atom bomb baby

I awoke in the shivering dawn. That damn electric heater I bought decided to call it quits and burn out in the middle of the night. Jumped in the shower - I tell you, hot water is a blessing in these modern and enlightened times - dressed, and walked the few blocks to my favorite café for a good cup of coffee.

On a bright, cloudless morning, I ambled down the broken, trash littered sidewalk, striding, as I always do like I have a purpose or as someone leaving a crime scene. I passed a business which taught English as a second language and computer services. Standing outside in the chilled shadows of that mammoth, plate glass building were several students and teachers soliciting passerby with their services. One, a mop-haired young man in a retro, faux-leather pimp coat stopped me with an extended hand. I smiled, shook it. He was tall and held a mane of curly, black locks cascading down to slender shoulders. His face was light colored but held distinctive Mexican Indian features.

“Excuse me, sir. Do you speak English?” He asked smiling broadly.

“Fluently.” I said.

“Oh…then I suppose you don’t need to attend any of our classes?” He replied a bit taken back. That smile, though. “Is my English good?”

I had to admit, there wasn’t even an accent. “It’s perfect.” I said. I wanted to add, Just like you, but I ain’t no sappy faggot.

We clumsily shook hands again and stated we both would like to talk later as he focused his attention on other prospective by-passers.

At the café, I sat slurping down my third cuppa joe pretending not to be annoyed by the tiny tot who sat with an obese family behind me. The brat kept slamming a spoon onto the table. Ghastly. Pay the mesera and cut out into the bright blue mid-morning Mexican sky. Even at this time the streets were teeming with early morning shoppers bustling about their various affairs. As if led by phantom hands, I found myself standing across the street to Cinema Latino, Tijuana’s downtown adult theater. Obviously crumbling under her own weight and advanced age, new paint still could not make her whorish face seem any better. It had been years since I entered her pearly gates and wasn’t even certain the movie theater was even open for sordid business any longer. Yep. I noticed a local evasively slither through its cracked pane glass entrance.

Eventually, I found myself leaning against the wall in an alcove on the inside of the theater smoking on a cigarette so nasty lurking like the three other sexually frustrated assholes who hovered nearby in complete darkness among the smell of dried semen, unwashed genitals, and at my feet the black concrete floor was littered with cum coated tissue and shit stained used condoms.

Ahead of me, the enormous screen flickered a sad blue light onto the worn, warped seats of the theater. The stale air echoed with the screeching of a floppy boobed, coked out bimbo being fucked long and nasty from a tired looking stud. In the one hundred or so seats sat ten or so catatonic looking patrons - some smoked, some drank from smuggled bottles of alcohol, one wildly masturbated like an idiot to lure a potential blow job. No one paid him any mind. Toward the entrance stood a row of four bloated old monsters ready to pounce on anything willing coming through the door - nothing came.

He popped out of nowhere, stood in front of me in the murk, and grabbed my crotch. Speaking perfect English, he instantly began mumbling in drug fueled lust, "Fuck - so horny, man. I wanna see your ass." All the while fumbling at my belt, unbuttoning and pulling down my jeans.

In the half dark, he was handsome - black short cropped hair, moustache, dark skin, athletically built, in early twenties - except, something wasn't right. Another younger fag sided up to our groping and my seducer ordered to the fag in Spanish, "Suck his dick, man - get down there, suck his dick." The twinkish fag knelt in front of me and took my semi erect member in his mouth and began sucking - slurps that could be heard throughout the theater. My seducer began kissing my neck, my ears. I reciprocated and he pulls abruptly away, "No hickies, cabrone."

"Don't worry 'bout it." I smiled in the dark. Fine. Guess he doesn’t want his wife to know about his secret provocations.

Roughly whirled around and the guy begins kissing my ass, pulling out his fat, flaccid uncut cock - grinding it against me. Still, something wasn't right. He absolutely refused to touch my penis or kiss or any other type of normal physical contact. So, I'm standing there with my jeans around my calves with some twink blowing me and this hyper-sexual groping me.

The fag stops and whispers into my ear in Spanish, "Watch your money." Before he slinks back into the theater proper.

My seducer orders me to suck him off and I do. His cock - though quite nice - wouldn't get hard. He mumbled something to the effect that maybe if he watches some more of the movie, he can get an erection. I compose myself as he walks over to lean against the wall watching the movie. I check my wallet to find my money gone.

I side over to him and state, "All that just for seventy pesos?" That's all I had on me.

He returned back to the alcove, me pinning him in a corner. He nervously cooed, "C'mon, man - suck me some more."

I stood there, fists clenched, "Give it back."

He mumbles obscenities and something to the effect he is an addict - but, the handsome fucker knew he was trapped. I even got the old "I don't know what you're talking about."

I draw my lips close to his ear. I can feel his heart racing. "Look." I snarl, "You could have just asked for it - I would had given it to you...you really want your ass kicked over seventy pesos?"

He states, "What? You want it back? Here..." And hands me my crumpled bills from his jacket pocket. He begins to say something else, I abruptly stomp away.

Exiting the theater, I start the few blocks back to my apartment. Down that lonely stretch of crumbling warehouses and razor wire with the barking dogs and I think, Damn...I really need to get out of Tijuana...

Well past midnight and I sit here in a cocoon of cold darkness. No sound but the tapping of these keys and the steady hiss of the kerosene heater. It doesn't work too well. I'm so cold. My fingers aches. As I said - I sit here in paranoid angst. I feel like my chest is going to explode - as if my very heart is going to give out. Is it too late, I wonder - too late to fix this train wreck of a life I have created? I cannot take this existence much more. A long list of failures and let downs on all fronts. My life has been a poisoned river and I think I have come to its end. I want it to end. Really, what is left?

I am so bored of it all. All of it.

wishes outside my window

I am alone but I am not lonely. I could sit for hours by myself and enjoy the company of my arsenal: the journal, the pens, the laptop, the cigarettes, the coffee, even my own pain. My company comprises of the people who I watch, the content faces who pass. They are my kinsmen in being alone.

I could be amongst a crowd for hours and still feel detached. Words cannot slice through my skin. Hugs cannot engulf me enough. The odd thing is there is no reason to be lonely. Perhaps being lonely is being without reason.

I analyze the tepid sewage water running under the Tijuana bridge. Sunlight dances in the discolored and foul smelling water and its incandescent reflection ballets on my face. The concrete railing sizzles under my grip. For a moment I imagine what it would be like to drown. I am then confronted with the possibility that I may already be drowning.

The bridge is a million memories away. I understand what it is all about. There is a cycle here. The trick is to never stop. The workaround is to never settle. Be it an arsenal, a crowd, a bridge. Hang around only when needed and move on when it becomes necessary. From the arsenal to the crowd to the bridge. They interchange. They mesh. All I need do is learn to squeeze through the spaces.

I sit for hours and delight in my own company. I stand in a crowd and find reason to smile. I look across the water from the bridge and laugh with the sunlight. I have learned my own cycle. The spaces are my waltz.

meanwhile in mexico...

the human condition

Depression and anxiety are cruel ironies in how they propagate as illnesses. They invariantly begin as a result of something, at least. However, as those many somethings build upon themselves, like a bacterium becoming bacteria becoming a plague, the symptoms come to manifest as the result of nothing except of the time-tested commonality of their presence, comparable to a vampire invited into the home returning for blood whenever it chooses to take the fancy. Even where there is a trigger, it is hardly ever something the neurotypical mind would glance twice toward in retrospection - a tendency, may I add, that is far too often so scarce of the neurotypical mind. These afflictions act as a magnifying glass to darkness, and a fog before light.

Oh, then, what horrible plagues befall those with the great misfortune to have been blessed with the accursed traits of benignity, for what comes of that beautiful, innocent naïveté is, by definition, unwarranted. This is the macabre irony of the human condition.

We are undoubtably a destructive force. We are relentless. We march on with stomping feet and hungry hearts.

7 billion parasites and counting.

borrowed flesh

a story

He opened his mouth and a goddamn serenade burst forth. It filled the dank, windowless room, a melancholy violin to shake your head to, and a piano accompaniment keeps a steady pace. That’s when he began telling me the story of some hustler who fell in love with a man imprisoned for murder. Similar with the rest of his stories, it was dreadfully sad. But, it’s the way he tells it, as if he’s reciting from a book. Nonetheless, he sits there in the corner of the spartan room, hands on his knees, his head obscured by looming shadows and a glitchy body fading unpredictably.

Exactly two weeks was all I got in my new apartment before he moved in, without anyone’s fucking permission. Ghosts don’t need anyone’s fucking permission, after all. He referred to it as his old haunt, his favorite, his beloved home. For several days he’d simply stand and stare at the new lightbulb I’d installed. He hated it, he said. I would stare at him while he did that, admiring his infinite ink scribbles which formed his body, his featureless face, his silhouette that lacked precise detail.

The first story he told me was about a writer who realized he was slowly going insane. He didn’t ask me if he could narrate it, he just began. I had to close my laptop and listen to him tell the long and detailed story, because if there’s one thing I can never say no to, it’s a story.

Even on that first day, I could feel it. My stomach was lighter, I was feeling fatigued, hungrier, more lonely. He didn’t inform me what was happening back then. I found the pattern only a month later. Every time I heard a story of his, I felt worse, even if I somewhat took pleasure with the story.

“It’s a trade,” he stated, sitting perfectly still in his chair. “A story in exchange for sustenance.”

The lightbulb became dimmer as the days passed. It was quite luminescent when I first installed it. Now it was causing long and menacing shadows. It became exceptionally difficult to read in the room—my eyes would tire far too easily.

“You’d take away what I’ve eaten, just like that?” I rasp on an empty stomach.

“Do you want to hear a story?” he asked.

I did. I prepared a simple fruit salad for myself, sat at the table under the dim light, and ate its entirety, paying close attention. I slowly chewed the food, felt it turn to gooey pulp, swallowed, washing it down with tepid water. It was inside me now, and soon it would be gone, just like that. All the nutrition sapped. All the calories, proteins, carbs, you name it, whatever food is made of, whatever is in it that keep you alive: all sucked into the opaque vortex of my roommate.

“This story is about a writer who lost his muse,” he began.

The lightbulb flickered, blinked a few times, and then went out with a pop. In the cool darkness, I couldn’t see him at all, however I could still hear him garrulously continue his story. I could feel myself being sapped. I lay on the floor, too weak to stand.

I feebly roll over to face the stained ceiling and listen to his story until I was gone and I knew at that moment, I hit the point of no return.

all tomorrows darlings

I really don’t understand why I expect things to be different with each passing day, nothing ever is. The same old crap day in and day out, sometimes I feel as though I am living on auto-pilot. As if someone else is living this so called life of mine. I truthfully can’t complain because I chose it and choose to continue living it.

Spent the afternoon at Cinema Latino. On screen some cracked out cunt was getting it nasty in her well-used, tattooed snatch. The coughs, slurps, and random wheezes of anonymous lust from the Baker's Dozen of fat or ugly or hoary perverts permeated the murky theater. Two seats to the left of me, handsome Latin transient kid stroked his wiener like a masturbating idiot. I attempt to make him but get hostile flashes from cold undersea eyes. Whatever.

I whip out my own nastiness when out of the inky murk ambles a young Mexican lad - khaki shorts, blue knit polo shirt, white baseball cap – youngster slinks next to me silent and furtive. Takes my rigid joint in his frail hands and wraps his tongue around my head. Sucks and blows like a champ - my hand glides along his lithe backside, feeling sinewy muscles as he bobs slowly up and down on my cock. He's good - minutes later I am squirting semen into his mouth with gasps through clenched teeth. Before I can button my fly, Little Faggito creeps back into the void and bee lines to the men’s room where the voracious ancient Pompadoured Fairy lurks.

I stroll outside for a smoke – sun blasting through a bright blue Mexican sky. Puffing on my Lucky Strike, Little Faggito exits blinking in the sun – however, before we can chit or chat, Old Vato rides up shirtless on a rickety bike and begins yapping.

"Hey, guero, what's up?" He smiles a toothless face of an old woman, hair a mane of grey knots.

"Not much." I croak. I don't know this person.

"Need anything?" Old Vato whispers down empty alleyways.

I dramatically think and half jest, "Got any coke?"

"Come on." He says and I follow him into the sooty, rubbish filled alley behind the theater - Little Faggito in tow and I haven't the slightest idea why. Red brick walls in black soot as graffiti claw at the sun. Smell of urine and dried shit and dust clog the nostrils.

After preliminary checks for patrols, Old Vato retrieves a small plastic bag out of the folds of his ratty clothes and smiles. Behind a smelly green dumpster as the passing bombaderos blows and moans; I sample his wares. Snort - wheeee! Snort - wheee!

Little Faggito disappears with the look of a wounded fawn as I slap the ten into Old Vato's calloused dirty hand. Look of wearied petulance - Old Vato zips off down the broken alley on his bicycle and I bebop back down town… amid broken bottles and rusted tin cans a tramp staggers past behind the cinema, his dirty right hand glides along the concrete wall leaving an iridescent trail of greasy slime...

Coke takes effect and I hit centro feeling quite yummy on this dead Tijuana day - sun seems to suck the very life out of you and you want nothing - nothing but death. I digress and stop at Bar Noa Noa for a quick beer.

Took a wobbly stool in the bar scoping out the scarce hotties who sat around the old wooden counter. Some sullen and alone as only faggots can be, others in animated conversations with friends or tricks. Each of us nursed the all mighty caguama in front of us. I was feeling it - being my third one. I do believe I am becoming an alcoholic.

The bartender and friend, Carmen - only old whore I ever cared about - pointed out that Miguel, was standing just outside the cantina doors - waiting. Waiting to talk with me. I uttered to Carmen it was a public bar and he could come inside if he wanted to talk. You see, Miguel and I had an argument a few days ago and I suppose he was under the impression I would be your run of the mill simpering faggot americano squirming back to him for forgiveness. How little he knows this cold imperious homo, verdad?

As I was saying, he's standing out in the grime and the smog with the honking traffic when finally Carmen beckons him to come inside. Meekly Miguel sits next to me - we shake hands. The wonderful thing about alcohol is it has a tendency of making things better. We talked and drank and shot a few rounds of pool - all was hunky-dory once again. As a fact, after I left the bar and stood in the lurking shadows of the dark street - Miguel followed me, I had the intention of going home alone. But looking into those beautiful brown eyes with the thick lashes - What the fuck?, I thought.

Back at my trap, Miguel was garrulous - going on about the maudlin woes of general life.

"You gonna stay the night here - or you wanna go home?" I asked. "I am exhausted and want to sleep."

He optioned to stay and I commanded he sleep in his boxers. Peeling off each other’s clothes we lay on the coverlet entwined like hibernating pythons. Kisses in the night turned into a massage. Rolled onto my stomach, Miguel smoothed away much needed tension - had to admit - the boy can give a mean massage. I reach up and brush against his erection in his boxers.

"Que es eso?" (What is this?) I say jokingly.

"Si sabes." (You know what it is.) He smiles in the dark.

My boxers are pulled slowly halfway down my legs and with saliva applied, Miguel slides in. He grunts and puffs lunging and thrusting into me before he yanks himself out and shoots his semen onto my ass. He plops down onto the bed next to me - still drunk out of his mind. My buzz still buzzing. Laughter. Pecks on the forehead and cheeks. Arms wrap around smooth brown frame.

We shower and dry and lay quiet in the warm darkness under the noise of the ranchero music from the radio. Suddenly, Miguel bolts up and dashes to the restroom and vomits loudly and abundantly into the toilet. Poor drunken kid.

He mentions it would be better if he went home and after borrowing taxi fare - we dress and I walk him to the taxi stand making a date to see him the following evening for a movie. In the somber chill of the night, I stroll back to my flat realizing I am beginning to take an interest with that guy...

everything is different but nothing has changed

If truth be told, I write – albeit unpublishable atrocities not suitable for your garden variety traveler or overt homosexual - nonetheless it is what it is. And this wayward literary existence has seized a horrendous foothold on the old mental state. I attain few contacts with the world nowadays. The expats here – drunken, misplaced, long-winded – voice opinions on what I should do. How I should live my life. I smile, I agree while watching the taco vendor strain past with his wobbly, splintered cart of decomposed food that will kill a stray dog two hours later. It being apparent I don’t give a flying fuck what my constituent’s tiresome opinions be.

Who are these people? Who are they? Why do they consider themselves the fountainheads of virtue and righteousness? They dwell in shanty adobes hidden in tenuous barrios; row upon row of decrepit concrete dwellings – in a vain attempt to one up one another with the I Lived Longer In Mexico So I Know More Than You About Mexico routines - and yet, they feel it necessary to judge me?

Sigh.

So I find myself hunkered down at this café on a bright, warm February afternoon writing infuriating, dismal prose regarding my current state in painful detail. It genuinely put me in a funk. In truth, I should be out with friends drinking and enjoying this fine day. William S. Burroughs once revealed to his son in a letter that the life of a writer was a solitary one. Old junkie sure wasn’t talkin’ outta his ass, you dig?

I will never live up to the image I have nourished of myself - an unkempt man exhausting his days in a dimly lit room, surrounded by dusty books spotted in roach droppings and empty bottles of tequila, putting fantastic narratives to paper and drinking black coffee with a burnt-out cigarette sagging listlessly on his scowling lip. That dream, I should believe, is dead. All dead. There is nothing left to do but go through that dream’s pockets and look for loose change.

Still, that’s no reason to stop.

A distinct wave of melancholy wracked my form. I was drowning in depression and under that fucking shattering blue sky of Mexico. From my café table in the Plaza, I watched as the boys and locals passed - this was it...nothing beyond. A Dead End Void. And that menacing void in every casual face.

“Go for a walk.” I mumbled.

I retrieved a twenty peso note out of my pants pocket and pay the jovencito for my breakfast; strolled out of the Plaza lighting a cigarette - the way was strewn with used condoms and empty prescription bottles in the glaring sun. High adobe walls honeycombed by unheated apartment cubicles and cafés, some a few feet deep, others extending out of sight in a maze of dirty restaurants and dank corridors splashed with the faded candy color of dusty trinkets and curios.

An entire block of malignant female prostitutes lined shoulder to shoulder grabbing and goosing as I walked by.

“Psst. Psst.”

“Wanna fuck, meester?”

“Twenny dallah make you hallah.”

“Watch me fuck my brother?”

“Plo chob?”

Occasionally hassled by intimidating, tattooed covered cholos asking if I needed to score any heroin or crystal or guided to that special farmacia that sells whatever I am looking for.

“Doubt it.” I muttered and moved on.

Did a loop-de-loo and found myself syphoned into Bar Ranchero. Bottom floor empty save for several tired looking old fags and an overweight transvestite who tottered drunkenly on glittering cha-cha heels. Sat at the bar, boy-whore in white jeans stood on the other end of the bar, kept eyeing me and rubbing his semi-engorged moneymaker. I ignored him and drank my Sol. Struck up a conversation with two guys sitting next to me. One real ugly and short and the other okay in a plain looking way.

“You visiting, gringo?”

“No.” I husked. “I reside here at the moment.”

“You running from the law?” Asked the ugly one with a smile of large, discolored teeth.

I smirked, “No…nothing like that.”

“You running from something.” He gave me a knowing look. “Why else would un Americano live in TJ?”

“I guess I am simply attempting to find my time/space location.”

“Time/space location? What are you? An astronaut?”

They had enough of my esoteric shit and made their way upstairs leaving me alone under the glassy, meth induced stare of the boy-whore. Crazy mambo jazz be-bop blared from the rockola. A bottle half-empty with my third beer is alone at the bar littered with wadded napkins and beer nut husks.

Sigh.

I paid my tab and ambled in a depressed funk back to my rented, windowless room. I really wish I hadn’t missed that flight. This town has become a vapid drag for me…