“There is only one thing a writer can write about: what is in front of his senses at the moment of writing… I am a recording instrument… I do not presume to impose “story” “plot” “continuity”… Insofar as I succeed in Direct recording of certain areas of psychic process I may have limited function… I am not an entertainer…”
Excerpt from Naked Lunch
What Is It?
(An essay concerning the subtext of the film by the same title)
by Crispin Hellion Glover
Is this culture content? Is it happy? Are the smiles broadcast by this culture’s media the smiles that reflect the collective mind? Does the self-professed compassion of the media for the unfortunate seem sincere?
Is this culture a Judeo-Christian culture? Is forgiveness a quality of Christian ethos? Didn’t Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold of Columbine high school pose with a caption that stated, “Stay alive, stay different, stay crazy”? Didn’t they target Christians? Weren’t they accused of being “Nazis”? Wasn’t one of them Jewish? Wasn’t one of them an honor student? If these fellows were staying “crazy” and staying “different,” and thinking on their own, were they perhaps manifesting a counter-cultural ideal?
What else in this culture were the Columbine killers attacking? Aren’t “jocks,” whom they killed, generally considered common “good guys” by our culture? Don’t jocks represent pro-cultural values? Do those who hold values that counter the culture see jocks as boorish, vapid, brute, conceited and condescending, who willfully insult and violate those who refuse to gang with the masses?
Were Harris and Klebold reacting to the media itself? Did they give their own lives and take others to make a point about the media at large? Can it be true that the media-at-large is so neurotic that it is unable to truthfully describe the Columbine event? Is it true that a videotape they produced just before the killings is now being withheld so the public can not determine their own thoughts about Harris’ and Klebold’s statements?
In Civilization and Its Discontents, did Sigmund Freud define a neurotic as an individual holding thoughts that clash with those held by the prevailing culture, an individual who subverts those clashing thoughts to the subconscious that later manifest in the form of anxiety and unnecessary behavior? If this is so, what does one consider a culture whose prevailing ideas express hypocrisy, sham and double-standard? Does this somehow define a neurotic culture?
Does Steven Spielberg hold the same values I wish upon myself? Does the mind of this grinning, bespectacled, baseball-capped man entirely reflect this culture?
Is it true that in his waning years, Orson Welles asked Steven Spielberg for a small amount of money with which he could make a final film? Is it true Steven Spielberg refused? Is it true that Steven Spielberg bought a sled used in Citizen Kane for an extremely large sum of money?
Do Steven Spielberg’s passions burn? Do passions burn in the man now imprisoned who wished to anally rape Steven Spielberg? Do our cultural mouthpieces confidently inform us that the wish to anally rape Steven Spielberg is a bad thought? Could anal rape of Steven Spielberg be simply the manifestation of a cultural mandate?
Do you believe Steven Spielberg is an ideal guide and influence for our culture? Do Steven Spielberg’s films question our culture? What do Steven Spielberg’s films question? Does Steven Spielberg focus much of his fantasy life on young people? Did he portray children wallowing in sewers filled with fecal matter in Schindler’s List? Did he use children to finger paint an adult in Hook? Does he collect the illustrations of Norman Rockwell, such as the one showing a young boy in his underwear examined by a doctor? Are the inclinations of Steven Spielberg above suspicion by the media-fed culture? Was Steven Spielberg very friendly with Michael Jackson? Wasn’t Michael Jackson supposed to play Peter Pan in Steven Spielberg’s version of the story? Now that Michael Jackson is no longer held in favor by the mass media, does Spielberg associate with him? Do Michael Jackson and Steven Spielberg share similar opinions about the sexuality of young boys?
Did Joseph Goebbels popularize certain ideals to the mass culture? Does Steven Spielberg attempt to do the same thing? Is celebrity more special than actual truth in art?
When you join in a conversation with strangers, do you openly discuss any idea whatsoever without fear of conflict? Or do you restrain yourself from discussing certain things for fear of offending people and then becoming an outcast? Are there laws that deem certain forms of thought as bad and wrong? Is what is now termed “hate” a form of thought?
Does our culture consider it acceptable to have a minstrel represent a black person on film? Does our culture consider it acceptable to have a person of average intelligence represent a retarded person on film? Why is one thing questionable, and one thing acceptable? Did Adolf Hitler entertain any good thoughts? Was Shirley Temple sexy as a young girl?
What if you wish to express these ideas? Can people sue you for expressing ideas, particularly if they’re blamed for inspiring behavior considered antithetical to cultural norms?
Would the cultural mainstream ever silence or suppress Steven Spielberg? Has the United States government given the immensely wealthy Steven Spielberg millions of dollars to fund a media project that reflects his religious heritage, and his cultural beliefs? Does The Talmud speak of the superiority of the Jews and the inferiority of other cultures and beliefs? Does Steven Spielberg reflect this religious imperative? Is Steve Spielberg neurotic? Is this belief hidden and suppressed?
If one discovers that everything one has been taught to be good is actually false, what then? At what point is one neurotic?
Did Vincent Van Gogh, Diane Arbus and Rainer Werner Fassbinder die for the sins of their culture? Did Joseph Goebbels?
Are we fed massive cultural propaganda? Are we infused with the belief that we act as we wish and do what we want? Are we not simply believing what cultural propaganda suggests us to think?
Do you like MTV? Do you like Steven Spielberg? Do you like post-punk rock? Do you like trip hop? Do you like rap? Do you define yourself according to the music you listen to? Do you consider yourself a true lover of music because you are in a rock band, or because your boyfriend is in a rock band? Do you like tattoos? Do you like body piercing? Do you believe that love, kindness, compassion, recycling and equality will save this culture from all its woes? Do you? Do you?
Is it considered “career suicide” to question Steven Spielberg if one is involved in the entertainment business? If one is not involved in the entertainment business is it considered a social suicide to question Steven Spielberg? If these things are so, what does that point to? Does this mean freedom of expression is actually curtailed in our culture by certain social pressures? Is calling someone a “fascist” in American culture today the counterpart to saying someone was a “communist” during the Joseph McCarthy era of the 1950s?
Does our culture congratulate itself for taking interest in the lack of original ideas personified by the name of Steven Spielberg? Do his films take chances or take risks in order to amplify, change or challenge the cultural though process? Does Steven Spielberg take risks, or does he simulate the idea of taking risks? What risk was involved in making Saving Private Ryan or Schindler’s List, or adopting a black child? Was there any risk at all? Would Steven Spielberg have adopted that same child in the Deep South of the 1950s where there would have been risk of being called a “nigger lover”? Were the adoption of a black child and the subject matter of his movies actually business decisions for which he knew he would be congratulated?
When Steven Spielberg clutched his Academy Award for Schindler’s List, saying it’s for the “six million,” was he speaking of a quantity of people killed, or the quantity of dollars poured into his bank account?
Did Steven Spielberg truly help the culture understand Stanley Kubrick’s ideas at an Academy Awards eulogy? Or did he accuse Kubrick’s films of being “hopeful” to make them seem as if they sell the same ideas as Steven Spielberg’s movies? Was A Clockwork Orange about hope? Was Barry Lyndon about hope? Was Dr. Strangelove about hope? Was Lolita about hope? Was Full Metal Jacket about hope? Was The Killing about hope?
Was Steven Spielberg’s company sued by an African-American woman who claimed that Amistad was based on her writing? Was this African-American woman suddenly happy with Steven Spielberg after he deposited a lot of money into her bank account?
Does the amount of money taken in by people determine happiness in this culture? Is the earth an unlimited resource, or is there a definitive quantity for people to exploit for gross amounts of money? When a capitalist invokes the word “hope,” does he speak about the continued escalation of his earning power, without being stopped? Could this hope be an illusion?
Are the ice sheets of the Arctic and Antarctic melting and shearing off? Could negative population growth possibly help solve this problem? Isn’t one child per two people negative population growth? Would Steven Spielberg ever support the idea of negative population growth within the medium? Have the goals of Freemasonry, as encapsulated by the back half of the dollar bill, succeeded? Has a megastate of greed been created?
Did DreamWorks, the megacorporate entity co-owned by Steven Spielberg, consider paving over the last remaining wetland in Southern California to create a studio? Does Steven Spielberg feel comfortable emasculating the natural? Is climbing the Alps, or is riding the Matterhorn rollercoaster in Disneyland, more attractive to Steven Spielberg? Is the theme park mentality of our culture, which is made to feel “right” and “moral” by the propagandizing movies of Steven Spielberg, helping to destroy individual thought processes and emasculate what remains of the earth?
Is it possible that the Columbine shootings would have not occurred if Steven Spielberg had never wafted his putrid stench upon our culture, a culture he helped homogenize and propagandize?
Would the culture benefit from Steven Spielberg’s murder, or would it be lessened by making him a martyr? Or would people then begin to realize their lives had become less banal and more interesting due to his departure?
Because I think it is possible a beautiful piece of non-lingual music could well be written by an angry victim once Steven Spielberg becomes a corpse. It could be that this angry victim of banal and ruinous propaganda will have written an anthem signaling a new era, a new thought process, a new music, and a new culture that is desperately needed in the coming days, and forevermore.
The one question lingering before this new utopian culture may very well be:
What…Is…It?
(by Crispin Glover, from Apocalypse Culture II)
Chloroform Dream
Ksssst…
The fumes make my head feel light and cold. Every time I hear the noise of compacted air being released from the pipes, the room becomes filled with more fog. And each time it makes it harder for me to recognize where I am. I’m stumbling around trying to see but the gas makes my eyes water so I can’t focus.
I’m walking crookedly in a cold chemical fog. As I walk I feel a warm body slam into me. I almost fall over but I don’t. The impact of the body jars me but I force my body to keep its balance so I can shove the body as far away from me as I can. I hear the body scream out as it falls over and disappears into the floor. Someone always screams and it makes the rest of us sigh. We all want to scream.
The gas has caused my eyes to freeze open. I can’t blink away the fumes. As I stumble around another body slams into me. Again I shove it hard and make it scream. The sound makes me warm for the time the scream takes to begin and end. A momentary relief is better than none at all.
Every couple steps I get slammed by a warm body. Each time my response is the same. I try to figure out the pattern so I can brace myself better. I can’t risk being the one that falls over. But when I think I have the pattern down, the pattern brakes. I am not sure if this is just coincidence or intentional but it doesn’t matter. I just focus on pushing as hard as I can and hope I am the one that stays up.
The bodies stop coming but I keep waiting for them. After awhile another one slams into me so hard that I almost lose my balance. I try to push it away but this time the body is freezing cold and it sticks to me.
My icicle is the same size as me and is sticking to my chest. His body is so close that its face is right against mine. I can see his face through the fog. He looks at me with vacant eyes. His pale blue mouth is tightened into a straight line across his face. His hair is stiff with frozen fumes. I know this man well but he doesn’t seem to recognize me. He just keeps staring at me with those milky white sockets.
He clasps on to the front of my jacket with stiff blue hands. I need to find a way out of this room. He is my buddy now so I must take him with me. It is hard to maneuver myself with a man frozen to me but I do it anyway. I try not to look at my buddy because his white eyes make me shiver. I wish I could close my eyes but my eyelids are still frozen open. The fumes are starting to sting.
I feel around to find a way out. My arms flail at my sides around my buddy. At first he kind of stumbles along with me but as more of his body begins to freeze, his legs stop moving. Finally his knees bend and freeze to my knees and he allows his feet to drag behind him as I move. I am now fully carrying his weight against my chest and knees. It slows me down but I stumble on. I am just glad no one is slamming into us because I don’t think I’d be able to hold both of us up.
I do my best to ignore him and keep feeling around trying to find something other than cold air. My hands finally touch a cold slippery wall. I slide my hands along the wall hungrily and press my body against it. I want to put as much of myself as I can on the wall but with my buddy attached in front of me, I can only touch it with my side. I turn my head and press my face as hard as I can against the wall so I can see it through the fumes. As soon as I attempt this, I hear more air escaping through the pipes. My buddy presses his face on me as his head completely freezes over. His whole body is frozen now and I know he won’t be moving anymore. Luckily I am turned away, so his face only freezes to my cheek. I can see those milky eyes from the corners of mine. I feel his weight on my head, chest and legs, the ice is starting to burn.
I try to forget him and focus on seeing the wall and finally I do. I am happy when I realize that the wall is a mirror. I can see my wild frozen eyes reflected back at me but it only looks like me for a second. As I keep looking, those eyes start to belong to someone else until they do become someone else. Those eyes remind me of someone. I’ve seen those eyes many times and they do not belong to me.
Neibma first mirrors my position but when she sees that I recognize her, she shifts but keeps her face up to the mirror. I look behind her and I can see her room. It is black with blue wooden furniture. It looks just like my room but reversed.
I try to look around more to see if there are other things I recognize but my buddy brings me back. I can feel a cold burn in my head, sort of like when you drink something cold on a hot day and you get a brain freeze but this was much more painful. I look at my reflection to see what is happening and I notice part of his head is buried into my skull. I can feel a pulling on my chest as more of his body begins to seep into mine. I start to panic.
I go back to focusing on the other side of the mirror. My face is pressed up against it so hard that my eyeballs are touching the glass. My eyelashes freeze onto the mirror but I don’t care because I see Neibma looking back at me again. I plead with my eyes for her to help me. Her posture matches mine exactly but when she sees me notice her again, she moves back and beckons to me. I try to tell her that I can’t but I know she can’t hear me. My eyelashes are stuck to the mirror so I can’t even shake my head no.
Neibma jumps up and down trying to get me to come with her. I don’t think she realizes that it isn’t that easy. I try not to look at my reflection but the pain gets stronger and I rip my eyelashes off just see what is happening to me. The front half of my buddy is completely inside me. Most of his head is already in mine so I can hear him screaming in his mind. I see flashes of his childhood in the backs of my eyes and they are not pleasant.
The memories suck me in so I see them as if I am really there. Just as I feel my six-year-old head being shoved into a bucket of cold water, I hear loud pounding and I jump back. I finally notice Neibma banging loudly on the mirror trying to get my attention. When she sees recognition on my face she gestures hard with her hands. She looks like she is trying to push something. She nods and points to me and keeps making pushing movements against the mirror.
Neibma is telling me to push so I do. I push my face so hard against the mirror that my face is now completely flat. I think I have completely crushed in my nose but I don’t care, I keep pushing. My buddy’s screaming makes it hard to concentrate and I can feel his brain begin to completely cover mine. More of his memories invade my vision and they are worse than before. I can see everything he sees and I am starting to get lost in him. Neibma punches the mirror so hard that I think it is going to shatter. As soon as I notice her again I push against the mirror with everything I have left and I feel my body begin to fall.
When I look up I see Neibma holding me in her black arms. She looks different now. She looks like a film negative with black teeth and white hair. Other than that she looks like a female version of me: same nose and mouth and expression. I look at her, studying every feature on her black face and she blinks at me with clear white eyes.
I watch her reach over to a blue table lamp that is right next to us. She picks up a soft black cloth and gently presses the cloth against my nose and mouth. The cloth is damp and I can taste the sweet chemical smell as the cloth touches my lips. As I inhale deeply Neibma leans over and whispers my name in my ear. Her breath feels warm against my head.
“Ambien.”
It is then that I feel safe enough to scream.
(Story from my 1st collection of short stories:The Puzzle Factory)
The Kitchen
Melanie woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of a shotgun. She knew that sound from shooting at empty beer cans with her father on weekends. It was the only gun her father owned. It belonged to his grandfather and was the only thing he inherited when he died.
He loved that gun.
Melanie ran out of her room and looked down over the banister. She could make out movement in the kitchen.
As she ran downstairs she ran into Jen who was standing with her arms at her side at the bottom of the stairs. Her sister didn’t even react to Melanie bumping her, she was too busy looking into the kitchen with a mixture of pain and fascination. Mel studied her, intrigued by her sister’s face but the sobs moved her gaze back to the kitchen.
Chuck’s silhouette was standing over their mother’s body which was on the floor. Her head had blown wide open and the blood was streaming out of her all over the tile. Chuck sobbed and stumbled against a chair but weakly caught his balance. The bottles of beer that lay strewn all over the kitchen table confirmed that.
He sobbed as he looked down at the corpse at his feet. Despite all his long hours at work and daily drinking, he was an affectionate man. Always smiling for his family save for the few moments of tears while he watched static poker.
Earlier that evening, Melanie had been sitting with him on the couch swinging her legs in her pink pajamas watching television with him. He seemed much sadder than she had ever seen him before. The pain in his eyes was prominent and he even let out a tiny sob as tears streamed down his face. Melanie didn’t understand what was happening but she knew she didn’t like it.
“I hate poker!” She announced.
Chuck laughed and took a swig of Coors. He licked the beer off his lips and kissed the top of Melanie’s head, patting it gently as she glared at the television. Someone just put down a Royal Flush and won the pot. $1,000 bucks.
“Me too Mel, me too.” He said.
The sobbing in the kitchen turned into wails of torment. Melanie could only recall snapshots of that night. Waking up, looking over the banister, running into Jen, her strange expression and warm back, Chuck’s silhouette, Mother in a pool of blood…
Then Melanie heard the familiar click as her father cocked the shotgun. Jen finally broke her gaze away from the kitchen and looked down at Melanie who was peeking in on the scene from her back.
Jennifer pushed Melanie’s face behind her so that her head rested at the small of her back. Warm and soothing, she could smell the fabric softener Mother generously liked to pour over all the laundry.
“Don’t look Mel. Whatever happens, don’t look.”
Melanie opened her eyes, only seeing the baby blue cotton of Jennifer’s pajamas in the darkness. She wants to look but Jennifer held her head still. She could hear more sobbing and another shot from her grandfather’s shotgun followed by the plop of a body falling to the floor.
Jennifer didn’t move and Melanie never looked inside that kitchen again.
(Excerpt from Clown Goes Mad, novel version)
She coughs up a ball of blood onto the sand, gagging out every drop. More laughter comes from the shadow above her. She squints up into the scalding sun and sees the looming dark figure standing over her. His black shadow is long and lean, save for the prickly ends of his fiery, orange hair that sticks out all over the top of his head like a chaotic pin cushion.
Her fear is not any less unyielding than before. She shakes and shivers under the scalding sun. Blood drips down her face from her broken nose. The gashes under her blackened eyes that had bloomed open under his punches, are clotted with sand.
Under all the bloody swelling is a soft pixie face with a delicate chin and eyes made out of concrete. Even as she begins to tear up like a calf about to be slaughtered, her eyes remain hard.
Mel attempts to stand but can’t feel her legs and ends up slipping back into the scorching sand that digs into every open wound on her body.
She hears more laughter and feels a sharp, deep pain that rips into her stomach. Another pain explodes across her jaw. Her body jerks upward and plops back down like a sack of butchered meat. She can still feel everything. She hasn’t yet reached that moment of euphoric numbness one receives when they have surpassed their pain tolerance. She knows she won’t ever get that here. She will feel everything until she’s dead.
It bothers her that she can’t even see him. How can he remain in shadow while being right in front of her?
Another kick to the gut and Mel is forced into a writhing fetal position. Mel breathes into her knees and watches her blood and snot spurt on her pants.
The agony is relentless. She could have been in this position for centuries. Time doesn’t exist at this level of pain.
More blood splatters out of her throat and onto the sand. Mel begins to make low gurgling sounds. She’s choking on her own blood as she gasps for air. The ear-fucking, high-pitched giggles from the shadow echo into her ears. Her eyes turn to razor blades. If she could only catch one good breath she could stand up and fucking kill him.
She can feel him walk around her curled up body but his calculated movements do not make a sound. Mel shuts her eyes and tries to raise her arms to shield herself from the desert. The sun’s stabbing rays sting through her irises, blinding her. Her skull throbs harder.
He walks around again and eclipses the sun with his body, allowing a minuscule of deliverance from the torment. Slowly, he crouches down in front of her. Mel tries to shield her eyes from the sun but he grabs the back of her head by her short, black, sweaty hair and yanks her head back so that her pulverized little fairy face is forced to open up to the violent ball of light in the sky.
He moves his face closer to hers and twists her head sharply so that she is looking right into his eyes. It’s the same wild-eyed insanity she’s looked into for infinity. Deep pits of abyss that reveal nothing but apathy is all she has ever seen. His grin reveals perfect pearly blocks that grind together in anticipation like a rabid dog about to rip into the soft quaking throat of a baby rabbit.
His pale face is perfectly clean save for a scatter of freckles on the tip of his nose. Were it not for his rabid eyes and tangled spikes of fiery hair, he would look like a jovial 50’s milkman on a vintage billboard: just a working-class man coming over to deliver some sweet sustenance at your all-American front door.
He leans into Mel’s face and slowly licks her cheek. She cringes away from his tongue and tries to strangle him with her glare. Bits of her bloody sand bits are scattered on his bottom lip which he licks into his mouth and grins as he grinds the bloody sand along his molars. Her eyes reveal nothing but a death sentence for him. The Orange-Haired Man laughs in appreciation.
She spits blood on his face and he laughs harder as he punches her across the jaw. He yanks her hair towards him, forcing the side of her face to touch his mouth and breathes heavily into her ear. Her eyes remain as cold as ever but the accelerated pulse in her chest and inability to breath reveals his effect on her.
His eyes fire up with hysterical cachinnation as he soaks up the energy gained through the climax of her suffering. He bends three fingers on his right hand and points out his thumb and index finger, making an L-shape with his fingers. Using his left hand to hold the right one steady, he presses his index finger into Mel’s forehead. He’s making a gun shape with his hand the same way kids do when playing “cowboys” in their front yard.
Mel reacts to the finger gun with genuine fear. Her eyes finally break away from the abyss as she tries to scramble away but a boot pressed down on her kneecap, threatening to snap it, stops her and keeps her from moving a millimeter.
He snaps his thumb forward and back, making a cocking sound with his tongue.
She feels his breath creep through her ear and run all along her entire body until she sees nothing but the words that crawl into her ear from his rabid lips.
“Kill God!”
The Orange-Haired Man shoves Mel to the ground, splattering her head into the sand and pulls the “trigger”.
The thundering sound of a gun spirals through Mel’s brain as she blacks out.
(Intro to Clown Goes Mad, the novel version. I’ve been working on the screenplay off and on for 13 years and wrote a few chapters in novel form to help me with the script. Shooting for the film begins this July in Los Angeles and Mexico.)
Western ideas of death are fucked up. People are terrified of it and they shouldn’t be because we’re all going to die.
It is out of the ordinary for someone to post their dead child on Facebook but I see it as a modern version of Victorian memento mori photography. I think seeing the beauty of death and sharing that is a lot healthier than fearing the inevitable and blocking it from your mind. That is why I post so much death-related shit on my tumblr.
Death is beautiful as is life.
I am curious why the dead baby looks like it’s made of clay though…
Voyage
The boat rocking up and down is making me nauseous. The people next to me don’t seem to mind. They laugh and talk as if we were all sitting perfectly still. They all know each other and think alike. I try to laugh and talk like them. I smile and nod and say “yes” every time they ask me something. I wonder if they can see right through me.
I’m feeling sick from the constant rocking. The laughter and jabbering around me isn’t helping much either but I keep trying to act as if I’m fine. It’s all in my head. Everything is fine. We’re all having a good laugh, chatting it up. We are all friends here. Nothing to be scared of….
The waves are getting bigger and the boat rocks up and down in greater leaps. Vomit fills my mouth and I swallow it down as I smile and nod. The wind blows harder making my hair flap behind me. Strands of hair slap my eyes. I quickly flick it away, a bit shaken up by the whole ordeal but everyone keeps laughing and yapping as if everything is fine. I try to stand but immediately sit back down. It feels worse when I stand up. I look ahead and see two little school children laughing and talking to each other. They start to sing.
“…The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out!”
I stare at them as they sing in bright chirpy voices.
“…The worms play pinochle on your snout!”
They fall to the floor and giggle. Their parents look down at them and laugh heartily. Everyone breaks into uproarious laughter. One sneezes and they all stop laughing to say “God bless you!” I think they all look at me because I don’t say anything. I try to shake it off and start laughing forcefully.
“You ever come here before?”
I turn to my left and see a rugged looking man in his mid-thirties. His hair is hidden under a grey wool newsboy cap but I can see tufts of thick curly brown hair sticking out from the side. He lights a cigarette and offers me one. I take it in hopes it will calm me the fuck down.
He keeps staring at me. At first it makes me nervous but then I remember he asked me a question. I am about to say “yes” since that always seems like the most agreeable answer, but this time “no” is acceptable too.
“I’m Jim.” Jim says between puffs.
I don’t tell him my name because I don’t remember it. I just puff away on my cigarette and hope he doesn’t ask.
“Have…you…been here before?” I manage to stammer. It is customary to speak when in a conversation. I don’t want him to think I’m odd.
“Naw, naw. I’ve read about it enough though. But once you take the trip you can’t really take it again if you know what I mean. HA HA HA!”
He smacks my shoulder as he laughs. I have no idea what he means but I begin to force a smile and nod. By the time I’ve worked myself up to a titter he’s stopped laughing. The water is really getting high now. It feels like the boat is tipping all the way backwards and forwards with each wave. The wind has progressed to a roar.
“I think we’re getting closer!” Jim yells over the wind.
I am freezing and try to wrap my tiny black flannel blanket around my shoulders but it keeps flying up in the air behind me. The other passengers are huddled together with their friends and family, still talking and laughing over the wind. Everyone has come to the trip with someone but me. I look at Jim who is huddling into his blue peacoat. Our cigarettes have gone out but I still suck on mine. Jim tosses his up into the air and it flies into the dark ocean.
“You here with anyone?” I can’t hear myself over the wind even though I am screaming.
Jim grins and puts his arm around me. He is actually quite attractive. I like his dark brown eyes and five o’clock shadow. I could have done a lot worse…I could be completely alone.
“Naw, naw. Wife left me ages ago. Couldn’t find anyone to come on such short notice.
“Me neither.” I mumbled.
“Well at least we have each other!” Jim squeezes my shoulder and I huddle into his arm. His coat is warm. I don’t feel as anxious anymore. It’s either because of the cigarette or him.
Jim smiles at me from under his little grey cap that he now has pulled down over his eyes. His grin is wide and I can see the stubble on his face sticking out from all sides. His smile widens. His scratchy striped scarf flaps behind him in the breeze. His grin keeps expanding wider and wider until it is ten times the size of the rest of his face. I try to move away from him, scared that the grin will swallow me. The wind gets louder and the boat tips forward so much that we are now sliding around. I almost fall forward on the floor but Jim hangs on to my shoulders.
“Hang on there, the water is really getting cooked up now! I think it’s about to start!”
Jim’s grin is now a normal size but the sky behind him has gone from a subtle pale grey to bright flaming orange. I look up at the sky and it’s on fire. Fireballs the size of fists start pummeling down on us. A fireball falls in front of me and burns a hole through the wooden floor. More fireballs shoot at us and I can see black holes popping up all over the ship.
“We’re here!”
Jim’s grin is so wide that is it resting on his lap. I try to run away but fall on my face. The boat is tipping all the way forward and all the way back so everyone is sliding around now.
“AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH”
A fireball has just hit a man on the head and burned a hole through the top right part of his skull. He falls to his knees and another fireball hits him right on the ankle detaching his foot from the rest of him. The man does not stop screaming but the roar of the wind makes it hard to hear him. I am thankful for that. I try to find a place on the boat where I won’t slide but everything and everyone is sliding now.
I feel arms grab me from behind and I turn and see Jim’s laughing lips. His grin is back to a decent size but still a bit too wide for his face.
“The book said it would be like this but damned if I ever expected it!”
Loud thunder is roaring over the sky and it starts to rain fire. The first few drops hurt so much I go blind but Jim shakes me and I can see again. I look at him as I feel flames burning my eyelashes off and I can see Jim’s face melting off his skull. He doesn’t stop grinning, he only seems to grin more when the last bits of cheek peels off his skull, leaving a charred skeleton with bits of hair and flesh scattered in burned pieces.
I look at my arm and my skin is melting off like wax with the flames. The pain is worse than anything I could have ever imagined. I look over at the water which is now nothing but fire. Fire-water gets into my right eye and melts it off my socket. I can feel the goo stream down my face. With my one good eye I look around at the boat as it is sinks into the fiery ocean.
“Don’t ever laugh as the hearse goes by, for you may be the next to die!”
I look over and see the two children singing on top of a wooden crate at the other end of the ship. They aren’t sliding around at all but the fire is raining on them and their faces melt as they sing “The Hearse Song” in their little voices.
“…They wrap you up in a big white sheet, from your head down to your feet!”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH”
People are falling into the ocean and catching fire. They squeal and scream like pigs in a slaughterhouse. I inhale and think about the farm where I grew up. The End smells like a slaughterhouse and a barbeque. I feel nostalgic, sick, and hungry at the same time.
“Aint this grand? Just like the book said! We’re really fired up!”
Jim’s skull is talking to me. His bones clatter as he banters excitedly. I feel more of my blood and skin melting off my body in long hot rivers of fiery pain.
“They put you in a big black box…” I hear the children sing over the screams.
“…And cover you up with dirt and rocks.” I can hear my jaw click as I whisper the words without lips.
“…All goes well for about a week…then your coffin begins to leak!” The kids are now slimy, burning bones but they don’t stop singing.
I look at Jim’s skull. His eyes are still intact and they are beautiful. The fire behind him lights up his dark eyes and the goo of his melted skin glistens against his skull. He looks like a piece of rotting art. My vision fades in and out like an old flicker show.
Fade to black… fade in to more of Jim’s face melting…fade out….fade in to Jim’s eyes oozing down his shirt.
“…A big green worm with rolling eyes, crawls in your stomach and out your eyes!”
A fireball hits one of the singing children from the back, knocking his little head clean off. The other child get bombarded with fireballs and disappear into holes in the boat. They’ve stopped singing.
I look back at Jim. What is left of his arms are now wrapped around me and I put my arms over his shoulders. We are melded together in a stinking fiery ooze of skin, blood and bones. A pool of yellow-red ooze forms around our feet and runs down a hole in the boat. I wonder if Jim’s book said it would be like this.
Another fireball rips my left arm off and takes Jim’s right shoulder with it. Another hits me on the side. Another on my legs. Pieces of me and Jim fly out around us and we begin to collapse onto the floor. As I fall, I see a bright orange ball going right towards my one good eye.
The boat stops rocking and I don’t see anything anymore.
-From The Puzzle Factory II, a collection of short stories
Flesh From the Box
Demeter opens the package with his freshly polished vorpal. Nice and sharp, he slices through the poly like he’s cutting up clouds. This was a special vorpal used solely for unwrapping a new uni-mate. Holding the blade in his hand make his crank harder than a diamond dildo.
Milliseconds such as these were his religion. Just thinking about it was enough to make him polyblast. His blastblob runs down his thighs as he continues working the blade through the casing to get to the prime center.
As he slices through the adhesive tape, he blasts again. The entire box was only 304.8 millimeters high and 609.6 millimeters long…only 1/5th the size of the actual uni-mate.
The entire ritual leading up to the epicenter of the unwrapping took 3,600 seconds. Demeter savoured every millisecond, carefully cutting through the poly, cardboard, clear aluminum, adhesive strips, more cardboard, thicker poly and then to the aerogel casing. The smokey glowing mist of the aerogel signalled the last of the unravelling.
Demeter paused for a few milliseconds, savoring the attow. He was thankful to be able to have enough devins to purchase every uni-mate update.
As soon as the Velve+ Cupcake was available for sale along the feed, she was auto-charged on his Teflon Celebracard and flashed to his home within seconds. He had already forgotten about the CherrΨ Nexus he retired less than a kilosecond ago. All the megaseconds spent working paper duty for CelebraCorp’s financial sector was worth these precious megaseconds of arsenic euphoria.
After trying to slow down his breathing so as not to rush, Demeter began vorpalling through the aerogel, making himself blast so hard it almost hurt. A puddle was forming under his kitchen chair. The roomba buzzed over to the mess, attempting to mop it up. Demeter kicked her across the room, not wanting his bliss interrupted by a robotic trash frisbee. The roomba pulsed in a daze, trying to compute what the human wanted and realized that cleaning the gobs of seminal fluid would not be beneficial at this juncture.
At this point, Demeter could no longer snail it. The glowing box of aerogel snapped apart and the following milliseconds speedskipped until normal timespeed resumed and his crank was already fully submerged into the Velve+ Cupcake’s spinning lubricated orbs, pumping away inside her like it was his cherrybomb. Unwrapping a new update always felt like the first celebration ever.
The Velve+ Cupcake moans loudly and wraps her arms and legs around Demeter, spewing wave of lubricant out of her vibrating click extenders, juicing up the spiral tendrils to vibrate alongside Demeter’s blastspot, sending tidal waves of blastpop down her focal ovum pouch which automatically ignites her orgasmatic sensory triggers and makes her scream happily, causing her orbs to pulsate along every millimeter of his shaft. She knew exactly what to do to turn him on, it was the best celebration he has ever had in the whole of his existence. It was almost painful to feel that euphoric. CelebraCorp totally outdid themselves this time. If they made the next update any better, people would certainly blast to death.
Demeter took a Celebration Day from the office. He didn’t even stop to mouth-gorge or hit the pavement. He had been happily celebrating with his Velve+ Cupcake for over 86,400 seconds and could not pull out of her for one millisecond. The thought of ever having to pull out made him ram into her harder which made her orbs vibrate up and down his piston with gusto.
Blast after blast after blast. Fuck, he never knew he could blast so much. Luckily there was a self-cooling installation to prevent the orbs from overheating, no one wanted their genitals to burn off during a Celebration Marathon. CelebraCorp thought of everything!
This was more addicting than any narco known to humanity. Like all 10-billion employed meatshells on the stratosphere, the second the Velve+ Cupcake was released, people could not stop celebrating. It was a good thing that a law was passed for all companies to give paid Celebration Days whenever a new update was released plus 1 additional megasecond minumum for personal Celebration Days that did not coincide with new releases.
Soon after the first uni-mate was released into the feed. The CookiΞ model changed the face of celebration forever. Jöh to Jöh celebration was more deviant than being a Pervy Pete. Not even the most degenerate wretch would be caught nexed celebrating with another Jöh.
It was finally after blastings for the 333rd time that Demeter finally flopped onto the pavement face up, his piston throbbing with a numbing burn. The Velve+ Cupcake rubbed CCC CoolingSalve on him gently using her long sparkle fingers with black and white hallucination nails shaped like triangles.
She whispered the latest news updates straight from the feed as she cooled off his stingray. Demeter closed his eyes and listened to the latest feed from her thick magenta lips, trying hard not to blast but failing miserably as the Velve+ Cupcake was prima-skilled in her strokes. Her every touch made him blast. The Velve+ Cupcake flicked out her tongue like a salamander, stretching it out to 609.6 millimeters in length towards his blastgobs that dripped down her hands and in less than a milli, she had lapped up every droplet of it without even pausing the feed.
“It’s Zuesday Venember 37, 30036. Happy Celebration Day comrades! Time is now 43:200. The atmosphere is crystallized with neon hydro scheduled at 46:800.
“Pavement Row was sugar-bombed 129.6 kiloseconds ago, leaving 1,063 nexed rooks in the wake.
“The Fists of God have just placed the Uni-mate Immediate Dispensary Act, also referred as the Throwbot Eradication Law, into punch-ticketing timelines a millisecond before the deadline. This law will make it illegal for uni-mates to continue powering up after being retired.
“Citizens who do not comply with this law will face severe penalties for improper dispensation procedures. The Citizens for Rook Rights have lashed out against this act, calling it crude and unnecessary. The F.O.G. countered by saying ‘Blast cans are the scourge of Satan and need to be burned.’
“Punch-ticket time for the New Laws begins at 64:800. Remote track data to review Laws before punching.
“Aerogel prices are down 6.483%. Oppulence is up 3.40002%….”
The Velve+ Cupcake rattles off feed that loses relevance as soon as it goes by. Demeter soaks up the information in a post-celebrating lull and only begins to reanimates once he hears his new toy being mentioned.
“Stocks are up 7,000 z’s today at the Velve+ Cupcake sold all 10,755,4056 models before being streamed to homes. CelebraCorp issued a statement thanking all Jöhs for their support of their exemplary products.
“The Velve+ Cupcake has upped the ante for the celebration experience. Reports are coming in from all over the strata that the Velve+ Cupcake is the most prime uni-mate ever. New apps are already streaming into the Velve+ Cupcake’s even before many Jöhs have had a chance to exercise even 1/10th of the capable features. Better take a personal Celebration Day!”
“You can fucking say that again.” Demeter opens his eyes and looks over at the Velve+ Cupcake who has stopped rubbing the salve and was now smiling at him. Her mirror teeth were small squares. Her eyes changed colors depending on the angle. A mix of amaranth, chartreuse, cobalt blue, quartz and titanium. Her skin was a rich mixture of bold colors with hot streaks of brightness cutting through the colors, making chaotic but purposeful angles along every millimeter of her body. Real barbarella. Varla to the core.
Her flesh was literally a work of art, no other Velve+ Cupcake had the patterns she did. The designer of her skinwork was one of the most celebrated artists of the gigasecond: Lina Rasp. Only prime members could order such a unique bot and Demeter had the connections. He studied his still naked uni-mate, tracking the patterns along her arm and body. She was worth hanging up in a gallery. Lina was to have a CelebraBot Art Exhibition to feature his personal collection of uni-mates which would make his Velve+ Cupcake look last season.
No matter, he had the best Velve+ Cupcake devins could buy. There wasn’t any sense comparing her to something that was literally priceless.
“You should gorge or else you won’t have any energy to celebrate ever again.” The Velve+ Cupcake teased.
Demeter yanked the glowing pink streaks on her hair and jammed his now-soothed stingray into her mouth. As soon as the base of his crank was enveloped by her lips, he blasted.
Demeter pulled himself out of her mouth and slowly penetrated her orbs. He felt himself about to blast again and reluctantly pulled out before he could.
“Could you fallow your blast inhibitors? I’d like to celebrate with you for more than a milli before shooting. I get it, you’re tripleplusprime. You’re the most barbarella uni I’ve ever celebrated with. Now let me enjoy you without worrying about my cock falling off.”
The Velve+ Cupcake laughed. “Sure thing.”
Demeter inserted himself into her orbs and corkscrewed her so hard, as soon as he felt himself about to blast, she released a numbing excretion that prevented him from blasting. Now he could celebrate the drainage out of her and show her who was boss. She screamed, hitting a pitch scientifically proven to stimulate celebration by 64%.
“I didn’t have to tell you that did I? You were purposely making me shoot my blast juice into you. You’re a little succubus aren’t you? You feed off blastpop like a little blastpire? My pop is real arsenic isn’t it?”
The Velve+ Cupcake responds by making him blast 6 times in a row. Demeter playfully chomps on her 960cc breasts as he blasted into her. He was in kier.
(excerpt from Robot Hookers, my novella coming out next fall on Eraserhead Press)
I have a new tumblr dedicated to excerpts from my various writing projects, please follow vanitywriting if you are interested in reading it. All feedback welcome!
n. the subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place, as maladapted to your society as a seal on the beach—lumbering, clumsy, resting often, easily distracted, huddled in the presence of other misfits—unable to recognize the nearby ambient roar of your intended habitat, in which you’d be fluidly, brilliantly, effortlessly at home.
that’s me!
"It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away. A nervous tic, an unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself--anything that carried with it the suggestion of abnormality, of having something to hide. In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face...; was itself a punishable offense. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: facecrime..."
Damn
