Infatuation (Part 1) � Vince
Nothing in my life so far had defined the banalities of a mundane existence. Although I was not a banal person by my outer shell, no one knew the trite chords attached to me. In recollection, my life was conducted in the same fashion ever since I left high school eight years ago. The same mother, Russian cooking, apartment, and secret desires I held for interminable defined my narrow views. My mother stayed in the apartment, all day and every day, and cooked large quantities of fatty, potato-based food for both of us. Every night when I came home exhausted from work, she watched the same soap opera that was populated with the same actors playing the same characters. Only my occupations seemed to change. From a clumsy brick-layer, I graduated to a tardy pizza-delivery worker, and then moved on to be a janitor at South High School, from which I was imminently fired after an official caught me out in a dress and out of uniform. After I returned home every night, eating a late dinner that sat like lead on my stomach, I ventured out to Purple Fingernails, an underground club for transgendered adults like myself. For endless nights, I drank, smoked, and played pool with the denizens I grew to know. A few times, however, in which I felt depressed, someone would take me back to his place, and I�d end up having a one-night stand, never seeing him again. The next day, as I walked to work again, I would feel trashy and submissive and vow to never participate in one again, no matter hoe depressed I felt. But, if I had listened to my conscience, I would have, but I listened to my instincts in my head that told me I wanted sex. My mother knew where I was, but never what I was doing. If I tried to explain my series of one-night stands to her, I would paint myself as a hooker. Surprisingly, though, she did not have qualms about my cross-dressing or bisexuality and frequently said, �You like both guys and girls? Just make sure no girls break our heart, and no men try to use you.� About the attire, she only had qualms if I wore any new clothes; if they were her old clothes I had her permission to wear them. However, I happened to be a head taller than she, thus making her clothes impossible to wear.
At Purple Fingernails, I met Vlad, another cross-dressing Russian-American, who had similar interests as mine. But, Vlad, unlike me, had a stable job at a body graphics parlor adjacent to the club. However, after a few nights of talking over cheap alcohol and listening to the clamor of billiards, he admitted that he was incompetent and merely worked at the parlor because he dated his boss for a brief period of time. The only design that he could successfully create was the banal red heart with an arrow through it, which few customers wanted because of its hokey and hackneyed connotation. Most wanted one of the gothic nocturnal creatures, gargoyles, or dragons, none of which he could draw properly. In high school, I desired to be an art major, but since I was the mere source of income in my family, further schooling was not an option and my talents of drawing and writing poetry were headed in the direction of oblivion. But, when Vlad mentioned his incompetence as a tattoo artist, I devised a plan to employ myself and to improve his skills; if I taught him to draw the designs, he would teach me to use the needle, and therefore give me a job a few steps up from that of a high school janitor. Within a month of teaching Vlad, I had a steady job at the body graphics parlor. Within the same amount of time, the parlor also drew more business since two competent artists could create.
From the day I met him, Vlad became my closest friend, but I could not call him �best,� since no one, aside from my mother, had ever thought of me in amicable terms. Every secret was shared between us, no matter its insignificance. Some nights, I would stay at his house, and others, he would at mine. My mother, however, disliked Vlad, despite he was the catalyst to give us a larger income, but I never comprehended her reasoning.
Soon, Vlad, too, became mundane in my life. I would expect to see him at parlor every day, and there, we would work, talk, and then, leave for the evening, before seeing each other again at the club. Despite, I still adored him, although my existence continued to remain empty and fruitless. From the depths of my stomach, an ache erupted, changing into a whine, and shedding acidic tears. The longing for someone usurped me, I knew. Never in my life had I experienced love, aside from maternal affection; love, to me, was a figurative terms for a utopia of inescapable bliss. In the past, I had boyfriends, but they were frivolous; the aspect of a relationship, at the time, seemed useless.
I desired to hold someone in my arms at night, with the moon shining its dim, mellow light upon us in our dark world. For the night, I could gaze into him, becoming lost in his convoluted ways. No one, nothing would possess any other importance. Although words would not be exchanged, emotions and feelings would replace him. I would breathe in his distinct scent and taste it on my tongue. The night, like any other, would be frigid, but his warm breath on my nape would defy that. Enraptured bliss would pervade our experience. Only when the sun peaked through the opaque curtains in my room would I recognize the day as an absolute happening � a period of drudgery to withstand for a few hours.
Perhaps I had, indeed, found my lover. Maybe the instance had been coincidental, but I discovered him independently, assimilating him into my trite life. Walking about the ice-covered piles of snow that glistened in the moonlight, I noticed him wandering, cloaked in black, looking like a meandering shadow in a world of pristine whiteness. The moonlight irradiated him, until he became fully lucid in my field of vision. His hair was rumpled and wind-blown and appeared as a dark shade of purple in the light. A lone flower, he poked his head up into the barren world, only to find out that nothing familiar existed. He, himself, was gradually becoming moribund � withering away to a fate of nothingness. But, in gazing upon him as I headed home from work, I knew I had to rescue this dying beauty, for I could not watch him disappear in front of my eyes. My incumbent duty seemed to be to take him home and inject him with a new, vivid life. Jesse was the name of this boy, dying in both of our eyes. Into my realm, the door was opened for him, and I allowed him to step inside for an extended period of time. And, now, infatuation described my life that revolved about him as much as it did me.
Jesse did not appear particularly beautiful or possess any redeemable pulchritude, but some aspects of him enticed me to gaze at him with my infatuation. Very few times did he speak, and usually when he did, he stuttered or spoke softly and timidly. Although he was sixteen � ten years younger than I � age did not seem to play much of a factor. Looks, as well, were trivial. Superficially, he was not thin � in fact, slightly on the heavy side � and unnaturally pale. He covered his visage in a convoluted mess of makeup, which was continually reapplied after crying. Despite each coat, I still noticed the remnants of a tear-streaked face of sadness. His eyes, however, captured my curiosity. Whenever I gazed into them, such as when we talked before falling asleep, I observed more than the obvious dark pupils. Deep-set in his skull, his eyes were cast over by a dark shadow. The darkened realm of his pupils drew me in because of its purity. With a single spot of light on their surfaces, the glossy globes of light � the clich�d windows to his soul � overshadowed everything on his face. Their implication seemed to be that he was clandestine about his past life, and the eyes were the vaults that held those facts. I desired to open those vaults to release all of the secrets that needed to alleviate him from his misery. Something disturbed him, I knew, as I stared at those dark, angst-ridden eyes; something that he could not aptly describe to me.
Despite I was infatuated with him, I never furthered my actions in that path to corrupt him to fulfill my internal desires. Each night, I watched him as he slept, appearing like a coveted lump beneath the blankets. As he slept peacefully, he snored slightly, but I lay awake in bed, vivified by my infatuation and anxiety about life simultaneously. Longing and yearning possessed me as I lay in a supine position on the bed. During the nights we spent at Purple Fingernails, I tried to protect him from everyone, for they would taint his innocence. Innocence, I admitted, was not an aspect of him; Jesse could not be an abstaining pure person when his cigarette addictions were as strong as mine. In any room, I sensed his presence merely by the odiferous odor of cigarettes, a pungent scent that ubiquitously spread through every room he entered. However, such an aspect was minor, for I frequently smoked as well. Both of us, despite this crux, continued to smoke habitually every night, with my mother.
Despite that factor, Jesse remained an innocent soul in my eyes, and I abhorred his contamination by any being outside of out realm. The world, from my experiences in it, was replete with impurities, poised to destroy any virgin in sight. Observing him sleep, soundlessly but tenuously, my heart plummeted into melancholy depths in the same manner as my depression. However, he coveted certain things, hoping that I would not notice his flaws. His weight, primarily, depressed him the most. The expression on his face as he stared down at his jellyroll stomach made an impact on my mind. Becoming glossy, his eyes would fill with tears, which would fall down his cheeks, as he made no sounds to indicate his sadness. As I watched him, I felt helpless. Watching him silently degrade himself, I wept silently, as well. I desired to dissect his soul to help him, but I knew the most I was able to do was to provide him with transient ecstasy, until he faced the rest of the world.
Tonight, as every night previously, I walked home, alone through the desolate streets, trudging through the snow. Within a few hours, I would be seated at Purple Fingernails, talking to Vlad again to loose ourselves in the blissful atmosphere. Business was minimal at the parlor today, but the weather proved to be the detrimental factor. During the winter months, business always became dismal. Logically, no one wanted to venture out into the snow in mid-February in twenty-one degree weather for a tattoo; spring would arrive in a couple of months, and the streets would be easier to navigate. However, I was employed, and therefore needed to come to work, despite the weather, to earn my pay. If I missed too many days, inevitably, my pay would be reduced. My mother especially needed it, since she could not work and needed to pay the rent and food expenses.
The sky darkened to a pinkish-purple shade, characteristic of a late evening. The tall, monolithic buildings stood against the sky, but blended with it toward their tops. At their bases, the lights illuminated the sidewalks and the snow upon the street, creating a shimmering allure in juxtaposition to the ponderous, gray pavement. As I walked my shadow bobbed up and down on the hills of snow, which was pushed aside from the sidewalks and falling into the streets.
The wind rushed up my coat, chilling my legs. Despite the weather, I usually wore a dress, instead of pants, which would have been more appropriate for the time. The boss at the parlor had no qualms about my attire, since Vlad wore a dress as well and customers were not affected. In other parts of the city, our attire would have played a large factor in our work, but here, we were fortunate enough for self-expression.
In the murky sky, the moon appeared as a sole white crescent, alone in its realm, but staring down upon another filled with people that were complacent about its existence. Occasionally, I empathized with the moon, alone in this convoluted realm with no one to fully relate to. I seemed to live my life through a glass wall; staring at the rest of the world, I could disconnect myself from them and cry, but continue to see them, after they forgot about me. The vapor accumulated on the walls, clouding my vision. Whenever I spoke, I was an unwitting clown, who, despite the fact he could not speak loud enough to be heard, was the center of laughter and mockery.
The apartment complex came into my vision, an indiscreet image in the darkness. Dingy and ominous, the building towered above the desolate streets, with the lights in its windows illuminating the morbid place. My mother would be cooking dinner now, I assumed, using potatoes and cabbage in an infinitesimal amount of ways. In a few hours, I would be out again, with Jesse, and headed in the direction of Purple Fingernails to loose myself in the intoxicating bliss of the night; at the moment, I could even taste the cigarettes in my mouth. The sweet nectar of alcohol had lain upon my tongue, and I closed my eyes to savor the euphoria. But, that�s all I needed � to loose myself and find myself in a whirlwind of bliss, without a doorway to show me where to leave. Tonight, as every other night, I would become trapped in that storm of bliss, until it transiently passed in the morning. The sensation, however, never reached the depths of banality, for such a fleeting feeling seemed to be my only escape from everything else.
On the ground floor, the only outer floor of the building, I spotted my door. Since my apartment was located here, facing an alley, there was only one window � in my room � and the door faced the street. Every other floor from above the second floor had more than one window, but their doors faced the center of the building. Because my door faced such a dark, murky alley, I felt nervous, but cautious, if I stood outside alone.
With my key in hand, I approached the alley with anticipation. With a mere few seconds of meddling with the lock, I would be safe inside my apartment; however, �safe� was a theoretical concept since I seldom felt safe and assured anywhere, aside from Purple Fingernails and work. Opening the door, my darkened view became flooded with bright light. Strangely, though, the room was silent - deadly silent, in fact, as if someone had suffocated everyone else inside.
Looking about curiously, I noticed that no one rested on the sofa. The television was on hiatus and the table was not set up. No scents of food could be smelled from the position in which I stood by the door, as I surveyed the room. As always, the air smelled pungently of cigarettes.
Closing the door behind me, I crept across the room to the sofa, where my mother usually lay � moping, smoking, and watching those mediocre, melodramatic soap operas. Tonight, however, she did not lay; only the burns of cigarettes upon the worn flowered upholstery remained, along with an old glass ashtray on the floor. I bent down to observe the ashtray � four cigarettes butts sitting in gray powder. My mother smoked lightly today, I assumed, or else, she would have emptied the tray. Aside from my muffled footsteps on the carpet, the room stayed unnaturally silent. Where was my mother, I wondered, and where was Jesse? Had he come home yet? Then, a frightening thought of insecurity upon my behalf crossed my mind; a shiver from my fears shot up my spine. I remembered telling Jesse to go to school this morning; in fact, I insisted upon it.
Guilt pervaded me by the thought of the myriad of possibilities of things that could have happened to him. All of those peers would have beaten him up, pummeling him until he was covered in black and blue bruises. An image of him upon the snow-covered streets, crying as every other body ignored him, entered my mind. And, I forced him to enter the hostile environment and made him promise that he would stay for the whole day. Guilt overwhelmed me until I shook in disgust. Where could he be now, I wondered. Why wasn�t he home, or where could he be?
�Oh, shit,� I heard someone murmur from the direction of my mother�s room. At least she was home, I concluded.
�Ma?� I asked, talking to the door of her room.
�Vinny, is that you?� she asked, but still did not open the door.
�Yes, it�s me. I�m home,� I replied, and then, knocked lightly upon the door. �Can I come in?�
�Yes,� she said morosely. �Come in.�
The door opened without creaking. My mother lay, sprawled on her stomach across her bed, and smoked. In the dim, flickering light of her room, I noticed that her face was slightly red, and her eyes were moist and glossy. The room itself was very small, with the bed nearly touching all of the walls. A closet door stood on one side, but she never used it, aside from storing it with old clothes. Instead, her clothes were thrown haphazardly about the floor. A grayish haze ubiquitously settled over everything, including her. A small ashtray lay by her left arm, as she plaintively blew rings of smoke into the air.
�Vinny, you�re home late,� she commented. �I was wondering where you were.�
�I was wondering the same thing,� I mumbled. I stared apathetically at my mother, who inhaled the smoke coming from the carcinogenic cigarette between her fingers. �What�s wrong?� I asked her.
�Everything,� she replied. �Everything, as usual, is wrong.�
�Oh,� I responded. An extensive rant about our precarious life loomed imminently.
�They shut the heat off today. Our TV lost reception. I�m feeling sick. Someone was nearly killed across the street. We�re broke; there�s no money to buy food or anything, and I�m starving. And, something happened to Jesse, and he�s crying and refusing to talk about it.� She inhaled again. �What�s the point of doing anything anymore?�
In front of her, I stood in silence. No wonder she was crying, I thought. Jesse was home and severely upset; I forced him to go to school, and, because of that, some fiend hurt him. �Where�s Jesse?�
�Your room,� she mumbled, and I sensed hopelessness in her voice. �Don�t bother him. He was crying hysterically when he came home.�
�No,� I replied. �I think this might be important.�
�Fine,� she mumbled, but, seconds later, she abruptly asked, �Did you get paid today?� The cigarette was almost burned down to the butt.
�A little,� I informed her. �Less than usual, though.� That was the truth, but only the lack of business was the cause, not the quality of Vlad�s or my work.
�Are you arriving late again?� she questioned. �You know, it�s not good to be late every day.�
�I�m not late, ma,� I replied, now becoming injected with her hopelessness but still irked by her inane inquiries. Each day, I aimed to arrive as early as I could, although customers, and even Vlad, would not show up for a few hours. When money was involved, I seldom lied or fabricated a story to my mother; she was too fragile and vulnerable to deception that I felt pangs of guilt when I was untruthful to her.
�Then why are you getting paid less?� she inquired, and then, tossed the butt onto the floor, in which others rested.
�No one�s coming to the business,� I murmured. �It�s not us; it�s the weather.�
�Figured,� she mumbled and looked away from me to find another cigarette.
�Do you want me to make dinner?� I suggested, trying to steer the subject away from financial matters. From the manner in which she lay on the bed, I assumed that she would remain sedentary for the rest of the evening.
�Fine,� she replied. �I�m too tired. You can use the stuff in the �fridge.�
�Okay,� I replied robotically, since I was not looking forward to cooking, for I was a respectfully incompetent cook. Despite my lack of enthusiasm, my stomach growled and my mother appeared ravenous for food as she sucked away on her cigarettes, which provided her with no nourishment, except for to mollify her depression.
�All right,� I told her and headed toward the door. �I�m going to try to talk to Jesse and cook dinner.�
�Try,� she mumbled.
As I quietly closed the door, I noticed that my mother had laid her head down on a pillow, which was yellowed and flattened from years of usage. Completely closing the door, I now heard only my breathing, but no sounds of anyone crying. But, as I glanced about the room � at the sodden upholstery, the peeling paint, the low lights, and the archaic gas stove � a sensation of moroseness swept over me. Although I could not concisely define it, I realized that the image of the room had injected me with a melancholy longing, but not of remorse. If I left this apartment tomorrow, never to return, I would feel no different than if I awakened the next morning, under my blankets, with the cold morning air brushing against my cheeks. In either situation, I would feel nothing, aside from the banal mood of �I�m awake and here.� What an existence, I thought to myself. I lie awake in bed in the early morning, trying to analyze if I am still alive or not. What if one morning I dissipated into the frigid air about me, like the breath of another body in the room? For a moment, I would exist as a transparent gray cloud that lingered in the air, only to vanish moments later. Vincent was here, but now, he�s not; he is not planning on returning in the future. My mother would awaken later, only to wonder, �Where�s Vinny?� For those remaining moments of tranquility that I would have to myself, I would remain in my former room, gazing at Jesse, who would be nestled between the blankets on the bed. I�d stare upon his face � that motionless face, with smooth eyelids that led into his elegantly curved lashes. His hair, a tousled mess of purple, would cover most of his pillow. As he breathes, I watch his chest and stomach rise and fall momentarily and consecutively. If I could use my hands, I would extend one to touch his pale, rounded cheeks. He appeared calm, as he lay asleep upon the bed. No sounds echoed in the room, and no breath was audible. I�m nearly invisible to everyone, besides to those who notice my transient presence. But, now, I became tangible again, rooting myself in reality and straying away from illogical desires. Standing in my room by the foot of my bed, I watched Jesse � a mere lump of blankets � cry, but I saw neither face nor hair, aside from a trembling pile of covers. And, I was one of the sources of its earthquake and future collapse, for I forced it to do something against its will. I might as well tell a rock to sprout fuchsia dahlias in flawless form. For this moment, in my bodily state of flesh and pulsating blood, I stood over Jesse, as if I had authority. Obviously, I knew that plants � let alone rocks � couldn�t create flawless blossoms.
�Jesse,� I said, as I attempted to lull him into speaking. �I�m home.� He didn�t answer, and the blankets continued to shake. �Jesse? It�s Vince. I need to talk to you.�
A low-pitched moan came from under the blankets. They stopped quivering for the moment, but I still did not see his familiar visage.
�I�m not going to hurt you.� I paused in reaction to my trite statement. �Please come out. I really want to know what happened to you today.� No answer, but dinner could wait to be made.
For moments that transformed into minutes, both of us remained silently in our positions. Jesse lay on the bed, while I stood above, waiting for his movement. As far as he cared, I could stand here for hours, and he would not move from his position. The inferences I perceived from my mother�s words were that he had already been in this state since he came home from school. I honestly did not need to ask about the incidents; I already knew from experience.
�Jesse, what happened?� I asked, with my voice on the verge of pleading. No answer again, just silence from the bed. Faintly, he cried beneath the blankets, sniffling and suppressing his ears. The �man� still resided inside of him, beneath the layers of the girl�s tissue paper emotions. I could tear through the layers of paper and find that scarring core that refused to leave him. My core still existed inside, but I knew that, for the moment, it was dormant. Like a volcano, it might erupt again, but, as I stood here in my less-than-heroic stance, watching Jesse in his decrepit, disconsolate state, the emotions swelled inside of me, gathering in my throat and escaping from my eyes in condensed form.
Now I cried, as well. The images cut through my mind until they reached a vein and attempted to force it to hemorrhage. The vein did indeed explode, and the plethora of blood escaped from the confining tubes. Watching my mother, in her helpless state, surrender, the destitute apartment, and Jesse, falling into his pit of melancholy, I cried in the same fashion I would have as a teenager, coming home after being cornered and harassed. Jesse, in his prone position, reflected the way I used to be in high school, eight years ago. The time different was not as vast, but those years left an imprint on myself. Each day, I came home to cry to my mother. She would turn off her soap operas and hold me in her arms to tell me that they �didn�t matter.� At this moment, I could become trite and tell Jesse that his fiends �didn�t matter� as well, but I would be a charlatan. At his age, as a precocious, fragile sixteen-year-old, the words of my foes mattered. As I attempted to sleep, their words tortured me in bed, and I tossed and became tangled in my blankets from recognition of their images and phrases. �Goddamn queer,� I could hear one say, and I saw him draw his fist backward, as I felt myself fall into the mattress of my own bed. Then, the antithesis would occur, and I would stare at someone across a crowded room, realizing his beauty, and I�d crouch in shame at the fact that I truly matched the words they called me. No, I knew their words had significance to him. If they did not, he wouldn�t be as upset as this.
Gingerly, trying to not sit on Jesse, I sat on the foot of my bed, still crying. My reflection lay inches away from me. �I�m sorry,� I stated in an unintentionally soft voice. Jesse did not answer or move. Perhaps words were not the tools to pry him away from his blanket, and I would need to physically persuade him.
Seizing a corner of the blanket, I pulled it off him, only to reveal him in a prone position, clutching a pillow. His trench coat, still on, hugged tightly about his body, aside from hid legs. His legs, I noticed, had no covering from his boots upward. This morning I recalled him putting on a black pair of pants. Upon the pillow, his smeared makeup made purple streaks on the white fabric. Although his visage was not in my view, I knew it would be covered in smeared makeup from his tears.
�Jesse, sit up,� I asserted. �I�m really sorry for this.�
Moments, in silence, I waited; he had the capability to hear me now. In a muffled murmur, he said, �You didn�t do a-anyth-thing.�
�What do you mean?� I replied instantly.
�It�s not your fault,� he tepidly answered. �Yuh- you didn�t�� his voiced trailed off, fading away into the pillow. The words became inaudible to my ears.
�Jesse, sit up. I need to talk to you,� I repeated.
�No,� he mumbled.
�Why not?� I asked, trying to cajole him, in a hackneyed fashion, into talking.
�Because,� he replied, with no reason.
�C�mon. It�s important, Jesse.�
Jesse clutched his pillow harder, until I noticed his fingers turning red. �No. Go away,� he said.
My heart sank. Watching him in his disconsolate and disillusioned state made me cry from the internal aching I possessed unintentionally. But, Jesse would not move and became like my mother � sedentary and wallowing in all of her troubles. A ruse needed to be reached that would drag him out of his depression. �Now,� I said, but I knew that any authority on my part would be useless. He was too stubborn, and I lugubrious about every matter.
�No. I� Just leave me alone,� he said, with his voice dragging and hesitating on every word. �There�s no reason, I just want to-� The last word became muffled and hidden in the pillow.
�What?� I asked.
�I want to die,� he repeated, but audible this time. �It�s nothing. L-leave me alone.�
The thought of Jesse with a knife or a bottle of pills in his hand shocked me. As an adolescent, I had also considered suicide, although I never told anyone about my desire. However, my plans never resulted in anything, and now I lived to see a reflection of me contemplating the same act. �Jesse, what happened in school today?� I asked sternly.
�Nothing,� he mumbled into the pillow.
In a gesture of affection, I placed my hand lightly on his shoulder in an effort to embrace him. Watching his prone and emotionally desolate state, I felt my own loneliness pervading me again. My body became numb and an overcast of dark clouds passed above. In all of the depression of the mood, I hung my head from my own shame, disappointment, and sadness. I could theoretically cry again, but I had not enough energy, even to cook dinner. �If nothing were wrong, you wouldn�t be like this,� I told Jesse. �Now, what�s wrong?�
The worn cloth from his coat scraped against my hand, as I fingered the material of his weathered trench coat. My heart, filled with my infatuation, sank, and my chest felt like a vault, filled with liquid lead. Jesse continued to cry, while I stopped, and grabbed the pillow with his pale hands to keep it beside him. As if inflicted with a disease, his knuckles were unnaturally red. The brown hairs on the back of his hand stood up against the pale flesh in a depleting field of rye. A drop ran down the middle of his hand and left a moist trail against the blue and red rivers of the tundra terrain.
I ran my hand through his purple locks of hair, amassed on one side like a clump of worn taffeta. Between my fingers, his hair glided like silk between two oblong white stones. His scalp, at the tips of my sore fingers, felt fragile, but coarse from the exposed roots of his hair. On one side of his head, the hairline seemed to be thinning about the grown-out brown roots at the base of curled purple stalks. As my fingers ran down his head from the scalp to his clammy nape, he seized my hand with his, grasping my fingers with his sweaty palm. The hairs on his digits stood erected, as the flesh on his fingers became mottled red and white at the joints. Timidly, he turned his head, until his cheek rested on the pillow. His features, slashed with black and pink, were visible to me now. His eyes, oozing with black mascara, remained tightly shut, although a solitary tear slid down his cheek and onto the pillow, creating a black splotch. �Don�t leave me,� he murmured. �Please.�
In shock, I remained silent since I did not know how to respond. Jesse remained in that position, without speaking again; only his coarse, hollow breathing was inaudible. Every time he inhaled, his back rose, and then fell back into its original position. At the base of his neck, above the collar of his coat, his skin folded, but the fold became tighter each time he inhaled. My hand rested on his nape, with his fingers still forlornly clutching mine. �I won�t,� I told him, but I felt like a liar and a charlatan. However, by the loosening of his grasp, Jesse seemed to have accepted my response.
The tips of his fingers caressed my palm and joints with a light, almost ethereal, touch. They explored the creases of my palm, curiously studying the bulges and depressions. My fingers remained motionless, while his seemingly discovered them. Then, as I looked downward at my own hand, I noticed, peering through the spaces of my fingers, that his eyes � moist marbles veiled in black, wet lace � were open. From my fingers, my interest passed to those lashes of his � long, like the fronds of a fern plant. When he blinked, the curved arms met in unison, a handshake of appreciation, before quickly repelling one another like magnets. Perhaps, they, too, felt like charlatans whenever they met, lying to each other about something obviously impossible from a far-fetched vision.
�You�ll stay with me forever and protect me from everyone out there?� he asked, gazing up at me past our hands.
�Maybe,� I replied nonchalantly, almost humoring him to coax him into telling me about the day.
�Why not?� he asked in confusion. The grip on my hand tightened again.
�Nothing�s forever,� I stated, using a hackneyed expression.
By the pale, apathetic expression on his face, he seemed ambivalent to my response. Tears did not stream down his face, but he also did not seem satisfied by my answer. �Jesse, I need to talk to you,� I told him blatantly. The dark globes of his eyes winced.
�I know th-that,� he replied, with his stutter returning.
�Well, sit up,� I asserted, trying to justify the adult I was with authority.
�I don�t know,� he hopelessly sighed. �I see no point.�
�Jesse, you have to eventually get out of bed,� I informed, in an effort to convince him otherwise.
Then, the realization that I was a hypocrite traversed my mind. My mother never left the apartment, I thought. All day, she lay on the sofa or in bed, depressed or watching television, or else, she said she was too tired to leave the apartment. I worked, paid the bills, left for enjoyment, and bought the food � although she cooked it. Yet, I never questioned her existence, for her inveterate actions seemed normal to me. As far as I recalled in my past, my mother had always been sedentary, even when I attended elementary school. In high school, I worked part-time after school, since my mother no longer received unemployment checks. However, as long as I arrived home with a decent meal on the table, I had no qualms. But, with Jesse refusing to budge from his depression, I felt disturbed. At his age, I worked and forced myself to go to school, despite I was constantly the object of ridicule and mockery. A longing inside of me did not want Jesse to become like my mother; I wanted him to face the world and fight back when they spit him in the face.
Yet, I knew such a notion was impossible. He refused to move from my bed. For all I knew, he could remain in that spot, until he dies from starvation. �C�mon Jesse. What the hell happened at school?�
�A lot of stuff,� he mumbled into the pillows.
�What kind of �stuff�?� I asked in determination to force him out of his shell. �I did �stuff� today, but I got paid, since that �stuff� is my job.�
�It�s not luh-like that,� he responded.
�Then what�s �it� like?� I retorted. Perhaps my rebuttals might make him speak.
�I don�t get paid,� he said, stating the obvious.
�Well, what do you get?�
�I get made fun of and b-beaten up,� he replied, but trailed off in his speech.
�By whom?� I inquired. I already knew his first assertion, but I wanted to dig deeper into his pile of melancholy.
�I don�t know,� he sighed. �They just do it.�
�Do what?�
Jesse did not respond. Instead, like a fire alarm from the depths of his throat, a whine, sounding slightly like a moan, emerged from his lips. Tears now streamed down his cheeks, still saturated with black mascara. His eyes tightened and his face became stiff, as if he were trying to express something extremely unbearable to repeat. The grip he once had on my hand loosened, and his hand fell in surrender to the bed sheets. And now, I though, I have started an emotional conflagration.
For a few moments, I did not speak, as he disintegrated in front of me. His face, from the mascara-laden tears, was mottled with black and white lines. About his lips, rose-colored lipstick was smeared. Merely by watching him, my heart sank into my stomach, weighted down from the anvil made from the lead of poignancy. My hands surrendered, too, to my lap, and I began to cry again. This, inevitably, was my fault. This morning, I convinced him to enter the very institution that has been rejecting him since he was six years old, and maybe � no, I knew � I should not have done that; if I were he, I would have stayed in bed and wrote depressing, cryptic poems all afternoon. My mind seemed to deteriorate - though by thought, neuron by neuron � and all I could remember was this moment � staring out the small window that faced me to the alley outside. The world beyond was like a reddish cake with gray icing, and the snow that covered the streets shimmered in the moonlight, as if someone spilt a bowl of sugar, but did not bother to clean it up. Like snails crawling on a damp log, cars viscously drove up the streets, which had not been plowed for weeks. The impatient ones blared their horns, but no one could or desired to move faster. Beside me, Jesse continued to cry, but I did not look downward upon him. His sniffles and moans ran incessantly like the buzz of a mosquito on a July day in my ears. But, yet, I continuously gazed out the window at the nothingness of the alley scene that, although was mundane, nevertheless fascinated me that the moment. Nothing. My stomach growled madly, churning like an agitated maelstrom inside of me. Soon, I had to make some kind of dinner, no matter the paltry amount of food that laid in the house.
Then, to my surprise, Jesse usurped my hand again, in the tight grasp of his moist palm. Gazing down at him, and ignoring the street, I noticed that, although he lay on his stomach, he stared upward at me, with those dark, glassy eyes of his. Both of his pale hands held mine. Tears did not flow from his eyes at the moment, although they did from mine.
�Please don�t cry,� he morosely said, with his eyes appearing as if they would shatter into a myriad of shards at the moment his eyelashes moved. �Please, Vince. I-I�m really suh-sorry. I d-d-didn�t want you to cry. I mean it. I�m sorry.�
�Jesse,� I said, trying to suppress my childish tears, �you didn�t do anything to hurt me. I don�t know why I�m crying. Hell, I�m the one that actually sent you to school today.�
�Why?� he asked in an innocuous tone.
�Those bastards wouldn�t have beaten you up! I know what it�s like; I did go to high school once, and those kinds wee shameless in the things they used to do to me. Truly, they were awful.�
�Like what?� he asked intently, before sniffling and rubbing his nose on the back of his hand.
Trying to recall the several incidents of high school, I searched for a benign memory � not too frightening, but credible. Certainly, I would not mention the time a group of snickering male peers backed me into a wall and forced me to prove my manhood. That incident embarrassed me to even think about it, and I still cringed when remembering that, although I dropped my pants, they refused to believe me and let me pass. I was prone into their spurns and pummeling, anyway, and would always run home to my mother to cry in safety. However, my mother seldom understood their antics and dislike for my androgynous appearance and open bisexuality. The word �fag,� to her, was only synonymous with �cigarette,� and even that word was still considered archaic.
�They�d corner me, beat me up, call me names,� I lamented, trying not to cite a specific incident.
�Oh,� he replied quietly, and studied my hand. �They do stuff like that to me, too.�
�They�re so full of shit,� I replied. I hoped to sound more profound, but the angst-laden teenager possessed me.
�Yeah,� he added. �I don�t understand it. Why should they have to care?�
�Beats me,� I answered. But, I lied. I sensed their dislike for homosexuality, or even bisexuality, and their disgust of the image of kissing another boy, aside from a dare or a coveted experimentation. A sin from religious teachings, I assumed, but, frankly, religion was like chasing after a fantasy that only became tangible in dreams. Despite my personal experiences, I did not desire to live and thrive in a world of flawless people, ideal situations, and harmonious overtones. I did not desire the existence of a fraud, and thus, from the time I was young, I accepted the dissonance in my life as Vince. By this acknowledgment, I found bisexuality as benign, although the media and my peers exploited it as the lifestyle of prostitutes and perverts.
�Today, I was accused of raping this guy and beaten up twice,� he confessed.
Rape, I thought. Rape? How could such a fragile, timorous person commit an act of sexual violence? Jesse, I knew, could not rape anyone; like the witches in Salem, he was accused of it from his peers� mere ignorance.
�Did you get into any trouble?� If he had, the school would have called his parents, wherever he was from.
�No. No one important found out,� he said. I was not terribly worried, anyway.
�Well, are you okay?� Jesse was the one I worried about. After seeing this, the image of him, lying prone on the bed and crying, never left my mind.
The grip on my hand loosened. Jesse�s palm suddenly grew cold against my warm flesh. His fingers curled, and his knuckles reddened about the joints. For a second, his fingers locked in that enraged position, but immediately straightened. His eyes seemed veiled beneath the elegant lashes. Coated with the film of black mascara, they reminded me of finely-stitched lace, like that of a fancy pair of gloves. Below them, his eyes grew moist and watery, having the appearance of peeled black grapes. Those black pupils of his faltered through the darkness of his overshadowing brow. Then, he abruptly answered, �No.�
�Why?�
�It� It�s my friend � b-best friend, actually � Glynis.� He paused in his speech. �She�s found a new friend, a girl whom she can probably relate to better than she can to me.� He paused again. �She�s been my only friend.�
Although I empathized with him about his troubles in school, I could not about the loss of a friend, for, before I met Vlad, I was alone, in social solitude, even when I did not sense my bisexuality, which later acted as a stigma. Vlad used to be intimate with me, but now we were close friends. With the men I had one-night stands with, I never became attached to them. In fact, I desired them to dissipate from my life or reject me. Most did the latter to me, but some, I never encountered after our night. A best friend to me was foreign; I never had and did not need one.
�I�m sorry,� I told him. �Is there any way you can talk to her?�
�Only after school, �cause she�s still in junior high, and now, she�s going to be with her new friend.�
�Oh,� I replied. As I watched his countenance, Jesse disintegrated again over his loss. The color faded from his skin, as his eyes closed, with his lashes like dark curtains being drawn over windows. A thin stream of saliva slid from one of the corners of his mouth and down his chin. His hands left mine and united in his lap. No tears were shed from his eyes, but his sudden saturnine disposition indicated that he was infected with a lugubrious disease that ate him away until he became apathetic.
Then, on an impulse, I embraced him, with my arms about his tense shoulders. His breathing sounded louder in my ears now, and the scent of the powder from his makeup filled my nostrils. At first, he was aghast in surprise from my act on a whim and grew stiff. His face appeared petrified � lips agape and pupils dilated. But, I continued to hold him in the frigid room, which grew colder as the heat slowly left our apartment. Against my chest, his pulsating heart beat like a repetitive machine. Against my fingers, the material from his coat felt as cold as the room, but he himself felt warm. With his smooth cheek pressing against my neck, his breath fell on my nape. Although he no longer cried, the pressure he exerted on my neck indicated his lead-like emotions that sank any happiness he once possessed. He�s only a child, I thought, a boy who is devoid of the knowledge that living and people force unto you. His words, �I don�t understand. Why should they have to care?� pulsed through my thoughts and nerves like an electric current on a wire. Why, indeed, I asked myself. Does it matter whom I love?
His coarse purple hair brushed against my cheek. By its scent and greasy touch, I sensed he had not bathed in days. But, to me, that was trivial. I longed to hold him closer to me for the rest of the night, to protect him so that no one would maliciously harm him. Jesse�s tension mitigated, I assumed from his acceptance of my embrace. His breaths lessened and his pulse became softer. There is no such thing as innocence in this world anymore, I thought, as I inhaled his pungent aroma of cigarettes from his coat into my nostrils. Now I needed a cigarette. My pulse rapidly accelerated, as sweat poured surfaced on and trickled down my back. Just one, I thought, only one. Under my perspiring palms, Jesse�s body seemed to grow colder, as I became torrid. He, however, did not seem to notice, since he now became a mere weight on my neck. But, I did not want to release him. A half-empty pack of cigarettes stared me coyly in the eyes, teasing me with, �You can�t have me.� Bull shit, I thought, as the defiant teenager resurfaced again.
Surrendering to my addiction, I ended my embrace, although Jesse now seemed stunned by my departure. Reaching across the bed, I seized the pack of cigarettes, despite �Coward� pulsated through my head. A lighter, replete with fluid, rested in my pocket, and I anticipated its sparking aflame to light my intoxication. With the thin tube of carcinogens between my lips, I took the lighter and lit the cigarette. In the darkness of the room, the tip of the cigarette glowed like a comforting pit of red embers. The grayish smoke filled the room like a ghost of whom I was submissive to. He was my malignant master, and I continued to drink the poison he offered me because I was infatuated with him.
Jesse began to plead with me, by intensely staring at me with those glassy, deep-set eyes of his. They gazed at me longingly, but those eyes were not desirous of me � they were for my cigarettes. I empathized with his forbidden desires, for I longed for the same thing. From my pack, I removed one and placed it between his quivering lips, and he lit it with his own lighter. A halcyon smile now appeared on his face, as his eyes closed when he inhaled his ghost. And, we�re too depressed to care, I thought in poignant, hypocritical realization.
Jesse sucked on his cigarette as if it were candy and occasionally drew in the smoke, as if he were taking a deep breath. I merely inhaled and watched the ashes form at the tip, before they fell onto my sheets like a grayish snow. Neither of us spoke; we instead attempted to smoke our depression into dust. His eyes closed, as if he were wincing or cringing. My shoulders felt like lead, but smoking seemed to alleviate some of the pressure. Previously forgetting about dinner, I now realized that my mother was probably asleep, anyway. Perhaps we, the regurgitations from society, empathized with each other tonight, creating our own secret union of infatuation, unspeakable in any room but echoing like an anthem in our minds. As I gazed into his dark, confused eyes, I saw myself, not merely my distorted reflection, looking back at me. And then, I could not refrain from crying at the sight. I lost control, regressing into my past as the saturnine sixteen-year-old I was, and exploded. The poison had to leave, and I wanted it out, but it resided in my veins, clung to my heart, and buried itself in my stomach. Jesse stared back at me, silently, but he himself did not cry � the man, however, was not posturing. Instead, he now embraced me, as I previously did to him moments ago. His breathing resonated in my ears, and the cigarettes smelled like heavy perfume on him. His arms rested about my waist, for my shoulders appeared too high for him to reach. I caressed the material of his coat and his wavy, greasy hair. He seems so innocuous, I thought, just as I desired to be. His purple locks and black coat were soft and comforting � something tangible that would not escape my hands. In my banal existence, there was nothing left to hold on to, to grasp, and to trust, aside from the definite factors that were killing me.
The following morning, I arrived at work earlier than I had planned. No one � not even the boss � had arrived yet. The doors were locked from the night and the lights were turned off, but I opened the parlor, since Lawrence, the boss, gave me a key. Needles needed to be sterilized, and the floor needed to be swept from the accumulation of dust from the night. Lawrence frequently was persnickety about cleanliness, even to the point of acting neurotic over a sordid spot on the bathroom or a trivial object out of place. This irked Vlad, especially since Vlad was indolent to picking up a broom and sweeping the floors. Constantly, I reminded him about the sterilization and discarding of old needles. Aside from our boss, who was, in fact, more indolent than Vlad and I, I had few qualms about working here. Lawrence paid me minimum wage for drawling intricate designs on people�s skins. If I could not draw images in charcoal or write poignant poetry, I could fuel my desire to create by making gothic gargoyles, melancholy mermaids, and glistening swords on others� flesh by the mere touch of a needle. My passion lay half-full.
Vlad always arrived lat to work, which also perturbed the boss. A half-hour late, Vlad waltzed through the doors, threw off his coat, and began to scrutinize his pulchritude in one of the mirrors on the walls. Mirroring Lawrence�s anxiety about cleanliness, Vlad fixated on his looks. In fact, he proudly admitted to being a narcissist. In the mirror, he would gaze at himself, analyzing his hair, makeup, and clothes. However, no matter how he tried to beautify himself, he appeared the same to me. In my opinion, and in Lawrence�s as well, Vlad was like a rose, with thorns hidden beneath a fragrant, velvety blossom. Vlad often disarmed his lovers, and I assumed Lawrence resented this fact, since both fought over petty, trivial things. From Lawrence�s perspective, Vlad spent too much time in the mirror, the floor was not swept well enough, and few customers came since Vlad was an awful artist. Lawrence was an �asshole,� insolent, egotistical, and indifferent to pay and working conditions, vexed Vlad. But, contrary to their superficial vexations, I spied them kissing passionately in the alley behind the parlor. However, Vlad hid his insincerity, for sexual satisfaction was prime and commitment was an intangible concept. He indeed found himself to be attractive, and he admitted to that with candor. I even knew, but never uttered, that he preferred masturbation to becoming involved with another person.
A thin layer of dust covered the floor, and I, since I was the only one in the shop, needed to sweep it away. Once Lawrence arrived, if any dust lay on the floor, he would become upset and impatient. Reluctantly grabbing a broom, I began to sweep the dust into a small pile in a corner, to be swept into a dustpan and dumped into a trashcan. The floor, with or without a film of dust, was the color of rust, dotted with flecks of black and white. On each wall, mirrors were centered, also with a cloudy film on them. To one side of the room, a table, with drawers, rested and contained our supplies. On the opposite side, a chair and a long, formal table were set up for customers. On top of the table, several books, containing images of the designs, rested. Outside, the wind howled like angry ghosts through the snow-covered streets. The snow, fresh from a recent fall, blew through the air, as if someone dumped flour onto the world. Few cars passed through the streets, for the simple fact that the snow hindered driving. I, however, was not disillusioned over the fact that I still could not drive; if I owned a car, it would sit on the street for six months, anyway.
As soon as I finished cleaning the mirrors, Lawrence stalked through the door. His face was red from the cold, but he did not regard my presence. Instead, he hung up his coat, and then, sulked to his office, a small room at the back of the business, without acknowledging me. Lawrence often did this, since I sensed his antipathy and lack of fondness toward me. His mere job was paying me, and as long as I cleaned and created satisfactory designs, he had no qualms about my allotted salary.
Like Vlad and I, Lawrence, too, cross-dressed. However, his supercilious manner, fueled by the fact that he was our boss, indicated that he sensed his superiority to us, especially me. However, I never fully understood his business practices; he neither created nor made contact with the customers. He viewed role as the overseer � pushing us and telling us to work harder for meager pay, while he himself was indolent. Since he dated Vlad in the past, Lawrence treated him with more courtesy than he did I.
As Lawrence ignored me, I continued to clean � sweeping, dusting, and polishing -automatically. Vlad would arrive late, as usual, but nevertheless, I longed for someone to converse with or a meaningful discourse. Then, while polishing a mirror, I began to reminisce about Jesse and wondered about his day in school, especially considering his histrionics from last night. High school is too cruel, I thought in recollection of my late teenager years and shuddered in antipathy. The positive aspect about being a legal adult was that I was not forced into a rectilinear requirement for five consecutive days of the week. But, my life as Vince, the adult, depressed me and was pathetic as I looked back at the past eight years and my desires, most of which never came true. I was twenty-six and living with my mother, but, unlike most adults, she did not have the stamina or knowledge to function independently. My free time was spent at a nigh club, in which I drank, played pool, and had sexual desires. Since I was obviously � I abhorred using this word � destitute, half of my clothes were altered attire that previously belonged to my mother in the 1970�s or clothes I bought in high school, which I attended in the late 1980�s. For all I knew, I was in precarious health, from smoking and consuming my mother�s high cholesterol foods for twenty-six years. Yet, strangely I remained emaciated, as my reflection in the mirror indicated. Oddly enough, my wish, from the time I turned ten, partially came true; I now was female, without the anatomy. Despite the fact I had not the money for a sex change, I distinctly appeared effeminate. To top the heap of my regrets that began to accumulate ever since I first spoke, I admitted that I was a self-loather. But, considering the fact that I never � and still do not � have many friends or acquaintances, this aspect seemed inevitable.
In the midst of my spell of depression and self-reprimanding, Vlad burst through the door, twenty minutes late to work, looking frazzled with his wind-blown hair and snow-dusted coat.
�Good morning, Vince,� he greeted me genially, as he hung up his coat next to Lawrence�s. �Fancy seeing you here this early.�
�I�m always early,� I informed him in a low voice. �You�re constantly late.�
�When did you get here?� he asked.
�Earlier than you,� I jocosely remarked.
�Funny,� he sarcastically said, as if he were imitating a detective on a television show who found incontrovertible evidence. �I guess I could say the same thing about last night. Where were you, anyway?�
�Home,� I groaned, in realization that he would be perturbed at me for missing a night at Purple Fingernails.
�Doing what?� he retorted. �Watching TV with your mother?�
�No,� I mumbled. �I had some important issues to deal with.�
Vlad postponed our conversation for a moment and waked to Lawrence�s office door, but did not enter. �Larry, you asshole, I�m here!� he yelled. Never call the boss �Larry,� I knew, but Vlad enjoyed being belligerent. However, although Lawrence could behave as angrily as he wanted to be, he would never cut Vlad�s paltry pay.
Lawrence stormed out of his office, with his hands on his hips and a malicious look toward Vlad. �Why the hell are you late? You�re dirtying up the place.�
�I just wanted to tell you I�m here,� Vlad said in an insincerely innocuous manner. �And, I am, Larry,� he mocked.
�Just be glad I have not fired you yet, Vladimir.� Lawrence then retreated into his office and slammed the door behind him.
After a second of silence, Vlad mumbled, �That was short,� and ignored Lawrence�s direct threat. He should be ecstatic that he�s merely being threatened, I thought in disappointment about my dismal salary.
�Where were we?� he asked me to resume our conversation. �Yes, where were you last night?�
�Home,� I repeated. �I had stuff to take care of, and it did not involve my mother.�
�You�ve never missed a night,� he whined. �We could�ve used you.�
�What were you doing? Getting drunk?� I retorted.
�The usual,� he passively stated and began to stare at himself in one of the mirrors, with his hollow, slender back facing me. �What�s your reason?�
�I don�t want to talk about it,� I mumbled and stared at my hands, thinking of a distraught Jesse who was prone into a pillow. In front of my eyes, I envisioned his smeared makeup from his tears.
Vlad adjusted his hair, grabbing loose wisps when one fell from its place. Like a cluster of tangled reddish vines, his curls were interwoven atop his head and fell down to his cheeks in corkscrews, with each impeccably placed. The red contrasted with his visage, which was pale and as immaculate as that of a porcelain figure. Watching him fuss over himself, I understood his self-infatuation. I would probably masturbate with myself in front of a mirror if I looked half as sumptuous as he appeared � a slender, lithe body, which gave into rounded shoulders and a neck that supported his mannequin face. To be so flawless, I thought to myself, is pragmatically impossible. Behind him, I saw my own reflection, like a shadow lurking or a vampire waiting to assimilate its next victim. Black hair, chipped face, and a sordid personality. A cross-dresser who needed a reality check.
�That�s not a good enough reason,� he replied and continued to scrutinize his pulchritude, since no one would come in for a few hours.
�What do you want? I�ll come tonight,� I lied. I set Jesse and my mother higher than playing pool and drinking my depression into my bladder.
�C�mon, Vince,� he whined and reminded me of a groveling teenage girl. �You can tell me. I have no one to tell.�
�I�m not so sure.� In my reluctance as well as indolence, I felt like keeping last night�s explosion in my thoughts alone. �You don�t tell me everything.�
�I can�t. You don�t know Russian.� From the night I met Vlad, he explained his two lives: his life as an American cross-dresser and a Russian bisexual, who constantly irritated his oblivious family. Between the two contrasts, he could not and would not differentiate for me to understand fully. Translations were possible, but both lives were two different realms that never connected.
�Fine,� I mumbled. �Jesse was having some problems and my mother wanted me to stay home and cook.�
�Who�s Jesse?� he asked, turning toward me; only his makeup needed to be perfected now.
�Just this kid I took in. He�s living with us.�
�Are you talking about that purple-haired boy you brought last week to Purple Fingernails?�
�Yeah,� I responded. Vlad had met him, and thus I was surprised at this moment when he asked about him.
�How old is he?� he asked suspiciously. �He still looks like he�s in high school.�
�Sixteen, I think,� I answered.
�Puberty must still be far-off to him,� V;ad joked, but I didn�t find his words to be humorous. Thinking of Jesse�s reluctance to speak because of his effeminate voice or his demure presence as he tried to conceal his weight, I shook in disgust and remorse.
�I really don�t find that funny,� I commented. �The boy�s having a really difficult time.�
�High school is taking its toll on him, eh?�
�Yeah,� I replied indifferently.
�So that was it? You listened to a pre-pubescent high schooler whine all night?� he stammered.
�Vlad, it�s more than that.� I wanted to repress his words. Why did he have to know, I asked myself. �The kid was in pain, crying, prone into a pillow, and scared half-to-death. I can empathize with him, since I nearly had the same experience. No one�s paying attention to him, he�s being tortured, and the reality is, he�s helpless.�
�Plus, I know you want to lay him eventually, right?� I hoped he was joking; my years of one-night stands were finished.
�He�s a juvenile and I don�t want to corrupt him.�
�I know you wouldn�t mind doing it. He�s sixteen.�
�And I�m archaic twenty-six. Sorry, hon, I�m not doing this for your fancy. Believe me, I don�t want to corrupt the boy.�
�Does he smoke?� Vlad inquired.
�Yeah, so?� His question seemed irrelevant.
�Then the boy�s already corrupted and impure. Just give him angel dust and a hand job, and he�s all set.�
His remarks sounded scabrous today, and, for reasons that did not appear discreet at the time, his words perturbed me. As I cogitated about them for a few minutes of my irrevocable life, they depressed me. Perhaps Vlad didn�t empathize or even realize the pain - the hopelessness we felt as two androgynous beings in a biased world. Maybe the loneliness never crossed his path, throwing him off a bridge into a river of despair and confusion. Although we were friends, I was not familiar with Vlad�s past. In some unwitting sense, I felt that we were the antithesis at the moment. Vlad stood, and the three mirrors lucidly reflected him; he appeared superficially immaculate, while I was sordid beyond the surface. In this chair, I was nothing but a capricious fool, wishing to fade into the darkness, but only to end up wallowing in my own misery, like Jesse.
Vlad became lost in the translation. The quizzical expression on his face indicated that he questioned my silence � my introverted exploration. Why? I could ask myself for an eternity, and never discover an answer. A heart could be seen on each of my sleeves in life. Both bled and cried crocodile tears for sympathy. What a hypocrite I am, I realized. But, perhaps I indeed thought for both of us.
Lawrence burst out of his office again, but now, he was even more furious at Vlad and me. Fueled by his anger, his eyes had daggers for us, to stab us in our hearts and backs. Originally, he did not speak; he merely glared at us and stood in the doorway, with his hands placed firmly on his hips. But, then, he discreetly rolled his eyes to indicate his displeasure before opening his lips.
�You know, I pay you and I don�t fire you. I�m beginning to think I�m crazy for still employing both of you,� he vexed.
�No one comes here, you moron,� Vlad rebuked. �What do you expect us to do? Tattoo each other?�
�And you!� he pointed a finger as straight as a ruler at Vlad, as if he were going to condemn him into subordination. �All you do is come in, play with your hair, and give half-assed designs. You should be glad I acknowledge you.�
�I honestly don�t see you doing any work around here, you hypocrite,� Vlad vehemently responded.
�Stop playing with your goddamn hair and get to work. Just do something, anything.�
�There isn�t anything to do!�
And, thus, the current argument ensued between Vlad and Lawrence about the definition of true work. After every argument, however, Lawrence would still employ Vlad, deal with him later, and use him occasionally. I was placed on a different scale to Lawrence. If I ever questioned his authority � I, in fact, viewed him as a puppet of Vlad � I would be fired, out of work, and unemployed for the rest of my monochromatic existence.
Vlad and Lawrence faced each other, screaming, as I seemed to face out of the picture. Lawrence insulted Vlad, and Vlad promptly rebuked, as Lawrence hurled another insult in Vlad�s direction. Like waves crashing against a beach full of jagged rocks during a turbulent storm, they fought. A voice rose, filling the entire room, and attempted to crack the mirrors. The insults pummeled the floor and the walls. In this chair, I became a mere spectator to their spectacle. Objects had not flown yet, but Lawrence appeared enraged and positioned himself as if he were going to lunge forward and seize Vlad�s lithe, pale throat. Vlad, however, began to lose his beauty with every sordid remark he made towards Lawrence, but he, unlike Lawrence, made no move to potentially physically harm him.
�You do nothing!� Lawrence screeched. �But sit on your lazy ass and waste the day. That�s all you do, everyday.�
�And you, like an idiot, continue to pay me!� Vlad retorted. �Admit it, Lawrence, you�re a pimp of the body graphics industry. But, you yourself wouldn�t fuck someone to �save� your career,� Vlad sneered. From the scornful and disdainful expression on Lawrence�s visage, I knew that Vlad exposed himself to a higher form of violence.
�Hell, you should talk. I don�t even know why I ever employed you. You�re a talent-less fool. Admit that, Vladimir, you Ruskie.�
�There�s one thing to insult my vocation, but to insult my-� I decided to tune them out, like am insipid, static station on the radio. To sleep, to dream, and to relax without the tense nightmares lurking in the dark. To see my coworkers agree, and to see Jesse escape his melancholy mentality. To see my mother become useful in her life and to see her find an avocation, other than watching television and smoking. To live a flawless existence. I could have laughed at myself from the irony of my final thought, but my mind resided in the doldrums � the dregs of creativity and a ubiquitous state of nothing.
Vlad cast his final insult, and Lawrence grabbed a portable radio from the table supporting the design books and hurled it at Vlad, but blatantly missed him by several feet. The radio crashed to the floor, shattering, sparking, and fragmenting into its minimal components of wires and transistors. But, Vlad made no response and no retorts, and did not cast an object in Lawrence�s direction. Instead, he stoically stood in his stance, with his long-fingered hands upon his slender hips and unflustered by the histrionics of Lawrence. He remained in place and spoke no words. Lawrence and I stared at him, without speaking, but our silences rooted from different sources. As for myself, I was mystified at Lawrence�s anger, while Lawrence recoiled in disgust, despite he remained a boiling cauldron of anger. I did not sympathize or empathize with either at the moment, and I did not desire to. Lawrence had flipped, diving into the deep end, while Vlad jumped into a shallow pool, which was void of water. The demise was merely inevitable. And, as the tacituen wallflower I was, I stood in the back, on a distant plateau that overlooked the battle. From where I stood, I saw every movement in detail, but I was aloof to the action. If one of their guns were pointed at me, I assumed I would collapse and cry in fear. But, in another sense, I would not mind falling into my own hole of histrionics, kicking and screaming because I did not understand �Why?�
Why? I asked myself. Why? What was the purpose of this? The whole cogent reason for all of this? Was there even a reason at all? Why, again? Why did I cross-dress? Why did I decide to take Jesse in or become friends with Vlad? Why was I such a failure? The image of the two of them, screaming at each other, slapped me in the face; they themselves could not escape from their vortexes of histrionics. They fell in opposite directions of depression and hopelessness and built walls of fortification about each other, which shielded them from each other and from everyone else in the worlds. And, I built my own wall, adding a brick and mortar every minute I disconnected from them. My mother formed her wall before I was born, and she hid in the house to smoke away her sadness; it had no affect.
Now I wallowed in my own darkness and closed the gates that would expose me to the outside world. My wounds were open and I felt myself scream � lips parting, with a sound like a siren escaping from the depths of my throat. The glass mirrors about me seemed to break into a dust, which fell to the floor in silvery piles. Vlad and Lawrence disintegrated, falling back into their dark pits. The floors were dirty again, since the dust from the mirrors covered the red linoleum. All of the sharp tools became dull and needles broke and bottles spilled their contents onto the floor. The siren, however, sounded silent in my ears, although my jaw felt sore and throat and tongue parched.
The floor hit my fact, and the rest of my body followed with a thud. My hands grappled, clawing at the dull floor. Thighs, hips, and ribs pressed against the smooth surface. The siren now stopped, but I did not. In my mad frenzy, my eyes opened their inundated chambers and released their contents. Tears streamed down my cheeks, and the forlorn teenager and resided in my subconscious usurped my control and me. I sobbed in my mother�s arms, as she tried to comfort me in her soft, but hoarse, voice that told me, �It�s okay, it�s okay. They don�t matter, anyway.� But, �they� did, and �they� gnawed away at that lurking teenager, who would slit his wrists if he had the opportunity. But, who was �he� � if �he� were indeed the correct pronoun � and why was he visiting me again? Why did I want to shroud my identity crisis by merely crossing my legs and feigning? Was I truly feigning, or was this a new being trying to emerge from its shell, despite I suppressed it with my fears of the unknown?
Vlad and Lawrence no longer existed, and my mother�s red flannel bathrobe brushed against my cheeks. Her arms were about me, as I sobbed, crying and taking inconsistent gulps of air. A hand lightly placed itself at the center of my back � her hand, a slender white bird that was scarred in vanity. In desperation, I clutched onto her, hoping that every humiliation that I experienced would dissipate. My clothes were partially soaked, but I could not remember clearly as to why they were. She didn�t seem to care, though. I was her Vinny, her boy, and she felt sympathy and did not condemn my bisexuality or gender ambiguity.
�Vinny, Vinny, don�t cry,� she coddled, but their scorn still spurned me nevertheless. �You�re safe at home now. You really shouldn�t worry.�
But, I was not worried. �Worried� fell in the shadow of �mortification.� As I glanced upward at my mother�s garish, clunky rhinestone earrings � the style in 1989 � that I bought her a week ago for her birthday, I felt inadequate, helpless, and puerile. What kind of boy goes to his mother to bury his head in her bosom, after being taunted? Blatantly, I realized I was like no other boy, and perhaps that was the source of my surreptitious mortification. I could balk, and I would yearn, but I resided in my body as a teenager, who was brought up in a precarious world and expected to act precocious and contain myself � to be a man. I could not. The purple thrift store taffeta skirt framed my identity.
�Why does it matter if you are bisexal, anyway? I love you, and I find you quite adorable in a dress.� My mother�s words of reassurance pulsated through my mind, as the mirrors resumed their previous solid state. Vlad and Lawrence continued to fight and ignore my collapse, which was both physical and mental. Staring upward at them from the floor, I became twenty-six-year-old Vince again, although I remained mortified by my own ineptitude. And, I still did not find a reason about �Why?� But, perhaps, that was a question that had no answer, for it was too ponderous and stultifying, yet mystifying in a dichotomy to be analyzed. The dichotomy proved to be a juxtaposition of �Why?� versus �Why not?�
�All you ever do is goof around here!� Lawrence yelled, but now restrained himself from future physical outbursts. Why?
�If no one comes in, how can I work?� Vlad vexed. Why not?
And, thus, the argument terminated. Lawrence sulked, blatantly defeated, back into his office, while Vlad primly sat down in a chair that was adjacent to the spot I landed. The day would resume and ensue; no pay, no customers, and no food to come home to.
Rising from the floor, I sat in a chair, without speaking; the fact that I seemed invisible no longer mattered. Who was to say that this was inevitable or even desired? The insatiability for compassion swept over me, like a longing to be with my mother again. But, that was impossible. Staring at the disconsolate, but inevitable, process of disconnection, the sixteen-year-old cried out and grappled with my heartstrings. I could merely pacify his infatuation.