I Can't See Through Your Perfect Smile The Exegesis Of St Frances II by Brian Martin
Mother said you'll never tame a bad boy. Mother told me they were only out for what they can get. Mother told me I would fall flat with empty arms. Mother told me my lips were too red. Mother told me my dress was too filthy. Mother told me not to be an exhibitionist. Mother told me the heart was deceitful above all things. It was one of those Irish summer nights where despite the dark clouds the city sunset hangs for far longer then it has any right to do. Jesus, they were kicking in too strong - far stronger then usual - I realised it must have been the alcohol as well; I should have looked at exactly how many milligrams were in each one. I was late. I was getting lazy. I just presumed since they were the same colour that they were the right ones. They were taking the cusp of my breath and bringing it back gently into my chest. It was as if some kind of nerve neutralizers were tickling me all over.      It was like I was being pushed from behind, pulled towards him, drawn down the slope of Dorset Street like a ramp down into another world. All the buildings were low and tight and huddled around me. Heavy gated community centres, sunken tenements, windows filled with bars and ancient buildings that look like slaughterhouses with rusted metal beams jutting suddenly out above me. Somewhere behind me, almost lost in the rain, was the muffled sound of a car window being smashed, and in front of me the clip-clip under my heels pulling me forward. I tilted my head to listen to the blood in my own ear and all I heard was expectation and a cold ache. His sheet metal door glistened in front of me. Why did he live in this awful building? Just before I knocked I heard the rest of them. I hated them.      My life didn't revolve, but spun centrifugally, around amphetamines, pills, clothes, work, Mother and Darren - the biggest, most beautiful bastard you'll ever see. He wracked me with every imaginable pain, he toyed with my devotion. He left the room when I begged. I even watched him in the cold wet bus shelter, in tears, as they came to take him away. When I first heard that Darren had gotten off on a technicality I went to the dealers in Christchurch to get something to celebrate with him. Just the two of us. I ended up spending the night following Darren and his friends, them. I tried to get Darren alone. I bought him drinks and sat on his lap and asked him to go for a walk. He refused and said of course and told me there's plenty of time Sweetheart. Maybe later. Oh God, I yearned for that later. I dreamed I would wiggle on his lap; play with his earlobes feeling like a young girl. I dreamed I would look at him coquettishly. Let me do you Darren. Looking at him in the nightclub I had to force myself from trying to kiss him, from embracing him, from caressing his thighs, dreaming of the warmth of his groin, seeing him nude, holding my head (not too gently the way I like it), pressing close to him, watching his muscles contract, running my fingertips gently along his tightened thigh muscles. He might even groan at the climax. His powerful body loose in my arms, slightly panting. His semen, playing cobweb in my hands. He'd make that face that I like and kiss me hard. I would be inside his mouth, behind his tonsils, breaking over his molars and then he'd rise hard again and turn me over. My eyes would close as he'd go for the kill. And then quietly in the darkness between each breath I would calm. Oh Darren we'll go walking in St Stephen's green, we'll wear our scarves just like nooses but not because we want eternal sleep. Everyone would stare and say its all our fault... no I'm wrong they'll build statues of us. They'll name cities after us. The fields of flowers will be so lovely in the sun; in the bright flooding sunlight - warm and brilliant and the tall grasses flow and the colours burst and small drops of dew glisten and it will be all red and violet and purple and green and white... yes white, and gold blue and pink, no a soft pink and we'll see the fireflies... like iridescent flowers of night. Soft little lights. Lovely little lights. Your hard rhythm. Your mouth and lips are so warm. Oh Darren say my name Oh Oh God his feel his taste his smellThe dream almost carried over to consciousness, the downers I had robbed from Mother made it even more difficult not to animate the dream into a low pleading groan just as I knocked. Each split second of contact with the frozen metal was like a jolt trying to wake me. I stood and watched delicate white puffs of air float out from me. My teeth clamped, I turned my back to the door and kicked at it with the base of my stiletto.      'Darren!' A sob began to tourniquet in my throat. My thoughts were zooming pitifully. Please Darren don't let me have come all this way, to be so close, yet so far. I had images of them finding a dead slut on their doorstep - drained and empty as if a vampire had fed on me. At least I'd leave a good-looking corpse. I wonder if he would even notice. I heeled the door again and again, and it shuddered. I didn't care about my new heels they were already ruined from the rain. I felt the panic and desperation in my stomach spread as my blood roared away, feeding on itself.      'You're supposed to'      I kicked and hit the metal door.      'Be fuckin here!' I yelled. Somewhere behind me a window slammed open. 'People sleeping, go away crazy girl, people sleeping!'      I turned and saw an ancient bald Chinese guy, his face so chubby and squished; he looked like a warped Buddha.      'You go 'way go 'way!'      From behind me I heard heavy latches and bolts moving, I twisted around, and it was like a wound in the world, with cars, lights, rain, noise and people passing the mouth of Dorset Street, and they had no idea I was there and waiting to be.      'For Fuck sake Frances ya mad looking bitch c'mon in!'      The door pulled open like a bank vault, and a golden light reflected onto the pathway.      'We were expectin ye fuckin ages ago u bring anytin?'      It was one of Darren's friends. I couldn't remember his name, it's wasn't important, I knew him as the fat one. He seemed to be closest to Darren. Darren hated him. It seemed the five of them had formed a group based on something erroneous, some basic misunderstanding that hadn't yet come to light and so they kept on in each other's company, going to parties and having conversations. Generally, with normal people these false coalitions died after a day or a day and a half, but this one had lasted more then three years. Later on, I heard, one of them got hurt when they were robbing a garden centre, and the rest of them were caught dropping him bleeding at the back entrance of the emergency room. They were arrested and all the bonds were dissolved. The charges were dropped but they'd torn open their chests and shown their cowardly hearts and you can never stay friends after something like that.      An unpainted sitting room that smelled of gasoline a mock barman who poured kind overflowing measuresa hysterical stoned drunk too emotional to really care a gigantic make shift bunk bed covered by ghost complicated women a crying teenage girl with mascara blurred and her lipstick kissed away, she got more then she bargained for when she came here a room no more then a bubble of hashish fumes captained by remorseless testosterone music that just sounded sophisticated and lonely.      'Im telling ye man, this party is sometin fuckin else as you know we always have the best parties but this one this one is the HEY JOHN GET OFF THE FUCKIN TABLE Johns gas too many people though as you can see anyway how are you the fuckin weather is something else shame about your clothes getting wet I'd take them off but I'm not into that shit ah no I'm only messing I think its great that people like you can express GET OFF THE FUCKIN TABLE hows your mother I hear shes not feelin the best mines fine shes doin fantastic at weight watchers seven pounds over the last three weeks thinking of joinin myself you bring anything Frances? it would be fuckin deadly if you did I ever tell you how much I respect your bravery for being yourself'      I remember thinking why did he put his arm around me as he led me through the tight avenues of the party. He must have been all loved up. The fat one usually only ever showed utter contempt towards people like me. Especially people who took Darren's attention away from him. It must be that he took too many pills, speed or both. I couldn't see his pupils behind his giant green play-glasses.      'Where's Darren?'      'That's the thing you see I don't mind blacks me no no no can't call me a racist me racist nowaylike I mean I listen to reggae its just the Nigerians that I don't like'      'Where's Darren?'      'Well this is it Frances you know Declan he sold me an ounce and when I got it home and when I got a decent gander at it like it wasn't more then a score he ripped me off I fuckin love that Declan GET OFF THE TABLE'      'Where's Darren?'      'Ah Darren yeah I'll bring ye upstairs now to him he's in his room watch the cans on the floor actually go on up yourself sure you remember yourself dontcha you've been here a few times before DARREN FRANCES IS CUMIN UPTOYA'      It was the silence ahead that stirred me to continue. Leaving behind the pointless savagery of downstairs I could feel each pore all over my body awn with anticipation as I walked up the rotting stairway. I called out for Darren. I convinced myself the quiet was a sound revelation. Images of him writhing with some bitch in heat or jumping out the window as soon as he heard me or other usually unimaginable atrocities flashed through my head as I approached his door but when I entered the room sharp shivers of relief fizzed throughout me. The room smelled of some kind of debauchery, the whiff of a potion that would banish everything plaguing me. He was half unconscious on his bed, playing host to two people that I recognised as two more of his associates. Through hanging eyelids he acknowledged me. The others could barely move. Without saying anything he held out his hand. In it was a white pill, one of the ones that make everything dark. I swallowed it dutifully.      I worried about the singing downstairs. It was framing everything in Darren's room. It had a desperate edge to it. It was as if by singing loudly enough they would weld themselves into an anaesthetised brotherhood. The song seemed to be about change and it was sung by an Irishman but it seemed to have little to do with the people downstairs. To them it was fighting music. I didn't want to fight anyone. It was beautiful music. Hangovers, while being pushed into the background by the drink, were also being fuelled. They were now so potentially big as to be genuinely feared. They would not stop drinking until they had to face the music, and that was when every bit of adrenalin had been burned away. When its summer in Siam and the moon is full of rainbows      'So Darren was she seventeen or nineteen?'      When it's summer in Siam and we go through many changes      'No she said she was nineteen but you could tell she was seventeen. Sixteen even. Real young like. I fuckin kid you not.'      When its Summer in Siam and all I know is that I truly am      'But do you think you should have dragged her outside, like, knowing she was that age?'     When it's Summer in Siam     'Fuck off it took me long enough to get her stoned.'     When it's Summer in Siam      'Anyway who cares she's gone now.      When it's Summer In Siam      'Yeah but Darren do ye not think it's a bit bad like.'      Darren deliberated over his answer then added sagely 'I see where your coming from, but look at it from my perspective, I had no other choice. I mean lets face the fuckin facts. Sexual politics an' all that.' Darren's little group nodded in intoxicated appreciation. He looked at me again and indicated for me to sit in the one vacant seat in the room. It was directly across the room from the bed. The furthest from him.      The weak lamplight began to blind my eyes. My belly began to tingle. Something was beginning to happen. The pill was coming on strong. Everything was beginning to spin. I could feel my heartbeat quicken. I tried to be careful. I tried to catch it. I didn't want to start tripping. No please not in front of Darren. Some sort of violence was happening downstairs, someone rushed into the room and said. Darren's friends jumped and began to rush everywhere. But I was just too fucked. I didn't care. All I wanted was to be left alone with Darren. His head was tilted back, his beautiful jaw pointed towards where he belonged. I could barely look at him he was so beautiful. He was like Caravaggio's Narcissus. He sighed and his eyes slowly arced to meet mine. I didn't know I could voice so many desires without saying a word. We were left in each other's silences but I could have stayed there forever swimming in his Nile blue eyes.      I used to see him around before I talked to him. I used to look at him in his garage overalls and I would fantasize I would get mixed up with him. But I had never known, never even imagined for a heartbeat that there might be a place for someone like me in his life. I couldn't look him in the eye at first. I thought it was my usual shyness around boys but it wasn't. I was afraid if he looked hard enough, if I looked into his watery eyes for just a second too long he would catch a glimpse of my razor sadness.      The birthing of the pill rush was over. All I had to do was relax and let it course through me. I let it take me back to when we first made love. That night he looked so soft and perfect, like a mannequin made of man-flesh; flesh all the way through. We were draped across each other as we approached the spoiled monastery. Like angels in bondage gear, our deep kisses, breathing our fluorescence into one another. He was my diamond everything.      Despair. The pink neon letters smouldered in the night, a nasty glow, illuminating the carvings on the tympanum into which they are still set. Despair. It was the latest, chicest place to get messed up for fun. Brothers and sisters in dope, congregations of ultra violet fuck ups flowed through the many cells towards the chapel. Inside, the drugs were so pure that even the most hardened e-heads, who had long since ground their teeth to stubs, fell to their knees in bliss, Never thought they'd come up so hard and fast. They never thought it could feel like the first time again. A hypodermic Saint Sebastian vomited blood at the stack heels of an unrepentant whore. An underage platinum blonde swooned by the tabernacle, the rushes overtaking her. Like a fainting' Magdalene in PVC, her lover fed her black jellybeans from a monstrance to case her mandibular distress. In time, the horde began to tear at one another, eventually there were no surfaces left to scratch, all circulation stopped, the hour of the Angelus was upon us all. Intricately woven synaptic brocades fell away, leaving the brothers and the sisters bare. All that was left was to stumble through the spent butane torches and atrophic saints.      Darren we staggered home, can't you remember? Our desperate kisses kept us almost steady. In the softness of the morning time, you came to me like tempered steel. Rock hard Darren. A diamond jaws of life, you cut me from the wreckage of the night before. Like liquid I made my way across the room and sat on the edge of his bed. I looked at the small of his back - his best part. I longed to bathe in his warmth and die in the cooling magma of his kiss. He put his hand on my thigh. Through his fog I could sense his coming. I wanted to help him get out. Follow me Darren.      'Darren?'      He was trying.      'Wha?'      His tear ducts welled. I touched his brow. It was hot but it cooled to my touch like I knew it would. That's right Darren, follow. Join me, follow me home. I'll look after you. We'll start slow. A movie or go for a walk, any excuse to hold hands. I won't wear this stupid dress or put on this makeup. We will defy them all. You can light my cigarette yes, you can cup your hands around the match, like no else does it, the way I like it, your cigarette hanging from the corner of your mouth. Oh Darren we don't have to go dancing. I know you don't like it. We'll stay at home. I don't care if you come back late smelling of bitch and tell me you were out with the lads. Everyone makes mistakes Darren. You'll be coming home to me. That's what's most important. Coming home to someone you love Love. And we will be loved. Darren follows me home. Try to love. Try to follow me. Let me show you. I love you Darren. I LOVE YOU DARREN.      'I love you Darren.'      He smiled at me. It was glorious burning when he wasn't trying to think of anything clever or funny to say, I loved it when he just was. I saw his emotions rake and gurgle throughout the ruts of his head and from a place somewhere less then conscience he held my hand. 'No Darren. I know we're doin pills an all. But I don't mean that type of love. Real love. Not just messin around love either. The real thing. Do you love me more then the others. All those skinny young ones that ye mess around with. They'll never be able to love ya the way I do. I love you.'      He tried to say something. He really did. I have thought about it ever since. Playing out the moments of that night over and over again. Thinking whether or not there was ever anything there in the first place. But of course it's in him. It's in us all. So forgive him. He tried to come clean. I saw his eyes darken and whatever light there was being desperately tended, I saw disappear back into the fog. He let go of my hand and slid his hand up my dress towards my groin.      He laughed 'C'mon Frances babe. Of course I luv ya. I'd crawl across fifty good pussies just to fuck your fat asshole.' I went looking for the feeling of that moment afterwards. I tried to see if it was real. But no dominatrix in a dark den or a violent drunk with a cable wire could ever expose me like that again. When I squeezed shut my eyes hot tears exploded from the sockets. But then I calmed. Suddenly, for the very first time the presidency of our situation swung to me. He was no star to guide me. 'Don't touch me. Don't ever touch me again.'      I looked at him scrabble for a reply, some line that would make me fall for him all over again. 'Oh Darren you'll never be able to love me.'      I remember arguing with him on my twenty-fourth birthday, I left the kitchen, came back with an axe, and tried to hit him with it from right across the table. But I missed. It wasn't his life I was after it was so much more.      He stood up looking tenderly as only a lover taking irrevocable leave can. He was holding his apology in his hands but he couldn't even say that. Without thinking further I walked down the stairs and opened the front door and stood back onto the street. I thought I'd fall out of the dying party into the brilliant disguise of night but I was shocked by how bright it was. Do you ever notice those sodium-arc lamps that play such an important part in all our lives? You know, street lamps, we always take them for granted. Do you ever notice that you never actually see them ignite or turn off? Well do you know what? That morning as I walked home I did. Even though it was summer and it was already bright I saw them plink plonk plink on all the way down the street towards home.      I know they argue about whether its right or not, whether or not its unnatural for two men to be together. It wasn't what the man on TV did. It wasn't what the politician did. It wasn't what the priest did. It wasn't what the parent did. I decided it's what two people do together. I make my confession. The sky was like skin. I stared straight at the sun. I felt it's glowing. Despite an aching tiredness I had forgotten what it was like to feel so beautiful. I fixed my wig and nestled my cock back in between my legs. I knew I was nearly home. It wasn't raining. Gigantic ferns leaned over me. A forest drifted down a hill. I could hear a clear creek rushing down among rocks. Yes I was the nucleus of the night. Yes I was nearly home. Yes the memories have stayed with me, like claw prints in concrete after the bird has flown.