That bloody little
thing appearing as if mocking human attempts to compose the golden sentence; a
thousand black bleeping lines of robotic middle fingers. And after a sufficient
amount of frustration under which we chafe on and on, one fine day I or you
decide to go out and procure some of that adventurous and enlightening ‘living’
all those hippies have deified and defiled in the process. Well sir, I tell you,
I am interested in more than mere experience of the true human condition; the enquiry at hand requires a lot more than a
sophisticated analysis of those puny sacks of cowardly faeces that possess the
impunity to dare to cry for inalienable rights—Those sentimental
gits. A company in possession of any society at all, of any decency or taste
whatsoever, must decry such a vulgar enquiry.
What we’re interested
in, Reginald my dear boy, is the world of Ideals; ancient heroism and old
legends that manifest that which has been strived for but never achieved.
However, reckoning this turn of the argument, sliding into the nostalgic and
self-dwarfing endeavours of the disappointed fellows who always look for
greatness above and behind, never around, I am obliged to take over this farce
and instil some new flavour for Christ’s sake.
‘What is God?‘ she
asked me with a challenge bubbling in her smile.
‘Us sitting here
waiting for a bus. That guy over there staggering on his way home. My cat. The
way you smile. That is God.’ I answered rather hastily so as to demonstrate
that I wasn’t that drunk as I’d seemed to be. That was the purpose of that
question: to find out how hammered I was.
She looked complimented,
though slightly upset that I proved her wrong, sort of.
In the end, it wasn’t
all that bad. Charles manoeuvring his slender gloomy body among the swarming
crowds, as was his daily objective: don’t allow contact. Shiny shoes clapping
in a massive thud thud thud all around him. Surrounding mutter and spatter of
pale, soulless countenances countenancing the illicit conduct, dirt bags of
rubbish embellishing the pavement blotted with pools of green-dark-blue water;
Marshes ahead around and behind, what kind of an evil monster of a god would
approve... that means that there are only sensations and ideas and matter. Oh
sweet tasty matter. Writhing slopes of smoke coming from the boiling pools of
moss and gross unrefined products; a city, he thought, it was an insult to live
in. By whom? Does it matter?
What a moronic
beginning to any piece of literary work of myriads of possible natures—What pretty little
things?! Oh how lovely! One just craves to melt and dissolve in a pool of pink
boiling popsicles Now find me a pen.
A pen? A computer? A
notebook? A book? A kindle? Wrong is what feels wrong, dreading to forsake. Possibilities
teaming with abundance of ebullient chances, however silly this might sound Oh shut it! This is
not literary language, this is:
As Lady Brown
descended the stairs, an astounding spectacle of late summer Alps mirrored its
splendour in her eyes as she fixed her gaze upon a boy, a plump lad that is.
The bus finally
arrived.
‘What? What are we
talking about? When does the bus go again?’
‘Like, you see, we’re
all in love with everything we do and think every little success of ours
brilliant... But we aren’t... You know?! It’s not about you and it’s not even about me... Right?’
‘Yeah sure, whatever,
the bus dude!’
Jimmy was impatient
for he was dead tired and the last thing his exhausted body wanted to endure
was yet another of Reginald’s drunken philosophical rants. He knew it would
come to this. He didn’t mind really. Reginald fulfilled his purpose in keeping
him company the night he would decide. He truly listened at least, a rare
quality these days. And he had cash
which is a bloody miracle. Finally the bus arrived!
‘So see you soon
mate,’ said Reginald as he galloped smugly towards the cab spot.
Jimmy looked about
him in a vain hope for an empty seat but instead he got the regular ensemble of
what appeared to be the embodiment of the wish to get back home and crawl up in
the warmth like a cuddly snake. Gripping a suspiciously humid bar Jimmy was
struck hard by the reality of absent headphones.
‘Did I left them
home? Or at the pub? Why would I pull them out at the pub?’
And then he saw her.
Tall, beautiful and asking for a ticket.
‘Fuck!’
‘Is there a problem?’
‘Oh, did I say that
out loud? I’m so sorry.’
So are
you on the bus or off the bus?
He fingered his
wallet in perplexed panic. The bus was just about to stop to unload some of the
sleepy heroes of the night. He hasn’t ever run away from a ticket inspector.
He’s always talked his way out of the predicament, somehow. But this time he
was too tired to pull something of that calibre. And who the hell would expect
an inspection on a night bus. Should he run then? Was it worth it? How much
would be the ticket? He had no time. The alarm announcing that the door was
closing bellowed its cacophonic tune.
What would Hume do? As he darted out of the bus he caught a glimpse of a
pair of bewildered eyes.
After a 200 meter
sprint he found out he didn’t have to do so – nobody was after him. His pulse
calmed.
‘Where the hell am
I?’
After recognizing that
he’s travelled only one stop away from where he had boarded the bus and that
another one wouldn’t arrive sooner than in an hour thoughts of despair flooded
his liquored-up mind.
‘I might not be the
biggest star in the whole wide world,’ he recollected Reginald’s rant, ‘but I
bloody am one of the hungriest tired brittle chaps around, Goddamn: the things
I’d do for bread and bed.’
A tea that didn’t
quite make it, how original: waiting on her, on another of those ‘absorbing
girls’ that you can’t have unless you either act like an asshole or wait for a
miracle. The author is abounding with patience—that is not the
issue, Reginald, my dear boy. The source of our troubles is our inability to
find what is it that we’re both, meaning you and me, craving in this brief
pitiful miserable thing called fun night. Nobody can tell you more; most will
advise to pursue the green, some may shyly suggest the possibility of a
probability of a right path but you either feel it, you make an educated guess
about it, or you just buy her a drink like a Man and forget about all the
lengthy insecurities/frustrations; you forget about all the disappointment that
has nearly drowned the life itself within you. No. Fucking no. I shall be
ignorantly aware and live on strive on getting drunk gettin’ stoned getting
high getting spaced out of my bloody brains easing into the mellowest
chillacity a bro has ever zonked into; shred the sweetest foam, slide into the
tightest .. naaah, that’s dirty and we don’t want that, Reginald, my dear boy.
What we want is a piece of Literature, you know, L-L-L-Literature with a Grand
‘L’, otherwise nobody’s going to spare a glance.
- Jaromír Lelek
