Novella:

In descending order, alphabetical

By Pablo D'Stair

[Part 2]

And he had had a stomachache, sour air in him tight like cold hands one moment, hot like dogs breath the next, for the better part of an hour, was stood in the shower, too chilly to get the motivation up to wash, even with the hot water, his skin just a kind of pilled wax from the bourbon still and all of it, when it struck him really that it should have been his idea, like the thought was a little whisper for a second and then a slap, jarred him, head up, having to turn his head then fast down sideways from the hiss of the hot water in his eyes—Frozen Alive, it should have been his idea, definitely, and there was no reason it should not be.

Very excitable, but still standing, no reason for him to want out of the shower, the hot water in his apartment lasted a long time, one good thing about the place, though at the same time a real sensation to get some clothes on and walk around, jabber about it, maybe a telephone call to Linda or Pete Gloss or some other acquaintance, he didn’t care, just let the idea settle a minute.

Frozen Alive

His idea was entirely different, really, not that anybody, he said, finally soaping himself, shins, the tops of his thighs, abdomen, had ever even heard of Frozen Alive and quick quick he growled at himself it wasn’t something he needed to bother with, this thinking up justifications, the truth was that even if everyone everywhere had heard of Frozen Alive, had heard of it and loved it to death, this was a different idea, his idea, better, he knew, but different absolutely and that was the thing.

This is what he had always gone on about, to begin with, all that semi-philosophy he would go on about Ideas and Origination and what a play or a painting or a book or a film was.

Frozen Alive was his idea, no arguing with anyone about it, no argument they could make to show it contrary.

The water off, a rapid dry and even applied deodorant absently, no reason for that, into a t-shirt and walking around pantless, a swig more of bourbon, just to not lose inertia, and another cigarette, where he found there were only four of those lousy little things left, so that was going to be a slog down to someplace, wherever was open, cigarette lit and inhaled too much so he gagged and wheezed like some asthmatic awhile, still excited and another teeny tiny mouthful of bourbon, noticed his pants but didn’t put them on quite yet, just leaned to the countertop and balanced it through.

This was just what he had been getting at, he just needed the scenario, some few sentences to go from and that was all, now it was there, he picked up the first of the DVD sleeves he saw, nothing about Frozen Alive, this sleeve was about Piranha Piranha and Panic and whatever else, he didn’t care.

Calculation

Maybe ten minutes later, more quiet in his thinking, more calm and with a dense calculation, he had decided it did not need to be Frozen Alive, exactly, even his little idea, some interrogation, some scene about a nightmare of imperfect language, that could be made out of anything and was not the sort of play he wanted to write, he knew that much, plays like that sort of got on his nerves, they seemed to be pointless, or worse than that seemed all puffed up big about themselves, he was not the sort of blowhard would write some play about some scientist gets frozen and has a murdered wife and winds up all accused of it, the idea was actually a mess, or it was for him to write it, some other guy could write about that, it was too floating in the ether, it was like a kid’s playtime argument, the sort of thing high school kids come up with, this symbol means this and this means that and fantastical elements seem to have meaning when they really are just airy blather, nothing to them, they die after a little while and become like television shows half remembered from more than ten years ago, never any good or not as good as you remember, however any nostalgic wants to think it.

Picked up this and that sleeve this and that sleeve this and that sleeve and had to clench down to keep either of two sensations from burying him under a timid, retreating malaise, the first being that he did not like this synopsis and this and this and so maybe the idea, entire, was something not worth going forward with and the other sensation that this or this or this synopsis was great, what he was after dead bang, when really it wasn’t, Chloe Love Is Calling You was not great, The She Beast wasn’t worth a damn, The Bowery At Midnight was whatever, added to that it was Bella Lugosi in there, so that one needed to be discarded outright, not the Phantom Express, The Lion Man or Alien Contamination.

How Awful About Allan

He read it five times over, taking a drink after the second and after the fifth read, he did a clumsy little dance step and felt the liquid in him slosh around, felt either a bead of sweat or still some moist from the shower scrung out of his skin, down his leg, get behind his knee.

It was exactly what he wanted and already the first blood of it, or not the blood yet but the whist of air going through the veins first, inflating them for the blood to slather through, got in his head.

The movie starred Anthony Perkins, but he needed to forget that or else that weird fellow’s little face would get mixed up in his thoughts, he always had a picture now of Anthony Perkins from that bizarre Jack The Ripper, Doctor Jekyll Mister Hyde evil-twin movie, Anthony Perkins using that cane to caress that prostitute in a particularly lurid way, in his head Perkins was a ruin, burnt grass piled and sopped with dank rain, he would forget it no problem, though, almost wanted a pen already or at least the typewriter on, almost wanted to pass out, straight asleep and lay there done, ready, just be no longer desperate, something more than doing nothing, yes, but not doing anything yet.

Answer

Dressed and having decided against the cab, even if she did answer the telephone to begin with and so he’d know she was in, he finished with lacing a shoe, had done it up a little bit incorrectly, it would likely come undone, but he wanted to just leave that to be dealt with whenever, the decision to leave off the cab being that the walk wasn’t really so bad, the bourbon he saw in the base of that bottle was it, so he needed another bottle and whatever else, that and the cigarettes, could think better walking, the air would keep the alcohol from getting him too warm and bloat, it would keep him dancing sharp, even if he came off as some nowhere lush it would only be the ten some dozen blocks, any bystander at all so interested in him would be a passing flit and then not mean a thing to anyone.

Of course no answer over the telephone, so he braced himself, oddly not sure for a moment was it cold outside was it hot, got in his coat and scarf and gave up after less than a minute on finding his second glove, it was likely on the floor, not in the mood to crawl around like some sniffer dog when it didn’t matter, locked the door behind him and checked the knob a few times, getting worried, realizing from how much of a wince the light caused, just even this dim entranceway light and some dribble of the street in through the tinted main door, that he was more inebriated than he had thought just lazing his apartment rooms, that he might have checked it wrong and heading back to it when he was just about to push out into the street.

He asked someone the time, to not only get what was the time but to test out his social interactions, could he pretend he wasn’t drunk even enough to fool himself let alone some other person, would he be able to fool the person sold cigarettes and bourbon, earlier than he thought, somehow, and definitely decided No to the cab, staring at a few that passed, filled to the guts plump, women in their dresses and their men in their long, heaping coats, scarves and ties tucked down tight under done buttons.

Right away he was faced with should he duck into this little shop for the cigarettes, anyway, they had several brands he liked, not being the type to be picky about a brand in particular, hesitated in front and for some reason thought he had another cigarette of his own to smoke down in the meantime while he made his mind up, had to beg one off of some one of a group of young girls, whether she had been flirtatious or not he could not make up his mind was it in his thoughts only, either way the girl just a kid in any events and if she was finding him charming, drunk and slurping down the street dressed like some wretch, she should think again, best to avoid even thinking about that and the cigarette was long, slow burning, some All Natural kind and so he wrote her off as a loser kid didn’t know how obnoxious it was smoking All Natural cigarettes like they were the more sophisticate choice, like longer burning was where it was at or even meant anything.

Pack of cigarettes he said, pack of those there, snapping fingers, those coloured ones, Fantasias or whatever they’re called, he knew all of that was said too fast and he kept bobbing up onto his toes as though to be more offhand, charming, slunked out of the place as soon as he had paid, even having to resist the urge to tell the clerk keep the change, obvious if he did that how far off to the left he was, a real bust out, the change more than five dollars, into his pocket.

Halfway through his third cigarette and just coming up to Krista’s block by the time he had calmed down, stopped slurping thoughts about the transaction, inventing alternates, getting caught up in fixations over some detail of how the light had tricked over the counter in oblong spills, smatterings of this colour that colour, and he got a yellow cigarette lit and just kept still, or at least did not proceed any further, arched his back a curled strangle of his torso, something popped and something shifted, two bones grinding into, under, over each other, the feel of tooth to curb cement.

Music students

Krista was just the sort of person who would live all the way up on the fourth floor and he begrudged her every single step up the bleak brown stairwell, a cigarette and a half and perspiring he got to the landing to Four, wondered would he be interrupting her with some one of those music students she was forever bothering with, kind of doubted it with the weather, knocked and waited, scoffing the cutesy little mat she had out, a tic-tac-toe game on it, neither the X or O having won, a stalemate tic-tac-toe mat, but it was exactly what he would expect from someone like Krista, her eyes still adolescent smooth though now she’s something like thirty-two, something.

She answered the door dressed for work, he apologizing and all in with how he just needed a minute and how he had tried to call, she overtop that she had just come from work, it was fine and wasn’t he the drunken little charmer, some wry snipe about his shoes, nice brown red boxing shoes, he did not quite understand and he stole a look at her cleavage as he entered past but wiped at his nose and eyes like a sickly cat to disguise it, worried he was just a pulping tongue, telegraphed and obvious.

To be continued