With the current Lunar prohibition I have taken it upon myself to open a speakeasy for honest folks who just need a drink. Don't worry about the low gravity in here and don't mind the glassware.
Some years and months ago, spirit was distilled and reckoned good enough to be put into an oak cask with heavy char. It would sit and breathe in the goings-on around it and would record the disturbances and actions taking place in its vicinity; imbuing those perturbations into the liquid held inside.
Some disturbances reach further with their ripples than others. An oversized truck barreling down a road adjacent to the rick-house would send its vibrations into the spirit coaxing the precious liquid further into the oak. A particularly cold winter that out-does the heating capacity of the building will force the wood to contract and expel some of its saturation, slowing the hard-won progress until warmth returns to the cockles of the stout 200 liter barrel, allowing absorption like the embrace of a long not seen friend.
The maturation process also keeps secrets. A late night tryst between distiller and visitor. A juxtaposition of senses: for the distiller the visitor is all long blonde hair and blue eyes to see and rough much pocked hands running over intoxicating smoothness to touch. The barrel becomes party to them as much needed support, the aroma of the visitor permanently etched into the rough surface as the slow inhalation of its surroundings continues. Muted are the complaints in reaction to a small travesty as an errant thrust dislodges the bung from its hole, irrevocably changing the course of the whisky’s history by prematurely exposing it to the open air. Its revenge, though not malicious in nature, is to lose a greater percentage of its volume, that is greater appeasement of the angels that continuously take their share. It will be noted on a spreadsheet in some years time by the distiller and the tax man. The visitor who languished so sensuously and briefly on the barrel will have long since removed the dust and soot inherent to aging casks and the offense of it long forgotten. The distiller filed in the visitors memory under the heading, interesting-setting-but-mediocre-lover.
Some years even further from that time someone might comment that that particular batch of whisky had some hint of longing, sweet misery, and playful boyishness. Perhaps, a combination of extra oxidization and a spike in evaporation, but really it is the maturation process’ secret laid bare for all to see.
Once finally emptied, the cask would still remember its liquid mate. Bathed in it for many years it would be hard to forget. Some time later after sitting and slowly expelling the memories it would be sent somewhere else. A new mate, but with different purpose. New disturbances and once again the bonding and percolation of history into the new spirit. A more focused distiller to be sure, but missed are the late night visits and feelings of uniqueness that it had once enjoyed. Before, one of a hundred, now; one of thousands and thousands. No more touches, slaps, or caresses. A more modern facility and so too are absent the vibrations from nearby trundling trucks, or cold winters to weather, or impromptu use as a lover’s surface.
Instead, many years of the same. Temperature controlled and visits few and far in-between. Solitude and pensiveness as spirit and oak mingle, still too the old spirit echoing forward in the future. Much longer this time until the barrel spear comes. The whisky this time does not raise any eyebrows from distiller or tax man. Gone are the notes of longing and playfulness; replaced instead, by notes of measured fortitude, patience, and as one drinker would note a by-the-numbers-whisky that pleases and reassures.
Once again shipped to parts unknown. This time a small cooperage. A fire built for a viking funeral. The farm hands, the pall bearers, are not gentle and with rough hands and rough tools they bring the barrel, bereft of its heads, to the fire’s edge. They scour the inside with sanders and plannars and the cask marvels as it feels the layers of char stripped away to reveal heretofore oak not touched by the light of day or the wetness of whisky. Then unto the pyre tossed to sit for some long seconds. Heavy char. But where there should be excruciating pain there is instead a renewed sense of usefulness. Removed from the flame and heads restored, a gleaming question forms in the barrel’s mind: “What next could I be?”
It was unusual to be tumbling down a flight of stairs trying to take my clothes off at the same time. Her lips pressed against mine and it felt sinful for me to remove them to pull the shirt over my head. We left a trail all the way down; rifle at the door, flak jacket at the stair landing, shirt and pants on the stairs, and finally underwear and helmet holding the door open to the shelter.
Inside, I had my mouth around her nipple and was sucking and biting while my hands explored and touched all the places I had learned to touch. I was going quickly, but still taking measurement. What caused her breathing to be faster, what made her press herself against me more, what was simply a nonplus. I took this all in as we kissed and licked each other all the way to the mattress in the corner.
We banged heads as we made our way down onto the bed. It was old and smelly, but it was a comfort for what we needed. A place to fuck. My hand snaked down between us until it was between her legs. I pushed my middle finger in and felt her wetness and in that moment it felt so good to be wanted. My erection, I would think, would be a pretty obvious sign that I wanted her, but the confirmation that she was wet for me was nirvana.
I played and I wriggled my finger around and she moaned into my ear. I leaned down and enveloped a nipple with my mouth trying my best to imitate an amphibian and wrap my tongue all the way around. The response was enthusiastic and I clamped down sucking hard, her body pressing against mine even harder. I bit lightly and looked up at her. She was staring down at me with the bluest eyes that seemed to shine through the grime and soot on her face. I realized that she must have been blonde, before the dirt and the mud and the war.
“Hurt me,” she whispered.
I bit harder and forced my finger deeper and she arched into me and moaned loudly. I pulled my finger out and traced upwards. I found her clit and lightly rubbed my finger over it. She wrapped her arms around me and tossed her head back in ecstasy. It was a perfect moment that I lingered in until her head came back and instead of a kiss she clamped down on my shoulder with her teeth and bit hard. “Fuck!” I jolted backwards looking down at her.
”Just play, okay? Not even a flesh wound, just a nibble.” She flashed a smile at me and another of her features illuminated brightly against the canvas of battle blush, her perfect teeth.
I paused to take it in and then cast a glance down at my shoulder and could see the indentation there. I grinned back at her and considered what she might see. Would she see see a kid? Or, would the months since conscription have made a difference. The many times broken nose? As if she could sense my thoughts she pulled me back down and whispered in my ear, “Think later. Fuck me now.”
I thought I had been hard before. I got in between her legs and pushed forward and missed. She reached down, grabbed me and guided me in and I felt her warmth and wetness. The feeling shot through my body and again I was forced to pause and enjoy it. I felt her legs wrap around me and she pulled me into her and so I sunk all the way in. Fully inside, I kissed her and then began to pull back and drive forward. I started slow enjoying the sensation of her body pulling at me as I moved away and then reveling in the feeling of her welcoming me back with each thrust.
Slow turned into quick and then shortly after quick turned into fast until I was pounding against her. She was moaning and encouraging me to keep going and for some reason I could not stop thinking about Basic Training. She pulled me down so my weight was on her and she told me to keep going, “Keep going Gaky, keep going! Oh fuck, that’s it you’re gonna make me come. Fuck, Gaky I’m coming!”
I thrust into her again hard and then stayed still. I could feel her muscles contracting around my cock. I looked down at her and she had her eyes shut tight as the sensation rolled over her body. I kissed her lightly then on the forehead and her eyes shot open. I gave her a lopsided grin and she smiled back looking me in the eyes for a moment. She pushed me to the side and I noticed she was strong and not just for her size.
“That was good Gaky, boy.” Her voice was rough yes soft and brittle as if the words were so sweet to speak they would break as she spoke them. All our voices change from the propellant smoke, but something made think it was a part of her.
“My name is–”
“You’re Gaky to me.”
A Gak, or Gaky was the slur of choice for a Grunt. It had come into vogue in the early days of the war when a company of Grunts got glassed and all that was left was cinder. In fact, it was granulated carbon, GAC, and from that came the name Gak. It’s all that’s left when you get hit by a torcher or a plasma bomb. It had been many years since then and I had seen my fair share of GAC in the last few months, in fact, I was pretty confident it is what was smeared on my face and hers.
”Alright. You can call me Gaky. You a General Staff Stewardess that got lost or something?”
She did something amazing. She laughed. “Naw,” she drawled, “I’m one of them PSYOP attendants, ya know? I am here to fuck your brains out so you feel better about the war.”
“Damn, you must be busy.”
She leaned over and bit me again. Hard.
“Ow! Jesus, lady.”
“Alright,” she said getting up. “You’re turn.”
She got on top of me and gripped my still throbbing member and slowly dropped down onto it, all the while looking me in the eyes. Now it was no longer an uncanny thing to think of Basic Training. I was doing it on purpose to delay my own orgasm as long as possible. I watched her as she started to ride me slowly. She was dirty, filthy really, but I didn’t hold it against her because I was too. Her hair was short and shaggy, but looked as if she maintained it when she wasn’t in the field. Her face was sharp and angular, but to be honest her eyes took me to another world.
I reached up and cupped one of her breasts and noticed that I could see her ribs underneath her skin. She must have been on the front lines because we were all a bit starved. I pushed my hand up higher and wrapped my fingers around her throat and she looked down at me and smiled again. I remembered when she whispered “hurt me” and I felt a little more rigid. I squeezed her throat and used my other hand to pull her down onto me harder.
She moaned and tilted her head back. I squeezed harder on her throat and with my free hand pinched one of her nipples. Slowly and softly to start and then increasing the pressure to see how she would react. She started riding me faster almost slamming down on to my pelvis with her own.
I released her nipple and throat and brought both hands to her hips and pulled her down onto me hard. I felt like I might break her, but I remembered her strength and looked upwards to see if she was enjoying it. Her eyes were screwed shut and she had her breasts in both hands.
”Fuck, I’m close,” I breathed.
“Keep going, Gaky I’m gonna come too,” she moaned.
I felt the surge coming and the point of no return.
“I’m coming now! Oh fuck, babe.”
She wrapped herself around me as I felt pleasure explode in my head and body. I saw stars as I felt her breathing and moaning in my ear. Wave after wave, it felt like it would never end. I felt her warmth combined with my own added to the mix and it made my whole body shake.
After what seemed like hours the moaning and shaking stopped and it was just breathing, her still wrapped around me. I could still feel the throb of my cock inside her and felt for a moment that I never wanted to leave that place. Her breaths became shorter and she shook a little and I realized she was crying.
I held her closer and remained silent. I am ashamed to say that my erection returned and I was still inside of her. After some minutes of her muted sobs I heard her giggle softly.
“You really are some stone cold killer, huh, Gaky? Get all hard seeing a little girl like me crying, huh?”
She sniffed and I looked at her and could still see the tears in her eyes. I began to try and explain myself. My words got caught up in my teeth. I was trying to tell her that it wasn’t her crying that was the reason it was her movements, or maybe it was the crying, or maybe it was the fact she was so close to me and for the moment she was mine. I never got it out. She just put a finger over my lips and smiled.
Slowly she disentangled herself from me. I slid out of her and I could feel the combination of our efforts oozing all over my still hard penis. She slowly worked her way down kissing my chest and my own exposed and telltale ribs. She gave the red and swollen tip of my member a wet full-lipped kiss and seeing me look down at her she gave me a wink.
She proceeded to lick the underside of my cock up and down and it felt so good I put my face in my hands and tried my best not to sound too dumb as she slowly licked up and down. She stopped teasing and took me in her mouth. She sucked on the tip before engulfing me entirely. My head went back and my mind whirled in a hot and sticky thoughtlessness. I could hear her sucking, her lips smacking as she pulled me from her mouth.
“Mmmm. You like that, Gaky? Come on use my mouth like the hard killer you are. Do it for the Front.”
I looked down at her and my mouth gaped. Almost dreamlike I reached down and grabbed her greasy blonde hair and forced her down. She looked at me the whole time. I started pushing her up and down on my cock and moaned. Her words ringing in my head over and over.
Do it for the Front. DO it for the Front. DO IT FOR THE FRONT. We had all heard it for years. Blasted from HR’s and speakers, in homes, before sports, and just in the streets. Here in a burnt out city, in some basement this combat angel-vixen just told me to fuck her face and to do it for the Front. Briefly, I considered this was being filmed as some sort of sick war-horror-live-action-porn. But, it was a brief thought, I was far to busy indulging her.
I let go of her hair. “Fuck, babe I am going to cum again.” I moaned and looked down at her and she was staring back at me and stroking. As my orgasm hit she leaned down and took me in her mouth. She expertly swallowed what I had to offer and continued sucking for some time after sending me into a paralytic state where I was incapable of making a sound or movement.
After some moments, she crawled up and laid beside me. Looking at me with those big blue eyes that seemed to pierce through days of soot and mud she said, “Why’d you have to call me, babe?” She wrapped her arms around me and pulled me in and even then I could feel her strength. We both faded into sleep and my final thoughts echoed through my nightmares: Who was this girl?
There is and has been a lot of guff on the web about how someone looks as a metric for their success when it comes to dealing with the opposite or similar sex. I can say this is false. You see, I lost part of my ear in the New Dallas conflict. I have not had cosmetic surgery done to fix my wide nose, or remedy the perpetual frown marks on my forehead and mouth despite much encouragement to do so. I am not a handsome man by any stretch of the imagination, yet I have encountered women. Women being my particular cocktail.
The thing is I am cursed. Lucky in life, but lost in love. I am not making this up either. This is not a self-diagnosed malignancy that I put on a dating profile. This is something I know as fact. Early on I entertained the assumption that I would meet someone and that I would find a way for love to love me back, but I tell you, I’ve done it all been back and forth and I am cursed.
Once I went out into the wilderness to seek out a witch. Roll your eyes all you want, but I found her. She wasn’t one of those ‘bathe in baby’s blood’ witches. She lived in a home and had a car, though it was covered in religious relics, and she offered me coffee when I arrived. But, she did live in the wilderness and she was a witch. We sat and we spoke for some time and then she stopped speaking and closed her eyes. I also went silent as I had an ingrained habit of not speaking unless spoken to. This went on for some time until she held her hand out to me. I considered what she might want and settled on my necklace. I pulled it over my head and coiled it into her hand. Her fingers closed over it and she moaned. Now this is not some sex novel bullshit. She moaned. She moaned as if the earth had travelled upwards through the soles of her feet and had imbued her with the knowledge of my own demise.
It was a lucky guess and happened to be true. She looked at me with the pain of one hundred years and she spoke, “you are lucky at life, sir, but unlucky at love.”
That was it. A simple diagnosis. At the time I smiled and laughed and when the witch had soaked up enough of the earth’s pain she opened her eyes and she laughed and grinned with me. You see, being lucky at life is a blessing, but your goddamned mind always wants you to be lucky at love. Your heart wants you to be lucky at love. But, when you are a soldier and a fighter and a gambler it pays to be lucky at life.
I speak to you now older and aged. I have seen red hair turn gray and then fall away to nothingness. I have seen the old republics die and have seen planets and space and found my way back here. I lived where others should die and I do not resent that fact, but the whole time this happened I dreamed and wanted love. I wanted someone to pluck me from the vine of life I reside and imbue in me their love and love them back for it, but it has never come.
Now I am alone. Truly. It’s not so bad either. I have my bar and I tend to it as I would a lover. Sometimes neglectful, but always quick to remedy that. I meet new people each day and their stories fill my life now. I have been lucky in life. So much so, that I won this bar and the life that I have now from certain doom, I won it. However, let me tell you, if you can be lucky at love, please give into it. Because it seems lovely and brilliant in ways that being lucky in life simply does not extend.
All my heroes are dead. They went and have gone forever as though they had meant to all along, leaving small little hints to their demise. It is easy to look back and pick apart these hints and derive from them some meaning of significance, but ultimately they are just gone. Gone, Gone, Gone.
There is a man whom I have never met. I have never been in his presence, or shared the rarefied air he breathed and was breathing not long ago. However, he has had a profound impact on my life. It is sad, really. I cannot proclaim to be his first acolyte, or someone who saw the brilliance in his ways so early on. Instead, I came to him randomly and as a skeptic. In a few short years I was transformed as I listened to more and more of what he had to say. In fact, in three short years I exhausted all there was to absorb and I spent time going over my favourites. I would replay the best parts and re-watch to surmise the sheer exquisiteness of his words, or perhaps his cadence.
I am so sad. My heart has been broken in a way that I have never felt before and it cuts down to my very core. It has been like I have spent my life building and positioning emotional armour to deflect such a blow, but this man lived and breathed in a way that his death found a way to split me in half and let all of the guts of my sadness flow out of the wound I now suffer.
A prayer:
A great man has left the ranks of us mortals. His soul must be conveyed in the way that he wished it to be because the alternative to that is too morose to bear. He was hilarious in a way that struck each person genuinely, even in their distaste. He was a soldier of sorts not bearing a rifle, but bearing the truth of reality and armed with that telling us things that would make us laugh despite his own pain and suffering. I pray, you gods, that you handle his transit from the mortal coil gently and with reverence. I pray you do this and if you do not then damn you for you are not gods at all, but monsters and I swear upon all things that I will exact revenge should his transit be marred in any way.
This man has a family. He has loved ones. He is loved and he shall forever be. He is my favourite person and someone whom from I have learned so much. I emulate him and pretend to be him and now my heart breaks because I wish I could have known more. Thanks, Norm. I am just some guy, but you really changed my life and your passing has wrecked me in a way I have never felt before. It is so stupid and I know you would have a laugh at someone like me, but you were great and I will keep you in my heart wherever I go.
These are just some ramblings, please forgive me. I have never cried so hard in my life.
I made my first offering to the gods when I was just 15. I gunned a man down in an alleyway. I saw him first, luckily, and as he raised his shotgun to blow a hole in my chest I managed to raise the machine pistol in my hand and pull the trigger. The first bullet took him in the groin as I raised my hand. The recoil brought the bullets upwards and a line of gore sprouted from his stomach, then his chest, and my brain reminded me to let go of the trigger when I saw his throat explode blackish-red in the neon light of the damned city.
It was chaos then and I knew I did not have time to stop, but I did. I knelt down and touched his foot and I offered him to the gods. It was a silly thought at the time, that there were gods in the first place and that they might govern my life, but the thought popped into my head and I went with it.
I escaped the disintegrating city that night, leaving behind wails of horror and constant gunfire. I do not know how many more offerings I made that night. I only remember the first one and the first one still sticks with me to this day. I see the surprise in his eyes and I see the muzzle of the shotgun moving upwards. I see my own death coming in hot and fast with a precise dispassion and, of course, I see the way to avoid such a death.
As I ran that night; as I hid and hugged walls and avoided my neighbours who were also trying to escape that damned city I became aware of a certain type of governance. You see, we do not have control over the moments. There are moments each day that are beyond us and we are simply subject to the will of the gods who control that particular moment. I devoted myself to these gods, though I did not know their names, and begged them to preserve me for another moment. When the moments grew longer and hours ticked by I asked them to preserve me until dawn. As I turned back and saw the sun break over the damned city I was converted and baptized in the rays that struck me. I was an acolyte to the nameless gods who control the moments we do not. I am zealot of the gods who bring me to the morning safely. Each night, as I close up this little bar that resides in my corner of the Moon I raise a toast to them and that they bring me more moments and selfishly I ask to see another dawn.
It has been some years since I have made an offering like I did when I was 15, but I never rule out the possibility that the gods will ask for more. I listen each night, as I close up the bar, for the warning signs of another damned city and I resign myself to being held at the whim of the gods of the moment.
Something of which we all have, but looks best on a woman.”
I have met this girl a few times now. We get coffee, or whisky when I’m drinking again. We sit and we talk and solve the world’s problems. A little salt in Liberia, a sprinkle of paprika in the Balkans, a dash of sugar in the Middle East, and set to simmer in the American Midwest.
Sometimes the banter is light and pleasant and other times things become more drawn out with the tendrils of our conversation reaching far deeper and more sensitive topics. Of course, it means nothing really, just a way for us to continue to see each other and talk about the things that interest us.
I worry though, and you’ll have to forgive me. I worry that I will not be taken seriously when I describe how much I appreciate and how wonderful this woman is simply because I find her attractive. Much ink has been spilled to point the finger at men who write about women and I worry that my point about this girl will be lost because I find her attractive.
She is smart. Not just in an intelligent way, but an emotional way as well. In one breath denouncing an easily solved atrocity and in another lamenting the circumstances that led to it and all the lives it impacted. Not single minded at all, but I worry that how I feel about her is invalidated because she also has magnificent breasts.
Therein lies the problem I am recounting to you now. I worry that there is not space for my adoration to be perceived both ways because of the inherent bias against a man and it is troubling. Is it wrong to admire her ability to quote Foucault in one sentence and comment on the delicacy of her pubic grooming style in the next? Does one invalidate the other?
I get it. I am a man and therefor the things I say are put through a singular prism created from a semen based epoxy. But, I must lament that fact because who then will write these things? Is there not some truth to the fact that this woman is both beautiful and intelligent? Can I not focus on both items separately and together as I please as long as I am not disparaging her?
Is it possible that there has been one too many men who have gone out of their way to describe a woman based on her looks alone that to even bring that matter into the mix is an insult? Perhaps, there has been one Pygmalion too many and we as men must avoid the physical nature of attraction and focus instead on the ephemeral side of attraction.
I believe it is a fallacy. That it is more important for me to wonder what she looks like in the throws of a good book as opposed to what she looks like in the throws of a good orgasm. I believe we are in a place now where one thought is outwardly praised more than the other and I believe that is where we have gone wrong as humans.
It is a personal fact: This woman is gorgeous. I could lie to you and say that I did not realize this until I spoke to her and felt her life-force knock against mine, but the truth is that I watched her walk into the bar and my cave-man brain started itemizing the things that I found particularly appealing about her. I won’t bore you with the details, but friend, let me tell you this lady has legs that would make a fertility goddess forget about hips.
Then we spoke and talked some more and the things I said were improved or eclipsed by the things she said. In the midst of this I felt my gut tightening. No one would believe me. To say, I have found a Unicorn out in the wild: “Ah, yes, fellas let me tell you she is stacked and it was delightful to hear her relate the parable of the previous reincarnation of Buddha to the homeless epidemic we are experiencing in the sad peripherals of our great cities.”
It’s a lot like using niggardly in a sentence. If you use it too early on most folks spend the rest of the sentence deciding where they come down on the racist implications of that word rather than listen to the rest of the sentence. Because I mentioned that she is ‘stacked’ the fact that she was able to use a philosophical story to fully describe a modern problem is lost on the audience.
There is a point to this. You see, I am blessed in having met a woman with such an equilibrium of beauty and intelligence. It makes it easy on me in describing her because I can tap into where the blood rushes. I can describe what makes her attractive to me and I can explain what it is like the swim in the estuaries of her personality.
I suppose it is not too much to worry about after all. She is what she is and if it turns out that I have exaggerated then others can rest easy that such a being of perfection does not exist, or if I am right on the money then I cannot be assailed for telling the truth about what I saw. I am practicing honesty and as it occurs to me there is nothing wrong with a little heroine worship. I just don’t want people to be distracted, you know? I feel that if one were to focus just on how beautiful she is then they would be missing a whole other world of what makes her so lovely. If one wanted to circumvent the typical protests and focus solely on her intelligence and personality they would being doing a disservice to how those things are presented to the world.
Inevitably, this wonder-woman will discover that I am far beneath her. I know it will come and am resigned to that fact. It will be a click in her mind as I say something that reveals my true nature: a drooling idiot, who was taught manners in the same way apes are taught sign language. It will be a good realization and she will leave and I will look to the door for more potential partners.
Well, this one sure is a dooz-y. I found this crumpled up paper in the corner of the bar. Cripes, this fella sure is miffed about a defunct social media platform. Poor guy…Or, girl.
“’Well, sire,’ Sir John answered, ‘the only advice I can give you now is to withdraw to some place of safety, for I see no hope of recovery. Also, it will soon be dark and you might just as easily fall in with your enemies and meet disaster as find yourself among friends.’”
–Sir John of Hainault to King of Phillip VI, Froissart’s Chronicles
“Oh, hi. It’s me – reflecting on how it’s been A YEAR! We all cope differently, experience the depths of emotion differently, and manage these emotions differently. I genuinely find this beautiful. Anyway, as I “look in the mirror” (god, we love a good metaphor) as the year mark rolls around, I wanted to check in with you, friends: How are you doing? How are you feeling? What can I do for YOU? Thank you for those who have been patient with me (I suck at texting back in these moments Thanks for reading, I love you.”
-An Instagram ‘Influencer’
I would like to take some time, if you would be so kind to allow me, to discuss the nature of straight talk and the distressing state of virtue signaling that has seen unprecedented rise in recent times. The idea is to compare two pieces of text, one a recording from the conclusion of the Battle of Crecy and the other taken from the one-year anniversary of a deadly plague, which at that point had taken the lives of some 2-million individuals.
Both of these quotes are taken from desperate moments. In one, Sir John of Hainault is informing the King of France that there is no hope to win the battle and that he must make a tactical retreat. In the other, a woman is lamenting a year spent during a pandemic and how this has caused a breakdown in communication among her friends and family. Essentially, these are both about expressing defeat. One is done bravely and in a matter-of-fact manner and the other is a convoluted attempt to assign blame of actions taken on vague external forces, while deflecting the conversation in a rhetorical way.
As far as individuals go there can be no real comparison. Perhaps, one could point out that they both sit on similar a similar socio-economic spectrum for their respective time periods. However, the distance-to-danger is a stark reminder of privilege of their times. Sir John in this moment has spent all day near death literally watching his plans, favour in court, and friends disintegrate all around him. The Influencer, on the other hand has been provided distance from the horrors of the plague thanks to her wealth and position in society. Sir John watched on as his son-in-law was slain on the battlefield; the Influencer is able to ignore the severe and horrific impact of the plague by simply turning off their phone screen.
Now that the scene is set it is time to investigate the words themselves. Sir John is telling the King of France that the battle is lost, not only that he is telling the King that he must leave his dead and wounded behind lest they are trapped and captured or killed. In the face of failure, Sir John is bearing the cross of truth. As well, he is implicating himself in the defeat as he was one of the King’s officers and advisers. Froissart tells us that upon hearing this the King flew into a fury. It makes one wonder if Sir John feared if he would be killed on the spot. Instead, the King makes a number of suicidal attempts to join the battle. Being part of his retinue Sir John would have been forced to accompany him and himself risking death. Those are the stakes. After witnessing so much destruction and having to be the one to inform the King of the defeat Sir John risked his life to give an honest assessment of the state of things.
In the Influencer post we see another type of delivery of ‘bad news.’ Ultimately, it is an admonition of guilt. Simply put, ‘I have been a bad friend.” She is delivering the news to her legions of followers that she has been remiss in these times and it is a plea for forgiveness that her attentions have been focused inward rather than outward. Ironically, there is no actual apology, instead just a reflection using tenuous and hollow wording. “We all cope differently, experience the depths of emotion differently…” These words are meaningless because they trivialize the human experience and as simple truths of individuality.
After a year of suffering these are the platitudes that are offered to hundreds of dedicated followers accompanied by some sexy ‘selfies.’ It is not this authors intention to be harsh on this Influencer it is just an attempt to show the distasteful difference in which bad news in delivered. There is the straight-forward method of Sir John, which comes with the threat of ejection from his spheres of influence or even death. Then there is the fabricated non-speak of the Influencer which deflects her own failures onto her viewers as if to say “No, really, underneath this self-serving exterior I promise there is someone who cares about you.”
In the end, Sir John lost his son-in-law and hundreds of his compatriots. After Crecy he is only mentioned in histories to mark his passing some ten years after that battle. He had the unenviable job of having to tell a King that he had lost and from what is recorded he did so with out frill and in an honest manner.
The Influencer, for her post, received thousands of what passes for votes of approval on the medium in which she posted. Many responded adoringly and praised her from her bravery of addressing the plague in a positive way. She would go on to star in movies and television shows in which she was type-cast as the girl-next-door type.
This is the injustice of the early 21st century. Hard truths were surpressed in favour of meaningless platitudes and it lead to a great degradation in how we communicate. Indeed, the line between truth and ‘personal truth’ would be blurred in this way as Influencers and other new-media types would continue to virtue signal. The widespread use of nice and pleasing words to say little, but express feelings that do not truly exist. It was an epidemic inside a pandemic that was spreading through new-media and would eventually spark the fires that would lead to the state of affairs we experience now.
Beware the man or woman who whispers sweet nothings freely. They are the dangerous ones and it is right and just to fear them.
Sometimes the bar closes and things get quiet in an ambient sort of way. The generator still hums and the airflow catches the loose ends of your skin and drags across it. Otherwise, you can’t hear much except the breathing of an empty space.
This is the time I have a drink. I turn off the screens and the jukebox gets unplugged. I sit at the bar and I pour myself something strong. It changes night to night, but I like to stick the the cask strength stuff.
I take my time. Pour the glass and put the bottle down. The light twinkles through the whisky and let what is in the glass come to a rest and really figure out what it is meant to be. In this time, I remember. Mostly, terrible things and heartbreak, but sometimes the good times.
I do not let my mind wander to the extremes of either end for in both places are memories I cannot bear to keep in my mind. In one direction, the road that leads to a blood spattered plas-steel corridor, in the other, Her. Both are far too lovely and terrible and if I get too close to those memories I have the whisky. I drink it and it keeps them at bay and I can wander through the memories that are closer to center.
Time becomes hazy and even further from absolute. Sometimes, the whisky is gone in a few minutes and merits a refill. Other times…
Sweet elixir, help me to remember and forget in the same swallow.
Okay let’s break it down like a shotgun, folks. You see, there is something very sick and wrong with the way things are today. Not just in the general sense but on a very individual level. Not even just a societal thing, but; you,you,YOU, and; me, me, ME!
It is so easy to point the finger and say no, not me, not me, sir. You are mistaken,you see I read Foucault and I have several bound books on my shelf that I look at longingly. No there is no wool over my eyes. But, you’re wrong. The thing is you have been deceived to believe that that matters. It doesn’t, you’re not beautiful enough and I’m sorry but it’s a problem.
Everything has become so visual and that’s the problem. Before reality was just reality, plain and simple. You walked out side and you saw a drunk at your door, or you’d see one travesty after another and it would be real and you would become desensitized that way. Now nothing is real. Everything that is visually consumed is some sort of magic trick and the magicians are the beautiful people.
People used to be so in tune with each other that there was a communal unspoken language that could be interpreted as telepathy. Now? People have to be overt. There is no more body language, instead just bright colours that we wear obscenely to make ourselves different from the next person. “Oh gosh, Lucy, you wore blue today? Fuck me, Lucy, you stupid bitch today is a pastel yellow day.” Yeah, yeah… I know it all sounds insane, but you know. Deep down inside you know.
We are weeding out ugliness in our ranks. Even now there are legal proceedings to determine if someone is beautiful enough to be right or wrong. Before, the gods could preside over trial by combat, but now that the gods have all been murdered in their sleep there is no real justice. So, people have tried to make themselves beautiful by mutilating their bodies, or tapping into a sub-genre of not-so-ugly so that they too can be loved. But, the devil is in the details. They may pass for a while, but they might have kids and when others realized they have passed themselves off as beautiful they will kill those children. Trust me, it’s already happening.
I would feel bad for those beautiful people if they weren’t fucking things up for our species so much. They have performed the magic trick too well, they have gotten their way. Now, that is all there is to aspire to. You have to be beautiful or else. Maybe not this generation, maybe not the next, but soon, in the grand scheme of things they are going to start culling. They will be praised for it. How could they not? You’ve already seen it happen. The beautiful blonde girl goes to the hovel to help and on a mission of world betterment, but at the end they simply got some pictures and videos of them beside the ugly people. It is proof that their ultimate plans of genocide were benevolent.
Eventually, it will just be the beautiful ones. They will die in opulence with a mirror overhead, but that too will come to an end. They will be brilliant and beautiful and they will have destroyed anything unique about humanity and then once that is gone they will kill each other out of spite. The killing will be barbaric, that’s one thing about ugly folks like me, we are good killers. Beautiful people want everything to be clean, you know, a fell swoop. Well that’s not how it goes when you want to kill your fellow man. Plus, in the pursuit of beauty I am assuming they will have forgotten a lot of important things along the way.
Ha-ha! I can’t help but laugh. It a real fucking tickler, you know? The old adages are true and none truer than beauty being skin deep. You know how I know? Because I have ripped and torn into people. With my bare hands even and let me be the first to tell you what is inside is not pretty at all. Sure, there is a certain aesthetic to it. Indeed, indeed I will be the first to admit that there is something about blood and gore, but you tear a man open and things get messy quick.
Anyway, anyway, you don’t need my life story. You have most of it on camera anyway don’t you? Can you hear me out there? Can you heeeeaaaarrrrr me?
Burn me up…
…let me pretend I was beautiful in the dark.
These last breaths I breathe in defiance of what we have become.
* * * *
“God-fucking-damnit!” A man leans heavily on a desk equipped with a microphone that sits not far from his dry, much chewed, lips.
“What is it? Have you managed to talk to him? The cutters should be through the hull in a minute or two.”
The man’s shoulders hunch and his head drops lower, “No. He’s gone.”
“WHAT?!”
A pause
“The cutters are through… Oh, Christ.” The woman watching the progress of the rescue team covers her mouth. Her eyes are wide with fear and disbelief.
“He killed them.”
“I thought you were communicating with him? We saw the life-signs they were good. He had enough air to last another 10-15 minutes at least. We were going to save him!”
The man shakes his head and looks over at the woman in the command station with him. She is tall and blonde, her lips are perfect and full and despite the ordeal they had been through the last hour trying to rescue the floating ship, she looked delightful.
He stops a moment to consider her and what the lone survivor said.
“I don’t know how to tell you this, Lucy, but that bastard talked himself to death.”
Not knowing you is pleasurable in some sense of the word. You see, it is because knowing you in earnest would fill my heart beyond its capacity. It would fill and fill and begin to overflow, ultimately consuming me in the process. So, it could be said that I am better off not truly knowing you so that I may remain me and avoid the changes that I have grown to fear in myself.
This banal and ludicrous theory of keeping true knowledge of you at a distance, does not mean that you have not invaded my thoughts. To the contrary, there are swirls and currents of you that penetrate my waking hours and force my mind to wander and float in these imaginary estuaries of you. I am surprised and thankful my mind applies well maintained brakes and screeches to a halt in front of the effigy of you that has been built up in my mind. I am even more surprised when it comes to life and begins to perambulate and make its way into other segments of my psyche.
I am glad of the tenuous nature of you. It allows a certain liberty when it comes to the perversions of my mind when we enter the boudoir of my memory palace. Once there, you look back at me; naked, beautiful, and smiling with the invitation for me to do my worst and in the process fulfill your own desires.
You are not mine. Let’s be clear and account for some realities of our situation. I know I am not unique as an individual who admires you. There are many, I am no fool, I see the numbers and the views you receive and this is okay too. I mean, there is a subdued ecstasy that twirls around inside me as your projected glow reflects off my own pale, sun deprived features. I am resigned, but also comfortable with the fact that your virtual presence is ephemeral and not necessarily directed at me. Perhaps, it is a pathetic admission to say so, but I am okay with it. I’m okay, I swear.
On the subject of reaffirmation, these distances and barriers and payment plans that we have put between each other may indeed be for the best. You see I worry about your proximity and the physiological effects that may result if we were in the same room. I have experienced sensory overload in the form of a pistol being pressed to my temple and, darling, that pistol has nothing on you.
You are opulent in the way we understand divinity. You are gorgeous like electricity illuminating a forgotten place filled with innumerable riches. I sometimes wonder if a goddess allowed her reflection to be born of earth and then I remember that you are your own goddess and I have been genuflecting for sometime now. I tell you this as a somewhat honest man, that should you find yourself in my little corner of the moon, I promise you will drink for free.
The Lunar Speakeasy 