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memory

*spits tequila on the campfire

when i was in boy scouts, there were these all weekend campouts that i was dumped into. i had always had a strange fear of the mentally disabled when i was younger, which became an irony after a nervous breakdown and a minor stroke, which left me staring at my hanging mask of a face in the mirror.

the last night of the campout there was a fire for everyone who attended the camp. my ill clothed soaking wet body sat close to the fire, and i drifting in and out of my imagination, as i always do in situations you find yourself in asking "how did i get here." the pirates were singing to the strange rabble that had collected, and my eyes wandered, looking at all the faces. i happened to notice a particularly unattractive, pitiful wretch of a soul, some sort of palsy, palpitating and jerking in his broken wheelchair, his mouth cranked open and head thrown back with his unsized eyes flickering around in different directions. i stared at him, his enourmous mouth full of jagged teeth for a minute or so (i stare, it's a socially vulgar habit but i've always gotten off on it) then turned and breathed, looked into the fire, shoulders hunched over. unintentionally i craned my fat head on my bent neckbone to peer at him one more time, and found that his eyes were staring at me, and then right into mine. i got cold, and we stared into one another's eyes for about a minute

later on that night, the young dead tired bodies lurched back to their tents. i was sleeping with four other boys, and sometime during the night i awoke to find someone atop me with an erection. immediatly i thought of my disabled friend from earlier, it was him.

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