jealous guy.

joe is certain that i'm fucking his girlfriend. it just isn't true.

i tell him, no, it isn't like that at all.

he isn't convinced.

she and i went for a walk in the park about the time this whole thing started. mostly i was quiet and she was bitching about joe. i found it marvelously uninteresting, but her babble was some comfort to me and i really just wanted an accomplice. it's so much easier to remember why you love solitude when you have someone chattering in your ear.

so joe's girlfriend went back to joe's apartment after we played on the swings and got a cup of coffee. i was glad to be rid of her. apparently, upon returning she wouldn't shut up about me, which planted the seeds of doubt. she fed him some line about how i really seemed to understand her and she felt like he just wasn't listening to her anymore. well, joe and i both.

so joe, portrait of tact that he is, approached me the next day. he said, 'are you fucking my girlfriend?'

i said no. i thought this to be pretty straightforward, but he evidently had his doubts. he tried to ease of confession out of me by asking if i was attracted to her at all. i said, 'joe, i find your girlfriend longwinded and annoying. i think you feel that way too, so she must be a pretty good fuck or there's just something that i'm missing.'

he obviously couldn't decide whether he should be offended or comforted by that one. he just sort of scowled and left.

his girlfriend showed up at my house the next day. i was growing tired of this already.

she said, 'joe is really jealous of you.'

'i noticed.'

'he thinks you're trying to fuck me.'

'i'm not interested.' she looked dejected, then half-offended that i even thought she was propositioning me. i have no idea whether she actually wanted to fuck me or not. but it's really hard to start a jealous love triangle when someone is trying as hard as i was to be uninvolved. still, she somehow managed to pull it off. i'll commend her on that one.

she sat down on the couch with her legs uncrossed. she was wearing a skirt and both of her feet were pointed inward, straight at me. i tried to remind myself that everything i know about body language is really just as easily dismissed and freudian psychology or communism. still, it works in theory. i looked her up and down, briefly entertained the idea of sex, then came to my senses.

i put my beer down and stopped drinking. i think i could feel the hair rising on the back of my neck, but that may have been completely imagined. after about a half an hour of cat and mouse i told her that i needed to go and do something. i don't remember what, but it was a pretty thin excuse and was intended only to make her leave. she did.

a few days later i went to the bar after work to have a drink. it was still happy hour and i expected things to be pretty quiet. he looked up as soon as i walked in, and i knew it was too late to turn and walk back out.

i went and sat down next to joe at the bar. he just looked at me for a while, then back at his beer, then back at me again. he sort of crinkled his nose, then his whole face went slack. he said, 'i'm really upset about this whole thing.'

i told him i didn't know what he was talking about. he raised a brow at me, looked me up and down, then shrugged.

he said, 'julie left me today.'

rather than consoling him i just said, 'ah. okay.'

we sat there and drank our beers in silence for a few minutes, and finally he looked me in the eye and said, 'so. you're fucking her, right?'

'nope. still definitely not fucking her.'

'i don't believe you.'

'yeah, i know.'

sometimes a guy just can't win. i bought him another beer and then did my best to make a graceful exit.

when i got home all the lights were off, but the stereo was on. it was playing portishead. i groaned a little bit. i was clearly badly cast for this sitcom.

i turned the lights on. she was naked and she was on my couch. she was looking me right in the eyes. very suggestively. i didn't know what the fuck i was going to do. i looked her up and down again, then walked into my kitchen and got a beer. when i walked back in she looked confused. i sat down in the chair across from the couch.

i just sat there for a minute, looking at her and sipping my beer. eventually, i said, 'see, i really don't want to fuck you. i'm not even kidding. not that i'm not flattered. it's just that i'm not really interested. not to mention all the drama it would cause.'

she pursed her lips up a little bit, then started crying. eventually she came over and put her head on my shoulder. i looked over at the door, figuring that true to the paradigm joe would show up at my front door and walk in to his naked ex crying on me. how romantic.

i realised i was staring at her breasts, so i got up after about a minute of crying and got her clothes. she looked kind of angry with me. she said, 'you know, i broke up with joe for you.' i just shrugged. 'what's your problem?' she asked.

i looked her in the eye. 'i have no idea what it is that you think you want, but i don't have it. and i think you should probably go.'

she picked up her clothes and covered herself up with them as she walked to the bathroom to get dressed. i will never understand why a woman who has just tried to fuck me is so suddenly uncomfortable with me seeing her naked. maybe it was symbolic. i guess i missed the point.

she left pretty quickly, giving me a mean look as she did.

a few weeks later i ran into her and joe together at the bar. joe was eyeing me like i was up to something. julie wouldn't make eye contact at all. eventually, joe got up to go to the bathroom.

she walked over to me and said, 'you had your chance with me and you blew it.'

'i really wasn't interested. still not interested. i understand that maybe it seemed like i was, but i was only in it for the swinging and conversation.'

joe came back out of the bathroom. he scowled at me. he still thinks julie and i are fucking. i guess i don't really blame him.

goodbye, chinese notebook.

tonight i filled up the last page of the chinese notebook with writing. i'll probably start a fresh one soon, but i have a lot to reread and filter through before i feel properly done with this one. i have drafts of seven or eight short stories kicking around, so i may start posting them if they seem good upon revision. otherwise you can consider this a short respite before i launch into more of the same vague and depressing garbage you've come to expect. feel free to check for updates with a morbid fascination or condescending sense of humour.

i'm pretty new to this whole prose thing, and so far this has all been an experiment. criticism is welcome. if i write you off i'll do it quietly, but mostly i just appreciate any analytical words or ill-will that come my way.

take it or leave it:
i felt much better having gotten this out of my head.

well, of course.

slip on your shoes, slip out the door. no one's gonna notice you walking like that. dressed like that. in the four a.m. early autumn street, the sky changed to a psychotic shade of orange and you with complete anonymity. feeling like the goddamn messiah is bearing down straight on your head before you've even had a chance to wake up and get your head together.

i could have told you all that. don't bother pointing out the obvious. because all the tenants and denizens of this fluorescent house have gone mad, pulled each other close and gone absolutely isolated. stared too long at what was and gained a set of paranoid delusions to carry them through all the waking hours. because things got carried off with such a rampant abstraction that everyone just trails off in the middle of sentences, looking absent for a second reaching for a pack of cigarettes with that hand that isn't holding one already lit.

trailing on and off through the flat and vibrant ohio skies, carry yourself like some reckless spectre ready to permeate the minds of anyone sane and ready enough to listen. clench those fists bone white and ask for absolution after you've finished your drink. get ready to yell something, feel the tension in your throat as you open your mouth and wonder what to utter. get settled and set yourself up for a fall. you're really going to tell them something.

it's the absent feeling of flesh carried across your skull in the morning, it's waking up and wondering what is surreal but being pretty sure. sure that this is it. watch as the door comes down, drilled full of holes, you sick and sitting in your bed wondering what the fuck has gone on outside while you slept. waking up and hearing your roommates fucking and screaming and thinking about how you can't tell the difference anymore even if it is an obvious lie. this is you looking for your keys and your phone and getting ready to run out the door hoping that you'll go out and do something decisive for real this time.

this is you looking at your friends and losing touch with yourself. surrounded by reference points and getting further out of control but still standing well within the bounds that they have set. this is you, not ready to place blame until you're sure you have ground to stand on. this is you brimming with hellfire and vengeance but really just looking for the door you came in from.

well i was there one time, walked around for days in the rain saying nothing to nobody. utterly convinced i'd find some off kind of truth collecting dust in the far corners of my psyche, left it up to me to do some soul searching, pretty sure i didn't know what was in there but it all had to be great. or at least better than thinking what losers my friends were and worrying about how like them i was becoming.

well, maybe you'll find yourself in the driver's seat. i hope so, because i promise that all this careful philosophy without action is helping no one. this is you thinking you're backed into a corner, but hon, i suggest you turn around and make sure it's walls you're pressed up against before you go lashing out at anyone.

last taste.

we've had this same argument at least eight times. i'm not one for redundancy, but we just can't resolve this one. she looks completely exhausted and at her wit's end. we stare at each other for a while in silence.

i say, 'we're doing this because we're bored.'

she says, 'yes.' emphatically.

i say, 'maybe we should just have some kinky sex or go on a road trip or something.'

she says, 'kinky sex.' i wonder if it will actually happen.

when we get back to the apartment neither of us has said anything and we just stand in the doorway and look at each other. she starts to open her mouth as i start to move my hand toward her hip, but it's completely half-assed. we both stop what we were doing and just look at each other again.

i guess i have to be the decisive one here so i make a move. i decide to cook something for her, hoping to coax her into conversation. i can tell she's disappointed that i abandonned sex. at one point she thought it was really sweet that i was always cooking elaborate meals for her, but now she takes it for granted. honestly, i think i do it mostly to keep my hands busy while i talk to her. cooking has become synonymous with fighting and i've learned over time that if i make something delicious and spicy enough we'll both just pass out like a couple of dumb ferrets after eating and hopefully forget about everything by the morning.

i pull some curry out of the cupboard and she immediately objects. i turn around and ask what she wants, and she says, 'something greasy.' this is oddly alluring and i have no idea why.

i realise i'm probably too late, but eventually i get the sense to attempt sex again. even though i know it won't really fix anything. eggs are cooking in my wok and vegetables have been diced by the time i ignore the food and get to undressing her. secretly, i hope that the house will burn down while we fuck. she interrupts me as i'm giving oral sex to tell me that the food is burning. i begrudgingly get up and flip the eggs. they're a little dry on the bottom, but i add a little sesame oil and they're fine again.

she tells me, 'i don't want to leave you.' right out of nowhere. maybe it's the context or maybe i'm just jittery and paranoid, but it unsettles me a little bit. i'm halfway to desperately telling her a bunch of the things i love about her- her cracked toenail polish, the horrible mess her room is in, the frequency with which she knocks the lamp off the table when we're fucking. she'd probably swoon a little bit if she were in the right mood, but have second thoughts and say something really lame instead.

'i think the eggs will be okay. do you want some wine?'

wine and eggs? of course not. she shakes her head and i give her a beer, realising what idiots we're both being. acting like complete strangers and obviously not helping the situation any. i throw the vegetables in the wok, turn the burner down and put a lid on it.

'come sit by me,' she says, and i do. she puts her head on my shoulder and i'm divided between trying to figure out a magical solution to our problems and acknowledging that they don't really exist. my hand is on the small of her back when she tells me she's not really hungry. i'm not either. i pull out two cigarettes and hand her one. i look at her and smile a little bit and things seem okay again.

i remember two weeks ago we were lying on the couch watching a clint eastwood marathon on tnt. she doesn't like westerns and i've seen them all a million times. i got a tub of ice cream out of the freezer and we shared it and rubbed our feet together. eventually one of us got the sense to turn the tv off.

i try to explain the significance of this but she puts her fingers to my lips and i guess she gets it anyway. or doesn't need to. we're both really self-indulgent and easily distracted. i think about how i don't really want the house to burn down, and eventually we'll go to bed and feel happy or at least some facsimile of happiness. i look down at her thighs in her skirt and remember that this is a girl who i like and to who i am immensely attracted.

i tell her i don't want her to leave. she crinkles her nose and looks at me like i'm stupid. i turn and she puts her head back on my shoulder. this time i have the sense to shut up until the food is done. there's no further talk of kinky sex, but i wasn't really in the mood anyway. neither was she. what the hell are we thinking?

we'll probably break up within a month and we both know it. when we go to sleep we kiss and it's soft but we embrace for a long time. like we're trying to get a last taste or something. her breath tastes like eggs. i wonder if i'll miss that, too.

romantic encounter, botched.

i went over to her house one evening with just the intention of having a beer or two. the next morning she invited me out for breakfast. that evening we went out for a movie and then stayed back at her place, watching the sci-fi channel, eating ice cream and fucking on the couch.

the next day i had to work, but she called me right after i got off to spend the night with her. when i woke up she was already making breakfast. i pulled a t-shirt on and walked out into the kitchen.

she said, 'i got you a toothbrush. it's in the bathroom.'

i'll admit it. i panicked. i thought immediately about getting my clothes and rushing out the door. the eggs she was cooking smelled really good, though. in my mind i was assuring myself that that was why i stayed.

during breakfast she played with my bare feet under the table. afterward we fucked on her plexiglas coffee table. by the time i got out of there i was so tweaked from all the sex and breakfast i couldn't even think straight. i bought two packs of cigarettes and a bottle of venezuelan rum and sat on my porch trying to calm myself down.

she called that night and left a message. she called again two days later sounding slightly angrier. by this time the rum and cigarettes were long gone and i still didn't know what to do. a week later she showed up at my diner and sat down at my table. she was looking pretty good. i was a little nervous.

she said, 'hey. you're being a real dick.'

i looked at her and said, 'yeah, i know. i feel terrible about it.

'it was the toothbrush, wasn't it?'

i nodded.

she told me that her dad was a dentist. i told her i hadn't seen a dentist in years. she looked at me, opened her mouth and then closed it again. we sat in silence for a minute.

she got up and said, 'okay. i guess that's it.'

i told her i'd pay for her coffee as she got up to leave, but i don't think she heard me.