Between Earth and Frank

8/14/2019 Between Earth and Frank

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x-teenth failed novel attempt

by P. H. Madore

http://freemadore.info

Afterbirth that might have been

titled Between Earth and Frank.

Don't steal my shit, I'll kill you.Why would you want

my writing anyway ?

You're retarded, go away.

Written: 11/3/08, 11/4/08,

11/5/08, 11/6/08, 11/8/08,

11/9/08, 11/14/08, 11/17/08,11/18/08, 11/20/08, 11/21/08,

11/23/08, 11/26/08, 11/27/08,

11/29/08


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Between Earth and Frank

PART I

1A

GETTING INTO FIGHTS AND LOOKING

SORRY FOR IT

That fucker thinks he's tough, looking at my eye like

some sort of leprosy, but fuck him I still got the

other eye,Frank thinks. At the cafeteria with a

blackened eye again. Always doing this.

Getting into fights and looking sorry for it. This

weekend wasn't any different. Something

crazy's happening lately, even three days ago

with the fight. People are hearing his thoughts.

He knows it's crazy, and perhaps he should get

himself checked out, but he's sure he's not


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saying anything, and yet people are still

hearing all the awful thoughts in his head. The

guy he was just talking about, the beefy

mobster looking dumbass with the beard, he's

looking around right now. Looking to see just

who had the courage to say something that was

never actually said. Outrageous as it seems, it

hasn't all been negative.

Yesterday, at the copy machine, a place he

rarely visits, being a mailroom clerk and

occasional errand boy, a beautiful woman with

the red hair of a Nordic goddess and the body

of an Egyptian queen heard him think something

quite exactly to that effect. Almost lunch time,

and so most people had already vacated that

particular floor of the building, and so she, as

with the guy currently scanning quite dumbly


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his culprit, simply knew that something which

had never been said had in fact been said. Voice

soft and gravelly as 1931, she said, Well, no

one's ever said that before. How beautiful and

daring and bold of you. I'm married, boy, and

you're quite young, but I'm almost a numb slut

hiding in the lapels of modern morality via the

courtesy of a marriage into money. Or so my

dutiful husband says. Listen, you're cute, black

eye and all. I guess I'd probably be pretty

turned on by the story of how you got it. Such a

prole, like my roots, wonderful. Listen, here is

my phone number.

Wait, he said quickly. Is this

happening? Charming her all the more.

All of this over something he'd swear he'd

never said, to himself or to anyone, even to the


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God he's long since lost faith in.

She'd said, Oh yes. This's just the

beginning. I'm wet right now, but I can wait.

I'm used to waiting. Forever. Jesus I hope you'll

fuck me! She looked around, coyly placing

hand over ruby lips, regaining some sense of

situational awareness. I must be going now.

Do call, okay? Hmm... a harmless kiss... so

romantic... may I? His eyes wide, he nodded:

north-south. Yes. And so she placed her lips on

his, and it was unlike the lips of the girls, the

whores, he'd been with his entire life. An

experience all its own. Her lips were wet and

perfect and full and sensual. Her kiss was not an

expression of lust or anything else, it was an

expression of love wrapped up in lust with the

benefit of some contact. He'd be crazy not to


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call her, and in his right fist he held this scrap of

paper where she'd so heavenly scribbled digits

which would allow him to enter into a fantasy,

random and sudden as it was, and crazy as it

had begun, unlike any he'd ever dreamed.

Promptly afterward he masturbated in the

nearest bathroom.

His only evidence that any of that had

taken place was the piece of paper she'd written

on. Supernaturally he blew his load onto the

white tiles and felt the world was suddenly

within his grasp.

Now the beefy dick with the black hair,

once again he looked at Frank. Frank

responded with a you-must-be-crazy look. He

held his lips firmly shut and transmitted the

thought: the guy who did this, his arms were


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bigger. I'll murder you. The guy couldn't take it,

had no clue what was going on, and so stood

up and left the cafeteria. He looked scared.

Frank liked people to be scared, at least when

they deserved it. It was something he didn't

often think someone deserved, but there were

always those who did. And so he felt no guilt.

1B

Not an alcoholic, but this Friday Frank can't

think of anything but getting annihilated drunk

throughout the evening, throughout the

weekend. Though he knows he'll regret it and


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all that comes of it. He'd rather be writing or

fucking or doing anything that might add up to

some progress in the pathetic life he's carved

out for himself. Anything besides drinking, but

by the time a given week comes to a close he's

so angry and anxious to shove off and away

from the world as he knows it, a place dire and

unfriendly to him and his class of people, a

term which in his mind has never had any exact

definition, just the emotional satisfaction of

existencea class, something he can say he

belongs to. The time will come, his bosses will

be long gone, always leaving early on Fridays,

and he will punch his name into the electronic

clock and be gone from this desolate office

building.

Speaking of the building.


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He'd seen so many like it around town,

that it made him some mornings feel like part

of a conspiracy at blandness. While certain

things in the world were meant to progress and

gain beauty from their own progression, the

business world seemed to be going the opposite

direction, even down to the around the necks of

the professionals Frank worked quietly,

invisibly around.

Speaking of these professionals.

What was with all the instruments of

constriction they used on themselves? A tie, a

watch, a walletall things you'd have found on

any of them. Frank had never seen the purpose

of a wallet, though he owned one. When he

went to work he tried to seem as normal as

he could. He'd never understood the meaning


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of the term, but he'd always also thought that to

spend too much time on such a broken set of

definitions as normality, was every bit as bad

as desiring to be normal, and perhaps even

founded in said desire.

Sometimes he had epiphanies like that,

most days he did not. In this regard he was like

every other man. And he'd grown up like every

other man, from the womb forward only a few

things had been much different about the life of

Frank.

Today liquor ruled his thought process.

There had to be something to rule it. Otherwise

he'd probably not function well for long in his

role as a cog at a machine called Dynasty

Corporation. There was little so dynamic or

royal about a place that dealt in the sale of


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office supplies.

Today liquor ruled his thought process.

Thoughts of cool drinks in snifter glasses or

shots devoured from the comfort of an outside

table with a cigarette in his hand or, most likely,

the comfort of the bottle as it left the freezer

and reintroduced itself to him. He'd put some

rum in there, in the freezer, a week before.

Every night since then he'd opened the freezer.

He'd secured the bottle. He'd looked at the

bottle. He'd taken a good look at it, and then

opened it, and taken a good sniff of it. A good

whiff. If he was to get drunk every night of the

week, he'd be an alcoholic. Something Frank

was not was an alcoholic, so each night he

resisted the temptation. And quite well.

This was Friday. Though there was always


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work to be done on the weekends and

sometimes he was drafted to get some overtime

work, a thing which Frank didn't mind, and

perhaps the bosses picked up on that and thus

never gave him any, there was only a small

chance that he would still be enlisted to do any

of it. It was the path to promotion, the whole

working on the weekend thing, and he doubted

he'd ever see that path in all its cocksucking

glory. He didn't mind working the weekends

because the building was deserted and once

he'd smoked a joint with one of the janitors

whom he'd caught with it. That day rated as

awesome, because he survived it without the

any suicidal thoughts or the need to get drunk.

He just went home, devoured leftover Chinese

food, and went to sleep. Next morning he woke


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up and didn't have to work. He'd been able to

write his first poem in months then.

1B-1

Not an alcoholic, but this Friday Frank can't

think of anything but getting annihilated drunk

throughout the evening, throughout the

weekend.

The work day ends, as all such must, and

Frank is elated, for the weekend has begun, and

over the past few years he's realized that that is

where the most life takes place. All across

America, people die five days a week and live

two or three. So many are lost in the race that it

seems it's been this way since the dawn of time,

but there are a precious few who know better.


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in the pursuit of some goal, and unchained, it

comes from within thus. Someday he'll find

meaning within all the words he's filled a

bunch of notebooks with. Not just any

notebooks. He has two preferences when it

comes to his haphazard gonzo writing, and

they are: 200-page composition notebooks and

Paper Mate pens. Though he hates the logo of

the Paper Mate, thinks it retarded and

insulting. There is no better time for him to

know he's crazy than when he has arguments

with unimportant items like pens or computer

mice.

As usual, tonight his intentions are to stay

home, get drunk, and keep himself busy.

Perhaps he'll read but probably he'll just stand

outside on his first-floor balcony smoking a


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cigarette, until the liquor gets the best of him

and he must soon make his way to the bed

piece. Bed piece, head piece: don't you love her

madly?

The bus ride to the other side of town is

too slow. A bum three persons away has a

brown-paper wrapped pint of something, is

sipping it as if no one notices. Frank offers him

the price of the pint for a good haul off it. The

bum gives him two good swigs and smiles and

tries to engage him in conversation. It's been

too long since Frank was homeless; he used to

feel he at least some talk to the bums of the

world. Now he didn't feel anything, least of all

a debt to anyone but his landlords and bill

collectors, which were few. He spent every

dime that came his way, weekly, but he didn't


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have to. It just happened that way, and

sometimes he hated himself but most days he

did not.

In the door. Stripped naked in the kitchen.

Fixed the first drink and changed into

something more comfortable, a pair of pajama

pants. Easy enough to stay alone in pajama pants ,

he thought. Then he thought of college and

high school girls wearing pajama pants. He had

a boner then and decided to masturbate. It took

some time. He did this so mechanically that it

would never have given him the opportunity to

think that perhaps most people didn't

masturbate. He'd have only seen it as one more

thing setting him apart from, above society as a

whole. That's all. Just one more thing to outcast

him in this play on lives. Were there gods,


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they'd surely not be the kind of mad hating

fools that the various puritan tribes made them

out to be. He'd realized somewhere along the

line that hating religion was also clich, and if

there was one thing he was not, it was clich.

Hours pass and he is drunker and

drunker, and still awake at around ten PM. He

thinks it's probably time to start really getting

drunk. He throws on a holey white t-shirt,

shoves ten dollars from a kitchen drawer into

his pocket, and leaves the apartment, headed to

a nearby liquor store. It is here that the fight

will take place.

There is a ghetto type buying some kind

of vodka and there is an Asian buying wine.

Rice wine. Frank has a funny loud thought he'll

never remember later about stereotypical


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ethnicity and this is when he's attacked. Bam,

bam, the man is throwing him around the store,

crazed and raging. He's too drunk to resist, and

in a way he enjoys the pain. Soon the police will

arrive and Frank will not file a report, press

charges. The Asian will swear Frank said

something, but the store clerk will say the Asian

is crazy and that he wants to press charges, file

a report, that he never wants to see the crazy

Gook again. Frank is given his bottle of rum on

the house for being so cool about the whole

thing, matter-a-fact make it two, and goes home

wondering what the fuck. Next morning he

wakes up with the black eye and little

recollection.

2A


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TRANQUILIZED FREUDIAN SLIPS

Steady now, steady now. He's awake this

morning, thinking about calling the woman. A

storm of written pages. He'll be crazy not to.

Wise men would mutter such. First he must

envision an original conversation. If for nothing

but his own satisfaction. Somewhere buried

within the pages written the night before, there

are words worth saying to a woman of her

caliber. Of this he thinks he's sure. Doesn't get

sick anymore in the morning and despises

sentences that begin with pronouns. Once he

counted every word in every page and slimmed

them down accordingly, but in those days he

didn't have stories to tell. These days he sees


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through the rare cracks of society. These nights,

he swears he sees the desolation silver of the

moonlight.

Reading through the pages beside the

mattress on the floor of his room he's finding

things. Worth savoring, which leave a greedy

taste in his mouth. It's a greedy taste that keeps

people interested in life, he's figured for some

years now. He flips over a typewritten

manuscript and with his red pen, on the

hardwood panel floor of the $320-per-month

room, he writes the basics, figuring these are

where all lives must begin:

I was born in 1985. In a city by the sea named

Providence. My name is Frank Zachary Mathias.

My name is ridiculous. Things like this occur in the

world, this much has always been known.


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This last sentence is ridiculously preachy,

he tells himself, and crosses it out. Now there is

chaos and confusion on the page: it's all in red,

and he uses red to moderate the better crap he

comes up with. This is something else

completely. This even requires precursors and

other things to happen, so he begins these.

Showering, a must. Yes. Picking up the room,

the best it can be picked up. There is no

furniture besides his mattress, unsheeted, and

this ratty brokedown camping chair he found

outside a dumpster some streets not too far

away to tote it one night home from work,

when he'd spent all his bus fare. There were

times he found it crazy that he worked in such

a monied institution and still managed to run

out of money. Such was the way of the world as


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it stood, he believed, though he likewise

believed that all things standing were bound to

one day not stand, that is, to fall, and

occasionally he recited vague inner predictions

of the end of society as it had for too long

been known, and in these moments felt more

clich than ever but couldn't bring himself to

care. Couldn't bring himself to bat an eye at his

own false melody, for he knew also that things

like that were bound to happen, and things like

that were bound to end as well. Somewhere in

the distance, he was sure, abandoned guitar

strings were strummed. This much had the

ability to comfort him.

First sin was something not worth

scratching on chalk boards in societal dining

halls from a thousand years before. All that


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madness was bound to matter never more.

Switchblades were once the wave of his future,

he'd once believed, but didn't bother to carry

out that future. Never robbed a man. Felt off-

balance whenever he really thought it through.

And so many prime targets at the workplace,

weren't there? No more than any other such

kind of place, surely, but they were there,

nonetheless, waiting to be raped of their money.

Like whores who couldn't sell what they were

offering.

He tried again.

A city by the sea, 1985, I was born. The first

thing I remember is my mother getting angry that

I'd beaten another little boy up.

Better. Something like that could develop

into a conversation with a woman like her.


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Apparently she had things to say. He

remembered her words, not exactly, and then

was disturbed by the memory of what had

started the whole thing. She'd heard his

thoughts. Somehow the volume of his thoughts

had been turned up so high that it made it

through the thick skulls of other people and

they understood what he was transmitting,

although his transmission was involuntary. The

whole idea scared the fuck out of him. In nights

for years he'd dreamed of such a day, but he

figured it a fluke, and maybe she was playing a

game with him. Maybe she wasn't real and he

was flaking out. Maybe he was losing his shit.

Maybe. And then the other guy, what of him?

The other guy never actually said anything, he

never made a scene, not the way she did. In her


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case there had been no doubt of who must have

thought that out loud. Tranquilized Freudian

slips. Lima beans. His thoughts would

sometimes wander so vicious, uncontrollable.

The piece of paper he'd scribbled on, he

took it and set it on the bed. Next to it he set the

cell phone, first having to get it out of his coat

pocket. Winter had come again already. This

was a thing that amazed him every year.

Another year had passed and he was still alive,

still having headaches and still wondering

things, still looking forward to a glory that may

never come. Somehow, if he just kept writing

this mad journalistic prose, somehow

something might come out of all of it. Perhaps

only a piece of prose, very short, worth

publishing, but if published in just the right


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place, it could take him away from all this. It

could change his life and pay his bills. It was

not a thing unprecedented. Such things had

happened in the short history of the large

country he lived in, a place called America.

Such things had happened. He could write a

life just this way. And as he neatly stacked the

pages out of order in the corner, on top of a

mad stack of much the same, most of which he

wasn't proud of, he realized that perhaps that

had been what he had been doing all along, and

he'd just not had the gumption, the ambition to

notice. Possible, possible. Steady now, steady

now, the winds are blowing in your favor.

These are the kinds of thoughts that rolled

through his head exactly at times like these. The

call must be placed.


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2B

The number was dialed as if by itself and the

call was connected and the woman on the other

end whispered.

She said, Already, I know who this is. It's

grand you've called.

Verbosity is a crime, he told her.

So may it be, and I, a criminal, she

chimed in.

Perhaps he was falling in love with her.

But oh-no probably not.

What have you been doing all Saturday

morning? he asked. Seemed a valid question.

I have been wanting to know who you


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are.

And I the same, no less and of course. I

love the way life treats me good occasionally

and most of the time I have nothing to speak of.

Some days I feel elated, mood bettered and

humorous. Others soberly humorless. I can't be

to blame, or can I?

You can. You the sameas in yourself or

myself?

Yourself, of course, beautiful. I am

mystified by our first meeting, and I didn't

much believe this number was real.

You commented on reality before, the

other day or wasn't it yesterday?

Yes, this all seems unreal. I'd tell the

truth about it all, but you'd be flabbergasted

and unbelieving.


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You could try me right now, or wait until

we see each other in person. I never have these

conversations in my normal life. I want a secret

life, that's all. If you or any good many could

provide such, I'd be astounded and suckered in

for life. Life. Life is what I'm seeking. Is that a

pursuit worthy?

Worthy? Yes. However, I am not a good

man.

Our dialog is so... so it's own , lover.

A lover who's not made love to you?

That much can be cured, handsome.

Listen, my name is Linda. I am older than I

look. I take care of my body. Right now, if you

wish, I will lie to my husband, she whispered

aloud. I will tell him I am going to the gym,

and I will come and love you until the heavens


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end. I will not want to go, but duty will drive

me to, I am good like that.

If you are to come here, be warned: this

is the place of a pauper. I live in a different

world, and I am younger at that, so I haven't

even had the benefit of a life to spend in pursuit

of the kind of life that was handed to you.

Right, right, this much I expected, dear.

Will you let me come?

By cab or by bus or by the prettiest moth

you can find, yes. First we must make

introductions. Phone introductions will work.

You are Linda and I am Frank. You are Ms.

Linda and I am Mr. Frank. I was born in 1985,

and you were born not too long before that. You

have red hair and mine is brown. There,

introductions over, all the rest can be learned in


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pillow talk. Surely you'll deal with the

shoddiness of my dwelling?

Sex is what I'm after, and conversation.

The latter you provide quite well, if you don't

mind my saying so. And so I say so. I love to

repeat things, sometimes I get a good taste in

my mouth by the words I spit out of it and I

can't help but want to keep it. I hope you'll

nevermind that, lover. May I come now?

Or before, as soon as possible. Here is the

address: 1039 Harlem Avenue. I will stand

outside at the position of attention until you

have arrived.

I don't know what the position of

attention is, but attention is what my husband

did wrong, although I never truly loved him,

not like I feel for you already, like I feel this


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thing where... Well, that much can be worked

out with our bodies, yes? I have the birth

control, have you any diseases?

Of course not, I never get any sex, or at

least not any unprotected sex. A rich woman

can carry my child anyway, though, so

whatever may happen, let us let it happen...

Right, right. A cab to 1039 Harlem

Avenue will be called momentarily. I can't wait

to see you, to see your face as you reach the

point of ecstasy only two lovers can give each

other. I see you lust for greatness, perhaps this

can go on, perhaps it can't, please don't take

anything personally, just take it for what it is: as

of now, I am only looking to fuck in as vulgar a

manner as can be done, and so we will, but

perhaps more can lead from there. We can plot


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to murder my husband. Oh I said that out loud.

Someday I'll believe every word you say, I am a

sucker that way... And well, I ramble, I'll be

seeing you!

Right.

And click and click, his erection stood and

he wasn't sure if the conversation he'd just had

was real. He loved the feeling of surreal that

surrounded this woman. Linda. How many

women in the world were named Linda? Oh,

who was he kidding? Such a name was

common enough. The whole affair made him

lust for a cigarette, not greatnessbut fuck it if

she took him wrong, at least he'd be getting the

physical satisfaction out of it. And with a piece

like that , he'd be crazy to complain.


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2B-1

The rich woman, name Linda, or so he

remembered, she arrived nearly an hour later.

He'd spent a solid fifteen minutes cleaning his

room. There weren't many possessions to

clutter the place. The bed, the printed

journalistic hack writing, computer, printer, an

ashtray, and cellular telephone. A closet in

which he hung his work clothes, a built-in

ironing board within. A floor on which to store

his non-work clothes. The one thing he

sometimes felt he was missing was his own

refrigerator, though it was not as if anyone ever

actualy messed with his stuff in the shared

fridge. Everything else he spent his money on

ended up as either broken glass on the


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more keenly waiting for Linda than he ever had

at any other time. For the kind who liked to

write things down, he'd never quite been

observant enough. He'd seen things, of course,

but it was easy for the whole of the civilized

world to fade into background and supportive

noise for him. So it was that he saw this early

afternoon the true chaos of his immediate

surroundings. He didn't feel angry, or even all

that nervous, though nervousness became part

of him for the first time in so long he couldn't

remember. Nervous that she would arrive at

her destination, see the filth that surrounded

his home, and tell the cab driver she was sorely

mistaken, and he would never hear from her

again. And he would see her at the workplace,

and she would ask him to stop calling her.


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Surely she would make up some kind of story

about how her husband had gotten involved in

the whole thing, and he'd not believe her, and

perhaps with his newfound powers he would

communicate his doubt with nothing but his

mind and be granted in that moment an

opportunity to fuck with her.

She arrived. She did.

Majestic, like a queen paying a visit to a

village in the outer reaches of her kingdom.

Queendom, in this case, being that she came

across like a black widow who'd never known

even a hint of guilt. The expected look of

distaste or disgust on her face was not there.

Neither the expected vibe of condescension and

self-righteously uptight-lipped expression.

Instead, she, like himself, did not seem to


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notice. A sigh of relief overtook him, and he

didn't bother to hide it. Realizing suddenly that

hiding anything would ruin this moment, this

day, even the rest of his life, he decided against

making anything less than perfectly obvious,

even the fact that he knew, right then, that he

was madly in love with this woman. The fact of

her societal inclination was lost on him; he'd

grown up poor and would happily achieve the

grave as such. Again the surreal feeling, again

the notion that perhaps all of this was a trick of

his overactive imagination. Again with all of

that. Apparently she noticed only him. As he

now only noticed her. Someday the crud of the

city, the echelon of her lover's caste, would

make itself clear to her, as it had today to he

himself. That day could be an eternity from


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now, she figured, and neither of them cared

much for eternity or notions thereof.

The cab, a typical yellow workhorse with

a finish line running the length of it, sat in the

center of the street, its driver counting change,

and said driver began to say things, to shout

things after her. Frank asked her, Need you

pay this man any mind, or what?

No, no, I gave him a hundred and he is

probably confused. If he's the smart crook I'm

sure he is, he'll be gone before a moment or two

has passed.

About this she was right.

Inside the house they stepped.

Linda made a comment, the place looked

better inside than out. Frank said his room was

another story. Not appalled, she said it was sort


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of romantic in its own way. Its own mad way, is

how she put it.

How long have you got? Frank

inquired.

Oh, long enough... surely this place isn't

good enough for you?

It's fine. Fine. I've lived in worse. I've

been homeless. You see there is a place to hang

my work clothes, a place to stash my non-work

clothes, a place for me to sleep, and a means for

me to write.

I see that you have written. I would like

to read these words. Rather, I would like you to

read them to me. You know, I have always sort

of envied people like you, Frank. You are

luckier than I in a way. You've got character,

you've got style. I've got money, and I don't


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even class. I--

Oh, you have class, my dear, that you do.

Please, sit, will you?

And so she did.

And so he did sit beside her, lighting a

comfortable cigarette. She didn't complain, nor

did she ask for it when she plucked it form his

mouth and began to puff greedily. He wasn't

sure he'd ever seen a person of wealth smoke

that way, not unless they happened to be drunk

or under duress. Could it be an act, was she

pretending? Well, if so, it was for his benefit,

right? Thus, who cared? Who could? Just look

at this womanso supple from chin to chest,

stomach to ankle. Perfection of its own.

It happened again, just then, as he had

these thoughts, as his arousal triggered itself.


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She heard, again, something which had never

been said. She'd been looking off out the

window, waiting for him to make a move,

though she was completely comfortable with

kicking the sex games off, and then these words

came through, in a voice which sounded

exactly like his though not somehow, words of

pure passion, perhaps the voice of passion

itself: an act, pretending, ah but she is so gorgeous,

from top to bottom, perfection, and so I don't care...

You know just how to charm a lady, don't

you? Well, I'm not a lady, so your charm works

twice as well... Fuck me now or forever hold

your peace.

Here, in my hell-hole, and sober? he

verified.

Oh, god, yes.


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The deal was sealed and soon the first of

many deeds was done. First time around his

passion got the best of him. Years had passed

since he'd fucked sober. Whiskey dick was his

friend, but this time around it just wasn't there.

And oh well. Steady now, steady now. Not

disappointed, she said he was young yet, that

she would train him. They had all the time in

the world. Right then she didn't care if she ever

returned to her husband's bed. There was

nothing very glamorous about being rich, she

explained, more often it was boring. Which is

why she did things to entertain herself. She too

wrote, she painted, she did a lot of things very

badly if only for the release. Security was not a

provision of liberty, mental or otherwise.

Four times that afternoon, and two more


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by early evening. Neither could get enough of

the other. Both felt like virgins, newly

discovering the genius of their own failed

human design. Lovemaking came naturally for

them both, they were both just those kinds of

people, or so they thought. Then began the

drinking, the excuse-me-honey call to her

husband, a matter of courtesy, and she found

herself explaining exactly what was going on,

and her husband's reaction was simple: I have

been fucking the tennis instructor for five

years.

Yes, I know this, she told him. I know

you could care less for any sport, unless it's

sport-fucking. Which you're not that great at,

just saying.

I know. But she pretends I am. She wants


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our money. Perhaps this Joe of yours wants the

same. Careful of that, hmm?

I think he's content where he is. Neither

of us have the balls to divorce the other

anyway, at least not right now, so anyway, I will

see you when I see you, hopefully you

understand I've never loved you.

Surreal. Frank thought: surreal. The phone

hung up, she said, Yes, this is crazy to me as

well. But oh well and so be it this is the way I

live. I live free when I can, enslaved the week

long. Every week. As I must. Please don't ruin

this for me, may we now get drunk?

Of course. Anything, name it.

She named it.

3A


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THE DISTANCE BETWEEN MORTALITY

AND REASON

We were scared and tired and barely

seventeen... --The Gaslight Anthem

As has been said, Frank was born Francis

Zachary Mathias in Providence, Rhode Island,

to Peter Hubert Mathias III and Penny Jean

Lifshin on Janauary 23 rd , 1985. Average parents,

though it's important to note that his mother

will never let him forget that her New Year's

Eve was ruined that year because of her

pregnancy. Frank's whole thing is that it's not

his fault, he didn't choose to be concieved or

born. Peter met Penny at an REO Speedwagon


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concert and never let her go, at least not until

Frank's tenth year, by this time having had a

second child with her. Restless and wanting to

ramble, Peter did just that, and things haven't

been the same between him and Frank since

then. Divorce doesn't go over well in the

Catholic church, and it's not the kind of thing

that can be easily shrugged off, but Frank and

his mother have managed, and Frank's father

was at least deeply apologetic when it came

time for such things to be discussed. For the

situation it left the kids in, one that was

becoming increasingly common around that

time. Eventually his father landed a steady job

somewhere out west, and the child support

checks became more regular, and the financial

struggle seemed to lighten up around the


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house, but by this time Frank was almost a

teenager, and whether he knows or admits it or

not, he was already ruined by then. He knows

he's broken somehow, though some days he

feels alright, and the chances are it all

happened before his twelfth year. Never

molested sexually; no, it was just his mind, like

so many other kids in his day, was raped by too

much thinking about things that kids shouldn't

have to think about, or at least the same people

who put them through it would say that they

should not have to. Frank always felt that

mentioning things like this had the ability to

lead any conversation or narrative down the

wrong road, one of debate. As if such things are

up for debate. It's so simple: be good to

children, don't make them think about things


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unless it's a means to challenging their

developing intellect.

Grew up a loner, of sorts. There were

friends. They all seemed to share the same

name. Now Frank is 21 and he can't say he has

any friends. He lives so far away from all the

people he once knew. At seventeen he was on

his own, didn't want to be a leech. His mother

would have had him on for as long as he

wanted to stay in her home. Perhaps it was a bit

of that restlessness that his father felt so

compelled by that drove him, a genetic

transferral of courage. The balls to make a

world supposedly for the taking like a

preacher's daughter clearly for the taking. If

that makes any sense, I don't know, it's

something Frank said once, and I kind of liked


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it, so I repeated it here.

One friend he'll never forget, well now

before that, let's dissect a bit about why he has

trouble forgetting people or places. Perhaps

when his father had to go, for his own reasons

which Frank has come to respect, perhaps it

was then that Frank became reliant on memory

as a means to keep people alive. When the

phone never rings with their voice on the other

end, when the gravel of the driveway never

crunches with the sound of their truck tires, the

only way to keep someone you love alive is to

remember everything you can about them. If

you get to doing this unconsciously later in life,

like with your first love, for instance, maybe it's

more concentrated. If you do it as a little kid,

perhaps it can fuck you up: perhaps you'll start


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something contrary. And he'll make it sound as

cretin as possible, so you won't get the hint that

maybe th thing you had to say could make

sense, because Frank wants people to believe he

is simple. Survival is easier for the simpler

minds of the world, Frank has seen that his

whole life, and the world hasn't changed

enough in twenty-three years for him to change

his mind. The friend whose name began with a

J, this friend could have been great. Computers

or business, he was going places. When they

were thirteen Frank smoked a lot of dope. He

loved it, he didn't have to think of things, he

didn't have to remember that people had

already died, people had already left, and once

this friend, this J, well he showed up down to

the trailers where Frank and his mother and


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little sister were living, and said, Let's go to

the movies, all of us, and there was a van full

of people. Most were mutual acquaintances.

Frank protested: I've got no cash. Worry not,

they said, we have plenty. All of it stolen, it

turned out, but Frank didn't know that. He was

high and wouldn't have cared anyway. As long

as he was high, the world seemed an alright

place to exist. He read books still, but kept that

to himself. Read a lot of books. Which is beside

this point, the point being this guy, this guy

who was driving the van. Well this

motherfucker. He asked Frank what was wrong

with Frank, on their way to the movie theater

across town. Frank shrugged, said, I'm high.

Frank will never forget this moment. This is the

part where the guy, with his older-guy goatee


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themselves.

3A-1

There were friends growing up, sure and of

course there were, but it is the nature of friends

to drift apart, unless they become lovers, which

can go either way, but usually goes the way that

cynics believe such things are destined to.

Frank is naturally a cynic. And at seventeen, as

has been said, he struck out on his own to take

the world by storm for himself. Long before he

knew what truly being a social person or a

socialist meant. Long before, he struck off on

his own. And time always went slower for him.

Months in Frank's world of progression were

the equivalent of years for his peers, all of


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whom were destined for college and certain

mediocrity: numb and distracted.

The two years he spent before he first

went to jail, during which he held more jobs

than he could remember. Worked for temp

agencies and labor pools. Telemarketers and

drug dealers and. Once tanned, living in the

deep Red South, he occasionally became

gainfully employed by going to where the

Mexicans were picked up near the home

improvement supply warehouse superstores by

keeping his mouth shut and working hard. The

cash was good, that's all he knew. And most of

it went to his habits: cigarettes, alcohol,

marijuana. Habits he may never break. Sobriety

wasn't for Frank Mathias, a conclusion reached

too early to count as much of a conclusion.


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Ah, but he was virile then, and vitriolic

and victorious. Memories of his prime, such a

short time ago, indeed a whisper through time

if anything, always bring a crisp taste to Frank's

mouth. Probably always will. Because

sometime after doing his first stint in jail, a

situation which had origins he may never be

sure of, something changed within him.

Reality set in. The dream became the lie.

The world was no longer an oyster for

drinking. No longer a cup overflowing.

And this haphazard history brings us to

the present, the more important present, the

one where Frank doesn't care if you care, and

won't even have the motivation to get into such

a discussion. Where he has nothing to prove

and knows he has nothing to prove. He's no


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longer working his way up in the world, he's

working his way through the hours between

now and inevitable demise; the distance

between mortality and reason.

Frank has landed the best job he's ever

had, or anyway the least physically demanding.

He has reached the point where ambition is

more of a notion than a reality. He's managed to

kick the dope habit, but drinking overtakes

him. Seems like the minute he became legal it

started to make sense to drink more. The

freezer always has liquor in it, bottles chilled

and legendary. This is the longest he's been at

one address since he left his mother's. This is

the longest he's been at one job since he scraped

together enough money for a month's rent and

got himself off the streets. That took some


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gumption, but often enough, and he writes

about this constantly in those wacky journals of

his, he can't even see that same person in the

mirror. Though not a day goes by that he

doesn't think about his days on the streets.

How romantic, to dive in a dumpster for your

supper. No, he'd be serious if he said this out

loud. If you gave him the chance, if you bought

him a drink and said, Tell unto me your story,

he'd say something like this with all

seriousness. To shower in the bathrooms of

beautiful women trying to save and smother-

mother you; to dumpster dive for your supper

from the best restaurants in a given city; to find

Gucci shoes on the sidewalk outside an upscale

bar... how romantic the bump-about's life can

be. Perhaps he has said things like this. If he is


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bathroom mirror the makings of the next lost

lover poet for the ages. Ages. If only.

Frank has sold out, but things are better as

a result. He always pays his rent, is never late

for work, always has money for cigarettes-

liquor-copypaper-ink and once in awhile

something else will bite into his meager

paychecks. Thing is, he's working now in the

kind of organization where all this is exactly

enough to get him where he might want to go.

That's Frank's whole problem as we find him,

projecting thoughts into audible form as a

result of their passionate force. Whole problem

is that he doesn't anymore know where he

wants to go. Some days he is sure that this is

not a reference to the work place, where he

never feels like he can be himself, which at least


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he could do back when he was working manual

labor jobs, that is, speak freely and still be fed.

Free thought is a bane to the existence of plain

building corporations like this one, where he's a

mail clerk these days. And this is how we find

Frank, and the year is 2005, and all of this is

true, even those which seem impossible.

There is a Zippo lighter. Back in the day,

and rest assured we will soon return to the

present, but back in those days, with J and R

and the rest of the retards that bore a

mediocratic fool like Frank, Frank and J stole a

pair of matching Zippos. Frank was never

much of a thief but it was the county fair and he

was feeling bold and J always spurred things

on, up until he ended up a felon, he did, and

now he seemed so defeated, all the time,


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deflated, but nonetheless, there were these two

Zippos. The only two like them they'd ever seen

anywhere. The game was you had to throw

these darts at these balloons. They spent their

tickets on throwing all the darts they could

afford, they hit the balloons, then to get a prize

you had to throw a ball and knock the prize

down. Fuck madness, Frank might grumble.

All their tickets, and these were poor kids, and

instead of the Zippos they get something lame,

a stuffed toy maybe, no one remembered any of

that. This Zippo sitting on the window sill in

his room, this is the story of it. The carnie

fucked them. He said, no, you take the stuffed

toy, when they pleaded with him. They made a

raitonal argument: hey man, we've been here

over an hour at your gay little stand. We gave


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you all our fucking tickets, we don't have

anymore. Just give us our goddamn Zippos and

we'll leave peacefully. The carnie said no.

Moron. As if these kids had anything to lose. So

they walked away, pissed, and talked it over. It

was decided: they'd take that bottle of

whatever, something cheap, from J's mother's

boyfriend and they would smash it in the field

near the fair, and they would sleep there, and

that night, they would hop the turnstiles and

take their prize. And walk away as if nothing

happened. They were fourteen years old, these

dumbass kids. Before the passion left his veins,

when he was never wrong. They succeeded.

The carnie smelled like heroin, but Frank had

no inkling about heroin then, that ame later,

and he survived it, but anyway, the carnie


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looked dead, smelld like burnt hair, and they

took their Zippo lighters right off the shelf, and

they walked away from there that night elated.

And years would pass before too many things

went wrong. And they'd doctor those lighters,

they were authentic and not often seen where

they came from. No, nothing nice was ever

seen. A fucking Cadillac was a luxury car. A

Corvette, passing through, must be. And none

of this makes any sense, but it doesn't have to.

It doesn't have to because I wasn't there for any

of this. I am just painting a picture of the

madness that developed our passionless

unmotivated friend Frank who all of a sudden

has these upsurges of emotion which somehow,

somefuckinghow, as you've seen already, they

translate into ESP or something. Whatever it


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might be called. He's going through this all of a

sudden and this is why: once, he lived; it's like

he's a walking ghost and he's transmitting

things from the great beyond. Answers,

translations, adding up to simple

communication he's too paralyzed to say aloud.

As with Linda, or the punkass bully

motherfuckers. That's what's going on. In plain

English. And all of this will be rewritten, but I'll

leave this line so you know. So you know how

this all was so frustrated and broken. The

things you're telling me aren't making any

sense, that's what you're saying, and that's

because you need to let go. Or perhaps you

don't need to let go, no, but Frank has, and

that's where he is. And thus into the present,

enough of this sidestepping conventional


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bullshit. Linear time is for historians, and this is

anything but a history, or rather, anything but a

complete history. This is between Earth and

Frank.

[heavy editing must be done to 3A-1, 3A, and all

previous, of courseBUT FOCUS ON 3A-1,

develop rough coal into diamonds]

3B

In the last city, there was punk rock. And shows

thereof. Music Frank could really dig. Bands

that would within two years be multinationally

famous were thanking Frank and the rest of the

tiny club crowds for showing up. During all

this, Frank got the ambition to pick up a guitar.


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He played with it and played with it, not

knowing to whom it belonged. At times he had

epiphanies about it, as if he could stay right

there forever and nothing would change,

nothing would break down, the guitar would

always remain in his hands and he would

always remain clever enough to do anything

with it. Things don't always remain, though,

especially those which do not exist. He tried

and tried, but in the end the guitar turned out

to be much like the pen for him. Once in awhile

something brilliant came out of hours of

constant attempts and assaults on laziness

within, and the immediacy of his music was

exactly the tone he'd been going formost of

the time, it sounded like pure unfounded un-

principaled crap, and Frank had never even


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bothered to learn how to tune a guitar. He

figured lessons would come around eventually,

but he was not in a place of learning. So that

Monday morning, all the frats passed out

where they lay, around the building, he felt it

necessary to leave that place, possibly to, with

much regret and little regard, find a place to

sell his time to like a normal person, like the

person he was once again up until that

Wednesday night slash Thursday morning, the

common worker. He stood up and, without

thinking, walked out with the guitar. The guitar

player knew right away, even asleep, but could

only grin: the burden of the creative spirit had

finally been lifted.

And now the curse had taken over Frank,

and nothing ever came of it. Not even one good


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must not carry this over to work. I hope it is

enough for you that my husband is fully aware

and does not care. Please do not dare, we both

have our lives to lead. For now they have

intertwined, they have, but let us not be fooled

into thinking this means anything.

You must be forgetting that I am a man.

Men are pigs, love. Perhaps I couldn't wait for

you to leave.

Nonsense, she said sharply, almost

angry. A tear forming.

Of course it was, don't take anything I

ever say so seriously.

This weekend would never have

happened if I did not.

About that. Nothing was ever said. You

heard a thought of mine, and I remain unsure


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of how this whole thing works. I think I need

some kind of examination of my head, he

explained.

Right, right, sure. Why you'd not take

credit for the brilliant un-obvious pick-up line, I

can't figure, Frank, but I don't care. The sex was

good enough, satisfactory building up to

ecstasy, you were out of a practice--

With a woman of your caliber, maybe--

But still you carried me through to

orgasm after orgasm, and that is all I was after

this weekend. There will be plenty of time to

discuss anything else, any other arrangement.

Yes.

Yes.

So here is one last drink to weekend love

affairs, right, Frank?


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One last toast. We shall use the rest of the

bourbon. You stocked this place pretty well, I

hope you know. There remains rum and beer

and cheap champagne.

Bourbon it is. I love the way it makes my

teeth look.

I love the way it makes you look.

Time may slap you in the face for that

one, she warned him.

And so it maymay it live for the rising

tides of vaginal fluids, right?

Right. Toast, then--

I just did, I'll start overno mother ever

dreams that her son is going to grow up to be a

clerk. Mothers are more ambitious, and so may

they always remain. I'm sorry, but weekends all

come to an end. A time has come and passed,


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something has died inside, and I no longer feel

it an option to just quit the job, he raised his

glass, which she had poured for him. Always

doing things like that, Linda was, servile things

that turned him on all the more. She cared

about him, in some ways at least, and he wasn't

used to that.

Here here.

Now you'll be leaving, he said as they

drained their glasses.

For now.

I hope you return, he said, standing up

and embracing her in a dipping kiss.

As do I. I hope you remain. Don't flip out

and disappear, I know you have a history.

A history and an injury. I've enjoyed you.

How I'd love to keep it going. As I say, things


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have changed within me. I regret this much at

least. I wanted to tell you I loved you, but I was

and am afraid that it will drive you away.

You're already on your way to being gone,

though, so fuck it, Linda: I love you.

It's late now.

Alright then, has the cab yet arrived?

It will, sure, let us wait outside together.

Anything you desire. We must give

ourselves to each other, we must be in this

together, dedicated to the infernal madness that

is our sexual relation.

5A

LINDA, REITA, UNFAIRNESS, AND HIS

ACHING BACK


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Emancipated, Frank goes into the next week

with a new vigor he's not brought to a

workplace for sometime. And his work suffers

for it, because people are kind to him, this

changes things, and so his zeal lasts a day. He

thinks, If only I had a job I could give a fuck about.

Like killing people or animals or something. Even

something so stupid as building the future of the

industrial world with my two hands or delivering

mail to people through snow and sleet and rain.

Anything in which I could feel I was making great

contributions to society. Though fuck society. Yes,

fuck society.

5B


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Linda speaks to him periodically. To him not

long ago it seemed she could have been the love

of his life. She was only vacationing. A tourist

in his life. He sees this now, every morning

when she walks by, eyes glazed, pretending not

to see him. Every night, his cell phone's call log

empty. And so be it, this is the only thought on

the matter he can muster. When she speaks to

him, she speaks in professional words. The

conversations are not memorable. After all that

seemed to flow between them, there is now

none of that left. He's not romantic enough to

muster any emotion to convey to her, and so

none is conveyed, and so life goes on in such a

sallow manner that he can't bring himself to

care if he ever does see her again. Three weeks


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pass and she is a memory and in the life of

Frank, this is nothing new. So few things are

new anymore. And there is no completion to

that sentence: so few things are new anymore.

That is all. That is all that is important. He can

go from one thing to the next without losing a

damn thing, he can think from one thing to the

next without feeling at all.

Sometimes the church folks wander

through his neck of the city. They say things to

him, and sometimes they can see that he is one

of those truly lost souls, one of those long

forgotten. Never to return to their holy

kingdom, supposing it exists. And he can see

within them that they have their doubts, and

once in awhile this will piss him off so, sitting

on the stoop, and he will so desire to say so, but


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there is no need to argue, especially about

something so unresolvable, and there is no

reason to start a fight where there was no fight

before. He firmly believes this. Passion and fire,

they have their own realm, and it's been a long

time since Frank lived in one.

But one Morning, a weekend morning, it

happens to have become a Sunday. On the

stoop, smoking a cigarette from the night

before, one that he had forgotten about, must

have fallen from that last pack, a cigarette

sitting on the stoop lonely and needing a home.

Rests it on his lips and lights the damn thing.

Thinks of the inspiration of movies for awhile.

Think of people who pirate endless video

footage onto their computers so they can see

things. Sot, rot, and so forth. So they can see


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pornography. New pornography, old

pornography. He's thinking about pornography

when they interrupt his thought process. The

church people, arrived again, with something

to say, a brochure he simply must read. Sure to

put a new spin on old nonsense. He thinks,

What the fuck. He thinks, What I call liberation,

you call sin. What I call America, you call a nation

doomed to hell. What I call nonsense, you call

gospel! How do you people fucking live with

yourselves!

It happens again. The poor elderly black

woman, she didn't know what she had coming

to her. He is looking at her, smiling, and his lips

have not moved. He is taking the brochure

from her politely, surely it will go in the trash

like all the rest, but he has a policy not to be


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rude to anyone passing things out, even foolish

things. A foolish policy.

The look on her face is quite damned. She

looks in pain, like her mind can't process what's

going on, but worse it looks like she is hearing

what her mind can't process, and Frank has not

said a word. He hasn't.

She struggles with speech. He sees she has

a name-tag. It reads: Reita. He can't stop

thinking about his aching back. The relation of

an aching back to the song by Nirvana called

Pennyroyal Tea. He wants to say or maybe

sing the phrase, I have very bad posture, to

this woman, but he is afraid she might him if he

says anything more. Though he hasn't yet said

a word besides, Thank you. Which is two

words. Chances are she didn't hear that. Instead


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she heard his heroic anti-church thoughts. And

now she doesn't know what to do. Maybe he

should remind her that it is Sunday. He decides

that no matter what, if she musters any words,

he is going to respond, I have very bad

posture. In some ways he feels this would be

relevant, or if not relevant, it would be

cognitive. He actually thinks that word without

really knowing what it means: cognitive. He

makes a mental note to look that word up, but

since he forgets all his mental notes, he already

knows how stupid an idea that is. How stupid

all ideas can be. How stupid everything is. He

could rant for weeks about the meaning of

stupid. He does know what that means. This

woman is stupid , he thinks. America is stupid. All

Christians are stupid, especially males. All Muslims


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are fucking stupid. Everyone is stupid. He realizes

suddenly that he is doing deductive work here,

and the results are obvious. Nothing is

changing, she is not hearing the transmission of

these thoughts. She doesn't have a window on

his mind. This means one of two things: the

transmissions, as he has come to refer to them

in his very gonzo liquored journals, are

connected to hyper-emotion, such as anger in

the heat of the moment or more refined and

romantic emotions as in the case of Linda at the

copier machine; or, conversely, he simply has

no control over when he transmits things. This

thought process takes place within the space of

thirty seconds in the mind of Frank, and during

that time the fat black woman named Reita

goes from standing there, judgmentally staring


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him down, to shaking her head, to walking

away mumbling something about lost souls. He

thinks, It's not fair. Two things are unfair right

now. One, I feel no guilt or remorse. I haven't

known those feelings since I was a young teenager,

at least not regularly the way average god-fearing

Americans dono, I've only known it when I let

someone down that I did not mean to let down. And

then it's not remorse so much as regret, though

regret is not keen enough a description for how I

feel. Dissatisified, maybe. Am I really having this

internal dialogue right now about nothing? Why do

I sit here and do these things, on Sundays in a city

where the beer store is open? Because I know of my

own alcoholism and try to keep it under control, that

is the answer, and there are days I want to be a

straight-edge vegan age 24 with a bachelor's in


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Youth and beauty are underrated. There are a lot of

underrated things. I could think just this way all

day, but I have run out of cigarettes. Of course I

have no money to secure more at this moment in

time, because the rent has passed. There was a time I

would consider rent weekend to be the weekend of

considering future possibilities. Here in this shoddy

building I have let myself stop dreaming, at least

beyond the very concrete goals of staying off the

street and staying employed, which at one time were

very much dreams in and of themselves. Yet I have

let myself stop thinking more grand thoughts than

that, to stop thinking that maybe I could conquer the

world if I really tried. It is a world made for

conquering, and look at the half-tards and ingrates

that have managed it thus far. I need to read more.

There is a book in my room. I should go get it, along


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with enough change to buy a pack of rolling tobacco

with papers, and I should read until I fall asleep

tonight. I will show up to work. I will because I

always do. As much as I hate to, I do this.

Frank's internal dissertation went on

another fifteen minutes before he brought

himself around to going upstairs and getting

the book, a biography of a great revolutionary

in China named Mao, and exactly a dollar and

thirty-seven cents in silver and copper coins.

With this dollar-thirty-seven in his right hand

and the cradled in his left, resting sort of on his

hip, he walked to the end of the block, took a

left, went one block up, and then diagonal from

him there was a corner store. Everywhere in

this city either sold single Newport cigarettes or

packs of rolling tobacco. He preferred Bugler,


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but this place had only TOP. He would make

the TOP work. During the week he might

borrow money for cigarettes or he might steal it

somehow or he might do any number of things,

but as soon as he could, he would trade that

TOP up, perhaps for a pack of Bugler but

maybe better. It's been so long since he bought

a carton of cigarettes that he has forgotten what

it feels like to be secure in that one thing. To be

secure in anything. And this is part of what is

driving him mad, driving him restless. He

never travels enough. His life is too boring.

There is so much exploration he could do right

here in the city. Parks, alleys, and things. So

much, yet he sees very little outside the

professional world where he is a tourist and

servant, an indentured servant supposedly free


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to do as he pleases.

PART II

1A

STUCK LOST. STUCK LAZY.

Three months have passed since Frank decided

to quit his job and do something new, and that

decision took place about three weeks after his

time with the luscious Linda. In the old days he

would have done this all quite differently. The

day after, a couple days after, or even the day of

the decision, and the deed would have been

done. He's grown a little older now, though. A


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little older means a little smarter, maybe, it

depends on the way a person looks at such

things. Frank works at the sort of regular,

average, desolate place where the rules is a

notice of two weeks prior to quitting, this way

the bosses can hassle you or find a replacement

or be sure to demean you as much as possible

during those two weeks. Frank hasn't even

given the two weeks' notice yet, but he will. He

will. He will do things by the book when the

book is there for all to read. The month is July.

Since the month of April he has had a simple,

weekly goal, and has almost lived up to it. This

is another change, another product of getting

older: he finds himself more able to accomplish

simple goals and tasks he lays out for himself,

like clothes for a workday, and finds it easier to


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focus on things, simple things even, mundane

things, like reading a book. His attention deficit

disorder has faded with time. He's always

believed that things like attention deficit

disorder are natural to human beings,

especially while human beings are younger,

and they are exacerbated in the prime, and they

gradually lessen over time, as the human gets

older. Attention Deficit Disorder. Bi-polar

Disorder. Restless Legs Syndrome. All of these

things, and many, many more are just pure

bullshit to keep pharmaceutical companies in

business, he believes. He practices what he calls

folk medicine. He has the callow belief that

putting the word folk before anything makes

it okay to be uninformed but still bullshit

through things, make conclusions. It's not okay


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without the folk, because folk implies

inherent falsity, makes it an exception to typical

reality.

Minus digression: his goal has been to

save a meager forty dollars out of each

paycheck. Two twenty dollar bills. To the

passive reader, this may seem a tiny goal,

simple enough, too easy. But in a world where

money is the key to everything, in a world

where rents are always due and money is not

something someone is custom to saving (nor

time), it is a great difficulty to save anything.

But he has accomplished this. Now, he is paid a

rate of nine dollars an hour. He works about

forty hours most weeks, and some weeks a few

of overtime. So for an average work week his

gross pay is forty times nine dollars, right?


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Right. That is, $360. The tax rate where he lives

is high. He pays about $90 in taxes. His rent is

also not low, not as low as it could be, and then

there are travel costs, either by cab or public

transit, depending on whether or not he's late,

and so on. So at the end of three months, he has

managed to live up to his goal of saving forty

dollars a week for the great escape. And this

doesn't amount to much, either. It amounts to

roughly five hundred dollars. All in a coffee

can. From the days when he'd had a coffeepot.

There are also a good number of coins in the

can. From before, when he'd save his change.

Though often enough he managed to dip into

this reserve for the purpose of the purchase of a

pack of cigarettes or a forty-ounce beer or

anything. Anyway that probably added another


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twenty dollars.

It's not enough, he says aloud,

depositing his latest savior. And it's not. He

can't get far enough on five hundred. He has to

do something for more, he just doesn't know

what yet. Something will come to his mind.

Something, anything will appear. Until then,

though, he's stuck. Stuck here, stuck in this city.

Stuck foolish, stuck crazy. Stuck lost. Stuck lazy.

Just stuck.

1A-1

The first idea is to collect bottles, like he did

when he was young. Copper. Things like that,

the authorities would take them back. They'd

pay him when they took them back. By the


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pound, by the piece. Bottles five cents. Copper,

it depended on the day. He'd once done this for

the purpose of buying drugs with his best

friend Josh.

He could sell his laptop. He could sell his

laptop and buy something else when he got to

where he was going. Without any idea of where

he was going. There had to be somewhere to

go. There had to be anywhere away from here.

The women here were all wrong. Wrong was

the wrong term for it, but nonetheless they

were all such. They were whatever they wanted

to be and he didn't want them to be that. There

were times when he could hardly bring himself

to think about them. He'd think about

screensavers and American History. He'd think

about anything other than women. Because the


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know what he was doing anymore. He'd say, I

don't know what I'm doing anymore. He'd say

it aloud when random strangers were passing

by the stoop or he was sitting on the subway on

his way home from work. He'd get the notion

that all of this was taking place in a fashion that

would make sense one day, someday, but that

day wasn't today. Today was where was, where

he was living now, and that was the worst of it:

there was no guarantee of a tomorrow for men

like him. He'd say, There is no guarantee of a

tomorrow for men like me. He felt that the

man who would write his biography, which

would never be written, would be a ridiculous

kind of man. A man who thought he had

something to contribute to society but did

nothing but blah blah blah. It would take a long


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attention span for someone to actually suffer

through a novel which was anything like the

life of Frank.

2A

ONE OF THOSE TERRIBLE DAYS WHERE

EVERYTHING WAS ONE DAY SURE TO BE

FORGOTTEN

At work one day a couple weeks later, he hears

the song by Billy Joel regarding Billy The Kid,

and he realizes that Billy The Kid was right,

that all bank robbers, all thieves, they were

radical and they were right in what they did.


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Unlike the normal boring lives of their peers, of

the people who lived during their times, these

people had the nuts to just go out and take

what they felt society owed them. And who

determined what was owed? They did, of

course, which was the beauty of it. Frank feels

that his own flawed logic is the most grandiose

thing that ever occurred in the mind of

someone with the last name Mathias. Frank

feels very little, really, and just thinks up a

bunch of stupid shit no one will ever care

about. He finds it hard to think most days.

Concentration is a killer.

Killing is a concentrated art.

Frank thinks that if he robbed and killed

someone and got out of town before anyone

ever noticed he'd be good to go, on the run


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maybe, but good to go. But such a thing leads

to repetition, really, requires it, and he's not

interested in doing a thing like that more than

once unless he really has to. He's always

figured that someday things like that would

need to happen over and over again, but it

would be on the same day. And that would be

one of those terrible days where everything was

one day sure to be forgotten.

He thinks maybe he could go to the bank

where he got the savings account that time,

where the savings account still probably has a

few pennies in it, maybe he could go there and

get a loan for this big move he is planning. Oh

but probably not. The story of his life: oh but

probably not.


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3A

Frank wanted to be a computer programmer

when he was young. Now Frank just wants to

make coherent sense for one day. He doesn't

have to leave the city to do that. His life is not

interesting and he knows that this is a repetitive

thought to have, to be having right now. Frank

has neighbors now, people who live in the same

building or next door, people that know who

Frank is, and he hates them. He doesn't hate

them but he hates the way that one of them, one

whose name begins with an R or with a T, who

likes to come and knock on his door only to ask

for a cigarette because he always spends his

money on this dumb slut of a girlfriend that

this guy has gotten recently and this guy was


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pretty lonely before that. Frank stands up and

dances. Frank does a jig. Frank tries to get

motivated and buys about a gallon of coffee

from the corner store in the form of Starbucks

glass bottled coffee. Frank feels weak like he

should do some push-ups. Frank feels lots of

things and knows that having feelings is a sure

sign of madness. Frank can't get over the past.

Frank makes so many mistakes. Frank is Frank

and Frank doesn't matter to anyone besides

Frank and to Frank this is the important thing.

Frank does this thing where he is marching

while he stands up and has thoughts. Frank

should brush his teeth more often. Frank is

absolutely out of control and he wonders if

there is a path to ever get back to.


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3B

Frank walks down the street right now

counting words he sees. His count is over

fourteen thousand. He finds it outrageous that

he can even count that high or that numbers

that big even exist. Why should a number ever

get that high if it's so intangible? Why do

humans have the fucked need to keep track of

things after they grow into such a density?

Frank buys too many books, too much

literature. He reads it in ten minutes. Frank

doesn't know how great he is. Frank is a hero to

some people but he'd never admit that he's

even an anti-hero. Frank is an unreliable

narrator.

Someone comes up to him as he stands


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Not a queer or anything, are you?

No, why?

I've been having homo-erotic dreams

about old friends lately, they are disturbing me,

so I can't associate with any queers or whatever

they're calling themselves these days. They've

always got some new hyphenated term for

everything, these weirdums. Like how I'm

making up insults all the time. They're all crazy

anarchists is what they are.

I can see you dream of anarchy.

Stop being so mystical, asshole, and don't

follow me. Yes, I have the strangest dreams,

things are always happening, things are

happening in semi-linear ways that usually

force me to awake quite breathless.

The man follows Frank anyway.


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3D

Friendships are based on a lot of things in modern

society. A vague thought in Frank's head, the

back burner. The random person who followed

him is becoming Frank's friend. They are

having beers and coffees at a place with a

shamrock over the entrance that serves both at

all times; it was this much in their signage

outdoors that brought them to this point. Frank

says, I think my thoughts might find some

claritarian traction if I were to use a guitar and

lyrics to spit them out as often as possible.

Build a recording studio out of used

refrigerator cartons. I hate that sometimes,


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especially when intoxicated, the only way to

speak your mind is to use words that are not in

the dictionary.

This is possible. It's your language too.

What is your name again? Did you notice

we're having two conversations at the same

time, taking turns?

My name is Robert, and Robert is my

least favorite name.

What a thing to say.

I know, right?

3E

Some hours have passed and the two men have

done little besides make vague, poetic

conversation, and look around at the faces of


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the regulars. Pretty slow for a Thursday. Frank

can't remember why he has the following day

off, but he does. Frank finds this much of it fun,

the conversation. He'd like to say so but he just

can't. Gets this way from time to time. Other

ways that he gets from time to time include:

cold sweating, broken down, forgetful, moody.

Just gets to the point where every fifteen

minutes he feels a different way. But today is

not one of those days. Today he is feeling

generally happy, at least since this guy attached

himself to Frank.

Frank talks to Robert. Makes inquiries.

Frank says, What do you write about?

There is a genre called Steam Punk of

which I am a fan. Nonetheless I've never been

able to construct an original situation wherein


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ten lines, and is elated: here is a talented writer.

Possibly. Every man can hit his high point in a

given vacuum, right? Frank needed to remain

skeptical in order to remain aware.

Why do you not publish yet?

Maybe I have, under other names.

What kinds of names?

Mike McKinstry was up for grabs after

someone killed him, so I used that one.

I see.

Frank says, I am interested in you now.

Let us drink a shot to that.

Two shots just for the hell of it.

I cannot afford two shots.

I am paying for all of our drinks.

This is an expensive bar.

I am to worry about that.


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Right.

Frank notices for the first time that this a

black man.

3F

Frank and Robert get smashed in the bar with

the shamrock over the entrance that serves

coffee and beer all the time that it's open. Frank

won't later remember the name of the place.

He's been contemplating a bar fight, but there is

no one here to bar fight. Everyone here is old or

stupid or somehow disabled.

On the way out of the bar, Robert says to

Frank, I've had an idea for a long time now. If I

could get sixty people together, and each of

them could commit to write one sentence on a

certain minute of the hour, with synchronized


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watches, every hour, we'd have this amazing

story after a few weeks or months or decades.

Something great would come of it. I've had this

idea for a long time now. Years.

That is quite an idea. I want to leave my

phone number with you, Robert.

This much was pre-determined.

Frank and Robert exchange phone

numbers and go their separate ways. Robert

buys Frank a cab ride home. Robert walks

home, because he doesn't live very far.

3G

At home, Frank goes to sleep and has a dream

about himself and his father trying to do

something, like go fishing. Can't remember the


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journal entry reads:

Letting go of everything. Want the people that

I know to know that I've no soul.

He sees the inherent falsity of this

statement. No one can let go completely. Still,

though, he is comfortable with having made

this statement. He could tell that to someone

and not be bothered by having just told a lie.

That's the best kind of lie, he decides. The kind you

feel no shame in telling. From birth we're told lies.

Lies can be useful. Can be painless.

Victimless lying is on sale, two for one, at the

dollar store.

This last thought had trouble making

sense even to Frank.

Frank walks around his room for a

moment, aimless.


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He sits cross-legged between the wall and

Documents

Between Earth and Frank