I got a dalmatian...

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmAxuIBSlEE
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R: Throw on some chill music. We've all got something that we listen to when things are going just right. There's some Sublime up there. This starts off like an old one, but it's different, and longer.

Oh God is it longer.

F:
My mother always said I was too damn curious. So I just couldn’t help myself when I saw the two kids sneak off into the alley, him playfully tugging at her arm. They were both young and living the life, nothing urgent about their mannerisms, just running along with smiles on their faces. I checked my watch to see if I had enough time before I had to go and stare at my computer. I hate working the weekends, not that the drudgery of the weekdays is any better, but the extended lunches were a short vacation in and of themselves. Groaning as I pushed myself off the bench, I slapped my hat back on my head and tossed the remainder of my tea into the bin. Gazing up and down the street, I saw nothing else worth occupying my time so I sauntered on down to where I had last seen the pair. A quick glance over my shoulder, making sure nobody was spying on me, and I took a quick glance around the corner, down the alley.

Well, they weren’t fucking, let me just make that perfectly clear. And no, there was no ‘making of love’ either. No rape, no beating, nothing scary or of the sorts. They were flopped behind a dumpster on a pile of trash bags, using an old refrigerator box to buffer between them and the rotting condoms and apples stuffed in the black bags. His fingers were intertwined with hers. Their forearms and hands pointed towards the sky like a steeple. He smiled. She smiled. Their sun burnt faces didn’t crease with it, but rather burst at the seams. Between the light of their faces shined the light of the joint they passed back and forth. As their conversation went on, unheard by my ears, that little light danced and flickered, burned slightly brighter then faded away. It was almost as if it were an author’s pencil, punctuating each sentence as it swooped through the air, vividly describing each laugh and bringing to light the theme of their conversation. I looked at my watch again. My, how time flies by while others are having fun.


I had those damn kids stuck in my head the rest of the day. Designing that better mousetrap wasn’t able to keep their grinning faces from slamming to the front of my mind. Why couldn’t they have been doing something sordid or, on all accounts, truly fucked up? I could have just shook my head in disgust or walked away. Yet here I sit with their laughter echoing in my head. Finally, five o’clock came, and I made my way home. I climbed the stairs to my shoddy little apartment, passed the piss stain that had been grounding into the carpet with memorized grace, stopped, and turned on my heels towards my door. But this wasn’t my door. This was Ronnie’s, our local meet-and-greet-have-a-seat hippie. I don’t remember knocking, but that’s unsurprising. That laughter seemed to be hijacking my body. We exchanged pleasantries after I assured him for the umpteenth time that “No, this isn’t the police.” I danced around the topic of what I really wanted a bit. Ronnie’s eyes got a little shifty while I tried to be smooth about the whole ordeal. At least I think they did, but with his lids half closed and the majority of his eyes being redder than a thousand suns, it was difficult to tell. After a bit I was relaxing in my living room, a hundred dollars poorer, but a bag of grass richer.

A few minutes later, I finally worked up the nerve to go back over and knock on Ronnie’s door again. He put up less of a fight this time, and cracked the door until the chain pulled tight against the frame.

“Hey man, what’s the problem now?”

“Hey Ronnie, um, well, it’s kinda mechanical.”

“Like, engines and shit? I just do the vegetation shit and stuff, man.”

“No, it’s, well.” I began to rub my eyes, the aggravation at myself beginning to build. “This is, y’know. My first time.”

“Wha? Oh man. Oh man, oh man. I did not know. I always figured you for a straight up kinda guy but I figured you were a kid once.”

“Yeah. A kid. Um, so I’ve got no papers or pipes or anything. What do I do?”

Never let it be said that those who spend their time in a cloud of smoke are not engineer grade material. Within a minute Ronnie had given me detailed instructions on how to make a pipe out of a can. I thanked him and half jogged back to my apartment, ready to find out just where those smiles bloom from. It burned my throat, made my sinuses cry in agony, punished my lungs, and gave me such a coughing fit that I swore I could hear Ronnie laughing all the way at the other end of the hall. I crawled to the kitchen and got a tall glass of water, hoping something, anything would cool my throat.

Halfway through the glass I noticed that water only pours down and not up. If only water would pour up, there wouldn’t need to be water pumps to get water to the toilets at the top of my office building. I could save the company, like, hundreds if not thousands in utility bills if I could just find some way to implement this. I began to draw out the schematics for the upward pouring system, detailed with exit strategies and the conundrum of getting the water to go back down and not hurl off into space, providing passing aliens with samples of our urine and excrement. After a bit of brainstorming, I noticed that my stomach was trying to chew its way out by way of my navel. The refrigerator was empty, no Pop Tarts in the pantry, whatever was I to do? There was a fabulous Chinese take-out restaurant about three blocks away, I could maybe make it without attracting notice to myself.
That’s when it hit me. I’d attract attention to myself. I’d never make it without stumbling up and falling on some granny and her walker. The police would find me and take me away. The headlines would read “Local Engineer Sentenced to Life for Assault on a Granny.” Then the drug tests. Losing my job. Humiliating my family. The horror! The horror! I curled up beside my television, willing my stomach not to send me to prison.


I awoke the next day covered in herbs and spices. I threw the remainder of the weed into the toilet, flushing it down like a madman. It’s too scary to deal with that kind of fear, never sure whether or not you’re going to screw up your life or not. I just didn’t feel worth risking it for that bit of childish joy. It’s a sort of abject terror, I suppose. Then a week later, I saw the same two kids, fashionably grungy in their denim jeans with holes torn in the knees and right under the ass. They were still smiling and giggling while everyone else around them moped along with their weekly routines, those little rays of sunshine on an otherwise gloomy Saturday. They disappeared down the alleyway, once again. A small rumble came from the sky, off in the distance. As if a switch had been flipped by some unseen hand, umbrellas began to sprout up like Technicolor mushrooms, popping up from the ground with cartoony sound effects. Sighing, I looked at my watch, the brown bag in my left hand rustling as the two day old muffin inside shifted with the motion. It was bran.

The scuffed tips of my dress shoes were all I really concentrated on as I shuffled back to the office. I took the wide, grey sidewalks, didn’t want to chance stumbling down any alleyways where the bright embers of happiness might be dancing. The office was a somewhat typical building. It stood tall among the rest of the city, blue glass panels perfectly aligned between thick steel girders. Truly it was a work of art, able to withstand gale force winds thanks to the construction that allowed a slight sway should a hurricane make it this far inland. Yet everyday that I came walking up the street, seeing the tip of that shining diamond hover above the lackluster commercial buildings that lined the district, I couldn’t help but feel that it wasn’t a beacon of wisdom or strength. It seemed more like a looming iceberg, beautiful and humongous, imposing on everything around it. I stood there for a moment wondering just how I’d ended up in this beautiful, monotonous place. The sky let open with another crackle of thunder, and the rain began to fall with a soft pitter-patter onto the city. A deep sigh escaped from my throat and I tossed the paper bag into the green wastecan bolted to the sidewalk. Why did I even order bran? And stale ones at that? I sailed my little boat towards the revolving glass doors, skimming around the quickly forming puddles.

I shook my coat off and hung it at the entrance of my cubicle. After flopping into my chair and flicking my monitor on I found myself just sitting there. I had been working on the new expressway bridge since the last one had almost given out the last hurricane season. It was a work of art, using a new alloy for the cables and a hinging system that was based on the new arithmetic theorem that was…Well. Let’s just put it like this: This bridge would act like the ultimate tripwire against Godzilla. I used to love being able to design a building that would support the world if stood on end. Not that that’s possible, just saying. But I just didn’t feel it in me today. I had been tearing through the blueprints and catching the errors up until this point. Now I was just sitting there, feet moved onto the top of the desk, and listening to the air conditioner pump the re-circulated air throughout the floor. Saturdays at work are the worst.

So I sat there the rest of the day, twiddling my thumbs, trying to figure out why I just couldn’t move forward with this anymore. The crosshatched pattern of my cubicle walls looked even drabber today, if that were possible for slate gray boxes. Everything I had in me seemed to have run out through the soles of my shoes and seeped into the coffee stained carpet over the past week. And then it hit me. I slid over to my jacket and slipped my cell phone from the inside pocket. Poking my head above the cubicle wall I surveyed the floor to see who else had been damned to a weekend in hell. None of my neighbors were in today. Jack was probably up hiking in the northeast, scaling the tallest ridges with a broken leg and a Sherpa on his back, if you were willing to believe him. Daryl was the closest to me, just a few blocks down. But if he wasn’t on something himself, then I think he would have been proclaimed legally brain dead a long time ago. I ducked back down and let my thumbs flip through the contacts till I found Ronnie’s personal number. After the text was sent out, I drummed my fingers on my desk until I felt the phone vibrate. The phone shot open in my hands. I don’t think I had ever skipped out on work before, but it wasn’t like I was getting anything done.

I sped through the revolving door and away from the blue, water coated building, finding haven under a covered bus stop. I breathed a deep sigh of relief and gave an embarrassed nod to the girl sitting on the bench. She gave a half giggle and smiled, her lips opening up a small glimpse into what the rest of the day would be like for me. We sat in silence for what seemed to be forty five minutes, just watching the rain shower down even harder. The odd crackle of thunder and flash of lightning illuminating the pedestrians quickly scurrying down the opposite side of the street, their umbrellas bobbing and the water wicking up the bottoms of their pants. A lone bicyclist passed by and hit a particularly deep puddle, the unexpectedness of the situation could be seen in his eyes as his front tire sank and is body sailed forward over the handlebars, his parka spreading out like the wings of a decrepit eagle. Unfortunately, they didn’t catch enough air to hold him afloat, and he crashed to the ground as if the hand of God had smote him right then and there for challenging the laws of physics. I gasped, feeling so sorry for the man, but the girl began to laugh like a banshee, the cigarette in her hand sprouting smoke trails as she brought both hands to her face. A sheepish look spread over her face as she pulled her lips between her teeth to stifle the laughter. We shared a knowing look and the giggles began to spread between us. The bus pulled up shortly after, the air screaming out from the brakes, and the doors whooshed open to an overly cold interior. I waited a moment while the girl climbed onto the bus before I climbed the stairs myself. Man, oh man did she have great legs showing below her dress.


It was a short ride to my building, a two mile trip, but with the rain and my lack of planning, the bus was a good alternative to catching a cold. As the bus screeched to a slow halt in front of my building, I noticed I was not the only one rising from their seat. There she was again, dark hair sliding from her shoulders as she turned her head to find her purse. She stood, the edges of her dress slipping from the seat and dancing lightly across her calves, and began to move to the front. I hesitated a moment. Man I hope she doesn’t think I’m some sort of a stalker or anything. It was my stop though, and no sense riding another couple blocks. She stepped off the bus and made her way to the front door, a finger delicately reaching out to the intercom and selecting a room. As I stepped off the bus and into the pouring rain I could make out Ronnie’s stat icy voice chirp out over the intercom.

“…Yo?”

“Hey Ron, it’s Lilly”

“Oh. Shit, hey darlin, you’re early. Come on up.”

The buzzer sounded and she swung the heavy metal door open, her hair swaying and bouncing with every step she took down the hall. I hesitated a moment, the rain beginning to seep through my jacket and tickle the space between my shoulders with an icy finger. I moved to the front door, fumbling for my keys, pressing closely into the door frame to reduce the damage to my clothes. I found the key, slipped it into the lock and let myself in, greeted yet again by that false air, slamming me in the face and bubbling my skin. I rubbed my arms to try to create some warmth, but the only effect it had was grinding the water deeper into my body.


I shuffled around my apartment for about twenty minutes, wondering how long the girl from the bus would be over at Ronnie’s. A look at the clock told me it was half past five. I could have finished off work and still have been on about the same schedule. Flipping my phone open, I pressed on the keys to spell out ‘Busy?’ and hit the send button. Almost immediately my phone chirped with his reply of ‘No, c’mon over’. I grabbed my money off of the counter and jammed it into the pockets of my slacks. As my feet carried me down the hall, I felt them bounce a little more than usual, a mixed feeling of relief and expectation washing over me. My knuckles rapped on the door and I heard Ronnie call out from inside:

“Who is it?”

“It’s me. I just got your text.”

I heard the faint whisper of cellophane crinkling through the edges of the door. The door wiggled slightly as I heard the chain slide from its latch. The door opened, pulling the air from the hallway in around me, rolling the cloud of smoke that was inside back.

“C’mon in man,” Ronnie said, poking his head out into the hallways and looking at both ends quickly. “I’ve got some business goin on but we can make it quick.” I hesitated slightly, hands in my pockets, but took a quick step inside and stood against the closet door while Ronnie shut the door, slipping the chain back into the latch and peaking out of the peephole.

“I can, uh, just come back later, Ronnie.” I chanced a peek towards his living room.

“Oh. Nah man. Just an old friend stopping by. Used to party with her parents, y’know?” He waved for me to follow him and I followed him into the living room, the smell of incense and pot growing stronger.

His living room was occupied by a large, sectional couch, the kind that wraps around the entire room. There were matching cushions stuffed in the open areas, making it look more like a Caesar’s bed than a couch. Along the walls were oil paintings, depicting mostly great schooners and sloops, the detail on them so fine you could almost see the rigging for the sails. I felt my forehead crease as I continued to observe the surroundings. There were two book cases in the path between the couch and the wall, filled with nautical manuals and what looked to be depth charts. A bottle took up the top shelf of each book case, inside each were meticulously crafted ships, floating on seas of fake water, their crews probably wondering why the scenery never changed. This must be what a dope dealer does in his free time; he thinks about doing something else.

A soft cough from the far end of the couch snapped me back to attention. I must have been staring at the décor for at least a minute or to, as I caught a glimpse of Ronnie coming out of his bedroom. My eyes swiveled, and were met with a set of smiling teeth and eyes. I felt my checks flush slightly.

“Oh! Hi, again, sorry, uh, heh.”

Yeah, I was that smooth.

“Well hello,” she said, “Ronnie said he might be having someone over. I think he was starting to worry when you didn’t show up earlier.” Her lips curled back into the most damning, knowing smile I’ve ever seen. My face did flush this time, the blood screeching through my veins to get there. It was probably laughing too. I tried to flash my own smile, but it was difficult to do so while feeling as if I were going to collapse into a puddle of sweat.

“What? Oh, yeah, well, I had left my apartment a mess, and-d I figured I should take care of that first?” There I stood, making an ass out of myself. At that moment, I wondered if I could start doing it professionally. She noticed the stutter and hesitation, a giggle softly rising from her chest.

“Is that so? You look like someone who has everything in place.” She arched an eyebrow and I damn near choked on my tongue. The hell is this? Day of the Succubus?

“Hey man,” Ronnie said as he pressed the plastic bag into my hands, “why don’t you stick around for a bit. If you finished that last bag already, you must have caught on pretty quickly.”

“Well, I’ve still got some work that I, um, brought home that I really should…” I trailed off and licked at my lips while they both stared at me.

Lilly’s smile brightened even more, a hand reaching up to scratch at the back of her ear.

“It’s Saturday, c’mon,” she said, “besides, you look like you could use some relaxation.”

I pressed the money into Ronnie’s hand and clutched the baggie to my chest like it would maybe make a difference. Ronnie tucked the cash into the front pocket of his shirt and when his hand came away it held a ream of rolling papers.

“C’mon man, it’s on me,” he said, hopping slightly and letting himself fall back onto the couch, the springs bouncing him back up slightly. They both stared up at me. I wanted some change, right? I sighed and tossed my baggie to the corner furthest away from Lilly and went to sit by it.

“Alright, let’s do this, I guess.”

“You’ll have to scoot a little bit closer,” Lilly replied.


We laid among the cushions for what must have been hours, smoking and laughing. Graciously they accepted me as if I were an old friend, hooting and hollering at all the right points in the stories I told. Ronnie turned out to have been a deep sea fisherman, pulling in tuna that were the size of small cars. He moved from the coast into the city after a hurricane picked up his boat and made it the hood ornament of the Federal Motors Regulation building. It also took away his house, storage shed, and his wife. At first I thought he meant that it actually took away his wife, as in screaming through the air. Ronnie said he wished that were the case; she left because he couldn’t afford to gain back everything he lost, even with the insurance.

Lilly was a few years younger than I. She was a bit of a dork, no matter how smartly she dressed. She was going to be finishing up her last year at college, going on to become a certified something or other. Her dress had ridden up slightly, so I was having trouble concentrating. Yes, ‘pig’, I know. But she had also done a bit of travelling. Spain for the running of the bulls. Bangladesh for the celebration of Holi. Amsterdam for the celebration of being a college student with some extra income. She showed us the scar on her right bicep from where a bull had barely nicked her during her trip to Spain. Evidently twelve people died that year. Her reason for being in the city was to visit her Aunt and Uncle who were on the north side of the city, and her father had asked her to ‘kick Ronnie in the head for old time’s sake’.

“Yeah, yeah. That’s one thing you won’t be doin tonight,” Ronnie said.

“Hey. You know Dad. It’s never a question, always an order,” she said, poking Ronnie in the head with her toe.

He swatted away her foot, saying “Well, there, obligation filled. But kids, it’s time for me to turn in, so you know the drill: Get the hell out.”
I lazily groped for my bag and stuffed it into my slacks, stretching as I stood. Lilly scooted closer to the edge of the couch and grabbed my arm, using it to pull herself up. She blew at the strands of hair that had fallen into her face and smiled at me.

“Thanks.”

“Welcome,” I said, an unfamiliar smile spreading across my face.

Ronnie showed us out, smiling and wishing us well. Once in the hall my feet started on their familiar route to my apartment. I noticed a second set of footsteps trailing along behind me. I turned around to meet Lilly’s eyes.

“Well, you didn’t say goodbye, so I figured I was coming back with you.”

“Oh, uh, I’m sorry. Was really great meeting you, Lilly.”

“Uh-uh, too late,” she said, spinning me back around and pushing me down the hall.

“Whoah, uh, you really don’t want to I mean there’s really nothing to do and the place is a mess and-”

“You cleaned up before you came over and you have a bag of grass, remember? March.”


I protested a little more but the firmness of her hand between my shoulders seemed to quell any sort of resistance I could put up. My keys jingled in the lock and the door gave way as Lilly pushed us through the threshold and peaked over my shoulder.

“See? Clean as can be. Jeez,” she said, her eyes scanned across the room, “bit of a neat freak?”

“Maybe just a little.”

She wandered over to the coffee table, where my notes from work were laying. I remember thinking of jumping through the window. Notepads and scrap sheets of paper filled with equations and calculations and diagrams. Heck of a conversation piece. I opened the fridge and saw that I had a six pack left. I stuck my head above the door and asked if she would like one. She affirmed the statement and began to circle the coffee table, her eyes running over the walls as she did so. I popped the caps off of the two bottles and shuffled into the living room, handing one to her as I took my first sip. She smiled and did the same, pulling in her bottom lip as she let it settle in her mouth. The rain outside began to pick up, small beads pecking at my windows. She sat on the couch and asked me about the books on my shelf, a mix of fiction and Structural Engineering and Hyper-Tensile Formations for Dummies. We discussed Vonnegut and the Chaos Theory and cartoons. All the while there was the little voice in the back of my head.

Our buzzes began to wear thin, so we took a quick smoke break, passing the joint between ourselves near one of the open windows. Rain splashed in occasionally, chilling my arm along with the breeze that gusted up now and then, blowing the smoke back in as it came, pulling it out as it went. The ebb and flow of the embers punctuated our conversation, somehow drawing a little more out of me every time that it touched her lips and pulsed along with her breath. We spoke of her travels again, mainly on the exotic colors of India. She asked if I had ever been able to travel and I explained that engineers are not allowed to be out in the wild as we have no survival instincts. She followed up, wondering what I did to amuse myself in the meantime. I delicately pried the joint from her fingers and held it to my lips explaining that there really wasn’t much, as I’d just started this technique of relaxation. She asked what kind of things I would like to do if I wasn’t an engineer. I was silent.

A crack of thunder rolled down the street, bouncing off the brick buildings and echoing up into the rain. Car alarms began to go off. A devious smile spread across Lilly’s face and she snatched the joint from my lips and tossed it out the window. I was about to protest when she grabbed my tie and hauled me out of my seat, leading me to the door.

“Wait! Wha? Why’d you do that?

“C’mon. It’ll be fun.”

“Wait wait! Lilly, Stop!” I felt the pressure on the back of my neck slack up for a moment as she turned back towards me, her eyes gleaming and her hair and dress flowing around in unison.

“No.”

And with that, she hauled me out of the door and up the stairs at the end of the hall. We climbed a few sets and finally reached a door with a big, red EXIT sign. She turned around, the glow from the sign giving her a wicked tint, perfect for the smile she gave me at the time. She pushed the door open and dragged me out into the rain, skipping and laughing as the water began to soak in through our clothes. Lightning flashed out, illuminating the gravel rooftop and she let go of my leash. I looked around, wondering if anyone was looking out of their windows or calling the police. I turned back, mouth still open in shock as she began to dance around in the rain, arms outstretched, face turned upwards.

“Rain’s always a good experience to have!” she said to me above the steady sounds of rain and erratic thunder. “It’ll be a good story to tell someone one day!”

I laughed and shook my head, running my hands over my face and through my hair. What the hell was I doing up there, out in the rain like a fool? She wrapped her arm around mine and pulled me forward. It was just too maniacal. Almost unreal, a girl there with me, walking around the rooftop in the rain, our clothes clinging to our bodies as I tried to explain why the buildings were arranged in such a fashion to reduce overall wind shear and so on. We stopped at the northeast corner of the building, and I could see the tip of my office building rising above the rest, lit up by massive spotlights. We were quiet for a moment, just looking at that ice blue tip jutting towards the sky. I remember thinking go ahead, blame it on the weed. So I did, cupping her face gently and pulling her close, rain running down in between our faces. Her arms wrapped around me. We smiled together, foreheads bumping gently. Our feet guided us towards the door and out of the rain. Puddles formed as we walked down the stairs, marking our progress on the concrete steps and the dingy red carpet leading up to my door. We were shivering as we walked through the door. I smiled and kissed her again. Without the rain and the lightning, she gained back her devious look, innocence replaced with knowledge. My mind switched over and I felt the lump begin to claw its way up my throat.

“Um, there’s, uh, a robe in the bathroom and I could throw your clothes in the dryer.”


I woke up in my bed. Swinging my legs over the side I yawned and wished that tongues didn’t exist, as mine tasted like the backside of a dead horse. I ruffled my hair and began to walk to the kitchen to get a glass of water when I heard the sound of running water. I clapped my hand to my mouth and realized my eyes must be bulging. I rushed back into my room and threw on some jeans and a shirt. I sat in the kitchen, staring at my glass when she walked in, hair in place, dry dress hanging from her shoulders.

“Off so quick?” I almost smacked myself for that little burst of confidence.

“Yeah, I need to meet the family for brunch,” she said, putting on her earrings.

“Oh, well, maybe I’ll, uh, see you later?”

“Probably not,” she said, walking towards the door and opening it. “Oh yeah, you’re out of toilet paper.”

The door closed and she was gone.

“Well shit.”

I ain't shit! But that's ok...

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I can see my body change before my very eyes.

I'm losing it, whatever I had.

Call it vanity, I call it health.

The ground sinks a little more below my feet. And I feel the disgust again.