go to a cash machine : declan kerr

[Noir City]

<center>

go to a cash machine
to get a ticket home
message on the screen
says don't make plans (you're broke)
no, no this can't be right
i know that time is tight
i've only just been paid
three weeks five days, til I'm seen

right...
no...

i scratch a living, it ain't easy
you know it's a drag
i'm always paying, never make it
but you can't look back
i wonder if I'll ever get
to where I want to be
better believe it
i'm working for the cash machine

i try to phone a friend
my credit's in the red
i try to skip the fare
ticket inspector's there
no no, this can't be right
i live an honest life
it seems like sometimes
you don't cross the line
you don't get
by...
no...

what am I gonna do
my girlfriend's test turned blue
we tried to play it safe
that night we could not wait
no no, this can't be right
she said it would be alright
i can't afford to be a daddy
so I leave tonight...
no...

there's a hole in my pocket, my pocket, my pocket...

</center>

( hard - fi : cash machine )

<font color="#000000" size="1">[ March 31, 2006 10:03 PM: Message edited by: fishhook grief (i'll catch you) ]</font>

[Noir City]

[ march . 05 ]

"It's not your decision."

"To hell if it isn't."

"I've got almost two thousand in--"

"And what's that going to pay for? Diapers and formula for three months? Linda, we're talking about a kid here. Not a new fucking purse."

"Don't yell at me."

"Stop being so stupid."

"Stupid? Seriously, Declan? We've been together since I was seventeen! It's been six years and I know that we weren't planning this but..." Her voice softened. "We can make this work. I know it."

"You think it'll be easy. Make a phone call back home and they'll wire you money, right? Not with me in the picture."

"They'll change their minds about--"

"Fucking Christ, Linda. We've been through this. Over and over and over again."

"What about the shop? They've been talking about giving you a raise for awhile now, haven't they? I'm sure Ben would understand..."

He shook his head slowly, lighting up a j he had left on the windowsill this morning. She was the obvious optimist in the relationship, and it was for a good reason. She came from a nice Christian family. They weren't loaded Trump-style or anything, but they were definitely comfortable.

"Everything will be fine."

"You always got your fucking head in the clouds, Linda. We don't have insurance. We don't have enough money to eat more than once a day. Half our paychecks go to rent. If everything was fine, we could've afforded condoms. Then we wouldn't be in this fuckin mess!"

"So what. You want me to get an abortion?"

"It's not my decision, remember?"

"It's against my beliefs."

"Then do whatever the fuck you want."

"Declan!"

"Wha?"

"Where you going?"

"I'll be back in an hour."

<font color="#000000" size="1">[ March 06, 2006 07:47 PM: Message edited by: fishhook grief (i'll catch you) ]</font>

[Noir City]

It would be a lie if I said that I didn't feel anything. Lying in that foreign bed, watching some shit television. The channels are mundane. I am mundane. She's called thirty, forty times. I won't pick up, I won't hear her cry, I won't even listen to the messages although a part of me is curious. I stifle that curiosity quick with a bottle of the cheapest rum, vodka, whiskey, beer, whatever I can get my hands on, whatever the cash in my wallet will forgive. She calls twenty, thirty times the next day. She thinks I'm dead. She's thinking the worst --?Whores, pants around my ankles,?back alley?fucking. She's right.
?
Her name is Rhonda. She's got clear blue eyes, although I never saw them in a sober light. Can't appreciate anything when all your senses are caught up in your own heart beat, that burning pleasure working through my groin. She looks young, under eighteen, but she jokingly shows me her I.D. when I had kiddingly said I'm old enough to be your daddy.?It says Rhonda?Lynn Robinson, blue eyes and brown hair, born in nineteen eighty-four. Yeah, that's her all right. It didn't matter if she had been?some high school student looking for adult action.?

I didn't satisfy her, but as I wipe the saliva from the corner of my mouth with the back of my hand, I don't care. Rhonda has got a boyfriend. I find this out as we're tripping on both laughter and a high alcohol content floating through our bloodstreams. We can't even smell the rotten?swell?of trash bin fragrance.?We round the corner, my arm is over her shoulder, she's almost pinching my waist.
?
I fuckin knew it.
?
I look over my shoulder, not sure?what face matches with the?deep southern voice.
?
Who do you think you are -- don't touch my gurl!
?
I release Rhonda, who is already trying to free herself from the weight of me.
?
Your girl wasn't complaining. What the fuck is your problem? I ask.
?
It's between me and 'er. Get the fuck outta my face before yur sorry.
?
He grabbed her tightly by the bicep?in a way that set me off.
?
I snarl. I charge at him, I think he broke my nose. There's blood, a lot of it. I wonder if I can shatter his eyeball with my fist into shards of?oozing white and red. He's wheezing, I'm slumped and his boys are pounding into me with Southern fists, and I manage to kick one off, but I've been defeated. It's not about Rhonda, but they don't know this. She's crying, holding herself like she's naked. It starts off as a cough, but I'm hacking up the sting. The burn. They laugh and leave me alone.?C'mon, I'll buy you a beer. They're patting each other on the backs,?recapping?on every swing, every punch that made me choke.?We taught him a lesson alright. I don't know why I did it. I sit here for a long while, and I don't know why I didn't just let it go before I got fucked up. I'm leaving tomorrow morning. I'm leaving another backwards town for another?and I'll be?that much closer to my final destination, to California.
?
The fluorescent buzz of the overhead lights. Gimme?one of those. I point, setting a Steel Reserve 211 on the counter. Buy one get one free Parliaments. Crap cigarettes for a crap road trip in my beat-up Chevy that I bought for the sheer novelty of having a '71 Chevelle.?The clerk's eyes light up from shock,?she's staring at my swollen lip. She takes my crumpled up one's with?no hesitation, but before she pours?the two dimes, a quarter and?three pennies into my palm, she says take?care of yourself and I give her a dry smile. She was sincere and I pay no heed. Sincerity isn't going to get me through the night, or pay for a warm meal or for a pint of Jim Beam. Sincerity is bullshit. Sincerity is what got Linda asleep when I kissed her forehead, told her I loved her. A half hour later I?took the rent money hidden in a box of household chemicals under the sink, threw some of my belongings in the backseat, and left before I could stop myself.
?
What's with the world and preaching about
taking the time?to care when no one really does?

[Noir City]

"This apartment building is fucking overrated. The cafe serves expensive shit; what happened to getting some pop for forty-nine cents?" Declan yanked his hoodie over his head, throwing it on the sofa. "And one of the waitresses was bitch." The click of the child safety, and cigarette was lit. "I'd say the whole damn experience was a waste of time, but I met someone." He shrugged. "Yeah yeah, don't give me that face -- it's not like I'm about to propose or anything. But this girl has got bite, and I like it." He was pouring himself a bowl of Trix, contemplating what he just said. "Is it wrong to say that? Linda moved on. She's fucking that jerk-off. Right?"

"You going to bang her?" Adam was in the process of yawning.

"Who?"

"Who? Who else would I be talking about, you idiot? The girl with the bite!"

"We'll see."

[Noir City]

I'm a hypocrite; I'll be the first to admit this.
But, really, I'm a lot of fucking things.

"Whatever floats your boat." She says with the most careless air, perhaps lifting her head just a little bit higher (she needs to be defensive, she needs this), but I never took the time to look. What's the point? -- It'll only break me, and I'm in no mood for it.

"Or whatever sinks it." I heard myself say it, and I was surprised by the tone. I thought I was being clever. I thought that it was a joke, in my own nasty humor. It was muttered low, sucked in too deep, strayed too far away from humanity, warmth.

Back and forth, back and forth, and it's only getting worse. It's a joke, a fucking joke, a good joke. I want to laugh. We're playing a mental game of battleship -- No. I am. I am the destroyer. I'll push lies and insults like cocaine, and no one can't fuckin' stop me. I'm winning, I've hit the jackpot. I've got the best adrenaline pumping, and I know where it hits the hardest. B10 . A6. J3 (baby, don't try so hard; you'll break a nail).This is battleship. This is a Milton Bradley Company board game. This is the first world war, maybe the second, I've never been good with remembering.

I see her. Abby. I take the time. Her eyes narrowed in slits of amber, and she is empty of anything horrible to say, and we both know this. The tension is building. To both of our suprise -- she recaps, thoughts sputtering like the dial of a revolver, of that old phone left in the bottom of a closet with a dusty old wire surprise split.

"I don't want to know you anymore."

I winced.

I was probably only three or four. We used to have to drive a long way to my grandma's house, my dad's mom. It was late when we got back, and I was such a sucker for falling asleep in the car. Maybe I was just pretending; I can't remember. But my dad would carry me out of the car and into my bed. I would shortly pop up from the mattress, maybe two, maybe twenty minutes later. Watching late night USA, or some Lifetime movie my mom was watching. She dominated the television, my father had no rights over the remote. But, anyway, I would be carried off, really asleep or not. And this is exactly how I felt at this moment. Alive, but barely. Wishing my eyes closed (tightertighter), wanting sleep. Beautiful washing ever-glazed honey dripping alcohol sweet sleep.

I failed her. Miserably. She doesn't cry, she just turns away. She wants to bring up Wendy, I know it. It's where it always goes. These bittersweet arguments straying to what had really mattered -- I had cheated on her. Her sister knew it, her mother glared at me whenever she got a free moment, I swear her father had a wooden baseball bat with my name on it. Everyone knew, and yet they shut up when she was around. I can't believe you're still with him. What is wrong with you?

She gets up from the table in the kitchen. She was doing bills, writing checks or whatever. Stamping shit. She doesn't say anything else. She packs her backpack, and I don't say a single fucking thing. I'm asleep on the couch. In front of the television. I'm even drinking some kind of cola. Most likely Coke, she loved Coke. She leaves. She's crying in the hallway. I would never admit it, but I saw her through the peep hole, down the hallway like some bad nightmare of a hangover -- it's blurry and I want to see her clearly. But I never will.

Her contacts are gone. Even the extra disposable pair in the medicine cabinet. She left her toothbrush, is that some kind of sign that she'll come back? I light a cigarette, the first of sixteen that I lite while hanging out from my window, thinking I really fucked up this time.

I saw her a couple times after that. The last thing she ever said to me was Don't Explain. I hadn't really planned on it to begin with, but this was a turning point for her.

She didn't want to know me anymore, and I met her cousin Linda a month and a half later when I went to see if maybe I could get on Abby's good side again. There had been a funeral, and her cousin Linda was shackin' up there for a little while, until things got figured out. The will, or whatever. She lived up in the hills, and I had never seen anyone look so beautiful in black. I knew I had to ruin Linda, but I had no idea that I was going to fall so hard.

[Noir City]

[Billiards. Declan and Adam.]

"It's your turn. -- Hey." Declan Paused. "Would you ever fuck a fat girl?"

"If she was short with a cute face. But only if she was short, like five foot three or smaller. Otherwise she'd be way too heavy."

"Well, you don't have to carry the girl, Adam. I said fuck, not cradle her over the threshold."

Adam paused, letting the pool stick sit idly in his hand. "No Declan, I wouldn't. Why, would you?"

Declan looked thoughtful, taking a long gulp of his beer. "If she had massive tits. Like a double F or something ridiculous like that."

"That's even worse, Declan. There's nothing you can do except poke them with knives and other 'Patrick Bateman' mess."

He laughed. "Or suffocate in them." Declan moved the other side of the table. "So fat girls aside, how bad would it be if I slept with a couple neighborly sluts?"

"Then that's you're own problem. The only reason that would happen is because they had stank breath or something. I don't think you're that scare of commitment, especially if they're fun." Adam faced the east region of the hall. "I know that broad in the green."

"Everyone likes a fun girl." He seemed to get dazed for a moment, finishing off his second beer. "Who in the green?" Declan glanced over his shoulder, not very discretely, unfortunately. "She blow you or something?"

"No, no. I'm a virgin." He snickered. "I met her at the picture show a few nights ago, she's really funny in a good way."

"Oh, yeah, I almost forgot about your good Christian morals," he said dryly, leaning over the table for a killer move, but of course failed. "I hope you fuck her, because if you don't--" He glanced at the chick once again. "I will."

"Declan, she wears a fake tan. Knock yourself out, just don't put her on my sheets. Jeez, are you balls really that blue?"

"Who doesn't have a fake tan around here?" He paused. "I'm just trying to forget about Linda, or is that not okay with you?" Touchy touchy. -- And it's been over a year.

"Whatever you have to do to get by, friend." Adam placed his stick down. "She's looking over here at you. Go introduce youself while I take a piss."

[Noir City]

"Linda. You're a fucking bitch, plain and simple." Declan leaned against the wall, cell phone pressed to one ear, hand over the other. He glanced over at Adam and mouthed turn it down, but Adam only smirked.

"You're a fucking asshole. What do you want?"

"We're meant for each other."

"Are you FUCKING kidding me?" She immediately lowered her voice. "The baby is sleeping and my husband will be home any minute--"

"Linda. Look. I know I fucked up... but there was good reasoning behind that. I couldn't provide for us... and I--"

"Did what you thought was best." They were always doing this shit... finishing each other's sentences. So typical.

"Yes. And being out here... going across the country, being in L.A., only makes me miss you more. I can't keep running from you."

"You're too late."

"It's never too late."

"Really? Is that what you think? You don't have a daughter anymore, Declan. You've lost your chance. I've--"

"You've moved on. You're over me." He sounded tired all of a sudden.

"Jesus, Declan. I'll never really be over you... It seems like I always love you, even after all the fucked up shit."

"Then why did you marry that fucking idiot?"

"Because he cares about me more than himself. That was something you could never do."

[Noir City]

The note for Adam was clean and precise. There was no need for theatrics. Declan didn't have much to pack; he was too good at picking up and leaving. A part of him yearned to say goodbye the right and proper way, but there was just no time for it. With one last sigh, Declan left Rhapsody Commons (and he would try to not miss any of the girls he had wanted to fuck but never had the chance).

Declan had the urge to call Linda again, but as he saw Tilda come out from the apartment complex, he changed his mind. It was a beautiful day. Brown lucky brand t-shirt (stolen from Adam, naturally) and jeans, cigarette perched.

We've got to keep moving forward, just don't look back.

Just don't look back.

<font color="#000000" size="1">[ July 05, 2006 10:05 PM: Message edited by: fishhook grief (i'll catch you) ]</font>

[Noir City]

A girl who eats lemon cake and raspberries and vanilla bean ice cream. A girl who can't taste the difference between an expensive and cheap bottle of wine. She quotes the same movies, she hates hot weather, and I love her all the same. She reads romance novels, and all I can do is shake my head. I wish I had known her then like I know her now. Those simple smiles were smart, were clever, were heart-drenched. I wish I had known her then like I know her now...

She's a mystery, opening the door, letting us in. I wish Matilda was my girlfriend. Everything would make more sense then... everything. Then I could deny this girl who has had my child. The child I've never seen. Will I be able to see myself in her eyes?

[Noir City]

"Get out." She wrapped the sheet around her body. She was noticeably heavier from the last time he slept with her, but he hadn't minded. In fact, the extra weight had given her an overall glow. "Hurry up. Alan will be home soon, and I need to cook supper."

Declan slipped into his pants before reeling her in, kissing her ear. She seemed to soften into him, a beam that Declan couldn't see but knew was there.

"I'm serious, Declan. You need to get home to Matilda before she suspects anything. And these sheets need to be washed..." She seemed to go on for another couple minutes about all the chores she had ahead of her. He shrugged and finished getting dressed. He found his daughter in the crib in the next room, peacefully asleep. He kissed her on the forehead, and promised he'd be back.