I've never met a heroin addict in barnes and noble, and today will be no different.
I slake my dehydrated bones at the faucet of the bathroom upstairs, behind the westerns/detective section.
The water fountain is out of order, along with the escalator that transports you back downstairs, but at least the air conditioning works, and no one has kicked me out of the store for reading and completing five books there in the past five days without any intention to buy anything
#adulting.
Emerging from the bathroom, my feet lead me through the fiction section where I stalk my sixth victim. There is a promotional display at the end of one of the aisle's for
bobby flay's barbecuing addiction. It is a memoir about bobby flay's crippling barbecuing addiction. How, at first, it was purely innocent, just enjoying some hot dogs and cheeseburgers at his adolescent daughter's friend's parents' backyard/swimming pool, but quickly spiraled out of control with him losing his job, his wife, his fortune, custody of his daughter, overdosing on some combination of burnt ends, pulled pork, and potato chips 11 times, and, finally, sucking 50 year old dick for a intravenous injection of BBQ sauce, and a rib. Eventually, he is able to stay out of jail and cure his addiction by becoming a jehovah's witness, and reclaim some of his dignity through the teachings of christ.
Instead, I pick up another book and sit down in the big beige cloth chair like I have everyday for the past six days.
Across from me is a girl with red frizzy hair who is passed out with her head in her knees with a partially opened copy of
Death of a Salesman.
Must be interesting!
On my left is a young man with a tribal tattoo on his right calf who is researching how to start up and run a small business for dummies.
I wonder if he is insulted by being called a dummy by the yellow and black cover of the book.
Like pissed.
Like gets up, rips the cover/every page out of the book to shreds that falls like snow onto his feet, and looks around at all of us with bulging bloodshot fighting bull eyes, saying, "Fuck that bitch. Totally deserved it. I ain't no dummy!" before abruptly leaving.
Or maybe he is an employee of that company sent to figure out who is or isn't a dummy in barnes and noble, then kidnap, tag, and send everyone he deems are dummies to a concentration camp for dummies..
Shit. Who knows?
I certainly don't, but now with each passing second I am more convinced I am a dummy. That the word,
humanity, is just a synonym for
dummies.
After twenty minutes of uninterrupted silence, except for the two gentlemen clangin and bangin away at the faulty escalators, the red haired girl wakes up, and the young man that may or may not be a dummy takes a break from his studies.
He looks at her before saying, "Wow, like you were really out of it. I thought about putting a blanket on you or something. Long night?"
He has the grin of a sociopath marking his next victim.
She laughs before readjusting her posture.
"Oh thanks for your concern. Yeah, I work at night in this Bosnian restaurant, and didn't get out until 3 in the morning," she pauses and gnaws on her bottom lip a little, "I really don't go out at night around town that much. Most of the bars are just like crowded with old people or college kids. The only one I go to is this like higher class dive bar that has karaoke from 10-1 every night. I'd much rather go to the beach or something, especially now since I have some free time because I just graduated college."
"Oh cool. Yeah, I like the outdoors. What do you do at the beach?"
I think about asking them for a bundle of junk, and taking both their wallets.
"I go kite surfing. I just started learning it from this guy named Zebulon who lives in St. Albans. It's really fun, but dangerous I guess if you don't know what you're doing."
I think about putting them both in a headlock, then say, "You both smell bad, but I smell worse, which means that I'm the master. Now come my children there is work to be done."
"Wow, that sounds like really fun. What's that guy's name? But yeah I want to learn maybe we can go sometime. Do you have a facebook?"
I think about prying one of my eyes out with a dirty fingernail, turn to each of them, say, "Ta da!" and showcase the white ball with its severed nerve still moist in the palm of my hand. Then explain how that was the trick, as I hold them down and baptize each of them on the forehead with the blood dripping from my empty eye socket. Making the sign of the cross in the blood with my thumb.
I am the master. I am the magician. I am the holy father.
Fuck you.
Embrace me sons and daughters, and I will deliver you to a paradise of bad feelings and excruciating anxieties.
Praise be to me motherfucker.
Now get on your knees, suck my dick, and pray.
(Actually, on second thought, I don't want my dick sucked, and never want to have sexual contact with anyone ever again. Just buy me a soda and two slices of pizza instead cause shit's expensive and I'm broke as fuck.)
"Uhhhhh...yeah I do."
The man who is certainly a dummy quickly looks down at his feet, then back at her, scratching the stubble on his chin.
"I mean like do you want to add me on facebook? If not, it's cool. I get the whole
stranger danger."
The red haired girl laughs. They exchange names. They send friend requests. They are now friends on facebook, but not in real life. They are both sitting at barnes and noble not reading books. They talk. She talks about cheap places to eat, where the cheapest meal is $10. More kite surfing. More Zebulon. She mentions how downtown is the meeting spot for all her friends. He nods. The muscles in his face twitch as he feigns interest. He mentions how he was in the military. She likes organic vegetables and community oriented production and stability. His favorite hamburger is from mcdonald's but he keeps this to himself. She smiles. He smiles. They talk. She talks. He talks. People are trying to read. The earth is still a speck of dust in a vacuum that will be emptied into a wet viscous trash can any day now. Any day, we will be surrounded by more garbage than we already are before suffocating to death. And the word,
dummies, is a synonym for
humanity. And the definition for
humanity is dumb motherfuckers.
Getting up to leave, I turn to the red haired girl.
"Just to let you know, he wants to fuck you, and I'm pretty sure you two will never be friends. He will be gone in the morning. Actually, it might be you who's gone. I don't know, (I can't predict the future) but there will be a locked door involved. You have to make a choice, and doing nothing is also a choice. But yeah, it's all bullshit. Or drug shit. Or piss. Or vomit. Or period blood. Or dick sweat. Or violent orgasms. Or awkward good night kisses. Or being alone at night even though you're with another person, and that person may or may not be inside you. Probably it's all the above, so just slay the small talk, go for the jugular, and get straight to the point. Do you want to fuck him or not? I don't care, either way we will always be prostitutes. But I'm leaving cause I can't stand this shit anymore. You're both assholes, but I will always be the king asshole. I will always be the king. Fuck off."
I am a liar with plastic bones that melt under a giant magnifying glass being held up to the sun by the
what ifs of today. My body spreads out across the pavement like an oil slick spreads across the ocean. Killing every thing that it touches. Always killing everything it touches.
