The way was off topic and yet another thing was emerging up out of their food. They crawled into their own cavities. Is that a reflection or someone else's appliances across the way? Heads rest on dirty hands haven't gotten around to washing them this time or the other. Haven't gotten around much anymore just going around and around these holes in the ground they curve like the little smiles that faded away in the car window on the way the way was off topic. Big mouths big teeth grit their stuff when the next round of little smiles begin to fade away in the car window on the way the way was off topic.
"What are you looking at?"
"Give me a little more time. No one ever gives me the proper amount of time I seem to need to think. I keep trying to tell myself there has to be more in there."
"More bullshit you mean."
"There it is again. There you are again."
"Me what?"
"You and my bullshit. There you are again. Like something sticking out of the ground to trip me up just when I'm trying to right myself. You and my bullshit. Very good."
"Bullshit doesn't need the proper amount of time for more of it. It needs to be shoveled into bags and set on fire in front of the right doorstep."
"Good luck with that as you choose among those who are getting tired of ignoring all those messages whether live or recorded of being randomly selected."
what was what was thought on had been pulled out with the cork from the radio static crinkling on static going on the way off topic ongoing.
The way was off topic and yet another thing was emerging up out of their food. They crawled into their own cavities. Is that a reflection or someone else's appliances across the way? Heads rest on dirty hands haven't gotten around to washing them this time or the other. Haven't gotten around much anymore just going around and around these holes in the ground they curve like the little smiles that faded away in the car window on the way the way was off topic. Big mouths big teeth grit their stuff when the next round of little smiles begin to fade away in the car window on the way the way was off topic.
"What happened to your hair?"
"Schoolyard."
"What happened at the schoolyard?"
"No. I thought I saw a schoolyard. It's hard to tell in the darkness of night."
"It's hard to tell anything at this level."
"And what level are we at?"
"Lower than the one before."
The walls were dripping dripping with windows windows on murkier things along the way and the way was off topic as it so happened as it so-called passed them by without their seeing without their knowing without them. Hot compresses cooled and dried into scabs that took their time and everyone else's. Hot applications to front porches compressing burns and cuts swelling emergencies burning their messages against eyes closed into frozen dinners.
They didn't see it coming. They saw it coming. This is what they told themselves after Chapter 10.
And now Chapter 14.
Which opens with a devastating and intriguing devastation of anything resembling a way out for the animals the insects the squirming the can't sit still and why should they keep moving? sit still?
And now Chapter 15.
Which begins with a benighted intrigue lapping at the shores of towns where they are on all fours having their milk pinched from their chests holding their breath that molds into armor for surviving the next wave of annihilation and they are still there with their heavy armor plating to slither along until the next wave of annihilation and they are still there for the next flashback.
Flashback . . .
. . .
Flashback . . .
Scene 4
"What happened to your hair?"
"It's gone."
"I can see it's gone. What happened to it?"
"No. The light is gone."
"It's been gone. What did you think you saw?"
"I know I saw a light. It's just hard to tell if it's our reflection or another's."
"Nothing is coming alongside us if that's what you're getting at."
"We just have each other's words is that what you're getting at?"
"I can keep quiet."
"If you want. I go on and on to relieve the nausea."
"Silence or speaking makes no difference to me. I feel discomfort all the same."
"That grimace on your face makes me imagine what must have been the expression on the face of the guard who following orders from the coordinator threw the person pretending to be a patient at the hospital out onto the street. It was also what he said what the coordinator said or maybe it was what the patient said as they lay in their gown on the curb. Something about if misery loves company then what does relief love? A good dump. These seats have something filthy on them."
"That would be us."
"It wants us to advance to the next chamber."
"What what number is that?"
"It says number 8."
"We've advanced to that one before."
"Then that wouldn't be advancing now would it?"
"No. I suppose not. It's as if our conveyance is chasing it's own tail."
"Or we are just chasing our own tails or looking for the carrot in the next chamber they shake inside our heads. What is that running down from the windows?"
"Some type of secretion to breakdown the buildup from the outside."
"How many? That's what I ask myself as I pretend to see stars in the dark of our windows as we pass along the way. I ask myself how many stars I see when I know that it's the sparks - the sparks of our own friction."
"How many? That's what I ask myself when I wonder how many stomachs we need to pass through as the universe digests us. That's all."
"That's all. Is that all you have to ask?"
"No. That's not all."
"What else do you have to ask?"
"What happened to your hair?"
The walls were dripping dripping with windows windows on murkier things along the way and the way was off topic as it so happened as it so-called passed them by without their seeing without their knowing without them. Hot compresses cooled and dried into scabs that took their time and everyone else's. Hot applications to front porches compressing burns and cuts swelling emergencies burning their messages against eyes closed into frozen dinners.
The way was off topic. The radio was left on while nothing came through clearly. The sound of static crinkling from the radio was like a cork had been pulled out and what was thought and what was thought and what was thought stuck to the lip the corkless mouth and its sound of static coming from the radio was like a cork had been pulled out and what was thought plausible and what was thought sustainable and what was thought enduring was escaping from the room not much room left for escaping through the butthole into the beyond protection beyond surge protection beyond explanation beyond explanations that had pissed them off far beyond any reason or response far beyond any simmering in a vat of bathos. Come come on let them come come on do they follow following on the rim beyond and on come come on let them come on do they follow following on the rim beyond and on come on escaping on from the room not much room left for escaping what was what was thought on come on what was what was thought on sustainable or plausible what was what was thought on had been pulled out with the cork from the radio static crinkling on static going on the way off topic ongoing.
- Max Stoltenberg
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