I keep walking down the same broken, twisting boulevards like a deficient, marred toy powered by a Duracell battery. Just another possession used and discarded by children who could never comprehend the intricacies of my mind. The visions have long ago left me and all that remains in my mind is the voices. The voices that batter me emotionally. The voices that resemble thunder clouds and pouring rain. Like the brilliant sun which shines illumination on the weak, disposable human race. I hate everything that exists, including myself, especially myself. What if I shoved this pencil up my nose and smashed my face against a table? I miss my youth although I was never young. Sometimes I’m surprised that I wake up in the morning, I always think I’m going to die in my sleep. I piss on this stupid country. The problem with democracy is that people are morons. What’s next? Nothing. Just like nothing I don’t exist. Just like nothing I dissolve like an ambien into tap water. Stop staring at me. I don’t like being ignored. I feel like masturbating tonight though I hate pornography. When I masturbate I imagine a chess game and when the pawn gets knocked off I reach climax. Please tell me I’m not a hopeless cause! Maybe I’m not hopeless, it’s just that others don’t see my value. Whatever has happened will happen again like the earth revolving around the sun. Am I hopeless Alice? You always liked me, but now you’re gone. Just like me. Gone. Whatever will happen has already happened. I’m sick of my mind. I’m sick of my clothes. I’m sick of my eyes. I’m sick.
The dream theatre is open tonight and as always I’m unoccupied, so I leave my jacket at the door and enter my seat. There are no advertisements before the picture starts, just random, fleeting abstract images. A close up of an iris changing color from blue to red. A distant lighthouse with a brooding storm in the distance. I keep thinking of more productive ways to spend my time though there aren’t any in the shithole that is this illustrious city of Totallitaria. The screen darkens for a moment before lighting up in glorious, sporadic images. This is what we sacrificed the future of mankind for… Images. Rotating, sputtering, sporadically dull images. I lean back in my chair as the sequence begins. We’re in a garden. A grand futuristic garden. New Eden they call it. The camera pans back and forth, left to right, upwards and downwards. We drift through flowers and weed, plants, and insects to arrive at an archaic house. Does someone live here? We’ll find out. The interior is dimly lit, and solitary. A brooding blue fire is alive in the corner. The camera zooms into it. Suddenly a woman appears. Is it the witch of New Eden? The one I’ve heard so much about but have never actually seen? She seductively lures the camera into her room. A bed is revealed. An empty single sized bed. She takes off her clothes. Slowly, ever so slowly. She opens her mouth where a rose is protruding. She pulls it out of her mouth and sits on the bed and begins to weep. Tears fall on the wooden floors as she tries to wave the camera away.
“There’s nothing in this city left for us, you know that don’t you Howard?”
I feel a chill cascade through my body when I hear her mention my name.
“The tears we wept, the dreams for a brighter future are buried under rubble and dirt.”
I feel uneasy but let her continue
“See this with me.”
She points out the window of her room at a majestic forest.
“This is where I grew up. This is where I live. Come find me.”
I feel puzzled. Are these sequences real? Do they actually exist? I’ve never been to New Eden, by now it must be a muddy field. Though I remember visiting a forest in Totallitaria during my youth..
“Do you live in the forest?” I speak quietly.
The screen fades to black and I gaze around the empty theatre for a face, but just like me it remains unoccupied.
