Monty: The Androgynous, Philosophical, Arson Enthusiast

Betrayal of the feet

Art walks away and I watch him go. There are no more big guys to hit and no more Art to pull me around. The street is quiet and damp and I hear myself laugh for a little while as well. And I think, maybe I want a little more than beat up knuckles, but then I'm not supposed to want anything at all.

So, where to, then?

I've got to get somewhere quick, real quick. It's that rotten hour where the night is either going to collapse in on itself, or reveal a whole new thread to start it up anew. Everything is real crucial right about now.

I can't think about it too much or I'll start thinking like me. The conscious input of "I" must be avoided at all costs. I is always trying to halt the process of thread following.

It drones on and on. Get some rest you've done enough, tick this night off the list. You're bleeding; go get some ice and bandages. Go wrap yourself up in layers of peaceful comfort, in a person or a pillow. All of that nonsense that says living is just the feed for restlessness, until it's full enough not to bother you for a week. No, that's not what it's for, that golden stuff of life. It's not another blanket and I won't give up on it.

Art is wrong, I'm not afraid of a damn thing. The fear you've got is equal to the limitations you live by. The routine comforts that numb your brain. So you aren't thinking or feeling nothing you don't want to. I don't avoid the intuitions of life no matter what. No matter where.

That's why I had to leave Daria's place. I couldn't feel any semblance of the threads in there. I couldn't feel anything in there but her. I did the right thing leaving. Yep.

A blue and red flashing eases around the corner and stops in front of the bar. Two cops emerge and their attentions snaps to me, the beat up person sitting in the middle of the road. I watch the gears turn in their minds eye.

"Hey you," one of them shouts.

Here we go. I yank myself upwards and slink away into an alley, onto another street. My pulse won't quite return to a steady rate. It pushes me to move faster and faster until I am running. But not back to Daria, I can't. Because the night can't end just yet, it just can't.

"Come back here!"

I hear two sets of footsteps coming up behind me. I put my head down and run like hell. I take off down another street and boy are they coming right on after me, so damn fast like my legs are broken. Jesus what did I do? I threw a few punches, it's not like I killed a man! But still, they are coming and coming after me so I move these bones. I move these bones and fuck what was that? Who was that?

No, no it couldn't have been. I slow even though they've got to be gaining on me and I look a lot harder because holy cow it's not... It's not, it can't be.

But that black mane of hair and those small shoulders and that gait. That damn, damn gait of hers. She's just wandering in the night, on the street, across the road, heading away from me with that silly white, yapping dog beside her lazy steps.

Cecilia?

I split in two. Half of me shoots towards her and half of me shoots backwards, at the cops. Because I can't see her, I haven't seen her. I should let them cuff me and drag me on back, I really should.

I cut across the road at a slower pace and stop in the middle of the road and that dog turns its head and tilts it to one side. Its little black eyes twinkling in the streetlight. Car headlights are rolling towards me and I need to move but which way. Surely not towards her. From top to toes I am vibrating with panic. I press my palms hard into the side of my head, I should not be here. Definitely not. Oh damn it, I am scared. I am definitely, unmistakably, utterly scared shitless right now.

I turn back to the cops. They aren't even there. But I heard them, I'm sure of it. They were just behind me. Maybe I did split in two and I'm already half caught.

The car honks its horn and I jump about ten feet into the air. I get off the road, towards Cecilia? Really? But the street is empty there too. I jog towards that streetlight she was just under, but she sure as hell isn't anywhere around here. It's all empty, the world is empty. That car passes and I'm alone.

I look up at the street name and I know exactly where my adrenalin soaked feet have taken me. I'm home.