Ozzie Fitch: Chapter 7
So damn thirsty, need a sip, nothing but tap water. Brown, let it run. Hiss like. Dizzy, but smooth. Just let it run, get all the dust out. Rust out. Dusty rusty.
Time for a show. Show a show a shoe dancing on concrete. JJ POP gone, we all stand up. Time to go show the show go to time.
Always a good show at the Square. Real dancing, real drums, like native. Jump up and down until your brain is free falling. Pass around the pills, the tabs, the sticks and the sauce, and sizzle til dawn. Forget your cares, and just make some noise. Everyone loves the Square. Safe club. Famous like. So many people know it, even the posers know it. Dangerous, that. Get a poser who thinks they know the chant. Gotta keep an eye out.
Sizzle down now. Popping less. So dry. Need a drink of water, flowing like a river, babbling brook through my throat and down my chest.
Make some noise! Screaming to the silent sky, ancient drums and steel strings vibrate their soothing patterns. We’re all children in the concrete womb, hearing our mother’s heartbeat. Always a good show at the Square.
Hard, after a good sizzle. Want to sleep, but that’s the best time for a show. Darla dresses to the nines. Leather jacket, sharp black eyeliner, fishnets, heels, and a napkin skirt. Tight, like skin. Lips, lips all purple. Purple! Kinky and wild, up for a play. Got me real excited, winking at me with puckered pillows.
Cindy dressed punk, puffy coat with tight jeans. Binny’s bowler hat hung on his head like lampshade, and ragged tuxedo made the suit for a laugh. Even Ribber had his comb. Leon, the nut, he wore what he always wore. Ragged jeans, not torn, and stained shirt.
Say this for JJ, wasn’t no chant-slave, like Leon, the nut. JJ was addict, truth. Couldn’t stay away. Had to chant, but that’s not chant-slave. No, chant-slave is something else.
Leon was a nut. A real nut. I liked him, pitied him to, but liked him more.
Leon works at the mechanics on Second. Father to son shop. Leon, the nut, thinks he can fix everything. Father drinks and smokes like a boss. Leon calls him the working man. I never seen him work. Nut always tries to get money from us. Pretends he has less green than he does, like the rest of the world won’t put him against the wall. He’s black too. Means something, maybe.
“Shit matters!” he says all the time. The nut cares about things. Thinks everything a problem to be fixed. The nut, he doesn’t have to make things problems. They’re not problems until he makes them problems. “Shit matters!” he says all the time. “This is important shit!”
“You say something?” Binny muttered from his cloud of smoke. Binny didn’t like Leon very much.
“I said this is important,” Leon said back. “We gotta do something.” Never says what. Sees problems, no solutions. Just gotta do something. Like he’s afraid of nothing. Not afraid of nothing, but afraid of nothing. Opposite of something. That nothing.
Me, I got Leon. I know the score. The nut thinks he’s smart. Thinks he sees things others don’t see. We see, we just don’t care. Boots gonna stomp. Cogs gonna turn. Green gonna slip ’tween fingers. How it is.
Not for Leon. Leon thinks he’s smart. Nut thinks we don’t see how it is. Thinks when we see it, we change it for him. Not how it works.
Wants us all to work for him. He doesn’t work. Sits there feeling alonely at night with his Jack and Doritos. Fucking loser nut, like all of us. Thinks he can be a hero, fixing what ain’t broke. Makes problems so he can be special and fix them. Like he’s better than us, but he’s not.
Said he once tried chanting for world peace. The nut. Binny laughed at him. I laughed too. World’s a big place, too big for one circle. That’s Leon, though. Thinks he’s big as a world.
That’s chant-slave. Thinks the chant is the answer. Solve all the problems so you find the problems to chant for.
Chant-slaves all got it good. Have to. Free to chant for what you want. Chant-slaves never starve if they don’t find food. Privilege. Not tourist, could be native, but thirsty.
Don’t know why he spends time at the Mall. He never buys anything, never dresses for the nines, and tries to look tough. One day he showed up with jeans and hand-me-down hipster rags. He looked like a wannabe without a clue. Darla doesn’t like Leon much — thinks the nut lowers her nine cred. She keeps trying to ditch him when we go to the movies or go out, and Binny wouldn’t care, but Cindy likes the laugh.
I like the laugh too. Good laugh. Leon’s a real nut.
The Square!
Light and sound and movement all around. Popping pills and licking tabs, sucking sticks and swinging skin. Always a good time at the Square. Everyone knows the Square. Even the posers. Gutter, chanter, poser, even a cog who wants to slum it, act all tough and put on the real like a costume for a second.
Walking down the street, the pill hits like a dump-truck. All garbage and stench, I throw up. Ribber laughs at me, Cindy pulls away. Darla, she rubs my back puts water to my lips. Empty stomach. Get a dog from some hole. Tastes like salt and sugar. Nothing better. Don’t remember eating it. Must have. Licked the aftertaste in my mouth afters.
Pill too much. Take a tab instead. On an empty stomach? Yeah, don’t know what I was doing. Lick the tab. Walk down the street all sliding until the cracks split wide and become curving dips slide down and around on wheelboard skates, spin the slalom until eight days from Sunday someday come and gone. Up and down and around about oval up and down mouth POP in and out lick and press spread the red and POP open like gunshot pierce my heart with heat smoke so sexy clean squeaky on skin. Skin fingers on arm Darla slides up and down around like vine silk rope on arms all tied up helpless can’t move like freedom salute the open crevasse.
Earth rocks back and forth, feet moving, turn to jello, turn to soup. Slide like a POP slug to the Square with bright lights and blue and green and yellow and red color everything like rainbows.
Darla, smiling, laughing, skirt up POP high flashing where to touch.
Blink hard, follow her in. Everyone follow Darla, can’t let go of POPing next to her and feel the punch of sound in the gut.
Gut. Chest. Beat beating on the lungs. Breathe in hard. Fills up. Limbs move. Pulse of the earth. Darla there with me, dancing on the floor. Spin and sing and whistle while the sizzle simmers and find it’s not Darla. Darla keeps moving. New Darla takes her place. Now not Darla, moving on. Find her somewhere.
Blink hard.
Danced all night. Brain sizzle and flashy jumping. Lights and sparkles and pops in the sound-system. Danced with everyone. Roll with Darla, dance with everyone. Danced with Cindy. Danced with girls I didn’t know. Danced with guys. Just danced. Up and down.
Music like heartbeat. Hit the stomach hard. Empty. No room for anything. Push you all out into the air. Only you stay behind. Body empty, just moving. Fill it with life. Like a mold. Dipped in water, all the steam, then solid gold.
“Hey Oz!”
Heard it a lot. Who was it this time? Flashes in the eye, new face, new spot, new dance. Vibrations in the brain. Who was it?
“Long time no see!”
Lean hard on the bar. Bar? I’m at the bar, sometime. Stop dancing, look at the voice. See it curl through the air like fingers on the rim. Tips. Tongues. Familar.
It was Paula. No surprise. See her sometimes, around like. Not vanished, Paula, just moved on. First time I met her was on Binny’s arm. She still wants to be his squeeze. He squeezes who he likes. Sometimes likes her. Not on Binny’s arm now. Pop.
“How you been?” She smiling.
Been alright. Better now. Pop up and down and feel the current. Paula nodded. She knew. She chanted the longest. Real old. Hanger on type. Used to have a circle in Maryland. Started young, in middle school. Called themselves witches. A Coven. Binny laughed. Kids being kids, he said. Posers, I called them.
Even stayed through college. Community, local like. Says it was slow, the dusting. It got so they’d go days without Chanting. Just talked. Made plans. Someone got a job. The others got a job. Then it was weeks. worked hard. Then it was months. Then they stopped; middle managers and startups.
Paula didn’t stop. She didn’t dust. She moved. She wandered. She kept the Chant. Came to Upper West. Found Binny.
“I see Darla.”
I look where Paula looks. Darla dancing. Popping around with three guys. Hip sway. Eyeliner flashing. Smooth and sharp like snapping fingers. Got me real excited.
Punching up! That’s old Ozzie, the truth. You want the hundred truth, Ozzie’s a six on a good day. Can push it to seven in the club, enough no one stares. Sometimes wear eyeliner and cake, so they look at what I want them to. When we walk the department once maybe twice a week, all the stares are on Darling Darla. Then they look at me. Punching up, sure, but not dragging her down. Not like a five would.
Eyes caught in nets. Fishnets to the floor swaying back and forth, scales on smooth flesh.
Jealous stares. Had to be. Stores full of jewelry, silk, nylon, perfume, fashion to the nines all in the department, and none of them could touch my Darling. Old Oz had a girl for the nines, and there wasn’t anything anyone could do about it.
“We still together,” I say. Let the mouth say the words while I drink my darling down, warm and squirmy in the stomach. Starts to hurt.
“You gonna dust,” she said.
“Old Ozzie don’t dust,” I popped back. See her head rock back and forth on smooth creamy neck, neck I want to lick all sweaty. Smell wet skin and grip soft pillows.
“You been with Darla for a year,” Paula whispers in my ear, flicking her hair like a whip. “Never thought I’d see it.”
Not Old Oz. Old Oz never dust. Keep moving, keep living. Never put stock in the system, not Old Oz.
“You take care of yourself, Oz,” Paula said, voice quiet like butter. “You not careful, you might find yourself alonely again.”
Watched her hair flick away, fish scale in the pond. Hook empty. Got away. No big, staring at Darla, her purple lips sliding over shiny ivory. Cobra. Tongue slides out, aching to be kissed.
Eyes meet. She winks a kiss. It boils inside me, fire-like. I move towards her. Three guys? So what?
She’s gone when I get to her. Other side. I keep pushing. Sweaty skin and wet cloth keeping me from my girl. I get rough. They rough back. No big. Gotta get to Darla.
She winks away again. I push back through. She’s laughing. Purple kinky play, all mocking me, saying I can’t touch. I can’t until she lets me. It’s all a game. Just play along. Makes me real excited.
I kissed her, truth. Good reason? Maybe, but no good reason not to. See, part of the lines and dust is this idea, bad idea, you know it, it’s like this, see, you can only love one person.
Hate a thousand. Hate everything. Love only one. That’s dust. That’s worse than dust. Better? Love everyone, hate one person. What a world, yeah? Think of it. So me, I was fighting the system. Yeah. All I was was a soldier, taking down the grid. Behind the curtain, no lines. Just circles on circles. Venn diagram. Round and round in the mouth, all sexy like.
Dance there all quiet, making noises with our mouths. Anyone see us? Everyone see us, I hope. See Old Oz breaking the walls down. Blown apart. Taste like sour beer and fish-sticks.
Someday, we all dance together. All kiss together. One big orgy of sex. Nothing but feel good. Pop from one person to the next. Nothing holds you down. Back then? What was back then? No memories, no shames, no nightmares in the dark remembering the stupid shit you said or did. Counting happy, not sad hours. One. Two. Three. Four. All the way to ten.
We do it in the bathroom, finally. Brain still sizzling, she opens herself, then I open myself. Shatters me. Whole universe comes pouring in, filling my space. Can’t hardly breathe. Lungs too small. Screaming. Primal. Ancient lions grip shoulders with teeth, nothing but feeling.
One. Big. Pop.
Sizzle pop spark flash sizzle. Bacon in fat. Sauté in butter.
Life can be hard. Need a shield. Bandages. Tent with a big red cross. Thick tent sides to keep the real world inside, instead of leaking out into the gray. When the brain sizzles, it’s easy to see behind the curtains. All the patterns pinned down by surveyor’s marks. Breaks down the walls put up all plumb. So you can see we are we. Sizzle away, every pop and bubble, break every seal, snap every line. Cumble the cookie to crumbs and smaller. Ground to dust. Hissing static that was the birth of the universe, all gray because it’s perfect white and perfect black, all even. One to one. That’s fair, isn’t it?
Shaman did it, in old days. Some still do. Binny does, smoke around his head. Break down the walls, and speak with the spirits. The power behind the curtains. Behind the system. I don’t have to, but I want to. No longer the layabout, I’m a real wiz.
But the brain hates the chant. Doesn’t like it. All wrong. Wants the reasonable. The steady. The cogs have gotten good, making the curtains all glitty. Don’t want to take them down. Soothing neon and shiny glass, make you feel happy, so much better than the gray walls and leaky pipes. Got Boots to keep them up. Call them vandals what want to pull them down.
The gutter don’t get the glitter. We get the pipes and the leaks and the puddles and the smells. No problems breaking the walls and looking behind the ragged tattered curtains. We see it for what it is, and we know how to break it.
Me, I got the list. Like memorized. Some just sip or sample, but old Oz, he’s a real wiz. I’m a goddamn gourmet.
The Emil got the simmer sizzle. Sits in the gut for a while before bubbling up and out to the fingers. Starts small, but ramps up quick. Dresses your brain up to the nines, and sends you flying. Fills up from the gut and lifts. Got a real kick in the feet, and you can see everything. Powerful like, gets a real hiss behind it, frying in batter. Smooth and creamy, moving real slow but savory like. Gives you warm in the chest, and doesn’t break the walls but shatters. See everything at once, and if you’re not ready for it, you’ll have a bad time. Like copper in the mouth.
Pen20 got the tickle. Makes you laugh. Deeper than Emil, but not as wide. Focus on a things that are next to each other. See a lot of links. A net of chains that holds you tight, sometimes comforting, sometimes like bondage. Inhibiting. Can give you a bad ride if you’re not careful.
Blackbird’s poison. Don’t take it.
Luffy for fun. Always a good time with Luffy. Full bodied. Thick like. Little tickles and prickles and fun. Lot of kinds of Luffy. Different shapes. Triangle’s hard stuff. Don’t take it with anything. Take it last. Square’s the easy one. Take it first. Five is sour like lemon, six good as grape. Six with a stamp kinda bready. Hard to swallow on its own.
Smoking is good. Softer, gentler, a taste of sizzle without your whole day gone. Snack like. All sorts of brands. Leroy’s Pineapple. The Green Dragon. Sharp and Tang. First Past the Bridge. Under the Rock. Peelie’s Pie and Wash. A Dance with Streaks In. Never try Kabbage. Kabbage is cheap. Ground up. Tastes shit, no great sizzle. Roy’s Rassle is the best if you got no money. A few more than Kabbage, but saves you the rot.
Tabs best for distance. Softer than the pills, fills you from the chest, the heart, the core. Lighter. Fizzy like soft drink, and floats you over the town. Comes from the mouth from the head and trickles down, gentle and warm like a springtime. Caresses the limbs and strokes the back. Always a good time with a tab, if you know the colors.
Best for new is green. All about growing things is green. Feel one with everything. You vanish. Melt away. Sugar in water. Ice in fire. Melt and spread and fill every crack and crevice until you are the universe.
Then add a purple. That’s a vacay. Add things that aren’t there, but all spinning and whirlwind of colors. They talk to you, tell you secrets. Don’t listen too hard, don’t think to hard, just be soft. Let the truths wash over you. Fill you. Clean like a Laundromat.
Red, blue, all good. If you want to touch or smell, pick a red. Blue’s for the eyes, see colors that don’t exist.
Some tabs have pictures. My favorite is Fox. Tab with a picture on it, smiling at you. Knows something. Good picture. Artistic. Dangerous, though. If you don’t know what you’re doing. Old Oz, he knows. He takes Fox. Sometimes Flaming Tire, but mostly Fox. Tried Purple Cake once, and that ones fine, but crumbles. Like old masonry. Fox, that’s a portal. Dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing, truth.
Like hikes. Trails. Rangers mark out the line. Easy incline. Railings. Good scenery. Safe. Real, but catered. See, the real forest is dangerous. Sharp rocks and teeth. Dangerous because it’s not a good ride, always. Sizzles the brain something fierce, and you get thirsty as hell afters, but when you ride, oh baby, when you ride you see something terrible.
You can run from it, and then you have a bad trip. Or you embrace it. You take the truth like medicine. Trail without the rails. Then it’s wonderful. You have to embrace it, or else the horrible stays horrible. Worms eat you. Teeth poison you. Fingers pierce the skin and pull you apart in nightmares.
But you smile, and see the truth, then it’s angels carving out the bad parts. So you can see. When you see, you know, and that takes back the power. Cogs come out of your stomach. You see the slick oil and lubrication at makes it all grind together. If you’re really good, you can look past yourself.
Not everyone likes a bad experience. That’s how they get you by the cheek. If you aren’t happy, you know it’s real.
Pills in the stomach. Thick and hard like a rock. No pills unless you want to travel. Like far. Most just pressed. No gelcaps. Some grind up for a snort; Oz doesn’t like that. Make the nose itch. All for what? Quicker? Oz is patient. We all sizzle, Binny’s circle. Binny just smokes, he’s a real sage, but Cindy and Leon and Ribber and Darla and JJ when he was here, we all partake.
“Why not?” said Cindy. “What’s here that’s the same there? Rather dream kaleidoscope stars than stare at glow-in-the-dark ceiling stickers.”
“Might as well,” JJ said, before he left. Angry. “God, need to unwind. God. It’s hard out there, you know. You layabouts got it so easy. God.”
“Suck in the ultra-violet and swim in x-rays,” Leon sighed. “You know the eye can’t see everything? Whole spectrums of energy pass us by. Can’t see infrared, or ultra-violet, or radiation, or anything, but it’s all there. I can dream I see it, though. I dream I see what’s really there. Eyes wide. Awake when you sleep. Lucid-like. Everything at once.”
Ribber giggles because he’s Ribber. “Like candy, right? It’s all what it’s about. Like hunger bad, like tired bad, like food and sleep good, because it takes away the bad. This shit, this shit gives the good, yeah? No need for the bad, so it’s the real shit.”
“It’s fun,” Darla smiled. Darling Darla, with her fuck-me-hard black lips and tight dress that gripped her thighs. Nut Leon with his shit-eating grin and cigarette stink. Binny and his pipes. Cindy and her sneers. Ribber just giggled. My family.