Shit, getting this story from the depths of my laptop is like digging up skeletons for me.
Oh, why didn't I post my stories and my poetry on the internet? I was always afraid somebody would take them from me. It's so easy to just copy-paste somebody else's work and call it your own. I mean, I wouldn't even know!
How many great people got famous from plagiarizing? H.G. Wells, T.S. Eliot and Martin Luther King. (I'm not implying that my work's great though.) (Side note: Got that from www.cracked.com/article_17198_5-great-men-who-built-their-careers-on-
Anyway, here it is.
A Short Story
By Victor Bautista
It was an unusually hot season. So unusual that it made me think that nobody would ever want to die on a day as hot as this. It makes one mad, and nobody, but madmen would want to part from this world in a disgusting fit.
On a fateful day, I went along with the lunacy of the sun (or did I escape it?) and went to a tavern. It was, of course, empty and only the bartender and a lone man were there. Ah, this man’s a failure or a drunkard, I supposed. Either way, he was a fool. Going to places like these in broad daylight leaves one with a lingering, terrible impression. It was a good thing it was just the three of us.
I placed myself a stool from the greasy man, and then I asked for a beer from the good chap (the bartender, I mean). I asked for a tall one, so he could leave us be and take a rest since most nights, the bar would be set ablaze with men on fire. It made me wonder who’s better off among these two fellows.
The bad chap lifted his heavy, drunken head and pointed it at me, but the black of his eyes was nowhere. By Jove! It was if he was in some kind of indulgent enlightenment! He was more fascinating than I first assumed.
After noticing that, I noticed that he had an extremely thick moustache with a messy head of short hair. His forehead had wrinkles. He had bags under his eyes, and while the ivory look of his eyes seemed mighty erudite, his mouth exuded a contrast with a deplorable dumbness.
He shook his head violently and came to his senses. Now, he saw me. Ah, that bloody bastard! He put his head down, and when it came up again, he just grinned and began his monologue. His speech was amazing, and I didn’t know myself if it was naughty or meaningful; either way, I listened to that coot (though I had to take a step or two back from the odour of his breath).
“Damn! Damn the university and their elitist sciences! Ha! What rubes! They think they’re angels from up above who give everybody the right to say what they ought to say and who give the power for everybody to have some kind of wonderful, never-before understanding. Well, they’re wrong!”
He paused for a while, as if he were flabbergasted with himself and didn’t know what to say next. I took that time to cram down a big gulp—refreshing.
He sighed then started again, “Damn the university for not taking me in! Damn them! They say they stand for art; they say they stand for the Lady, yet—My God!—all they do is shut us out. Their intentions, their intentions are for you and for me and for everybody to just read the stuff that everybody can understand. But what about the rest of us? The philosophers, the scientists and the intellectuals? What about the bloody brilliant deviants? Art for art’s sake. Phoo! I’ve never heard such distasteful lies in my life! Art ain’t for art’s sake, or it just can’t stand on its own... stake, somebody else has to see it! You know what you’ve done? You know what you’ve done, you bloody bastards; you just put a limit.”
He stood up and took a deep breath, and like a lion pouncing, kicked the stool (but it didn’t fling too far). He shouted with all his might, taking out all the air from his tired lungs, “YOU THINK YOU’RE TAKING DOWN WALLS; YOU’RE JUST MAKING ‘EM!”
Slowly, he crouched; his palms pointed upward.
Damn me. After that wonderful experience (despite the potent stench at the end), I had a sincere grin on my face. Once I noticed, my head went hard and my face turned blank. Sobriety... I drank the rest of my drink bottoms-up.
After that, the good chap came out of the room behind the liquor cabinet. On the other side, the bad chap’s face had suddenly turned blank like mine. The fun was over; we both knew it. Suddenly, his eyes returned to that lofty look—which now looked distant, not smart. The bartender lifted the stool and put it in its right place, and he did that with the drunkard too. He held him by the shoulders and propped his back on the bar. In a quiet whisper, “Alright, old friend, just rest easy.” It was as if he let a stray animal in and allowed the poor creature to rest its weary bones.
“Terribly sorry, mate,” he said. I wanted to ask about the wild fellow, and he knew that from the serious look in my brow. In polite aversion, he offered a free drink and apologized for the “over-the-topity of it all” (it became the prayer of this sordid temple).
I gave him a wide, sad smile and refused.
But I liked the scenery here. The cool, empty room apart from the blithering heat. The lethal kindness of that bartender with a black apron. The obscure complexity of that wanton scholar. That’s why I replied, “I’ll be back tomorrow.” I liked it here, and that was the only reason I came back.
And so, I did. Everything lost its lustre from that point on, the amusement was gone and it was replaced with an intense (perhaps scientific) despising of him, that instead of repulsed me, attracted me instead.
From time to time from that day on, I had a feeling that I would have liked to asked him what his problem was, but I was afraid he would bite. And if he did, it would be utterly, terribly infectious—deadly even. That fear made me half the man I was. Utterly pitiful of me. Good thing it’s just in this limbo, and it’s a better thing the good chap had good alcohol.
By the third day, I found the joke within this entire predicament. Peeps go to the tavern in the night to forget and be merry. But here I am. The furious sun’s outside. My only friends are a madman and a bartender that takes in strays.
Damn, the fact that it went by so hastily was the most over-the-top; I got along this deplorable line so fast, and the sad part was that I was assimilated—and beyond that, I could’ve sworn I almost did his weird eye movement sublimely and that the bottles seemed to look down upon me—like idols (gods even) upon lowly worshipers.
By the seventh day, I had a potent urge to set this man straight. By this time, he felt like a distant cousin from a distant land, hence, the call for duty.
Maybe I had too much or had too little. I set my head down.
It was such a conundrum, this dilemma. I was so disgusting! Why couldn’t I get out of this place? Why? Why?
I knocked a lot at the bar, and when my friend came out, I asked for a drink that would hit me hard in a second. I fell like a brick afterwards. The last thing I remember was sounds of buzzing up high and tapping on the floor.
By the second week, I got totally used to it and it became a habit. Shouldn’t have.
By the fifteenth day, he finally broke out of that disgusting cycle. But only for a while! Damn it, only for a while! “P... P...,” I was going to utter something. It could have meant everything or nothing, but, anyway, I kept my mouth shut. As his head was tucked away from the sun, he mumbled the only words that made sense, and I reckon he was saying how tedious and pointless this circle was, and I was tipsy then.
*applauds* i liked how you used words that make me run for the dictionary. :)) haha
ReplyDeleteNice story. Hope to see more of your works~
ReplyDelete