Symptoms of an Overactive Imagination

[Vatman]

When I was very young they thought me to be of low IQ, I certainly did test out to be of a low IQ. Yet in my research I've found these tests are far more reliable then they are truly valid. As I came into early adolescence my parents were musing on the idea of sending me to some sort of private school for people who need extra attention. Oh yes, don't doubt for a moment that I do adore the attention. But then something monumental happened. An event with such gravity weighing upon it that it can change the entire perspective of loving parents and a nosy psychologist.

I stabbed myself with a fork.

What the fuck does that have to do with anything you may now be asking yourself. Well I shall tell you. My diction may not be direct but baby its certainly well worth the struggle. I had been eating dinner and had accidentally stabbed my lower lip with a fork. That's right, no self harm here. Well at least no physical harm. I was subsequently diagnosed with severe ADD(not to be confused with ADHD...I don't have the energy for that nonsense.) My parents refused to give me any sort of medication though, god bless them for it. I may be an entirely different Vatman right at this moment if they had. Perhaps you wish I had been. Tough luck darling, the show will go on.

Enough backstory, I have always been observant. Its really my only redeeming quality, save for my fanciful prose of course. I like to walk around empty parking lots and stare into abandoned cars and find their stories. I see a Volvo with a coffee stain and imagine a woman desperately trying to hold the cell phone in place with her shoulder as she takes that long awaited sip of a cinnamon latte...the stain is too large for the cup to have been anything but completely full. The woman tells her friend about how horrible her boss has been to her, takes a quick glance at the ominously straight road and reaches for her jo. Her hand finds the cup, her friend is telling her about a boss she had back when she was working towards her first car in early high school. Another quick glance at the road, it seems even more straight and opportune then ever, its safe to drink, her lips touch the slightly too hot liquid. Beeping. Honking. Breaks trying their damnedest to stop misfortune. "Fuck, its everywhere"....

In high school a therapist diagnosed me with schizoaffective disorder... I feel as though he was mistaken... I could be wrong of course. But I did tell him that I saw the spirits of things. Poor man, I wanted to make him feel like he had discovered some hidden mental illness. I told him that I saw the shimmering essence of good and bad, the energy inside of him that was flowing now coming to his mind and making him feel the way he does. I told him the sky had no color, each person who looks up changes it. Its a tapestry. If people stopped monitoring their own melancholy then the sky would be gold once more.

His diagnosis would have been better if he realized I was fucking with him...

[CrayolaColours]

Vatman, that was pure epic win. That's what I'll do if I'm ever diagnosed for anything.

[username01462781]

Awesome. But I gotta admit I partially lol'ed at the part where you said you stabbed yourself with a fork.

[LOON_ATTIC]

I really never trusted those IQ tests, I had a relatively high IQ but it's difficult for me to communicate and I have been taught not to think, not to question, by everyone in general. Not just school, but infection from it. It's hard to get rid of that habit.

You got diagnosed with ADD for stabbing a fork on your lips? That's just fucked. Accidents happen from time to time.

[Vatman]

Yes indeed, being stabbed has the comedy equivalency of being hit on the head with a coconut. Being diagnosed with a minor learning disability is just a bonus of course...But yes I do recommend messing with psychologists on all levels; they are one of the few types of people that never ever realize they are being mocked.

[Vatman]

Did you think I was done? Said all that I could? Hardly, if you think that there is no nonsense left for me to sprout, then prepare for a garden baby; I'm like poison ivy only more annoying and knee socks can't save you from my wrath. Now seeing as this forum is a one shot deal I wouldn't dare pass the opportunity to positively drown you in my musings. Prepare to be mused.

There I am. And all around me; Jews. Big Jews, Small Jews, everything but Tall Jews. Dr. Seuss would be proud huh? Where was I you ask? A temple? A bank? An Adam Sandler movie premier? No dear readers, I was sitting in the farthest corner at the all high school Stamford production of Fiddler on The Roof. Now I do enjoy the theater, the romance behind bursting in song. But this was a whole other world then my days lurking Broadway ave...Stop. Don't worry, I'm not here to review some small budget musical. Its the audience that really tickled my imagination.

Why was I in this kosher hellhole? My girlfriend was in the ensemble and a few of my other friends had scattered second tier roles. I had to see it for posteritys sake naturally. Always the good friend I suppose... Anyway, the audience. I promised you them didn't I? Jews aside, I always wonder who actually shows up to a show of such low caliber. Wondering does wonders let me tell you. Of course the obvious answer is the family/friends of the actors yet sometimes this is not always true. I see an older couple, probably in their 40s a few rows down. They don't seem to know the school, and have trouble finding their way around the old theater. But then, I realize it, they don't look through the playbill to find their child's name in bold next all their assorted "accolades." They don't gaze at the audience to try and see some family friend. They sit and wait for the show to begin. This of course isn't claim to just label them as strange, more proof is necessary and I am just bored enough to provide it. The mans hair is combed to perfection and his watch looks to rustic to be new but much to clean to be worn often. The woman's purse is impractical and tiny; unequipped for any decent sized wallet...Being a high school production the parents at these sorts of things are bombarded with raffles and charities to donate to, not to mention memorabilia. They were clearly not prepared for those sorts of things. Now, none of these symptoms individually would denote a suspicious nature alone. But together, it was clear that these people came. Get this. For the show. It truly baffles me why anyone would do that. Lots of build up for nothing right? The next story will be better. It was a long play.

During intermission I had ample amount of time to analyze and construct intricate hypothesis of all the people around me; but instead I went and bought a kit-kat bar. What???....it was king sized for a dollar...good stuff. Anyway as I sat back down I noticed a woman in the corner alone: with her head against the wall as if it were some religious shrine. (I told you it would be better). She was muttering something of which I could only imagine at the time as demonic rituals. Random thoughts aside, I carefully slid closer to her which was easy of course with all of the empty seats...courtesy of the line at the concession stand. Kit-Kats aren't just good for snacking.

Lets paint a picture of this woman shall we, since with all my flowery language aside; this whole post is about her. She was slender and short, with long dark brown hair stretching to her waist. She wore a blue blouse with a long jean skirt that went down to her ankles best describable as a denim colored nun-suit. The point of interest for me was not in her fashion police worthy outfit but the display of her earrings. Her hair; long as it was, was tucked neatly back behind her ears so that the two shimmering sapphire-like stones could be clearly displayed.

Even having moved closer to her I hadn't been able to decipher what she spoke of in her probably broken English. I imagined her being mistreated as a child in... maybe, Maine? She didn't seem to southern, and by the climate outside and the girth of her outfit she had to be used to the cold. She would tell her mom that all the other girls already had their ears pierced, there was no harm in such small holes. "No harm in holes?", The mother pulls her to stand in the corner where a crack in the wall stood out as a broken feature in the otherwise tidy room. "Stare at this crack and pray until you see how evil they really are!" The girl cries out in rebellion at first but then subsides her fury and begins to pray that there would be more holes so that she may slip through them and find a better place where girls could have anything they ever dreamed of.

I thought these things as I gracefully moved another seat closer to the woman, I say gracefully but really it was far from that. Luckily whatever world the woman was in provided enough distraction for me to remain unnoticed till I could hear the end of her babbling. "I pray for the souls of all of these gentiles never to know the love of christ our lord, amen." At that moment she clapped her hands, turned away from that corner and proceeded knowingly down the isle to where I assume her seat was. I didn't follow her after that. I couldn't. My eyes were fixated at a single solumn crack in the wall where her head had just been.

The show wasn't half bad.

[Tennos]

you should be a detective or something man. because if you can visual things like that happening like with a coffee stain on a volvo seat you would most certainly be a very successful detective or investigator or somehtin.

[Vatman]

Detective Vatman...... Vatman, Private Eye...Private investigator.

No. I don't think that will work out. But I am definitely flattered at the comparison.

[Vatman]

I am walking in one of my more familiar haunts, a painting studio lies along a less noticeable edge of this half decent shopping plaza and there she is. Painting, the only one in the room lit by only the communal streetlamps and the leftover holiday lights. Who is she. Does it matter? My fantasy begins....

Why wouldn’t I want to drag a soul as innocent and as uncomprehending as yours into the very depths of Hell with me? Why should I burn alone when I can have such exquisite company? Besides, you have no where else to go...all alone in your painting.

Take a look at your life and tell me what you see... or are the images too distorted when viewed through the bottom of an empty liquor bottle to make any sense at all? Let me tell you what I see. You’re young, attractive and you stand at the very threshold of life... as I do... you hold the world in the palm of your hands. Ah, but you’re a fool... reality has been clouded by passion. I know that feeling all too well. You’ve turned your back on comfort and security to pursue your dreams. You don’t give a damn if you live in a cardboard box as long as you are able to put your brush to the canvas. Liquor and colourful little pills don’t even begin to numb the pain you feel when you think about the life you could have had and of what you have become.

You are a perfect reflection of the man I once was.

Have I ever told you how beautiful you are when you suffer? There is nothing more alluring than to see that look of hopeless despair in your eyes when you realize just how lost you truly are. You’ve been abandoned by those who claimed to love you and by a god who once held the answers to all of your questions... forsaken by the saints and angels whom you thought would always be there to protect you. You’re broken, my love... tainted and corrupted. They don’t want you anymore, but I do. I want to see how far you can fall.

You’ve writhed in ecstasy beneath the body of the Devil himself. You’ve moaned in breathless desire at the feeling of his cold lips on your own... tangling your fingers in his hair as he stamped down your soul. You have been a willing sacrifice time and time again. You know the true meaning of sin and I wonder... has goodness ever tasted that sweet? Have the angels ever made you feel that way?

...I keep walking. You were lucky today. Crossing my path doesn't warrant much happiness I fear.

[Hidden Flame]

You have a strange mind indeed. No offense. I'm almost jelouse of you. Being able to see the world like that would be nice for a change. Do you think that you might be able to teach someone how you see?

[Vatman]

I'm glad you find my mind fascinating. Personally I would trade if I could...and no I don't think I can teach someone to think like me....but you can follow the steps I took....afterall we are what we've done in essence.

Step 1: Lose all self-confidence and thus delve into other peoples lives
Step 2: Despise yourself to the point where you embrace a fake identity as your persona
Step 3: Realize that your fake identity is really just the person whom you have always wanted to be.
Step 4: Read yourself into a coma. Seriously. If your not in a coma at the end of your reading. You haven't done it right.
Step 5: Rinse and repeat steps one through four.

[the forgotten]

This really is a unique topic, one admireable for it's absolute lack of social barriers truly a sight beyond the looking glass given to us by a man who undervalues himself, it's a case study in psychology performed on oneself, an admirable feat. I find this to be interesting in its use of language and it's openess.

[Hidden Flame]

Vatman Wrote:I'm glad you find my mind fascinating. Personally I would trade if I could...and no I don't think I can teach someone to think like me....but you can follow the steps I took....afterall we are what we've done in essence.

Step 1: Lose all self-confidence and thus delve into other peoples lives
Step 2: Despise yourself to the point where you embrace a fake identity as your persona
Step 3: Realize that your fake identity is really just the person whom you have always wanted to be.
Step 4: Read yourself into a coma. Seriously. If your not in a coma at the end of your reading. You haven't done it right.
Step 5: Rinse and repeat steps one through four.

You're welcome. I always have had wonders about what the human mind can do. And it seems that I've done steps 1-3. I read a lot, but never into a coma.

[random_name]

Vatman Wrote:Yes indeed, being stabbed has the comedy equivalency of being hit on the head with a coconut. Being diagnosed with a minor learning disability is just a bonus of course...But yes I do recommend messing with psychologists on all levels; they are one of the few types of people that never ever realize they are being mocked.

As funny as you might find fucking with psychologists, I don't think it's really fair to mock them because of their job. They're only trying to help.

[Vatman]

the forgotten Wrote:This really is a unique topic, one admireable for it's absolute lack of social barriers truly a sight beyond the looking glass given to us by a man who undervalues himself, it's a case study in psychology performed on oneself, an admirable feat. I find this to be interesting in its use of language and it's openess.

I am nothing if not open...I'm glad your enjoying the ride but don't get to comfy....as long as this forum is in place I feel it is my civic duty to report my inconsequential imaginings.

Quote:You're welcome. I always have had wonders about what the human mind can do. And it seems that I've done steps 1-3. I read a lot, but never into a coma.

The human mind can do much more substantial things than type out ill advised musings on a ranting board. At least I hope so.

Quote:As funny as you might find fucking with psychologists, I don't think it's really fair to mock them because of their job. They're only trying to help.

There you are, ruining my fun again...Don't be so quick to chastise dear; mocking another person is a window into the mockers soul. It expresses the entirety of his inadequacies. And I who am so very terrified of being insane am almost handing that information to the psychologist complete with silver platter. In a way... I was helping him help me.

[Hidden Flame]

Of corse it can. Me and my freind have actualy devolped some telapathic comunications.

[Loxor]

Hidden Flame Wrote:Of corse it can. Me and my freind have actualy devolped some telapathic comunications.

Either that or you understand eachother real well.

[Vatman]

(Edit: I realize now I should explain what this is....I was trying to write poems using the first thing that came to my head.... And failed...so I elected to take the first thought I have and then run with it wherever it goes)

These people
are starving me to death
I can't get their wrappers off

....I want to take a walk

I remember just now Divine, the ladyboy,
who got himself fitted out with a pair of comic strip boobs
but could never get rid of his 6 o'clock shadow

Why do so many poets kill themselves?
They find out--record jackets notwithstanding--
that Beethoven and Chopin did not look like Zeus and Adonis
respectively

I once said to my father :
"I'm reading Freud and Plato."
He said:" I don't know much about Floyd and Nato."
It took me ten years to laugh

[Vatman]

What is the most beautiful moment you ever experienced?

My family had checked into a local motel on the big Island of Hawaii, and as I have recently been accustomed to doing late at night. I snuck out. I never know exactly where I am going when I do so. But I just love the freedom of vanishing into the unknown with no map of where I'm going or of what I've left behind. Anyway. I found myself slowly drifting out of civilization, and believe me its easy to do. A few steps and poof no streetlights or pavement, all jungle baby and I certainly felt like a young Tarzan. After a short period of time I find myself growing hesitant, my adventurous side has suddenly been sidetracked by my lack of direction.

I was lost in a jungle, cliche yes? And having a bit of experience in this situation my logical reaction was to get to highergroud as to discern my location and scope out my next path. I do so, I find a hill positively erupting from the ground and I find that when looking up it almost brings me to tree level. I make my way upwards, clinging to roots and dirt to stay aloft. When I make my way to the top I realize that I still have no view to make a logical decision and become frustrated and sit at the very top of this hill. I look around myself seeing the world as I suppose the ironic incarnation of the metaphorical king of the hill would; and I take notice of how wet the edges of my jeans had become. I pick up a stone. And the suddenly water began emerging like a fountain from where I took the stone. It shot up so very high that I fell back and grabbed a larger stone to prevent my decent down the hill. At once I realized what I had done and stood in awe of this blossoming fountain. I then proceeded to dig. And dig I did. I dug where that original spout first cut the sky in liquid brilliance... and the more I dug the more I uncovered this almost celestial fountain springing to life under starlight and reflected in the very jungle around it. I was completely soaked now and made my way down the hill only to find that the entire mound was submerged in streams of orange and blue and gold. and at the very top stood my fountain. The one I had fell upon and dug out of the ground as a god would harvest life...I call it...The Remains of Crius ...and I carved that into a tree by the newly formed fountain.

Whenever I am dwelling on all that can't be known.. it occurs to me that perhaps our lives aren't measured in our midterm grades, the lovers we have swooned and fought for, the children we raise and trim from the ground up. Perhaps sometimes. We dig to find the beauty we always knew existed but feared would be impossible to find. X marks the spot my darling readers, and you need no reservation to waste moonlight.

[Vatman]

Principles of Marketing is boring me...I close my eyes. Sand all around me, the crackling of waves dull my senses. How long have I been here. All day, all night? Oh yes I remember.

There was a woman on the beach early this morning. She walked slowly and without purpose as the sky began to glimmer with light, the inevitable softening of the eternal black that precedes dawn. I watched her hips sway a lonely rhythm towards the tiny flicker of a distant and dying bonfire some distance away. Her eyes were fixed on the sea, on the sparks of cold light which seemed to evaporate to the grey night above. There was a bitter twist to her soft mouth.

As she came closer she suddenly picked me out of the dark. I don't know what she saw, perhaps just a glimmering shadow lying on the sand; a shock of dark hair, a ruffling white shirt. Her sultry steps continued on but her gaze lingered. I didn't move. But for a few eerie moments we shared a moment of understanding under a desolate sky.

"David, are you listening?"

I wasn't.

[Absnt]

Strange, you seem like an older version of me. Of course this is not true, I find myself in a lot of people. Or maybe I just conform to others personalities on accident. I do find myself acting like the people I respect or the ones I find something interesting about. Temporarily of course. At times in the past I've found hero like figures which personalities I completely adopt. This will last a while until I figure out I shouldn't be adopting others personalities.

I guess I got off topic, this thread isn't about me, anyway, I enjoyed reading about you and your stories. As earlier stated by another, I am slightly jealous of you.

[Vatman]

Anthropology is the study of humans, I wonder if bacteria studies itself. Either way, I'm not paying attention now. "The early Paris sewer system", my teacher says aloud. I close my eyes.

The apartment was typically Parisian, of course; all painted paneled walls and creaking floors with a balustraded balcony leaning several floors above the tireless and narrow streets of the old Rive Gauche. I could clearly hear the raucous laughter of Quartier students mingling with the bellicose roar of distant traffic and the whispers of strolling lovers; distilled human essence rising on a teasing breeze. The room behind me was bathed in muted modern light, but I could imagine old shadows flickering about the plaster walls and the ghost of thick tallow smoke wreathing from a candle to the high ceiling. A ghostly vision flares of wine-soaked chatter in the muddy Boulevard St. Germain, of dark eyes reflected in liquid with unfathomable desires.

A woman’s sleek reflection moved to dissolve the half-memory, setting aside her drink in a cloud of sweet and musky perfume, bedroom eyes drawing from me an epicurean smile. She was drug store beautiful, pretty painted eyes, plastic nails, plastic heart. Her mouth a cute little furnace. What a hot parcel of flesh and sighs to writhe sweetly in my arms. I laid aside her auburn hair to kiss the sweep of her little neck, her breathing shallow with appreciation as her hands explored the hardness of my flesh. A little crucifix gleamed against the ripe swell of her breasts and I kissed that too. She closed her eyes in swooning surrender to my hungry ministrations.

Outside, the old bells of the church of Saint Séverin sounded the hour and the shadows dance.

I turned her body towards the fluid shimmer of the smiling mirror, encircling her waist firmly from behind. Her heart thudded through the thin cotton shirt she wore, her gaze electric at the sight of us entwined in the panel of glass. I could see the abandoned slash of a silk scarf pointing red towards the room beyond....

I didn't make it to that room, my fantasies always end to early. Class never does.

[Vatman]

Absentinsomniac Wrote:Strange, you seem like an older version of me. Of course this is not true, I find myself in a lot of people.

I guess I got off topic, this thread isn't about me

Its strange that you say that... as the years have passed I've found that I can only find my personality in the inklings of others. Like glass shards on the floor, the pieces may in fact go together but each piece is its own separate entity.

I think this thread should be about you, its a crime that it isn't. =p

[Vatman]

6am and I haven't fallen to bed.

What is the evolutionary advantage to sleep, shouldn't we replenish our strength through solar power and damn the tempurpedic mattresses to that same hell of idiocy humankind has outgrown. You'd think ignorance would be there, but alas snooki just wrote a novel. But this isn't about the real. Close your eyes, imagine a lavalamp; your cheating...that lava lamp shouldn't exist....your eyes should be closed now.

Close.

Clo...

I forget. Were we talking rocks? I do that, you know. I sometimes do a vanishing act but ah, not really! How can I move far? Your delicate intelligence and tender passions will always harness my wandering spirit.

Pfft, he couldn't describe what's outside his own window for all the attention he pays it. But we do rather stand out here as we tend to do in the East of the world. His skin is stark and my hair and eyes don't exactly blend in with the locals. He knows a great deal more about geology that he'll admit but I can't say that I do. I don't know about the earth or what lies within it.

I do remember investigating a little crevice or two in the rocky ground beneath patchy grass under a rather ancient sky. I saw the imprint of old bones and spent some time there, digging away to see what secrets the ground would spill. I found the shape of shells an unimaginable distance from the water. Seas on land. No news now, of course, but it was still pretty sensational in the 1780s. I'd read Epochs of Nature by Georges Buffon and wanted to see for myself how elephants could be buried in Europe as if they'd once lived there some impossible time ago.

"Who are you talking to?" She says as she carefully redoes my bedding.

Prodding me is your stalwart hobby isn't it cher? Why do you not want to study humans? I can't imagine that. Humans are the most fascinating subjects on earth! I can't imagine comparing a bit of rock to a human soul and choosing the rock. He might.

Buffon was quite an author. Le style c'est l'homme même, as he said himself but then he was merely the authority of the time. He theorised that the earth was older than 4004 years BC - its Biblical age, ya know? Very radical! And unity of type, namely that certain animals have common characteristics, also very revolutionary. He wasn't an evolutionary. He predates Darwin. But close. I was giddy with excitement when I read it. I was inspired to find an elephant immediately! He dug with me for a while. It was one of the few passions we shared as we traveled. You know, I never found my elephant. Is that a metahpor?

"How old do you think you are tonight sir?"

Old, I can't even remember anymore.

"You're only 48, you've been in an..."

You know that can't be true. I do. Almost everything that existed when I was born is gone. The buildings change or are pulled down or burn to ash and are concreted over to make a parking lot. No more horses, industrialization. The furniture is no more. It's almost as antique as I am. The music is gone which I once sang in vanished streets and inns. No-one reads those books any longer which I heard debated over wine that isn't now brewed. Everyone I once knew is long dead. What they knew is dead. The culture is no more. The intellectual or spiritual thought is no more. Who wears what I once wore? Well, I do, yes. Ha. The plays are not performed. All those old broadsheets are dust. The old order was swept away. They cut off the king's head. He burned down my theater and now it's built over with cathedrals to commerce and apartments in which modern machines whir and hum. Even the night is not the same. There are now brilliant lights which make the midnight sky glow until you can't see the ancient stars. But there are a very few places that remain. Eternal things are precious to me.

"You were a professor of literature at Wesleyan, you've been in a horrendous car crash, Don't you remember any of...?"

I... it was like sublime frisson of heat, a rapid beat of concentrated light, like a pinprick of all possibility, of yearning and demanding and absolute promise. It tastes of what love can be and of the most primal radiance of passion. Anger tastes stronger, fear is a spur. Oh, I can be a perfect brute when I taste fear and anger. But surrender is a sweetness in which I can search out the most intimate reaches of my soul and theirs. It's a drowning.

Well, I'm an erratic fellow, aren't I? I feel the world and then some. I'm never still. Are you steady and unchanging, Peterea? Does your heart race to its own tempo?

"You're in a mental asylum, you're wife's name is Patricia; you can't keep living like this Will."

I'm not always a charming fellow like- ah! But yes, I am, mostly, of course I am. But not very gentle. No. Not that.

You know that I aspire to be good. Yadda. All that jazz. Well, who doesn't know it? But I don't always remember that. I don't always try. I can number innocents among my life. I have willfully corrupted souls. Always with charm, of course. Yet something feels off.

Something is rotten in the State of Denmark

[Vatman]

holy fuck thats the worst thing I've ever wrote. But I AM IN LOVE WITH IT...you know you need sleep when you start producing trippy stupid crap like that.

[Vatman]

A throng of humanity like a living wall, shoulder to shoulder in narrow cobbled streets. Sound from above. Sound washing from the wood framed doorways and up uneven steps from a cavernous wine-soaked basement. The sound of any crowd; sound like a low many-layered roar, like the ever-present tide of the living sea. A sudden gruff laugh, the light chime of a child’s voice tinged with excitement, a caress of intimate conversation, clotted with emotion and jostling memory. I moved through the Latin Quarter in a cloud of confusion as the centuries coiled and overlapped in my head. The tang of a hundred different wines, a splash of beer, the acrid smell of smoke over pungent roasting meat. Perfumed cigarettes. Sickly sweet and sticky foods.

Yet how little it had really changed since I had lived here as a little boy, dashing through these very streets with my friends, laughing at the innocent, roguish existence we eked out in a small room somewhere above; solemn and soulful over bottles of sour wine, booted feet warming by the crackle of an autumnal fire.

On the corner of the Rue Saint-Séverin, a dark-skinned man juggled four batons in a brilliant blur of red, his eyes darting between them, a tall jug of water balanced on the soft curls of his head. Fish bobbled in the water in tiny flashes of orange. A guitar picked out a simple tinny melody from the lap of a young girl nearby and I watched her warm lips part and pout as she sang along, her long hair veiling her eyes as she bent her head to the strings. The Church was a solid mass of stone spiralling to the ghostly heavens above. Old books piled on a table, yellowed pages ruffling in the breeze. A street lamp glowed with a curious amber solidity, plastered with little curling papers which advertised the latest classical work to play at the Sainte-Chapelle. Used Métro tickets were stamped in the gutter.

Pickpocket brushing my pants for a wallet. I lingered in momentary interest, but no real sin here, just bland petty crime and bland petty thoughts. A small dog pushed past my leg, straining on a thin strip of gilded leather, a soft round arm jostled mine with a melodious pardon. Doe eyes from the homeless woman cross legged on the ground, hungry gaze hanging on my flamboyant finery. I dropped a guilty largesse in the sea of colourful skirts that was her lap. Ah, move on. Darker eyes glancing up coquettish under a fringe of long lashes, thoughts straying into exotic pleasures as she passed my smile with slowing steps.

I took a seat at the red-canopied café in the Place de la Sorbonne, the university clock chiming a lazy late hour. Lovers whispered sensual promises beside the soft roar of the fountains. The waiter served me with a monochrome flourish. I took a glass of wine for old times. I don't drink it, of course, but I liked the smell of the fermented grapes and the deep color and a deliberate wallow in the memories it grazed.

There was a scrape of the chair beside me. Her excitement was palpable as she caught my mood. Wine is the author of joy and sorrow, but I felt nothing but contentment as I ran a languid finger around the lip of my glass.

“What are you thinking?” she asked and with that I simply crashed through two centuries.

"Nothing darling"....turn left here...damned blockbusters keep disappearing.

As does my world.

[itsurgrlcass]

Vatman, you are my hero.

[InDenial]

You say you have no self-confidence, but to the rest of us, you seem infallible in your ever complex ways. Your stories hold rapture over all who whimsically decided to read of your posts, leaving ideals shattered, cynical sense brought forth, and more things that an average person wouldn't find pleasing. Thank you for existing and keep writing you mystical beast.

[Vatman]

At some point in my life I decided that I no longer cared what others thought of me. But the idea is a farce, a shield set up against harsh words and ill intention. I care what people think about me; maybe more than I should dare reveal. And it really does do wonders for my mood to read kind words. So thank you Cass and InDenial =D

[Vatman]

TL DR...weird friendship theater fantasy

Hidden stuff:

Despite all evidence to the contrary, we are undoubtedly moving forward. I'm sitting in class, lets take a walk shall we?

Have you ever pondered the mystery of a fire? Have you ever willed yourself to become hypnotized by the sharp play of color and the ceaseless movement and light..? Do it. Let it sear you, let it expand your senses and burn away your thoughts.

My father always kept an immense fire burning in the living room though I couldn’t feel the warmth of it for the perpetual damp and the drafts that chilled us all to the bone. I never knew why he lit it, except that it lent the place a more than usual medieval gloom, but it was always there, roaring with light. The only time I recall that heat was when I was being lovingly whipped for some real or imagined mischief, for he would always do the deed in front of those mocking flames.

Fire seems to be an enduring metamorphosing motif in my life in some strange fashion, certainly most of the turning points have been branded into my consciousness through flame, and often literally.

I’m thinking about a roaring little fire now.

Still with me? Imagine me breathless as Emily pushed me bodily against a wall with far more force than was strictly necessary. That impact stopped me in my tracks and knocked all remaining breath from my body. For a moment, I simply couldn't move as I bent double in laughter. She hauled me back into the muddy road, and shoved at me again in purest frustration at my madness. I can still see it, even now, that look in her eyes, caught as she was between absolute annoyance bordering on fury and a gleam of real amusement which, predictably, she tried to hide, though not very well.

And back then, she could jostle me and I’d actually totter off balance.

"Enough!" Emily panted with yet another push increasing the girth of the tear in my unbuttoned and much mended coat. Really, you'd have thought we were having a domestic in the street.

"We’ve been into every flea pit theater in New York already. Besides, there's little money left," she continued, ever pragmatic. That was the cause of this and so many childish spats. What did I care for the money? I was ever her antithesis in matters of daily practicality. I just didn’t give a damn about the money. I never did.

So, I wasn’t listening. I felt wild and free. Instead, the whole gorgeous feeling of liberation suddenly welled up inside me and I raised my arms beneath the steely gray of the sky and tipped back my head as if I could drink in the whole damn world. ‘We’re in New York!!’ I was yelling like a lunatic to anyone who might listen, and loud as I can be, it might have been heard by any passer-by within a square mile or more.

I had duly escaped the meaningless drudgery I'd been born into. I must immerse myself in absolutely everything with a giddy sense of urgency. It hadn't sunk in, not even with New York filth caked on my boots and I was as yet uncertain of my tenuous grasp on fate. What’s more I was young. I was going to gorge myself on this feast before I found myself starving and bitter again. Woe betide anyone who tried to stop me, even and especially Emily and I knew her well enough to know how she would try.

"You’re quite mad," she affirmed with shake of his head, or words to that effect. Allow your author a little poetic licence, here and there. I can vouch that she did call me insane. She did so on a daily basis, and ah, I can feel the irony at a remove of imagined years.

"If you had your way we would live and sleep and dine at the theater!”

She made a gesture to include the rotting filth of the street, the gaggle of bracelets about her wrist lifting in a sudden gust of wind. I remember a tiny dot of color staining the white, roseate testimony to a night in the arms of a motel. How strange that so often it’s the little insignificant details that echo down. I remember that ketchup stain looking much like dried blood.

“That is where we shall be in a month,” she said of the damp ground in a flat tone that completely failed to hide the fact she was in fact enjoying every moment of the unfolding drama.

“Then the Chief of Police will drag us naked and in chains to the Asylum to laugh at the moon for the rest of our days…’ She had a beautiful laugh, my ever ambiguous Emily, even edged as it so often was with spite.

Incidentally, don’t you go thinking that I really understood her plans for us then. This snapshot memory is viewed with the benefit of being unreal, but I’ll come to all that.

I suddenly took her by the shoulders, my eyes, no doubt shining with excitement, and yes, perhaps a little spite of my own. I wouldn't put it past me.

"Madeline George!" I declared the name, returning us to the subject of our earlier disagreement, which was pretty much the only kind of disagreement she and I ever had in those long ago days.

"We just need to find a few bucks to see her play Celeste! "

Emily groaned right on cue and pulled away. I don’t blame her really, the play in question was ghastly, and likely to be much the same as a dozen similar performances I’d already dragged her to. It didn’t matter to me. I was in the first vivid bloom of my love with the stage and anything and everything that purported to be entertainment upon it was compulsory viewing, regardless of merit opportunity or solvency.

"We've seen her a dozen times already,” she said. “I've never seen such a travesty masquerading as drama. You can't have forgotten the last performance. The audience weren't content to merely heckle and drown out the dialogue. I heard they actually chased the director all the way to Rikers Island

"I wish they’d put him in it!" I grumbled at Emily's characteristic attempts to dampen my spirits; Rikers being an unappropriate name for something as imaginably grand a NYC prison.

I looped an arm about my companion as we stumbled in the path of a cart heaped with rotting hot dogs and pulled by an emaciated carriage. Something yellow-green and vaguely edible was dislodged by a rattling pot hole and tumbled with a soft thud to Emily’s boot. She kicked it away through a murky puddle.

"You only want him out of the way so you may pursue Madeline George," she replied with an acrimonious smile, her own arm warm and comfortable upon my back, and at odds with her tone, although back then I didn’t take this goading seriously. "You wish to investigate the extent of her talents in private."

“It's her talent I wish to adore,” I protested. It was true and despite everything she must have known it. But she did so love to drag my dreams through the dirt. Oh, that’s not to say I didn’t play the lover on and off the stage, but it was more than that. It always was. I’m not sure to this day if she genuinely didn’t understand or if he deliberately courted any opportunity to pluck at my strings. I still don’t know if she genuinely thought me such a thoughtless rake or if she merely loved to grate me to anger. I think it was probably a little of both, don’t you?

“I should have his part,” I was muttering though I didn’t want any such thing, “I can play it. He couldn’t play the lead in the story of his own life."

‘‘You merely wish to thrust -your- part inside her," she answered me with characteristic charm and a dry laugh. "That is the extent of this obsession of yours! The play is worthless and I grant you the girl is sweet-faced, but I've seen more dramatic expression in a mounting block.”

"But then an actress is nothing but a mounting block," she chuckled. Imagine her belligerently sarcastic, yet with a compulsive undertone of genial humor that never failed to make me smile. That was my Emily, full of contradictions.

"If you wish to mount her then do so,” her voice made crude by an indefinable spite, or at least I couldn't fathom it, “but for the love of God spare me from your florid idealism."

Get the picture? Well back then I didn’t.

Oh by the way, didn't I mention the subtext...?

Its there. But as fake as the story. None the less, calc is unimaginably dull.