"I could skip my first class tomorrow, then I would have a few more hours to write," Method thought, knowing that if he left it he would just find another excuse to put it off. He’d had all holidays - fourteen days - to do it, but he kept ‘catching up’ on other things. Why not start that book I always wanted to read – he did and never finished it. Why not see if I can make an album in two days – he could and Ferrí loved it. Why not see what's happening on the Internet - I hear Paris Hilton has made a new porno, or has she had a baby? Who cared – she was a stupid pseudo-celebrity anyway …back to this essay, it was for Bé’s class too – he couldn’t disappoint her – he had to endure.
By three in the morning he had finished it – he had class in six hours. He shutdown his computer, it protested with a buzzing noise and spasm form the A drive, then finally lay to rest – the little orange light of the monitor flickered. He got in bed and slept. He dreamt of Ompaloompas.
φ
Oceans away Ferrí dreamt of Australia and the beach - more specifically the southeastern coast town of Broulee. She was with Method and they were on a coast trip with two other people, Di and Laurel, but she didn’t know who they were because she’d never met them. Di and Laurel often went on walks together, disappearing for several hours before returning flushed and giggling. This left Ferrí alone with Method. She was in love with him but he kept ignoring her, he was more interested in the crabs that crawled on the beach. Every day the crabs got larger, and furrier and Method became more engaged with them. Until one day when Ferrí was about to get Method’s attention by making love to him, they reached their final form - giant spider crabs – Method’s favourite animal and a mutilated incarnation of Ferrí’s most feared.
Ferrí woke with a scream - her hands were between her legs and she was covered in sweat. One of her roommates asked if she was ok.
"What a cliché awakening," she said, and fell back to sleep.
φ
Younger than yesterday, Method woke, got dressed, had breakfast, set his essay to print, got undressed, had a shower, got dressed again and picked his essay from the printer’s tray.
"You’ve got to be joking!" Method cried.
The print out was a garbled bunch of black code. He swore at the printer – it said there was no paper. He was patient with the printer – it said there was no ink. He gave the printer sensitive loving strokes – it printed out an acceptable bunch of words, which seemed to resemble what he had written.
Method selected a CD from his ever-growing collection and popped it in his discman – doof boocha doof-doof boocha d-doof boocha doof-doof boocha. Method strutted outside his feet hitting the ground in time with the beat.
The street – the beat – the street – the beat - the street – the beat and the red-hot heat. The people of the city moved in time under the big bright yellow sun. Two girls swung on poles and a man with an umbrella opened and closed it trying to fix it. The traffic lights danced - green to orange to red then green again - Method crossed the streets the lights flickering to the colour of his whim. Cars, confused, sped over and around each other like a plague of mice hunting for grain. Method walked over them as if they were parked sets of stairs. A man – painted silver – danced as people threw money at his feet – his arms stretching and wiggling with the frequencies of the music. Methods feet kept in time with the music all the way to the arts office.
φ
Ogling a magazine advertisement of a semi-naked child, Bé was standing in the centre of her office. Above her head on the wall behind was a gaudy coloured and lacquered crustacean.
"What on earth is that?" Method asked.
Bé was cutting the picture out with some scissors, "Its something I picked up at the old bus depo markets."
"You? At the bus depo markets?" he chuckled, "I didn’t think you were the kitsch type."
"It’s not kitsch its art. Anyway I quite like it. Its by an artist from Broom, it’s an exploration of how little knowledge humans have about the creatures of the sea." She looked directly at Method and said in a self-mocking romantic way, "Who knows – maybe a creature like this exists at the bottom of the Marians Trench."
"Ahh.. No. For one the crustaceans down there have no colours. And two this is just a horribly painted giant spider crab - they’re found off the coast of Japan, which I know is near the Marians Trench, but it’s still way too far away to find one there."
"I know, I know, I just wanted to annoy the head of the department - It’s so ugly huh."
"Sure is – hey I handed in the essay. So what will it be, super high distinction?"
"You do know you were meant to e-mail the essay."
"What?"
"Oh it should be fine – it’s still accepted – but you were meant to e-mail it."
"Damn I spent all that time trying to get the printer to work when I could of just e-mailed it in. That always happens."
It was then that Method noticed the picture pinned to Bé’s small wooden bookshelf.
"Oh my god! Hey I know her, that’s Ferrí!"
"How do you know Ferrí?"
"She lives just near me, well she’s in America now, but I got to know her like the day before she left. Why do you have a picture of her?"
"She’s my daughter." Her voice was kind of dry.
Method gulped.
φ
Under normal circumstances Bé would have been fairly ok with Ferrí ‘befriending’ a guy. But Method was three years seven months and eleven days older than she was, and clearly horny. She didn’t want her fifteen-year-old daughter having sex just yet. Bé hid her feelings from Method, after all Ferrí was safe at flying school in America, there may be boys there but at least they were her age.
There is an unspoken rule about the acceptable age difference of a couple. To work out if the age difference is acceptable, half the age of the older person and then add seven. If the younger person is equal to or older than this age then it is socially acceptable. Otherwise, tough luck kiddo, you’re gonna have to wait till you both grow up!
φ
Rrrrrrrrrchhhhhhhh crunch! The car sped off the road into a sign marked stop. And that it did. Method and his mother froze as they watched the car materialise in front of them – it was like something out of back to the future – one second the was no traffic for miles, the next… boom! Except there was no boom – there was no sound – it was serene and beautiful, the site of metal bending and contorting in the hands of an invisible man, or woman - it was impossible to tell, as they were invisible.
Mother got out of the car. This was after much nervous discussion with Method over where the right place to pull over was – they weren’t moving, but the mounting traffic was making it difficult to manoeuvre the car off the road – eventually they parked on the median strip.
The driver of the other car was androgynous but looked remarkably familiar to Method. They looked about twenty but had bags under their eyes - it gave the impression that the eyes were set deep within their head. They had black hair, pale skin and discrete clothes. Their appearance was of a person who would go to a death metal concert with their friends and at the same time have a secret love of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
To the police the androgynous being made this statement: They were going to work when Method and his mother pulled out forcing the crash into the sign – they said their name was Id. They walked away after the documentation was made – leaving the car to an unknown fate.
φ
Ecstatic to the point of insanity, Method’s mother had inherited a large sum of money from Juxta. This is what she had told Method. In truth the money was not inherited but won through the combined cognitive power of her and Juxta. In her dream state in hospital she was more accepting of the ‘impossible’ and so it was a simple matter for Juxta to coerce the state of reality to his and her desire – a quick escape from a financial rut, but a plunge into an emotional rut.
Whilst living Juxta had already had a powerful grip on controlling ‘his world’. It was his consciousness of this ‘power’ over his world that caused him to lapse into depression. He had tried too forcefully to control others – something that is very hard to do willingly and almost always ends in self-loathing and suicide.
Juxta was enjoying a state of ‘life reliving’. Even though he hadn’t actually been alive during this part in time he was still an important part of it. He watched the local happenings from the background, coming at odd intermission to meddle. He had become one of those people you see in the street who could - in another life - have had a profound affect on you but who you just pass by and never see again. He was a ‘Man in Black’ for gods.
φ
Another book started but never finished. Method’s near-death-experience lent him an eye for reflections on life. He started a book about his experiences with girls, death, love, hate (he didn’t hate anyone yet) and anything else that was in life. It wasn’t particularly good but it started another universe that would cause a paradoxical battle like no other.
φ
Lost.
"Where the hell am I?" Method thought.
It was dark, dank and dirty - an un-likeable combination for anything but a mole. Method felt like a mole, he could feel the dirt underneath him – it was cold and smelt musty. He lifted his head up and hit it on something wooden.
"Ow."
His ow was one of those ows that one says just because they are conditioned to. After a moment of stunned thought the sound of a whispered whistle came from somewhere in the darkness. Method froze, he wasn’t moving prior to this but at the recognition of the sound his brain decided that any future movement was not advisable until further notice.
Further notice came with the iridescent illumination of two eyes. The site of the two circles of light scared the shit out of him. The sound of a guttural language scared the fuck out of him. And the touch of a hairy leathery hand scared the life out of him.
φ
I’m not ready for this yet - rewind and replay.
φ
Zealous people go to extremes for their beliefs. Being zealous is not necessarily good or bad - stubbornness and determination walk hand in hand. But you can be zealous for all the wrong reasons and at this point the universe was getting ahead of itself in trying to make things right. Of course ‘right’ is totally subjective so trying to make things ‘right’ is a bit problematic in itself. Nothing can be ‘right’ for everyone and everything – which the universe found out the hard way. It let too many Conun Drums™ (multi-dimensional collections of possibilities and antibillities) - a product of Fantasy® – slide. From this lapse in control all manor of antibillities arose causing chaos in the minds of the beholders. The universe had to let things flow and not be so interventional – chill out and enjoy the view!
φ
Entire cities have collapsed for love, most commonly through the imposition of rules of a loved faith for the appeasement of a deity or deities. To Method Ferrí was like a deity. She whisked in and out of his life like an intervening omniscient being tweaking its creation to perfection. She wanted to mould him to perfection. She saw him as a fine clay that could only be imagined but never materialised as its materialisation would cause complete destruction of anything that was graced by its presence – its sheer beauty too much to comprehend…
Maybe not quite that extreme – but she loved him.
She flew back from America. This time she didn’t take a plane but made the trip herself – it was long and gruelling but she was determined and stubborn. It took a week to fly and it was pretty much non-stop as there were only a few islands between America and Australia.
She had grown quite fond of Method in America and he had told her that he was not in the position to allow anything form between them so she should go to Method in Australia instead.
"What about my training?" she said.
"Tell your coach you want to take your alveolus extremities test now," he said, "the trip there and back is equivalent to one of the things you would be tested on – endurance in a foreign sky. I’m sure your coach would think it’s a good idea seeing as at the moment your in-air-performance is leagues ahead of anyone else you age."
She agreed and it was all organised – her flight over would count towards her alveolus extremities test. She wouldn’t tell her mother, she would turn up on Method’s doorstep and make passionate love to him there and then – it would be great.
φ
?-0
She fell – supersaturated with lead like water. Something like a baseball bat hit her, her arm snapped and she screamed in agony crashing into a corrugated shed roof. She rolled off landing in damp muddy grass – her knee jarred on a slab of concrete. She was shaking from the shock and the cold and the pain – it was all hell. Her throat was clenched and her head was thumping, then a slow wave of bliss like a warm blanket covered her – the rain turned to bath water. She moaned and vomited and all of a sudden everything was cold again then something clammy touched her and called her name it was muffled in the rain, which soon became engulfed in the rush of white noise.
φ
? Before awakening you must remember this…
Karma kills hopes and dreams – it is not for the good to receive just rewards but for the guilty to receive just punishment. One’s own perception of good and bad is its only reference: do what you believe is right and you will succeed, do what you believe is wrong and you will falter.
To your own self be true.
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