Tag Archives: romance

January 2, 2012

Stop tempting me!

By welcometoflavorcountry

“Stop tempting me! Stop tempting me!” she cried out, far after when I had tried to kiss her on the cheek.

“Alright, alright! Sheesh,” I said as I sighed.

There was play in her voice and heavy amounts of alcohol on her breath. She had in her hand a small packet of cocaine and I wondered if these were some of the “party favors” her friend had promised us would be at his friend’s gathering by the ocean.

Her friend told us of the party when we sat in his beefy pick-up truck at two a.m., having had driven us to her place from the bar.

I hadn’t thought we couldn’t go – I reminded her she had a dog who needed let out to go pee and would need to be let out again in the morning. And we couldn’t take the dog with us – her friend said he wasn’t comfortable making that call since the event wasn’t at his place.

I wasn’t too keen on going out to the coast and drinking the night away. Although I was sure, as a relatively mellow individual, it would be a night I wouldn’t forget. Not to mention great fodder for my writing. I decided that despite her inebriated state, I would let her make the final call. When I am with her I don’t hold back. I say yes to everything she wants to do.

She flubbed her way through half-spoken sentences until it emerged that she thought it would be best to look after the dog and leave it at that. I got out of the white pick-up and that’s when she paused in the truck. I couldn’t tell what was happening until she showed me the baggie with the white powder inside. It wasn’t much – maybe enough for a few lines.

As her friend drove off she said, “I’ll do it if you do it.”

I smiled. “No thanks.” And that was when I tried kissing her – as she groped in the dark for that connection between her key and the lock at the front door.

Her boyfriend wouldn’t have liked any of this much. I don’t know if I cared. It was hard to care when we both knew she was with the wrong person. But she had made a commitment and I struggled to respect that when I could only see how much she clicked with me. How she told me I have the things she loves but never in such a direct manner. She was probably oblivious to all she did to me, because the alternative is that she was malicious to a disturbing degree. I prefer to think she’s splendid and flawless and that’s my right, even if it bites me in the end.

The dog was happy to see us and I let him out. He took a long piss in the courtyard behind her apartment – peed like a bitch, but was so relieved he could have cared less. We got ready for bed. I slept in hers, alone. She slept on the sofa bed with the dog.

In the morning I woke first. I took the opportunity to read and write. I talked to the dog. I drank a glass of water. She slept. I wanted to go curl up next to her, take the back spoon, and wake her to the sensation of my breath on her neck.

When she did arise, she did so with a groan and lazy attempts at movement.

“I drank too much last night. I’m really hung over,” she stated with a weight on her voice.

I asked her where the coke was.

“What coke?” she asked.

“The coke your friend gave you last night.”

“What friend?” she asked and I could tell she honestly didn’t know what I was talking about.

“The friend of yours that drove us home. I don’t remember his name. He had a truck. Was kind of a bigger fellow.”

“Oh! Luc!” A pause. “He gave me coke?” she asked, surprised. “I don’t remember anything from last night.”

“Nothing?”

“I remember Lacey and I did shots at the bar but after that I don’t recall anything. What else happened?”

I mused to myself. “Besides getting coke from your friend?” I paused. “Eh, nothing.”

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , | posted in Non-fiction

March 21, 2011

Pope Killdragon

By welcometoflavorcountry

I grew up in the same neighborhood as Tim Showalter.

Our families went to the same church for a number of years and I was in the same grade as his older brother. After I graduated college we got to know each other fairly well while we both lived in our hometown. We’re still friends although now he lives in Philadelphia and I live in Boston.

Tim is also a musician and under the moniker Strand of Oaks he has put out a remarkable album, Pope Killdragon. Having known Tim for a long time, I thought that connection made for a unique opportunity for my own creativity. I decided to take each of the songs on the album and use them as inspiration to write something. Hopefully you like some of what you read. You can listen to each of the songs off Pope Killdragon here.

10. Pope Killdragon

I know this is kind of awkward, but I was wondering what your thoughts might be regarding a dramatic, volatile relationship between the two of us. I know, I know – it sounds ridiculous, but just hear me out.

My thought was that it might be somewhat passionate and also somewhat catastrophic. I don’t want to destroy you or corrupt you – I think we’re both too old for that. We’ve both witnessed too many things to go back to having any sense of innocence that could be shattered.

But I really like you. I like your teeth. They’re wonderful in their imperfection. And I think the things you dislike about yourself are absolutely adorable. Your diminutive size is something upon which you take umbrage but the way in which you carry yourself is remarkably strong. I can see where you draw your strength. It comes from your family and your friends. It comes from being independent.

Yet I feel this ache in my body. Deep down inside, past all the black stuff and whatever it was I had for dinner last night. Past the fear and the acumen I normally display. And this feeling (whatever it is) wants you to cut open my chest and crawl inside and seed my heart to grow a crop of fruit so rich that once you get out of my body and sew me back up and clean yourself off we can both enjoy it when it’s ripe. Just you and I. And never Eddie Rabbit. (But maybe Crystal Gayle?)

The skin is fresh and crisp and it has the sweetest, richest taste. Trust me, you’ll love it. Once you find the meat of the fruit it gets even better. It’s so brilliant and filling, but too much of it and you’ll groan in blasted sickness. Vomiting it up is something fiercely rotten. You’ll never want it again if you go too far. So take your time with it and enjoy it while it lasts.

See, I’ve read your book and you’ve read mine. I know your words and how you sculpt them to create the person I see you as. But they give me hope. Hope in romance and a future and a redemption outside of god. A salvation we have both separately agreed we don’t need.

I want us to read to one another like you used to read to him. Lounging sideways over the arm rests in our respective la-z-boy recliners. Our silence interrupted by the next person to say, “Oh! You have to hear this!” Or perhaps it will just be my loud, abrasive laugh or your giggle.

I don’t know much, but I’m pretty sure you have the same faults I do. We both can’t commit. We both desire our independence too much. We are suffering from the after effects of a twisted youth, trying to understand what it means without a social structure we once adored and a lack of cohesion of what we were told we needed to survive. How is it we’re still surviving? Maybe we just need each other? Or nothing at all? Or like I said, perhaps we just need something dramatic and volatile.

However, I know that after a continuous diet of this fruit that has blossomed from my heart, you’ll find yourself one day gorging on it. And you’ll be forced to release it up from whence it came and let it go. And you should. Just let it go.

I’ll hold your hair back behind your head and bring you a damp cloth so that you might wipe your mouth. But don’t think I don’t know what it all means. Even with my chest not fully healed from the harvest of the crop, you will no doubt rise from your posture of servitude to the porcelain throne and thump me in the solar plexus with the butt of your palm. I know how that feels and I’ve dealt the blow a few times myself.

It will be time for me to go. But you and I both know I’ll still be there for you. And I have no doubt that in spite of our faults and in spite of any once-sweetened and now rotten fruit we might partake in, one day when we are living in New York City and an apocalyptic event struck – the type we’d assumed would only be found in the movies – we’d find ourselves outside on the same street, looking up to a darkened sky at our impending doom and then at one another.

While there would be a brief questioning in each of our minds as to how we both ended up in our last moment on earth at the same time and place, we’d smile gently at one another. And we would both extinguish gloriously in an obscene event of gratuitous violence. And we’d be okay with that. We would expect that. And nothing less.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Fiction

December 30, 2010

Hey I Miss You (Part 1)

By welcometoflavorcountry

I’m really not sure how I feel about this story anymore, but figured I’d share it anyway.

Originally from issue #10, April 2007.

“You know, there is seriously a good chance I may never fall in love,” Jim says to his friend Paul looking up from his writing.

Paul, a scrawny college senior with black messy hair slightly hanging in front of his eyes and sporting a yellow Bad Brains t-shirt with the band’s ROIR tape cover on the front, glances up from his book while still trying to finish the sentence he’s reading. He mumbles a “Hmm?” only half paying attention.

“I said there is seriously a good chance I may never fall in love,” Jim, repeats himself, this time more firmly. Jim is the nerdier counterpart to Paul, with wire-rimmed glasses, short brown hair and wearing a button-up collared shirt. While not masking his interest in all things computer-related it does belie his more non-mainstream music tastes which range from Mr. Bungle to James Brown and old Green Day.

“I’d rather doubt that,” Paul says skeptically. A few seconds of silence pass before Paul adds, “Wait, you’ve never been in love before?”

“Uh, no,” Jim says hesitantly.

“Wow.”

“Why, have you?”

“Yeah, a couple times. Don’t worry though. It comes easier to some of us than others. Besides, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.”

“Why do you say that?” Jim asks. “Did you have a bad experience with it?” Jim finally puts down his pen on his notebook. Sensing that this is leading to a deeper conversation, Paul loosely places the bookmark in his book and lays it face down on their table at the coffeehouse.

“I wouldn’t say either experience was bad, per se, it’s just that love is a very intense emotion and often times it will turn you into someone you’re not. Later on, months or years down the line you wonder why you did what you did or said what you said.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard all that before,” Jim responds. “I was hoping you’d have some other insights beyond that.”

Paul laughs a quick “ha” and then says, “Afraid not man. What makes you think you’ll never fall in love anyway?”

“I dunno. I’m just not feeling the possibilities I guess. It seems like my life is all such a routine: school, work, sleep. It’s hard to imagine anything else.”

“Yeah, I hear ya,” Paul says, blowing on his still steaming cup of coffee.

“Does that really help at all?” Jim inquires, motioning to Paul’s hand holding the cup of coffee.

“What?” Paul asks, looking at his hand holding the piping hot cup of java. “Oh. Uh, I dunno.” Paul takes a sip and the warm liquid burns his tongue. “Ahh – still too hot,” he quips, rubbing his tongue around his mouth.

“So what are you reading, anyway?” Jim asks, pointing to the book lying face down in front of Paul.

“Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.”

“Any good?”

“I have no idea. I literally just started reading it.”

“What class is it for?”

“Modern Russian History. Solzhenitsyn was a political prisoner in the ‘40s and ‘50s in the Soviet Union. He also had internal exile imposed on him.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, according to my professor’s definition today in class,” Paul thinks for a second, “it’s ‘the detention of people in specific places by force.’ It’s within the person’s own country, but usually out in the middle of nowhere.”

“Ha. If that was a condition of the mind, I think it would be vaguely synonymous with love,” Jim quips, laughing. “Speaking of, do you mind if I ask what happened with the two relationships when you were in love?”

“Not at all. The most recent time was just last year with Maria. You remember her, right?”

“Yeah, totally,” Jim replies, recalling the girl a year ahead of them in college with the choppy brown hair and piercings in her nose, ears and lip. The seminal indie rocker minus the elitist attitude. She broke up with Paul after graduating and moving way. The two of them had been going out for a couple of years. It didn’t come as much of a surprise to either one of them when it happened, but it certainly didn’t make it any easier on Paul. He spent a good three days in his bedroom, coming out only to use the bathroom and to get the occasional glass of water. Jim was finally able to coax him out to go to a house party where Paul promptly got incredibly blitzed, fucked some girl he didn’t know and puked all over someone’s bed. It was one hell of a rebound.

“So yeah,” Paul responded, flickering through all his memories of a two year relationship in the course of five seconds, “you know that situation. The other time I was in love was before Maria – it was a very strange experience to say the least.” Paul leans back in his chair and exhales, staring blankly at the book in front of him. Nervously, Jim chimes in, “Hey man, if you don’t want to talk about it that’s ok.”

“No, no. It’s cool. I just haven’t talked about it much – hell, I haven’t thought about it in forever. It almost seems like another life,” his voice trails and for a split second he’s somewhere else. Paul wipes his hand over his face trying to clear his thoughts. Suddenly he asks Jim, “Do you remember the band I was in a few years ago?”

Ah, how could Jim forget Ache? Named after a Jawbreaker song, they were the toast of the indie scene in their college town for their two-year existence. Culminating in a couple of regional tours, an EP and an album, Ache was a good mix of punk and indie rock. Their live show was always a good time, usually degenerating into a full-on party with at least one band member drunk. What else could you expect from a band full of college students?

“Paul, I was at half your shows dude. Of course I remember.”

“Oh yeah. I guess that just seems like so long ago I haven’t thought about most of it in a while.”

“That’s too bad. You guys were good.”

“Thanks. Anywho, I was the guy in the band answering most of the email from our website and so I’d get the occasional email from some fan from somewhere in California or Texas who heard our stuff either online or some other way. They’d write and I’d write back just to be nice and answer any questions they might’ve asked.

“Anyway, one day my freshman year I get this email from a girl in New York City. She’s a student at Columbia and seemed sincere and friendly and after the initial email we kept writing, talking about our lives, schools, what inspired us and so on. Well, this went on for a few months and before I know it we’re talking on the phone a few times a week and sometimes for like four or five hours at a time. How I kept from failing my classes is beyond me.

“The girl’s name was Alex and she was a junior and lived in an apartment with a few roommates in Manhattan near the campus. And as weird as it may seem for people to meet over the internet, that’s totally what was happening. We were getting to know each other better and she really liked the songs I was writing and I liked that she was older and bookish. And you know how it is meeting someone over the internet.” Paul quipped, knowing his friend had made quite a few friends in the online gaming community.

“You can really get to know them to some degree but usually only what they want you to know. So after months of phone calls and emails and us opening up to one another and eventually sharing our feelings for one another, she told me I should come visit her in the spring since we both had the same spring break.

“So I bought my plane ticket and when spring break came I flew in to JFK and took a cab to her place. Here I was, nineteen, by myself in New York, and about to meet some girl I had primarily communicated with over the internet and spend four days with her.”

“Had you ever been to New York before?” Jim asked.

“Yeah, once with my family when I was about ten,” Paul replied.

“Okay. So is this the part where you tell me Alex was really a 48 year old man who weighed 300 pounds?” Jim questioned, laughing.

Paul smiled. “Hardly. Of course we had traded pictures beforehand. She looked pretty much like she did in her pictures: maybe 5’2” or 5’3”, short black hair, black eyes, just incredibly cute. I finally got to her apartment and she buzzed me up, I lugged my bag up the stairs and knocked on her door and there she was, finally before me. She gave me this big hug and squealed out, ‘Paul! It’s so good to see you!’ I hesitated for a moment and then returned her embrace. And it was right at that point that I thought to myself, ‘You know what? I’m gonna treat this just like anything else. I’m not going to make this weird. I’m just going to pretend this is like a normal relationship.’

“And so there we were. She introduced me to her roommates and then I was all ready to crash out on the couch since it was late and I was tired from being in airports all day. But as I threw my stuff down on the couch she just looked at me and said, ‘What are you doing?’ I told her I was pretty tired and was going to crash on the couch. ‘Oh no,’ she said to me in a really coy voice, ‘you’re sleeping with me tonight.’ I swear dude, my penis went from half mast to full-on raging boner like that,” Paul said, snapping his fingers.

Jim laughed. “Nice. You’re one lucky guy.”

“Oh, just you wait,” Paul replied with a half-tortured smile. “This story only gets more fun from here on out.”

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , | posted in Fiction

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.