Part 9 (2/2)
”What will he do now?”
”Nothing.”
At first I thought it was just people pa.s.sing by that were talking. But then I noticed it was coming from the statue.
”Nothing?”
”Ya, nothing. He's boring by himself. Reactor.”
”Maybe we should switch. What about you, what do you think?”
The stick heads had wavy hair that blurred when I heard the voices, masked simultaneous defocus of my contacts.
”Huh?”
”Ya, why are you so quiet?”
”Oh, the Judgment of Paris.” The sticks were talking. And there was circus music.
”Ah!” I couldn't take it anymore. Like what's wrong with me.
I got up and ran away from the statue. I think a car might have honked at me but I was going crazy so I didn't pay attention to it. Sometimes when I was a kid I would daydream in cla.s.s about stuff like that separate from what the teacher was saying but this was too much.
I kept picturing the stick heads moving. I didn't run very far before I got tired and had to walk. I remember pulling my hands though my hair. I think I tried to repress the experience but I kept picturing the heads moving. I couldn't turn around because I half thought they were still behind me. I was afraid they would leap out at me through the pool of blur like in those 3-D movies at Disney World. With yellow snapping beaks.
First pink poodles and now yellow sticks. Later I would get used to it but for the moment I was definitely unhinged. Something was beginning to form in my mind... I remember once when I was a kid my dad was driving me under a bridge and I saw all these people in their own cars pa.s.sing us. The revelation hit me that they all had thoughts, that they all could think and form ideas like I was. My dad also had little words going through his head like I always did. He wasn't just a robot programmed to react to my words in stock phrases and gestures. I was not the only sentient being on the planet.
Or at least I thought it was a revelation when I first felt it. It stopped affecting me the way it once did. I think I lost a part of myself over the years and never realized what the denial of solipsism truly meant. (beyond ghost in machine) But the talking heads brought it back again. And the apple picture immediately afterwards too. Like I had a second chance and my fear of random colorful objects was the key.
After walking for a while I ended up in front of an art museum. Actually it might have been a gallery but it was pretty big so I don't think so. I stepped out of the street and went upstairs to try and forget about what had just happened.
The air inside didn't feel much different. They kept an A/C on and it was just as cloudy as outside. (clear) I walked through the main lobby and headed towards some stairs. The colors were all dark browns and grays so I didn't find it very threatening. A guard stopped me as I stepped over some seal on the floor. ”The museum closes in 15 minutes, sir.”
”Thanks.” Maybe it was Sunday so the place had to close early or something. I went on up the stairs. The guard looked at me funny. I guess I looked pretty scruffy by then so maybe that's why he was looking at me funny. There was an archway at the top of the stairs. I remember walking under the arch and looking up at it. It was made of stone.
After the arch there was a hallway whose left side had draped windows out into a back allay and whose right side comprised of doorways s.p.a.ced by paintings. The far end of the hall was arched by another curved pillar but this time it looked like marble. I didn't notice the paintings very much; they were nice but I didn't have much time and they all looked the same anyway. As I was walking down I stepped on some gum and that annoyed me. I wanted to try to calm down so I ducked into one of the side rooms and sat on a bench against one of the walls.
A couple pictures hung across from me and to my right was another window through which you could see a brick wall. (mic check) I saw a faint reflection of myself in the gla.s.s. It was really a mirror I guess. I thought I'd lost some weight; my face was pretty taunt. I closed my eyes. I kept twitching though. It couldn't just be the caffeine.
I looked around again -> !solace. There were a couple pictures of men on horses and naked women on the wall across from me. Then I saw it. There was a child's portrait propped underneath the mirror against a wall. It was on the floor really. A little girl sat with an apple in her hand. The apple was dark red. It pulsed. Then somehow I remembered I was supposed to look at the eyes. They were like mirrors too. I don't know how I knew to look in at the eyes. Maybe that's what the aliens had said in the shadows when I was a kid.
Actually looking back on it I don't know why I thought it was such a big deal anymore. I mean it's weird but... Anyway I saw this calm in those wide-open eyes. They radiated it even though I could see chips in the paint pupils. She was looking at me with her eyes. Then there was a s.h.i.+ft. The girl looked lonely all of the sudden even though she had the apple. And then she moved within the painting like the yellow statues before.
She breathed and I stood frozen, unblinking, with paint cracks in my own eyes.
I got scared. I bolted out the door and almost fell down the stairs. I couldn't take it anymore. I didn't wanna think anymore. This isn't just a love story. And it wasn't over yet.
I decided that the best thing for me to do was to head back to school. Not school itself really but people that I knew. People that are normal and predictable and I don't have to think around.
I didn't know where my rental car was so I figured I'd take the bus. Maybe back in that parking lot with the yellow stripe. (yellow).
I remember standing on a curb with my hand stuck out calling a cab. One slowed down and pulled over farther up the street from me. I ran up to it and got in. The car was yellow, too.
At first the cab didn't move and I saw the cabdriver stare at me through his rear-view mirror. The cab smelled like ammonia. ”Where to?”
”A train station.”
The driver set the meter and pulled away from the curb. There was some talk radio coming out of the speakers behind me but I wasn't really paying attention. I was staring at the mesh between the front and rear compartments. It had little circles and some parts were kinda bent. After a while the driver started talking to me. ”So, who are you gonna vote for?”
”What?”
”Vote for, you know, the election and everything.” I could see his face in the rear-view. He had big cheeks and stubble.
”What? I don't know. I don't follow that stuff.” The circles in the mesh intertwined and if you focused a little past them you could see honey combs.
”What do you mean you don't follow politics? Don't you care what happens?” I think he was scolding me.
I didn't really want to reply but I did anyway. ”I'm sorry. Of course I care what happens.”
He grunted. We stopped at a traffic light and a bunch of people walked in front of us. He lit a cigarette and took a long drag and then put the cigarette out when the light changed again. ”It's ok. All politicians are sophists anyway. At least the ones with good writers.”
He smiled at me through the mirror and I smiled back but the word sophist had made me uncomfortable. I guess he thought he had made a joke.
He pulled up to another curb. ”Here we are.”
I paid him the amount on the meter with the fake money. Then I opened the door and got out. I was standing in front of the train station.
I think I took Amtrak. I went up to a window and asked the girl there for a ticket. ”Here you go. It's sixty-two fifty.”
I gave her a wad of cash and she gave me some back. I guess I gave her too much.
”Hey, can I ask you a personal question?” She was looking at me funny. She had long wavy kinda hair and brown eyes with green in the middle of it like a supernova.
”Sure.” I tried to smile.
”Are you stoned? I won't tell anyone.” She got fidgety and moved her hands around pseudo-randomly. I remember reading once that adverbs are bad unless you're Dostoyevsky.
”What?”
She glanced around and then looked at a screen in front of her behind the window. ”It's only that yer eyes are all red.”
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