just because they know the name, doesn't mean they know the face. [oscar]

[particles of me]

<center>

the sky is falling
i heard it crash over on east street
the shepherds are calling their sheep
but they're all asleep

the wipers blink like eyelashes clash
against the plexiglas of the day
and in the dawning of this paradigm
i try to wake up
and all i can say is

there's beauty here
there's beauty here
and there's love everywhere
but we're sleeping and too stuck in fear
we're sleeping in fear

we can blame it on religion
i'm sure not everyone's been saved
but at the end of the day we all lay down and say,
"i wish i'd done things differently"

but there's beauty here
there's beauty here
and there's love everywhere
but we're sleeping and dreaming in fear
we're sleeping in fear</center>

I hate funerals. I always have, but I love angels, and God knows I've been looking in all the wrong places for one. What I've been looking for is a savior and that's not what I deserve; what I need is someone who understands me and understands that I, in fact, cannot be saved. I am walking proof that some things are meant to be broken and left broken, because it is in being broken that they are whole. They are unique. They are free of stereotypical worry and guilt that strangles the poor lives of simple nine-to-fivers. Lucky for me, I will never be one of those kids. Maybe a noon-to-threer, but anymore than that and I'm spent. Blame it on the medication, blame it on whatever you want. I don't work well. Never have.

I like the church; it's small and white, all draped in silk and a crown made of puffy white clouds. All the leaves are changing, browning around their edges if not lucky enough to turn into some vibrant sort of gold or burgundy, but in the death of a season another is born and the fresh, sweet scent of lilac is in the air. I don't know where it comes from, so I decide after the service I'm going to seek out the scent and sniff it all up until I can't take it anymore, but I've got it memorized so when I lay in bed at night I can close my eyes or stare at the ceiling and picture the day I went to a funeral and fell in love with a scent named lilac.

By the time I get to the church the service has already started; some older gentleman is plugging out some sort of dirge on a small organ that should have been torn out of the building and replaced by a simple baby grand, but he's there, plugging away, none-the-less. They've left the door to the foyer open so I sneak in easily and sit down in a seat just to the left of the doorway, my spine stacking accordingly when I realize there's a dead body at the front of the room. A funeral, I remind myself, my palms growing sweaty and my temple starting to pulse. A funeral, it pulses on and on like that damned dirge that will never end, while people pay their respects by murmuring to a dead body that no longer holds a soul. He's already moved on!, I wanted to shout out to them. He's moved on, why can't you?!

The pastor is an older gentleman with graying temples and angels for eyes. He shows pity through his features as he realizes this man was a wonderful one, but could have been even more wonderful, as could every other breathing human being on the planet Earth. He takes a small amount of time out of his eulogy to confront those who have yet to be saved, and ironically, he stares at me dead-on. In my throat, I'm gurgling up the words I bet you wish... and I keep the grin off my face that threatens to pull at my corners. Rather than keep eye-contact with him, I scan the place for a crown full of gold hair that's probably worn down and probably in curls. I see too many older crowns, too many male crowns.

Finally, I spot her. She's there, in the first row, beside an older crown that I suppose belongs to her mother. I study her shoulders, the way they dip and angle like so. I study the curve of her neck, and imagine how it feels beneath her hair that's been let down and is naturally filled with wave, just as I suspected. I imagine my lips on her skin and my fingers inside of her until I can hardly stand it, but I don't dare move a muscle. Instead, she flinches, and at first I think she's read my thoughts. Instead, I realize she's crying, weeping, even, over the loss of her father. With every tear that drops onto her knobby knee, I feel my heart wilt. I read your letter, I burn into the back of her head with my eyes. I read every word of it and I love you, I try to tell her with a stare but I know she is too distraught and too distracted to hear anything my heart might have to say.

I give up. I sigh a little and shift in my seat, an older woman to my left turning her head to cock a brow at me as though I'm a four-year-old who has to piss and doesn't quite understand how to hold it yet. She rolls her eyes and clears her throat and stares at the pulpit, and inside I remember she's sitting in the back, she got there just as late as me, who is she to think...

Then. Just then, her chin tilts and her mouth pulls into a puzzled frown, and she turns to glance over her shoulder, looking at me dead-on. She sees me, there by the door, in my black suit that is ridiculous and my hair that is finally somewhat tame. She blinks and lets her jaw go slack, and she turns to face front again, her face twisting into something confused. Again, she turns around, and when she realizes I in fact am not a figment of her imagination, she bubbles up a brilliant grin across her face, but then quickly suppresses it when she remembers she's at her father's funeral.

For twenty-five long, drawn-out minutes, we all sit in silence while various people speak. She even gets up to say a few words, but by that point she's too focused on her father to remember to look at me, so I watch her turned-down chin that matches her turned-down mouth. I want to kiss it -- both of them -- and tell her that he's probably in a good place, even though I don't believe in Heaven. I want to tell her that one day we'll be birds and we'll fly way up in the sky to a place everyone has only dreamt about but has never really gone because it only exists for two people, and their first names have to start with E and O and end with -ward and -scar. I watch the way her mouth moves and the way her nose is a delicate button that sits there on her face so perfectly, and I realize that I am incredibly in love with the girl who ran across the street just to be with me for one moment. I realize how stupid she must find me for not telling her I ever saw her do it, but I pray that at some point she'll do it again but not for me, for her.

The next morning, the sun will come up and shine its face through the cheap plastic slats of the horizontal blinds that hang over my window, and I'll roll over and drag her up into my arms. She's still in her black dress and while I've shrugged the jacket, I'm still in my slacks and shirt, but my hair is not brushed and hers is just as perfect as it ever was. We'll murmur stuff at each other about how we hated the funeral as much as we hated crossing the street, and we'll kiss each other good morning, rather than good night. And then, we will stay in bed all day, and sleep like babies.

[particles of me]

Dear Jane Fonda,

Sometimes hearing her voice isn't enough, I've got to breathe on the breath she's finished with. And feeling her isn't really enough either, because deep down inside I've got to have her melt into me until we're one person, just a tangle of limbs and eyes and mouths, and should someone walk in, they couldn't differentiate between elbows and knees and moans. I want to do things with her I haven't done much with anyone else, except for the girl with brown hair who once wore my heart as her own until she decided to strip herself of it. It's her fault that it's taken me so long to let myself into a little bit of Edward, and her a little bit into me -- but then again, that's a cop-out. It's my fault. It's usually my fault.

The weather here is nice. It's cool and sunny and I like to sit on the back porch which isn't much more than a slab of cement, but we're (Ella and I, even though she doesn't really live here) lucky enough to have a small patch of backyard and friendly neighbors. Ella disappears over there frequently for lemonade, and even though it's cool, she still wears sundresses, just with a jeanjacket or a light-knit sweater. She's starting to look so much like Mom, and sometimes I love it, but sometimes I hate it. Is hate the same feeling as longing? I tend to hate things I can't see or hear or feel. But I know deep down I don't hate Mom or Dad. I just miss them. But I'm glad they didn't stick around to see what kind of man their son turned into, because I bet they would've been disappointed. Ella pretends not to be usually, but the other day she made it more than known that she was tired of me playing games. But that's all I know how to do anymore -- after all, isn't life just a ridiculous, drawn-out game?

The funeral reminded me of a lot of things. It reminded me of living on Market Street and the house with big windows and black shutters. It reminded me of playing catch with Dad in the frontyard and how I was awful at it but just trying made the guy smile. I remember the dinner functions and how they used to make Ella and me dress up in ridiculous clothes as though we were going to perform some sort of song-and-dance routine, but they wouldn't dream of asking us to sing because neither of us can really carry a tune. It reminded me of the way mother used to smell. Lilac. Always lilac.

I still have her strand of pearls that I'm to give Ella when she marries, but I don't know if I want to wait that long. Sometimes I think she will never marry (she's too much like her brother in that way), but she still deserves to have those pearls.

Tomorrow is Friday, and I have a photoshoot with Valen Hent, an up-and-coming musician (at least, I think so). We will probably take a roll's worth, talk about the weather, and call it quits. Then, I will find Edward and make her share my bed, because it doesn't feel right without her anymore.

<center>-Oscar.</center>

[shutterclick]

"So, here we are."

"Yep. Here we are."

Behind her sunglasses, Cooper hid a lot of things, but not as much as Oscar, who went shadeless.

"Something's wrong with you," her mouth blurted out with a careless slap of her tongue.

"Probably."

"Well? What?"

From his side of the table, Oscar played chess with two packs of sugar, his eyes occasionally ticking towards the door to check on a sister who refused to ever appear when or where she said she would. Rather than answer Cooper with words, he answered her with his tongue wetting his bottom lip, his eyes moving back to the table to glance at the packets of sugar.

"Just say it."

"A lot."

"Well, this is pleasant," she sneered and dropped her eyes away from his face, really feeling like she'd gotten no where with him. "Maybe I should go."

"If you want," he shrugged.

"Oscar, what the hell? You ask me to lunch, and then y--"

"Ella asked you to lunch," he corrected her plainly. "Ella. Not me."

"Excuse me," she hissed as the chair halted backwards, her limbs all a-flail as she moved to her feet. "If Ella ever shows up, tell her I'm not hungry."

"Edward," he again replied plainly.

"What?"

"I saw her."

"Oh," said the girl that wilted down into her seat, all folds and angles.

"With another guy," he tried to explain.

"Oh?"

It was Oscar's turn to push back his seat, but rather than it's legs raking back, they only tilted. With his hands pushing at the lip of the table, he rattled out a sigh and slapped forward as he let go of the table, bringing his hands to smother over his face.

"Forget about it," he wished he hadn't even brought it up.

"You're a mess," she reiterated. "Did you go to your session?"

"No."

"Oscar! You need a session!"

"This is torture enough," he mumbled all too loudly.

"...Oh. I see."

"Margaret, I didn't mean it."

"I'm leaving."

"Cooper, come on."

"Why am I even here? Why do I ever care?"

"Because."

"Because nothing, Oscar. You're a bad man. A bad, bad--"

"Hi!" Ella's voice chimed over the fit.

"I'm leaving," Cooper barked at Ella as she stumbled to her feet.

"Hi," Oscar groaned from his side of the table.

"What's going on?" Ella blinked rapidly.

"Your brother is a jerk, that's what's going on!"

Oscar sighed. Ella frowned.

"What did he do?"

"I saw--"

"He saw Edward, that's what he did." Among gathering her belongings, Cooper was full of things like moans and whimpers.

"...You did?" Said a very gentle Ella, who folded down quietly into a seat between Oscar and Cooper. Her hand instantly went out to touch his.

"Yeah." That's all.

"Oh, dear."

Upon Cooper stopping herself from continually gathering her things, she blinked at the two and her facial expression lost its confidence as she moved to wilt into her seat for a third time.

"She was with another guy," licked out a flapjack tongue.

"Oh," Ella nodded sullenly, with a parental sigh following soon after. "Oscar-- are you alright?"

"Does he look alright?" Cooper's brows ticked up. "He looks like shit, Ella. You feel like shit, don't you, Oz?"

"Don't call me that," his eyes stayed stuck on his chess game.

"Oscar," Ella eased into his name. "You were the one who pulled away from her in the first place."

"I know."

"You can't expect her to wait around forever," Cooper added on.

"I know."

"Did she talk to you?" Ella's thumb went to gently rubbing the back of his hand, only until Oscar pulled it away.

"No." His hands fell into his lap and he sighed, rolling his head back to hang as the hill of his adam's apple rounded up towards the ceiling. "No, she didn't. She ran away."

"What kind of girl runs away?" Cooper snickered.

"A hurt girl," Ella defended Edward unintentionally. "Oscar, you've gotta-"

"I've gotta what, huh?" Lifting his head, he stared at Ella, his face twisting up into something ridiculous. "What exactly do I have to do to make you girls shut up and leave me the hell alone?"

"Oscar..."

"No, Ella. You stop 'Oscar'ing me. And you," he turned to look at Cooper, whose jaw went slack. "If you raise your voice to me one more time, you red-headed piece of sh--"

"Oscar!" Ella practically gasped. "What's gotten into you?"

"I'm tired," his voice shook along with his hands and lips, the color draining from his face. "I'm tired of everyone telling me what to do and who to see, where to be... I'm tired of it! I'm tired of you people thinking you're so much smarter than me just because I have to take a few pills! I'm tired of her showing up every goddamn place I go!"

Cooper and Ella sat in silence, their eyes unblinking, their mouths still.

"I'm just... tired." Oscar wilted forward, his knobby elbows jabbing at the white-clothed table. With his head turned down, his fingers moved to rake through his hair, his shoulder blades protruding like tiny wings. With his luck, they'd never let him fly.

For a long moment, the only sounds in the restaurant were the chatter of others and the clinking of dishes and glasses and utensils. The ladies sat in silence, Oscar sat defeated, and the three shut down into their own separate worlds, afraid to shake the thinning foundation beneath their feet.

"Hello," a penguin-like waiter interrupted their silence, his hands gently clapped together as his mouth bowed up in a hundred-buck grin. "Can I get you anything?"

"Bread," Ella nodded and replied quietly, reaching out a hand to rest on the crook of her brother's elbow. "Just some bread."

[shutterclick]

"So here we are," said a limp tongue that dotted at the corner of his mouth sloppily, his eyes rolling in their sockets, his head rolling atop his spine. "Just like you always wanted."

Oscar Calloway and Margaret Stills had a long line of history with one another. They read each other easily, and where their tongues were mute (though Margaret's rarely was), they worked off of one another's energy -- which, more times than not, was a negative thing. There were many things they hated about one another (it is not sufficient to use the term 'dislike', as their feelings for one another runs much more (violently) deeper). Yet in the light of the morning sun with the palm of a bedsheet draped over the milky skin of Margaret's back and Oscar -- having kicked said sheet aside -- sprawled out in a pair of navy blue cotton boxers, the two were nearly electrifying. The thought of knowing where he was made Oscar cringe inside; it never should have come to this, he reminded himself incessantly, this never should have happened. Even as his tongue was limp and his hands were still, it wasn't long before he reached to touch her and draw lines along the curve of her back, his bleary eyes drawing trails over her lips before he leaned in to kiss her. She responded sweetly, in a kind of way Margaret rarely did, with a warm mouth and a tone of submissive attitude. His arm, what generally looked like a stringbean at his side, seemed more firm when draped around the thinning waist of the girl.

"Oscar," she murmured against his mouth, before nibbling at his bottom lip, tugging it gently with her teeth.

"Hn," he grunted against her mouth in return, refusing to say much more as his mouth held the same span of attention as his brain -- shortlived by far -- and started for her cheek, before dragging down to her jaw.

"I say the shit I do because I care, you know..." Her voice almost sound nervous, which was not to be confused with excited. "Last week at the restaurant, I didn't mean to--"

"Stop," he rumbled against her throat, his arms pulling her closer to him as he rolled onto his side, and Margaret onto hers.

"But I mean it," she insisted, though physically obliging. "I'm not good like Ella; I didn't like that woman to begin with and I don't like her now. She doesn't fit with you--"

"You never met her," he cut her off blindly with his mouth moving towards her collar bone, his spine curving for him to lean down and melt his mouth against her warm skin.

"I didn't have to," she sighed and willowed against him, her eyelids falling shut. Falling victim to the privacy behind her closed eyes, her mouth said things it could say to any man when found in the dark, even when they were really in a bath of sunlight. "I've always loved you," was the truth Oscar already knew, but she felt forced to say. Not by him, but by her swelling heart.

For a long moment, there was nothing but the sound of his mouth against her breast, with small whimpers from her mouth and the shortness of breath when his fingers disappeared beneath the sheets. On her side, Margaret waited for a verbal response from the man, a response that would fill her and make her know this was the right thing to do. When he never answered her, her fingers went to his shoulders and prodded in a coaxing fashion, his mouth pulling away from her, his spine straightening for his eyes to meet hers. There was only one thing Oscar could say to her to make her half-pleased, and he tugged at her mouth for another long moment before he pulled away and looked her straight in the eyes, momentarily losing himself to the sunlight and warm skin and blue eyes that stared back at him.

"Turn onto your back."

[shutterclick]

"This whole thing is ridiculous. I mean, it's not even probable, let alone possible. How the hell does someone cross the street and get hit by a car? And you know if that happens, I'm the reason why. I'm bad luck. I'm incredibly... bad... luck." The cafe smelled of overpriced coffee and the pages of freshly printed paperbacks, of scarves tied around women's necks for fashion rather than warmth, and itching fingers that curved around mugs produced in Malaysia. With his hair uncombed (though that's not to say unbathed) and his clothes dull (a black sweater and jeans, with black shoes to match), his mouth refused to bow up as he was, is, and always will be the boy with the upside-down smile. Even she agreed to that. "What I don't understand," Oscar continued without thinking much of his words, "is how you could have been so cruel to that poor woman."

"That poor woman?" Across the table sat a very pale-faced girl, with a red nose and redder hair. Her lips were red, her eyes were bloodshot, her fingernails were red. Everything about her was red. Oscar hated the color red. "That 'poor woman', as you so like to call her, is nothing. She is nothing, was nothing, will always be nothing. She's a girl who doesn't know how to dress, and for Christ's sake, Oscar, she can't even cross the goddamn street by herself. How do you expect to make a life with that woman when she can't even have a life of her own?"

"Watch your language," he answered flatly, his eyes staring into the pit of his coffee-filled mug. He hated coffee almost as much as he hated the color red.

"You treat her like she's so pitiful," Cooper answered with a dramatic brush of her fingertips to her collarbone. "She's only pitiful because she doesn't know any better, and she only doesn't know any better because she doesn't try. Even Ella agrees--"

"Ella does not agree with that," he interjected.

"She does. She told me last night while we were in the lobby that she's thought this was poor judgement on your part. What, with the way you've been handling yourself over the past few weeks, I don't blame her for finding you just as pitiful as that woman."

"Edward," he interjected again, pushing back in his chair. "Her name is Edward."

"Her name doesn't matter to me," Cooper pressed on, a lilt in her voice that signified a devout confidence. "She is a pitiful excuse of a girl and you're better off to do without her."

"Since when are you so keen on relationships?" Oscar's mouth twitched out of exasperation, though it almost leaned towards a hint of a smile. "I don't see you getting married anytime soon. I don't see you even dating anyone."

"Oscar," Cooper leaned forward on the table with her elbows propped and her hands neatly woven with themselves, and the very posture made Oscar's spine stiffen. "Have you forgotten already, love?"

"No," he answered blandly and went back to looking into his coffee cup, hoping she would change the subject. But, he knew that was too good to be true.

"You certainly were not complaining the other night when--"

"Margaret," he warned.

"--you were... what is the word you like best?" She paused for dramatic effect, but said it quickly enough so that Oscar could not interrupt. "Oh, yes. When you were inside of me."

Oscar sat in silence; he did not disagree.

"She's pitiful," Cooper reiterated. "But you are so much more pitiful than she could ever be."

For a slender moment, the two sat in silence. Cooper's eyes dragged along the length of the cafe; Oscar stared down into his untouched coffee cup, his hands twitching in his lap, his mouth so tightly drawn shut his jaw began to ache. When Cooper had had enough of watching other people (of whom she dreamt had more fantastic lives than herself), her eyes rolled back to Oscar, and she studied him silently. Her studies were broken by an interjection of her mouth, which she undeniably had trouble controlling -- but that was nothing surprising.

"Oscar," her hand reached out and lay flat on the table, asking for his. "I'm sorry."

"You're not," he shrugged and leaned back in his seat again, lazily dragging his eyes up to her. "But you're right."