WHAT KIND OF COMIC WOULD YOU RATHER READ:

1.) A comedic action story about (and called) The Worst Superhero Team Ever, who have lame powers and everyone clearly knows their secret identities. They're totally oblivious and think they're awesome, and win battles due to chance and plain dumb luck but must find the TRUE HEROES WITHIN to combat a legitimate rival superhero team from their high school.

or

B.) A comic about a young boy who is supposed to die being hit by a bus but doesn't, so La Muerte, the personification of Death, follows him around, attempting to get him to accept his intended death. The complication? Every god, spirit and personification of a universal force there is has bet on if or when he'll finally crack, and they will do whatever they need to in order to win.

I want to write a comic script and submit it. Which one should I do?

BUZZ OFF, 2008

The year is ending tomorrow. My sources tell me this is an important day that I should have been preparing for all year but I totally flaked.

I'm spending the evening at work, then at my house. My chums have all gone gallavanting off to Massachussetts to go to parties and things, though honestly I don't actually mind at all, which is probably even more sad than not having anywhere to go on one of the most social days of the whole year (which, given that it is divided by two years is even more significant!).

My plans so far involve chinese food and TV, perhaps a movie if I muster the desire. It'll be relaxing and fun. As much as I adore symbolism, for whatever reason New Years just doesn't interest me all that much.

This year was okay. I spent most of it giving advice to people. Like a whole lot of advice. Like practically ran an advice column amounts of advice. Apparently I am some sort of hair and love guru who can make guys have hairpiphanies and fix their relationships. The thing is I was right a staggeringly large amount of the time. Real-life people tended not to listen to what I told them which is perfectly natural because who wants to be told what to do, but for the most part things worked out the way I said they would. Which is vindicating but sad too.

As far as internet people (and it may sound lame but I know a goddamn lot of internet people) go, I helped a lot of them. I actually almost did start an advice column because I kept getting good feedback from people I had talked to. It is nice to help people. The irony of course is how nonexistant my own love life was but this isn't that kind of blog.

The only other immediately recallable highlight of my year was going to Greece for a month. I miss it dearly, even more than I did the few years I didn't go. I couldn't live there but I wish I got to visit more often.

See, this is why I hate New Years. Everything is sappy and retrospective and I know from talking like that in my head all the time that it's boring and no one wants to hear it. Also the resolution thing is bollocks.

Is it bad that I think I'm an annoying blogger? This is why I write, I make a total mess of words unless I'm telling some sort of awesome story.

2008, you were a cool dude. Thanks for the good times.

It's Kind of Funny (In a Horrible Way)

It is 4:30, and I have spent the past several hours drawing cave walls. Between that and the huge drawing I'm doing it seems I am attatched to my tablet whenever I am not at work or hanging out with my chumpals that are back from college whom I have not seen in far, far too long.

Something about having an artistic purpose, a singular goal besides all the sensible real things I am supposed to do is so incredibly life-affirming. I'm being unbearably pretentious right now, but the high of creation, of investing myself in something I actually give a crap about is...I don't want to say all that's keeping me going because that is leagues too dramatic and plain not true, but being back here is severely taxing, and this is a release I don't really get anywhere else.

Man, how is it so impossible to talk about enjoying art without sounding like a total jackass? There should be a word for that.

But goddamn. It's almost five and all I wanna do is keep making graphics. I'm going to try to force myself to sleep so I can wake up and do this more.

Listen Chief, I Only Follow Two Sets of Rules:

1.) My own,

and

2.) NONE.

I recently reported that I wasn't going to be using this blog for blogging until there were logs of people longing to snog my blog.

Well, one odd thing about me is that I have a massive but almost entirely passive-aggressive rebellious streak, and this streak has struck me since writing that I wouldn't stretch the purpose of this blog, and thus I'm going to start stretching the strata of this st-

I've been watching Pushing Daisies. Clever alliteration and lyrical progression is on my mind, as is the sad knowledge that I will never be as horribly clever at it as the writers for that much loved but much soon to be over show.

In any case, here is me blogging:

It is winter break! A great many people enjoy it, but I find it to be a nearly unbearably horrible ordeal. Let us explore this briefly.

I have been working for my father, who owns a restaurant and bar, since I was 12. That is to say, specifically, I have worked every Friday and Saturday since I was twelve, with literally the following exceptions:

One Friday when I just started working
Two to three times due to sickness
The Friday and Saturday of Prom
One Saturday for a Rennaissance Faire
One Saturday for a wedding
And two Fridays, including tonight, for snow.

There may be more, by perhaps a day or so. In any case, nary a handful of missed weekend work days in roughly nine or ten years. This is to illustrate the point, which is that I work. A lot. Except for Monday, I have been at work every night and a couple of days since I came back. I will continue to do so for the rest of vacation.

On the one hand, I have no right to complain because me working has gotten me the financial stability I have, and my dad works a shitton to put me through college and I should be helping him.

On the other hand, working food service destroys my faith in the human race and the vast majority of time I'm not actually doing anything, which is endlessly boring and mentally taxing.

I digress. I work pretty much every night. When I have school? Four nights of glorious free time, which is used almost exclusively on TV and interwebs. I enjoy it, and the solitude that comes with it, quite a bit. Being home after being in your own apartment several days a week for months is unpleasant for obvious reasons I don't think I need to go into here.

What else is going on with me? I've been drawing a lot. Drawing drawing drawing. Some of it is graphics for a game, some of it is a huge drawing that is barely 1/3 done without coloring but already the best thing I've ever made. I will probably post it here because it looks not horrible, I can show you the in-progress version of it if you ask me because people who know about it have been interested to see my outlines vs. final versions and such.

I miss school. Last semester was nice, and by some bizarre aligning of the planets I magically started to make friends in the last like, month in a half. It actually creeped me out. Not that I minded finding people at school that didn't make me hate the world, oh no. It was cool.

But really. I figure my constant attachment to my headphones, my nearly monk-like silence outside of class discussions, and my aura of nerdery should ward humans and medium-size animals away, but for some reason recently people started talking to me all the time. Kids would just be walking out of a class, kids I did not even recognize, and they would make comments about the class.

Here's a fun game: Want to hear Phil make an ass out of himself? Say something to him when he's not expecting to be spoken to. It's hilarious, he stumbles over his words and has no idea what to say. You should probably ask him about Spiderman or something after so he doesn't go into a coma.

Anyway, people have been talking to me a lot and I have no idea why, but as much as I adore my lone-wolf swagger it's nice to meet cool people, even if I probably wont see most of them ever again.

I feel, often, as if I have a compulsion to portray myself as a slinking creature of darkness, muttering Sandman quotes to himself as he adjusts his robes to best mimic the shadows, wringing his hands as he maniacly thinks of ways to be antisocial, emerging but once a year to feast on tacos and the blood of the innocent before receding back into his high-perched cave to spin his vile webs of solitude.

I'm not saying I'm not. I'm just saying I seem to portray myself that way.

But then again, there are an overwhelming number of people who think I'm an extroverted party animal who probably hotboxes his bentley so who knows.

Is this actually more interesting than me writing about people doing it then shooting each other? I have to wonder.

Secret Origins (Part 2)

This blog is currently read by two groups of people:

1.) People who have met and know me, and likely got here through Facebook

and

2.) Internet people who talk to me more often than the IRL people but who don't know that much about me

Ideally, I would like to add a third group, which is

3.) Internet people who don't know me at all


Essentially, what I want out of this is a showcase. Blogging asserts a self-interest that I don't think there's any worth in denying. I don't know if I'm interesting enough for people to actually want to know about me, but I fear being the kind of person they don't. I follow the blogs of artists and writers I like a lot; I figure there's no harm in aspiring to this nearly completely arbitrary measure of status.

In general, I don't think I'll be doing a lot of real blogging in here, at least not until I have a steady readerbase of people who aren't actually involved in my life (a pipe dream, for sure). I don't think anyone really wants to read about me being nervous because there's a line forming behind me at the self-checkout, or that I read comics for three hours while eating doritos.

However, at this juncture, I'm going to talk about myself, because I think that knowing a person is absolutely relevant to what you get from their writing, whether or not this is a good thing. This may not be your thing or you may already know me in which case it may be horribly boring.

I am 21 years old. I go to college, majoring in English because every English teacher I ever had told me I was good at it. I plan to be a writer, because these same people all told me I should be a writer. I have an apartment, but only stay there during the week; weekends and breaks are spent at home, where I work at my father's restaurant. This makes up the majority of my actions during any given timespan.

I'm a nerd. Like, really super a nerd. I seem to be attracted specifically to interests and passtimes that alienate me from the average person, which I'm actually totally fine with because in general I'm kind of horribly awkward around people. I enjoy liberal doses of comic books, video games, and sappy primetime dramas. I spend an inordinate amount of time on the internet doing pretty much nothing, and have trouble not freaking out when there's not a TV on. I'm not too good with silence.

I write, draw, make music, cook, and engage in other artistic endeavors but only the first one of those is something I consider myself to be any good at. I tend to have an artistic sort of ADD, in which I cannot focus on anything for very long. I'm constantly coming up with things, and usually nothing physical comes from it. It's really not a good thing, I should write way more than I do.

Vaguely tangental story: I used to really want to be an actor. I went to acting classes, got the leads in several of our acting class plays, and basically horded spotlight opportunities whenever I could. Though still not horribly social I was all about performance and attention. If I could pick a moment that it changed, it would be this:

In elementary school, I was a terrific singer, frequently doing solos in our class concerts. In sixth grade, puberty hit me like a brick wall that was being wielded by the hulk who was himself being shot out of a cannon by Superman. I was sort of a showcase of post-pubescence for our whole grade, which manifested quite neatly when my voice cracked, for the first time, during a vocal solo.

It was only a practice. But the whole sixth grade looked up at me from the bleachers, a bizarre mix of confusion and amusement gracing their tender little faces.

This is mostly the last time I was on stage of my own volition.

This is to say, I went from being an extroverted attention whore to an introverted attention whore. The point of which is to express this: I want a shitload of people to read my work. I want people all over the freaking world to be reading my stuff, and to think I'm awesome. I am not ashamed of this. I would like to make money off of writing, but more than that, I want to be read. Art for the sake of art is not my thing; I come up with stories in my head every minute of every day, but when I choose to write something down it is because I intend on sharing it.

As I said earlier, I was always told I should be a writer. What actually inspired me to do it were two works: The Sandman, by Neil Gaiman, and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami. I am not going to talk about them now, but I will say this: they changed me in profound ways that I am still discovering. I want to do to people what those works did to me.

Speaking of Neil Gaiman, he always says mysteries are more interesting than answers and he is absolutely right. I have a compulsion to talk about myself because I find most people don't even come close to getting me and I want them to understand me, not out of some sappy inner desire to be closer to people but because on a base level I don't like people misunderstanding me and I want them to know what they're dealing with.

See you on the other side of fame.

(the famous side I mean)

(wow I sound like a total tool today)

(listen I wanna be famous but not d-bag famous, more like cool-guy famous)

(I mean really if I started thinking I wasn't good enough to make it there'd be no point now would there)

Secret Origins (Part 1)

Perhaps it would be fitting, at this juncture, to discuss myself. I believe, dear reader, that you should know whom it is you worship, to know the nature of the being you so covet in your heart.

Like most Greek youths, I burst forth from my father's thigh, fully formed, armed with both shield and spear. I was, however, born in America, so for legal reasons there are records of me being "born" in a "hospital."

Anyway, when I was 2 I felled my first enemy, a lion that had invaded my home to steal the horde of gifts that accompany Greek births. I grabbed it by the tail and hurled it into the sun, where it now awaits me, gaining solar powers until the day it returns to finish the job.

I'm waiting, lion. Anywhere, any time.

Anyway fast forward. Literally, a thousand years in the future. See, I accidentally turned too fast on my bike and was hurled into the future, where I had to liberate Ohio from the Glogonauts who had taken over most of America. Turned out the Ohians were actually the evil ones and had taken advantage of my time travel amnesia. I eventually snuck into their base and exploded the chronobomb, sending me back to my time.

I decided to go undercover and raise myself as a normal child. I read comics and played video games, resisting human contact so that no one could discover I was secretly a hardcore badass. I assumed a "nerd" persona, elegantly fooling all I came across. As I walked down the avenues with my headphones on, blasting downbeat contemplative music and avoiding eye contact, I smiled inside, knowing that my true nature would reveal itself when the time was right.

I'm kidding, of course. I don't actually know how to ride a bike.

DZM and Drawing

The response to DZM has been really overwhelming, seriously. I have gotten such great comments, a lot of which should probably not be attributed to me but to the guys who helped me film it. Everything really came together and I think everyone involved did an amazing job especially given how quickly and crazily we had to pull this together. I have been wanting to make this movie for four years, and I could not be happier with it.

I keep getting asked this: Yes, I have a sequel planned out. Everyone's shown interest in continuing this, so it may very well materialize in the future.

Also, I will probably next to never post drawings here. Writing is something I consider myself to be good at, something I hope to be paid for some day, I don't mind posting it. Drawings, however, I do for fun and have no intention of ever trying to do anything with them. I do have a site where I post all my art, sufficient coaxing or baked goods will get you the address but it's nothing to write home about.

Anway, this is to say I am hesitant to post a drawing but I decided to draw the characters from the story a couple posts down, Dissolution. I will spare you the expository paragraph I usually accompany my art with, and just say that I worked on this pretty much continually from 11PM to about 3AM, it was a lot of fun, and the characters look pretty much nothing like what I thought they would but I am quite happy with it.

EDIT: So I can't post it here, the size doesn't fit with the layout, here's a link! http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v438/suppai_no_iruka/dissolutioncopy.jpg

Dangerzone Maverick

Dissolution

Written for my creative writing class, newly revised, needs another polish to examine all the splicing and tense changing but I think it's overall tighter (and for those of you who read it before I removed like half the semi-colons, then wrote new sections where I used some more). I recommend Bloc Party.

Dissolution

I'm taking a sip of coffee as the first bullet shrieks into in the wall next to me. One leg kicks over the table, the other kicks back my chair as I drop, all instinct, onto the ground. A snap, a slide, and there's a gun in my hand. Another round glances off the metal table, denting it. Not the same kind of gun; it's a lighter gauge warning shot, to let me know I'm the target. That suits me just fine.

I only have a couple of seconds to get my bearings. I'm in a cafe at the northwestern peak of what is, looking at it from the top, a large octagon that makes up an outdoor mall. It's actually quite nice and quiet this time of day, except I suppose for when someone's shooting at you. I'm on the far side - the shots came from across the way, but they weren't straight-on. No, the first one was a sniper shot, the second came from the same direction. Whoever is shooting at me is doing so from the roof in the center of the complex, and there's about 20 yards in every direction in which I'd be completely open.

There's no choice but to run as more shots ring out, and I dart down the wall, weaving in and out of kiosks and tables as people run screaming. People are running in the chaos, and the shots are coming slower as they push each other over trying to move in the opposite direction I am. No one but me is meant to get hurt here, and the mall is being cleared out so we can do this one-on-one. I know it's her, I knew it from the first shot. It didn't hit me only because she didn't want it to, not yet. I'll have to pick that bone with her later.

I find good cover inside a scented soap store and take the time to catch my breath and try to pin down where she is. From where I am I can't see her, I'll have to get closer, exposing myself. For now all I can do is stick to the wall until I get a better angle. As the store window fills with holes, I know I have to move; if I stay in here she'll toss in a grenade, and no amount of dodging is going to save me then. I roll out and immediately take off. I hear the click of an automatic weapon. Damn, she's serious about this.

The first time I saw her, she was shooting a man in the arm. He was in a business suit, exquisitely tailored, the kind of suit most men would not even be able to identify as being more expensive than their own lives. I faced her from his back, and cocked my head.

“Mind if I ask what the hell you're doing?”

“Well you see, when a boy really likes a girl she fucking shoots him in the arm because he wont tell her what he needs to know. Now if you'll excuse me...”

“Excuse you? You must be kidding me. This is my mark. And we both know he's not some two-bit CFO, which means your company should know that I claimed him.”

“Did they hire you for your big strong brain, or was that just a bonus? Look at my uniform.”

I cocked my head. “You...work for us.”

“Congratulations! You're vaguely insightful. Now-”
“Now nothing, you can't just come in here and steal my mark! You know how much money I was gonna make off this job?”
“Yeah. I do. And frankly, I wanted a new car.”

“You...you bitch.”

Bullets cascade around me as I run, though I get off a shot or two when the angle is right, more to shake her off me than to actually do any damage. As I pass the divides between awnings I catch glimpses of her. She's wearing the same old uniform, standard issue. She always liked the classics. She's got enough ammo strapped to her body to take out a small battalion, but every last one of those bullets has my name etched onto it. She hasn't patched up the holes I put in it the last time we met, and her hair has been chopped off. Her hair used to go down to her waist, she really loved it. I can't see her eyes from here, but I don't have to, I know them well enough already. There's no life in them now, no sign of anything but function; those eyes exist only to identify the target.

Last time I saw her was five years ago, in Stockholm. She was lying on the ground, her hot blood melting the snow where it was oozing out of her body. I looked down at her, a thin film of snow forming on a body that was growing increasingly cold. She mouthed something to me, then used what little energy she had left to keep her eyes open, to keep them on mine, and we shared a long moment of silence. That silence was huge, it was all-encompassing, countries exploded and populations rose and fell and not a bit of it penetrated that silence. It was a real thing, more real than the snow falling, than the cold seeping into our wounds, than all our history and the fact that it was going to end at that moment. We had nothing else to say to each other. It was done. And so I pulled the trigger.

We're alone now, just her and me. She picked the location well. We should have at least a few more minutes before any authorities show up, and longer before they do anything that will effect this. There's no way I can match the firepower she's packing, I'll have to get up to the roof where she is before I can even have a chance, and that is assuming she doesn't blow me away before then. But I know her, I can feel how much she hates me right now, and I know how this is going to end.

She is, as of the last time I checked, the fifth best sniper on the planet. She can shoot the wings off a fly from a mile away without even thinking twice about it. I'm, on the other hand, a knife specialist. You give me something any sharper than a billiard ball and I can take out a whole room of people before any of them even realize I'm there.

Maybe, in the end, that was always our problem.

As the chatter of her weapon sends a hundred metal slugs my way, I can almost hear Gordon's voice again, think about him telling me not to date within the company, that I'm being crazy.

“Man, you're being crazy.”

“I know what I'm doing, Gordon. I'm not some rookie, I don't harbor any illusions about what that kind of girl is like.”

“Listen to yourself. If you really knew what she was like, by which I mean if you hadn't already slept with her, you would never even think about it. She is completely crazy, and you're crazy, this whole damn thing is crazy.”

“She's really not as bad as everyone thinks.”

“You mean she's not a cold, vindictive, distant, break-your-arm-in-four-places-if-you-glance-at-her-chest bitch?”

“No, she's all of that. She's just...different sometimes, that's all.”

“You know what? I'm out. No way am I getting in the middle of this. You know what dating someone from the company entails, you know the rules. She's going to tear you apart one day, you know that right? Besides, everyone knows female assassins are stingy lovers.”

That's completely true, by the way. They are stingy. I never had a chance.

I'm kneeling behind a wall now, tearing off part of my shirt to staunch the bleeding in my left arm. It's pure luck that she didn't render it useless; the bullet's in deep though, and I doubt I'll be able to get it out. While I'm here, I check the other injuries I have. A couple of grazes, another bullet in my thigh, nothing life-threatening and nothing I haven't had before. In general the saving grace of a firefight is that once you've been shot a few times you usually give up or stop moving. We don't have that luxury. We've been trained to take everything we inflict, and while being able to shrug off a few bullets in my flesh may seem advantageous, it makes fights between professionals drawn-out and brutal in a way that it even makes us queasy. And us, we're two of the best.

There is a stairway directly across from me, from which I can access the roof. Between me and that lovely little door, however, is a wide open space with nothing for cover but a couple of gaudy plants and a bench with melting ice cream on it. Letting her waste bullets until she has to reload isn't an option; with the payload she's carrying there's no way I'd be able to last that long. Looking to my left I see a car on display, a disgustingly yellow hummer that has about as much taste and function as a couch with electrified metal spikes on all the cushions (professional killers don't need a giant boxy eyesore to assert themselves). However, I can get inside with no problem, and if I can scramble, I may be able to hotwire it.

Of course she continually pumps the car door with led, and if I move at all I'll be full of holes and soon even this monster wont work so once it's running, still on the floor, I slam the gas pedal with one hand and cover my head with the other. Even with the break, the car impacts the wall next to the door, and I feel the metal contorting, and hoping my stunt doesn't kill me, I can't help but think about the first time I slept with her.

As we were lying there, I could have sworn she looked at me the same way she looked at someone through a sniper scope, as if my life was entirely in her hands and she controlled every inch of my being, and lying there under her I felt more naked than I ever had or have since. Love Will Tear Us Apart shivered from a record player sitting in the corner, but I could barely hear it as the full weight of her presence bore down on me. She was regarding me in the manner that she regarded a mark, and I found myself shaking as lowered her face to mine. No one else ever made me shake like that.

Crashing a car into a wall to simultaneously escape a hail of gunfire and open a securely locked door may seem like a stupid thing to do, and I'm not exactly prepared to argue that it's not. However, when given the immediate choice between different ways of dying, you'd be surprised how little either of them start to matter. Death, at some point, is just death. No point cloaking it in different language. Self-inflicted but accidental impalement or turned to a colander by a jilted lover; is either one really preferable? In any case, I'm wonderfully alive and safe from her for now. A couple flights of stairs separates us, and as much as I hate where this is going, I have no choice. I start to run, ignoring the shooting pains in my leg, and each time it hits a step a pain shoots through my whole body and memories come flooding back to me.

---

My eye's resting on the scope, and I'm trying to hold my hand steady.

“I don't think I'm cut out for sniping. My hand keeps shaking.”

“You can skin a man with robotic precision in twelve minutes, but using a sniper rifle makes you nervous?”

“Hey, it's not my thing. You only get one chance, it's too far away, it's so...impersonal.”

“Yeah, because I like to have conversations with people I'm killing for money. You're doing fine, just take a deep breath.”

“ The target's too small.”

“It's not too small.”

“Can you even see it from here? It's way too small!”

Her finger circles around mine on the trigger, and I feel her chest against my back.

“If you don't shoot this thing in ten seconds I'm going to break your finger.”

“Would you calm down, this isn't a job, it's freaking practice, I'm trying to do this righ-”

The yell muffled the snapping of my finger.

---

She stretches out on the bed, then shifts onto one elbow to look at me.

“So what did he say?”

“What do you think he said? He begged for his life. He gave me that look – you know the one -- and he started telling me about his family, how much they love him. Like I've come this far and I didn't think about shit like that.”

“Can you blame him?” she asks, as I pass her the cigarette. “Guy's got a knife to your throat, you're not gonna try whatever you can?”

“I guess you have a point. I dunno. It's starting to get me down.”

“Going soft on me, are you?”

“It's not that. I love what I do. Hell, I don't think I could do anything else. I ever tell you what I used to do, before I joined the company?”

She takes a long drag, and stares at me. She hates existentialism, doesn't have the patience for it, but she accommodates me.

“I worked in a meat packing factory. For, God, it must have been seven years.”

“That explains how good you are with knives, I guess. It's not so strange.”

“I never touched a knife. I did office shit. Seven years in this place where they cut up animals and shipped them off for people to eat, and I did stupid office shit.”

“So? You left. You live a great life now, at a job you love, that you're great at. You've moved on.”
“That's not what I'm talking about.” I sigh as I put out the cigarette. She has never been about the big stuff; I don't think she could understand what I'm talking about even if I knew how to explain it.

“It's been a long day. You're just worn out. Turn out the light, get some sleep.”

We're lying in the dark about three minutes before she speaks again.

“I never did tell you my real name, did I?”

“Nope.”

“Don't got one.”

---

Time's running out. It's raining hard, the kind of rain that suffocates you when you stand under it, so thick that everything loses its form and blends together. She's sobbing and my arms are around her, but I can tell she can't feel them, she just beats her fist on my chest again and again, and I'm trying to find words to calm her down but I don't have any and it makes me feel weak and useless. Having nothing left to say to her then, it was like a kind of death. Maybe worse.

---

It's been a week, and we haven't spoken. She calls me from another hotel across Stockholm, and tells me where to meet her. I take a long time strapping on my weapons; I make each movement slow and deliberate, almost lovingly preparing myself. It's snowing outside, and even from inside I can tell that there's going to be a holy silence out there, the kind that can't happen unless there's snow to soak up the noise. For a while I sit on the edge of my bed, head down, not thinking of anything. Then I get up, sigh once, and go to see her for the last time.

---

In most situations like this, were I to bust through a door to the roof I would be shot dead before I could even finish kicking, but she's going to let me do it. She's being old-fashioned about this, which isn't like her; she never had the patience for anything but cold reality, whatever was needed at that moment and nothing else. She has this way of consuming everything. It's not a conscious decision, not something I think she knows she does, but everything and everyone around her is meant only to feed her, to be witness to her, to be used by her at whatever moment she chooses. There were times where I felt like a resource -- something that was feeding her, that would eventually be used up and discarded like a fleck of dead skin. I couldn't hold it against her, even now. The way things turned out was, I've decided, inevitable. I know it for sure now, and I probably knew it then too. We were always destined to come to this, even though I tried to avoid it.

I kick open the door, gun pointed, and for the first time in half a decade, I see her face. She has a rifle pointed at me, and her eyes are just as I imagined them. She doesn't even blink as we stand there, listening to the sirens approach. My sense of time and space fall off their axes, and for just a moment I feel like all this is fake, like I'm actually back in my apartment listening to her shower and staring at her green dress slumped over my chair before I come to, and the reality, the cold physical circumstance I'm engaged in comes back to me. I barely hear the words that come out of my mouth.

“There's no way you would have missed that first shot.”

“You're a real son of a bitch, you know that?”

“You cut your hair. It's different, but I like it.”

“Don't fuck with me. You know how this works. You stood there above me, you pointed your damn gun at me, and you didn't kill me. Do you have any fucking idea what it was like waking up in a chopper? Knowing that I had been denied that basic fucking right? God, you know how these things are supposed to go. You knew how I would feel when I woke up.”

“But you did wake up-”

“Don't you feed me any bullshit! If you didn't have the balls to put one between my eyes you weren't worth my time to begin with.”

“So this is really it? There's no way to do this but one of us leaving in a body bag?”

“If you don't like the rules, maybe this life isn't for you. That doesn't give you the right to insult me like that.”

“Maybe I'm not cut out for this shit. I don't know.”

“Shut up. I don't care what you think, not anymore. One of us dies here. That's the rule.”

“So it's really that simple? That's what it all boils down to? A fucking rule?”

She puts one in my shoulder. It goes straight through, and I can already feel the blood going down my arm. I try not to flinch. We trade shots, a flurry of movement. She's on top of me, but this is my area of expertise; I ditch the gun. Soon we trade places, and she's lying on the ground, staring at me with the eyes someone who's been hovering on death for years, and she's using them to tell me what she couldn't with words. Whatever feelings she may have once harbored for me, there's nothing there now, nothing but raw hatred. Did I really turn her into this? I'm holding a knife at her throat, but you'd never know it looking at her. Even drenched in blood, with her short, ragged hair, stone eyes, she is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I have to wonder how many men have suffered for her. It was wrong of me. I know that. I've spent five years running from it, but she was never one to let things like that go.

---

I put in a call to the company as I leave, tell them she's dead. I'm told she quit after Stockholm, same as me. The receptionist, Amanda, tells me she's sorry to hear about it, that we were the cutest couple, most people didn't get it but she saw what made us work. Too bad, she says, that it always works out like this so often. Our kind weren't meant to find happiness with each other. I tell her she's probably right, then thank her and hang up.

Day Seven

So I've never been big on writing poetry, because whenever I try to write a poem it comes out pretentious and overly crafted. This year I took creative writing which gave me no choice. One poem I wrote I actually really liked, and it sprung from one of the most random trains of thought I've ever had. My teacher suggested I try it as a prose poem, which is the kind of thing it's next to impossible to write without wondering if you're not just writing a paragraph (I still have no idea).

I think the bolded sub-titles are horribly pretentious but I love them for some reason.

Day Seven

Manifesto

And then they begin to fall, one by one, then in twos and threes, and soon the sky is screaming with stars. They strike the earth, sending a slow gentle rumble through the ground that we feel coming long before it hits us. The end of the world is a slow thing, it is deliberate and bright and leaves no room for misinterpretation. She looks at me, streams of light painting her face, and says, simply, I'm kind of hungry.

Declaration

We go into the shack, flashlights bleeding out beams of half-sincere vision, making our way over debris and through half-collapsed doorways into the kitchen. The power has been out for days but the gas still works. All I find in the pantry is some bread and two slices of cheese. Okay then, I'll make you a sandwich. She insists I have one too, even though I think a sandwich with just one slice of cheese is
kind
of
depressing.

Resolution

It's dark inside, so we lay a blanket on the grass, to have a picnic. We listen to the destruction, bathed in starlight, and take small bites, because sitting here, surrounded by the sundering of the earth, the howling of the sky, the profound, immaculate sense of loss and dread, it's actually kind of nice. We smile at each other while we chew, and wait for it to end.

I can't decide if I really like it better this way. As someone who prefers things in paragraphs, I was surprised how much I liked this in verse. We'll see.

Sonny's Friendly Asassination Service - Chapter 1

Wrote this back in February of 07. I want to do a book called Sonny's Friendly Asassination Service, which is about...a friendly asassination service. I never wrote anymore, but I made up all the members of the company, and I'd love to continue it some day.

01 - Jack

So I walk into the office, and I'm feeling pretty good. There are joys that come from advancement in the corporate world that cannot be replicated. The fact that you're exceptional enough to rise above several floors of dedicated employees instills in one a confidence that I would put against anything a drug makes you feel. You're not getting your high from an external substance; it is created purely from the knowledge that you are, in whatever capacity, superior to everyone else doing your job. The higher salary and company benefits are something else, that's not of any interest to me nor to the story.

So I'm walking into his office, and I can see myself in the reflection of the marble floor. I wonder, as I'm walking, how much money is spent on keeping that marble floor so clean. You could probably turn a backwater village into a sprawling metropolis with that kind of cash, and here it is being invested into keeping this thing shiny. But I'm digressing again. The office is huge, and extravagant, and my suit is tasteful but a little out of place. The boss is waiting for me, his chair turned around so he can see out his giant window and look over the city. As I place the stuffed file onto his desk, I once again entertain an idle thought that the high one feels from corporate advancement must be insignificant to someone like him. He sits there, looking over the city like he owns the thing. And, in a way, he does.

"Six months," he says to me, without turning around.
"Six months you've been here, and you've pushed this product to retail like it was second nature. I've been paying people for years to make this damn thing, and you waltz in here and put everyone that works here to shame."
"Just doin' my job, sir. Its what I love."
He turns around now, and flips through the folder in front of him. It's more a symbolic gesture, than anything. He has people to read things for him.
"I don't even know what to do with you. Hell, I don't think there's anything that would fit. You've probably saved me millions of dollars that I would have been wasting on trying to push this thing. I'm really speechless."
If I could interject, my feeling at this point was practically orgasmic. He wasn't exaggerating. I'd entered this company as a nobody and had managed to save its premier product from the brink of extinction in half a year. Being the best at what I do is what I live for. I loosened my tie a bit, and flashed my biggest smile.

"Sir, you really don't need to do anything. My satisfaction and your acknowledgment are really enough. But that's actually not why I'm up here."
"Hmm? I called you up here to commend you," he says, cocking his head a little.
I smile. "Well, yes, this is true, but I actually had business with you. My name, as you already know, is Jack, and I'm going to be your assassin today."
He gives me the look. You know the look. We've all gotten it. He hears the words but nothing registers; I might as well have barked at him.
"What did you say?"
"My name is Jack, and I'm going to be assassinating you. Please, open up to the end of the folder."
He begins to draw his hands back, but I place mine gently on top of them.
"Don't bother. If there was any chance of security helping you, I wouldn't be doing it this way. And besides, I could be gone and you could be dead before anyone even got your signal. Please, open the folder," I said, opening up my jacket to reveal the gun holster. This usually either illicit panic or compliance, so of course its a gamble. Luckily, the boss goes for the latter.

At the end of the folder, he finds my brochure. He unfolds it and reads it, although not much registers through the shaking. I pick it up for him, and glance at it.
"I understand this is difficult for you. Feel free to have a drink, to calm your nerves. As I said, my name is Jack. Its not my real name, just a professional one. I've been hired by Mr. Anderson to kill you. Now, me? I think its a little boorish. I mean, if you're going to sabotage a company, there's easier ways to do it. Not that your death itself is going to destroy your company; for sure, your leadership has taken it this far, but, if I may be so rude as to infer, there's some seriously bad blood between you guys."
A couple shots of scotch had made him more aware, if not more calm. Knowing that the owner of his rival company was having him killed certainly made him more grounded. Probably embarrassed, too. Its not a particularly nice way to go. There's no clearer sign of loss.

"As I was saying, the point is obviously to ruin your product, coupled with the resolution of whatever personal issues you two may have. To that end, I was hired to enter your company and sabotage you. I had to learn everything there is to know about computer programming in two weeks; I don't mean to brag, but given what you said earlier, I just wanted you to know just how good I am. I took it as a challenge; see how fast I could outprogram people who'd been doing this since their fingers could hit keys. For what its worth, the product is completely functional. There's a small line of code in there that will ensure that it crashes; no one could find it, so you don't have to worry about my efforts going to waste."

He's looking at me now like he thinks I'm insane, but I ignore it and continue.
"So your product is going to launch and then flop. I imagine that your company will go under not long after. You, of course, will not be around to see it. If I may once more interject, I suggested that this would be enough but Mr. Anderson wouldn't budge. I don't know what you did to the guy, but he really, really hates you."
"It figures. Anderson always was a son of a bitch."
"Yes, well. Mr. Anderson has generously purchased you the deluxe package. I am going to kill you in whatever way you find most comfortable. I have a variety of weapons and other implements with me, and I can make it as painful or painless as you want. I should mention that this particular package is exceedingly expensive.

"So I'm supposed to be impressed that Anderson would spend so much to have me killed?"
"Well, the way I see it, and not knowing either of you I may be perfectly wrong, the fact that he's willing to spend much, much more than he would have for me to just come in here and shoot you says that he respects you, and your rivalry, and wishes you to go out with some sort of dignity."
"You call this dignity?" he spits, scowling.

"There are some really horrible ways to die. Gruesome, slow, painful. If I get to have a choice of how I'm going to die, I will consider myself extremely lucky."
He looks at me like he's annoyed, but I brush it off and push the brochure closer to him. He looks through it, paying more attention to his options now. He does this for about twenty minutes, during which I inspect the priceless artifacts he's had the office decorated with. There's too much style, too much uniformity to make me think he actually chose any of it. I go ahead and ask him.

"No, of course not. You know how much I make. I haven't done a damn thing for myself in years. And now I suddenly have to decide how I'm going to die. I can't believe this."
I looked at my watch. It was getting late.
"Listen, I understand the position you're in, but we really have to get going."
His eyes drift up and meet mine, and he stares me down like he's trying to shoot holes in my head, and for all I know that's what he's trying to do.

He points. I look it over for a second, then nod. I loosen my tie again, and take it off, draping it over the chair.



Mr. Anderson's office isn't as extravagant, but it is by no means the kind of place anyone who's not ridiculously powerful would spend their time. Now, Mr. Anderson himself, and I know I've said this before but it always boggles my mind, is sitting there looking like he just had me go get him coffee; he just had a guy who used to be his friend killed and he couldn't care less.
"Is it done?"
"Everything's in order, sir."
"How'd he take it?"
"Remarkably well. There's usually a lot more crying and begging. He didn't seem too surprised."
"Yeah, well, if there's one thing I can say for the guy, he's got balls. There's not a lot that can get him down."
"I totally agree. He definitely knows how to run a business as competitive as this one."
"Knew. He knew how to run a business. All he's doing now is cursing me down in Hell."
And then I draw my gun on him. His eyes go wide, and his hands go up, shaking a little.

"What the hell are you doing?!"
"I'm sorry, Mr. Anderson, but I'm afraid the terms have changed. I'm going to be your assassin today."
"How the hell did this happen?! We had a damn deal!"
"I'm afraid I was made a better offer."
"What is he giving you?! I'll double it!"
"Sorry, but I don't do this sort of thing often, and never twice."
He goes to say something else, but its nearing 4AM and I have to get going. As per the instructions of my new client, who is understandably bitter, I leave him in his chair, blood trickling from his head and dripping onto the pristine white floor.

Dangerzone Maverick, or DESTINY FULFILLED

Several years ago, I got a call from the President, on my personal line.

"Well well," I said as I put the phone to my ear, "looks like someone's calling in their favor."
"Listen," he said, his voice with the slightest shiver. "You know as well as I do that I wouldn't be calling you if it wasn't serious. You're the best in the goddamn business and as much as I hate to admit I need you..."
"Let's dispense the flattery, Mr. President. You want something."
"It's...it's the film industry, Phil. It's just - it's just not right. Things are going downhill, and if someone doesn't do something to stop it...well, let's just say Gigli is gonna be the high point."
"My God," I said, taking off my glasses in a single smooth yet dramatic movement, "what can I do?"

I could hear him sighing on the other end of the line. The President doesn't like me. My methods are too high-octane, too extreme. I do what needs to be done and I don't let anything or anyone get in my way. But I've saved his skin one too many times, and he can't afford to let anyone else do this.

"You must create a film, beyond any that has been created before. It must be so transcendantly explosive, so gut-wrenchingly action packed, that no viewer will be able to resist, that all of America will band together under, to hail, to love. Phil, I need you to create the ultimate movie."
"The ultimate movie...you really have some balls, Mr. President, to call me like this and ask me."
"I have no one else to turn to. You're the only one who can get this done. I know what happened back in Morocco changed you, but you need to do this. For America. For film."
"...Yeah. I suppose I do."
*click*

That was the night everything changed. For years now, I've been planning. Plotting. And in one week, it all goes down. I've only got one shot, and if I miss this, the whole country's gonna go up in flames.

This trailer is a taste. And you better savor it. Because this is one bread crumb of the immaculate cake that is Dangerzone Maverick. You better wear three pairs of underwear because you WILL soil them.

AEAJ - Chapter 6

Chapter 6 - In Which Justin Decides Something, And Is Threatened With a Wrench

Justin couldn't have told you how long he spent outside the building, his back to the wall. The salty tinge of sweat on his lips was about the only thing keeping him tied to reality; his vision was all color, no form, and there was only a dull sense of sound in his ears. He observed the world as if he was looking at it from a million miles away, and for all he knew, he was a million miles away. His muscles wouldn't move, as much as he willed them, and someone came over and asked him something, obviously concerned. He was vaguely aware of him making some sort of response, but he didn't know what. He must have looked like he was on drugs. And, to be honest, he thought, that would have been preferable to the reality. Justin attempted to pry his feet from the ground and make it back home before he drew any more attention.

Alright, then. Walking. One foot in front of the other. You just walked through...through time, or something. Surely you can make it a couple of blocks. Right foot, left foot. There you go. That was easy.

It was nighttime before Justin wandered sleepily into his apartment. He was initially surprised by the vaguely romantic presence of candles everywhere before recalling his light switch didn't work due to lack of electricity. He was not quite as surprised by Chadwick, who was eating Chinese food on his couch (more specifically, he was unsurprised at Chadwick's presence but found his food choice odd; Chadwick didn't seem the type to eat anything that wasn't colorful, low in calories or European).

"You know," he said, wiping his mouth, "General Tso's specialty was actually cakes. He was good with tortes, too. Pies, he never really grasped. I don't think the man cooked a chicken in his life."
"I suppose that's understandable. 'General Tso's Cake' doesn't have as much of a ring to it," Justin muttered, as he lay down on the carpet. Finding his way to an actual sleeping surface felt like much too much work.
"Went well, then?" Chadwick asked, cocking his head to the side slightly.

Justin paused for a few seconds before he responded.
"Did you know what was in the package?" he finally asked.
"I knew who wanted it delivered, and I knew why. I can infer what it was, but I don't actually know."
Justin hesitated again. He knew he should leave it alone. He knew there was absolutely nothing good that could possibly come out of asking his next question. This made him feel all the more foolish when he actually asked it.
"The hallway-"
"Anyway, you're hired."
"Excuse me?" Justin said, sitting up.

"I have to admit, I wasn't completely honest with you before. This wasn't just a test for you, but for me to know that you were right for this job," Chadwick said, as he took his take-out container to the garbage. The candles around the room cast a soft light on everything, but the dramatic shadows being cast made the apartment look smaller than it was.
"Most people would have walked into a perfectly normal apartment building, delivered an uninteresting package to no one in particular, and their lives would have remained largely unchanged. You, however, and may we note for a second that I was impeccably right about this, were able to see what the hallway really was, where it really led. Most people are far too ignorant of their surroundings to realize that sort of thing.
"She...she didn't seem to like what was in the package."
Chadwick sat back down on the couch, and was silent at first. He seemed to be choosing he words, which Justin hadn't seen him need to take time to do before.

"You can't run away from time, Justin," he finally said, in a voice that was a tad softer than usual.
"She managed to get a few decades more than she should have. Time had to move forward sometime. She-"
Justin interrupted him. "Wait, did I kill her?"
"Justin, she was maintaining her own pocket of time in her apartment for years, there was only one-"
"You didn't answer my question," he said, glaring at Chadwick, straining to read his expression in the candlelight.

"What you did was show her some sort of evidence of today's date, correct? She had stopped time. Rather, she kept it from ever entering her space; all you did was show her that it wasn't her decision to make. That she wasn't the boss."
That didn't comfort Justin. He began to feel sick, and stumbled into his bathroom. Chadwick sauntered over and stood in the doorway.
"Think about it. An apartment in an abandoned building in which time does not pass. Imagine if it were demolished. Do you have any idea the kind of horrible mess that would create for her? It may seem bad, but in the long run what you did was put things back in their natural order, and ensure she didn't get in any trouble later on."

The thing, Justin mused, that he despised most about Chadwick was that even when he couldn't grasp a thing that he was talking about (this, of course, encompassing most of their conversations thus far) he knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that Chadwick was unequivocally right and to attempt to prove him wrong would most likely result in him looking like a complete moron. He always felt like a child in Chadwick's presence, and this made interacting with him an immense pain. And yet, Chadwick was the sort of person you knew instinctively you could never get away from, unless he wished it to be so. He began to wonder just how much choice he had in this affair.

These thoughts were interrupted by a stack of $20 bills being lowered in front of his face.
"Your payment. And a bonus, for your troubles. But I'm afraid I really should get going. Its been fun, but there's work to be done. This is your last chance. You've seen what I have to offer. You've received a fairly large amount of money, with which you could pay off your bills and go on with your horrendously boring and unstylish life, or push through the veil of reason and reality and make more money than you'll ever know what to do with."

Justin stared intently at the money in front of him. Even if he paid off everything, he had no job, nor a college to go back to. He was knocked out of his deliberations by a knock on the door. The voice of his landlord came through, some business about "rent" and "months" and several vague threats involving a wrench. Justin pocketed the wad of cash, and went to his bedroom to stuff what little he found important into a duffel bag.

Elmer Rocca was gripping a large wrench tightly in his left hand. Justin was a nice kid, and before this year he was always good about payment, but hey, he needed his money, and being a good guy does not make a profit for a landlord. He didn't imagine that, when it came down to it, he could actually do any of the things to Justin's head with the wrench he said he would. His arm, maybe. Not to break it, or anything like that, just a bruise. Maybe rip his shirt up a bit. That would teach him. Justin emerged with an effeminate man dressed in purple and red, and, well, Elmer didn't want to say he'd known it all along because there wasn't anything wrong with that, he lived in America and all now, but he'd always felt Justin had that feel about him. He shook Justin's hand, patting him on the back.

Having not injured Justin with a plumbing implement, he readied himself to head back, when Justin handed him a large sum of money, in cash, and informed him he was moving out. This, to say the least, made Elmer very happy. He was going to inquire when the marriage was going to be, but the two seemed in a hurry.

Chadwick had a stylish but decidedly nauseating shade of purple adorning his Corvette. He put Justin's bag into the back, as Justin took one final look at the life he really didn't care much for to begin with.
"So, where do you live?"
"Where do you think? England."

AEAJ - Chapter 5

Chapter 5 - The Longest Apartment Building Hallway on Earth

The package was a simple brown box, about the size of two gallons of milk, though it weighed very little. There were no markings, no stickers, nothing to discern it as anything other than a regular, uninhabited box. The apartment Justin was delivering it to lay in an old but otherwise normal-looking building four blocks away. Chadwick had taken it upon himself to stay in Justin's apartment, and he was to return there once the package was safe.

Inside, the building was truly showing its age. The floral wallpaper was peeling in the halls, and the wood floors creaked loudly with each step, warped and flimsy. From what he understood, there shouldn't have even been anyone living there. The owner of the building had passed away thirty years ago, and his son had closed down the building, finding it more cost-effective to go into the hotel business with the money left to him that was meant to fix up the place. He kicked everyone out, and the building degraded over time. Squatters occasionally made it inside, but even they had better places they could live.

This story gave Justin an overwhelming sense of discomfort as he ascended seven sets of crumbling stairs. He walked slowly, and while he felt this was safer the constant, slow sounds of wood that should long have collapsed filled his ears, and he found himself trembling slightly as he came onto the seventh floor. There was a long hallway ahead of him, lined with doors that hadn't been opened in decades. A wooden table was positioned near the stairwell, a cracked vase holding some black water, surrounded by a powder that may have once been flowers.

Eager to get out of the building, he started down the hallway. Windows at either end of the hallway illuminated the fine dust, shifting suddenly as Justin waded through it. The air was thick and heavy, and beads of sweat were starting to form on his head. He was leaving footprints on the ground, as if he were walking through a light dusting of snow. At length, he came to apartment 746. He knocked on the door three times, creating a dull echo. He thought he heard something on the other side, but couldn't quite be sure. He began to wonder if anyone lived here. Perhaps Chadwick was raiding his apartment, taking everything of value and getting out, while he waited here in a building that no one in a healthy state of mind would choose to live in.

Of course, the joke would have been on Chadwick, because the contents of the apartment would probably just barely compensate him for the five hundred dollars he'd left in the letter. No, he'd been sent here on a real delivery. He had to do this. To see if Chadwick was right. To see if there was another life waiting for him, now that his old one had so efficiently crumbled. Justin almost instinctively reached for the doorknob, and turned it.

The apartment was smaller than he'd expected. The air was slightly clearer, but still not without the hint of age.
"Hello?" Justin called in, and though he got no answer he knew almost immediately that the place was occupied. Nervously, he stepped inside. To his side was a small couch and coffee table. A cup and saucer sat on it, and they looked new. His eyes locked on the table as he realized it was perfectly clean; someone was definitely living here. As his gaze traveled back up, he looked once more upon the couch, but found five sets of slanted eyes staring back at him. They belonged to cats.

The cats were unmoving, their green eyes showing nothing of what they thought of him. Justin swallowed, and looked around. He couldn't count the sets of eyes this time. The apartment was full of cats, perhaps two or three dozen. They were all shapes and sizes, here a red one, here a white one, shaggy and slender and fat. He had never seen so many of them in one place, and they were all staring directly at him. Gripping the package so tightly his knuckles were white, he froze. He could barely breathe, and in this he took almost a mild comfort, feeling as if any slight move would have the lot of them descending upon him. He was now saturated with sweat, but he dared not wipe any away.

He was broken from his trance by a raspy but kind voice.
"Is that a visitor? Come into the kitchen, I've just put on some tea." The kitchen was half-obscured by a wall, and he could not see who owned the voice, but she seemed to be human so he cautiously made his way through the apartment. He stared at the floor, trying his hardest not to look at the feline eyes that watched his every move. He lifted his head when he got into the kitchen, which had, of course, even more cats, but also, notably, a human woman.

She was perhaps sixty or seventy, plainly dressed and standing over a pot of tea. It seemed such a normal scene, if not for the cats everywhere. Justin had always heard about old ladies surrounding themselves with cats, but he always figured that if the archetype had any truth to it there was at least a single-digit limit.
"Please, sit down. Its not often a visitor stops by. You'll have to excuse my appearance, but when you don't go out much you don't find much need to dress fancy, eh?"
"I'm, er. I'm here to deliver a package," Justin said, sitting down awkwardly.
"A package? My my, I wasn't expecting anything. That's always a nice surprise. Do you take any cream or sugar?" she responded, as she poured the tea into two porcelain cups.
"Just sugar is fine, thank you."

Several minutes of silence passed. At length, she smiled at him, and started to stir her tea with a spoon.
"I suppose you're wondering about the cats."
Justin practically spilled the contents of his cup, and tried to tell her she was wrong, but she simply chuckled and raised her hand, silencing him.
"Don't worry. If I was your age, and I saw an old lady surrounded by cats, I'd have my questions too. At my age you can't go around being embarrassed about things. I'm an old woman. I've lived a damn long time, and I've known a damn lot of people. And, well, I've been through a lot of stuff, and I decided one day that I'd had enough. Society is great, its got a lot going for it, but I felt like I'd seen everything I needed to see. All I wanted to see. But I wasn't ready to die. Not yet. Living isn't all about doing exciting things, you know. I'd had enough of doing things. You can live day to day without needing to entertain yourself. Me, I was content to live out my days in peace, no cares. But a woman can't live alone forever. Not me, anyway. I always loved taking care of my husband. To truly be there for someone, to devote yourself completely to them. He died, though, you know. Accident at the factory. He went quickly, nothing too painful. So I bought myself a cat. My first one, the black and white tabby over there. We lived out our days peacefully, with each others' company. We connected, you know. So I got some more cats. Can never hurt to have a couple friends around. The more I had them around, the more my days became happy. Taking care of so many, feeding and grooming and petting them, it gave me all the worldly pleasure I needed in this world. Time didn't matter anymore. We're slaves to time, we are. It's a useless thing, once you've got rid of it. I had nothing to do but take care of my cats, and I lived a simple existence. Its hard for you to understand, I'm sure. But I'm not ready to go back out there, don't think I ever will be. So I created my own world."

Justin listened intently. He didn't know what to say. In her own strange way, she was making a sort of sense to him. He understood her, in all her complex simplicity, and he felt a strange sadness for her. He wondered what kind of pain could have caused her to recede into this world of devotion and stillness, but he dared not inquire further.
"Oh my, but I do ramble. I'm sorry, dear. Now, what's your name?"
"I'm Justin. Nice to meet you." It sounded stupid, and he wished he hadn't said it after he was done.
"Justin? A good name. Strong name. Now then, let's see about this package, eh?" she said, pushing her cup and saucer aside. Justin had almost forgotten about the package, and leaned over, finding it on the ground. A few cats were circling it, sniffing it. He put it on the table and slid it over to her. She used the end of her spoon to tear the tape, and reached inside the box. However, she stopped short, and asked if Justin could take it out, she didn't have her glasses on.

He pulled out a rolled-up newspaper. Justin tilted his head as he unfurled it. It was a perfectly normal newspaper, though there appeared to be a note in the box. He looked it over quickly.
"A newspaper...I suppose its today's?" She said, her voice almost a whisper.
"Yeah," Justin said, “June 17th-”
"Wait!" She shouted, holding up her hands and looking away. Justin was shocked.
"Don't tell me the date! I don't want to know! Please, get it out of here!"
"I'm sorry, I don't understand, what's-" Justin was cut short. He had stopped talking so he could listen. There was a low hissing noise, coming from all around him. It was the cats. Their eyes were once more focused on him, and he started to slowly back up and get out of his seat. Before he could finish, however, they were upon him.

Justin bolted back, covering his face with one arm. However, he soon realized there were no cats on him. He opened his eyes, and saw them destroying the newspaper. They clawed at it madly, tearing it beyond recognition. The old woman had her heart on her chest, and tears were beginning to make their way down the labyrinth of her wrinkles. "I'm sorry, I didn't.."
"Please, just go. I'm not ready. I'm not ready for today yet. Please."
He turned around and began to walk out. Behind him, the cats were still hissing as they wrought havoc on the day's news. He hurried out, and leaned against the door when he finally closed it, breathing hard. Nothing that had gone on made sense. Then he opened his eyes.

The air was crystal clear, the floorboards shining. The wallpaper was vibrant and alive, in pristine condition. There were nameplates besides each door, and at the end of the hall a bright vase held a large bouquet of sunflowers. Jaw open, Justin rubbed his eyes. It was impossible. The place had been ready to collapse. He began to walk down the hallway.

As he did this, dust began to circulate. The wallpaper dulled, ripped, peeled from the wall. In front of him, the flowers began to droop, to dry up, and, as he got close to them, to crumble into a fine dust. The floor had sagged perhaps a few inches, and the air was pungent and old once more. Justin stood where he'd entered the hallway, once again trembling, much more noticeably this time. Throwing caution to the wind, he descended the stairs in a mad rush to leave the building.

Inside apartment 746, bony hands held a small letter. She read it intently, though tears blurred her vision slightly.

Hello Irma. Enclosed, you will find today's newspaper. I trust you'll find the news to be of profound interest. You might not be happy, I'm afraid, but all dreams have to end, all songs have to stop. It was clever of you, to figure out the thing with the cats. Some people say cats can see time, with their slitted eyes. That they can see the future, or the past, and everything in-between. This, they say, is why they were worshiped. If only they knew, eh? Well, you've had a good run but you can't stay in the same year forever, dear. I really am sorry.

"I'm not ready yet," she said, crumpling the letter up and throwing it behind her. A gray cat with a slightly bent tail nuzzled its way into her lap, and she stroked it idly.

AEAJ - Chapter 4

Chapter 4 - In Which Justin Inevitably Changes His Mind (Or In Which He Doesn't And The Story Ends)

Justin returned to his apartment, making a point to avoid his mailbox. No good had come of that thing lately. He collapsed on the couch, and made a valiant but ultimately futile effort to clear his mind and think of nothing. Deciding the only way to keep Chadwick out of his head was to busy himself with other things, he went shopping.

Which would have worked, had he been able to afford any more than milk, bread, cheese and a bar of chocolate. Justin returned home and ate a cheese sandwich, accompanied by a cool glass of milk. He finished the meal with a bar of chocolate.

Who did he think he was, anyway? Justin's being broke was none of Chadwick's business. He may not have had a working phone line, or next week's rent, but he still had electricity. Chadwick had been wrong about that, at least, he thought, a small but meaningful victory. Of course, upon the completion of this thought, the lights all went out. Justin uttered some words that need not be printed.

In any case, there were more important things than electricity. It wasn't like he couldn't start paying the bills again when he got a normal, non-suspicious job working for someone who wasn't leaving the country for any reason, or...well, someone who wasn't Chadwick. A job like that would be perfect. Even Justin's normal sanity-preserving indifference couldn't help him from feeling a little let down by life. Law school had taught him that law wasn't about fairness but about competition, his parents had abandoned him at the first sign of failing, and his boss had probably killed the ambassador to a friendly country, or at least sold a book with instructions on how best to do so.

To be fair, Chadwick was technically trying to help. Deep down, he knew that. Chadwick's smile was many things, but it was not a lie. Even so, it was just too much. Justin didn't have much of a life, but he wasn't about to abandon everything for someone he didn't know. He went to bed as soon as it got dark, and had a deep, dreamless sleep.

He awoke to the smell of bacon. It wasn't a bad way to be introduced to the waking world, and his first thought was surprise at how hungry he was. His second thought was that his apartment smelled of bacon, which was not an altogether bad thing but that was at the very least unusual. Justin got out of bed and sleepily made his way to the kitchen, where Chadwick was cooking something in a pan over what appeared to be a fire in his sink. Justin struggled to find words to express the amount of confusion present in his head, but all he managed to say was "Is there toast?"

Chadwick had prepared huevos rancheros, two strips of bacon, a split slice of buttered toast and glasses of both milk and orange juice. He made nothing for himself. When Justin asked about this, Chadwick explained that he'd picked up a breakfast sandwich on the way to his apartment this morning. Justin found it odd that Chadwick had then decided to make breakfast without a working stove, but he explained that it was nice to wake up to the smell of cooking food. He had already been up for hours, so it wouldn't have done him any good.

Not one to refuse a good meal, Justin dutifully ate the breakfast Chadwick had prepared. Chadwick cleared away the newspaper and wood chips acting as the stove in the sink, and cleaned the pan.
"Justin, I've another question for you. Your faucet, currently, is working. But, on occasion, it does not. Sometimes, you don't get the correct temperature of water. Why is that?"
Justin wiped his mouth before answering.
"Well, I don't know the specifics of it, but it'd have to do with the water heater, or drain systems, things like that. Why?"
Chadwick turned around, leaning on the counter. He seemed to be collecting his thoughts.
"Could it not be that your faucet is simply deciding not to give you the correct temperature of water? That perhaps you might have done something to upset it?"
"Its not something that ever occurred to me, to be sure." A reserved response to what Justin assumed was another test, something more to support Chadwick's theory on convictions.

"Smart answer. No trick, this time. Its a serious question. We personify everyday items all the time, without really thinking about it. The washing machine is acting up. A repairman can tell you why, but that's only one way of looking at it."
Chadwick went over to the table and sat down, looking thoughtfully at Justin, whose expression didn't betray any particular feeling about what he was saying.
"What would you say a dog spends the day thinking about?"
"Eating, sleeping, maybe playing or chasing things."
"So," Chadwick said, swaying slightly, as if organizing his response through movement, "a dog does not, for the most part, care whether or not the stock market is doing well."
"Not unless he's planning on eating it." This provoked a chuckle.

"A dog does not care about the stock market because it has no value to him. Up or down, it doesn't essentially effect his day. He chooses not to care about it, or what's on TV, or what time he has to do anything. He exists on a level in which he acknowledges that such things are largely inconsequential to him. Everything has a different level on which it exists. A faucet's existence is its function; it dispenses water. Anything unrelated to that is of no interest to it. As humans, we have complicated our means of existence such that we are unable to see any means of existing besides our own as important. An ant spends its lifespan of mere days with no desire other than to do mindless, repetitive tasks for the colony. It has the choice to spend its time going out and seeing the world, but to it, the option has no color, no appeal. It exists on a level we could not understand, a simplicity we could not hope to match. What, then, is to prevent a faucet from existing on that level?"
Justin mulled over this for a minute, before he replied with the only thing he could, and as he said it he knew it was exactly what Chadwick was expecting him to say.
"Humans built the faucet."
"Is that so different than God building us? Just because we do not specifically imbue a faucet with life does not mean that it lacks life. There is an essential truth of humanity, and it is both our greatest strength and most debilitating weakness."

"The truth is that much of what we see is a lie. We build a world around us that is easy to comprehend, that we can shape and mold as we wish, with little to no influence of outside forces. Man has spent thousands of years operating under this essential principle. While humans have always wondered about, if not prescribed to, the influence of higher beings, it stops on a certain cosmic level. We collectively interpret the world as being much, much simpler than it is, as a survival mechanism. We essentially have created our own world within the world that operates by the principles we have set forth." Chadwick now took a sip of Justin's milk, and paused, letting Justin absorb some of what he'd said.

"The faucet was built by humans, and is, thus, considered an inanimate object. In fact, from the moment of its completion the faucet has been, in fact, living. Its existence is so simple and straightforward compared to ours that it is difficult to consider fully, but it exists nonetheless. It exists as much as it needs to in order to fulfill its function and get satisfaction. So, if you neglect to clean your faucet, it may decide it does not want to give you water, or at least put up a fight. It is the only way in which it can communicate with the outside world, because the outside world isn't listening."

Justin finally spoke up, surprising even himself by interjecting. "This is all very interesting, but then how do you know all this?"
Chadwick smiled, wider than Justin had seen so far. This entire conversation had been planned out beforehand, and Justin was feeling increasingly helpless, like thinking you're driving a car only to discover you're on a track and have no control.
"I said we built a fake world within the world. I am freed from that world, and can see things for what they really are. Its a skill, more than anything. I can teach you, if you wish."
"And how is that? Is there some sort of "break out of the Matrix' class?"
"A delivery. One delivery is all you'll need. I told you that you were the only one, Justin. You have the predispositions and situation, among other things, that are necessary to aid me. Not everyone can break down the walls we build around ourselves and..."
Chadwick rubbed his chin, attempting to find a more sensitive way to finish his sentence, but failed.
"Frankly, I need someone who wont go insane and run away."

Justin narrowed his eyes.
"That five hundred dollars. That's the kind of money I'd be making, on a regular basis?"
"More, most likely."
"And all the travel?"
"Everything paid for by me."
"And danger?"
"Everything's dangerous. The question is whether one is able to deal with it or not."
"So, good pay, travel, but obviously not very secure safety-wise."
Chadwick's smile morphed into a sidelong smirk.
"So there were actually hippos at that table?"
"Oh, I've no idea. I just needed an example, and that's what I came up with."
Justin looked around at his apartment, the early sunlight doing nothing to pierce the darkness that pervaded the place. He really didn't have much lower to go.
"One package. One bullet hole or stab wound, and its over."
"Oh, they wont be carrying guns. But I'd watch out for biting."

AEAJ - Chapter 3

Chapter 3 - In Which Coffee Is Had

Au Lait had an outside area with about ten tables. Seated at one of the tables was a young man matching, to the smallest detail, Justin's mental image of Chadwick. Justin simply stood there, for a moment, staring at him. He was ordering something from a waitress who seemed completely enthralled in his choice of drink, that took almost a minute and a half for him to articulate properly. The young brunette did not mind this, and if anything felt lucky to have been the one with the honor of serving him. He turned, and saw Justin, whose gaze was still fixed on him, and widened his smile.
"Hullo, Justin."
English accent. Justin hadn't thought of that.

He sat across from Chadwick for a while, neither speaking. Chadwick was looking directly into Justin's eyes, which was making him wildly uncomfortable. After a while, he leaned back in his chair.
"Well, are you going to have a drink then? Contrary to the name, or perhaps because of it, the cafe au lait here is not fantastic. However, I think it can be universally agreed that a name like Au Lait has the precise amount of foreign appeal while maintaining a sort of warm, homey feeling. Of course, what I ordered is, under normal circumstances, much too complex for the average barrista to make. It may come off as slightly gaudy, but I am willing to pay as much as they ask and once you have sampled it, I very seriously doubt you will be able to enjoy any other drink here or anywhere else."

Justin wasn't sure what to say. He asked for a regular cup of coffee, and shifted nervously in his chair. Chadwick stretched out, and shot their waitress an intoxicating grin as she gave him a cup of something with an unclear color, brown yet orange, like a tree basking in the light of a brilliant sunset. It smelled wonderful, like the air in an autumnal forest at the height of its beauty.
"You notice it, right?" Chadwick said taking in the fragrance. "This cup of coffee is exactly like a forest at sunset, in the fall. Took me years to get the thing just right. You have no idea just how bad coffee can actually taste."
Justin cocked his head slightly, and spoke his first words, besides ordering his beverage, since he'd sat down.
"Why don't you just make it yourself?"
Chadwick took a sip, eyes closed, so absorbed in his actions Justin began to repeat himself. However, Chadwick spoke first.
"I like to see how others will make it. No two sunsets are ever the same, nor should a recipe be set in stone. I order it based on my feelings, the sunset I want, the kind of forest I feel like standing in. The young lass serving us has made it exquisitely."
Once again, Justin was at a loss.

He felt awkward now, sipping coffee, cream, and sugar. His clothes, his drink, his demeanor, all seemed so plain in comparison to the brash yet stylish way in which Chadwick dressed, drank, and lived. He had said volumes, Justin barely a sentence. And none of it coming close to addressing why he was there. Breaking his unintentional vow of silence, he popped the question.
"So...what do you want me to do?"
Chadwick opened his eyes, his cup poised at his lips, the coffee millimeters away from his mouth. He gazed at Justin through the steam, and at length put the cup down.
"I perform a service. I don't know if you could really find a concrete name for it. I am a go-between. When two parties find it unfavorable or inconvenient to communicate directly with each other, I perform whatever action aids the process. You, Justin, would be doing deliveries."
"Deliveries?" was all Justin said, but Chadwick understood that he was actually asking how a delivery boy position could warrant five hundred dollars of encouragement.
"Of course, the things you'll be delivering will be very important. The parties I work with are willing to pay very well for my services, and I in return can pay you very well. I trust you are satisfied with what I included in the letter?"
"Are you kidding?" Justin said. "That was five hundred dollars. I don't think anyone's ever been paid five hundred dollars to read a letter."
Chadwick sipped his coffee, and smiled, bowing his head slightly. "I suppose not. I'm sure it seems over-the-top, but as I said""
"You're the only one who can do what I need," Justin interrupted, completing Chadwick's sentence. At this, Chadwick's smile widened. His smile was a living being, writhing and moving, completely independent from Chadwick's will. It had its own presence, its own personality.

"Justin, let me ask you a question. I'd like you to answer quickly and honestly. Don't think about it, just say what you feel. Ready? Let us say, hypothetically, that I were to tell you that the table closest to the window is occupied not by people, but by two hippopotami. What is your response?"
Chadwick could see Justin was inspecting the question for hidden meaning, so he wagged his finger.
"No no, no thinking. Just answer."
"Alright," Justin said, derailing his train of thought. "I suppose I'd look and see if there were really Hippotami there."
"You would actually look?"
"Well, assuming I don't have the time to think about whether there's some sort of metaphor or hidden meaning at work, I might as well just find out if they're actually sitting there."
Chadwick interlocked his fingers, and put his elbows on the table, hiding his mouth. He looked at Justin for a while once more, eventually lowering his hands onto the table.
"Justin, there are, if we're going to be simple about it, three types of people in the world. The first type has no convictions. They take the world in idealism, believing whatever comes there way because they don't see any reason why not to. The second type has incredibly strong convictions, judging the world and everything in it by a set of mostly unwavering standards."

"If I were to pose the question to someone in the first group, they would either believe me outright, or try immediately to think of the circumstances in which I could be right. Someone in the second group would point out everything that would make such a claim impossible based on their standards of logic and reason, or at the very least do everything in their power to disprove it. You, however, did neither. You are the type of person who simply investigates, neither completely trusting nor mistrusting my claims. This is essential for your job."
Justin listened intently. The logic, he thought, was somewhat flawed, and the use of such an extreme example seemed the sort of thing that would skew the results of the experiment, but he seemed to have answered the way Chadwick had wanted him to.
"That's enough for me. You are, most definitely, the one. If you'd like to take the job, we'll begin right away. I should mention, we will be moving quite a bit; my clients are rather spread out, and it does no good having to complicate things as far as traveling goes. In other words, you'd be abdicating your home and going on the road, after a fashion."

Now wait a second, Justin thought, I am just beginning to accept the fact that this man has a legitimate job he has selected me for, but he's only just met me and he's telling me to move? His face did not betray this, however. When he needed it, Justin had a fantastic poker face. Chadwick, likewise, had made it almost impossible to see that he was scanning Justin's face for an insight into his thoughts. The two studied each other, not moving, not blinking, eyes locked on each other. Justin trusted Chadwick less now than ever, and yet things were still too strange to outright ignore. Before he could come to a decision though, Chadwick broke their locked stares and the silence.
"Oh, come now. Like you have anywhere to go back to, anyway? Is your electricity even still working?"
That was it. Justin couldn't take any more of Chadwick and his living smile and auburn coffee and indelible charm.
|I'm sorry, but I don't think I'll be taking you up on your offer. Will you be wanting that money back?"
"To even think such a thing," Chadwick said, unphased, "is an insult to my character. The money is yours. I'll even buy the coffee. I rather wish you'd reconsider, though."
Justin thanked him again, still refusing, and left.

At the table by the window, the male hippopotamus ordered a second iced latte, his wife a cappuccino, light on the sugar (she was, the undertone suggested, watching her figure).

AEAJ - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 - Dear Justin,

Hello. You don't know me. And, technically, I don't actually know you. I know of you, though, and this is enough for our purposes. My name is Chadwick, and I think it would be in the best interests of both of us if we were to meet. You see, I perform a service that I believe you would be incredibly inept at aiding. I realize it is a tad strange for me to ask you to believe that I'm not trying to scam you for all you're worth, but I think we both know that you're not worth much. While I don't know you, I do know a bit about your situation, and it is most definitely not a favorable one. All I'm asking is that you meet me for tea. There's a cafe two blocks from where I'm sending this letter, Au Lait. I'll be in town in two days, and I'll be there at 1 o'clock sharp. If you are to attend, we will discuss the aforementioned service and what, exactly, I'm offering. As a token of my seriousness, I have included a small payment. There is much more where that came from, and there is no one else who can do what I need. I await our meeting.

Sincerely yours,
Chadwick Emmerson the Forty Second and Three Quarters

Justin read the letter twice, in case he'd suffered some sort of massive head trauma while reading and had hallucinated its contents. When he was done, he folded the letter back up, and tossed it onto the counter, then went to lay down on his couch. On the T.V., a topless, three hundred pound woman was assaulting her husband who'd had sexual relations with a thin but plain secretary for some months. The host of the show looked on in horror, the security guards standing up very slowly and allowing some time to past before they quickly and efficiently broke up the fight, which ended in no legal injuries and was met with monstrous applause. The host, struck with awe that a scuffle had ensued from what was a perfectly normal situation, went into the audience to get the reactions of the crowd, where an elderly woman made a comment that did not survive the network censors. Justin, however, was staring at the five hundred-dollar bills in his hand that had been in the envelope.

That night, over a delivered box of pork lo mein, his apartment cast in the cool gray glow of an old movie from the forties, one phrase of the letter suddenly insinuated itself into his head. There is no one else who can do what I need. What did that mean? Chadwick had curiously forgotten to mention exactly what it was he did. The natural assumption was, as he himself had said, a scam, or at the very least something very illegal. It was, he figured, a natural technique of such people to make their targets think they are special, that they are being done a magnificent service by a stroke of amazing luck. But to say something so vague and mysterious seemed counterproductive. It made the letter all the more suspicious. This was to say nothing of the five hundred dollars he'd been given. Whoever Chadwick was, he didn't seem like the type to send someone that much money unless it was legit. This was the impression Justin got, anyway.

In fact, in spite of the short letter he felt as if he could see Chadwick perfectly in his mind. He has hair the color of looking directly into the sun, long and mercilessly styled, probably for at least an hour every day. Not one strand is out of place, not one modicum of frizz. He has a shirt of lilac satin, a classy yet sporty black jacket, and dull leather pants a rare sort of unobtrusive red. He carries himself almost like a tree, swaying in the wind, moving much more than the average person does in the course of any particular conversation. And he is always smiling. Sometimes its a smirk, sometimes an almost unnoticeable curve of his lips, but he always looks, to some degree, pleased.

It was not like Justin to form such concrete images of people, especially not from single-paragraph letters. He had less well-formed visuals of people he actually knew. Chadwick, he realized, was a genius. He sent a mysterious letter brimming with exceedingly personal yet headache-inducingly vague sentiments asking for something he of course would not discuss but that he felt needed five hundred dollars of encouragement for Justin to do. And all the while, Chadwick must have known that the reader would be able to form such a complete picture of him; he seemed like the type who selected every word, controlling absolutely the content and interpretation of what he wrote.

As he predicted, Justin found it difficult not to think about Chadwick, his letter, or his money for the next day. At first, he tried to force all of it out of his mind; just forget that he'd ever read it. However, he found it was easier to let the thoughts mull around in his head, and managed to work it down to a low nagging, thinking around it while always aware of its presence.

Monday came, and Justin woke up at 11. He didn't usually get twelve hours of sleep, but having a person he'd never met in his head all day must have taken quite a bit out of him. He drank a glass of orange juice extremely slowly, taking in the waking world gently. Still unable to shake off his sleepiness, he jumped in the shower. The warm water only made things worse, so he turned down the temperature, which is to say he actually fell asleep and hit the water control with his hand, and somewhere between hitting the floor and the shards of icy water assaulting him, he woke up substantially.

After his shower, Justin applied a pertinent but modest amount of gel to his hair, brushed his teeth, and went to his closet. Recalling his image of Chadwick and his wardrobe, he felt an overwhelming need to dress fancy himself. Unfortunately, Justin was not the type to wear anything fancy and thus put on a white buttoned-up shirt and a black pair of pants. That was about as complicated as his wardrobe got, if one was to speak generously. Once he was ready, he read Chadwick's letter once more. He still found it hard to believe any of what had been written.

Even so, at exactly 12:59 and 38 seconds, he arrived at Au Lait.