This is mad love. I close my eyes, to hold back the burning fire. To hold back the shame of tears. It doesn't work though, I can feel them, slowly leaking out from the sides of my eyes. I squeeze my eyes shut harder. I can feel the tears run down my fever red cheeks, and I sob. This is mad love. "Stop it, you fucking girl." I can hear my father snarl. But I'm not here anymore, I'm lost in the black, even as I can smell his whiskey fetid breath in my face as he hisses, "Fucking faggot!" Then he hits me again. I choke down a mouthful of salty snot-spit and I think I taste blood. I wipe my nose off with the back of my hand and I can feel a warm wetness smear across my face. I open my eyes, to the dull light of the living room, everything is distorted and diffused by tears. Like I'm under water, like I'm drowning. I look down at my hand, at the orange-red swath and I know that I'm bleeding. I try to gently sniff, but I taste copper and have to fight the urge to gag. I look up at my dad, he mumbles 'faggot' again and then staggers off. I run upstairs to my room and lock the door. I bury myself under my blankets and hope that it's enough to stifle my bawling. It usually is.

I mutely stare down at my clean white paper, at the translucent blue lines running across it. I should be taking notes, but instead I watch as my hand starts to draw a line, and then another line and a curve and soon a picture starts to come into focus, out of the blinding white of the paper. Out of nervous habit I bite my lip, but it's still pretty swollen and sore and so I end up reopening the tear that my dad made last night. Which is just as well I suppose. I run my pointer finger across my puffy bottom lip, until it's sufficiently covered with a thin greasy layer of spittle and fresh blood. With that tainted finger I start to color my picture. No one seems to notice. The kid next to me keeps taking notes and the teacher keeps up her fevered lecture on finding the square root of an imaginary number. I run my finger across my lip again, but my wound has already started to close, the blood already coagulating. So much for trying to add some color to my dull life. I look down at the smudged pencil lines, at the stain of brown, drying on the paper and try to block out the rhythm, the slow repetitive tap, tap, tap of the teacher assaulting the black board with her chalk. I look over at the clock and sigh, because I still have twenty minutes left of class. I go back to my picture, try to come up with something to add to it, but I can't, so I just crumple it up and shove it into my backpack. Seventeen more minutes. I put my head down on my desk, shift in my seat, try to get comfortable, but it doesn't work.

I take out a fresh piece of binder paper, bounce my pencil against the edge of my desk, for inspiration or something, twelve more minutes. I press my pencil to the paper, but nothing comes out. I want to write a poem, or something beautiful. Instead I end up writing the word, 'dead.' There, that's a poem I guess. Then next to that I write the word, 'fuck.'. I write this over and over and over and over again, until my whole paper is covered in 'deadfuck.' I look up at the teacher, she has her back turned to the class and everyone is just sitting so quietly in their seats that I just want to shout at the top of my lungs, 'DeadFuck!' That could be performance art, maybe. On the very last line of the paper I write, 'I'm dead- fuck!' Then the bell rings and class is over.

At lunch all Cindy can talk about is the AFI concert we went to the other night. "Wow, I was like so drunk. Do you remember that Tobe?" I just shrug.

"Wasn't it cool when they did Totalimmortal?" I start to tongue my damaged lip, to help combat the ennui.

'Wasn't it, Tobe? Hello?"

"Hmm, yeah? Oh, yeah, I guess that was cool."

"Yeah, they're cool. I don't even mind that Davey's gotten all Goth or whatever, they're still cool."

I readjust my sunglasses, look down at my hands and have nothing to say.

"So, do you want to get stoned after school?"

"Sure, Cindy, get stoned. I guess."

Cindy starts to say something else, but is interrupted by Michelle. People make fun of him because he has a girl name. I don't care though.

"Hey, guys."

I just nod in his direction, Cindy responds with a long drawn out, "Heeeyyy…" I try to curl myself up into a ball on the bench, but I just can't seem to make myself small enough for it to work. No matter how long I shut my eyes for, whenever I open them I'm still me and I'm still here. Either Michelle or Cindy run their fingers through my hair, and I shudder. This is mad love.

My last class of the day doesn't have any air conditioning, so it smells pretty bad by the time two o'clock rolls around, since it's full of sweaty teenagers. It's art class though, so I guess it could be worse. It could be something like chemistry, something that sucks on top of being smelly. But, at least for me art class doesn't suck, it just smells. We've been working on doing portraits in charcoal. Most everybody in the class picked either like a family member or just some random picture to draw. A few of the girls opted to do pictures of their favorite member of N'Sync or the Backstreet Boys. I found an old copy of Rolling Stone in a stack of magazines that my art teacher had. It's the one about Kurt Cobain's suicide and there's this quiet, solemn, black and white picture of him on the cover and even though I was never really a Nirvana fan, this picture just said 'draw me.' So I am. So far it's turning out pretty good. The only thing I have left to do are the eyes, I hate drawing eyes. I thought about just coloring the holes with my blood, now that would be a statement. But, the last time I did something like that the school counselor called my dad. So I guess I have to draw the eyes. I don't want to though and I'm just about to track down an X-Acto knife, when something distracts me, when someone distracts me.

The door to the class room slowly opens and this guy I haven't ever seen before pokes his head inside. Then the door is quickly shut again. I don't think anyone else has taken notice of this except for me. A few moments pass and nothing else happens. I go back to my picture and try to figure out what the hell I'm going to do about the eyes. Maybe I could just cut them out and glue them onto the paper. Then the door opens again. Just like last time. The kid looks inside, then sees me. He hesitates for a minute, then gives me a funny look and sticks out his tongue. He starts to shut the door again, when the teacher catches him.

"Excuse me?" My art teacher demands.

Startled the kid doesn't say anything.

"Do you need help with something?"

The kid thinks about it for a minute, then shrugs and says, "Yeah, I guess I'm supposed to be in this class, I'm new."

"Okay, come in then and take a seat."

"No."

"No?" The teacher repeats, in deadpan.

"It kind of stinks in there."

My teacher is usually a pretty patient person, but I could tell that he was losing his patience.

"Look, I know it's stuffy, but we can leave the door open, so now come in and please take a seat."

The kid steps fully into class, sniffs at the air and then grimaces. "So where should I sit?"

'You can take the seat next to Tobe, Tobe raise your hand." Reluctantly I do. The new kid comes lumbering towards me with this goofy grin on his face. I put my hand down. Then everything goes back to the way it was and once again the question of the eyes is vexing me. I really don't know what to do about it.

"So what are you drawing?" The new kid asks.

"I dunno. " I meekly state.

"Sure you do, who is it?"

"Somebody."

"Well, it kind of looks like that Nirvana guy. But, where are his eyes?"

"I haven't drawn them yet."

"That's kind of spooky, why don't you give him eyes?"

"You're annoying, you know that?"

"I just think he should have eyes."

"Whatever, he'll have eyes, just not right now."

"Okay, cool."

Dinner is silence. I push my food around my plate, reorganize it, pretend to eat. The phone starts to ring, but my dad just keeps shoveling food into his mouth, oblivious. I ask him if I can be excused, and he just sort of grunts at me and I take this as a yes, so I get up and get the phone. It's Michelle, he's heading over to Cindy's and he wants to know if I want to go with. I look back over at my corpulent father, stuffing his face, and without hesitation I answer, 'okay.'

I try not to walk in the orange pools of light, cast down by the street lamps. I try to walk like a thief or a killer out doing the devil's business. But the night is too warm and I'm just not mean enough to entertain such ideas, so I loose interest in the game pretty quickly. Then I start to get paranoid, because what if there is really someone out right now doing the devil's business and what if they find me? Maybe I should of waited at home, but my dad's at home, and I'd rather take my chances with whoever is out here. I get to the end of my block and lean up against the pole that holds up the street sign and wait. A few minutes pass and there's no sign of Michelle. Just as I start to worry, his car pulls up next to me. Someone is in the front seat though, which kind of pisses me off, but I get over it pretty quickly, since it's just Greg. I climb into the back seat and am immediately handed a can of Coke. Without really thinking I take a swig of whatever is in the can, which turns out to be mostly rum. I give the can back to Greg, and he fills it up some more from a bottle concealed in a brown bag. As Michelle starts to drive off I roll down my window and let the balmy August wind whip me wholly in the face. I inhale the full bouquet of the late summer night and taste the city. I close my eyes and just breathe.

Cindy's basement is dank and in the air hangs a dense cloud of pot smoke, making it all seem like some kind of post apocalyptic warzone. I sit on the couch, bored, while Michelle tries to roll a joint and Greg tries to feed me more rum. Cindy gets up and turns on the black light and then the stereo. She puts on an Eminem CD and he just doesn't seem to suit the milieu of things right now, so I turn on the Playstation and try to ignore him. Michelle finally gives up on the joint, he keeps ripping the paper, so we revert back to taking bong hits. At the moment I'm handed the bong, there comes a loud rap-tap-tap at the window. I'm so startled by this that I almost drop the bong, the heavy, expensive, glass bong. In unison, like in a bad movie, everyone turns towards where the noise came from. Sometimes Cindy's older brother will fuck with us, so we're all kind of use to stuff like this happening when we're down here. However, peering into the tiny window is sad faced, purple haired Mandy. Not Cindy's asshole brother. No one invited her, but at the same time no seems too surprised by her appearance. Cindy unlatches the window and Mandy's rail thin form comes shimmering into the basement. After she's all the way in, another leg slowly makes its way through the window. This doesn't make much sense because everybody, for the most part, is here. No one else should be coming through that window. Yet, there they are, and as the body eases itself down I can't for the life of me think who this should be. It doesn't register as to who it is until he asks, 'So, d'you draw the eyes yet?'

Before I have a chance to respond, Mandy introduces her new 'friend,' Elijah, the annoying kid from my art class. As everyone says their half-hearted 'hellos' to Elijah I take the bong hit and hope to God that this doesn't ruin my high. After I exhale Michelle takes the bong from me and starts to repack it and I go back to playing video games. Some one lights a cigarette, and everyone's teeth glow yellow-phosphorus green in the black light. On the TV, my character gets attacked by a monster, and I try to kill it, but, it ends up killing me. Out of frustration I throw the video game controller at the television screen. Greg picks up the controller and starts playing the game where I left off. Michelle gets up to go to the bathroom or find more pot or something and Elijah comes over and takes his spot on the couch, right next to me.

'Hi!' He chirps.

'Um, Hi.'

'So, did you draw the eyes yet?'

'No.' Ask me again and I'll stab you.

'So, you're Tobe, right?'

'Right.'

'You're pretty like a girl.'

'What?'

'You're pretty like a girl, you kind of look like a girl, you're kind of androgynous.'

'Uh, thanks, I guess?'

Greg interrupts our conversation like a drunken deus ex machina, 'Hey, do you want to play again?' I shake my head, no, but immediately regret it, since it would of given me an excuse to ignore Elijah. So instead I sigh and pretend to act interested in the thread bare hole on the knee of my jeans. I methodically start to pull thin fibers from the edge of the ragged hole, and this action seems so important and fascinating to me that I block out the rest of the world. No more Elijah, no more Greg playing video games, no more Mandy, no more Cindy, and who the fuck even knows where Michelle went? Just me and the hole in my jeans. That's all.

When I get home, I find my dad asleep in his recliner. I creep up the stairs as silently as I possibly can, but before I even reach my bedroom door, I hear him stirring. So I just go into my room and wait. I sit down on my bed and patiently wait. I don't really get that scared as I hear him lurching towards my door. I shut my eyes, and pray that it doesn't last long. 'Where the fuck were you!' He slurs. I hold my breath and pray.

The bruise isn't that bad, the bruises are never that bad. Still, I wish they weren't there, I hate it when people ask questions. The bruise is a delicate, pale grey, an opaque purple, running down the side of my face. I gingerly finger it, and in the mirror, I can see myself wince, even though it didn't really hurt. Just force of habit I guess. I take a deep breath, steady myself, put on my sunglasses and leave the bathroom. The halls are virtually empty, the tardy bell has already rung, and I'm late. I could care less. I think we're in third period now, so that means that I have English. We're studying MacBeth, it's required that all seniors read it, I don't mind too much, I actually like Shakespeare. 'Out, out brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.' How can you not like Shakespeare?

'Ah, Mr. Baxter how nice of you to finally join us.' My teacher coos mockingly.

'Yeah, hi.' I mumble as I take my seat. My teacher starts to ramble on about the blood imagery in MacBeth and what it signifies and whatever. I take out my copy of MacBeth and try to follow along, but everything starts to get all muddled and confusing because my brain feels dry and hollow from all of the pot I smoked last night. I start to zone out, forget where I am, just forget.

Once seventh period rolls around the question of what I'm going to do about Kurt's eyes is at hand, once more. I don't want to deal with it at all, so I go about retouching his beard stubble, because in this world it's all about creating the illusion that you're working, rather than, say actually working. In fact, I had been so absorbed in pretending I was doing my art project that I hadn't even noticed that Elijah wasn't in class, until he finally came in half way through the hour. I don't even think the teacher noticed his absence either. Everyone just went about their business in this eerie drone like manner. Elijah took his seat next to me and immediately started to chatter.

'I just woke up, even though there's only like a half hour left of school or whatever, I just felt like I needed to come in for some reason, so that the day wouldn't be like a total waste.'

'Um, okay.'

'So why are you wearing your sunglasses?'

'Because I can.'

'So, you still haven't drawn the poor bastard's eyes?'

'Look…um, do you think you could like do me a favor?'

'What kind of favor?'

'Nothing big, so just say yes, all right?'

'Well.. all right, I guess.'

'Great.' I say as I get up and go over to the supply cabinet. I take out an X-acto knife, and return to my seat. I hand the knife to Elijah, who looks at it totally puzzled.

'I want you to cut me.'

'What?'

'Cut me, carve your name into my arm or something, I want you to cut me.' I lay my arm out on the table, wrist up, exposing the old lattice work of pale scars running the length of my forearm. 'Cut me.' I reiterate. Elijah, slightly panicked looks around the room, at the teacher sitting at his desk reading or grading papers, at the rest of the kids in the class, dutifully working on their portraits, then back at my arm and the knife. I'm just about to give up and call him a pussy, when, ever so gently, he presses the tip of the blade into my skin. I smile and mouth 'harder' and he proceeds to make the first crimson line appear. Then he makes three more slashes and a very distinct 'E' takes shape. Slightly shaking, slightly giggling, he makes the 'L' in one smooth deliberate slice. The cut is deeper than the 'E' and it bleeds more. A thin scarlet thread, spills down my arm and beads on the table top. As the cold metal digs into my soft flesh to make the 'I', I become vaguely aware of the fact that I've started to get an erection . Elijah starts to make the incision that would become the 'J', but a shadow looms over us and a frantic voice distracts us from our 'art.'

'Just what is going on here?' Our teacher demands.

Elijah just kind of stammers, and drops the X-Acto knife.

I look up and say, 'I wanted him to cut me, so he was.' In this totally matter of fact like tone, that I could tell shocked my teacher. I was so absorbed in Elijah cutting me that I hadn't even picked up on the fact that the entire class was watching what we were doing.

'Go to the principal's office, now, both of you.'

Elijah soberly gets up from his seat and starts to trudge to the door. I follow in tow, head held high, slight grin twinging my lips. I can't help it, I just want to laugh. As I walk I swing my arms in stride and this action causes droplets of my blood to splatter themselves on the off-white linoleum, total performance art. Ron Athey, eat your heart out. As I close the door behind me, I make a point to get blood on the handle, which isn't that difficult as it's started to drip down my arm and on to my hand. This is mad love.

 

©2002 Aaron Nielsen - Contributor's Bio