 
### Run Charlie Run

By

### John Wiber

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2012 by John Wiber

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## Chapter 1

I'm sitting on a bus and there's a mother and her son Eskimo kissing beside me, their faces meshing together at the tip, noses sliding softly and warmness. Cars glide by through the tinted windows, faceless machines moving through each other, on their way to nowhere in particular. My knees jerking, eager to be off this wretched bus as the black frosted pavement glints bright against the burning sun. But this little boy with brown skin is smiling, and his eyes are half-closed because the world only stops for him. His mother is smiling too, and the boy's feet don't touch the ground, hanging limply as they sway all pale and young. There's an elderly black woman with squinty eyes sitting beside me. She's wearing a large gold necklace and her mouth doesn't look like it remembers how to smile. I watch the child and his mother rubbing noses together gently, the mother's arms embracing the young boy, and I look back over at the black woman who turns and squints back at me. And it makes me wonder when's the last time she'd been Eskimo kissed.

When was the last time I'd been Eskimo kissed?

The bus lurches to a stop on Laurier and people flood out quickly, bouncing off of each other and out into the street. Everything seems so urgent in the city, something I was still getting used to. I'm supposed to be on Sparks St. by 5 for a lovely dinner with my lovely lady, but I see the mother and her son are getting off now, and something inside my gut makes me get up and follow them. I push past a cluster of people and accidentally step on someone's shoe as I hop down onto the sidewalk.

Moving through the throngs of bodies, I chase after the young boy and his lovely mother, swerving and jutting and weaving; always through the throngs. And on a day like today it's easy to see why Icarus got burned. My inhibitions are so high I just may do nothing at all! And as the rooftops leer down upon me, I watch the mother and son move swiftly through the crowds of people and across the street, parting the seas like Moses. The little boy's hand reaches up towards his mother and she takes his tiny fingers, squeezing them between her withered palms. The market is crowded and I'm surrounded by slow moving stragglers. Staggering, I try and keep up, but the faces and bodies are swarming, and I lose them at a red light.

Typical. My heart sinks briefly in my chest, and it doesn't help that someone has scrawled " _please help_ " into the sidewalk with black ash, the letters glaring up at me from beneath my feet. A cool wind lifts my shirt part way up at the back and makes me shiver. _I never knew life had undone so many_...

A shadowed doorway half-hidden by a torn banner leads me into a deserted pub called The Thorn Castle. Ottawa was a city of constant motion, what with all the business suits and government officials – there was plenty of impropriety to take part in, and plenty of pubs tucked away in the shadows. And yes, I know I probably shouldn't be in here right now my friends, but the bar-counter stretches forth across the room like a pointed index finger, beckoning and indifferent, making me feel right at home. The room is loosely spread about with chairs and tables, dimly lit and musty. Scattered in no distinct pattern, no point, no relevance – and the long shadows bleed into one another across the battered wooden floor. I take faint notice that the clock hanging behind the bar says 4:45. I pull out one of the barstools and my cool shadow sticks to the floor like glue. The bartender notices me and comes over to take my order.

"How are we this evening, son?" he asks.

"Couldn't be better," I say.

"We don't get many college kids in here."

"I'm a European diplomat..."

"Yeah," he says, "and I'm the prince of Saudi Arabia."

I wink a twisted grin and turn to my left where a hunched over man is leaning up against the bar with his elbows. I watch him sigh into his palm and look away. We are pretty much the only two people in The Thorn Castle.

"So, what can I do ye' for?" the barkeep asks.

"I'll have a pint of Canadian, good sir."

I watch him move eloquently over to the tap with my glass, titling it at just the right angle, and the golden liquid pours steadily, a perfect head of foam resting on the top.

"Is there anywhere else you'd rather be?" I say to the man beside me.

"I could think of a few places," the barkeep says. Although the hunched-over man gives no indication that he heard me; his crooked spine slumping – folding in on himself with his little grey hat. He gives me a quick glance, and then looks back down at the bar, studying his wrinkled fingers that are viciously clutching his half-empty beer glass.

My pint, cold and frothing, is placed upon a coaster in front of me. I watch the beads of moisture drip down the chilled mug, coming to an abrupt halt upon the wooden surface of the bar.

"Cheers to shadows and dust," I say, tilting my head back all the way and drinking until my mug is empty.

I order another beer as the freezing rush settles in my stomach.

"So, my friend," I say, wiping my mouth and clapping a hand on the back of my shrouded companion, "what's the good word?"

The man shrugs his shoulders and my hand falls from his back, now hanging limply by my side, dangling and alone. He stays crouched over his beer and in this hollow light it barely looks like he's breathing at all.

"What's the matter buddy?" I say. "Come on, give me a chance here. My friends tell me I'm a riot..."

The man stirs slowly. Swinging his neck towards me like it was some major inconvenience to him, the poor bastard.

"I don't have much use for friends," he tells me, "a kid like you wouldn`t really understand."

I signal to the bartender with my hand for another cold one. He coughs and pours another. I have an economics exam tomorrow that I haven't studied for yet.

"So, what... you've never had any friends?" I ask.

"Sure I've had friends," he says, "they talk and I talk, and at first everything is just fine. It`s a circle you see – or at least you think it is. But the truth is, it's hardly ever a circle at all, not even close. Everything is straightforward, straight as a fucking razor. And when all the cushioning is torn away, when that youthful ignorance is gone, there's nothing left but cold, solid _rock_."

My mouth hangs dumbly so I fill it, and after wiping my lips with the palm of my hand, I bend over and push my nose to his. I see his eyes widen in horror as he yelps, and I'm grinning like a bastard until...SMASH...falling – floor – wetness and ringing...calm. My head hurts. Broken shards of glass sprinkled all around me like tiny diamonds glistening at the bottom of the blackest and deepest cave. Sounds of scuffling and anger _What'd yah do that fer yah animal_? A sharp pulse of bright pain flashes behind my eyes as I try to lift myself from the floor. Feet stomping and stumbling, then silence.

Hoisted up from under the arms, my head flares bright again. Steadying myself against the bar I hear someone yell for an ambulance. Flashing lights in my fabricated mind.

"Now, now," I holler, "no need for that my good fellows. I figure a strong shot of whiskey is just what the doctor would prescribe," blinding pain, hot and bright, "better make that a double!" and in my mind the bar is crowded with people, and they're all cheering.

Soothing and burning down my throat, settling in the pit of my twisted stomach. And the liquor nestles up against my pelvis, the loneliest part of our anatomy indeed, because for some reason things can get rigidly cold down there, quite uncomfortable at times.

"What was that all about?"

I shrug and ask the bartender for another beer. He hands me a cloth to wipe the blood from my forehead.

"It looks like he cut you there, just above your eye."

"Nothing that won't heal."

"What was that all about, anyways?"

"I don't know," I reply. "I guess he was just having a bad day."

"And you're what... okay with that?" he says, astonished.

"Well, it's not his fault."

"How is it not his fault?"

"Apparently he just hasn't been Eskimo kissed for a long time," I say.

"Huh?"

I can tell this bastard doesn't get it. And neither does the mean looking bouncer who is still lurking around behind me, watching and listening. Leaning over the counter and pressing nose to nose, cheers! Beers to beers and friendship, loyalty and love...

"You little shit!"

Hands' gripping tightly and rough around my shoulders – and suddenly the air is horizontal and the ground is gone... and then it comes back again with a slamming thud. My head rings as I pull my worn body up from the pavement and stumble down the darkening street towards the market. Passing by people, most of them mere shadows, men and women in business outfits walking briskly and bustling through, washing over each other like waves in the ocean.

After a couple more staggering blocks filled with bright lights, and loud, obtrusive noises, I arrive at my destination and enter the restaurant only twenty minutes behind schedule. The people sitting at the flawlessly set tables with white cloths and crystal stemmed glasses look reproachfully towards me, and my hand is streaked with blood when I pull it away from my face.

I am a nuisance.

"You're late."

"Quite sorry my dear," I say to Natasha, her blond hair sparkling in the light, "you know how the buses are in Ottawa..." and leaning over from behind her chair I press my nose to hers and move swiftly back and forth a couple times before she pushes me away with a disgusted look on her face.

"What in the hell is wrong with you, Charles?"

"That's Charlie to you."

She sighs as I make my way around the table and set myself down delicately in the lightly cushioned chair.

"What happened to your face?"

"Oh, this? I cut myself shaving..."

"Well clean it up for Christ's sake," she says, throwing her napkin at me from across the table. She could be such a peach sometimes. The restaurant is brightly lit, reflecting off her pale face, her high cheeks and tiny lips curving slightly down, and I wonder if she shaved for me tonight.

The waiter approaches.

"Good evening sir. May I take your drink order?"

"Certainly Jeeves," I say, smiling. "I'll have a double rye and coke... and why not bring a bottle of your finest wine for my lady friend here."

"Right away sir," he nods, scuttling away. And I can't help but notice his uncanny resemblance to a penguin.

"You are unbelievable," Natasha says from across the table, crossing her arms tight and staring daggers at me. "Don't you think your father...?"

" _Step_ -father."

"Yes whatever," she continues. "Don't you think _he_ would disapprove of you spending your money like this? On booze and fancy dinners and lord knows what else..."

"Oh, Paul's a prince. He won't mind. Besides, this sort of thing, as he knows, is a necessity to a prosperous education."

"You are impossible," she sighs. "The way you spend money... I doubt you'll be able to pay for your next semester, and it will be just like last year. What will you do then, huh? How will you buy groceries? What about after school? Have you thought about what you're going to do this summer? The girls won't let you come live with me again, not after last year's disaster...

"In my defence, it was mostly the raccoon's fault, I mean, he was the one doing most of the damage..."

"Yes, but _who_ brought the raccoon into the house, Charles? _Who_ started feeding it whiskey...?"

"Umm, wait-wait, I know this one..."

"You need to get your act together, start spending your money more responsibly. You don't even have a proper bed right now, let alone a proper place for us to live. That apartment of yours is a disaster – it really needs to go. I mean we are supposed to be starting our careers by now, Charles – we're already behind! It's never too late to save you know..."

"Yes my love, saving is _certainly_ a must..." I say. "But how can I save what I don't have? How am I supposed to get any enjoyment out of life...?"

"Please, please just shut-up."

I grin at her and try to rub her thigh with my foot.

"Stop that," she says. "I don't understand why you have to live in that apartment by yourself. It just doesn't make sense."

"It makes perfect sense," I tell her. "Paul doesn't want me around his house, no, that's just for him and my mom. Just like his goddamn two-seated convertible, there's no room for me in there either, it's the way he wants it."

The ass of a waiter returns to take our food orders. I refrain from calling him garcon and ordering another double rye and coke because Natasha is poisoning me with her eyes from across the table. We order our food, or should I say Natasha orders our food, and my empty drink sits dauntingly beside my empty hand. Natasha takes a large gulp of wine and settles back in her chair. I watch her eyes drift over the room, and I suspect that she is comparing us to the other couples in the restaurant.

I met Natasha at a party last year. She was showing off her biceps (she did have quite the pipes for a skinny girl), and I very suavely jumped on her back and proceeded to do the Gangnum Style dance while she held me up. You see, back then – when we first met and all, she wasn't as picky or proper. That air of pretentiousness just wasn't there, and when she didn't expect anything from me, well, that was when I wanted to give her my all. When she started to transform, after all those months of unconditional company and carefree sex, well, it slowly decayed under the force of her expectations; what she expected me to become.

"So, have you spoken with Paul lately about your future with... will you cut that out Charles, have you spoken with your father...?"

" _Step_ -father," I mutter.

"Feet to yourself mister, and you really should talk to Paul. You would be stupid not too, especially if he can get you a good job right after graduation."

The waiter saunters over with our food and I can't thank him enough for providing this interruption. I order another drink and Natasha frowns at me. The air is stale and the stiffs sitting around us are like mannequins in a store-front, completely superficial and fake; plastic bodies and hollow heads. I can't help but imagine my life in Paul's place, sitting in a restaurant like this with designer clothes on, talking about my work and my golf score; it was enough to make me puke.

I take a large gulp from my new drink and scarf some food into my mouth, hardly knowing what it is or caring. Only that its meat and I'm drunk and my chewing seems to effectively drown out Natasha's incessant babbling.

Time blurs against the background and I find myself sitting in front of an empty plate watching Natasha pick and prod at hers. There is an air of perfection around her that cannot be disturbed, despite my best efforts. She acted the way a real lady was supposed to act. When she finally finishes eating I'm pretty much asleep at the table, leaning over my plate with my chin in my palm. I feel a stab in my shin from her pointed high-heeled shoe.

"Keep your feet to yourself, miss."

"You can be such an ass sometimes."

The waiter approaches for his final stand.

"Are we all finished here for the night?" he asks, leaning slightly forward.

"Yes Jeeves, I believe we are. You have been such a treat tonight, I was wondering if we could have you for dessert?"

"Very funny sir," he replies dryly, and I feel another stab in my shin.

"What is wrong with you?" she snarls.

The waiter nods awkwardly and goes to get our bill. Natasha crosses her arms and looks away from me. There's nothing I can do to calm her down. She drinks the rest of the wine and gets up to go to the bathroom without saying anything. Part of me wants to reach out to her and tell her I'm sorry for behaving like this, that I'm sorry for being late, for being reckless, for everything – but somehow I don't think that will be enough.

## CHAPTER 2

Later.

My breath is heavy and toxic from the drink; eyelids warm and drooping, feet staggering under my weightless legs – floating. Grey-black shadows of hulking buildings leer down upon me, broken by the yellow-white street lights. All shining and sparkling in my diamond eyes, Ol' Charlie boy to the rescue, don't mind the blood ladies and gentleman, I am merely a spectacle; better yet an illusion. Oh! Well hello there, what brings such beautiful creatures out at this time? Certainly there must be a reason you're out here, all dressed up in your tight skirts and high heels, looking for something? No? A rose for you my love, please, you beautiful and ample ladies, supine and stark naked beneath my diamond eyes. But the tramps saunter off all huddled and bulging like wet blankets, looking like fat rosy pies in the crimson night, but still, I would have had a slice, more than a slice.

Arriving now, teetering and blasted outside my darlings' house. Here for a quick romp and then beautiful, elegant slumber. And in the morning she'll make me breakfast, heaping piles of crisp bacon, toast and golden eggs. And yes, I wouldn't mind if you drizzled some of that syrup on my bacon, too kind, too kind my love.

' _You do this every time!_ '

I notice a grey car sitting snug against the curb, parked right out front of Natasha's house. I can see the end of a lit cigarette burning inside the vehicle on the driver's side, and I watch the orange amber move in my direction, pointing right at me, and then back towards the windshield again. I slow my pace and walk by the car, trying to catch a glimpse of whose inside. In the back of my mind a little voice tells me its some guy here for Natasha, and I can't help but think, ' _good for her, the old gal, finally getting a bit on the side for herself_.' The car starts up and drives away when I reach the passenger side window, and I watch the cigarette butt dance across the pavement after being flicked from inside, the red amber staring back at me with disinterest.

I lunge up Natasha's front steps in a lustful dash, throbbing and bursting, my skin seething. Pounding on the door with my cement fist, I hope that her roommates aren't home. _Thump, thump, thump_. Looking like some sort of deranged stalker, the drunkenness and blackness cloaking me.

I can hear her footsteps coming, and when she opens the door I reach out for her waist but she smacks me over the head. I laugh and push past her. That scent, her scent, it always crept through me when I was alone. I reach out and pull her close, her tight little ass taut against my seething finger tips.

"Stop it," she says. "You're waking everyone up."

"I missed you, baby," I say.

"Stop it, stop..."

"And I don't care who hears it," I say, even louder now, "I love this little lady right here!"

"You have to go," she says, but she doesn't mean it. I can tell because her pelvis moves tight against me as I pull her closer.

"I'm sorry about earlier tonight," I tell her.

She nods and kisses me while I whisper romantic nonsense in her ear. She tells me I can stay, but only if we are quiet, because the other girls are sleeping. And like an infant crawling through the womb, I ascend the stairs behind her, my feet clunk-clunk-clunking, pushing forward head first towards her bedroom.

My cell phone dances against my perverted thigh as I move down Natasha's front steps. The winking sun greats me from behind a wall of clouds, and snatching my phone out from my gaping pocket I see that it's Sylvester, the horny bastard, probably calling to yammer on about the latest skank he's walloped with his monster (self-proclaimed). I'd known the guy for 4 years now, ever since freshman year. He was still the exact same kid I met then. He had a penchant for steroids, ecstasy, and prostitutes. He also enjoyed multiple online dating sites, and wasn't afraid to eat the lunch buffet at BareFax. I clench my fist and toss the buzzing little rectangle into the sewer, which makes it the third phone I've been through in the past year (I never cared much for cell phones, ruined the art of conversation, if you ask me). Not in the mood for Sylvester and his meddlesome prick right now, not after Natasha kicked me out of bed and told me to go get a job. It was too beautiful a day to worry about cell phones and jobs.

The streets are speckled with stuttered movement, relatively calm, blue, because it's Sunday. My head is making clicking sounds, a burned out battery, short-circuited wire. The morning air is crisp and bright and makes my eyes burn. My hangover is strong, but not strong enough to deter breakfast. I get a seat in Father's & Son's, a small pub-type bar that was just down the road from Natasha's. The place is always busy on Sunday mornings because it's close to campus and has cheap breakfasts. There's a lot of younger looking kids sitting together, being loud and obnoxious and talking about how awesome last night was.

I order a cup of coffee, a glass of orange juice, and a pitcher of water to start. The waitress gives me a look and wanders off like I just asked her if she shaves.

There's a family of three sitting by the window, the gentle morning glow falling softly on their faces. The daughter is no more than 10 years old and she's got curly, blondish locks hung up at the back of her head in a ponytail. Her grim looking father flips through today's newspaper, staring intently at the pages. He's got that middle-aged man goatee speckled with grey hairs, and I can tell that he is writhing on the inside over all the hard-pricked little bastards who will soon be perusing his lovely daughter. I can tell because he keeps looking around the restaurant, studying various groups of students and frowning. I can also see that the little girl's mother has been blessed with a slender waist, curving hips and a beautiful, bouncing chest. A real treasure; with full pink lips that open and close, open and close. Glistening wet in the yellow-white light. And I wave my fingers at the little girl in the pink dress with blonde curly hair, and she giggles and waves back at me, while her poor, goddamned father looks on helplessly.

Later that day, on my way to class, my mind wanders down familiar roads. I can see so many like me. But nowhere close. Not really. Anyways, I guess we all want the same thing; love, happiness, confidence... whatever... I'm not really sure anymore, to be honest. My buzz is wearing off though. October was always a long month; it was a month for waiting, for getting used to the cold again. It never used to get this cold in South Port because of Lake Huron. My hometown in Southwestern Ontario wasn't anything like Ottawa. There weren't any stripclubs, or prostitutes, or sky scrapers, or parliament buildings; to best honest, there wasn't really anything open in South Port past 9p.m. It was a very quaint little place to live, except for all the drinking and drugs. My dad was from South Port, and everyone knew me has his son, which was probably why Paul never liked it there all too much.

I make my way into a corner store for some cigarettes. I grab a newspaper too and when I ask the clerk how his day is going, he just stares at me blankly with an outstretched hand.

On my way to class, after inhaling a cigarette in about three puffs, I flip through the paper as I walk. It's the same old shit, the usual articles about what the black president's dog is named, another murder downtown, spring elections coming up, and of course, all the latest celebrity bullshit. I find an empty seat near the back of class and sit with the newspaper spread out across my knee. I think this is my political science course on violence, although I'm not sure and don't really care. I watch the other students filter down through the aisles, setting up their laptops as soon as they sit down and going straight to Facebook, or Twitter, or whatever the fuck, anything to take their minds off the fact that they were in class.

I find an article in the Ottawa & Area section of the newspaper with a headline that reads ' _Night Watcher Strikes, Again._ '

Police are reporting that a man, somewhere between the ages of 18 and 25, has been breaking into homes at night and watching girls sleep. The police suspect he watches the houses, since all five incidents have taken place at homes where only girls live. Four out of the five attacks have taken place in Sandy Hill, the student housing are located just east of the University of Ottawa. The police are warning to be cautious of any suspicious vehicles or persons in the Sandy Hill area...

I fold the paper up and set it down on the desk in front of me as the professor starts to talk up at the front. I sit there trying to pay attention, but I can't help but think of the grey car parked outside of Natasha's place last night.

After class I'm walking aimlessly through campus because I don't want to go home yet. Every car that drives by makes me jump and I think people are looking at me funny. I wish I had my cell phone, because then at least I could call someone, talk to them, and hear their voice (goddamn my impulsive self!). Natasha wasn't going to be happy that I'd lost another phone. I need a drink.

By the time I get down to the market I'm covered in a light sweat, flesh chilled and tingling. A couple homeless people ask me for change, but I can't possibly help all of them, so I shrug and shake my head repeatedly. I am feeling desperately lonely, the sky empty and starless, and Natasha has to work tonight at the Children's Hospital. I liked that she worked at a Children's Hospital, it was better than working at an old folk's home. There was never any hope left at those places. But it often meant that she had to work long nights, leaving her cranky and lacking in sexual adventurousness.

"Charlie Mahon!" a familiar voice calls out from behind me.

I stop in front of the big LCBO on Rideau Street, and turn around to see Sebastian Drillers walking towards me. I haven't seen Sebastian since high school, and I barely recognized him with all the piercings in his face and tattoos covering his neck.

"Am I seeing shit?"

He laughs and pulls me in for a hug. I can feel how skinny he is through the baggy clothes. There is a bald man standing beside Sebastian, and he stares at us with mild disinterest.

"What are you doing in Ottawa?" I ask, still stunned.

"Well, I'm up here on business, naturally," he says, winking. "This is Victor, but you can call him Deviated Septum.''

Victor, or Deviate Septum, just stares and nods at me.

"So," Sebastian says, "Septum and I were just about to roll through the strip club."

"Well boys, what are we waiting for?" I say.

The dingy club we stumble through is deserted and, for the most part, we are left to our own devices; pitchers of Canadian and Keith's, shots of whiskey and tequila, nachos with cheese piled high, and half-hearted girls dancing to shitty music above us. Some of the girls can tell we are on coke and they make crude comments as we take separate trips to the bathroom. They say cocaine turns strippers into prostitutes, but I never liked having sex on coke anyways, it seemed to take all the romance out of it – besides, cocaine was for conversation. Eventually, I puke a little bit under my seat and Sebastian laughs his fucking ass off at me. He was a couple years older than I was, and I could remember when he was in high school how he would show up to class with black eyes and blood on his shirt. His dad went to jail for drug trafficking – they found 150 plants on the back of his property when we were in high school. I remembered his dad from playing hockey with Sebastian when we were young. He used to drive a loud pick-up truck and always had death metal pumping from the speakers. I guess most of the weed I smoked in high school probably came from him – which was sort of weird to think about now. I guess his dad was probably high a lot of those times he drove us to hockey practice too. Sebastian was starting to look more like his old man, especially with the full arm-sleeve tattoo of a dragon breathing fire.

My nose starts to bleed and a mean looking bouncer tells us to leave.

Later.

I can taste the vomit and blood in the back of my throat, but oddly enough my entire face is numb.

Deviated Septum's voice is hardly heard between me and Sebastian's incessant babbling. The conversation takes drastic turns as we move through the darkened streets, pointlessly rambling on about how life used to be so good, about how coke used to be so good, booze, women, money... and the three of us, Sebastian, myself, and Deviated Septum, come to the conclusion that things will probably never be as good as they used to be, unless of course we can find some more blow. And although I'm not sure how, we end up back at Deviated Septum's house on Percy Street. The floors are covered with empty Ziploc bags and half-empty beer bottles. I can hear other people moving around in the back of the house. A kid no older than 18 comes into the living room and whispers something in Septum's ear. Septum glares at the kid and tells him to go away. He pulls out the pound of blow and I can't help but feel excited, ecstatic, thrilled and exhilarated.

The last thing I remember is Sebastian showing me his gun. It was black and heavier than I thought it would be. Septum's eyes started rolling into the back of his head and he was making weird noises, so I left.

I wake up the next morning on the floor of my apartment with all my clothes on and I can't remember how I got there. My apartment is cluttered with empty liquor bottles and dirty clothes. I find a cell phone in my pocket that isn't mine, and the red light at the top of it keeps blinking at me. Someone calls later that day from a private number and when I answer they hang up. I find a tiny bag of blow in my pocket from last night and do the rest off an old Offspring CD case. Sitting here alone in my shithole apartment, wondering what happened to the days when I could be happy just by being with someone, when I used to be able to sleep without whiskey and still believed in unconditional love.

## CHAPTER 3

The house my mother lives in with Paul is pristine. They've lived here for 3 years, but it still smelt new to me. Tucked away on the edge of the Ottawa River, the hard-wood floors polished all slick and shining, glistening in the leathery morning light. Paul owned his own Real Estate Company, and I'm sure he kept his little gem tucked away from himself. I walk in past the maid who's bent over scrubbing a stain on the floor. She's wearing her placid blue apron and she seems startled by me. I smile at her and wink – which makes her shuffle off down the hall, absently dabbing at tables and picture frames as she passes them. She was probably high, the old gal, I caught her puffin' one round back last year. I asked her for a hit and she dropped the goddamn thing and ran off, poor old gal. Who has a fucking servant these days, anyways? But I guess she did do good work, even though it was probably pretty easy work without me here. I guess I never really was _here_. Even for that first year when I had the room upstairs to the left with my Dr. Gonzo poster up on the wall. It was Paul's office now, and I suppose the Gonzo poster went in the trash. It seemed like I'd seen less and less of my mom ever since we moved to Ottawa with Paul. Paul Flannigan – Mr and Mrs. Paul Flannigan. There hardly was a Meredith anymore. And when Samantha dumped me and I asked if I could move back in, Paul said he would rather rent me a bachelor apartment.

He showed me his tax return one year when we still lived in South Port. All those zeros lined up nice in a row like that can be intoxicating – it's true. But somehow his smug little grin made the whole thing revolting to me. And now I live alone in my shithole apartment (that Paul pays for), while what's left of my family stays trapped in this beautiful house on the river.

"Charles, take your shoes off when you come in here."

Slipping them off at the front door, spinning back around to see my mother standing in the hallway; her hair up in a bun, frowning. She's wearing her expensive designer jeans, dark blue, and a cashmere blouse. She also happens to be wearing a pair of red slip-on shoes. She notices me staring at her feet and waves her hand.

"These are my _inside_ shoes Charles, don't look at me like that."

"Where's ol' Paul at?" I ask.

"He's at the golf course with some business associates."

"Ah, associates indeed."

She scoffs at me and turns back to the kitchen.

I make myself at home, slipping my shoes back on and moving methodically over to the new stereo system. The light filters through the windows in sheet-sized slivers. I hit play and Neil Young starts singing at a low volume. Nodding my head, I sing along with the tune: _Old man take a look at my life I'm a lot like you, I need someone to love me the whole way through_. I start rifling through the CD case on top of the speakers. Here we go; the Hip. My air guitar is dead on, needs more volume:

He said bring on a brand new renaissance – 'cause I think I'm ready! My arm's been shaking all night long, but my hand is steady.

Bouncing around the room now, rocking my head and throwing my arms in the air like a deranged lunatic, stringing that air guitar to a tee. I grab the remote control and use it as my mic; " _Little girls come on remembrance day, placing flowers on his grave_..." And just when I'm really getting into it, a black smudge in the corner of my eye.

Paul is standing inside the front door with his golf clubs hanging from his shoulder. I see his mouth move but no words come out. I keep dancing as I watch him storm over to the speakers, throwing his golf bag down on the floor, and suddenly my music is drowned out by his incisive, meddling voice.

"... what in the hell is going on in here, Charles? If my new speakers are blown, and why do you have your goddamn shoes on?"

"Mom has her shoes on too," I say.

"Those are her _inside_ shoes."

"Ha!"

"You treat this place exactly like our last one..."

"Yea, but we left that place, didn't we Paul?"

He sighs and frowns at me. He's wearing a pair of Oakley sunglasses that look a bit too big for his round face, and his black hair is slicked back so that it covers up the bald spot in the middle of his head. He's got a polo golf shirt on and a pair of beige dress pants, and overall, he looks like the typical 50 year old douche bag.

"And what is it Charles," he stops briefly, hiking up his belt, "that you need?"

"What? A son can't stop by his own mother's house? I am here merely for the company. Jolly good company in this house Paul, you know that."

"Yes, well, most of the time anyways..."

"I was just stopping by to talk about work actually."

"Oh yeah," Paul says, raising his eyebrows. "Did you finally find a job?"

"Well, no - not yet, not until you take me on as an agent. I have a real problem with getting up any time before ten though, especially on Fridays – because Thursday is the new Friday, as I'm sure you know. And I hope the air conditioning has good circulation in my office. Also, is my lunch an hour or only forty-five minutes?"

"Why don't you try graduating first, Charles? Then we can start talking about getting you a job..."

"...and once I graduate will you put me up in a nicer apartment?"

"Just be happy with what you have now," he says.

"It's sort of hard with ants crawling around all over the place..."

"Most kids have to live with their parents if they go to school in the same city."

"But I'm not most kids, Paul. Besides, you like it better without me here anyways."

He nods his head and grins.

"Paul, is that you?" My mother calls from somewhere else in the house. Her voice sounds strained, further away than it should be, like she was standing at the end of a long road.

"Yes dear, one minute," he says, turning back to me briefly.

The bastard shakes his head at me, and I grin a lavish grin as he moves towards my mother's voice. After he disappears down the hallway I run across the living room to where he set down his wallet. I scoop it up and pull out a $100 bill, one of many. Then I move delicately back over towards the granite bar, beside Paul's precious speakers, and I pick out the best bottle I can find, Crown Royal Reserve, a very fine drink indeed. I take a quick swig and run back over to the stereo where I crank the volume up and press play. I can hear Paul yelling as I run laughing from the house.

Outside the air is cold and my palms are sweating. _Bring on a brand new renaissance_. I can feel the crown bulging under my shirt and it makes me grin like a fool as I walk briskly down the sidewalk. Fucking Paul. Yes, welcome to my family, do you and my mother do it doggystlye? Or is that, like, not in your generation? _Ah missionary's the most efficient son, you'll learn that one day – when your back's gone to shit and your cock spends most of the time winking at the floor_. And sometimes I swear I catch him looking at me like he wishes I was dead, like I was an inconvenience to his sick little world. ' _Did you ever have kids, Paul_?' I asked him once. ' _No_ ' he said. And there didn't seem like much else to say. I don't even know if she loves him really. She thinks she does, maybe. But I know _she_ knows what's really going on. I hope she does.

The sun is out in the sky, making me squint as I move down Somerset Avenue. There are people outside in their yards, busying themselves with outside chores before winter hits. I pass by a man with hedge clippers in his tiny front yard. His house is rustic and stands on a slight angle. He's got a plaid shirt on and his blue jeans are covered in mud, working the clippers frantically against the rosebush that runs along the sidewalk. It takes me a moment to realize that he is chopping off all of the rosebuds.

"Why are you doing that?" I ask, stopping there beside him on the sidewalk.

He turns around startled and sort of shakes his head at me. I watch him chop off a couple more rose-buds before I ask him the same question again.

"I'm trimming the flowers," he says.

"Yeah, but you're cutting off all of the best parts."

He shakes his head.

"I don't understand." I say, desperately wanting a swig of the crown, and knowing that this poor bastard probably needs one as well.

"Well," he starts, wiping his forehead with a dirt-covered hand, "the roses attract the most problems. It's easier to chop them off. I have kids here – you got that, young ones, a little girl. And I don't need bees and other sorts of bugs and insects flying around all over the place..."

"I don't see..."

"Listen," he says, "don't try and tell me how to trim my garden. I know what you'd use these roses for – all you kids are the same. You see something pretty, you see something you want, and you take it. This is _my_ garden – so if I want to cut off the goddamn rosebuds then I'm damn well going too, and Jesus Christ son – are you drunk?"

"Well..." I burp.

"That's your problem, you kids. Walking around half-hammered, trying to tell us how to live – like some miraculous change is going to happen in your generation. Everything stays the same, and it always will."

I shrug and take a swig of the crown. I offer him a drink but he scowls and shakes his head at me so I saunter off down towards the market. I try enjoying the rest of the day, the sky blue and clear, sparkling little diamonds in my eyes and a burning in my stomach from the Crown. But the streets are crowded and busy, which ironically makes me feel even more alone. I walk past this elderly lady and she stares at me gapingly while I take another quick swig of the Crown, which makes me feel sort of guilty I guess, and so I duck into the nearest bar, a place to drink in peace.

The Honest Lawyer beckons me forth with a florescent yet indifferent sign that says ' _open'_.

"CHARLIE BOY!"

Fuck.

Sylvester is in here. I should have known, since he always liked coming to the Lawyer so he can play the punching bag game that measures how hard you punch. I haven't seen him in months, ever since I found out that he fucked Samantha after we broke up. He's got a full-back baseball cap on backwards, and his shirt is probably two sizes too small for his large chest and biceps. He works as a bouncer down in the market, and the job was definitely making him an even bigger asshole than he was before. We spent a lot of first year getting fucked up together and partying, but I was so tired of all that now – mostly because of bastards like him.

The idiot giant comes tumbling over to me, knocking over a bar stool in his wake. I can hear that familiar clatter of drinks and loose lips lapping in the background. He claps his humungous hand on my back so that I fall forward a bit. I can tell that he is just plastered right now; shit-hammered. And as he's shaking me back and forth, howling out obscenities, my Crown falls from inside my shirt and smashes against the floor.

"No worries," Sylvester says, shuffling me off towards the bar, away from the broken glass and wasted liquor. "Plenty more where that came from."

"What are you doing here?" I ask him.

"Ah, me, Dennis and Brennan came down here to meet some chicks – those fuckers. They said there was going to be 3 chicks, but only 2 showed up. They left a little while ago. I tried convincing the one girl to let us Eiffel Tower her, but I think she thought I was just joking..."

The counter where Sylvester is sitting is covered with tipped over shot glasses, half-bitten lime slices and other miscellaneous booze splashed all over the place. There aren't really that many people in the bar, and its dark – thank god, which means Sylvester has been sitting here for a while getting drunk in the dark by himself. My head starts hurting because that old man was cutting off the roses from his rosebush, and my mom walks around the house with her _inside_ shoes. There's an elephant sculpture sticking out of the wall behind the bar, and its black eyes are intense, staring right at me, through me, and maybe Sylvester will slip into one of his shiny tusks tonight.

"What's a dead baby in an oven smell like?" he leans over and asks me, his reeking breath fogging up my face.

"I don't know."

"Me neither, I was too busy jerking off." And the buffoon just bursts out laughing, nodding his head at me and the cute blond bartender. She looks at me and I smile but she turns away. Sylvester leans in to me and says ' _I bet this whore will blow me under the bar,'_ and I say _'absolutely, why don't you ask her_ ,' and so my magnificently classy friend leans his mammoth torso over the bar and whispers something to the blond bartender. She scowls at him and storms off towards the other end of the bar, which makes us both start laughing.

"What did you say to her?" I ask.

"I asked her what the best tip she'd ever gotten before was," he pauses. "Then I told her I'd give her my dick-tip."

Laughing loudly, I had to hand it to the bastard, he _was_ a genius.

Thrusting the ol' tusk.

Sylvester laughs and scratches at his crotch. "Goddamn Steroids are making my balls itchy," he says.

"So, how's working at Pier 21 going?" I ask.

"Not bad, we had to kick this big gang of Serbians out the other night. The bastards all came back and jumped the bar, a couple of our busboys got fucked up big time. I got sucker punched and boot-fucked by about 10 guys."

"Ouch," I say. "That's the beauty of working at a bar, I guess."

"Yeah, and all the chicks."

"Naturally."

And Sylvester, completely consumed in his own inebriation and toxicity, stands up on the stool at the bar, pulls down his pants and yells out ' _who wants to give me a blowjob_!' The few people scattered around the place gawk towards the spectacle; cold suds with light heads, and I can't help but laugh. For a second I feel like maybe things aren't so bad, maybe it was still possible to feel young again – until I notice that some drunk looking chick is actually talking to Sylvester right now, his pants still hanging down around his ankles, and I watch in horror as the two of them scramble off towards the bathroom, the poor girl's eyes glazed over and oblivious while Sylvester's eyes sparkle with success. I sit there drinking my double rye and coke and after a couple more minutes the two of them get escorted out of the bathroom by the bouncers, Sylvester's pants still hanging down around his knees. And while he gets dragged out he tries slapping at my hand, but I ignore him. I look over at the elephant again but his eyes just don't seem as menacing anymore, ' _thanks for nothing bud_.'

## Chapter 4

Reaching over in the radiant bright light pouring in through the parted curtains, and outside rustling and voices, cars moving by, a humming rush, inside my heart as well – and her face is closed and asleep, her arm hanging crookedly over the gentle slope of her head; moments so fleetingly slipping. Like a slit wrist – dripping wet and crooked; hauntingly swept away in the mist of my mind, always so fogged over and blurred. I stuff the wound with gauze; cauterize it with cigarettes and liquor, but the blood keeps flowing fast. And the river just keeps on roaring, swept up inside the current. A second can go on forever when elegant lips are dancing on the flesh of an emotional albino, my eyes blank and desperate in the soft white-light. The waves hanging above cast a heavy shadow, caught in the emptiness of eternity – shadows of the future and the past melding in the whirlwinds of my mind. But nothing will wait for me, nothing will bring her back, and in my little boat I feel it capsizing, and the rushing sound of the pounding waves will swallow me whole, disorientation far behind me now, and far beyond recognition. But these little memories shift and fade – in and out – her brunette hair and the soft blue of her windows – they were always open to me, and like a fool I put a fucking black drape over them, blocked them out – the sun, the blue, the everything. And for what? But I think I can see. Like under the surface or something – and that's what scares me the most. Because really I know that things are the way they are for a reason. And there are rocks and other sharp things down there that bite and sting and twitch

Twitch

Twitch

And inside my heart beats because the best part of my day is usually that ten seconds before I'm fully awake, that limbo of consciousness when I'm still not sure where I am. For those ten seconds I can convince myself that I'm still with her. But the moment passes as my eyes focus in on the cluttered apartment; my kitchen, my bedroom and my living room are a single entity, and the half-empty bottle of Forty Creek sitting lidless beside my bed. Such wasted nights spent on the pursuit of yesterday. And in the end, all my dreams were for nothing, because she told me she doesn't feel the same way anymore...

## Chapter 5

I'm sitting in my bachelor apartment wondering how people in California live. Like actually. We'd be aliens to them, I'm sure. My mattress is cluttered with school text books and essays with big fat 50s scribbled down on the front of them and I haven't showered in days, sleeping in my jeans and eating while lying down (it was a talent I had mastered over the past year). I think Paul would do well in Cali though. He did go out and buy a TWO-seated convertible when we moved to Ottawa. I mean what does that say? I guess I could ride in the trunk, but there really wasn't much room back there beside his golf clubs. Anyways, he liked cruising around with the top down and his goddamn Oakley sunglasses on, and I'm sure the way he grins at all the young girls makes them shiver deep down inside, but that fucking convertible has a pretty powerful spell over the placenta, so I've noticed, and goddamn it, maybe I needed a little cruise in ol' Paul's convertible, would be good for the soul I'm sure.

My apartment is a disgrace. A tiny square with the fridge, stove and sink all jammed into the far corner, and a bathroom tucked away in the corner opposite. It was in the basement too; my own personal dungeon (thanks again, Paul). I was planning on living with Sam, not this shit. I only have one bowl that I use for pretty much everything, ever since I smashed all my plates – but that was the beautiful thing about living on your own – you really only needed one bowl.

I can't sleep without whiskey and lately I've been waking up in the middle of the night thinking that there's someone in my room; that blinking red light from the phone, winking at me constantly from the floor. I haven't been able to get a hold of Sebastian since we last saw each other, and every time I see a grey car drive by I watch it intently before it turns out of sight. The Night Stalker broke into another home in Sandy Hill three nights ago, only two blocks away from where Natasha lives. He had a knife and molested a girl who was only 18. I brought my hockey stick over to Natasha's and left it lying beside her bed. Her and her roommates were all sleeping together for the next couple of nights, which meant I was left to my own miserable devices.

Septum's cell phone starts ringing.

"Doctor Mahon's office," I answer.

"Charles, please – be serious. Where have you been the past two days? And how did you get this new phone number?"

"Well... ummm."

"Never mind, I don't want to know, to be honest, but honestly, what have you been doing?"

"Helping the elderly across the street, saving the whales..." and the liquor flashes bright behind my eyes, making me dizzy. Glorious morning!

"I am dealing with a child," Natasha laments. "And why do you all of a sudden have a new cell phone? Do not tell me that you broke another goddamn phone Charles."

"Listen, my darling," I say. "I've been busy, made a trip over to where my mom lives – and Paul happened to stop by while I was there, believe it or not, and we had quite a long conversation – a riveting one at that. It really was refreshing. He told me he was going to lend us his convertible next weekend, and you better believe we'll be cruising down Rideau with the top down baby, you and me, and maybe you can practice on your stick-shift – orally of course."

"Jesus Christ, Charles..."

"Are your roommates home?"

"No..."

"I'm coming over now," I say.

"No, Charles, no really – I have _work_ to do."

"Me too, we can work together."

"I know what you're working on Charles. It's not the same thing at all."

"I'm coming over."

She giggles and says come, and I will, and I can tell that she wants me too. So off I bound, rolling from my mattress on the floor of my shithole apartment, throwing on a t-shirt and strutting out the door like the handsomest bastard that ever lived.

In class our professor talks about violence. Political violence, which sort of makes me laugh. Any sort of violence can be political when it's traced back to the core. But that never seems to help any. I mean, some woman shoots her husband because he gets caught sticking it to his receptionist, or the babysitter, or the neighbour's cat. Either way, she shoots him and he dies but some professor down in Massachusetts says that it's not her fault because our Capitalist society advocates misogynistic tendencies, so the woman gets off on self-defense from spousal abuse. Meanwhile, some guy down in Detroit shoots another guy because he's sticking it to _his_ wife. That guy doesn't get off though, he goes to jail for life. And it's the same thing, except _we've_ made it different. That's what these philosophers do; they make up more questions instead of answering the one's that need answering. It's like standing across from one another in a giant, hollow room, and even though everything seems very formal and educated, nothing ever really gets done, and both sides just seem to yell at each other the entire time. People will shoot each other and stab each other and burn each other alive. We will punch, bite, pull and stomp – you can't stop it, but we can figure out how to best cope with it. When Colonel Williams confessed, he said he didn't know why he killed those women, why he did the horrible things that he did. He said it probably didn't matter anyways, and that's my point. The way it is now, nothing really matters. I could be sitting on a goddamn bus with my headphones on and my iPod pumping, meanwhile the guy beside me is getting his head hacked off and I wouldn't even notice. There's a disconnect within our society, and this brave new world of customized technological freedom is only making things worse.

Class ends and everyone filters out through the brown doors. I linger back awhile because there was an essay due last week that I haven't bothered starting yet. I come down the learned steps and stand stock still beside the blackboard behind ol' Tinninger, with his frazzled grey hair and hunched over back.

He turns around startled and jumps a little at the sight of me.

"Mr. Mahon," he says, "how are you this evening?"

"Oh, yea know, pretty tired and all..."

"Yes, I could see that," he nods.

"Hey, I love your lectures!"

"Don't worry Charles, I'm only joking."

"Does it frustrate you when nobody contributes in class?"

"Some people say things," he says, looking at me, "the ones who pay attention do."

"I would say stuff! It's just too embarrassing at this point, I mean, everyone is so busy playing with their blackberries or twiddling with their iPods... I don't think anybody wants to hear what I have to say..."

"I'm sorry you feel that way."

"I still haven't given you my essay..."

"Ah, I thought that might be what you wanted to talk to me about."

"Well, we could talk about something else?"

"Like what?" he asks.

"Huh, the homeless population in Ottawa, I'm sure that's somehow politically violent."

"You don't take this course very seriously, do you Mr. Mahon?"

"I take all my classes seriously Mr. T, it's just, _my life_ is serious too..."

"Make sure you get it to me by the end of the week."

"Thanks Mr. T, hey, what are you doing now, got time for a wee drink?"

"Can't help you with that tonight Charlie..."

"I pity the fool who don't get a drink!"

I'm walking to campus and the wind is slapping at my face, the sunlight slowly fading against the echo of an evening sky. Across the fields I can see tall building complexes piercing the horizon. The lights are on in most of the windows so that it looks like a million fireflies are dancing against the charcoal sky. They look trapped inside hundreds of little man-made boxes. A bus whizzes past me and I look at all the people crammed in against the doors, proverbial sardines. The other day I watched a homeless woman get on the bus, and she didn't look well, I mean, worse than the average homeless person looked, but either way, she is still a person, right? Anyways, she sat there on the bus rocking back and forth in her seat for a couple of minutes, and people were all staring at her until she finally puked all over the bus floor. And it was really sad because the noises she made were filled with whimper and scorn, and even though everyone on the bus was staring at her, well not staring, I guess it was something like how a person looks at road-kill – _that_ look, no one would help her. I finally asked the homeless lady if she was alright, her puke snaking along the bus floor towards me, and she looked at me scared and nodded her head yes. I mean, yeah, she was probably drunk – but no one deserves what this woman had. Not even that filthy fuck Sylvester.

I walk past a couple of girls in tight black pants and smile at them as they hustle on their way to class. I see something shining in the snow along the sidewalk, and stooping down I scoop up what I thought was a Toonie, but is actually a piece of jewelry. It's a silver locket with the face of an older woman carved into the center. Her hair is in a bun and she's looking at me with this very stern countenance. I stick it in my pocket and keep moving. My phone starts ringing, and after fumbling with it for a few seconds, I answer.

"Hello, Sir Charles here."

"---"

"Hello?"

I can hear someone breathing faintly.

"Hello? I can't hear you..."

Nothing but whispered gasps.

I hang up after about thirty more seconds of this.

When I'm almost at campus I see this poster stapled to a telephone pole, and there's a picture of this sad looking kid in black and white (and if you ask me, if you're going to print them in black and white, you might as well declare them dead already). The boy's head hangs down in the picture and it says:

Jordan Spade

MISSING

Those horrendously bold words made everything so definite.

Underneath the poster someone has carved crudely into the wood:

' _I killed Jordan Spade_ '

And later, after class, I'm sitting on the bus with my head leaned up against the window. It's dark out now, and inside myself I feel utterly calm. The bus is warm and quiet. The gentle hum of the engine seems to sooth my wretched soul. I take a quick slug of my flask, and the burning settles down inside my belly. Everything starts to get far away, and it disturbs me how comfortable I feel right now, just sitting here half-drunk with no one on an empty bus. An Asian girl gets on at the next stop. I smile at her as she walks by and for a second I think she's going to sit down beside me, but the bus lurches forward, and she sort of stumbles past towards the back.

## Chapter 6

I pass by a used condom on the sidewalk, and seeing it lying there all soggy and forgotten always makes me wonder where the little guy came from. Most likely it was just some horny little peckers fucking around – not actually fucking, but there's always that chance of the promiscuous; that some lucky lady had her socks blown off right here on the sidewalk. People don't really notice much these days anyways, and if there's a warmth to the sidewalk, even just a shallow gust, well sometimes I stop, sort of stoop down a bit – just to see if I can feel that warmth, that evidence of filthy, filthy passion, of lust and everything good. Carpe Diem! Pluck and pluck along the sidewalks! Walking alone through the restless night; people drinking on their porches and balconies, playing beer-pong on crooked kitchen tables. We were all soaking up the last of that autumn air, that refreshing sort of chill that makes the beer taste better and can fix an aching lung. My blood rises and that tingle settles in for the night to come. I take a quick sip from the flask and quicken my pace. I left Natasha's later than I meant too, because while she was talking I was lying there with my head buried in the pillow playing with her tits, and she kept trying to whack my hand away but I always managed to creep it back onto her soft nipples, and I would rub them and try and make them hard because her tits looked really damn good when they were hard, if you must know. And I guess it felt pretty good lying there beside her, even though her voice was sort of clogging up the whole placid atmosphere I had managed to conjure up amidst the after sex sadness that always made me say horrendously stupid things like ' _i love you_ ' or ' _what's your favourite colour_?' She couldn't come to the party tonight because she had to work a night-shift at the Children's Hospital. The night-shifts were always the worst, she said, because a lot of the kids have nightmares.

But walking here now, down the street past my fellow students, all the glory of student housing, I feel a bit like Diogenes, perhaps a little flustered, and suddenly I feel that temptation to pluck a chicken, to whip it out and pound on it in front of all these people down here in Shady Hill, and they called Diogenes a cynic!

I left my phone buried somewhere in my apartment. The goddamn thing won't stop ringing, and every time I pick it up there's just that same gasping sound on the other end. They never say anything – like an injured animal whimpering, or something half-dead, I was starting to get pretty freaked out by the whole situation. It was a problem not worth dealing with tonight, but not having a phone was also a pretty big problem; because I'm not exactly sure where I am right now, or where I'm supposed to go. I'm _supposed_ to be meeting Patrick and Dennis for the kegger, but somehow Laurier has turned into Charlotte Street, and I'm supposed to be on Daly Street. I reach for my flask but the damned thing is empty and now I'm _really_ in trouble, stomping down the sidewalk like a maniac, cursing Ottawa for all her one way streets and clustered subdivisions. I pass by the Russian Embassy and yell out ' _Ovechkin Sucks_!'

I keep moving and eventually I start yelling out, ' _hello_!' to everyone drinking on their porches. All I get in return are a couple of blank stares before someone shouts at me to shut the fuck up.

No YOU shut the fuck up!

But wait...

Eureka!

Daly Street, my friends. I recognize where I am now, that drunken fog lifting in that pure moment of inebriated glee when everything clicks inside your head and you know again what your purpose is. And bouncing up the steps I nearly tackle Dennis on his way out for a smoke.

"Charlie boy!"

The two of us share a smoke and he tells me there are plenty of tight looking broads in there who are just begging to be laid down tonight. I met Dennis in first year, just like Sylvester, we were all on the same floor in. He was a smaller dude, quiet in big groups – but he could hold his booze like a true country boy. He was from Barrie, which meant he was accustomed to fighting and rap music.

"It's been a while, man."

"I know," I nod.

"Got any girlies in mind for tonight, Charlie boy?"

"Ah, sadly I've retired my cock Den, it's a shame I know, but I've thought about it a long time now, and it's best to quit while I'm ahead. While the shaft is still clean and the balls are wart free."

"Don't worry about that sort of stuff," he says. "What with the medical advances these days, and besides, white guys don't get those sorts of things..."

"Well said sir."

"Cheers to women and their magnificent cunts – without which they would surely be extinct!"

Inside the place is hot and alive. I pass some drunk looking girls who are leaning up against the wall beside a pile of shoes. They all have too much make-up on and dresses that show the top half of their tits and bottom half of their assets. I wink at the one but she just stares at me drunkenly, unable to comprehend. She has no idea what she's doing here. Brennan is in the kitchen standing beside the sink. His hair is gelled up and he's wearing his goddamn leather jacket that make his shoulders puff out, so I go over and cuff him on the back. He laughs and offers me a drink, which is what I intended. I watch him pour the rye into a glass and when he tries to stop a quarter of the way, I tip the bottle so that the brown liquid goes plunging into my cup, deeper and deeper, and when he reaches for the Pepsi I knock his hand away and snatch up a chunk of ice.

"Cheers," I gesture, moving my way through the house. Brennan was a city boy, the whole way through, and even though we were friends, I couldn't seem to see past the hair gel, cologne and popped collars. He was still a decent guy though.

The whiskey is warm and so it makes me cringe a little bit when I sip it. Patrick is standing in the corner of the living room, talking to some bombshell brunette with long legs and a tight black dress. I cannot help myself.

"Patrick, you handsome bastard, how are you?"

"Was a lot better about ten seconds ago," he says smiling, shaking my outstretched hand. He's got a baseball cap on forward and rocking a plaid shirt; true style in my opinion.

"And who is this?" I ask.

"This would be Candy."

"Candy?"

"Yes, Candy."

I look at her and she's smiling at me and I say, "Well that is a lovely name, Candy, mine is Charles, Sir Charles the first, in fact."

"Oh yes, Charles is a fine piece of royalty," Patrick says.

She smiles and shakes my hand and she smells like something I want to fuck.

Patrick ducks out of the room and gestures for me to follow. He leads me into his bedroom and shuts the door quickly behind us. There's a CD case sitting on his dresser with a bunch of coke chalked up on it. Pat starts carving the blow into lines, while I pull out the $100 bill I took from Paul.

And a blast of white hot light - Snnnnn, behind the eyes, Ahhhhh – always fixed you good. The whiskey is cooler now and my taste buds are effectively numbed.

"How is school going for you?" he asks.

"School?" I say, "I mean there's this place I go with big rooms and a bunch of kids on their laptops typing away on fuckbook, or playing Tetris. Tetris is big these days. But have I been learning anything? Do the teachers even know what they're fucking doing? I have this one Political Science class, and the goddamn teacher can't speak English! I'm not kidding. I mean, it's great that the guy is black, or African American – shouldn't it be African Canadian? Anyways, it's great that he's from the Congo and all, diversity blah blah blah, but he is so lost when it comes to teaching. And no one has any clue what is going on in the class, but for some reason I'm getting an A-..."

"I'm thinking about dropping out," Pat says, leaning forward and snorting another line.

"Not a terrible idea," I quip, leaning forward with the rolled up hundred-dollar bill and ahhhhhhh

my mind rushing away, tumbling down the tumultuous cliff; turning into Swiss-cheese. _There's a hole in my brain and it's driving me insane while the sniff sniff turns to a cliff and my lips quiver in vain_.

"I bet you would learn more working than at school."

"Jan got pregnant," he says.

I stare at him and scratch at my numb lip.

"It's all gone now."

I nod.

"Seems sort of like a waste... or something."

"Yeah, I guess it does."

"We broke up because of it."

I nod.

"Do you think I'd be a good father?" he asks, looking at me solemnly.

"Absolutely," I say. "Teach those little bastards a thing or two about respect. Teach them how to drink, to read, to love, to hate – Lolita, Caddy, Stella – all the good ones. And I can be the uncle – you bet your fucking ass I'm the uncle. And Uncle Charlie can come over with Candy, and we'll just fill little Patty up with Candy all night long..."

And the two of us howl with laughter as the room spins, colours blurring, leaving lines through my vision of sight, my sight, vision, lines and lines and colours and abortions. _Old man take a look at my life – sha la la la_ , tiny little foetus and a big old nostril. My weightless arms quiver in the half lit room and tiny little stars are dancing in the ceiling, on the roof, in my soul. I try and catch my breath and it sounds like a raspy carburetor in my chest. I notice a blue clock sitting on Pat's dresser, the little red numbers say 11:23, and for some reason this gives me a sense of urgency and desperation for which I can hardly bare.

"I am in desperate need of a beverage," I tell Pat, my whiskey drink now empty.

"I'm on it," he says, and swiftly the two of us swoop out of the room, back into the maze of lost souls. And it's hard not to think about the look in Pat's eyes. Or the way his face looks older in the bright light, or the patches of white hair poking out at the back of his hat. Snnnnn – drip – drip – drip. And I'm good. Rolling through the house, slapping hands and giving people the thumbs up for no particular reason at all, only because I'm fucked and they're fucked and outside the earth is moving; the sky is parting and the heavens are about to come crashing down upon us, but somehow I doubt we'll notice. Patty pours me another stiff drink and my taste buds are for the most part annihilated so the vodka rushes down my throat with ease. The kitchen is crowded with scattered bodies and my body sways gently with the masses. My bottom lip is completely numb.

"I hear this stuff cleans the soul," I say, lifting my glass of vodka towards Pat, "cheers to a good soul cleansing, long overdue if you ask me."

"You got that right," he says, giving me a clink, "we never see you around these days, Charlie boy."

"Quite busy I'm afraid."

"Bullshit. Busy blowing all of your step-daddy's money on booze and smokes and porn..."

"Hey," I interrupt, "every man deserves an extensive porn collection, it's a necessity – we bore very easily Patrick, you know this."

We cheers again.

"God, it's hard being a 23 year old man in this modern age we live in."

Candy walks back into the room and Pat winks at me and turns off, moving his way stealthily back into the living room. I smile at Candy and I know she's going to stop and talk to me; please don't ask me what I'm taking, please don't ask me what I'm taking....

"Are we having fun tonight?" I ask.

"Yes," she says, looking around casually. "I don't know many people here though."

"Ah, but that is always the best sort of party to be at," I say.

"Why?"

"Well, because you can be anyone you want."

She sort of laughs but I can tell that she doesn't really get it. Pretty girls like her would never want to be anyone else anyways.

"So what are you taking in school?" she asks.

Damn!

"Well actually, I'm done school now my dear, pilot school that is, at Algonquin, and I just have one more in-flight session before they give me my license."

"Really?" she says, incredulous.

"And the hat, they'll give me my pilot hat – that's the biggest part of all," I add, taking another drink.

"The hat?"

"Oh yes, the hat my dear, the hat, the hat."

"You don't look like a pilot though," she says.

"It's my ears," I reply, "they're too small."

And she nods as if what I said makes perfect sense to her.

"You don't have a drink in your hand miss Candy," I point out.

"Oh I know, I'm not really feeling..."

"Nonsense," I say, taking her by the hand and leading her through the living room. And I know exactly what I'm doing right now, because Candy doesn't need another drink. She doesn't even know what she needs. But I know. And when I pull her into Pat's room she lets herself be pulled, and when I close the door she looks at me and I look at her and when we first kiss she stops and says ' _i have a boyfriend_ ,' and I say ' _i'm a pilot, i'll be flying off tomorrow_ ,' then her legs are spread up on Pat's desk and my pants are hanging down around my ankles and she's soft, so soft and nice and deep breaths, in and out, in and out – inhale – exhale – my spirit souring in the air like Whitman's Song. And she's my little trapper girl, and I've got my gun pointed right at her. Whishing away through the soft blackness, everything warm and soft and supple, pure and ignoble at the same time – so purely ignoble my loins may burst. And after it's all over, in the dull glow, she looks just as beautiful as she did before, and when she asks me if I'll fly her to Rome I say yes my dear, absolutely, yes, yes, and yes again. And I find a half-bottle of Jack tucked behind Pat's speakers. I take swigs from the bottle as the two of us share a cigarette, the amber burns bright and orange at the end of the stalk, and passion burns bright and gold in my ruptured heart; for these few minutes left.

Later that night, back in my apartment, with Candy, because she was going to go home, but in the back seat of the cab, with my charmed tongue and the very stealthy maneuvering of my rapid-happy fingers, I was able to convince Miss Candy to spend the night in my apartment. And while I have her all naked and spread out on my mattress, the goddamn phone starts ringing. I try ignoring it but the fucking thing won't stop. I leave her panting on my bed while I throw some shit around my room looking for it. I finally find the phone in one of my shoes.

"Hello?" I say. "Hello, who's there?"

Candy is looking at my strangely now as I keep saying ' _hello_ ' into the phone, practically screaming. I hear some rustling around from the other end of the line, movement, and then a tiny voice says

' _help me_.'

Then the line goes dead. I look at the phone puzzled and toss it across the room. I can still see the red light blinking at me, taunting me in this wretched quiet. Candy asks me who it was and I say ' _i dunno_ ,' then we go to sleep.

## Chapter 7

Off to meet the father today. Good ol' daddy boy, or Brian as I sometimes refer to him. It's a blue-grey sort of day. The clouds are stretched out and white in the sky, and the cool wind shifts into my face as I walk down Rideau Street. I meet Brian downtown at the Rideau Centre and he looks about the same as usual, his hair a touch whiter. We walk over some dead leafs on our way to the canal; the orange all stomped out of them.

My dad does look older in the damp air, since the last time we'd seen each other anyways. His glasses look thicker and he walks with a bit of a limp now, which was new to me. He pulls out a joint and the two of us go for a slow walk along the canal, passing the j back and forth between us. Lots of rollerbladers give us dirty looks as they skate by. We laugh at their little outfits and my dad seems happy which is good, I guess.

"How is school going?" he asks.

"Do you care?"

"Not really."

"You never wanted me to go to school."

"Do you like it?"

"I suppose," I say.

"You suppose?"

"Yes, I suppose. I suppose there are plenty of good-looking ladies walking around and most of the teachers don't really care if we show up for class or not, so I mean, it's a pretty sweet gig."

"Tell me about it," and he inhales hard on the j.

"I mean it's all just one big money grab."

"What isn't?"

The sun ducks behind a couple white clouds while my feet bounce gingerly along the paved sidewalk beside the canal. There's a couple kids sitting up near the bushes and they're puffing a jay too. They all stare gapingly at me and Brian as we make our way by.

"How's life on the golf course?" I ask.

"Shot a 74 the other day."

"Good score."

"I know. Do you want any more of this?"

"No I'm good."

He tosses the roach in the canal and the water looks especially murky at this time of year because they drain it. You could see all the garbage and a layer of filth that hid beneath the water during the summer. It's starting to smell like winter. Brian is walking ahead a bit, and his eyes are pretty red and glazed over from the j. He tells me about how the weed these days is different, stronger, filled with all sorts of chemicals and shit, and I say ' _yeah, so is everything_ ,' and he nods. Eventually we get to a pub and inside it's warm and I guess it sort of makes me feel at home. The bartender nods at us as we pull out stools at the bar. My dad orders two double rye and cokes and a beer. I ask him what he's been doing with himself these past few months and he tells me he's been on the road.

"On the road where?"

"I've been driving a big rig. Down to the states and across Canada, just got back from out west – great dope out west..."

"Have you been back to South Port at all?" I ask.

"Nah," he says. "Not much reason for me to go back there now."

This sort of goes on for a while, him telling me where he's been, and I guess I am interested in some of it. But inside my head, these burnt out switches are trying to spark again. And it sort of hurts a bit, inside my head, but eventually we start talking about hockey and I tell him that the Bruins suck and he tells me that maybe I should pick a team before I start talking shit about his.

"Well that's my generation daddy boy, we're the generation of indecision, you raised us – may I remind you."

"I knew school would be bad for you."

We both laugh.

"How's your little apartment holding up?"

"Well," I say, "I've got ants, and they've just recently figured out how to scale the wall and get up onto the counter, so you know – and my window is still broken, so it's getting kind of cold in there."

My dad grimaces.

"Yeah, but it's not all bad. There are also these centipede spider things, real big fucking alien looking things, and apparently they hunt down other insects, so I'm hoping the situation will just sort of take care of itself."

"Spoken like a true scholar."

Eventually our food comes and by then I'm pretty drunk and stoned so the fish and chips melts in my mouth. I mix the coleslaw and the tartar sauce in with the fries and my dad doesn't really eat much of his burger because he gets bad heart burn these days. After it's all over, Brian hands me a crumpled up cheque from his pocket, and even though I want to tell him ' _no thank you sir, I am good_ ,' another part of me wants to take the cheque because, I mean – I don't think you'd understand but either way it's another couple nights of drinking and some food and maybe even a couple dances from some exceptionally talented ladies over at Pig Al's.

"Well that was good, wasn't it?"

"Yeah," I say.

"I'll see you soon, okay son?"

"Okay."

"I love you."

"Yeah, I love you too."

And...

Natasha wants to go out tonight but the thought of dealing with her friend Tiffany is nauseating at best. She was from Toronto, like Natasha, and Tiffany had an annoying tendency to complain about how nothing was quite as good here in Ottawa as it was in Toronto. She has this boyfriend named Freddy who is completely useless. When Freddy gets drunk he gets loud and he hangs off Tiffany. He wears dress shirts tucked into his black dress pants, and the drunker he gets the faster she gets ready to snap, and usually I somehow find my way into the path of her shrapnel. It's beyond me to explain to her that Freddy is an insecure, bumbling idiot. A guy who's potential in life went away with the Video Cassette. But I guess they did deserve each other, those two beautiful bastards.

"Come on Charles, we never go out anymore."

"We went out last night," I tell her.

"That was two nights ago Charles, and we went to _your_ friends' house, remember? And I didn't really want to go, but I did anyways – for you."

"Well that's why you're my princess, baby."

"Are we going or not?"

"Yes, we are going, absolutely."

So while the princess gets ready I lay there on her bed with a half-hard cock. The evening light peaks in through the window, giving the whole room this sort of blue tinge; because it snowed today for the first time and it's cold. But lying here watching Natasha straightening her blond hair is nice, and she's got a black skirt on that comes up to her belly with a black bra on, holding up her tits so that they look firm enough to hang from.

Suddenly I need to fuck her.

"Stop Charles."

"Come on baby,"

"I have to get ready."

"You are ready – you've looked ready for hours now!"

She giggles and pushes me away. Girls never believed you when you told them they looked ready. That was one thing they never believed.

"I always say you look better without any make-up on anyways." I tell her (another one they never believed).

She keeps doing her hair so I hop off the bed and head downstairs to the fridge. I find a cold beer tucked behind some lettuce and open it with a satisfying crack. Natasha's cat is on top of the fridge and when he paws down at me I nearly drop my beer in a startled mess. I give the cat a menacing look and I'm pretty sure he returns my malice, glaring back at me with his yellow eyes. The two of us stand locked in place, my hand slowly rising to bring the beer to my lips, but never once breaking eye contact with this feline – have to show the little prick whose boss. Meow. Gulp.

"Charles?"

Spinning around in tremendous fashion, I scoop Natasha up by the waist and twirl her in the middle of the kitchen. She is now wearing a lime green dress with gold earrings and beige coloured lip-stick and when I go to plant a big fat kiss on those very kissable lips she dodges me and says ' _don't mess up my make-up_ '.

"Shall we?" I gesture with my empty beer towards the door. And after Natasha runs back upstairs once more to change her earrings, we finally make it out the door. The Ottawa wind is sharp and cold as the frost prepares to settle in, and my loins are deprived and angry. I guess now would be a good time to let you go because let me assure you, these next couple of hours are going to be pure, undisputable shit.

Tumultuously

Tumbling

Down

The

Infinite

Drain.

## Chapter 8

_Walking down to the market past the gypsies on the sidewalks, shrouded in their little hanging canvasses, I always enjoyed walking past them. Samantha's dark hair looks darker today in the shadow of the buildings and the cool wind lifts my spirit as her skirt billows. I buy her a cup of strawberries and she kisses me. '_ _you're a lucky lad_ _' an old man said to me down there in the market – and I said '_ _i know sir, i know it_ _'. But I didn't know shit. He wasn't talking about the same thing I was, he saw what we really had – that intangible web that hung between us. And what the hell am I supposed to do when every song, every scent, every notion – clouding up behind my sinister eyes, behind my fabricated life – but always in the background; her voice, her laugh, her smell, it was always with me. A prisoner of my own devices, or of hers, I'm not quite sure whose fault it is – the easy answer would be my parents, society, the terrorists! That longing, that emptiness, all hollow and whispering in the gentle glow of my fabricated life. But it wasn't their fault either. It used to scare me when I would hear my mom and dad argue with each other. I would go outside or go to my room and shut the door, and I never understood why they couldn't just love each other. I do now. I can see it all so clearly now. It wasn't their fault that they fell out of love. It was me who ruined their lives. I'm the reason my mom and dad started to hate each other. And any sort of sympathy or condolences that I receive from them should be greeted with open arms and sincere gratification from me, because really, I am a dead-weight. With Samantha it was the same. I guess we used each other, because that's all love really is – an addiction; two people using each other up like a drug. Injecting, snorting and smoking you up until there's nothing left. The way I wanted to call her every day, or how I would lie beside her at night rubbing her back and then she would rub mine and nothing else seemed to matter except the soft brush of those fingers – that was love. We were two lost kids, we were best fucking friends. These memories, like kids lined up along the shore all in a row, and I'm walking along behind them, dunking their heads under the water one at a time as I pass..._

## Chapter 9

Turkey weekend. Time to head back to the roots, back to South Port, where the grass grows green and the rivers run brown: whiskey, of course. I haven't been home in over a year. But it's still the same. That feeling of nostalgia and youth, when responsibilities were something talked about in class and drinking was still something done in our parents' basements, or out in the bushes. When I still believed in love and innocence and the idea that our parents, our teachers, well they all knew what was best for us and sincerely wanted to help us.

I grew up here, shit like that never leaves.

Meredith is driving because Paul is busy with work this weekend and couldn't come. He didn't want to come back to South Port anyways. Paul didn't understand the small town mentality that made me binge drink and chat with cab drivers. He was from Ottawa originally, and it was obvious that he wanted to be there, even for those four years when we lived in South Port.

I can remember sitting on our front porch late into the summer nights, back when I was still just a high school dreamer. You could actually see the stars at night in South Port, and that was something I'd forgotten about over the past couple of years. Paul was still someone new in our lives then, when the stars came out, and I thought I loved him. Everything seemed so different back then, so simple. Dad was gone but Paul was here now, so in my mind it was good. I used to think Paul was good for my mom. He seemed to care for her, he had money – he was able to provide us with everything we needed; I was such a fool.

When I got into the University of Ottawa (which was the only university that accepted me), Paul and Meredith sold their house in South Port and bought the new place on the Ottawa River. Paul never liked it in South Port to begin with. The decision to pack up and leave was made even easier by the booming real estate market in our Nation's Capital, what with all the condos being built downtown and all. There were only so many houses to sell in South Port, and only so many clients.

When Paul decided he wanted to move his business back to Ottawa, there was no questioning it. He said that I was a nuisance, and staying in South Port would only make me worse. He wanted to take South Port out of the equation. Mom acted like she didn't want to go, but I could tell that was all it was; an act. She was ready to leave South Port too, and I can't say that I blamed her. A town like this, it can make you feel as if there's nowhere else to go.

Nana is drunk on the front porch when we pull into the driveway of her condominium. Her teeth are stained red from the wine and she squints down at us as we pull our bags out from the trunk. Her condo is thin with three stories, two of which she never uses.

"Happy Thanksgiving, mom," mom says.

"You're late—"

"Yes, I know, Donna..."

"I told you to call me if you were going to be late."

"I know, mom..."

"And now I've got this empty bottle of red wine sitting here beside me, and I look like that native fellow who always bikes by drunk. See that, Charles? See what your mother is doing to your poor grandmother."

"I missed you nana," I say, bounding up the steps and planting a big fat one on her stained lips.

She smiles, and in her eyes I can see the anger die, like a flame, just sort of flickering out, and my poor, lovely, blessed nana. She really was happy to have us here, no matter what she might say. My Grandpa passed away about ten years ago. He used to take me golfing, even after the cancer devoured his leg and they had to amputate it. He was one helluva man. I tried to be like him whenever I could – but it was hard, to be that noble and hard working – expecting nothing in return. They didn't make men like my Grandpa anymore. Hell, they didn't make men like any of our grandfather's anymore. We are a generation of weak-hearted, self-entitled bitches.

"Help me with the luggage Charles."

Never a rest for the wicked.

Inside the house smells the same. Like nana. And there's some food on the stove; a couple of whitish looking pork-chops in a frying pan, and some mashed potatoes in a brown bowl. I watch my nana maneuver her way over to the microwave where a steaming batch of green peas is waiting to be unfurled. We eat at the round kitchen table and the food tastes like nana, if you know what I mean; that sort of ambivalence to the texture of the peas. I drink a glass of white wine but it's homemade and not very good, little chunks floating around like tiny islands. The two ladies drone on for a bit until the inevitable question comes directed my way, and I say ' _oh it's good, real good – learning lots, making lots of friends and meeting nice people_ ', and I keep talking until the two of them seem satisfied, then I'm swiftly out the door and on my way to Duhaime's for the kegger.

I take a cab to the party and think about my Grandpa as I sip from the mickey of gin that I took from Nana's liquor cabinet (just like old times). I remember going to visit him in the hospital when he was on his death bed. The nurse tried to put in his IV, but his veins were so faded from the cancer, it took her four tries until she finally hit the vein. He didn't complain though, he didn't even flinch. The nurse apologized and Grandpa waved his hand, and when she asked if he wanted a priest to come into the room, he looked over at us, me, my mom, my nana and my sister, and he said ' _nah, who wants them around anyways_.' I'll always remember him for that, because all of us laughed, and he smiled, and in his mind he wasn't sick at all.

There are lots of cars parked outside of Duhaime's place and inside it's packed with old friends from my high school. Ryan Morris is here, and when we see each other I give the guy a hug and pat him on the back.

He grimaces, nods and says; "Good to see you man. Jesus it's been over a year now hasn't it?"

"Yeah about that, it's been a while for sure."

"Some of us didn't think you were ever coming back Charlie boy, we thought you were gone for good."

"You know I can't stay away forever," I laugh.

"Well, like I said – it's fucking good to see you man."

"So, how's life with you?" I ask.

"Life's a terminal illness."

We both laugh.

I ask him if he's seen Sebastian around and he shakes his head no.

"He's pretty fucked up these days man," he says. "No one knows what he's getting into now."

"What do you mean?"

"He went to jail last summer, and I guess he met some guys in there from Toronto, because ever since he's been running drugs, guns, and even women back and forth between here and the city."

"Bull shit," I say.

"Nah, it's no joke – people have seen him roll into town with a limo full of girls – and these aren't the kind of gals you'd be introducing to mama – if you know what I mean."

Ryan says goodbye and goes outside for a smoke. Everyone here has known each other for years, and spirits are high. The beer is U-brew, a homemade beer that tastes flat and is barely cold enough to drink. I do a couple keg stands and manage to get drunk quickly. Mike Havloore shows up and we give each other a sloppy hug. He looks pretty skinny these days, but he's just as loud and he has just as much coke on him as usual.

So things keep arockin'.

It does help the drunken eye see a littler straighter, just a wee line. Okay, maybe two. Then it's off to the bar. And we are walking down the same streets we've been walking down our entire lives. I guess I feel a bit like a kid again, which is sad and good at the same time. We start singing " _wonderwall_ " as we march down the middle of the street. I haven't been home in a long time.

' _Cause maybe, you're gonna be the one that saves me, and after ALLLLLLLLL, you're my wonder waAAALLLLLL'_

My heart racing and cold sweat piercing my forehead, I'm drunk. It felt good to be home, I had to admit. Everything seems frosted through my slanted eyes as we move towards the bar, passing by another group of high school students, flipping them the bird and chirping ' _fuckin kids these days_.'

There's a line outside Club Q, the only bar in town, which is fucking ridiculous because I've never had to wait in line at this bar before in my entire life – but new people own it now, and I guess some things do change around here. So the pack of us make noise and chirp the bouncers within reason until eventually they figure it'll just be easier to let us all in. It doesn't really matter who anyone is, because on a night like tonight, back home, it was all warm embraces and well wishes. It was something like a high school reunion.

The girls are here, lots of them. Some of them hate me – well, most of them do – but there was still a chance. Linda comes over and I insist on buying her a drink, double vodka and cran, and we talk for a bit. She asks me what I've been doing way up there in Ottawa and I say, " _Oh you know, sweeping the floor at the House of Commons, playing croquet with Stephen on Sundays, after church, naturally – oh, and I'm a pilot now_."

"I thought you were in communications," she says.

"Stepping stone," I tell her.

"Well, we haven't seen in you in so long – we were starting to think you wouldn't be back."

"I'll always be back, baby," I say – ordering another round of tequila shots.

We hit the dance floor for a bit and I twirl her around a couple times. She grinds her nice full ass up on me until she sees some other girl that she used to be friends with, so the two of them go make that whole scene while I step outside for a smoke. Mike's out puffing on a smoke too, and even though I was never that close with the kid – I mean, he was a little intense back in high school – he seemed to be looking for friends, so I go over and start talking to him.

"Things are changing around here man," he tells me.

"Yeah, I've noticed."

"Things are fucked."

"Haven't they always been?"

He shrugs, takes a drag.

"Nothing seems the same anymore – it's like, I dunno..."

"Like we're not kids anymore?" I say.

He shrugs again, takes another drag.

When I go back inside the air is stale and it sort of makes me choke a bit, but then again it could be all the cigarettes. The music is loud and it's pretty dark so that all I can see is a mass of moving arms and mouths. Someone smacks me on the back and I turn around to see Sebastian Drillers grinning at me, his lips twisting up the sides of his face in a fiendish grin.

"Holly shit! Good to see you man," I yell. "I've been trying to get a hold of you..."

"Let's step into my office," he says, gesturing towards the men's bathroom.

So we go into the men's room and he chalks up a couple fat lines on the toilet paper dispenser. We don't bother being all that discreet about it because every person that comes into the bathroom knows us. We keep getting interrupted and having to tell the scavengers and vultures to fuck off. Classy. Anyways, after a couple rippity-rips and some white flashing lights behind my eyes, we leave the bathroom and go to the bar.

"So," Snnnn, "what do you need to talk to me about?" Sebastian asks.

"Well," Snnnn, "remember that night in Ottawa?"

"Barely," he laughs.

"Who was that guy you were with?"

"Who, Septum?" Snnnn.

"Yeah."

"Just a client man, a big one."

"For what?"

"That's not important."

"Oh."

"Why?" he asks.

"I don't know, man. The guy was sort of... shady. His house was a fucking crack den, and I woke up the next morning with this cell phone..." I pull the phone out from my pocket and show it to Sebastian. "I keep getting these weird calls on it, like just this gasping sound – it sounds like a little girl. I heard her say ' _help me_ ' the other night..."

"You serious?"

"Yeah... man."

"Well," he pauses, takes a sip of his drink, "I would leave Septum out of it."

"Why?"

"I've only known the guy for a year or so, but he's never in the same spot for long. Before Ottawa, he was in Toronto, and I was selling him all kinds of shit – coke, ecstasy, Special K – the guy moves weight Charlie boy – he won't want to be bothered with your shit."

Eventually Sebastian finishes his drink and says good-bye to me, his eyes all glassy and far away. I stand at the bar alone fingering my double rye and coke. I have a sour feeling in my stomach as the bartender yells out _last call_.

I walk back to nana's condo and it starts raining. I miss Sam. She was probably back in Oakville at her mom's place for the holidays. I couldn't shake her. It was ironic, I guess, because I did everything I could to drive her away when we were together. But when she left it all became too real. I think I was scared, scared that she was the one I wanted to be with for the rest of my life. I thought I was too young, I thought I couldn't handle the responsibility, but what I couldn't handle was watching her leave, and then when I heard that she slept with Sylvester...

That night I can't really sleep because the bed is pretty hard and my nanas house is deathly silent, something I can't stand. I have this sort of listless worm crawling around inside me, wrapping around my spine and sort of shifting and oozing. I need something to distract me from the silence. I am dreading the ride home on Sunday with Meredith. It was always so horridly long and boring. The ride never used to be so bad when I was still with Sam. Back then I had something to look forward too, you know, something that made time not really matter.

Samantha didn't live in Ottawa anymore. She moved to Toronto last year, and I hadn't seen nor talked to her since. I still dreamed about her almost every night though, and it was starting to drive me a bit insane, if you must know, and some nights, when I'm feeling particularly lonely, I picture what she's doing at that moment, in Toronto, and it comforts me in a sick sort of way. That longing, that desire to be beside her again. And when I look at Natasha I don't feel the same.

I get up from the bed and try to kill the worm inside me with some more whiskey, but the R&R makes me start gagging. My mom wakes up and comes downstairs to shake her head at me in doorway of the bathroom. I'm leaning over the toilet on my knees dry heaving into the bowl.

"Another fucking terrific Thanksgiving," she says.

I start laughing as she slams the door.

## Chapter 10

I bought Sam an ocean blue ring from one of the gypsies. It wasn't expensive or anything, but she loved it because I bought it for her. That's where I've been living since it all ended, inside her ocean blue ring. Ever since she took me to the park and read the letter she wrote. Both of us cried, and when I walked away into the darkness she tried calling my name, but her sobs choked out the sound. We both needed each other so bad it scared us. And sometimes I can see her, through the ocean, and her eyes are glassy but solid, because when a person decides to severe the chord, it's pretty much impossible to re-attach it...

## Chapter 11

Any man who says he doesn't like to eat a girl out is either a liar or a little light in the loafers. Because really is there anything more magnificent? All vibrant and alive in the heat of it all – I'm talking about diving right in.

I think I would love it even with teeth; in fact I know I would.

But that was one thing that always bugged me, when a guy said he didn't like to go down on a chick. You really should work the nipples first though, gets them in the mood much quicker.

I'm driving in Natasha's car (which was actually her parents' car), down by the Salvation Army, crowded with shady looking dudes wearing ripped-up jeans and faded green tattoos on their arms.

There's a part of me that wouldn't mind driving on past Rideau Street, continuing down King Edward, and catching the highway over to Montreal. Maybe I could catch myself some French kisses. But it's only Wednesday and there's papers to be wrote (or written?), ladies to be attended too, wheels to be turned and bridges to be burned. The bundled up wad of cash in the palm of my hand feels all warm and soggy and it sort of makes me feel sick. The hookers are all huddled together behind the Salvation Army. The one is a massively busty and bootyful black chick with tits that sag dangerously low out of her pencil thin blouse. She looks over at the car and I wink at her so she walks over to my window.

"Hey stud, you looking for a good time?"

"Who isn't?"

She giggles and moves to get in, but I gesture for her to stop. She looks at me puzzled.

"How would I get in touch with, um, a lady who, well, who wasn't always a lady?"

"Oh sugar, you're not into that sort of thing, are you?"

"Oh, it's not for me -," I say. "It's really for a school project. A bit of group research... all I need is a number..."

"You kids just keep getting weirder," she says. "Are you sure you're not a cop?"

"No ma'am, just a lonely boy in need of some lovin'."

My phone won't stop ringing and I still have no idea whose calling – although the calls are starting to get even more disturbing (I can distinctly hear someone crying, and sometimes a muffled scream escapes from the other end of the line). The whole situation is starting to give me nightmares.

I'm sitting on my mattress and I stomp out a colony of ants as they march across my hardwood floor, letting my eyes drift over the disgraceful surroundings.

The wind is pouring in through my shattered window, but for some reason I haven't bothered to let my landlord Ron know about it yet. I broke it one night in the summer after a big fight with Natasha. There was a tiny scar on my middle knuckle that looked like half a heart. Dried blood is still streaked across the wall below the window.

There's a big hole in the wall beside my kitchen sink. It's half covered up with a Playboy calendar because I used to have a picture of Sam there but I stabbed it to death with scissors one night while it was still hanging from the wall. The brown girl in the Calendar is smiling at me with perfectly white teeth, and her tits look like cantaloupes. I'm fiddling with the locket I found in the street, flipping it over and over again through my fingers, and I keep wondering who this elderly woman is, and why she looks so concerned. She looks so placidly stern. It actually scared me a little bit, but for some reason I couldn't throw the damn thing away. It felt good spinning in my hands and somehow it soothed me.

Sylvester calls.

"What's up Charlie boy?" he asks.

"You sound sober," I say, somewhat astonished.

"Listen, I'm late... gotta go meet a special lady."

"Oh," I say, "and who is this special lady?"

"I don't even really know man. We met on Plenty of Fish, so, yah know. She's got real nice tits though, I mean, we fucked on the webcam or whatever. I just need to get my dick wet, sometimes nothing else matters, bro."

"Well you have a good night there Sylvester, you sly bastard, have fun with this special lady you met on the internet..."

"Do you want to come with?" he asks. "She might have a friend."

"No I think I'm good Syl, I'm saving myself up for your birthday – your big night. I've got a surprise in the works for you."

"Cool."

"That's at the end of the month, right?"

"Yeah, man."

And then he hangs up, just the classiest piece of shit on the planet. But that filthy prick was going to get what it deserved. Sex meant nothing to him, Sam meant nothing to him.

The inside of my window is splattered with snow and ice, and I see a girl walk by on the sidewalk with black boots that stretch all the way up her calves. She's got great legs and her ass isn't bad either; definitely a good lay – I can tell by the way she walks. Part of me hopes she slips and falls on the wet pavement. Her purse would go flying up into the air, as would those sexy legs, and then it would be Charlie boy to the rescue. Scooping her up in my arms, through the sleet and wind, and maybe she'd be too stunned to even speak, just so utterly and beautifully speechless, but she would let me take her, and I could do all the talking for the both of us – which would probably fill up most of the time.

Later that night I'm downtown at a bar in the market called Minglewoods. It's pretty dead, as usual, but there _are_ a couple of pretty girls on the dance floor in tight skirts, and one of them is wearing black. I like black. Her legs look smooth and tanned in the bouncing lights. And while I'm trying my damndest to give this girl the ol' shifty eye, her fat roommate keeps glaring over at me and giving me nasty looks. I finish my beer and flip the fat girl off. Turning back around to the bar I try and signal for the bartender, but he's chatting up some girl with her tits hanging out, so my chances of getting noticed anytime soon are slim. Everyone I came with is gone now, not sure where, and my throat hurts from the dry heaving I did earlier in the bathroom – fucking Jaggermeister.

Why do I always end up alone?

I'm pretty wasted, to be honest, but mostly I'm just tired. I need a goddamn cigarette. Across the bar I see Deviated Septum sitting with a drink. He is looking around the room with empty eyes and I start making my way over to him. He notices me coming but doesn't make any effort to acknowledge me.

"Hey man," I say, patting him on the back.

He turns around in his seat and says ' _hey_ ' to me, but up close he looks pretty whacked out and I can tell he doesn't want much to do with me. His jaw is twitching and there's sweat covering his forehead and face.

"How have you been?" I ask.

"Do you want some coke or something?" he says, turning around in his seat and giving me the once over.

"No man, I'm good."

"Well then, fuck off," he says.

"Listen, I woke up with a phone in my pocket the other weekend, after we were at your house that night or whatever..."

He looks at me blankly.

"Anyways, I've been getting these weird calls on it and, I don't know, the one time I swear I heard a girl say ' _help me_ '...."

"Why the fuck would I know anything about that?" he says. "Why would I _want_ to know anything about that? Who the fuck are you again?"

"I'm Charlie – Sebastian's friend," and I try not to panic as Septum gets up from the stool and stands right up in my face.

"Sebastian's friend, eh?"

"Yeah man, don't you remember..."

I'm holding the phone in my pocket, my grip tightening as Deviated Septum grabs my arm.

"I'm going to the bathroom," he says.

He brushes past me and I watch him disappear through the crowd of drunken university students. I don't see him again for the rest of the night. Eventually, Patrick stumbles back over to me. He says that everyone's leaving. Outside we meet up with Brennan and Gordo. The two of them look pretty out of it, and Gordo has a fairly large stain on the front of his shirt which may or may not be puke – so we leave. On the way home my phone starts ringing again and for some reason I answer it.

' _Where are you?_ ' a voice asks, and then the line goes dead.

Sometimes I won't leave when I want too, I stay because I don't want to say goodbye. I hate goodbyes. Not because of the tragic loss of company – quite the contrary in fact. They are always just so reprehensible – awkward – like ' _oh it was a great night_ ' and ' _I can't wait till we do this again_ ' even though most of the time you never do the same thing again with the same people. Sure, you do the same shit you did before, but it never _feels_ the same. You always try. My whole life I've been trying to transform one thing into another, always trying to duplicate a feeling that I had once before, a feeling that died a long time ago. I can hardly remember it anymore, to be honest. When everything was still vibrant and the heels of my shoes would click together and I'd be home. But that's humanity my friends – finding a way to ruin the good, wearing any piece of fortune in our lives down to the rusted, blunt end. And now I guess there is no home – not one that matters anyways. I hate this goddamn apartment. I hate the fact that it's only me in here and at night I can hear my neighbour listening to the goddamn ten o'clock news. And that poor, old bastard is alone too. I saw him out in the hall one night shuffling past, and he looked at my apprehensively like I was going to cuss in front of him or something. He hated me, because he was a war vet and he knew how to behave properly. I wish I had been in the army.

My phone rings and for some reason I think it might be Samantha, but it's Natasha, so I don't pick up. I have a bluish bruise on my forearm from climbing a fence on my way home from the bar last night. The skin looks dry around the edges of the bruise, and I sit here on my bed with my school books sprawled out on the floor beside me, picking at my various wounds and scars, wondering where she is tonight.

I turn on my TV and take faint notice that a spider centipede is currently crawling up my wall (probably trying to get at the brown girl with the cantaloupe tits).

There is a woman on the news crying because her daughter has been missing now for three weeks, her white hair like frayed yarn – and by the way her hands are shaking, her blood-shot eyes and quivering mouth – I can tell she hasn't slept in days. The plastic-looking reporter woman mentions that the young girl, Cindy, was last seen with her favourite toy; a pink teddy bear. The house sits shrouded in the background, beyond all the microphones and plastic people, and it made me sad to look at all the missing shingles and white curtains, because really, it was more of a trap than a home – and somewhere beneath those missing shingles, behind those white curtains, a grown woman is probably rocking back and forth on her bed, wondering why her daughter had to disappear.

I'm sitting at the very back of my class and everything is swirling, the colours bleeding into one another. Because Dennis had shrooms and we ate the nicest caps earlier tonight, the gold ones all warped – the perfect crowns – and I can feel my eyes melting out of my skull. I look down at my notebook and there's just a barrage of pointless scribbles: smiley faces, angry faces, little stick men with their stick-men arms waving in the air, a knife dripping in blood and some naked chick drawn crudely by a maniac. The auditorium is pretty full tonight, and lots of kids have their laptops out. No one is paying attention to the Professor, as usual, and the tetris blocks make my eyes light up. I gap out for about ten minutes watching this kid with a purple GeeGees sports jacket on make it to level 10. Then he dies because the blocks get all blocked up and the teacher has a funny voice and big ears with chalk-tipped fingers. Sitting here in class; learning of knowledge – no-ledge to stand on, blocking up in my tetris mind, blearning with the blocks in the plastic seats with robot arms, mechanical no-ledgers teetering on this edge of nothing; my mind is mangled.

At some point the class ends and everyone starts getting up. All this movement gives me the twitches so I have to sort of sink into my seat and grind my teeth together, the shrooms making my mouth dry. This goes on for a while until most of the other students are gone. I make my delicate way outside, tip-toeing like some sort of deranged lunatic, and it's a fresh sort of night outside. The cold air hits me smack in the face and the street lights look like glowing orbs of magic.

My bag is pretty heavy and it really is a pain in the ass to have to lug these gigantic books around with me all the time, considering we never read the entire things, usually just half – if that. I mean talk about wasteful fucking practices, no matter what I'm doing here; I can't help but think I'm wasting my time. I reach into my duffle bag and pull out my American Literature Anthology that's over 2000 pages long (which I paid $175 for). I study the book for a moment, watching the letters intertwine and swirl together, before chucking it into some nearby bushes. A squirrel comes flying out of the bush, startling me, and a car almost flattens it as he scampers across the road.

Life would be simple, to be a squirrel – well, not a squished one, but a chipper, fucking elastic, horny-ass mother-fucking squirrel. I've never seen squirrels fucking, but something tells me they go at er' hard.

When I make it to my apartment I hate that I'm here right now, alone, and if there was a party going on somewhere, anywhere, even the slightest hint of noise or activity – but the night sky is grey-black and empty, there's not faces or even stars up there, and the moon looks pretty goddamn lonely too, if you ask me. It takes me a good couple of minutes fumbling with my keys before finally sticking them in the slot. I'm still tripping out pretty bad. When I do finally manage to open the door, my hand blends into the doorknob and it freaks me out for a second so that my mouth hangs open dumbly. I manage to make it inside my building and when my elderly neighbour, who is a war vet, sees me and says hello, I stammer and run past him, slamming my apartment door behind me. Inside my brain there's a million sparks of lightning and they're all striking at exactly the same spot, at the same time, and inside my apartment it's pretty fucking cold and the ants make me shiver as I stomp at them with my heavy feet.

It's Saturday night and we're on our way home from the casino, me, Patrick and Dennis. The snow is falling hard so we hustle up the walkway towards the entrance of Pat's apartment. The French cabby yells something at us in French, probably something to do with the lack of tip (give us a fucking break, we all just lost money, asshole), and so we flip him the bird and laugh heartily as he drives away cursing.

"What a night," Dennis says. "Feels good hanging out with you two idiots again."

"Feeling is mutual," I say, turning to Pat.

But Pat isn't walking beside me anymore, no. There is a tremendous crashing sound, that crystal like crashing sound which usually follows the breaking of glass.

"Oh my god..." Dennis says.

I say nothing.

Pat has just gone flying through one of the giant windows at the front of his apartment building, lying there in a pile of shattered glass. I can see blood smeared across his face. I move over towards him, reaching down to pull him up out of the mess.

"No," he says. "No, just leave me."

So Dennis and I stand there for a while, and when a car passes by slowly, a man calls out from the window; ' _are you guys okay?_ '

"Doing just fine," I respond, the man in the car looking perplexed. And as he drives off Pat finally begins to lift himself up from the shattered window, the sound of hollow laughter filling his lungs.

"Let us help you," I say, pulling out a giant chunk of glass wedged in the hood of his sweater.

When we get upstairs Pat continues to laugh. He crouches down on the floor of his apartment and laughs, rocking back and forth with his legs crossed. There is blood trickling down the side of his neck from the cut on his ear, but other than that he isn't hurt.

"Pat, are you okay?" I ask.

"Peachy fucking keen," he says, choking on his own laughter. "You know, I haven't talked to my parents in six months... they keep calling, everyday they call me, but I don't really have anything to say to them."

I can only offer him a subtle nod in response.

"It's just, I feel like I'm letting them down, like... well, like I have nothing worth telling them about, you know? I don't really have a clue what I'm doing here, or if any of this even matters. I miss Jan..." and he pauses then, looking up at me with tears welling up in his demented eyes. "I think I fucked everything up."

"Well, have you talked to her – maybe it's not too late. Maybe you can get her back."

"No," he shakes his head. "No, it wouldn't work. It's never the same twice. I don't even think I want her back. I just want that feeling, you know, that feeling when you're in love and nothing else matters..."

I watch Pat, sitting there in the middle of his living room floor, tears streaming down his cheeks, while Dennis sits on the couch, staring intently at the television as he plays Call of Duty on the X-Box, completely oblivious to everything else around him.

"I think I'm gonna go..." I say.

"It's never the same twice," Pat mutters as I open his apartment door. I turn back and think about asking him what he means, but when I see the blood stains on his shirt and the way his face is twisted up into a sort of hysterical smile, I decide it's better to just leave.

Stumbling home through the slush, the streets are empty and quiet because it's 3am in the goddamn morning, and here I am walking home, alone, again. Why was growing up so cruel? Wasn't there a way to hit pause, or even rewind? I keep waiting for my moment of redemption, but somehow I think I might have missed it...

"Charlie?"

I know it's her before I lift my head (I will never forget that voice). She's standing in front of me on the sidewalk, standing here on King Edward Street, her green jacket with the furry trim, her dark brunette hair cascading down the sides of her pale but beautiful face, I give my head a shake and blink several times, just to make sure I'm not imagining things.

"What are you doing here?" I say, barely able to squeeze out the words. She looked just as I remembered; her face perhaps a bit more slender... and those emerald-green eyes. Am I dreaming?

"Just on my way home from work..."

"No, no – I mean what are you doing _here_ , in Ottawa. I thought you were living in Toronto?"

"Well, it's a long story," she sighs, looking at the ground. "I was getting so sick of Toronto, all the noise and people, there was just always so much going on, you know – it's not like Ottawa. Besides, I missed it here. Oh, and I got fired so... yeah, there's that too. I'm back at the University now, taking a couple classes in Communications..."

"So, you're back at the Royal Oak then?" I ask.

"Yes," she sighs, "back at the fucking Oak."

"Where are you living?" I say, still not quite sure if this is real.

"I moved back in with the girls. They're all still here at the University so, it was easy. My room hadn't even been lived in by anyone yet..."

"Must be fate," I say.

"More like dumb luck."

"It's good to see you, Sam."

"You too, Charlie," she says. "First year feels so long ago now..."

"I know."

"I'm taking a couple more classes now too, trying to get my average up so I can maybe apply for a Masters."

"That sounds dreadful."

"I know."

And she smiles then, looking up at me softly with those green-blue eyes.

"I was going to tell you about it, about me coming back," she starts, looking down at her feet briefly. "But I didn't really know what I would say. I wanted to call you though, after I got fired, I really did..."

"That's okay," I say. "Did you leave behind a boyfriend in Toronto?"

"Nope," she says, shaking her head.

"We should grab lunch tomorrow or something..."

"I'd like that," she smiles.

And when I hug her, and she hugs me back, I feel young and free again. After, I watch her walk off beneath a street lamp, her silhouette slowly fading, and in my chest something melts.

It's Sunday and the morning feels like an infant's vocabulary – unlimited possibilities. The frosted sun shining through my window makes me squint as I pull my mangled torso from the mattress. Why did I feel so exhilarated? And for a horrible instant I start to question whether I actually saw Sam last night, if maybe I wasn't lying here dreaming about it the entire time... but no, I can feel it, feel her eyes and the way she felt in my arms again; it was real.

I stretch and turn on my radio; the forecast for the day is good – calm and sunny with a slight chance of snow. I check the cell phone to see if there's been any missed calls, but there hasn't, which is another good sign. Maybe all of this bullshit was coming to an end; maybe there was still a chance...

The shower pelts down hot on my scathing flesh, and I wash myself quickly. Pulling on some blue jeans, I look around my apartment. It is pretty disgusting – I had to admit; with clothes strewn about on the floor, empty beer bottles filled with cigarette butts, and a half-empty McDonald's bag sitting idly beside my bed, the leftover fries becoming sustenance for my tiny roommates. I'm pretty sure my sweat smells like booze, so I brush my teeth hard and splash some cold water on my face.

I leave my apartment and outside the wind is cold but the sky is bright with energy. It smells like snow. The Byward Market is for the most part whispering and barely alive on a Sunday morning. I think about her smile as I walk past the Beaver Tail stand. I'm early so I decide to go buy some flowers from one of the gypsies; all set up down the one-way streets with their little stands of fruit, veggies and flowers. There was even a Maple Syrup stand where you could buy absolutely anything Maple Syrup related (chocolate, suckers, bread, you name it, we have it with Maple Syrup). Her jet-black hair in my glazed-over mind, sweeping and intense, and her lips, in my mind, were intensely red and puckered. ' _I'm waiting for you Charles_...'

I'm standing now in front of a gypsies' flower-shop, a bundle of roses clenched between my frantic fingertips, daydreaming about Sam, and the gypsy lady is staring at me in a disgusted manner, like I'm doing something wrong... oops! I'm about half mast down there – popping a wee tent for the old crab.

"How much, my fair lady?"

She snarls at me while I stuff thirty dollars into her cold hand. I take-off without my change because I'm thoroughly red in the cheeks from my little escapade – must learn to be more careful, you little bastard. The gypsy lady yells something foreign and guttural at me before I make it around the corner. Not since grade-school, sitting there all tucked under my desk, not sure what to do with the damn thing; still not quite sure to be frank.

The streets are more crowded now as I dance my way through the throngs, always through the throngs, endless circles of meaningless faces (if only they knew what an enlightened guy I was). My heart beats and I swallow while the earth spins and the sun swells in my bulging eyes. The snow is slushy and everything is wet, the pavement all black and shining, like my little heart – check downstairs, little feller's calmed himself down, for the moment.

I get to the restaurant before Samantha, which is perfect because I need a couple drinks to smooth over my anxiety. The Highlander is pretty much empty, since it's only 11:30am on a Sunday. The place is dimly lit and warm so I take off my jacket and post up at the bar, my home away from home, feeling quite content. The bartender nods and I order a double rye and coke with one ice-cube in a short glass. He tells me that he likes my style. I watch fleetingly as people filter in through the thick wooden doors of the pub. Every time the front door opens I swing around and picture her walking through the door in a beam of hot white light. The two of us together again, like it used to be.

I get a text from Natasha that says: _what are you up to babe?_ And I find it disturbing how easily I am able to type the words into my phone: _at the library right now, will call you later._

After three drinks I'm starting to wonder if she's going to show up, if maybe I did actually dream up this whole little scenario last night in a drunken fog (you are losing your mind, Charlie boy), and my flowers seem to be wilting beside me here at the bar.

"You want another?" the bartender asks.

"Absolutely," I reply.

Someone taps me on the shoulder, startling me so that I twirl around in my seat in tremendous fashion.

"Easy boy."

"Hi," I say. "You look great."

And she did, with her little white toque hanging off her silky dark hair. She laughs and waves her hand at me. She's wearing the blue winter jacket I bought her a couple Christmas's ago. That all seemed so far away now, and for a horrible instant I wonder if we're still the same people.

"Let's go get a table," I say.

We start to head over towards an empty spot, but I turn around because I forgot the flowers sitting on the barstool.

"Oh yeah, I got these for you."

"Charles, you shouldn't have."

"Oh, but I had too."

She gives me a kiss on the cheek and we sit down at a table for two. I ask her how school is going and she says ' _shitty_ '.

"Me too," I say.

She orders a beer and I get another rye. I watch her set the flowers down on the table in front of her, and her eyes hover on them for an extra couple seconds before she looks back up at me.

"So what have you been doing with yourself?" I ask.

She shrugs and smiles in a very perfect way.

"Come on, tell me something – give me a string to play with at least."

"You've got your own string Charles, and from what I know you play with that thing plenty."

"Still a quick one I see."

We both smile.

"I haven't been doing anything really," she says, "I hate that I'm working at a bar again. You know, one of our bar managers just got fired for having sex with too many of the waitresses. It's all just so..."

"Childish?"

"Yup," she sighs. "It's the same old shit – just like you used to always try and tell me."

I grimace and nod.

"Ummm, let's see, what else... my brother's got a new girlfriend, and she's older than me – and I know it shouldn't bug me, but Brett is only in high school and – jesus – if you saw the facebook messages this girl left on his wall, oh my god Charlie, you would hate her too."

"I already do," I nod, somewhat drunkenly now, I must admit.

"What about you?" she asks. "I hear you're running around with that Natasha Winters."

"How do you know her?" I ask, somewhat bewildered, and at the same time thrilled that she has bothered keeping up with my mis-happenings.

"It's Sandy Hill Charlie, everyone knows everyone," she rolls her eyes. "So, do you like her?"

"She's alright," I shrug. "Doesn't approve of some of my antics though, but that's probably a good thing, right?"

"Is it?"

"No."

She giggles.

"You never really approved of them either," I say.

"Come on Charlie, we both know that's not the way it was."

I shrug.

"What way was it then?"

"We were young and in love and stupid," she says.

"Well, can't we go back to that?"

"I don't think so Charlie boy, I just don't think so."

## Chapter 12

A woman is a flaccid thing. But if one knows where to insert – the odd funny comment... let's say, or something otherwise, well, one-liners can lead to one-nighters with sometimers. And in my minders I know there's nothing but spinning spiders hanging from twirling strands of silky, silky web – all wrapped up in the majestically empty sky, wavering yet infinite because eight tiny eyes are always blinking at the same time. I am drunk.

The hunter never rests.

I'm sitting at a bar and there's some band playing a pretty shitty rendition of _Mr. Jones_ at the back. The place is getting busier as the night bleeds on, and my head is fogging up with the liquor, not in that good way though – no, it was that sort of fog that came from having your first drink at three in the afternoon – all heavy and damp on this frosted night in Ottawa. Watching all these people moving through each other ambivalently, living vicariously through their iPods, it was enough to make me cringe.

Yesterday a little girl fell through the ice on the river. She was skating with her father and when she fell through he jumped in and pulled her body from the frigid water. But she was too young and too cold, and she died before they made it to the hospital. I know most people in the world won't be affected by this little girl dying, but it still resonates something inside me, because I know how hard it can be to find someone who will love you unconditionally. Someone who wants to share their life with you, not encompass you. And for someone like that to just fall through the ice one day, and you do everything you can to save them, to save yourself, but she dies anyways, it was all just so hopeless. Nothing more than an empty pair of skates coated in black ice.

I finish my double rye and coke, swallowing the last gulp bitterly. I'm at the bar and it's a Thursday night and I can't remember which club I'm at or the last night I haven't gotten drunk. I shake my head so that little stars flash behind my demented eyeballs. The phone vibrates in my pocket and after a moment's dread I check the text message and it says ' _sorry I'm already in bed, goodnight Charlie-boy xo_ '.

I rise from my barstool and make for the exit, wondering if it's too late to convince Natasha to let me inside her, bed, because I really don't want to sleep alone tonight.

"Charlie boy!"

Some guy I hardly recognize approaches me.

"How are you doing these days, Charlie?" he asks.

"Life's a terminal illness," I say.

He looks at me and then laughs awkwardly, ordering us a couple of shooters. They're too sweet and don't have nearly a high enough alcohol percentage to them, but whatever. I can't remember this guy's name.

"How's school?"

"I saw a lady disappear today," I say.

"What?" he shouts over the music.

"I saw a lady disappear today. She was standing at the bus stop on Rideau and Nelson, and she had all these shopping bags crowded around her, but when the bus stopped and people started getting on... she was gone, but all her bags were still sitting there on the street. And somehow I know she just vanished into thin air, gone without a trace, and I'm the only one who even noticed."

"Oh," he shrugs, and something in me wants to smash one of these empty beer bottles over his fucking head.

"How's Adam doing?" I ask, finally remembering the meager thread connecting me to this puppet (but still not remembering his name). "I haven't seen him since first year..."

"Oh, you didn't hear?"

"Hear what?"

"Adam's dead."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"How'd it happen?" I ask.

"He was jerking off in his closet with a belt around his neck. I guess he must have slipped or something – it was his little sister who found him hanging there..."

"Not a bad way to go."

"I guess not."

We stand there for a minute, neither of us really sure what to say.

"I think I'm heading out man," he says, "you know, I think a couple of us are heading over to Percy Street – there's a house there that, well, what are you up to? Do you want to come too?"

"Why are you going to Percy Street?" I ask. "It's sketchy over there..."

"That's exactly why we're going," he says, winking at me.

He stares at me for a few seconds, expecting me to say something, but I'm too drunk and indifferent to respond, and after the wretched silence hangs above us for a minute or two, he says good-bye and shuffles away from me, another kid through the ice, another pair of frozen skates.

Please Help

I killed Jordan Spade

I'm looking at the locket that I found on the street and I swear the old lady keeps frowning at me. I wonder what her voice sounded like. It was starting to creep me out though, not knowing who or where this random locket came from, because sometimes I swear I catch her looking at me impatiently – like I'm not doing something I should be.

Last night I had a dream about a little girl with fangs, and she was knocking on my window in the middle of the night. I screamed at her to get away, to leave me alone, but she screamed back at me in this really horrid, high-pitched way, running off all pale in the silver moonlight. Then I was sitting in a hospital room naked, disoriented and confused. The walls were blinding white in the fluorescent light and I could feel something on my leg; something pulsing on my thigh. It was a giant cyst and looking at it made me scream. Black sludge started pouring out of my body when I popped it and I fell to the floor yelping. The doctor came in and looked at me, shook his head and ran away. All I could do was try to block up the hole, the black sludge was warm and gooey in my hands – it felt like my soul was leaking out.

I'm trying to study for my Canadian Literature exam. I keep cracking fresh beers and I desperately need to puff a j right now, but if I do that then this whole studying operation will be lost.

Oh the decisions of a university student.

Let me lament some more. What the fuck am I doing here? I mean honestly, what can I do with a BA other than end up in suspenders and bi-focal lenses with coffee breath and yellow tinged finger tips from chain smoking in between my social sciences lectures. All of this seemed so pointless, and there's no one to blame but me.

Sylvester calls me and the two of us go out on the town. Not because I want to spend time with the oaf, but because I can't stand sitting in my apartment alone for another full night. Natasha is working (and pretty pissed off at me lately anyways). My landlord came by today to check up on me, and he grimaced at all the holes in my wall. He asked me what happened to the window, and I told him there was a perfectly good explanation for what happened – and that I would get back to him as soon as I thought up what that explanation was. When he left I felt pretty lonely, to be honest.

The bars are dead on a Tuesday night and it's pretty close to Christmas so you can't expect the girls to get too slutty or anything. I feel a bit like dancing but the floor is empty and Syl is rambling on about how he needs to get laid tonight because his mom and dad are coming up for the weekend and he won't be able to do anything. I tell him he's an idiot and a whore, but he's so drunk now that he doesn't hear me. The music dies down and around midnight the bartender tells us to settle up.

"So, when are you gonna start working for your dad?" Syl asks, drunkenly.

" _Step_ -dad," I say. "And that probably won't be happening for a while."

"That's dumb," he says.

"Well thanks for that contribution Syl, really, thanks for that. You're a giant fucking help."

"Calm down Charlie boy," he laughs, ruffling my goddamn hair with his gorilla hand.

Outside the wind is blowing snow into our faces and gentle humming giants with two beams for eyes crawl past us on the streets. Neither of us says anything for a while because it's too cold to talk. The inside of my jacket is all wet with saliva at the chin, and I wouldn't mind hacking into Sylvester's head with the blade of a hockey stick right now, but I guess that would be a waste – no one would see anything and the birthday surprise would be ruined. All of this was leading to something – there was definitely a point to this...

"Pretty decent night so far... eh Mahon?"

"Not... bad," I say, gasping.

There's a spider web on the roof that I can't stop looking at because somehow I think I'm going to get caught inside it.

Eight tiny eyes blinking at once.

"So," I pause, taking a deep breath, "what do you look for in a gal, Syl?"

"Huh...oh... her tits, no – her ass – yea."

"What about the inside?"

"Yeah, the pussy is good too," he groans.

"No, you idiot – just – never...mind..."

"Yours has better tits than mine"

"Wanna trade?"

"I'm done," he says.

And after a while, I finish too. The two girls put their clothes back on pretty fast and they leave without really saying anything – which is the way I want it. Sylvester pulls his clothes back on too and I step outside onto the balcony of the EconoLounge room to have a smoke. The cold is bright; illuminated white against the yellow streetlights as my breath comes pouring out of my mouth in a pale cloud. I look up into the sky but the glow from the city blocks out most of the stars, so I stop looking.

There are a lot of cars in the parking lot below – and it makes me sad to think about all the people spending their nights in this place; stuck inside these walls rather than at home beside a fire with their favourite novel on their lap, the smell of a decent home-cooked meal coming from the kitchen. Or wait... did people still want that? I guess it's hard to say.

Sylvester shuffles his way out onto the balcony and stands beside me. He asks me what I want to do for the rest of the night and I say ' _get fucked up_.' He asks me for a smoke so I give him one. We stand there in silence and I'm starting to get cold because I'm still wearing just my boxers and it's snowing out again.

"Hey," Syl points across the parking lot, "isn't that your dad's car in the corner there?"

" _Step_ -dad," I say, straining through the white to see the red convertible tucked ever so carefully in the back corner of the Econo Lounge parking lot.

"What do you figure he's doing here tonight?" Syl asks.

"Nothing, that's not his car," I say.

"But I'm pretty sure..."

"Just go back inside," I say. "We're leaving."

Later that night.

Fogging through the streets like a sheet floating in air, light on my withered feet and bleak explosions in my brain. The snow is falling all around me, floating through my line of blurred vision, and a small part of me realizes that it's only 2 weeks until Christmas. I walked with Sylvester to his house and we did some coke before I left. He lives with a couple guys from the football team and they were still up playing flip-cup when we got there. They told me I should stay and hang out, but being around all that testosterone can drive me fucking insane.

The sign outside of the Econo Lounge says ' **no vacancy** ' and for some reason this unsettles me. I go inside the lobby and there's a middle-aged woman working behind the desk wearing green-rimmed glasses with her hair up in a bun. I can feel the coke dripping down the back of my throat and I cough into my clenched fist before moving over towards the desk.

"Hello there," I say.

"I'm sorry sir, but we're all booked up for the evening..."

"Oh I'm aware," I reply. "It's just... there's been... an incident. People hurt, stocks dropping and what not..."

"Excuse me sir?"

"Yes, errr... I need some information, there is someone here who..."

"I'm afraid we can't disclose any of that sort..."

"Listen here!" I bark, slamming my fist down drunkenly on the counter. "I need the room for Paul Flannigan. _Now_! I am his son, do you got that? His son! And he is in grave danger, I'm afraid – top secret information of course, confidential files and so forth, but he is seconds away from being plunged deep down into a deep, black pit of despair!"

The lady looks at me sort of scared and I'm not surprised to find out that Paul hasn't bothered to come up with a fake name or anything (some people just don't have imaginations). She gives me the keys to room 469 and I stumble up the stairs with the stained walls and sticky railings. I feel like a zombie, my emotions sucked dry in all this torment and irony. But my hollow heart still beats in my chest and there's a ringing in my ears because I'm drunk, _monstered_ , twisted and torn.

I come to door 469 and put my ear to the cold wood. There are random sounds of scuffling coming from the other side that might as well be dead leafs in the wind. I pull out a cigarette and smoke half of it right there in the hallway before killing it against the hallway wall. A light flickers above me and I wonder if anyone is watching this right now, what they would think of this little situation. I hope my Grandpa isn't watching...

I stick the key-card in the little slot and burst into the dank room. Paul is half-naked sitting on the bed with his dress shirt still on, and the hooker is down on her knees, completely naked. For a horrifying second I think it's the same girl I had with Syl – the same girl I had been inside, the same girl I had paid – but it's not her, this one is younger, and it makes me realize that it wouldn't have really mattered if she was the same girl, because in a way they were all the same. She starts screaming and Paul jumps up from the bed and pulls his boxers up over his naked lower-half. The whore scrambles to grab her pink dress up from off the floor and the whole scene is quite a spectacle.

"So sorry to interrupt," I laugh, pausing. I almost want to reach out to her, ask her what's wrong – why she's in bed with this piece of shit – how could such a young, pretty thing come and do this? But it's a rhetorical question my friends, because I'm the answer.

The prince is up in a flash, bounding over the bed towards me in a mad dash to snuff out this insufferable pest. Hehe! But I'm drunk and limber, and as I manoeuvre my body to the left the old man isn't quite able to keep up. He trips over his own shoe and goes pitching forward into the corner of the night-side table. This makes me laugh all the more.

"You little fucker," he gasps, pulling himself up from the floor and rubbing at the bridge of his nose. He sits back down on the bed and a stream of blood starts pouring from his left nostril, turning black against the blue carpet. The poor girl is standing beside the window staring at Paul with this concerned sort of look on her face. I tell the prostitute that she might as well toss on her little dress and get the fuck out of here.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" he asks me.

"Just doing a little investigative work Paul, it's no big deal."

The girl scrambles to get all of her things and she leaves the room much like I bounded in, slamming the door behind her.

"You've crossed the line this time Charles," Paul says, using his hand to wipe away some of the blood trickling down his chin.

"That's Charlie to you, and yes, you may be right Paul, you just might be right there. The line seems to have been crossed at this point. But either way, we've got a little situation to work out here."

"What do you want from me?" he asks, attempting to stop the flow of blood with his sock.

"I've never wanted anything from you."

"Bullshit," he says, wiping more blood off his chin. "Ever since the day I met your mother, you've always wanted to ruin me..." Then he starts chuckling to himself a bit, "you will never work for my company, not a fucking chance in hell."

And in the flickering light his shadow whimpers against the carpet while my eyes stare back at my own reflection in the mirror from across the room. I seem far away. Hollowness and a toneless voice; " _I guess you'll be taking a cab home tonight_."

Chapter 13

It's Christmas Eve and I'm walking down the numbed streets, alone. Some of the houses have lights up and some don't, which sort of bothers me, but it's too cold to care and I'm getting tired. I don't really have anywhere I want to go. I walk past a church and I can hear the organ playing all low and rumbling through the enormous wooden doors, echoing inside my hollow chest. I haven't been inside a church since Meredith used to make me go with her every Sunday morning back in South Port. I used to kind of like it actually, until I got a little older and realized that it wasn't cool to like church. But I used to sing my little heart out in those pews, and I was even in a couple Christmas plays – back when I still had innocence.

I go inside and sit near the back. The church is full, but there aren't nearly as many young people as I remembered. It's dark in here and the organ makes my heart pound against my ribcage. The shallow hymns move through my body and I sit here in the pew trying to feel something, waiting for a lift inside – but the structure of the soaring steeples, the high ceilings and stained glass, it all made me feel so insignificant.

The candles burning at the front flicker and dance to the low rumble of the organ. Jesus is strewn up on the cross above the Alter, and he seems utterly alone. There's this little girl who has clearly just learned how to walk, and she is prancing back and forth through the aisles grabbing at people's knees and giggling with a purple crayon in her hand. Her parents are obviously embarrassed, grabbing at her and telling her to hush, but you can tell no one really minds, and for a fleeting second I feel enlightened. Everyone is standing now and sort of humming or singing, I can't really tell, so I stand up as well. There's an old woman walking down the aisle passing out candles to everybody, and so I take one too.

Next there comes an old man holding a long candle-stick, and he's walking down the aisle lighting everyone's candles. He can hardly walk and his arms are shaking under the weight of the long wooden pole.

There are people looking around at each other wondering what to do next. A murmur of confusion and impatience ripples through the crowd. Everyone starts whispering to each other and shuffling around because he's taking so long. I pull out my lighter and spark up a flame; putting it to the wick of my candlestick and watching the dancing whisper of the fire take hold. A nice looking woman beside me laughs with her husband and offers her candle over to me. She's wearing a white dress with dark red lipstick on, and while I'm reaching over to oblige her, I hear this voice behind me say:

"He shouldn't be doing that."

I turn around and see an elderly woman dressed in black staring daggers at me. Her old bastard husband has his flabby arm hung around her all protective like, and she says it again – _he shouldn't be doing that_. Where did she think the goddamn flame came from? Did god come down from the heavens and spark it up with a snap of his divine fingers? jesus Fucking christ.

I turn around and try to sit down and feel good again, but it's all ruined now so I leave. People watch me move through the aisle towards the exit, and I swear they are all whispering about me. On my way out I notice this big carving of the Virgin Mary above the door, and it occurs to me that Mary was a sucker; she got all the pain and none of the pleasure. Poor gal.

When I get to Paul's place my mom is on the phone and she scolds me for being late.

"Come talk to your sister," she says.

I answer the phone and wink at Meredith which makes her shake her head at me.

"Hey sis."

"Well look who it is, King Charles himself."

"King Charles the 1st," I say.

"He got his head chopped off, dumby."

"Yes, I'm aware..."

"So how have you been? We haven't talked to each other since thanksgiving."

"I'm okay, how's Thailand?"

"It's going well," she says. "Really well, I think dad just figured out I was here a couple weeks ago..."

"Oh yeah?"

"I got a postcard from him – here let me read it to you:

'Dear Alice

It's so nice to finally find you! I've been busy, working different jobs here and there – but mostly just finding time to enjoy the small things. I hope you are doing the same! How is your new job? It must be very fascinating work. I am so proud of you, I hope you know that. I wish you would call more often. Your brother and I are getting alone very well. He keeps in contact with me all the time. He's in his 4th year now at school. He tells me that it's going very well too – I think he really enjoys it there. I hope to hear back from you soon Alice.

Love always

Dad'

"Can you believe that shit?"

"Are you going to write him back?" I ask.

"Charles, I haven't spoken with Brian in over 4 years."

"I hardly ever see him either," I tell her.

"Yea, I figured that, considering you told me that you fucking hated school last time we spoke..."

"Yea, I tend to say a lot of things..."

"He doesn't even know what my new job is."

"Sure he does."

"Come on Charles, ' _it must be fascinating work_ ', you know what I'm doing over here! Brian is too busy enjoying the ' _small things_ ', I'm sure – because he sure as hell can't handle the big things."

"How is that going anyways, with all those kids...?"

"Some of them are doing okay," she sighs, "it's hard to get over, you know – being violated like that for so long."

I try and think of something inspiring to say, but nothing seems quite appropriate. She worked at a rehabilitation centre with children who had been trafficked, and it made me sick to think about it.

"They really liked those books you suggested, the ones who can read anyways."

"That's good."

"I like that one set in New Brunswick with the son, and the daughter – and that poor father..."

"Yeah, _Nights below Station Street_ , it's a good one."

"I miss you," she says.

"Come back to the country sometime kid."

"I promise I will, soon."

We say the rest and I hang up.

Paul is already sitting at the table when my mom and I sit down. He looks at me briefly and then back down at his plate. My mom says a little prayer and I get reminded of that rotten old lady in church. I start trying to eat, but I'm not really hungry because there's a throbbing pain in the corner of my stomach, and so I end up just mashing all the turkey and potatoes together into one sloppy mess, with a little cranberry sauce mixed in there for colour.

"So how do you think you did on your exams?" my mom asks.

"Superb."

"Superb?"

"Yes, superb, and I would think that my extensive vocabulary should verify..."

"Oh be quiet," my mother says. "How is your apartment holding up?"

"The ants are dying off on account of the cold, so that's good," I say. "But Ron still hasn't come in to fix my window yet, so I mean, it's rather chilly at night."

"Why don't you and Natasha get a place together?" my mom suggests.

"I do believe that would be the death of me, mother."

I look over at Paul and he's sitting there glaring at me like the old bastard that he is, and when I meet his eyes he looks back down onto his plate and stirs the food around aimlessly with his fork – stirring the pot with his goddamn filthy fork.

"So where is Natasha? I thought she was going to come over and have dinner with us this Christmas," my mom asks.

"She's off to Kanata to see her perfect little family in their perfect little condo," I say, "and her dad's going to cut the turkey with the big knife while they sing carols around the dinner table. Then her mom will probably complain to her about that no-good boyfriend she has, and I suppose Natasha will sit there and scowl for a bit before her mom makes the Ceasers and then it will really turn into a party..."

"Charles, honestly, what is wrong with you?"

"I'm a child from a broken home mother – I'm fucked up – it's like my privilege or something, isn't it?"

"Honey, why are we paying for his school if he can't take it seriously? He doesn't take a goddamn thing seriously." Paul says.

"I do take some things pretty seriously Paul, like that car you gave me – now that was a serious situation..."

Paul just stares.

"Please Charles; show a little gratitude for Christ's sake," Meredith interjects. "I mean Paul gave you his car! He is trying, aren't you sweetie? _(the two of them smile sickeningly at one another while my eyes nearly start to bleed)_ He's really trying to make this work, and for some reason you just can't accept..."

I burst out laughing and shake my head. I look across the table towards Paul and stick my tongue out at him like a child, because I can and it's funny to me. The dinner drags on for an excruciatingly long time while I finish a bottle of white wine and Meredith talks about how her one friend just got pregnant again. It turns out the father is this young Puerto Rican gardener or something and he wants her to get an abortion. Which is probably a good idea considering her husband is a hunting fanatic with about five different high-powered rifles in the basement. At this point I'm dangerously close to taking one of the glistening forks sitting idly on my half-eaten plate and just plunging my meticulous eye into the jagged little ends. Paul talks about his business for a while and I can tell my mom isn't really listening to him while she glares across the table at me because I'm making faces and chugging down wine like it's fucking water.

"Alright Charles," she says. "That's quite enough."

"Well," I say, standing up, "it's been a pleasure, ladies and gentlemen -"

"Where are you going now?"

"I'm off to save the world mother; believe it or not there are people out there depending on me this wonderful Christmas night."

"Like who?"

"Adios Amigos," and I'm gone.

## Chapter 14

Natasha calls me and despite my pleading and trying to explain to her that I'm on the verge of losing my mind and going on a killing rampage, I still have to take a shower and get ready to go out. My bathroom sink has blue globs of toothpaste caked all over it, and while the water pelts down on me all hot and scalding, I can't stop thinking about how disinterested I am with everything. Waves of apathy and a cold body floating in the mirror; nothing really makes sense because even if I do get a good job and work real hard, it will probably be doing something that I have to convince myself I'm happy doing, and somehow I'll always know that I'm just a complete fucking fraud. I guess sometimes I feel like there isn't really a point anymore – because life isn't some ongoing thing, or some entrance way into eternal bliss, but it's just there and you're here and everywhere is nowhere. You can't remember anything before you were born and I doubt you can remember shit when you're rotting in the ground or ashes in an urn on some poor fuck's mantel. That was always sort of a weird custom in my opinion, I mean, are we going to strap nana to the kitchen table when she dies and eat dinner with her every night? We can all sit around nana and every once in a while someone will touch her gently on the shoulder and say ' _ah gee I miss her_ '. But eventually that person will forget about missing nana, or they'll die too, and then nana would just be sitting there with a fucking empty plate and no one to talk too.

Natasha comes into my apartment without knocking and catches me whacking off to a lesbian video on youjizz. She scowls at me, clearly disgusted, and when I ask her if she wants to help finish me off she tells me to fuck myself.

"Very poetic," I say.

She practically dresses me and before I can argue or come up with an excuse, I'm being dragged through the doors of Pub 101, a student bar with cheap beer. There's a table of about 5 people I don't really know, and they all gesture towards Natasha. It's that limbo between Christmas and New Years, so the bar isn't very busy.

"Who are they?" I ask.

"These are my friends from class Charles," Natasha says. "This is Jacob, Roberto, and, um...."

"Fox,"

"Fox?"

"Yea."

"Right, and this is Fox – they all work here at the Heart and Crown."

"Oh, yeah... right." I say.

Two of the guys are bartenders and the one girl is a waitress. Fox is from the kitchen and he is a lot drunker than the rest of them. He's got a greasy red beard and he's wearing a black shirt that says _Got Milk_? on the front of it. He keeps saying ' _fuck this_ ' and ' _fuck that_ ' because he is a miserable bastard who works in the kitchen. The two bartenders have gelled up hair and both of their heads are constantly swiveling around trying to see if anyone is noticing them. They keep checking their cell phones every 30 seconds, just in case they are missing out on something more important.

"There's no decent tail out tonight," the blond haired bartender says, Jacob, I think.

"It's all the same anyways."

"You got that right brother!" Fox chirps in.

The two bar-boys laugh but you can tell they don't really like the kitchen kid.

"So anyways, like I was saying; there's a brand new thing called planking, I think it started over in Europe, anyways, it is the coolest thing ever. You go around and just lay face-down on stuff, like outside parliament, or off your balcony, I want to plank on the American Embassy..."

"That would be so cool," bartender #2 says.

"Really cool," bartender #1 says.

I look over at Natasha and she's not really paying attention to the rest of us because her friend seems to be crying about something, and Natasha is patting her on the back and saying ' _it's okay sweetie, he wasn't worth it – you are better than that_ ' and I'm not so sure she's right.

"Charles," she says suddenly. "Tell that story."

"What story?" I say, my head swaying back and forth to the bouncing music.

"The one about the cabby and how he chased us down the street..."

"Oh right," I start, "well this incorrigible bastard had the _audacity_ to tell my baby here that he couldn't give us a ride because he..."

"I hate cabbys." Natasha interjects, "I mean when they're just sitting there on the side of the fucking street – I don't understand why it's so hard for them to give you a ride – that _is_ there job, isn't it?"

"So anyways, my princess here spits on the windshield and the Paki comes tumbling out of the cab screaming nonsense at us, so Natasha decides to spit on his car again, then the guy calls her a ' _bitch_ ' so she spits right on him! It was really quite funny until the cabby came running at us with a crow-bar..."

"And the maniac was running right at us, wasn't he Charles? He was going to hit us!"

"Yea, so anyways, the two of us ran off down the street – it was raining too if I remember correctly, and so we ducked inside the school library to dry off, and I think, we may, just may have knocked boots on the top floor..."

"We did not! He's joking, really, Charles. Tell them you're joking."

I start laughing but no one else does, so I finish my drink and head to the bar for another. Maybe one of those bartenders will try planking off the edge of the CN Tower, the fucking morons.

Eventually, we go out to a club together called Suite 34. The place is hot and pulsing, and all the flashing lights make my skull throb. There are too many dudes with popped collars in here. Throngs of mean looking dudes, guys with tight shirts who drink shooters and smoke Belmont's; they'd all love to stick it in my girl, I'm sure, which is fine with me because I'd gladly stick it to any of their girls, the filthy bastards. We're all just a bunch of bastards, I've come to realize. And no matter what any of us say – we would stick it in any other guy's broad if we were given the inkling of a scent, the slightest chance for coitus – oh how sweet it is.

At some point Natasha tells me that she wants to go upstairs to the bigger dance floor. I look at the huge line and say ' _no fucking way_ ' but she seems to know the bouncer or something so she bounds over to him and after she stands there smiling at him with her goddamn tits hanging out he lets her up. I go to follow but the bouncer shakes his head no and I say ' _I'm with her_ ' and he says ' _back of the line_.'

"Come on man," I say.

"Sorry dude."

"You just let my fucking girlfriend up there!"

"Yeah, she's a girl."

I flip the guy the bird and leave the fucking bar. Outside it is bitterly cold. The streets are speckled with girls in heels and short skirts with red legs – nothing tougher than a Canadian club rat. Anyways, I wave down a grey cab that's missing the little light on the roof. The guy waves at me to get in, so I jump in.

"How the hell are yah tonight?" I say, splashing myself down into the backseat. My head is buzzing and light. I lean against the smooth surface of the window and sigh, letting the anger slowly drain.

"Where are you going?" the cabby asks, his voice all worn and raspy.

"Ah, Chapel Street I guess."

The cabby doesn't say anything, but I can see that he's looking at me in the review mirror. His eyes are crooked and I guess it sort of starts to creep me out after a while because the car isn't moving yet and he's still just staring at me. Eventually the traffic starts forward again and the cabby's eyes shift back to the road.

"Where on Chapel?"

"353."

"Hmmm," he nods.

"Busy tonight big guy?" I ask, but the cabby doesn't hear me.

"I said were you busy tonight, sir?"

He still doesn't answer me, but I watch him look into the mirror again – watching me like an animal stuck behind a cage.

I sit there trying to fight off the head-spins, feeling my heart rate pick-up as the smell of stale cigarettes and aftershave waft back towards me. I watch the cabby make a wrong turn on Rideau Street, and my adrenaline starts pumping when I see him signaling to exit for the 417.

"Where are we going?" I ask.

Nothing.

"Hey!" I shout, pounding my fists on the back of his seat. "Let me out of this fucking car!"

Suddenly, the phone starts ringing and I answer it sort of frantically, which makes the guy turn around in his seat. We're stuck behind a line of cars at a red light. All I hear on the other end is that same gasping sound – and I scream into the phone ' _Stop calling me!_ ' then I hang up. The cabby is looking at me in this real weird way, like the bastard knows exactly who I'm talking too.

"Where'd you get that phone?" he asks.

"What the fuck are you talking about man?"

"Give it to me," he says, reaching towards me with his demented hand.

The goddamn phone starts ringing again. I try rolling down my window so I can chuck the fucking thing away, but the window won't open.

"Let me out of this car," I say again.

He turns around in his seat, glaring at me with dead eyes. He's got a gash carved down the side of his face, as if someone tried clawing at him with their nails. He grins at me and tilts his dirty green hat down over his fat forehead. We are creeping forward slowly, and to the left is the exit for Highway 417.

"Let me out."

"No."

I start pounding my fists on the window of the cab, screaming at the top of my lungs as the phone in my pocket starts to ring again.

"Stop that," he says calmly.

"Let me out of here you fucking bastard!"

"Give me the phone."

His breath stinks, mixing with the sour odour of his aftershave, and he's smiling. I keep screaming and pounding on the window until people outside the cab start to notice. I see a man pointing at the car, and suddenly I hear that familiar click of the doors being unlocked. I fling my door open and jump from the grey Impala just as it starts to drive away. I watch the blank-grey car drive on, merging with the rest of the traffic and disappearing into the night.

Samantha calls me in tears, and through the sobs I hear her say, ' _I need to see you_.' Natasha is lying beside me on her bed in my Sens jersey looking at Perez Hilton's blog on her computer (it always pissed me off when she spent time reading that celebrity bullshit). It's a Sunday night and we both have class in the morning. I look over at her digital clock beside the bed and see that it's 9:47.

"Where are you going?" she asks.

"To see an old friend," I say, pulling on my pants quickly as I scan the room for my discarded t-shirt.

"You don't have any old friends," she says.

"Sure I do. It's an old friend from South Port. He's just stopping in Ottawa for the night, and it would be extremely rude of me not to join him for a quick beverage. I won't be gone long though, I promise."

"Bring me back some chocolate." She croons, yawning in that very adorable way that she does, and right then I almost jump back into bed with her – momentarily forgetting that she is not Sam. I give her a quick kiss and then leave.

The snow drifts down softly from above, melting instantly against the windshield. My heart races as I remind myself not to drive 100km in a 50km zone. All of these old colours in my mind are blending together, and for a second I feel nauseous, coughing violently as I struggle to keep the wheel straight. It feels as if my heart has been ruptured, torn from its arteries in a swift and urgent motion. It's amazing what the past can do to us.

When I get to Sam's place I can see her silhouette in the 2nd story window of her room. Her shadow disappears and I watch the light go off, filling me with the best sort of dread I have ever felt. A few minutes later she is bounding down the steps, gaping at the red convertible.

She hops in the passenger side and kisses me on the cheek.

"How in the hell did you convince Paul to lend you his convertible?" she asks.

"It was easy, my dear," I say. "You just have to know how to talk with Paul. He's all business that boy, strictly business."

"Well I still can't believe it," she smiles, "you look good driving this car, Charlie."

"And you look good sitting beside me," I say, reaching over and touching her inner thigh (and when she doesn't move my hand I let it linger).

"Are you okay?" I ask. "You sounded pretty upset on the phone..."

"I feel better now," she says, placing her hand on mine.

There is a small parking lot behind the Supreme Court where we used to go in first year. Not many people know about it because of its location (the Supreme Court of Canada is on Parliament Hill, right across the road from the Justice Building). Most people think it's a restricted area but it's actually public property, overlooking the Ottawa River between a gap in the tree line, it really is a magnificent view. There is only one other car here tonight, empty and black so I know it must be someone working. We have the place to ourselves.

"Isn't it beautiful," Sam say, our hands gently clasped together on the armrest. "Ottawa really is a beautiful place, when you get a chance to just sit and look at it, you know?"

"Yes," I say, looking out past the river towards Gatineau, the hulking Ministry Buildings with thousands of windows like eyes staring back.

Samantha starts to say something, but I can't hear her because my head is buzzing and my lips quiver. Leaning over across the armrest, I bring my lips to hers and feel an explosion of white hot desire. Those lips, that scent, filling me up, overflowing into a sea of expectation. Two years since I tasted these lips, two years since I felt her soft cheek against my coarse and seething flesh. I know I don't deserve her, which makes me all the more ravenous. ' _Charlie, we shouldn't,_ ' she gasps, while simultaneously pulling her shirt up over her head. We grope and kiss each other hard, bending over awkwardly in the car, and I can feel her hands stealthily undoing the button and zipper of my pants. I work away at hers and soon we are both naked together, her hands tenderly clasping my cock, rubbing it as I moan and bite her neck. ' _Fuck me, Charlie_.' Pulling her on top of me, I lay the seat back as far as it will go as she positions herself above me, sliding into the warmth, melting, soft and slow, faster now – her hair a barrage in front of my face, panting and squeezing, I can feel her fingernails digging into my chest, ' _bite me,_ ' I say, ' _bite me, hard_.' And she does, sucking at my chest until I feel the blood vessels pop. I reach around her waist and grip her taut ass, pumping it quickly as I continue to thrust. She calls my name and I start to cry, thrusting inside her still – the tears mere lubricant, adding to the heat, the sweat and desire – my emotions boiling, rising up to the tip – nothing else matters except this moment, this recapturing of my humanity, this freedom, this past blending with present, and suddenly they overflow, washing away in a wave of complete and utter dependency, her hair a mess, tits gleaming with the sweat and satisfaction; ' _I haven't cum like that in a long time_ ,' she says. And after it's all over, while we sit there naked sharing a cigarette, in that simple and tragic after-sex glow, we kiss again, holding it for a long time, pushing the back of her head against my face until I can barely breathe, because I'm too scared to pull away.

## Chapter 15

We are all drinking in the common room of Thompson Residence. Its first year and everything is still new. Earlier this week a kid jumped out of the 13th story window and died. There are pictures and candles all lined up against the wall outside of the building. It was weird looking at the pictures of his dead smiling face. Sylvester is playing Beer Pong against Patrick and Dennis, while Gordo and Brennan keep arguing over what music to play. Pat and Den are both from Barrie and have been friends since grade school, while the rest of us are still just getting acquainted.

We all lived on the same floor, and security knew most of us on a first name basis. Everyone seemed to like me because I could drink a lot and didn't have to go to Hull to get into the bars. There weren't many 19 year olds in first year anymore. Everyone seemed so fucking young.

Samantha is sitting with a group of girls that I used to know. She keeps catching me looking at her. I give her a wink and she makes a funny growling face at me. All I want is to be alone with her.

Sylvester sinks the ball in Pat and Den's last cup so the two of them start chugging while Sylvester hollers and prances around the room with his arms raised up over his head. Gordo and Brennan are wrestling over in the corner and the two of them fall into the Beer Pong table so there's a big crash as empty plastic cups and half filled beers go splashing everywhere. The girls all make high-pitched squeaking noises and Samantha comes up to me and asks for a smoke. We go out for one together and standing there in the entrance to the building, shielding ourselves from the wind and cold, I tell her that I can't stand this anymore.

" _You can't stand what Charlie boy?" she says, smiling in that way she used too._

I take a look around at the snow falling on the wet pavement, melting on contact.

" _I'm just sick of all the bullshit," I say, "all the bullshit that's going on up there constantly – I mean, isn't stuff supposed to start changing now? Aren't we supposed to be like, more mature, or something..."_

" _Baby," she says, wrapping her arms around my waist and pulling me in close, "there's still plenty of time for all of that. It's fun up there! I know you're not having a great night tonight..."_

" _Fucking Brian..."_

" _Shhh," she says, kissing me softly on the lips._

" _I can't believe he didn't show up."_

She nods and looks at me sadly.

" _I mean, I haven't seen the guy in almost 2 years –"_

" _He doesn't deserve you babe," she says._

" _Do we have to go out tonight?"_

" _You don't want to go to the bar with everyone?"_

I shrug, look down into her eyes.

" _Well, what do you want to do?"_

" _You," I say._

" _Charlie!" she laughs, giving me a smack in the chest, "we don't have to go to the bar if you don't want too."_

I grab her suddenly and kiss her hard on the lips.

We'd only been going out for a couple months at this point, pretty much since Frosh Week, but we spent every day together, and every night. We both liked sleeping beside each other.

Or maybe it was that we both hated sleeping alone.

_On our way back upstairs to my room we pass a really drunk girl in the staircase and she is sobbing to herself, trying to be silent but failing. Samantha asks her what's wrong, and the girl can only blurt out one word:_ _fucked_ _._

## Chapter 16

"How did you convince that rotten bastard to lend you the convertible?" Sylvester asks, astonished. His eyes are all red and glazed over and his breath stinks because the bastard is utterly hung-over on a Thursday afternoon.

"Oh Paul's a prince once you get to know him," I laugh. "He's really quite agreeable, given the right circumstances."

"Whatever."

"Yes, whatever indeed."

"Where the fuck are we going anyways?" he says, looking away like he has something infinitely better to be doing.

"I told you, first we are going to the Casino, and then we are going to buy some cheap beer over in Hull with our winnings."

I'm starting to study the streets because we're getting close to the Salvation Army. Last night I dreamt about Sam and when I woke up I reached over for her and found Natasha beside me instead. She didn't have a clue what was going on, which did make me feel a touch guilty, I'll admit (although if she paid more attention to anyone other than herself, she might notice these things).

I spot a girl with big tits in a short skirt with a couple piercings and a tattoo on her arm – but she is far too haggard. The day is bleeding into night and everything is sort of grey-bluish right now. Shadows run long over the pavement, grey giants being pulled forward by the chains of another day.

"So, are you coming out next weekend for my birthday, you little prick?" Sylvester asks.

He ruffles my hair like I'm his bastard son or something, and it pisses me off quite a bit, but I manage to laugh and say ' _oh i'll be there sir_ ' and he says ' _right on_ ' and I say ' _yea_ '. Then I see a hooker who fits the profile. Her skirt is hiked up almost to her hips and she's got a pair of rocking tits. Her face isn't all that great, but I know Sylvester doesn't give a fuck about that.

"See that girl there -" I point, "best lay I've ever had."

"Her?" and the filthy bastard leans half-way out of the car to get a better look.

"She can do things with her tongue that I didn't think were physically possible. I mean, I've never been one to associate myself with rim-jobs but – she changed my whole perspective on things man."

Both of us are just staring at this broad now and she winks and smiles at us as we drive by. God did I feel sorry for her. I wonder if her daddy was nice to her, or if her mommy was around while she was shooting H and smoking crack with her beauty friends. But all of that was so played out now; it was hard to even feel sorry for anyone anymore.

"You're serious eh? She does have a great looking rack, nice legs – what about her lips?"

"Oh, they're definitely used, maybe a bit like opera curtains, but she lets you take the back door," I say.

"Perfect."

"Yes, and she's going to be all yours in a couple of nights."

"You serious?" he says, turning solemnly to me.

"Absolutely Syl, it's your fucking birthday bro, you really deserve it. Just make sure you stay with me on the big night."

"You bet your ass I will," he says.

Inside I feel a bit like sewage is seeping through me, but I swallow the bitterness and the rage because a slow and meticulous attack is always most devastating.

I have class tonight and in this feeble hour I feel pretty goddamn rotten because earlier today I had a conversation with Sam and it didn't really go at all as I had planned. She wants to see me again too, but not in the same way. My head is swirling with sour liquor so I puff back a smoke and pick up the Citizen on my way to the Arts building. While the teacher drones on about the evils of democracy and capitalism, I read about Iran and women being shot in the streets, children being massacred in Syria, and the hockey scores from last night. I curse because none of the players in my pool got any points and a couple people look over at me and I smile back at them smuggishly. There's a small square in the local section of the paper that catches my eye:

Students and others are asked to beware of a grey Impala reportedly driving through downtown Ottawa at night. The car has been seen in the market and student housing areas over the past few weeks. The man allegedly poses as a cab-driver, and will attempt to pick up pedestrians after the bars are out in the Byward Market. A 19 year old girl was given a ride through hell last Saturday night when she was abducted from the market by the phantom cab. Luckily, she was able to escape through the window of the vehicle by the SouthKeys mall. Another 21 year old girl was sexually abused near the Hurdman bus stop two weeks ago. The man is described as balding and in his mid 30s or early 40s. There have been five reported cases of abduction so far, although police are unsure as to the number of unreported incidents. One victim reportedly gashed the man's face when she escaped. People are asked to make sure any cab they enter is properly marked, and any car acting suspiciously should be reported immediately. There is speculation that some of the recent missing children reports could be linked with the phantom cab.

The class ends and everyone files out but I can't move yet because everything feels numb. The prof walks past me and she looks at me like maybe she should know who I am, but none of that matters now.

It is shithead's birthday and we're out at the Royal Oak sitting at a long table with all the boys. I've managed to squeeze up right beside Sylvester and I've been force feeding the slob shots of tequila and broken-down golf-carts all night. It's amazing the amount of booze a buffoon can consume without flinching or burping. Eventually, I start tossing hits of Ecstasy into his shot glass, and it's not like I'm drugging the guy or anything, because he's already eaten three on his own accord. I'm on them too and the room is dangling dangerously low or maybe I'm just holding my breath. I take a shot and watch Sylvester devour another whiskey shooter with a little pill dissolving in the brown liquid. The pill makes him gulp funny but by now he's too shitfaced to notice much. A waitress stops and starts talking with him so I pound back another shot myself and shake my head. Dennis and Patrick are talking about some girl they tag-teamed the other night, and when someone asks them if they wore condoms they both look at the guy weird and say ' _fuck no, man_ ' and then laugh.

I keep looking around the crowded restaurant for Sam. She started working at the Oak near the end, and I didn't like it. But sitting here with everyone, having drinks and talking loudly, it was almost enough to convince me that things weren't so bad – that maybe things could go back to the way they were...

A band is playing at the front of the bar and they're pretty good, the music all Celtic and obtrusive, drowning out Sylvester's fucking nuisance and constant jabbering. This morning I woke up at 6:30am and couldn't get back to sleep because it felt like someone was watching me. The little red light on my phone never stops blinking.

Dennis and Pat's eyes are bulging right now, their pupils like black marbles, while Gordo looks about ready to pass out in his chair. This guy sitting beside me with a Mohawk, who I've never met before, is telling me all about his band.

"We really rock man – it's going to blow-up, for real..."

"Hmm," I nod, taking a long drink from my beer. The kid is wearing all black and if I'm not mistaken he's got a little black eye-liner on too. He worked at Pier 21 with Sylvester, and he had tattoos covering his arms and neck. I hate him.

"We do like a trip-rock grunge-techno style, it's really unique, man. Do you like Marilyn Manson?"

"Huh, sure."

"Well it's a little like that – but not really, like I said – we are really unique."

"Yea, I can tell."

"So like, what are you into?"

"What am I into?"

"Yea – you know, like, what's up with you?"

"I have no fucking clue," I say, "but I do have to take a piss."

The guy looks at me funny as I get up and head towards the back of the restaurant. The bartender says Hi and one of the waitresses nods as I move past. Samantha used to try and bring me in here all the time. She always wanted me to meet everyone, and she would introduce me with this big smile on her face. She didn't have too, but she did – she wanted too, and everyone she ever introduced me too got to shake my dead hand. I didn't trust a single fucking one of them. She did though. She liked working in a pub. I guess that was one thing I could never let go, because I knew what these places were like. But still – I was hoping she might be here tonight.

My stream is a bit propelled above the urinal because the Ecstasy is really starting to kick in now. I laugh and wipe some of the sweat from my forehead. I can feel my eyes bulging. It is fucking hot in here, goddamnit. My head feels all fuzzy and warm and good.

When I get back from the bathroom Mr. Trip-rock Grunge-techno asks me if I like Lady Gaga, and when I just stare at him and grind my teeth in a menacing way, he stops talking to me. Dennis buys everyone a round of shots, the tequila goes down rough but the lemon stops me from puking, barely – I'm trying to remain calm. Sylvester keeps turning drunkenly over to me and asking when we are going to the opera. I tell him soon.

"Charlie, let me tell you something man," Sylvester says, slurring his words. "There's this place, this shitty little place on Percy Street, right by the Greyhound station. And you can go there, at night, and, well... it's like a whorehouse."

"Yeah, so?" I say. "So what Sylvester? Since when is fucking whores anything new for you?"

"Well, like I was saying, these aren't the usual type of hookers, they're... younger."

"How young?" I ask.

"I don't fucking know man, it's not like I ask to see I.D. But they let you do pretty much anything to them, no restrictions or anything like that..."

"Who let's them do anything? The girls?"

"Not exactly..." he says, staring at me with wide eyes.

"What are you trying to say right now, Syl?"

"We should go together sometime, that's all. They have a couple big dogs that you can usually hear barking, and there's this girl in a room at the back, and she's in there naked. It was good man, real good. They let you video tape it if you want, and you can fuck her anywhere."

"Don't you think that's like, weird, man?"

"Why? What's the difference? I've fucked hookers with you before Charlie boy..."

"Yeah, but..."

"It's a service, that's all – I have money, they offer me a service, and there's nothing more to it than that."

I throw another pill of Ecstasy into his beer while he ogles some passing waitress. ' _We're heading over to Percy..._ ' Why did that house keep coming up? Somewhere in the back of my mind, I see a grey car pulling away from the curb.

But the boys are really getting into it now, standing on their chairs and singing along with the band:

' _Oh, I wish I was in Sherbrook now,_

Goddamn them all!

I was told we cruise the seas for American gold,

We fire no guns! Shed no tears!

I'm a broken man on a Halifax Pier,

The last of the Barrett's Privateers.'

and even I have to admit I'm having a jolly fucking good time. Some of the waitresses come over and start singing with us, and my hand sort of slips onto one of their thighs and she doesn't mind until I get a little greedy. Patrick is puking on the floor underneath the table and Gordo has managed to tip over a full pitcher of beer. So naturally, we all get thrown out. Sylvester quite literally by the cuff of his collar is shoved out the back steps because the goof can hardly walk right now. I watch him stumble down the few steps and hit the ground with a solid thud. I laugh at the bastard and help scoop him up.

"Where are we going now?" he asks, completely clueless as to what is happening around him, his jaw twitching.

"You're coming with me birthday boy," I say. "I've got a little surprise for you."

"What's the surprise?" he says, slurring the words together so it comes out something like _was-de-serpise_.

"Oh you're going to like it big man," I say, handing him another pill. "Remember that blonde chick I showed you the other day, the one with the rack and the tongue—"

He nods his head, pops the pill and says "So, like, I'm gonna fuck her."

"Yeah man."

"Cool."

I move behind Sylvester as he stumbles down the streets with pupils the size of fucking quarters. He's sort of mumbling to himself which makes me laugh but there are lots of police cars driving around tonight, and this drooling oaf is attracting way too much attention. Pat and Den yell after us, but I wave them away with my free hand. I hurry our pace, pushing on Sylvester's drenched back with the palm of my hand. I can see the hotel sign in the sky all shining against the placid black. Our shadows move silhouetted against the cold pavement, just a couple of black smudges moving silently through the still night air. I've given Sylvester 6 hits of ecstasy now. The cries of drunken girls mixed in with all the sirens and staggered movement makes my head spin. I lose Syl momentarily as he prowls around some young looking girls standing outside of a club. They look at him funny because there is sweat just dripping off his face right now and his jaw is twitching. He keeps trying to ask one of the girls for a smoke, but his words aren't coming out right. I grab Sylvester by the arm and drag him away before he gets arrested.

"It's my birthday," he says.

"No shit."

"I'm 24."

"Yeah."

"Does that mean I can't sleep with 16 year old girls anymore?"

And by the way he looks at me with wide eyes and a narrowed forehead, I can tell he's genuinely concerned. I pat him on the back and say ' _I'm pretty sure the legal age is 15 these days anyways_ ' and he says ' _nice_ '.

God I was an awful prick.

We get into the hotel somehow without getting arrested. I shove him past the receptionist because I've already got the keys to room 66 in my pocket. She gapes at us as we move past. There's no way she could possibly understand how fucked up we are. In the elevator Sylvester starts to puke on himself and he sort of has a seizure I guess because he falls down and his eyes roll up into the back of his head. I smack him a couple of times in the face and drag him into the room. The bastard is really heavy and I end up knocking his head hard against the edge of the elevator door. Luckily, the hallway is deserted.

The room is utterly plain, a couple of dead looking flowers painted on the sheets that are tucked in tight under the mattress. Sylvester is in the bathroom staring at his own face in the mirror, and beads of sweat are dripping off the tip of his nose, splashing flat against the porcelain sink. He reaches out towards his reflection, and then stops with his hand caught in mid-air. He looks horrified at what he sees.

"Here, drink this you fucking slob," I say, shoving a bottle of beer into his hand.

And the idiot chugs down the beer like water. He collapses on the bed and his eyes are really bugging me out right now because I've never seen anyone's pupils so big and black. I bust out a rail of coke to calm myself down. He asks for one too so I pull out the bag of Extra Strength Tylenol that I busted up earlier tonight. I chalk him up a line and the douche bag snorts it back like a champ.

"How was that?" I ask.

"Fucking golden," he says, all coughing and choking.

"Good," I say.

Sylvester stumbles around the room for a bit, making strange noises with his throat, and eventually he lies down on his back just staring at the ceiling because he's probably dangerously close to overdosing. I step out onto the balcony and the cold air hits me deep in the lungs, stinging my charred nostrils. I pull out my cell phone and dial the number for Vicky.

No answer.

I call again.

No answer.

I call again.

"Hello?" she answers, all out of breath and annoyed.

"I'm ready for you over here..." I start.

"I'm with a client..."

"I paid you in advance, or did you forget that part Vicky?"

"Listen man..."

"No, you listen _man_ ," I pause, take a deep breath, " – don't try pulling this shit on me tonight – this is very important, you got that? This _has_ to happen, okay? So don't you dare try fucking me around..." Exhale. "Courtyard Marriott, room 66, and if you make it here before that thing inverts itself or whatever, I'll pay you double."

"Okay," Vicky says, sort of scared.

"Good," and I hang up.

I have a smoke and go back inside to set up the camera. Syl is still lying on the bed grabbing at his dick. He sits up suddenly and looks at me funny.

'What's the camera for?' he asks.

I tell him ' _nothing_ ' and when he keeps asking I tell him to shut the fuck up and give him another line of Extra Strength Tylenol.

It takes the transvestite twenty minutes to get here and by then Sylvester is pretty much passed out on the bed. Vicky is wearing a white skirt with a tiny pink halter top. There is way too much skin showing for its own good. I rip Sylvester's clothes off and splash some water on his face so that he wakes up.

"Your birthday present is here."

"You were always a good guy," he says drunkenly.

"Thanks man," I laugh. "You too..."

"I always felt bad for banging Sam like that on you – I didn't know -"

"Shut-up," I say quickly.

"But she never loved me man, she never loved me like she did you..."

I splash some more water on his face and he squirms and says ' _what the fuck man_.'

"He looks all fucked up," she, or he, says.

I look back down at Sylvester, lying there naked on the bed, and I feel nothing. His eyes are complete marbles, and it's clear that he has no idea what is happening right now, and even though I know he deserves this – I feel like a monster.

"Maybe you should just go," I say to the tranny.

"Are you kidding me," Vicky says, "you just dragged me away from another client."

"Well can't you just like, go back?"

"It doesn't work that way, sweetie."

"Fine."

I stuff a wad of twenties all green and bunched up into the tranny's filthy hands, and Vicky sighs and stuffs the money into his or her little pink purse. I move over to the video camera and hit record, the caption focused on the top of the bed where Syl is all sprawled out and naked, giggling with a massive erection.

"Hey, no taping..." Vicky tries to say.

"I've given you enough money now," I say. "So just do your goddamn job, and make sure the camera can see, you know – it. Ride him reverse cowboy – that oughta be the perfect shot."

Vicky looks down at Sylvester and says ' _this is weird_ ' which makes me laugh, and for some reason I can't stop laughing, so I decide to just leave the room. I go downstairs through the main lobby and outside to have a cigarette. A bum walks by and asks me for a smoke. He looks pretty rough, so I give the poor bastard a cigarette. I ask him about the state of our failing economy, and he looks at me solemnly and says ' _do you have any change_?'

## Chapter 17

I can still remember the first time I realized how to be malicious. It's something that stuck with me. It happened when Meredith and Brian were still together, and my sister was still living here. She was a year younger than me and had not figured out how to be evil yet. I was bored one afternoon so I took a black crayon and scrawled her name all over the hallway wall between her room and the kitchen: ALICE. Alice. alice.

Mom comes out of mom and dad's room and sees the writing all over the hallway wall. She starts yelling for Alice to get out there, and Alice pokes her head sheepishly out from her bedroom door.

" _What is this?" she asks._

" _It wasn't me" Alice says._

" _Alice, do you know what that says on the wall?"_

She shakes her head no.

" _It says '_ _Alice_ _'"_

" _That's my name," she says, smiling._

" _Well Charles, did you do this?" and she turned to me then, looking at me with her motherly eyes. Those eyes that said I trust you son, whatever you say here I will absolutely believe and hold to be true._

" _It wasn't me mom," I say._

I lied to her so easily. I did it because I wanted too. I wanted to show myself that I was capable of fucking another person over.

Alice got spanked that night for writing her own name all over the wall in black crayon, and she didn't even know how to spell yet. She cried a lot while she was being spanked and I could hear her from my room, even with the door closed. I felt so bad after that I actually sat down and taught her how to spell her name; I guess I was always good at covering my tracks.

## Chapter 18

I'm at Natasha's parents' house for dinner tonight and her parents, who have been together for 25 years, are sitting across from us side by side. They must be the last high school sweethearts in the world. Their house is pretty big, and I guess it's sad that's the first thing I can think to say about it, but it's true; it's fucking big. They have leather couches in their living room and a fire place, but the thing I hate about them most is the fact that they are still in love. They hate me too. Jim and Mary Winters. It's hard to explain, but they're sitting there across from me eating their casserole with mechanical arms, and I can't imagine they could ever understand how I feel. It's not their fault; no one stays together for 25 years anymore.

They were just weird that way I guess.

I slug back my third glass of red wine and Natasha pinches my thigh beneath the table.

"So how is everything going with work?" Natasha's father asks me.

"Oh, well I'm not working yet – still in school, you know..."

"Well, how have you been supporting yourself?"

"Huh, the government helps a bit, and, well, my mom..."

"Paul helps a lot with your tuition and stuff," Natasha adds.

"Yes, that he does."

"And I suppose it was Paul who gave you that car?" Jim asks, his eye-brows raised.

"Right again, Jim," I say.

Natasha's parents share a look before the both of them stare back across at me, like they're expecting me to say something more. The two of them both have white hair and wrinkles around their mouths, probably from frowning all the time. Their eyes are like mirrors. Natasha plunges into the awkward silence head first and starts talking about her job at the Children's Hospital, while I stare at my cracked blue plate.

"There are so many kids who don't deserve what they get," she says. "It's so sad, to watch them suffer, but every once in a while you get a smile or a laugh from the good ones, and it makes things not so bad..." she stops because I can tell she's getting choked up a bit.

I nod my head and mention my sister in Thailand.

"I'm sure you miss her very much," Natasha's mom says.

"That I do," I nod.

"Maybe that's something you could get into Charles," Jim says. "I hear they are looking for teaching jobs in Japan, for English..."

"Jim!" Mary interjects. "You can't possibly think it's a good time for Charles to be travelling to Japan..."

Jim shrugs and says he doesn't know, maybe it wouldn't be so bad for me. "I'm sure they've cleaned up most of that radiation by now," he says.

I swallow a mouthful of casserole with difficulty and picture myself rotting to death from radiation poisoning, while Jim sits there eating his goddamn casserole with that sick little smirk sliding up the side of his face.

"Dad," Natasha says. "Charles doesn't need to go teach in Japan because he's going to graduate and get a great job with his step-father..."

"And what about your real father?" Jim asks. "Where is he in all of this?"

"Oh, he's around," I say.

Jim and Mary look at each other again, clearly expecting more, but unfortunately I have nothing more to offer them.

I wake up hung-over with the taste of cigarettes in my mouth. I throw on a sweater and my shoes without showering because I'm already late. My apartment smells like stale booze and cigarettes.

When I get outside the fresh air makes me feel a little bit better. I'm walking beside a native with a cup in his hand and he grins at me with half a smoke hanging from the corner of his detached lips. I toss a Toonie in his cup and he seems happy enough to get it. I watch him shuffle off in the other direction because the liquor store is back there and the bastard probably has enough for a nice ol' bottle of Old English, or maybe a Colt 45.

The phone starts ringing in my pocket and because I think it might be Samantha, I answer it right away.

"Hello?"

" _You have to come help me, please... I.... oh my god, he's coming, he's coming, do you hear me? Hello?"_

"Where are you?" I yell into the phone. "Why do you keep fucking calling me? Who are you? What's happening to you?"

" _My name's Cindy, I'm Cindy, okay? You have to come help me, okay? Tell them I'm in a scary place....please, no -"_

I can hear her sobbing into the phone and I'm saying ' _tell who_ ' but she won't say who.

Then the line goes dead.

Ten minutes later the phone starts ringing again but I won't fucking answer it. It keeps ringing though, and after a while I finally pick it up.

"Hello?"

"Hey man, it's Syl."

"Ol' Sly Syl! How the hell are yah?"

"I can't remember a fucking thing from the other night..."

"You were popping those pills like vitamins my man," I laugh.

"All I can remember is getting thrown out of the Royal Oak, and I think I was with you at some point... but it's all so fucking blurry. Eventually I woke up in some hotel room naked with a sore dick. All my goddamn clothes were gone so I had to walk outta the place in a fucking sheet... and... I think I might have... a rash, or something."

"You don't say."

"Were you with me man," he asks shakily. "Like, what the fuck happened?"

"You don't remember anything?"

"No man, not until way later in the night."

"Well, I tried taking you to that hotel room Syl – I wanted to give you your birthday present..."

"The Hooker?" he asks.

"Bingo."

"Well what happened?"

"What do you think happened? I dragged your fucked up ass into that room and left just as your pants were being undone."

"Ah, thank god!" he laughs. "I was sorta worried there, but I mean, the pros always make you wrap it up so, it must just be like... carpet-burn, or something, right?"

"Absolutely," I say. Although the only thing that Sly Syl didn't know, the filthy fuck, was that they don't make you wrap it up when I pay them an extra two hundred dollars not too ;)

Natasha is over at my place and if I could draw a picture of the expression on her face for you, it would start with a giant black glob – perhaps a little red spec buried somewhere in the middle.

"How can you live in here?" she says.

"I make it work, baby," I say, flicking a couple crumbs off my bed where I am currently all sprawled out in just my boxers. Natasha wants me to come to the library with her but I just can't be bothered right now. There's a throbbing in my head, not the good one either, and my skull feels heavier than usual.

"You know your dick is hanging out right now."

"Prove it," I say.

"And it's freezing in here Charles, your goddamn window is still broken!"

"I like the fresh air,' I say. "Besides, there's only a little snow..."

"Jesus..." and she tinkers around the room a bit. It almost seems like she's going to start cleaning or something, but when she sees the ants crawling around in my sink she sort of screams and says I'm leaving and I say ' _so soon_?' and she says ' _call me when you grow up_ '.

Where is he in all of this?

Where is he? In all of this?

Where's he? _In hell_.

That night I'm driving down Russell Avenue in Paul's convertible. The street lamps are all glowing and orange through the windshield, slightly blurred. I'm pretty drunk right now, to be honest, but I'm not driving like a maniac or anything, quite the contrary. Everyone I pass gives me a good stare as I creep slowly by them in my little red sports car. I wish I could have the top down. But it's the middle of February, the youngest month of the year. It starts snowing again, the flakes sprinkling down and melting instantly on the windshield.

I'm not really sure what I'm looking for tonight, but that little girl's voice keeps echoing inside my head ' _I'm Cindy, okay_? – _you have to help me_.'

Please Help.

It's starting to drive me crazy, which is why I had to drink so much vodka tonight. The taste is still sort of lingering in the back of my mouth, like black liquorice mixed with metal, and I blink a couple times, giving my goddamn head a shake because this is all just fucking insane. The phone is sitting propped up against the dashboard and for once I'm hoping it will ring. I hope it will ring so I can tell the little girl that I'm coming.

I'm driving down Bronson and I take a left on Catherine, then a quick right onto Percy Street. I'm not really sure where I'm going, but everything looks oddly familiar. A lot of the housing is subsidized around here, lots of dirty porches with overflowing garbage pales. But when I pass this particular house on the corner something clicks. I pull my car over to the side of the road, turning off the headlights with a snap. I watch the house while the snow starts falling harder, blowing across the windshield all white and blank in the frigid air.

I see a younger looking guy come out of the front door, and after looking around frantically for a couple of seconds, he steps back inside.

A shiver runs up my demented spine.

I step out of the car and stand at the side of the road. The cold air feels good on my face and deep down in my lungs. I burp and the taste of liquorice fills my mouth. The lights are on in the house and for some reason this feeling just won't go away – that there was something off about this place...

Deviated Septum.

This was his place, all worn out and battered through the winter night. I recognized it now because he had a worn out Canadian Flag hanging in his window, the same one I was looking at now.

Before I can stop myself, I've walked up to the front of the house and my fist is pounding on the door. I stand there in the cold for a minute, the wind whipping at my face, and eventually I hear scuffling from inside. Some guy I've never seen before answers the door. He has a black eye and a piercing through his bottom lip. It looks like his hair is falling out.

"I need to talk to Septum," I say.

He just stares back at me without saying anything.

"Is he here?"

"Who?"

"Septum!"

Again, he just stares.

I push my way through him and into the funny smelling house. It smells like burnt rubber. When I go into the living room there's a light-bulb all blackened on the table and a couple of used syringes sitting in the ashtray.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" Septum asks from the couch. He's sitting beside a big black dude who won't stop looking at me. I swear the bastard doesn't blink. His shaved head is all shiny even in the dim light coming from the broken lamp that's sitting on the floor. The black dude sneers at me with his yellow-tinged teeth. I never understood why a guy would get tattoos on his eyelids.

"I...well, I'm not sure..."

"Do you want to see a girl?" he asks.

"No, nothing like that."

"Well, then what the fuck are you doing here?"

"Here," I say, handing the phone over in Septum's direction. "I just wanted to bring your phone back..."

"I don't want that fucking thing," he says, glaring at me.

"Listen man, I've been getting some really fucked up calls on this phone – and I just don't want to deal with it anymore..."

"And what makes you think I want to deal with it?"

"Well, it came from here," I say.

"So what?"

I don't say anything and the two of us just stare at each other for a second, me standing in the middle of the room, and him sitting there with his neck craned up and bulging eyes that are all swollen and red. Time seems to freeze and I can feel my heart trying to pump through my chest.

"How do you know Sebastian again?" he asks.

"We went to school together," I say. "Listen man, I don't really give a shit what you're doing. I just don't want to have anything to do with it..."

Septum gets up out of his seat and tries to grab the phone from my hand. I move back a step and clench my fist around the phone. He reaches out again to take it but I take another step back.

"Give it to me then," he says.

"No."

We stand locked in the same spot.

"Well then," he says calmly, "get the fuck out of here..."

I turn to go, not before hearing someone cough down the hall. A door creeks and I hear footsteps start coming towards the living room. His shadow moves into the room first, and I see the scar on his face second, then the green-rimmed hat. He smiles at me and starts to laugh. Septum looks at him, then back at me. I close my hand around the phone, holding it tightly between my fingers, feeling my blood go cold and remembering the grey car.

"Just let him go, Frank," Septum says.

But Frank keeps moving towards me anyways, his lips twitching up into a sinister grin, the scratches on his face still prominent in the dim light. I turn and run through the house, tripping over empty beer bottles and garbage. I can hear laughter coming from behind me. I run past the burned out kid who is still standing by the front door.

" _Wow, chill out man_ ," he says, which for some reason really freaks me out.

Sylvester keeps calling me because the rash on his dick won't go away and he thinks he remembers something about me being on the balcony yelling at someone, which I of course tell him isn't true – a pure hallucination of his deranged and fucked up mind, which he naturally believes. And lately my biggest concern has been what to do with the video tape, which is by all accounts shocking, even for my disturbed little pupils – especially near the end when things get really, um, hard to watch?

Anyways, I can't decide whether I should put it on youtube or mail copies of the tape out to all his ex girlfriends and family members, and the idea of it just gets me so goddamn excited I hardly know what to do with myself.

"Did you have a camera or something?" he asks.

"I did at the Royal Oak ol' Sylly boy, there were some great shots – real beauties for sure – but I was hardly in that hotel room with you, I wanted to give you some birthday privacy."

"It's all so weird, my head feels like..."

"A sponge?"

"Yeah."

I can tell that he suspects something – but he has no clue where to start or how to figure out what happened.

Natasha wants to go out for dinner somewhere tonight but that means I have to shower, brush my teeth, and put on a nice goddamn collared shirt with clean pants (I have no clean clothes at the moment). She tells me that we never do anything she wants to do and I say

' _well what about Tiffany's the other night_ ' and she says

' _you left and completely embarrassed me_ ' and I laugh and say ' _oh yea_ ' at which point she hangs up.

I called 9-1-1 with an anonymous tip that the Cab-stalker is hiding out on Percy Street. Later in the week, when I turn on the news, all I see is commentary on the continued hostilities in Syria, another CEO of some company is getting charged with sexual assault, and brief mention that the Ottawa Police still have no leads on the recent abductions in and around Sandy Hill.

At night I can't sleep and in the mornings I try and get excited for the day, but black crows are cawing on the inside, reverberating my bones so that I shake sometimes and not even a goddamn shot of whiskey helps. My pain is throbbing, because I've been feeling this same way since the day she told me she doesn't feel the same way anymore. And I can't help but think that I blew it. They say you always want what you can't have, but it's not that; it's just that we take it all for granted. Not until you're waking up alone in cold sweats, waking up with a bottle of whiskey sitting beside the bed, and you can't hardly sleep anyways because seeing an old cripple reaching for juice-boxes at the grocery store makes you cry.

The worst part about all of this, even though I would do anything to get back with Sam right now, if we did get back together and all, I'm scared it might still be the same as it ended up before, and it's the best goddamn thing I've ever had, you know, so what the fuck can a guy do but go out and make a romantic gesture?

So that afternoon I go home and I clean up my apartment. I picture the two of us sitting on my bed, laughing at how small my place is. At the various holes in the wall or how my fire alarm is smashed in because the goddamn thing wouldn't stop buzzing one morning. And she would say ' _Charles, you're such a silly boy_ ' and I'd say ' _but I'm your silly boy_ ' or something corny like that, and everything would be alright again because Sam wouldn't care about my job prospects or who we were going to the club with that night...

But it's not like that; _maybe it never was_.

I have a shower and stare at myself in the mirror for a while before throwing on my new jeans and a beige sweater that Sam bought me for my 21st birthday. Jesus fucking Christ, that seemed so long ago now – what is happening? Help me my pretties – I'm melting....

I walk downtown to the Rideau Centre and the snow is falling again, landing all wet and cold on the back of my neck. The sky is all grey overhead, and cars drive by noisily through the slush.

I go into People's and pick out a diamond necklace that shines silver in the florescent lights above.

"She must be a very special lady," the clerk says.

"Oh she is ma'am," I tell her, "she is."

I buy the diamond necklace for close to five hundred bucks – money that is supposed to be used for groceries and rent this month.

I've never had much use for money, to be honest. I mean, yeah, I use it a lot, sure. But I'm pro-economy. I'm good for democracy. Hurrah for capitalism! For pillaging and rape and slaughter! Because any piece of currency I get in my hands burns like poison until I've managed to secrete it upon some unsuspecting shop clerk or bartender. They probably need it more than me anyways.

Take Paul for instance, he's been married three times now – no kids. He's got that little two-seated sports-car, his expensive sunglasses and a Rolodex that has some pretty important people in it, but all of that shit was conditional.

I'm sitting in Sam's house at her kitchen table. Her hair is down and she's wearing a blue v-neck that makes her tits look amazing. I told her that I wanted to cook dinner for us sometime and she invited me over almost instantly, which I took as a good sign. She seems relaxed, and I catch her looking at me between bites.

"It's great that we can do this again," she says.

I nod, take a bite.

"It's been so long now – sometimes I miss those days."

Even though I haven't been here in a long time, it still looked the same, her house, but it didn't feel the same (maybe because I wasn't in any of the pictures on the fridge anymore).

"I haven't had a nice home-made meal like this in a while..." I tell her.

"Why don't you cook for yourself?" she asks. "You're a good cook."

"I don't like cooking for myself. I liked cooking for _us_ though."

"Oh, Charlie Boy," she laughs.

She lives here with three other girls and they have a Spice Girls poster up on their living room wall, and beside the Spice Girls is a poster of Starry Night, which always cracked me up.

Sam's perfume reminds me of oranges and apples and scented candles.

"What have you been doing?" she asks.

"The same old stuff," I sigh. "I've been kind of in a rut since, well, I don't know, since always I guess."

"Charlie," she says, reaching across the table and touching my hand. "You're a great guy, you're smart, charming, funny. There's no reason you can't be successful and happy."

"That's just it, why do you have to be successful to be happy? Why can't we just be happy with what we have? I mean, what do we need all the other shit for?"

"What other shit?"

"It doesn't matter, I miss you."

I'm not hungry anymore and her plate is empty. The room is quiet. God, I just want her to say it. I want her to admit what she feels so we can go back to the way things were, but it's locked up somewhere inside her; deep inside her ocean blue ring that she's still wearing on her little finger.

"Have you talked with your mother lately?"

"Yes," she sighs, "she's doing fine. Her migraines are coming back again though, which usually leads to pain killers and booze. I worry about her, but she's so damn stubborn, she won't let anyone tell her what to do."

"That's too bad," I say.

"Yeah, it's frustrating," she says. "Her new husband doesn't make things any easier. I don't like him."

"Why?"

"Because he's a selfish bastard, and he's going to end up bankrupting my mom. God, I just wish my parents hadn't got divorced..."

"Me too."

We both sit there for a moment in silence.

I get up and walk over to the kitchen window. I light a cigarette and watch the pale smoke evaporate in the empty night air. The snow is glistening all frozen off the trees and makes the tears glisten in my eyes. Samantha comes up behind me and says ' _what's wrong_?' and I say ' _I want you back_ ' reaching for her, and she looks at me weird and sort of pushes herself away. I go over to her and get down on my knees like a real jerk-off, opening up the box with the diamond necklace in it. She looks at it and starts crying because she says she doesn't want to go back to the way it was.

"But things use to be so good."

"Used to be," she says.

And I guess there's not much else to say about it because when I try and hold her again she squirms away from me and runs upstairs to her room. She's gone before I can even show her the goddamn ballet tickets. I throw the necklace down on the ground and it shatters; the tiny diamonds scattering all over the floor, lost beneath the fridge.

That night I'm driving down Alta Vista Drive in Paul's convertible. I've got the top down even though it's a goddamn blizzard out. I can't stop fucking crying and it only helps when I really let it out, just wailing like a fucking baby, otherwise I feel like I'm choking – which is why I needed the fresh-air, if you must inquire, and the beer. Overall I'd say that it feels like a great inconvenience to even be alive right now.

I turn the radio up because a Nickelback song just came on that I'm pretty into called ' _something in your mouth_ ' but all I can picture while I'm listening to the words is Samantha with her pretty lips wrapped around some other guys dick.

My head is pretty soaked and the wet snow drips down the back of my neck as I drive. I shiver and pull out the locket with the old lady and she looks disappointedly at me. Her frowning face makes me cringe and so I put it back in my pocket. I take a long drink of beer, and toss the can out of the car. I look up and panic because I'm careening right for someone's mailbox. I turn the wheel frantically but the tires won't grab. The car starts to spin and I can do nothing as the tires brake uselessly on the black ice. As the wheel thrashes from side to side in my hands I start to laugh and decide to completely let go, releasing my grip on the steering wheel and pulling my hands back.

The car misses the mailbox and does a nose dive into the ditch. There's an explosion of snow over the windshield and I smack my forehead on the steering wheel pretty good. I can feel the blood from my forehead start trickling down the side of my face. My door won't open because the front half of the convertible is buried in the ditch. I'm covered in snow and wetness. Luckily the street is empty, and the beers are unharmed. There's a tiny cloud of grey smoke coming from under the hood and I'm hammered drunk, still laughing at this whole situation. I try putting the car in reverse but the back tires just spin uselessly in the air. I climb over the back seat, making sure to grab the last beer, and jump down onto the cold pavement from off the trunk. The car is standing almost completely straight up on in the air, the back wheels hanging uselessly above my head.

I don't recognize any of the streets and a lot of the signs are covered in snow, so I guess it doesn't matter. I walk slowly away from the car, my beer freezing between my maniacal fingertips, taking long drinks and wishing I had a cigarette right now. I ruin everything.

' _i only wanna hang out with you, like, i just want to be with you all the time_ ' and I would say

' _oh yeah me too baby, me too'_

But then I'd sneak out after she'd gone to bed to go meet the boys at the bar, or to play X-Box, and when she'd wake up and I wasn't there... I guess that's probably how I felt now – completely fucking alone – and even though I was probably happier than I ever had been in my life, I still found a way to screw everything up. No one wants to be with someone who doesn't appreciate them. And when Valentines' Day came in February and I woke up and she had that big bag with a new shirt and chocolates and a really sweet card that she made herself – and I had nothing to give her, well that was entirely my fault.

After a while I stop and look back at where I crashed Paul's car, and the way that the trunk of the car is sticking up in the air, the shadow of the opened doors all spread out around it, well it sort of looked like a cross.

## Chapter 19

I put a cigarette out on my arm today and the flesh sizzled up all pink and melting.

## Chapter 20

It's Sunday night and I'm sleeping at Natasha's, her soft figure already asleep beside me, the gentle rise and fall of her chest. She was a good girl with a good heart; her head wasn't her own though.

I get a text from Sam that says ' _sorry_ '. It says some other stuff too about how she still loves me, and that she misses me too but that's only because we were both so used to each other.

Winter weather melting outside the window. Exams coming up for classes that seem foreign to me because I haven't gone to any of them in over a month. Love is just an addiction, we grow accustom to someone and our brain gets used to being with them all the time. Love doesn't really exist.

And why does March always have to feel like an eternity?

Paul's been calling me like crazy, and every time I pick up the phone he starts screaming at me and I laugh for a little bit before I hang up. He can't say a goddamn thing to me. Even though I'd never _actually_ tell Meredith about what I saw – not because I'm like a good guy or anything. I just couldn't bear to see that look on her face again. I am a coward.

Natasha lets out a sigh from her sleep and I sort of feel like playing poker so I hop on her laptop and open up Party Poker. I deposit 200 hundred bucks with my Visa card and I enter this superturbo tournament where you start with 300 hundred measly chips and the blinds go up every minute – short story shorter – I loose. So I toss on another 300 hundred bucks with the ol' plastic and I win a couple small games, but after that I start playing in a high stakes cash game and proceed to lose about seven hundred bucks to some asshole that sucks out on me twice. I close the laptop and wonder how I'm going to pay for groceries for the next month.

The next day Natasha has to get up early for work. I keep trying to pull her back into bed with me but she resists. I start making faces and rolling around, which makes her laugh and say ' _i love you_ ' before she leaves. I lay around for a bit until I hear one of her roommates in the shower. I sneak out while the bathroom door is still closed.

When I get home to my shithole apartment, I turn my cell phone on and see that Sylvester has been texting me all night about his dick and how sore it is. Patrick sent me a bunch of messages too, most of them saying the same thing: **I'm so fucked right now**. I toss my phone aside and yawn because last night I didn't really sleep at all. I roll over on my bed and pass out with my shoes still on.

... _wrapped in silk, her hair around my fingertips – walking down the beach – then on the water, towards the sun that's burning orange over the horizon, the waves rolling softly on the shore, white caps rolling towards me as I move stealthily atop the water – completely weightless and carefree – my feet move me across the sea,_ _and suddenly everything changes –_

Natasha is with me now, we're in a car and she's driving. I start eating out her pussy while she drives, reaching over across the armrest and burying my head beneath her skirt. She giggles and says

' _you're such a little whore Charles_ '

and when I look back up Natasha has transformed into Sam and she's got red-eyes and fangs and she says

' _you really are Charlie Boy, just a fucking whore._ '

The car crashes so all three of us get thrown out of the windshield and for a while I'm just flying through the air, suspended in nothingness, and it feels good so I don't really want to come down – then something changes – and everything is shaking with loud banging sounds and wetness...

Paul is in my apartment and he's got me pinned down by the shoulders, leering over me with his sinister face.

"Get off me," I say.

"What did you do to my car!?" he screams.

I try and push him off me but he decks me in the face pretty good, and I watch the bastard take a step back. His wedding ring leaves a gash above my eye and I feel that familiar trickle of blood begin to flow. Paul stands there breathing heavily looking down at me. I start laughing, which is all I can seem to do these days, and he asks me what the fuck is wrong with me.

"Fuck you dirt bag," I say.

He runs at me again, and even though I'm quicker than the old bastard, there just wasn't much room to maneuver in my little kingdom of an apartment. He heaves me down onto the ground and screams some shit about how much I've fucked up for him over the years. I squirm as he reins blows down upon my weathered face. I can taste that metal taste in my mouth and feel the blood trickling down my cheeks. He he he. What does it even fucking matter? Bright flashes of light explode behind my eyes.

He finally stops and moves away from my laid out body. I lie there all comatose,

watching out of the corner of my eye as he contemplates whether I'm dead or not. He paces around my room huffing and puffing for a minute, rubbing at the back of his neck.

He looks at me and says _get the fuck up kid_.

I stay perfectly still, lying there on the floor with my mouth hanging slightly open.

"Come on Charlie," he says, with real concern now. "Are you okay?"

As he moves closer and closer I amass a good amount of blood and snot in my mouth. I can see that he is genuinely concerned, his neck straining and beads of sweat pooling at the corners of his forehead. He says my name again and leans in closer. I wait until I can feel his breath blowing on my cheek, then I hork the goddamn phlegm ball right into his ugly goddamn face. At this point, Paul kicks me between the eyes and I do actually get knocked out.

I wake up on my cold hard-wood floor with dried blood covering my face and ants crawling up my arm. For once I can't laugh because I'm actually hurting right now – and sober. So fixing that quickly, I stuff some whiskey down my throat and almost puke, which makes me cry a little bit. I try and calm down by slapping myself in the face. I go into my bathroom and strip down naked in front of the mirror. My face is all purple on the one side and it looks like I've been crying blood, all streaked down my cheeks in wet patches. The gash above my right eye is crusted and dark red. I smile like a madman and drink some more whiskey. I don't bother cleaning my face and I throw on the same blood-stained clothes that I had on before. Then I head out the door.

People are staring at me rather strangely as I make my way down the street, and for once they are noticing me, the bastards! I smile and wave and say hello to everyone, looking like a raving lunatic with my bloody tears. No one has anything to say back to me except for this one guy who asks me if I need help, and I say ' _you bet your fucking ass I do, bucko_.' I reach out for him but he lurches away from me in disgust. I manage to get on a bus that will take me to Meredith and Paul's house. The driver almost doesn't let me on because I'm such a bloody mess. I show him that all the blood is pretty much dried now, rubbing at my shirt and face. He grimaces and nods begrudgingly. When I get off I say goodbye to everyone on the bus but they all just stare at me.

I felt pretty goddamn good now, to be honest.

I stroll on in the front door of the place my mom lives, and Paul is just getting home too, taking off his coat in the living room. He can't do a goddamn thing but stare helplessly as I stroll through the house, with my shoes ON, and I sit down at the kitchen table like I'm ready to eat dinner, blood still leaking from my face. Paul moves to the entrance of the kitchen and just stares at me, not knowing what to say as the blood drips down the curve of my cheek and splashes onto the clear white table cloth.

And that's when Meredith walks into the room.

She looks at me for an instant, and then bursts into tears. I smile at Paul and give him the finger under the table. Then I turn back to my mom and ask her what's for supper.

"What happened to you?"

"What? Oh this... just a scratch – some worthless bastard, some disgusting degenerate piece of shit attacked me, and something about the way he performed has convinced me that the prick was impotent, which would explain a lot of the situation actually..."

At this point Paul has grabbed me by the neck and looks like he's about to slug me again. When the plate hits him in the head it just sort of thuds off his skull quietly before it smashes into a thousand pieces on the floor. It digs a deep gash right between those sinister eyes of his, and the blood sort of leaks out slowly at first, just dripping, then the pressure gives and it starts to pour out in a geyser. I get up and run over beside Meredith to avoid getting sprayed. Paul looks at the two of us, holding his head and whimpering like a wounded animal. He turns around and pauses, then says ' _fuck the both of you_ ' and walks out, slamming the front door behind him.

## Chapter 21

Swirling clouds in my misted skull – like a song that you can't quite remember, but a good one – that you really want to listen too, you know the words – but they just won't come to you. It's funny – the way things just sort of melt away like that – but I guess it happens to pretty much everything, au naturale. You think everything is meant to be, you think that life is fair, until you live it. No one gets married without a prenup these days...

## Chapter 22

"Hello?"

"Hey man, its Drillers."

"Sebastian! How the hell are yah? I haven't seen you since Thanksgiving! How is everything back home?"

"Not great man, just had a pretty disturbing call from one of my best customers" - _pause_ – "you know who I'm talking about?"

"No..."

"Septum."

"Septum?"

"Yeah, he called me."

"Well, what the fuck does that have to do with me, man?"

"I've been selling him guns Charlie, guns and lots of cocaine."

"Where the fuck are you getting guns anyways?"

"That doesn't matter Charlie boy. This guy in Ottawa has been buying up a shitload of weapons man, and a shitload of coke. He's a scary dude man, not someone you should be fucking around with. I even sold this guy a couple hand grenades."

"I haven't been fucking around with him..."

"He said you've been snooping around, said you came out to his place one night like a complete fucking maniac – then ran out of there screaming – I mean the guy is a fucking _drug dealer_ Charlie boy, you're lucky you didn't get shot."

"Bullshit."

"He thinks you're a cop man."

"Me, a fucking cop? You know me Sebastian, get real man. Fuck that guy anyways dude, you shouldn't be dealing with a guy like that, he's shady – real fucking shady. Like I don't know how to explain this to you but..."

"But what?"

"Never-mind,"

"Alright, well stay the fuck away from Septum, 'cause he said the next time he sees you he's gonna slit your throat."

"What is all this, man?"

"I have to go."

"Sebastian, wait...'

Click.

"Hello?"

"Charles."

"Yes dear?"

"Where are you?"

"I'm at home."

"No you're not."

"Yes, I certainly am my sweetest of babies."

"I'm standing in your disgusting apartment right now you idiot, and if you were here I'd definitely be able to see you, wouldn't I Charles? Because you waited until the last possible second to find a place, which is why you live in this shithole and I can never come over."

"Tragic, I know."

"So where the fuck are you then? A bar?"

"Of course not, to think that I would ever bail on my plans with you to go drink a gloriously golden and frothing beer that's fresh from the tap and served in an ice-cold glass..."

"We're done."

"Done?"

"Yes."

"Finally."

Click.

"Hello?"

"-----"

"Hello?"

"---ah-"

"Who the fuck is this?"

"----uhhhh"

"Listen man, or whoever, stop calling me or else-" " _Or else what you pathetic fuck_?"

"Who is this?"

"You're a fucking dead man."

Click.

"Hello?"

"Hi Charles."

"Mom, what's going on? You didn't let that bastard back in the house did you?"

"No, he's not coming back."

"Good."

"------"

"Good, isn't it?"

"I guess so."

"You guess so? For Christ's sake mom, he was a complete asshole."

"He was cheating on me."

"What?"

"He's been cheating on me."

"And how do you know that Meredith?"

"Jesus Charles, do you think it's hard to find something like that out, especially these days? I mean he didn't even bother trying to hide the fucking text messages, or the emails, or the smell of cheap perfume -"

"Please, just stop."

"Are you okay with all of this?"

"I don't know."

"Me neither."

"Does Alice know?"

"Not yet. She's dealing with enough as it is, I'm sure..."

"Well, what's next?"

"I'm going to visit nana. I think maybe we all just need a break. You can stay at the house if you want – he won't be there."

"Okay."

"Bye Charles."

Click.

"Hello?"

"Yo man, it's Syl."

"How's the rash?"

"It's gone, finally."

"You liar, what'd you have to do eh? Burn the fucking skin off, or did you use sandpaper?"

"Ha-ha, fuck you alright. That was the worst night of my life, for the most part anyways."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, when I woke up I was naked, like I said, and I didn't have a fucking clue what to do with myself, so I sort of just stumbled back to the Oak and Samantha was just getting off..."

"Samantha?"

"Yeah, I guess she works there or something. Anyways, she took me back to her place after..."

"You're serious right now?"

"Yeah man."

"Why didn't you tell me that before?"

"Well I thought you might be mad or something... but I talked to her and she says that you two are just friends now anyways, and like completely over it or whatever..."

"Rot in hell you fucking bastard."

"What'd you say to me Mahon?"

"I think you heard me, you fucking slob."

"You better be careful, Charlie boy..."

"Take that filthy dick of yours and keep it the fuck away from me, alright?"

"Oh, coming from the biggest man-whore in the city."

"Yeah, that might be true Syl – you might have a point there. But somehow I've managed to keep my dick out of the filthy holes while you just go diving right into those gaping mother fuckers. You just can't help yourself can you Silly boy? There's a problem with this fucking generation Syl, and it's you – haven't you ever taken a look in the mirror and wondered why you don't feel anything? Don't you realize how pointless you are?"

"You better hope I don't see your face around the market again Charlie boy."

"Oh, I can't wait."

Click.

"Hello?

"Charlie, its Ryan."

"Yeah, what's up man? How's South Port treating you?"

"I'm okay, something's happened though..."

"What?"

"Its Sebastian... he's... well, he's dead."

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Someone shot him."

"Fuck."

"Yea..."

"But... I just spoke with him yesterday – he called me."

"Well you must have been one of the last people he talked to, because they found him dead this morning in his apartment."

"But... why?"

"No one really knows for sure, but I mean, come one Charlie – we all knew what he was into..."

"I knew he was dealing..."

"He was doing a lot more than dealing, Charlie boy."

"What do you mean?"

"Sebastian has been running guns up through Toronto, apparently all the way up to Montreal."

"Jesus..."

"Charlie, there's something else..."

"What is it?"

"Sebastian was, well... he left town last month."

"What do you mean he left town?"

"He took off. He pulled a gun out on Tommy Carson, drove off with some 14 year old girl he was banging, some girl he brought up from the city."

"I don't get it..."

"We think he was running girls too, kids."

"Running?"

"Yeah, you know, whoring them out."

"What the fuck is happening?"

"I don't know man, but Sebastian is dead and the cops found dozens of guns in his apartment; shotguns, handguns, rifles, even a couple grenades."

"How do you know that?"

"Come on Charlie, this is South Port, you know how things get around here."

"This can't be happening."

"That's not even the weirdest part... apparently they found videos, on his computer. no one knows for sure what was on them but, people are talking..."

"What do you mean?"

"Sex tapes, weird ones."

"Jesus..."

"Apparently, there was a pink teddy bear sitting on his chest, you know, when they found him this morning."

"A pink teddy bear?"

"Apparently."

"What does this all mean?"

"I'm not sure Charlie, just thought you should know."

"Thanks, I guess."

"Take care, man."

"You too."

Click.

"Hello?"

"-------"

"Hello!"

"Stop! No, no --- – PLEASE ---- – ah -- – I can't, no – stop stop STOP! AHHHHHHHHH"

Click.

## Chapter 23

I put on a collared shirt because it's the only clean shirt I have left and I spit on my wall as I walk out the door of my shithole apartment. The sun is out and things are all soaking through the snow. It seeps inside me and makes me all soggy and pathetic. There doesn't seem like much else I can do. Tiny crystals dance on the crusted surface of the ice coated pavement. I tried watching the tape of Syl fucking the tranny again but it kept making me barf so I had to turn it off. Paul has rented an apartment on Elgin Street because my mom is going to keep the house, which is good, I guess.

Moving down the darkened pavement at a crawl, and in the sky everything is grey. My face aches as the wind cuts sharp across the bruised and battered flesh. The thing that eats me up most is that I always knew it would be like this. And every day I wake up and try to tell myself things are going to be different, but it never works out that way. I keep expecting this fucking magical moment – this climax or sign or epiphany – but nothing ever comes. Where's my Miramax moment? I keep looking up into the sky but it just stares back all blank and grey so that I start wishing for comets and missiles and lasers to shoot down from above. I can't stop myself from regretting the way it ended because she was my best fucking friend, she was everything. And when you know that if you just got that one chance, that chance to talk to her again, and you would say all those things you never said when you had the chance, when you should have, and every word would come out perfectly, eloquently. We laughed at each other's jokes and when I said weird shit or stupid shit or gross shit, she would always giggle and call me a loser or retarded or sometimes she'd just hit me but it was always good, you know, and now neither of us is with anyone, and to me it just seems like a complete fucking waste. I fucked everything up. And then she fucked everything up. So now we're both fucked; but not with each other.

I get to her house and bang on her door. She answers in her pink bathrobe with nothing on underneath. I see her reel a bit at the sight of my face. She reaches out towards the gash above my eye and I bat her hand away. I can't call her mine anymore.

"How the fuck could you do it?"

"Do what?" she says.

"Sleep with him, again."

"Charlie, don't – please..."

"No, I really have to know."

"What happened to your face?"

"I cut myself shaving."

"Charles..."

"No – I need to know. I mean, I fucking loved you Sam – I still love you. And I know you feel something too because I can see the way you look at me and the way you smile... but there's something stopping you."

"Charlie, it's just..."

"Why do you torture me like this? I mean, why don't you just admit what you want?"

"You don't get it!" she screams, cutting me off in anguish. "I can't trust you anymore. I gave you so many chances Charles, and every time you told me things would go back to the way they were, you were always such a romantic – but all we did was fight! Nothing was ever going to change. We were always arguing with each other, but then you would go out and buy my flowers, or ballet tickets, or you'd give me a back massage... we were just good at pretending..."

"Pretending?"

"It wasn't real Charlie, it wasn't the way you remember it."

"But... I want to go back..."

"It's too late now," she says. "Everything's changed."

"What about the other night?" I say, clutching and pleading.

"Charlie, it's not what you think. The reason I got fired... the reason I came back to Ottawa, it's not what you think."

"What do you mean?"

"I had a boyfriend Charlie, we were living together and... he dumped me. I was devastated. I quit my job, left Toronto, dropped everything and came running back here to Ottawa. And it's been nice, to see you, to see all the people I used to know, but it's only a rebound. I won't be staying here, I can't. I don't want to get stuck in a rut..."

"So... what are you saying? You're saying that I'm a fucking rut?"

"No, Charlie, please – try to understand."

"Understand what? What the fuck are you trying to say?"

"Me and you will never work, not ever again," she says, staring into my soul. "I was feeling weak, vulnerable, and I'll admit I've thought about you a lot lately, but I can't keep doing this, I can't keep going back."

"Sam..."

"Just get out of here, please, just go Charlie."

Before she shuts the door I turn back and say 'you _should probably get your cunt looked at_ ' which makes her start crying a lot harder.

I meet up with Pat in Cornerstones and when he sees my face he goes ' _what the fuck happened to you man_?' and I say ' _nothing_ ' and he says ' _was it Syl_?' which makes me laugh and shake my head.

"So where is this new car of yours, Charlie boy?"

"Doesn't exist anymore."

"What do you mean?"

"I crashed it."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah."

"And that's what happened to your face?"

"Sure."

"Sure?"

"Yeah, sure – well, sort of – can we just have a fucking drink already?"

Patty laughs and pats me on the back, patty-pat pats, and we go over to the bar to enjoy a couple of over-priced drinks. We know the bartender though, so he gives us doubles and triples and puts a little banana liqueur in our Coronas so we get right smashed. The place is pretty empty and Patty disappears for a bit while I sit at the bar staring mindlessly at the hockey game. Patty comes back with the staff bathroom key because he used to work in the kitchen or something, anyways, trekking down the stairs and piling inside the rotten stall. Pat busts out a couple lines and I ask him how often he's doing this shit now. ' _not that much man_ ,' he says. But I can see the outlines of his skull against the pale skin, all stretched out across his forehead. And his eye sockets were starting to bulge out of his head a bit. I do a line but it doesn't make me feel any better. My nose burns at first, but then the numbness sets in and the -snnnnn-ahhhhh – one more good sir, righteo then – onward and upward, soaring about in my mangled mind, stopping at random pit-stops with severed heads sopping in the toilets.

"I dropped out," he tells me.

"Shit man..."

"My dad is pretty pissed."

"Naturally."

"Yeah, but that's only because he can't gloat anymore. If only he knew. Shit, I've drank more here and tried more drugs... I've fucked without rubbers on, I mean, what do they think we're doing up here?"

I laugh and nod my head, but in my mind I realize how contrived these little coke-filled diatribes are – meaningless results for actual problems. I have this sinking feeling that I don't even know who Pat is.

We leave Cornerstones and Patty says 'just _so you know, Syl is looking for you –_ ' and I say ' _yeah yeah another fucking story, another fucking day._ '

Where is he in all of this?

We're in hell.

I can't call her _mine_ anymore.

When I get to my apartment my door is sitting ajar. Poking my head inside, I see that my place has been trashed. My mattress is flipped up on its side, and there are smashed plates all over the floor.

My toothbrush and all my other bathroom amenities are floating in the toilet and it looks like someone tried to start a fire because the oven is on with a bunch of papers stuffed down in the elements. My steel-toe boot is sticking out from the television screen, and it sort of makes me laugh at first, but I don't really have the energy to smile, so I stop. I go over to the oven and turn it off, taking note of the blood stains on the floor from when Paul broke my face. I go over to my closet and reach up to where I hid the video of Syl and the tranny, but it's gone.

Then I leave – not before noticing the message carved into my wall that says ' **Run Charlie Run.'**

When I get outside the building I feel like somebody is watching me. My phone starts ringing again but someone taps me on the shoulder before I can answer it.

"Jesus!"

"Sorry Charlie boy, I thought you heard me."

"What's up, Ron?"

My landlord shrugs and asks me if everything is okay. He's wearing a dull teal uniform with yellow-stained teeth and I would give anything to be him right now.

"I'm doing great, Ron," I say.

"You don't look so good Charlie... I saw your room..."

"That wasn't me who did that."

"Who was it?"

"I don't know."

He looks at me strangely and I tell him I have to go. He asks me again if everything is okay, but I tell him another lie.

## Chapter 24

I'm staying in Paul's old house now because it's too dangerous to be at my apartment. I'm sleeping upstairs in their old bedroom, with all the sheets torn off the bed. Last night I woke up and thought there was someone in the house. I kept picturing this deformed little boy scampering around downstairs so I went with one of Paul's golf clubs and put a hole through the living room wall. It turned out to be the back door slamming against the house in the wind; echoes inside my twisted skull – all hollowed out and screaming. Something inside me is leaking. The bruises on my face have turned to a shallow yellow and I can blow my nose again without flinching.

There's something happening inside me for which I cannot quite control nor understand. I feel as if I've done it again. As if I've ruined everything for my family, for myself, for anyone who loves or cares about me. Is this all my fault? I can't help but feel that I alone am to blame. My antics, my refusal to grow up and act like a civilized and normal young man – I used to think it was important to be genuine, but now I'm not so sure.

I'm sitting at the kitchen table and when I reach into my pocket for my cell phone something comes clinking out onto the linoleum floor. I bend over to pick up the locket, the sunlight reflecting sharp off the silver – and I run my fingers along the surface of the bronze, over the nose, the eyes, the mouth – taker' for a spin. And the old lady looks sad now for some reason, like her eyes have fallen a bit. Then I notice something, something I haven't noticed before, a rough patch along the side of the locket – letters – a name: _Cindy_.

Dark shapes crawling like ants across the dust and grime. Cheers. How could she do this to me? When a person says, you know, they care about you or whatever – and everything swirls and in your chest there's this burning, what does that really mean? Because eventually that burning goes away – it's not that the flame goes _out_ exactly – you just stop noticing it. There's a woman sitting beside me at the bar and she looks really sad, her shadow all crouched down and seeping, and part of me wants to ask her what's wrong; if her husband left, or maybe her kid is on drugs, or booze, or... Warcraft? And I would probably tell her all about my little trifles, my broken heart made out of paper-cliché; blah blah blah.

It's all been said before and whatever this lady's problem is, none of it really matters, because in the end I can't stop myself from wondering whether or not this cougar still shaves. I bet her man hasn't gone down on her in years – in which case a formidable forest would undoubtedly be dwelling in her nether regions; but I'm a lumber-jack by heritage ladies and gentlemen, I'm good with the ol' axe.

Someone taps me on the shoulder and it startles me pretty good so that I jerk around and spill my beer all over the counter. Mr. Tinninger stands there chuckling a moment before pulling up a stool beside me.

"Haven't seen you in class for a while Charles," he says.

"I know Sir. I just haven't been myself lately," I say, wiping my beer soaked hand off on my pants.

"That's not good," he says. "I'm going to have to fail you Charles."

"I don't blame you Mr. T, I really don't. I'm actually kind of glad. I don't have to stress about it anymore..."

"Why's that?" he asks.

And by the way he takes a gulp of his rye, the way he grimaces at the sour taste and his eyes light up with the liquor – it makes me believe that maybe this bastard will understand.

"Well, there's people trapped under rubble in Haiti – our parliament is prorogued right now and the U.S economy is on the same road it was four years ago before this whole shit frenzy got stirred up. 50% of marriages end in divorce, at least 50% – meanwhile, the ice caps are melting and people in the Middle-East are still stoning women for committing adultery, which probably doesn't really matter since we're all going to get annihilated by a comet soon enough, I mean, right?"

Mr. Tinninger nods and takes another sip from his tumbler, and he doesn't say anything for a while so we both just sort of sit there staring at the wall of liquor bottles behind the bar – a venerable candy shop for the wicked – a playhouse for the deranged. Oh, fill me up daddy, please daddy, please. I'm losing my mind. I look to my professor and he notices and looks at me and all I can think to say is ' _do you get it_?' but the old man sets his empty glass down and says ' _no one goes to the bar because children in the Congo are being decapitated with machetes_.'

And he's right.

I go back to my shithole apartment and grab the few remaining things I have left; a basketball that I never use, a white dress shirt, and some books. My steel-toed boot is still sticking out of the TV.

I go into the washroom and look at myself in the mirror.

I turn on the faucet and splash my face with cold water.

There's a knock on my door.

I stand still, too nervous to move.

The knock comes again, louder this time.

I snatch up a shard of the broken TV screen and start moving towards the door.

The doorknob starts to rattle, turning as a creak escapes from the rusty hinges.

I lunge at the door.

"Wow!" my landlord cries out.

"Oh my god," I say, dropping the shard of TV screen. "Sorry, I, errr, I'm not feeling too hot."

"Charlie, I've got to evict you," Ron says, looking down at his shoes as he says it.

I nod and the two of us stand still for a moment in the doorway.

"I'm sorry," he says. "There have been a lot of complaints..."

"It's okay," I tell him.

"Are you okay?" he asks.

"No," I say. "But I will be."

"I think someone has been breaking into your apartment," he says, "I saw a man coming out of your apartment, and... well, he didn't look like he belonged there."

"Did he have a scar on his face?"

Ron nods his head yes as my stomach starts to spin.

Natasha calls me drunk and crying the next night while I'm on the bus. She says some really nice things which sort of make me love her, but I tell her I have something I need to do first. ' _Charles, please – I'm scared_ ' she says. I tell her not to be scared, but she says there's someone outside her house in the bushes.

"It's 3 in the morning and your hammered drunk woman – listen, I will be over there as soon as I can – just let me do this first, okay?"

"Do you still love me?"

"Yes," I tell her.

"Why should I believe you?"

"Because, you're all I've got."

She tells me that she loves me too and we hang up. The bus stops and the driver announces that this is the last stop. His voice sounds all choppy and robotic over the rusty bus speakers, and it's raining outside, falling like sleet across the deserted night sky. It's that sort of half-rain half-snow that comes at the start of every Canadian Spring. The streetlights look like demented fireflies. As I walk down Percy Street, I play with the locket in my pocket and sort of hum to myself.

The street is empty but I can't shake the feeling that someone is watching me from behind a darkened window. Septum's house sits stagnant in front of me three houses down, the torn Canadian flag still draped up over the living room window. I look down at the locket, the elderly woman's face coaxing me still, pushing me forward with her stern gaze, and even though I can't feel my legs I somehow force myself forward, each step seeming like the last one I may ever take. There had to be a reason for all of this.

The front door of his house opens suddenly and I dive behind a pile of garbage that's piled at the end of someone's driveway, watching Septum and the man with the scar on his face get into the blank grey car. I can hear them talking but can't make out what they're saying. I watch Septum light a cigarette in the passenger's seat as the car pulls out and drives off.

I make it to the front door and stand rooted beside it, unsure as to what I should do next. There are sounds coming from behind the door, the muffled volume of a television playing somewhere inside. A cold wind whistles past and makes me shiver. I reach for the door knob, my hand clasping firm around the cold metal, and push gently while turning the knob. Nothing. The door is locked. I move over to the window and peer inside – the living room is dark and I can't see anyone. There's a sign in the window that says **'Beware of Dog.'**

I hear someone cough from behind the door.

I am frozen.

The cough comes again.

' _you're fucked_ ,' I think to myself.

Reacting quickly, I stick the locket back in my pocket and kick out at the door with my right foot, propelling the splintered wood forward and into Septum's house.

' _what in the hell are you doing, Charlie boy?_ '

I hear a stifled cry, followed by the distinct thud of a body hitting the floor.

Taking a step inside, I see the same burned out kid from before, and he's lying beneath what's left of the door, looking up at me with bulging eyes.

"Just, chill the fuck out, man..." he gasps, before his head lolls over and I watch his eyes roll back.

Moving quickly past him, I snatch up a long piece of the broken door and clench it tight between both hands, wringing my fingers around the splintered wood like a cold neck. I can hear my heart pounding between my ears, a cold sweat erupting on my lower back. I move further into the noise, into the static, buzzing inside my head, voices I can't quite decipher or verify their existence, because none of that matters anymore. The living room is barren, only the couch and an old television set remain. There are syringes and cigarette butts scattered across the table and spilling onto the floor, empty zip-lock bags and whitish powder coating everything.

In the corner of the room I see a large red stain in the carpet, and there is more red splattered against the walls behind it.

I hear someone scream out.

Moving through the living room, down the hallway - there are four doors, all of them closed. Opening the first one to my right, I find a room with no furniture. There are shoes piled in the middle of the floor, dirty soles and undone laces hanging pointlessly, most of them looking quite small, the size of children's feet. Someone has scrawled _'fuck you all_ ' on the wall behind, and the moonlight sheering in through the window reveals a sinister red-silver tinge to the writing.

The next room is simply a bed, a lamp on the floor, and some clothes strewn about. A knife sits idle on the windowsill with a dark crusted tip and the shadowed whispers of horrible deeds seem to waft in powerful waves towards me; echoes of the evil that lives inside.

A dog starts barking from somewhere else in the house.

Whirling around I rush to the next door, pushing my ear against the cold wood, feeling a sudden sense of urgency. I hear sounds of scuffling, the subtle groan of a man and what could be a cry of pain. The dog keeps barking, but not from this room.

Approaching the final door, a greenish-blue glow emitting from beneath, I can hear the dog more clearly now, the sound of a chain being rattled, and there are other sounds coming from the room as well.

Opening the door slowly, peering around the corner - I see a dog chained to the wall, snarling and baring its teeth at me. I don't notice her at first, sitting there on the couch beside the Rottweiler, just out of reach of its barred teeth. There's a camera set up on a stand in the corner of the room, and I can see the red light winking at me.

She looks at me shaking and then back to the TV. I move into the room slowly, watching my step because there are syringes scattered all over the floor. The Rottweiler is barking frantically now, the chain rattling violently against the wall. There is a woman being fucked by three men on the television, gagging and moaning in a very guttural and disturbing way. Every orifice is being penetrated. Cindy sits transfixed by the television, unable to take her eyes off of it.

I move to scoop her up and at first she doesn't really move – she just sits there in front of the TV with the controller wrapped tightly between her skeleton fingers; rigid. Her pupils are like black marbles, rolling around without seeing. There's a syringe and an elastic band sitting on the floor beside her, blood trickling down her skinny arm from all the little holes. She reaches out blindly towards me with a cry and when I catch her she collapses against my shoulder.

"Are you here to take me away?" she asks.

"Yes," I tell her.

"Hurry," she whispers. "He'll be back soon."

I carry her over all the used syringes and back into the hallway. Suddenly, the door across the hall opens, and a middle-aged man with glasses stands there in front of me, staring hungrily at Cindy. His hair is balding and he has yellow-tinged teeth.

"Hello, little girl," he says.

Running now.

Through the living room and out of the house. On our way out I see a pile of wallets and cell phones sitting on a table in the kitchen. There is a foul smell that is following me around, and it takes me a moment to realize that it's Cindy. The dog keeps barking as I fly by the burned out kid carrying Cindy tightly in my arms.

"That's not, cool, man," he says as we move past.

Slush falls from the sky as I walk briskly down Percy Street with little Cindy in my arms, floating through reality like a dream. I stop suddenly when I see two beams of light turn towards us, and as the car moves closer I can feel it in my chest, it's him. I veer with Cindy off into someone's front yard, and duck behind a bush. As the grey car approaches, I feel Cindy's hands tighten around my shoulders. I can hear the wheels slowing down, and the light stops a couple feet in front of the bush. I hear the door open and a man grunt as he pulls himself from the car.

" _Run_ ," Cindy whispers in my ear.

Racing through an alley and around into someone's backyard, I pump my legs as fast as I they will go. I come to a fence and basically toss Cindy over the four foot wire, she lands in the wet mud and I see her scamper up as I'm hopping over the cold steel. I take her hand and we both move swiftly through another backyard and out into a field. I can barely see my hand in front of my face it's so black, and Cindy says ' _i'm scared_ '. The two of us duck down into the mud and snow beneath an overpass that leads to the Highway. We sort of sink into the mud a bit while we watch the figure move out into the field. He stands still for a while, surveying the scene and trying to find our footprints. I can hear him talking on his cell phone, and it's pretty hard to miss that raspy voice. ' _I just saw them... Yea, I'm sure... well I can't.... Fuck_.' He leaves after a while but Cindy and I remain in the mud on our bellies, listening to the sound of cars drive by ambivalently overhead. The black stretches on inside my frivolous heart – lying here cold on the soggy ground. Eventually, I feel something crawling on me so I scamper to my feet and scoop Cindy up from the mud. We make it onto Bank Street and even though none of the stores are open yet, there are enough cars driving around that we should be safe. I pick Cindy up again and tell her things are going to be okay, cradling her depleted little body in my arms, and she looks at me with enlarged eyes before she says ' _are you sure_?'

Instead of taking Cindy with me to the police station, or the hospital, or the moon, she asks me to take her home, and since I'm in no position to deny her anything, what the hell else can I do but nod my head yes. In the past ten minutes she's started coming down off whatever those bastards were injecting her with, so there's a bit of white foam that keeps frothing up at the corners of her tiny pink lips, like soap suds, and her entire little body keeps twitching. I can feel the shiver moving its way through her spine. After a while I feel her back get damp with sweat, and she lies all splayed out and soaking in my extended arms. She looks at me and says ' _are you the voice_?' and I ask her what she means and she says ' _the voice, from the phone – you're the one, aren't you_?' and for some reason this makes me cry. She smiles and brushes away my tears with her tiny fingers.

I reach into my pocket for the locket and give it to her. She fumbles with it in her tiny hands and stays fixated on the emblem of the old lady for a while, then she looks up at me and asks ' _are you an angel_?' which makes me inadvertently burst out laughing. She tells me where she lives, on Bank and Gladstone, about six blocks away. I set her down and she starts trotting beside me. After a while the sun starts to come up, winking its golden eye above the concrete horizon; everything all shallow inside my heart. The cell phone starts to ring from my pocket which makes Cindy stop dead and start to cry, so I throw the goddamn thing down and smash it on the pavement, scooping up the little crying girl who clutches at my stretched and torn shirt. My heart is racing up in my throat as cars are start driving by with that crisp feeling of morning, birds chirping, eggs frying and pigeons dying.

Cindy tells me that the locket was her grandmother's. She tells me that she lost it on the day the bad man picked her up. She tells me there was another boy there too. She says he was just as scared as she was and they made him do more things – scary things that made him cry out in the night while she sat there trembling and hunched over in that room with the TV. ' _they always wanted me to be watching it_ ' she says ' _if I stopped they always poked me again, with the needles, and then I would have to watch_ '. With the morning glow reflecting off her pale skin she looked like a ghost. Her hair was starting to fall out. I rub at the smooth scalp with my fingers and she tells me that she pulled her hair out because she felt so strange. She was going through withdrawal as the ambivalent horizon beckoned us forward.

A grey car drives by and I see it slow down a bit but it keeps going because the sun is up now and there's people scattered about, many of them taking notice of the spectacle moving past, Cindy all wrapped up in my muddy arms and leaning against my chest. A couple people point because they probably recognize the little girl from the news, but I can see Gladstone up ahead, we're almost there, so I keep on moving past all the gaping fools.

"We're almost there now Cindy," I say.

But she's pretty much asleep in my arms, her little body riddled with chemicals and evil. There's a bird chirping in a tree and the snow is melting while the sun winks above the tree-speckled horizon, everything placid and nice while in my arms something else melts. Will anyone ever love this girl like she needs it? Like she so clearly fucking deserves... but no. Some asshole, some depraved lunatic with nothing to lose and nothing to gain will get her drunk, say sweet things to her and make her feel special, fuck her and chuck her just like the last one – and when everyone is a commodity it's easy to forget about morals. What is equality? Does that make anything better? Maybe none of that really matters. Maybe the only thing that matters is now, right here in the vortex of time, forever and never, always and again and again, but she's safe, for now. I try and hang on to that notion as I make my way up the stone pathway to Cindy's house. Where do all these wasted promises end up? I knock on the door with numb fingers while Cindy stirs and says ' _We're home_ '.

There are some thuds from behind the door before Cindy's mom opens it and stands in disbelief. I recognize her from TV and she still looks like she hasn't slept in days. After a moment she snatches Cindy from my arms, looking at her child with wide eyes.

"Who are you?" she asks.

I shake my head, shrug my shoulders.

"I'm calling the police," her back turning swiftly in the morning glow.

"No mommy, he's a good guy."

She stops, turns back around and asks me how I got a hold of her precious little daughter.

Again, I can't really answer.

"Who are you?" she asks again.

"I'm Charlie."

"How do you know my daughter?"

"He's the voice mommy," Cindy says.

"The voice?"

"Yes, he saved me from the bad man, look mommy, look-see, see what they did to my arm?"

And when Cindy's mom sees all the little holes in her daughter's arm, she breaks down, falling in a heap on her porch, the wind whipping up snow, swirling around her – the perfect Canadian martyr. Cindy tells her mom that everything is okay now, rubbing her back and smiling innocently. After awhile she is able to stand again. I watch her try and light a smoke but the flame on her lighter keeps getting blown out by the wind. I move over and light the cigarette for the lady like any goddamn self-respecting gentleman should.

"Well, thank you... for whatever it is you did," she says.

"Yeah," I say, "you're welcome."

"What do we do now?"

"Call the cops, I guess. I know where they were keeping her – it's a house on Percy Street."

She nods her head, and I turn to leave.

"Wait," Cindy says.

She holds out the locket for me to take.

"No, you keep it," I say. She smiles and reaches out for me, hugging me around the shoulders. I smile back at her as tears well up in my eyes.

"Okay, well, it was so nice to meet you Cindy," I say.

"You too Charlie," she says, and runs back to her mother giggling.

I turn to go but Cindy's mom calls for me to stop and when I do we both look at each other, Cindy's mother and I, her eyes all gray and swollen – and I can tell that she wants to say something to me, something that could describe how she was feeling, all her regrets and horrors and nightmares, but in this yellow-orange light of the early dawn there doesn't seem like much to say.

"Just promise me you'll take care of her," I say.

And she nods her head valiantly, pulling Cindy in close to her as the sun peaks over the skyline so that everything is suddenly illuminated in the flaccid white-light, blinding my sinister eyes and revealing the subtle horrors of innocence.

## Chapter 25

I've tried calling Natasha five times now but she won't pick-up, which is strange because I know this girl; and even if she didn't want to talk to you, she would still pick up the phone so that she could _tell you_ she didn't want to talk with you. All of her roommates are gone for March Break. I'm on the bus and everything spins past in utter irrelevancy. There's a bum with a plastic bag full of empty beers sitting at the very back who keeps looking at me.

Just promise you will take care of her...

I get up from my seat and move over towards the door. The bum gets up too and follows me to the front. Someone's phone starts ringing and it makes me jump a bit. ' _Welcome to the Suicide Hotline – our systems have now been officially automated for your suicide convenience_ '. The homeless beggar comes over beside me, his beard stinks in the putrid light, and the bastard grins at me and winks. I try and ignore the prick but he won't shuffle off and so I ask him what the fuck his problem is and he says ' _what, are yah scared_?'

When I get back to Paul's old house my clothes are soaked and hang heavy on my shoulders. Face aching from the cold, legs barely standing, no more understanding with no feet left to stand on – when can I collapse? I need a drink but all Meredith has left in the house is a 10 dollar bottle of red wine covered in dust. That'll do good sir; down the hatch with the sting of a hatchet – all sour and sweet in my diseased veins, a wee spring in my step, if I may say so – and I do. I call Natasha again on the house phone but she still doesn't answer. I let it ring until the bitch on the other line tells me to hang up and try again. There's a ticking going on somewhere in the house, incessant like the cry of a bastard child tucked ever so sweetly in his demented crib. Tic Tic Tic. I find a hockey stick in the garage and bring it back into the house with me. My Nana's old wooden clock hangs behind the couch in the living room. I take the damn thing down off the wall and shatter it against the polished hardwood floor, and then I shoot the broken shards around like pucks with my hockey stick. I start laughing and fall onto the couch with the wine.

"You really can't beat this location," Paul says through a strained jaw. "Beautiful view, great neighbors – just the kind of peaceful type of place you two are looking for."

The newlyweds nod enthusiastically as Paul gently scratches the bandage running across his forehead, just above his left eye. The afternoon sky is beginning to clear as the sun streams down, spring feeling like a distinct possibility again after another long and harsh Ottawa winter.

"You're looking at a 15 minute drive downtown – 20 minutes max – and there are some really nice restaurants around here, no joke. You got a brand new sushi place that just opened up around the corner, Fishy Sushi I believe is the name, and an Italian joint called Isabella's not 10 minutes away – great chicken parmesan."

"You seem to really know the area well," the husband says.

"Yes, well, I used to live around here," Paul replies, holding back the urge to start screaming at the top of his lungs. ' _All of this over some little bastard,_ ' Paul thinks to himself, ' _some spoiled, bastard kid who didn't have the decency or respect to appreciate all that I've done for him_.' All Paul wanted now was to be done with it. Sell the goddamn house and be done with it. ' _It took me years to find that house. It was perfect, the perfect fucking house right on the Ottawa River, right where I've always wanted to live, and now it's all gone_.' His pride choking him; ' _At least I made that bitch sign the prenup_ ,' he smiles. This wasn't the first time he'd been through a divorce. It was always messy, these types of situations, but Paul was good at pretending (as a Real Estate Agent, you had to be).

"You've got Venetian blinds in this baby, brand new – both bathrooms have been redone in the past five years, hardwood floors – I'm talking real hardwood, none of this laminate b/s. Ah, here we go, you see – this is the place right here," Paul says, pointing with his finger out the passenger side window.

The roof comes into view first, the black crusted surface penetrating the sky – and the rest of the Victorian Masterpiece comes into sight, the large windows and high ceilings – perfectly symmetrical and appealing.

"There she is," Paul says.

"It really is magnificent," the wife says.

"Yes, I must say..." but before the newly married husband can finish, a 40' Flat-Screen TV comes flying through the giant living room window, landing in a splash of broken glass on the front lawn. There's a pause before Charlie comes running out the front door in his boxers with a hockey stick.

"Oh my," the wife gasps.

And he lashes out with the stick, hammering and bashing the busted TV into a million pieces. Charlie (completely consumed in his own insanity), dashes back inside the house with a deranged look of purpose on his face. Soon speakers, the coffee table, and a laptop follow through the shattered window. Charlie comes running back out again with the hockey stick in his hands, and Paul watches in horror as Charlie continues his rampage, slipping on a patch of wet grass and falling flat on his back where he thrashes about for a while before pulling his crumpled body up from the slush and destruction, staring blankly back at all of it.

"Maybe we should come back another time," the husband offers.

But Paul has stepped out of the car now, staring in disbelief at Charlie, who has still failed to notice the car in the driveway.

"You little shit!" Paul screams. "You piece of fucking no-good little shit – you bastard – you stupid, dumb bastard!"

And turning now, finally noticing Paul, who is shaking his fists and stomping his feet like a child, Charlie grins from ear to ear as he rushes back inside the house, slamming the front door and locking it behind him. He runs as fast as he can upstairs to Paul's old room, grabbing his golf-bag and hoisting it up over his shoulder, he runs back downstairs and pitches the golf-bag out through the window, watching them come crashing down amidst the broken television, speakers, computer and table.

"You ruin everything!" Paul continues to scream, "You bastard kids ruin everything!"

Natasha is gone. No one knows where. Her dad openly blames me and the police have been asking a lot of questions. I had to go into the station and sit down with two detectives. They still don't understand how I found Cindy.

"What were you doing at that house?"

"I don't know, I just... I ended up there somehow."

"That's not very convincing, kid."

"We're trying to figure this all out," the other detective said.

"I am too," I said.

"There was another boy in the house – Jordan Spade – do you know anything about him?"

"Just that he was missing."

"Well, he's dead."

"Dead?"

"Yes, he was suffocated to death – we found a condom lodged down his throat, it was filled with heroine. They were using the kid to smuggle drugs, as a mule, and there may have been some human trafficking involved..."

"Please," I begged. "I don't want to hear anymore of this."

"He was 12 years old."

"Stop."

"But we can't," said the one, looking at the other. "This is what's happening."

Cindy says I'm her hero so the police are pretty much forced to let me go. Jordan is dead and Cindy is in rehab because she's addicted to heroin. She keeps having seizures, and a lot of her hair has been pulled or fallen out. On my way home I see spaceships floating in the sky; hovering saucers with blinking red lights that suck up children in the cold bitter night. Back at Paul's old house everything is quiet. No booze left either, and the wind pours in through the shattered living room window. There's a black hole on the ceiling in the kitchen, and I think somehow that everything is backwards. Like I've gone through this black hole, this vortex, so now I'm living in this alternate universe where children have fangs because women give birth to little monsters.

Outside spring is beginning to poke through the snow; all the colours more vibrant and alive. This virgin of the seasons all shrouded in innocence before that intrusive summer heat melts away the moulds, removes the layers – so to speak. There's a ticking inside my head - tic tic tic – just behind my eyes - tic tic tic – I wonder where Natasha is.

Nothing Seems Real.

The front door is sitting ajar when I get to Natasha's house. There's a smashed vase in the living room and the couch cushions are all scattered around the coffee table like someone was tossed off of it. Her roommates are still away for spring break and it smells like rotten food. I call out her name but the sadistic silence offers no reply – stifling my voice as the stranglehold tightens. I close my eyes

take

a deep

breath

No man is an island and I have nowhere left to stand.

' _there's a man outside in the bushes'_

I have to find her. There's a pounding inside my panicked skull – where is she? What have I done?

There's a red light blinking...

I start running around the house frantically. I look under the couch, tossing aside a lamp in the living room, watching it tumble to the floor. I look behind the curtains, behind the closet doors and under the sink – Natasha! – Into the kitchen, a picture of my smirking face on the fridge door, stuck on with a Corona magnet –

"NATASHA!" I scream.

I find her cell phone on the linoleum floor beneath the kitchen table and there's a half eaten salad all browned and rotten sitting in a blue bowl. Her cat is dead, lying limp against the door of the refrigerator with its tongue lolling out at me.

... _there are noises outside filtering up through the midnight air, all razor thin against the frosted window. Natasha rolls over in her sleep and reaches out as the voices grow louder and more hostile. They're drunk and it's late on a Saturday night, but the two of us just stayed in, which was nice because we didn't have to worry about anything_...

I add to the havoc and destruction, screaming out her name and finding my fist against her walls the only reply. I take one last look in the living room, knowing that it has nothing to offer, but desperate nonetheless.

... _and she grabs a hold of my bare arm all pale in the silver light, still half-asleep but scared. And I say 'it's okay babe' and outside the voices pass and a car drives by, lights cutting through the black like two eyes, and I touch her soft hair, so silky against my coarse fingertips, snow pounding against the window_...

Upstairs her bedroom is empty, the sheets all wrinkled and used sitting crumpled atop the bed (I can still see our imprints embedded against the mattress). In her bathroom I look at myself in the mirror; bulging red eyes jumping out of their sockets, quivering mouth and shaking fists. And just before I turn to leave, I notice the pregnancy-test box sitting empty beside the toilet.

I'm out with Dennis and Patrick, again. There are empty tables and music dripping from the walls of the bar as the two of them jabber on.

"A little landing strip is okay, just a hint of pubis – you know? Don't let me see no hippie bush down there."

The clock on the wall behind the bar is broken, which fills me with relief.

"Yeah, give that little speech to your mom, I've been picking her pubes out of my teeth for days."

"Fuck you man!"

"No fuck you."

No, Fuck me.

"Charlie, you're awfully quiet tonight."

"Couple things running through my head," I say.

"Ah, let me guess," Pat says, "a girl?"

I shake my head.

"Girls?"

"No."

I watch Den and Pat look at each other and laugh.

"It's not women this time, honestly," I say. "I mean girls are the easy part – as long as you reach the coitus..."

"You gotta make em' go..."

"... to keep em' cummin!"

I finish my drink and go take a piss in the stained bathroom while Dennis and Pat meander on about White Trash Night at the Cabin in a couple weeks. The girls get dressed up all slutty in tank-tops and cut-off shorts, and the guys get to wear wife-beaters and act like pieces of white-trash-shit. There's a message carved into the wall above the urinal that says ' _I'm watching you HeHe_ ' which really creeps me out. I zip my dick back into my pants and go back to the bar. There's a girl sitting in my seat talking with Pat and Den.

"Charlie boy! Look who it is!"

"Hope you've got a sweet tooth."

Candy swings around on the stool with her long brunette hair all curled and somber in the dim bar light, flashing her pretty little smile at me.

"Candy," I say, pulling up a stool beside her.

"How are you?" she asks.

"There are people watching me," I say, looking over my shoulder.

"What?"

"Why are you here?" I ask her.

"Oh, just out with a couple girlfriends. We were over at Pub 101 earlier but that place is totally dead – very lame."

"No," I say, "you don't understand."

Den and Pat stand up to go prowl the dance floor and I can tell they're both pretty drunk because Pat stumbles into a waitress who scowls at the two of them while they laugh. Candy is looking at me expectantly, but I have nothing relevant to say.

"So," she stalls, "are you having fun tonight?"

"Listen," I tell her, "you've gotta go – get outta here. There's something... wrong... with me? Or... I don't know exactly, but please Candy, just go. You have to trust me."

"What are you talking about?" she asks, and I see that disturbed look in her eyes as she moves to get away from me.

"I'm not trying to scare you," I scramble, "you look beautiful tonight, no joke, and I'm sure your girl friends look beautiful too, you're all independent or whatever – but that's the problem. Nobody around here sees that. I mean they see you all dolled up but they don't see _you_. We don't deserve you Candy – none of us do. But you goddamn beautiful girls keep coming back and it's driving me insane! Please, tell me I'm a creep, call me an asshole or a pervert – a Monster!" but I can tell from her quivering lips that she won't say anything. Pat comes over and whispers something into her ear and the two of them shuffle out towards the dance floor. Candy looks back at me over her shoulder, and in that fleeting second she sees me for what I really am.

That night I'm dreaming about fucking Samantha and Natasha at the same time. And the two of them keep looking at each other and scowling; then they both look at me. The expression on their faces is a bleak sort of blankness – just nothing there at all – and my dick goes soft and when I can't fuck them anymore, they both start laughing at me, pointing with their tarantula fingers.

I wake up because there are noises coming from downstairs. Meredith is still away, won't be back for at least another week. I creep out of my bed and stand beside the closed bedroom door. I lean my ear up against the wood and listen. There's a rustling sound coming from downstairs – then it stops. I look back at the king sized bed, the unfurled covers and the lonely imprint of my body in the sheets. I just want to go back into bed. I just want to go back.

' _Where is he in all of this?'_

But now the noises have started again, closer now – coming up the stairs. _Footsteps coming up the stairs_. I grab the 9 Iron from beside the bed, leaning against the door to listen....

Breathing

On the other side of the door

Door knob rattling

Stepping back

Door knob turning

Golf club swinging back behind my head and

CRASH!

A man cries out and starts running off down the hallway. I yank the club out from the hole in the splintered door and take flight, chasing down this intruding bastard with Paul's 9 Iron. I see him trip halfway down the stairs and tumble to the floor. He lies motionless on the hardwood. I follow the trail of blood with the 9 Iron clutched tightly between my fists, descending the stairs slowly, trying to look everywhere at once.

The man scrambles to his feet and runs into the kitchen, I bound after him and corner the bastard behind the island counter-top. His face is gored, a gash running across his forehead starting at the bridge of his nose.

"You picked the wrong house to fuck with," I say.

He reaches up and touches his wound, flinches, then stares back at me.

"Who the fuck are you?"

He doesn't say anything, his face covered by the shadow of night. The wind whistles through the shattered living room window.

"I said who the fuck are you?" I move closer with the club swung back in ready position.

"I'm no one," he says.

"Don't fucking test me, bud."

"I'm no one," he says again.

"Are you the one who took Cindy? And Jordan?"

He nods his head.

"Why?"

"What do you mean why?"

"Why did you take them?"

"Why do you ask stupid questions?"

"But you killed him – you fucking killed a 12 year old boy!"

"I didn't kill that kid, his parents killed him, his teachers and the police officers who never showed up killed him, the media killed him with their tireless stream of bullshit, Hollywood killed him with their superficial glory, music killed him with their whorish messages, and you killed him, Charlie. You."

"You're insane," I whisper, horrified at the smirk on his face.

"Oh, I think we're more alike than you'd like to admit, Charlie boy."

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

He laughs and shakes his head.

Outside a siren drives by somewhere else in the city.

We stand in the silhouetted silence for some time, and his eyes are like little black beads. Beetle eyes. I can see my reflection in them and it disturbing, seeing a part of me inside him. My grip tightens around the golf club as I watch Septum reach behind his back.

"What have you done with Natasha?" I ask, my jaw straining.

"She's safe – she's fine."

"Tell me the truth!"

"You never cared for her anyways Charlie, isn't that right? You wanted things to turn out this way..."

"That's not true."

"You're the reason she's gone, you and all of your friends. You are all the same, such easy prey..."

"Liar!"

And before he can start laughing again I lunge out at him with the golf club, catching him square in the temple. The bastard plummets to the floor and moving fast I come around to the other side of the island to find his crumpled body – I swing the 9 iron up over my head and prepare to strike him down with one final blow – but there's a bang and a burning in my shoulder, spreading to my chest fast like hot lead. I see a figure, much larger than Septum, move into the kitchen from the hallway. Drowning beneath the pain, I fall against the kitchen counter and hear Frank's raspy laugh echo inside my head as the warm blood spills against the linoleum floor.

## Chapter 26

Wrapping myself in the warmness of her sheets, tangled forever in this bliss, why do I only think about the happy times? These feelings drift on inside my sand trapped skull, tiny grains shifting in and out, and even after I'm dead these memories will rot away beneath the dirt and grime – never to be realized or resurrected. But as long as my heart still beats, this love will burn inside me like a tortured cry – a piercing wound that stings to touch. Lemon juice splattered all over my severed heart. There's snow outside, wind against the window pane, flesh against flesh – my hand on her sweetness – inside her – outside her – transcending what we call love because companionship is one thing but dependency is another. And we both were without knowing it, which is the worst part. By the way her empty hand reached out towards that cold pane of glass, I could tell she was looking for someone, someone who wasn't there. And so sadly, she was stuck with me, and I with her. If only we had known. For a while I did my best, it's true, when it was easy and there wasn't any trying to it or doubting but everything spun with radiance and potential. It all happened too soon – I guess – too fast. I had never loved before, and somehow I doubt I will ever love again. Is it ever the same twice? Regrets stay bogged down in a person. Everything you see, every song or TV show you used to watch with her – they all choke you up, seizes you like some virus and then it's the red. The red red rage. Where are you daddy? Oh daddy where art thou? Please, don't mind us, we're not here to bother you, honestly, but can you tell me about the birds and the bees, or how I'm supposed to find a girl who will ever love me the same way – is it ever the same twice?

## Chapter 27

Waking up through the white; swimming upwards through the depths of my flickering consciousness to the sound of her voice. My vision doubled in this morphine induced haze, everything swirling against the dull hospital walls. My bed stiff and body supine, stark still against the bleeding sunlight leaking in through the parted curtains.

"Am I dreaming?"

"No, Charlie, you're awake," and there are tears in her voice.

"Why are you crying Sam?" I ask.

"Because you're hurt," she says.

"Yeah, but you don't care about me anymore. You don't feel the same way."

"Oh, Charlie!"

I laugh for some reason and when I close my eyes I'm travelling to a faraway land where humans ride on dinosaurs and the stars are fingering my vision. There's a flickering light somewhere in the corner of my eye, but every time I try to look at it I go blind.

People filter in and out of my hospital room over the next week. My mother comes back and makes a scene. Watching her cry is the worst part about all of this. The bullet ended up missing my shrunken heart but my shoulder burns because there's still a bit of lead stuck inside me. I have a little pad with a button on it connected to the side of my bed, and when I push the button everything goes clear, then blurry, then clear, then soft and warm. But eventually I reach my limit and the warmness goes away so I'm left with the pain – wrapped in a warm blanket of bitterness and confusion.

"Mr. Mahon, there's someone here to see you."

"Send them on in!" I say, looking towards the door expectantly.

Natasha's dad walks in with his hat in his hand and a bowed head. I look at him and he meets my gaze for a second before looking away. He sits down beside the bed and rests his hand against my bed frame. The nurse asks if there's anything she can do, and we both shake our heads no. I try pressing the morphine button, but nothing happens. He looks out the window blankly and I can hear him sigh.

"Your mother called. She told us what happened to you..."

"You must have been pretty thrilled," I say.

He shakes his head and doesn't say anything for a while. The hospital is pretty dead, soft noises of machines with wheels being rolled around, the occasional cough fading away beneath the faint hush of breathing.

"We still can't find Natasha," he says. "We're sorry we blamed you. I guess it's just easier that way, blaming other people."

"I went over to her house," I tell him. "I went over there to find her but... it looked pretty bad."

He nods his head.

"Have you been there?" I ask.

"The police told us we can go in and look for ourselves, but Mary is just too broken up..."

"I think someone took her," I say.

"But who?" he asks incredulous.

"I'm not sure," I say. "But she's gone."

Patty and Den come in with Brennen, who has a black eye.

The three of them regal me with the tail of how that black eye came into existence; including a cross-dressing stripper, a bouncer, one helluva pair of tits, and a pile of cocaine.

"Standard," I say.

They laugh and pat me on my good shoulder. I smile because for a second I don't feel alone.

There's a speck of dust caught in the stale air of my hospital room and I watch it linger there encased within a single beam of light, but eventually something happens and it drifts away as I evaporate into the worn-out fog.

The Ottawa Citizen

March 18, 2013

Police and border officials have busted an Ontario-based human smuggling operation, detaining 30 people in or around the Ottawa and Gatineau areas. Sources tell CBC News that many or most of the detainees are under the age of 18, and that includes victims of the alleged human sex trade operation.

Three men were formally charged with 28 counts in connection with 10 separate incidents involving 7 victims. The charges include human trafficking, abduction and sexual assault.

Police are still on the hunt for one suspect, who allegedly escaped capture during the raid that took place near the Greyhound Bus Station at 3am last night. The missing suspect is described as a young man, 25-30 years old, with short hair and various tattoos on his arms and torso. Police say he is armed and should be considered extremely dangerous. Please do not approach this man, contact the police. Anyone with information can call 613-330-3300.

The two detectives come into my room and tell me that Deviated Septum is gone.

"His real name was Victor Campbell."

"A real sicko – straight out of Montreal..."

"... Hells Angels, lots of crimes connected to this scumbag. He first got booked for assault when he was 14, trafficking coke when he was 16 – got off on a man-slaughter charge a couple years back when one of the witnesses wound up dead..."

"So... what?" I ask.

The two of them look at each other.

"I'm waiting for the part where you tell me he's going to be caught," I say, "the part where you tell me everything is going to be okay."

"Oh," the older detective says, "we're going to catch him."

"Everything is okay," says the younger one.

"What in the hell were they doing here, in Ottawa?"

"Well..." the younger cop starts.

"We're still trying to figure that out," the older one finishes.

"Is there any evidence? A clue for Christ's sake..."

"We found a couple expired passports...and an extensive collection of pornography – some of it was pretty sick shit too, children and animals, well you get the idea – other than that, some used syringes and empty bags... there may be a connection to an underground sex market in Thailand, but all of that is unsubstantiated at this point..."

"And what did that taxi driver have to do with all of this?"

"Frank Delapedat?" says the old-timer.

"He's dead."

"What?"

"He's dead," says the rookie, looking pretty goddamned pleased with himself. "We found him out behind the Southkeys mall with two bullets in the back of his head."

"Apparently they were using Frank to abduct the kids. It didn't really make sense until we took a look back at his police record. Mr. Delapedat spent two years in jail for child molestation charges back in '99 – he's got two kids and an estranged wife – been on the run for the past year with nowhere to go."

"But why did they need the kids?"

The cops look at one another yet again and say nothing, although in the stale hospital air their silence seems to say it all.

The doctor comes in and tells me that things are going well, that the lead is gone and infection is not present. I tell him that's great but I still can't move my shoulder. I've been here now for just under a week.

"That will take some time," he says.

"How much time?"

"Just be thankful you're alive."

"Oh yeah, cause I have so much to be thankful for, is that it doc? I have so much great shit to look forward too. I've got so much fucking shit to be thankful for. How many wives you been through so far, eh? Three? You look like a three time man – is this the charm? Did you finally get it right?"

His eyes burn at me and he opens his mouth to say something, but then he thinks better of it. He leaves me alone with the sounds of the machines and sickness.

Samantha comes back the day I'm supposed to get out. My arm is in a sling and there's been an empty whistle blowing through my head for the past couple of nights. There are shadows on the walls that make funny faces at me and somehow I know that Septum is gone. Never to be seen again. It's a small world but there are still plenty of places left to hide.

"I have to tell you something," she says.

"You love me?"

And for some reason she starts crying when I say this, tears streaming down her soft cheeks.

"Samantha," I say, reaching out to her.

She pulls away and buries her face in her hands, and through her clasped fingers I hear her say ' _Sylvester gave me Syphilis_ ' and in my mind something snaps. She's sobbing now beside my bed. I can feel her tears fall all hot and wet on my arm. I wish I had Cindy's locket with me still (or at least some more morphine). Samantha pulls away from me and looks down at her crumpled hands.

"What will I do?" she asks.

"Donate your yeast to a bread factory," I say.

She starts crying harder and makes to run out of the room, but I can't watch her get away like this, not again. So, dashing up I make to reach for her, my IV slides out all burning through my vein and I slip on the cold linoleum floor. Samantha turns back and comes over to me on the ground.

"Charles, please – tell me you still love me."

"Of course I still love you," I cry. "Of course I can't stop loving you. There's nothing that can change that, because I've loved you ever since we broke up. I can see past all the things we've done, all the mistakes we've both made. We'll find a way because we have to. I can hear the clocks ticking Sam and it's not good – nothing has ever been good since you left me. There's been all this regret haunting me – following me everywhere I go – and now it's me to blame!"

"What do you mean Charles?"

"It was me – I'm the syphilis!"

She looks at me all torn up here on the floor of my hospital room, her dark brunette hair all matted against her cheeks, hiding the freckles around her nose and the tiny red scar on the corner of her head from when she got chicken pox as a child; Samantha with her soft black hair and green-blue eyes like emerald sky.

"I want things to go back the way they were," she says.

"They will my sweetness – believe with me that they will. Everything is different now – I am different now."

"Oh Charlie!"

And in the bright glow she kisses me with trembling lips, her scent filling me up – taking my soul through the roof and out into the open sky, past relevance and meaning and time – before the oceans swam and the earth split – before my last breath and after – always after, because something like this can go on forever when a twisted girl meets a twisted world.

## Chapter 28

There's a line at the Cabin to get in for White Trash Night but Sylvester knows the bouncer and the two of them give each other a solid handshake and talk about protein supplements for a couple of mindless minutes before Sylvester ducks in behind a pack of young girls who look just about drunk enough to fuck.

Sylvester checks his coat and tries not to scratch his dick.

The coat-check girl smiles at him and he gives her a five dollar tip for having an excellent rack.

Inside the Cabin it's pretty dead downstairs but the action was always up top with the DJ. There's a couple people scattered around the bar and a long line waiting to get upstairs where the loud music and flashing lights are coming from. Sylvester orders a coke and goes to the bathroom with it. He takes a piss and it burns a little while he pours the contents of his flask into the watered down coke. He takes a sip and cringes, not at the sight of the yellow-crust on the inside of his boxer shorts, but at the strong taste of the whiskey.

He leaves the bathroom with his mix drink and stands by the bar. He wishes he was back in Toronto. The market in Ottawa was alright – lots of pretty girls or whatever – but most of them were university students with at least a meager sense of moral dignity. The clubs in Toronto were a different story. Sure, lots of niggers and spics, but they knew to stay the fuck out of his way. And the girls in Toronto were mostly 18 at the club, little daddy-going-nowhere-girls with the ambition to live their lives as free and post-modern as they possibly can. You want those breast implants? You need that diet pill, a smoke – maybe a little speed – _oh I couldn't_ – no really, it's quite alright – _well, just for a little bit – hehe_.

Syl snickers and takes a sip of his drink while he thinks about all the girls he's fucked.

Pat and Den come stumbling down from upstairs and notice Syl standing by the bar. Pat has a fake moustache on and his hair is greased back tight across his scalp. They're both wearing wife-beaters (most of the guys in the Cabin are) and Den has dried blood beneath his nostril.

"What's up Silly Syl – not the monster I hope?"

"Not yet anyways."

"Lots of girlies up there," Den says. His eyes are like marbles rolling around in their sockets.

"Yeah they're all dressed up like little Pamela Andersons' – short cut-off jeans and tiny white shirts – a Kid Rock heaven."

"Nice," Sylvester nods. "Hey – you guys seen Mahon around?"

"Oh, Charlie boy, he said he was coming..."

Pat whispers something in Dennis's ear and the two of them share a look. Dennis starts to gag on his double-vodka and cran so they tell Sylvester they'll catch him upstairs. They go to the bathroom together and Pat waits for Dennis while he pukes for the fifth time that night. They say vodka can cure ulcers but so far it just seems to make them bleed more. Pat looks at his reflection in the mirror and for some reason he expects the mirror to crack. And through his hollowed out eyes he imagines himself as a young boy. Shorter hair and thinner lips with that hopeful look in his eyes that he used to see but didn't notice anymore.

Meanwhile, Sylvester is upstairs ordering a round of Jagerbombs for some girls he knows from class. They tell him he looks good and he knows it because his shirt is tight around his chest and he doesn't hesitate to flex his arms as he turns with the shots. Drink up ladies – oh yes, yes – down those pretty lips and I'll come with another shot.

Life can be a vicious cycle.

Sylvester looks around for Charlie because even though everything is still hazy, he's been having dreams that make him wake up sweating and ashamed of himself. The dreams make his dick burn and for some reason he gets all choked up. Charlie is in every dream. His voice, his laugh – haunting Sylvester these past weeks – and he still hasn't gone to the walk-in clinic because once you know you have something you're obligated to tell the bitches, which just wasn't going to work for him.

Sylvester ducks into the washroom because a girl he fucked last year comes up the stairs. On the dance floor bodies convulse in pulses against the seizuring lights. And there's one girl on the dance floor with a red dress on. She's swaying half-heartedly to the music with a couple of her friends, but all of a sudden these two guys come up and steal the other two prettier girls away. So the girl in the red dress goes over to the bar and she's not ugly by any means, but tonight she feels ugly – for whatever reason. Maybe because her cat just died. Or because her best-friend Shannon is having a hard time with her ex and is too depressed to come out. Or there could be an exam coming up that she's not ready for – or maybe she just killed and mutilated a homeless person and used his eyes for pieces of chewing gum. Either way, she orders another vodka and cran – even though she feels a bit like puking already. And thinking about all of this makes her feel dumb, useless – and for whichever one of these reasons, this girl in the red dress is going to go home with some random guy tonight and fuck him. She's going to get pregnant and even though both he and she will want to get an abortion, she won't be able to go through with it.

Sylvester comes out of the bathroom pretty drunk because he downed what was left of his mix drink in the bathroom. He notices the girl in the red dress standing at the bar but moves on because she looks like one of those emotional ones.

He notices Pat and Den on the dance floor with a couple girls, some mutual acquaintances, so to speak. And Syl shakes his way over there, grabs one of the little blonds (her name might be Tracy) and pulls her ass into him while he gyrates her hips into his infected dick. He was still dreading to hear from Samantha.

_And Charlie boy – wait till I get my hands on you_. _He was a sly little fucker, staying so close to me all this time. What sort of man gets that hung up over a girl? You get the job done, you pull your pants up and you get the hell outta there – if she's the one who wants to leave first then it's that much easier! I can't understand it – such a girly man. Always throwing his little fits, breaking every goddamn cell phone he's ever owned. He's just a spoiled pervert with an ego twice the size of his cock..._

Syl starts sweating and goes outside for a smoke. The spring air is moist and the cigarette tastes good mixed in with all the booze. Sylvester smiles and thinks more about Charlie boy.

Hell, Samantha wasn't even that good of a lay. She had a nice cunt and all but she never really got into it when I fucked her. I mean she hardly ever came – which is just weird. Some chick tried to tell me it was 99% mental for women, but when I stuck my cock inside her she learned right quick. It didn't work that way with Samantha for some reason. Maybe that's why Charlie boy liked her so much. Probably made the little fuck feel big – powerful or something. Where does he come off with that giant fucking mouth of his? Well who has the last laugh now, Charlie boy?

Back inside there seems to be twice as many dudes upstairs than chicks – Patty and Den have disappeared along with the girls Sylvester knows – so he lumbers his way downstairs and prowls around the entrance for a bit, offering girls cigarettes while they come out all drunk and dripping. The bouncers notice him and shake their heads. Syl runs to the alley across the road to take a piss because his dick is burning again. There's a dumpster in the alley and while Syl pulls out his aching cock a shadow moves behind him that he fails to notice.

' _Maybe I oughta head to Percy Street_ ,' he thinks to himself.

Paul looks out the window of his new car as he drives back from another business meeting.

Meredith sighs into her palm.

Pat and Den double team a girl they bring back from the bar and high five each other while they're inside her.

Natasha is gone.

There's a boy somewhere lying in his bed listening to static because he can't stand to be alone.

Sylvester emerges from the alleyway, wiping his hands on his jeans and lighting up another smoke. The crowd is thinning out now and Sylvester's buzz is wearing off. He fumbles in his pocket, playing with the pill of Viagra that he brought out with him tonight. The prospects weren't looking all that good at this point though. His dick is sore and he just wants to go home.

He waves down a grey car.

I killed Jordan Spade

Please Help

Samantha looks at her phone and somewhere out on the street, a homeless person dies in the cold and no one notices. A patch of ice melts, a car drives by and another baby gets born into a void world.

Where is he in all of this?

The grey car stops and Sylvester opens the back door, falling into the backseat with great ease, and the driver gives him a quiet nod as the unmarked Impala moves slowly away from the curb, merging with the rest of the traffic.

The End.
