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the archive(s):
issue no. 2:
Hop / Patrick Eamonn
I happened to be in the Life Cafe with Carl, Mark, and Patch, with a bladder swelled from lager. I needed a piss, when I bumped into Joanna; she was coming out the lav. Right off, she said, "I'm three weeks late," which was me fucked, without so much as a how-do-you-do-Tommy. I'd been feeling on to something till then: buoyed up, on the peak, like. 'Cept that some nub put on Radiohead. I checked the faces on my way to the lav, on the hunt for some pleased fucker's grin to smash in. Who willingly selects Radiohead on a night out? Then out stepped Joanna. "Should be a fucking criminal offense," I began, with a he-e-ey kid, sliding my arm round her neck. I pointed toward the ceiling, indicating the speakers, meaning the song. "Good band, yeah--no debate here. Cept they're not a proper soundtrack to maintain the peak with. Brings you down. Specially The Bends. Eh? Should be outlawed from every bar on Earth." But, anyway, then she fired into that three-weeks-late business.
I squared up. Pointed out that I was spot on about protection. Always. But she said that doesn't fucking matter. Condoms are 98% effective. I'd drawn my lot and wound up as a sacrificial loss to the losing 2%. So deal with it, Tommy. Deal with it? "Well I need to piss," I put, flatly, but truthfully. My bladder was busting capacity, man, muscling all other organs out of its vicinity. The pressure I felt most, though, was in and on my head; a real vice-like clamp, and no immediate relief, not from that. I bolted the door and unloaded, groaning, flapping my dick around as the jet died down, shaking the drips, feeling lighter, but feeling worse, all over. I skimmed the graffiti on the walls, then looked long into the mirror--but fuck, man, what was I going to luck into, hidden in here? A ripper of a headache from stale urine mixing with fucking antiseptic odor absorbents, the supply of one unable to contend with the volume of the other. I staggered a bit in the confines, gunned for the toilet, flushed. Zipped up, stepped out again.
There was Joanna's crew, grouped round the other end of the bar, by the kitchen. I debated over which avenue was the appropriate choice to make, given the circumstances. Deal with the situation in a timely fashion and decisive manner? Or do I ride the fucker out? Couldn't decide. Consigned myself to the path of least resistance, which chanced to open just then in the direction of the boys. Crowd parted, and that was me, reclaiming my stool. I scored a double Jack with a Brooklyn Lager to chase from Mark, who's finally lucked into a job, and was flush with a full week's pay. Retribution, man. I smacked his back and warned, "Don't be running off now, right? Two months' income, man--I've two fucking months' worth to make up for tonight. Keyspan, ConEd . . . retribution, man, retribution . . ."
"I'm picking up what you're putting down, man . . . picking up what you're putting down," the boy said. He was positively beaming from his stool. He waved his hands, palms up, in an expression of jovial wonder. "Just looking to spread the wealth, like. A little deposit back in the karma bank, eh?" Sure enough, he'd be broke in the morning. But the boy had scored a night of feeling royal, so why spoil it. For him, or for me? Soon it was ten, 2-for-1 bottles of Bud and R.R., and the scales tipped from quality to quantity. We packed that shit down. The night was soaring, and we, experienced pilots, the lot. Spot on. Clinging to the trajectory, man. Just trusting in its path, like Ophelia . . . Ophelia, cop a fucking feel yeah, and Bruce came on and soon we were singing along, only splintering off into four different keys, but joining up again at the end to pour our lungs into one last chorus of "Rosalita," and that was Mark's wallet, tapped. The Patch lost the luck of the draw, and we scored the next round off him, and Carl's handing me mine and we're clapping each other on the back and really on the peak, now, when the box kicks out with "My Ancestral Homeland, New Jersey" and Carl remarks that's funny: two songs back to back, both with the line swamps of Jersey in 'em; what are the odds, like, and I'm saying, remember that psychic on East 13th, the one you dragged me into, the one who broke out with this rant bout how I was headed for a kid and wife and all that fucking weight, man, sure as fucking rain, it was in the cards, like. Carl says, "Man," and here he breaks off and shakes his head sadly, closing his eyes; then sighs, "that was a counselor, and you were supposed to go back . . . ," and the nubby fuck's scoffing real good at that one, but behind him is Joanna's crew, headed out the door. Joanna's facing me before she steps out to glare at me for a sec, and I wish this vice would quit teasing me and run its course already, and pop my skull and splatter everyone with pulp.
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