last path

available for those so inclined. As a people, we're blind to the one vision that's worth seeing. Anybody

with a brain in their head is hurtling toward death. The lucky ones see this with frightening clarity;

anything else is error—every subjectivity, every liberalism, every philosophy that chooses life leads to a

fearful, cowering death, a piss stain at the moment of truth. This is the unification, the guiding dogma

for the cult of death; every human being who's touched the absolute has simply given it their own

name: the skulls adorning the helmets of the SS, the cyanide-laced Kool-Aid at Guyana, the nails affixing
Jesus to the cross, the approach at 450 MPH to the world trade center, the virgin's still-beating heart in

a Mayan priest's hand, the knife plunging into the samurai's belly, the flash of the Jacobins' guillotine,

the fetid jungle swarming with Maoist guerrillas, the poisoned urban landscape of the radical insurgent,

the hammer and sickle adorning the helmet of a million butchered soldatiki at Stalingrad . . . Call them

stupid, call them evil if you'd like, laugh at them all you want . . . Their eyes were wide open at the

moment the light shined into the core, and maybe, just maybe, they saw something more in life than we

do. We don't see anything; we can't see beyond our own existence, we can't even imagine doing so.

But some of us, Avril thought, are curious.

Spitting blood

Clears up reality

And dream alike

The torpor of the past few months and the possibility that this could be the mode of the rest of

her life had solidified all this in Avril’s mind. There was one last thing to confirm before these

conclusions would be reified: Avril was going to make one last stab at life, one last try to replace what

she’d had with John. He once mentioned how he’d disappeared from his roommate’s life; but how

much more effective Avril was at vanishing! The extent of her individualistic isolation was far greater

than his, despite his masculine egoism.

She set out from the hostel and made her way back to their apartment in Wicker Park. John

wasn’t there, the locks had been changed, somebody was sitting inside watching TV, and there was even

a dog there. Clearly the landlord had found some new tenants . . . So there was one last place to look.

Avril remembered perfectly the location of John’s old apartment, and more than that the hominess that

he’d attributed to his roommate, the feeling of warmth and safety she’d felt upon stepping into the

living room, the womblike comfort of John’s bed . . . All of this filled her with nostalgia, or sentimentality

to be harsh about it . . . The guy wasn’t that special after all . . . Still, he symbolized a sort of hope . . .
 Avril was surprised to find the front door unlocked. She went in and climbed the stairs. At the

top was the door; she paused before knocking. Her stomach was twisting and churning—what if he

wasn’t here? She closed her eyes and pounded on the door three times. There were footsteps from

inside, which set Avril’s heart racing.

The door swung open and the roommate’s face appeared. Avril suddenly remembered her

name—Mel. Mel half-smiled; Avril did the same in turn. It was a smile of recognition, maybe slightly

hostile on Mel’s part. Avril felt no hostility for the girl; but then her eyes moved down from Mel’s face

to her body. She was wearing a tank-top that had been rolled up, and under her breasts there was her

gigantic, naked belly. Mel still didn’t move. The image of this woman, bursting with life, overflowing

with her own vitality and the total presence of another human being, violently struck Avril, it tore a

sucking black hole in her, in something she knew as her essence; she instantly saw herself as a

juxtaposition of grim death against vibrant life. Avril stepped forward into the living room; Mel didn’t

flinch. The belly begged to be touched, and Avril slowly brought her hand forward. Mel still didn’t

protest—there seemed to be something of an understanding between the two women. Avril’s fingers

brushed the belly, and then the palm of her hand made contact—it was incredibly hard, firm and tight,

almost bristling with heat. She couldn’t breathe, a shiver coursed through her body, an invisible vise

tightened around her throat. Here was something real . . . Then something made her look up away from

the belly and to her side, and there was John, watching her and Mel, looking shocked and hapless.

When their eyes met there was a sharp impact against the palm of her hand; it had come from inside

Mel’s belly. Avril pulled her hand away as if she’d been burnt; both John and Mel started forward but

stopped themselves, seeming to wait for Avril to say something. “It’s a girl . . . ,” Avril said. Still nobody

moved. “. . . She’s jealous for her daddy.”

“April,” John said, tentatively stepping forward.

 Avril realized that he’d never learned her real name . . . She looked at Mel and frantically said,

“You’ll do a good job with John. He isn’t good at it, but he’ll get by as long as you drag him along.”

“He isn’t good at what?” Mel said.

“Living . . . Neither am I, that’s why we wouldn’t make it,” Avril said, stepping back out of the

living room. She turned and went down the stairs, leaping down them two and three at a time. She

heard John call after her, “April, wait!” but then the door to their apartment slammed shut. She left the

building and ran down the street, stopping at the corner to check if anybody had followed. Neither of

them had. That was good . . .

The El station. Waiting. It had been eight minutes and still a train hadn’t come. It would be a

simple death. Not glorious, but easy—a simple leap, a falling forward like Anna Karenina, but without

that tragic aspect of amorous revenge. This particular station was ideal, as the train could be spotted

from far off, and it always approached the beginning of the platform at full speed . During the eight

minutes, Avril had composed a death poem.

Living from birth with a demon,

Whispering, “Duality,”

She found the truth

In negation

It was hard to tell if this was good or bad as a death poem . . . It’d have to do. Her suicide had

originally been an intellectual conclusion, a series of logical sequences overcast by an imperturbable

vision driving her to an affirmative end; but in a moment of clarity she realized this was also the greatest

favor she could bestow on the world, on the few people she could actually affect . . . Without Avril, John

and Mel could have a life, build something which, if not permanent, at least held the possibility for

happiness—they could live normally, as human beings, and bring another person into the world in a
healthy atmosphere. It really was easier this way, better; other than the two of them Avril had no other

ties to the world. If your existence implies only terror and heartache, why should it be? What possible

paths were there? All Avril could see was disgrace; as a living being, she could only confer pain and

division, but in death she could ensure that there was at least one strong bond on Earth.

There was no future in exile either. Relationships, obviously, were impossible. And what about

possessions? At most, Avril had some earthy beauty and a somewhat functioning intellect, even if it was

subpar at composing death poems. She also had the bipolar disorder; the disease morphs as age and

new influences set in, but all the same she had spent some time earlier charting exactly how many more

manias and depressions she could reasonably expect if she were to live to a normal age. There were

about twenty cycles . . . This implied a world of misery, violence, danger, conflict, and anguish, along

with, as Avril aged, the strong possibility for the development of obesity, diabetes, epilepsy, and

schizoaffective symptoms. Her youth held some of these things at bay for now, but eventually she’d

succumb as they all do. Avril knew John, she knew his personality—he’d endure everything along with

her until the day she died, even if they weren’t able to maintain something like a romance. This was the

worst possibility of all; she refused to inflict herself on anybody else.

She found some solace at least in that she’d be spared the humiliations of aging. She knew that

John, and men in general, enjoyed her body. In this respect she could leave near her peak, never having

known the shame of having a subpar body, the shame of seeing a person’s face as they gaze upon your

ugliness. This made her feel better . . . How pathetic! She accosted herself for her unbelievable vanity,

especially at this stage. Sad right down to the end, Avril. Her thoughts frantically bounced in her head

as her anger rose. She never really knew who she was; she’d never had the chance. The demon—when

had she begun thinking of bipolar as a demon?—had always asserted itself, and if she was ever

somebody, it was always in reaction to her moods, which seemed foreign even as she surrendered to

them totally. And as for the time before she was diagnosed, that may well have been an idyllic dream, a
vision of the village before the war tore through. Yes, Avril thought, there really is truth in negation.

Unfortunate as it is, it’s the first decision she’d ever made on her own, and it was a good one. Hesse,

maybe, said it best: “Let suicide be as stupid, cowardly, shabby as you please, call it an infamous and

ignominious escape; still, any escape, even the most shameful, from this treadmill of suffering was the

only thing to wish for . . . Nothing was left but the simple choice between a slight and swift pang and an

unthinkable, devouring, and endless suffering.” Avril thought it over one last time, just to be safe . . .

There was no duality as far as her life was concerned; only one choice had merit, and that was not to be.

She laughed . . . It always had to begin and end with Shakespeare; at the very least, Hamlet was an

upgrade from Juliet . . .

Finally, the train’s headlight appeared in the distance. Avril held her breath. The train

approached. She jumped. The last thing in her head was vertigo, her body reorienting itself to its

suspension in physical space, calculating limb placement and muscle exertion, protecting the spine and

base of the head. There was a flash at the instant the train smacked into her. A dim candle glowed in

the immensity of the universe; then a faint wind blew and the inexplicable flame was extinguished.

Finally, there was quiet; finally, there was darkness.

Avril was evaporated, her blood, guts, bones, and sinew spreading out over an impressive 90

foot radius; people were disgusted, many were traumatized. This was a good death . . . But it hadn’t

happened. She hadn’t jumped—the flame burned as brightly as ever, spewing greasy smoke and oily

haze in every direction, clouding everything, dirtying everything. She didn’t move a muscle; now she

watched the train storm past her into the station and crawl to a stop. The faces streaming past in the

windows didn’t watch her. The train doors opened. The other people in the station stepped on. Avril

stood there in a daze. The train doors closed, the train moved on. Suddenly, it screeched to a stop and

the doors opened again. A booming voice: “Lady, you getting on?” Avril turned to the conductor; it
was the first time she’d heard one of them address somebody. She nodded her head and meekly

stepped onto the train.

John
Mel slammed the door shut just as John started forward and shouted after April. He stopped

dead in his tracks and gave her a look; god knows what could’ve been read on his face in that moment,

but he got the feeling that his eyes were burning straight through Mel. She stared back defiantly for a

few moments; then she slumped forward, defeated, her eyes cast down at the floor and her hand

pressed to the small of her back, which had been giving her terrible pains recently. What was there to

say? He tried to conjure some words to console her, to bring her back from the depths of wherever he’d

just sent her, but something irrepressibly drove him forward. Without saying anything, John pushed

past her, opened the door, and dashed down the stairs. He hit the street, in search of something he’d

lost . . .
Mel

John left her again for the same reason, only this time she knew he wasn’t coming back; she

wouldn’t let him in even if he came. Nobody changed, nothing changed . . . Now she knew. She couldn’t

find any fault—it was how things were.

Avril
Avril stared out the train’s window at the buildings passing by, the gleaming skyscrapers in the

distance, the millions of people inhabiting that drab space; it was easy to imagine a giant hand wiping

the city away, leaving a formless beige mass stretching all the way to the horizon; and the train itself

slowly dissolved around her until she was left floating in an ethereal monotone ocean—this would be

the totality of Avril Fontagne's life. To know and not to act is not truly to know—the words appeared in

front of her, suspended, bold, heavy, and they weren't crimson-tinged as she'd hoped, but they too

were beige. In the absence of courage there's no choice—you only live because you were born.

Avril hadn't truly known death as she'd thought; she'd known life all along. Each drawn breath was a

self-reinforcing act of life, so she'd know life, it'd be all she'd know . . . It was the worst thing

imaginable. Fuck you, she said aloud. Suck my mother fucking dick.