02.Jan.2003
new years eve 2002 part one
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new years eve part one
My bedroom explodes in flames. In my head, I feel my muscles tighten the split second before they come apart, heat-raped molecules bringing the flesh-tower to the floor. I blink and it's candles.
To illuminate the solitude of my personal wrought iron fence, I take shots of Bacardi O over Michael Hutchence songs. I want to pause on Bono's line in "Slide Away" and frame it musically: "but you tore a hole in space." and my body instinctively moves forward.
My skin knows Bono's voice as an Irish security blanket, and my veins warm from the alcohol. Giddiness.
I'm switching CDs, sometimes beckoned to the mirror to comprehend my silver-painted eyes while chords and discord lovingly assault the Edgar Allan Poe quietude. It is like love.
Concrete Blonde. Through my nose I want to be Johnette Napolitano. I stretch the name "Caroline" until my lungs collapse. There are eerie shadows, sprawled and twitching, against my Northern wall. I pick up an RSVP pen and the tip innately understands drawing letters against the college-ruled lines. Phrases like "someone else's number" and unsent apologies and "smiling Jackie", and it almost makes sense to me.
At 12:01 EST, my cell-phone rings, registering "unknown" in all its neon-green, Tr0n-fonted glory. "Unknown" means "Joseph".
I'm thinking, Thank Christ.
I'm thinking, Great Scott.
I'm thinking, I could make love to Scott's telepathic message-sending techniques.
I'm thinking, Access granted.
I say, "Hello?"
"HELLO!" and there is so much thick background noise that I can feel the static-irritation 1600 miles away. Inebriated, he expresses his discontent with my Oklahoma residency. Inebriated, he paints my ear-canal with images of New Years Eve parties infected with 16-year-olds. Inebriated, he sounds nothing like himself.
I'm thinking, Leon "no women, no kids", and the way Joseph sounds, inebriated, when he leans over a Queen-sized mattress and whispers things like "no longer falling" and I'm a Chinese New Years and I. Am. Lit.
And he says, "I'm pissed."
"Why?" I asked, amused, at first wanting to respond with, "Well, of course you're sloshed."
"Because you're in Oklahoma," he says. "Ask anyone here. Ask Al. Ask Kaitlin. Ask Michael. They all know I'm pissed that you're in Oklahoma."
I'm thinking, Your confirmation number is 16269.
"And these bloody 16-year-olds, oh, for fuck's sake, why are they counting down AGAIN?"
"Guess what I'm doing," I murmur.
"WHAT?"
"I appear to be having an Edgar Allan Poe New Years Eve," I respond.
"Oh, jesus ..."
I request to speak to Kaitlin, and, inebriated she thanks someone for the champagne they just handed her.
Inebriated, she asks, over the background, "WHEN ARE YOU COMING TO CANADA?"
Musically loved and warm-veined I say, "Hopefully no later than February 15th."
"DON'T COME THE SECOND WEEK OF FEBRUARY!" she says.
"You're not going to remember any of this," I say, charmed.
"YES I WILL!"
She hands me back to Joseph, and I say,
"Darling."
And I say, "Dearest."
And I say, "Love of my life."
And he says, "I know."
And he says, "Happy New Year."
And he says, "Goodnight."
And he rings off.
I call Ben.
I call Bobby and Michelle.
I call Tony.
I call Giz.
I call Larry.
I call Dustin.
I call Duck.
I call Sammy.
I call David.
I call Paul McCartney.
I call Dave Gahan.
Tom and Pen�lope call me.
Jubal calls me, hours later.
Happy New Year, dears.
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Part Two: Teaser
My brother David is a pillar of masculine pain and sardonic glory. At 3:15 in the morning of the New Year and the shots are drying themselves in the back of my throat, he and his friend Josh reappear to whisk me away to David's apartment on the Northern side of this crudely-shaped city.
In a 1982 fuck-me-lipstick-red Porsche Carrera ...
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time & machine