likewise...ii The sack flops onto the nearest deck chair. i would turn away if i could. there was no line. fuse, melt, seal. the distant cowboy line had become a wet blanket of colour. my body was the chair, and the chair was the deck, and so i too was now Tatty. like i said if i could i would have turned. what i am trying to say is there was nowhere to turn to. everything had become a running fusion; a constant state of movement without boundaries. yet i couldn't move. at least not physically, and what more Tatty knew of my vulnerable position. the way she moved oozed sleaze. my body wanted to be a million miles away. away from this sexual predator. if my legs could run, if they could just catch up. catch up. my feet were swimming and my mind was seemingly good.

i stand in the middle of the cell. it's not my cell. it will never be my cell. this cell belongs to the state. and they can keep it. keep the legs standing, in this cold your legs can seize up and if you need them they wont be there for you. i don't get out into the yard anymore, where the shallow sun teases a fifteen minute warmth, then thrown back into the turgid river you freeze. but still you gotta use your legs in the hall. just last week a ghost stepped out of the line. a ghost is someone who has had their mind cleared out by a bit too much electro-shock. they are not meant to be using it in here, but no one will say, and no one will find out. who would care if some nut who killed two girls and their mother got a bit of a shock three times a day for a couple of months. he was asking for it. acting out of order. but it doesn't fix them right up. nothing but the big shock will do that. just last week this ghost ripped a guy's larynx right out of his throat. not many ate breakfast that morning. fucking sludge. anyone who doesn't know when to walk away, well they deserve what they get. i bet those fucking judges don't know when to walk away. they deserve themselves for what they do. a system. now the penal system, that's a system. the justice system? that's a farce.

i thought for a moment i could see my mind waving out there on the picasso that once was a horizon. it wasn't waving, it was screaming. the cow was all over me. i couldn't see my mind in the distance, i couldn't see the sun burning her back. i bet it is blistering now. well, it would have - then. the licking actually pleased my face. at first it was like a cool face-cloth replacing swelling sweat with cool water. the alcohol on her tongue disappeared into the air, cooling and drying the skin. but it was getting hotter and sticky. uncomfortable and disgusting, the smell. i couldn't feel myself, the puddle, the heat, the alcohol. slushing. i had run all over the deck. Tatty was driving her pelvis into the earth. the squealching, unbearable. the constant tic of the record run dry. a constant of time. it was too much for my stretched body to bear. my eyes rolled. i felt a sinking feeling. something fell from the back of my throat to my stomache. that something rushed straight back up. then my mind turned away. fuck, my mind's a cowboy.

Labels: shortstory

  ¶ 2:43 pm