His environment had become hostile. Fanged smiles, toothless missiles, and bulging tonsils threatening infection but more than anything there was no way to inoculate oneself against the silence.
Their silence spoke miles of their malice. It was the kind of quiet that made your ears ring, and made you look over your shoulder just to see yourself.
Instead of a mailbox they had an unmarked headstone because dead things didn’t need names. When the bills came it made them feel like at least they had identities, or in other words, futures to ruin.
It had become a privatized version of sadomasochism, which eliminated anyone else from the equation, not that she minded. She had been spending more time with the roaches these days than with other “people” and that was just fine by her. Her favorites were the ones that had red spots on their backs; they blended into the carpet and made it move.
She tried to peak over the resentment to find embittered resilience. Those tricks wouldn’t work anymore with him. It was always some thing with her—some nag, and no one realized it was because what she wanted was dying.
He opened another can of sores from the top shelf of his memory. That really wasn’t his intention but the label marking the fuzzy bunnies had been rubbed off, and he grabbed it by mistake. Next thing he knew, his fingers trembled and he reached for the bottle, which screamed, forget. It was the only thing he could manage to do anymore that was intentional, that marked an act of will. Drowning himself out just to keep the voices down.
She was thinking about him when the outside went inside and the rest got mangled. Next thing that she could remember was a Ferris Wheel, one with power out that looked over a lake...just like a fingerprint smeared across her childhood mind...only this time there was a person who appeared to have been stuck at the top for a very long while. Suddenly the lights came back on and she could hear the carnival music, just as the Wheel started to jerk into motion the person at the top stood, and did a head first into the concrete. She wondered why they didn’t pick the sea. Now there would be such a mess to clean up and who would be there to help her.
It was suppose to be fun. A good time for all. There was never supposed to be a closet full of tears or over running sinks clogged by sludge.
She looked into a pile of blisters and though about what the puss would look like running out of them, you had to make the best of things or they would make the worst of you.
They were together for the first time in a long time but black-lashing whips kept coming out of her mouth. Himself was upset about the attack but the herself inside of his self understood and didn’t back away from it. Peace and quiet had decided to take a nap and it really was all too bad. They had waited so long for the night sky to pop out of the plaster.
Don’t get the wrong idea, there were still, on occasion, the rainbows which mocked life’s promise and made liars out of anyone who said there had ever been one.
The plant was in efflorescence but neither of them saw it growing. They both privately wondered when the growing happened. It must have been when stars came out of their sockets and radiated love from one to the other. That was the only idea that made any sense.
He had his own corner of maggots that she couldn’t stand the smell or dampness of. At the same time her isolation booth irritated him. There were times as if a river ran between them and that as the days grew on, so did the streams width...there was a constant fluctuation on the banks...at certain points in the day they were closer than others. He hated the mornings more than she did. That was when he could hear the grinding and groaning of the broken down Ferris Wheel in her mind.
She had been lying in bed asleep when the earthquakes tremors started. His arms were wrapped around her so tight that her heart was rattling in it’s ribcage. She looked into the face of her earthquake and thought about how the faces always ruined it. He hadn’t had enough of the forgetting today...she had to pay the bills and their waters ran out, over the banks and into the houses of others. She was afraid that if this kept up, they wouldn’t be invited over any more for disease and lectures.
He never understood why she wouldn’t just leave that place but in the same thought felt lucky that she didn’t. He had become the operator of the giant metal monster that triggered her synapses. In the mid-night morning her eyes light up as the circus tent came up in her heart. He loved that he never had to wait in line for the carousel. One-night things got scary and he was almost trampled by an elephant under her Big Top and just when the little clowns were doing his favorite number. Now he didn’t go there so often. He didn’t like how unpredictable his visits were becoming.
As the numbers flung themselves from the calendar her grip tightened around his throat.
It all went by in a panorama of pain. He was constantly walking the tightrope that ran between her heart and her mind.
They had contorted to each other’s cruelty like Chinese contortionists wrapping around their own malformations. If only if only didn’t matter.
A new sprout was coming out so they laced their hands together and sat and waited. There isn’t enough light. They both nodded. What will we do? They shook their heads in unison. It is going to happen isn’t it? And just then it sprouted wings and flew away. Winds licked their faces, heat flushed their bodies and it was better than either of them had ever imagined.
This was the same day black ink started to pour out of the bathtub faucet and smoke seeped from their only window out into an alley.
