Night Watch

This is an awful story I wrote in high school. I was quite proud of it then. Now I find it kind of laughable, but it did inspire my rather fabulous tattoo, and for that I am grateful.


She saw him ahead of her and ran, her bare feet barely touching the soft wet grass. She ran quickly, trying not to laugh, knowing that he could disappear at any moment. Her long hair flew in her face and she stopped to push it out of her eyes, gasping for breath. He was gone.

She collapsed on the ground and buried her face in her hands. Night after night she went through this. Night after night she saw him in the field and ran, wondering if she were crazy and laughing at herself. Even now she laughed through her frustrated tears.

It would be simple to write this off as insanity, to concede that this man didn't exist, and to sleep through a night for once. But she knew that she was not crazy; knew that he was real. She had spent a night with him once; he was warm, living, breathing, flesh and blood.

She remembered clearly that night. Summer, cool breeze, fragrant scent of flowers hovering in the air. The night had called to her; she couldn't sleep, so she had left her home and walked to the field. Halfway through she saw him, standing straight, erect, seemingly staring directly at her. Her first impulse was to run, but she was drawn forward to him. She stopped before him and their eyes met, until she turned hers away, flustered.

Burning with the awkward silence, inwardly wondering what she was doing, she forced her voice to be light. "Beautiful night, isn't it?" she asked politely, trying to meet his gaze again.

He nodded, staring through her with his intense brown eyes. "Beautiful. Out for a walk?"

She nodded. "I couldn't sleep." She felt a peculiar sense of reality shifting, of normality slipping, and for a fleeting moment wondered if this was a dream. Perhaps she was still in bed, had only dreamt of going for a walk, of meeting and speaking to this beautiful man.

He smiled, and somehow she felt he knew her thoughts and blushed, overwhelmed by a feeling of naked vulnerability. "I couldn't sleep either," he said wistfully. "Will you walk with me?"

No! she screamed inwardly, I have to go home! but she heard her voice say, "I guess so," nervous, yet rich with muffled excitement. He took her hand and she felt energy shoot through her body and again the strange, detached-from-life feeling. They began walking, and she had the sensation of not really moving, as if she were gliding, guided by his hand. They came to a tree illuminated by the moonlight, and he turned to her. She saw her own reflection in his eyes briefly before he kissed her, and then she knew for sure that this was a dream, for if this were real she wouldn't be kissing this strange man, would she? She wouldn't be allowing him to remove her clothing, to lower her onto the soft wet moonlight. Yes, its a dream, she decided, surrendering to the fantasy cloud surroundering her and the beautiful man beside her. Its all right; its just a dream.

The next morning she awoke in her bed. It was a dream after all, she realized, a beautiful, vivid dream. But still it felt real to her, and she revelled in the afterglow throughout her blurry routine of a day. And that night she gave into temptation and surrendered herself again to the night and the park.

It was again a beautiful night, so like the one before. But that was just a dream, she reminded herself sternly, and then she saw him. Her heart skipped a beat, her stomach plummeted. She breathed deeply, but although he had startled her with his presence she was not truly surprised to find out he was real; she had known that all along. She forced her legs to move toward him. He leaned against the tree, looking directly at her, and she was close enough to see that strange sadness in his eyes, to feel again the displaced feeling of not quite being alive. And then he disappeared.

It made no sense, she reflected from the ground where she had fallen, the moonlight reflecting the tears on her face. But that was how it had been, every night after the mysterious encounter and again tonight. Sometimes she would walk toward him, sometimes she would run, sometimes she would stand still across the park and watch him. But inevitably he would disappear, leaving no trace of his existence but for her memories of that sweet summer night. Always she would feel the awful frustration of having lost something she had never quite found. Then she would go home to sleep, as she did tonight, knowing that tomorrow would find her in the park again, repeating the pattern, reliving the dream that was no dream.

The next night she saw him again. Once again he stood at his tree; she started toward him as always, but then abruptly she stopped and called out. "Please...please don't go!"

"Stay there," he called out harshly.

"But..." she faltered.

"Stay!" he yelled, his voice echoing through the night. Startled, she could do nothing but obey, although she trembled at his approach. "Don't move." She wanted almost nothing more than to bolt from the park, but she had come this far; she had to stay now. He stopped before her, staring. His intense brown eyes burned into hers until she lowered them, but he forced her face up roughly. "Look at me." She did, depsite the fear rising within her. "What is it that you expect from me?"

"I don't know!" she cried, frightened and confused.

"Then why do you come here every night?" Beneath the anger on his face she could see a tinge of pain and was touched through her fear, wishing she could free him from whatever demons these were that tormented him. His hand under her chin burnt her skin but she found now that she couldn't move when she tried. She was paralyzed and he had all control.

"I don't know," she whispered through her tears.

He stared into her eyes, searching, and dropped his hand. "You really don't know, do you?" he said angrily, sadly, turning away. "You're playing in a world you know nothing about. How did you get here?"

"I don't understand what you mean," she stammered. He looked at her expressionlessly, and she felt she had to continue to speak, to fill the terrible, throbbing silence. "I was walking in the park and I saw you, and you took me in your arms...I thought it was a dream." She heard her voice echoing, high-pitched, almost shrieking, and wondered if she was crazy after all. "But then I say you again and chased you, and you always disappeared. You always disappeared!" She began to laugh, unable to quell the hysteria rising within her. "That's why I'm here! That's what I'm here for! Are you blind?" She stopped, and the sudden silence overwhelmed her, the word "blind" echoing in the night.

He shook his head and broke the silence thundering in her ears. "Blind? No. I'm not the one who is blind." He turned his face to the moonlight and walked to his tree, patting it lovingly. Abruptly he turend back to her. "You've dug your own grave. You should leave. Now."

"But I can't move!" she protested, and nor did she want to. She wanted to stay near him, drinking in the beauty of his presence. She wanted to free him from his troubles, to understand him, to feel what he felt.

"Is that really what you want?" he murmured, so softly she wasn't sure at all he had said it, and how could he read her mind like that? He didn't wait for an answer, but stepped back and said, "Then its too late."

She had a sudden sickeing feeling of the humanity being ripped from the core of her very being. Then a thick pain wrenched through her stomach andn she felt her legs join together, bonding as one. She sank into the ground and felt limbs growing, spreading, drinking in the soil as growths burst through her skin, spreading, blossoming, blooming upward, and the word "tree" raced through her mind as the transition completed itself.

Silence fell heavily again on the park. He smiled, but there was still a sadness in his eyes as he walked to this newest tree and leaned against it. The moonlight shifted to illuminate this tree, his tree, and he stood intense, erect, watching, waiting.

5/21/91

Untitled bit o' prose...

Safely encased in her car, she lets the world outside pass her by. City scenes whiz past on both sides. A flash of blonde hair, big smile, colorful tattoo advertising pale flesh, and the mini-van in front of her pulls over. She watches in her rear-view mirror as he makes a u-turn and disappears, in search of unnamed pleasures. An abandoned business juts from the earth on her right. She watches a huge man walk his German Shepard through the overgrown, dandelion-peppered grass until the light changes.

Highway now, el tracks flanking her left side. The Sears Tower looms ahead like a steel beacon, but before she reaches it she veers off, looping around to the next highway. The Greyhound bus station leaps out as she passes, reaching deeply to penetrate the inner recesses of her brain, those places where she stores that which she would rather not recall. Dimly she dismisses it, but still she feels a scrabbling in her chest, like some small trapped animal desperately seeking a way out.

Town Hall Pub

As he listened to the sounds of yelling coming from the hallway, Caleb found himself lonely and depressed. Everything in his life was falling apart. He could sense Nina slipping away from him. The night he had decided to move here everything had seemed so clear. His friend Doug’s girlfriend Nan had given him a tarot reading, and the cards said it was a good time for a change. They also said a relationship would be favorable. He knew it was a sign that their friend Nina was the woman for him, and he couldn’t lose her because he lived so far away. Doug wanted him to move in and change his lifestyle, get his shit together, and he agreed a change would probably do him good. He certainly wasn’t doing anything in Indiana, living off his girlfriend, in a loveless relationship based on convenience. He wasn’t even painting anymore. So he left the girl, threw his few possessions into his Honda Civic, and drove the three and a half hours to Chicago and Nina. 

 But now he was homeless, carless, and soon to be Nina-less, the way things were going. Doug and Nan threw him out of their place when he got laid off from his job. Then he got into a car accident, drunkenly driving home after Nina’s work’s Christmas party. The car was totaled. Nina had not been the same with him since her friend Donnie had died, even though he had done everything possible to comfort her. He even let her hang out with her ex-boyfriend Gus, whom he suspected wanted her back. Hell, he even drove Gus downtown to get his methadone the day they found out Donnie died. He felt unappreciated and taken advantage of, but if he complained to Nina, she would tell him to just break up with her then. That was the last thing he wanted. Nina would get mad when he spent the money his parents sent him occasionally on alcohol, but he had to drink sometimes. Otherwise he didn’t think he could make it through a day. Doug’s anger at him hurt him more than he would admit. He had done nothing wrong. He hadn’t quit his job, or gotten fired. They just had too many people. Nan and Doug didn’t even give him a chance to get another one, and he knew it wasn’t the job that led to his eviction. It was because Nan hated him. He didn’t know why. Maybe she was jealous, afraid he would take either Nina or Doug away from her. Or both. Sometimes he wondered if she had cursed him. She was a witch, after all, doing those tarot readings and stuff. Maybe that’s where the run of bad luck had come from. 

 He used the money his parents sent him to move into the Abbott, a transient hotel in Chicago’s gay neighborhood. The hotel was full of sex workers, drug addicts, and roaches. Sometimes he would lie in the pull-out bed and flick the lights on to watch the cockroaches scatter across the ceiling. He slept with the blankets pulled over his head so they wouldn't fall on him while he slept. Nina wouldn’t even visit him there. Her best friend Greg would, however, and they laughed about the situation all the time. But when Greg wasn’t around it didn’t seem so funny anymore. So here he was, in his decrepit hotel room, alone with the roaches. Greg was still sleeping, and his roommates wouldn’t wake him up. They didn’t like Caleb either. Nina was in school, and then she had rehearsal, and then she would probably give some other excuse for not being able to see him. Her distance was killing him.  He cried to her friend Jennifer about it one night, and Jennifer promised she’d talk to her about it. She also gave him some cocaine. So what that he hadn’t done hard drugs since he moved to Chicago. That obviously wasn’t doing him any good. He thought that Jennifer would have slept with him if he had tried, but he wouldn’t go that far. She made him swear that he wouldn’t tell Nina she gave him coke. That was a promise that was easy to make—Nina would kill them both. 

 Listening to the fight in the hallway, suddenly he couldn’t stand sitting in his roach-infested room anymore. He decided to go for a walk. The streets were bustling and busy. The neighborhood was so strange. People paid a ton of money to live there, and yet there were sleazy hotels and down-and-out denizens everywhere. There was an average of three to five bars on any given block—on the busy streets, that is. But the ones that weren't gay bars were expensive. Hell, the gay bars were too. Once or twice he considered letting some guy hit on him and buy him drinks, but he didn't have the heart to let them down.  

He turned onto a busy street he had never walked on before. Several blocks down he came to an interesting looking bar. The old-fashioned, wooden sign on the front said “Town-Hall Pub.” He liked the sound of it. It looked dark and divey inside: another plus. No rainbows in the window, so it might even be a straight bar. He had no money, but he decided to go in and check it out. As he walked in he noticed a counter on his right. A man with a white beard who looked uncannily like Jerry Garcia was playing chess with another middle-aged man with long brown stringy hair. They looked up as he entered. 

 “Afternoon,” the Jerry look-alike said. 

 “Hi,” Caleb said. 

 “Pull up a chair,” the brown haired man invited. 

 Caleb peered into the darkness behind them. They appeared to be the only ones there. “I can’t stay,” he said. “I don’t have any money. I just came in because I liked the sign.” 

 “That’s a good enough reason,” the white-haired man said. “Name’s Tom. This is Henry.”

 “Caleb.” 

 “Go ahead and pull up a chair, Caleb, this one’s on me.” 

 Caleb did so. Henry put a beer down in front of him. “Made this myself,” he told him. “What do you think?” 

 Caleb drank, considered. “It’s pretty good for homebrew,” he answered honestly. 

 “Good answer, my friend,” Tom laughed. “Where you from? You don’t strike me as a Chicago boy.” 

 “Indiana.” 

 “Not too far from home.” 

 Caleb almost laughed. “Feels pretty far to me sometimes,” he said. 

 “I’m from Oregon, myself. Henry here hails from California.” He pronounced it Ca-lee-forn-eye-ay. “Now we’re a long way from home.” 

 “Do you miss the West Coast?” 

 “Sometimes,” Tom replied. “But I love this town. There’s some good folks out here, for a big city. Chicago’s all right.” 

 “What brings you here?” Henry put in. 

 “A girl,” Caleb answered. “And the lure of opportunity.” 

 “Familiar story,” Henry nodded. 

 “How’s the girl?” Tom asked. 

 “Not so good, lately,” Caleb said. “I think she’d rather I go back to Indiana.”

 “Tough luck,” Tom said. “And the opportunity?”

 Caleb shook his head. “That’s not so great either. In less than two months I’ve lost my job, my place to stay, and my car. And I’m about to lose my girlfriend.” 

 Tom looked at him a minute, then turned to Henry. 

 “Give him a shot. Anything he wants. And give us each one of the same.” 

 “You’re the boss,” Henry said. “What are you shooting?” he asked Caleb. 

 “Jack Daniels,” Caleb replied. 

 “Sounds good,” Tom said. “You play chess, Caleb?”

 “Not in a while, but I used to be pretty good.” 

 “Well, you can’t be any worse than Henry here. When I’m through beating the piss out of him, maybe we can play a game.” Henry laughed and shook his head. 

 Caleb nodded and smiled. He pulled his chair closer and peered at the game. Henry put the shot in front of him and held one up himself. “Cheers!” 

“Cheers,” Caleb repeated, throwing back the shot. These guys were all right. Things were looking up, at least for a little while. 

 1997

Juliet

Juliet sat on the cold bathroom floor, a razor blade in her right hand. Moments ago she had been sitting in her backyard with friends, a beer between her legs, watching the sky make way for the sunrise. The idea of killing herself had slipped easily into her mind with the oncoming day; she had bid her friends goodnight, gone upstairs, and broke a razor blade out of one of her father’s disposable razors. Now she sat cross-legged on the floor, cheerfully daring herself to use it. Her mood was one of cynical good humor, but her moods wavered these days, and sometimes bled together in runny streams.

(Benvolio was sitting on the front porch when Juliet and her father came out of the house. “What’s going on?” he asked. He had heard the screaming, figured Juliet’s parents were angered by her drunkenness. Her father walked past without a word to him. “Come on!” he roared. Juliet turned to Benvolio, smiling sickly, her left arm wrapped in a towel. “We’re going to the hospital,” she said. Benvolio jumped up: “Oh my fucking God!” The towel was soaked with blood.)

Things had been different when Romeo was around, but Romeo had been dead almost five months. Since his death Juliet’s life had been a whirlwind nightmare. She was never sure of how much of all that was happening around her was real. She found she didn’t care much anyway. Romeo had tried to slit his wrists too, she guessed. She had a letter from him written on the back of a blood-stained Dali poster. Obviously he didn’t do a very good job; he had lived for three more weeks before his roommate found him dangling over the stairs. She had never even seen a scar. The trick, she decided, was to close your eyes, plunge the blade in and pull down. She closed her eyes.

(At the hospital she got sick of explaining herself. “How did this happen?”/ “I cut myself.”/ “Why did you do this?”/ “My boyfriend killed himself in April.” Finally the doctor came in. “What happened?” he asked. “I fell down the stairs,” she smiled pleasantly. The doctor turned and left, calling for X-Ray. Her father had to chase after him to tell him the truth.)

She opened her eyes. Nothing! Puzzlement dissolved to laughter as she realized she had used the wrong side of the blade. Figures, she thought, shaking her head.

(Later, a nurse told her parents that she “wasn’t grounded in reality”. “She thinks her dead boyfriend told her to commit suicide,” she said. “She needs help.” Juliet disagreed. She wasn’t killing herself because Romeo had told her to. She was killing herself because he didn’t.)

She tried it out on the back of her arm, just to be sure. Bingo, she thought, as blood welled to the surface. “You didn’t think I’d do it, did you?” she whispered wildly. “Well watch this, Romeo.” She turned her arm over. She closed her eyes. Blood dripped onto her jeans.

(“I really have to go home soon,” Juliet said wearily. Her parents stood on one side of the hospital bed, Benvolio on the other side. “I have to work tonight.” The anesthetic in her arm made her feel tingly and throbbing. It was almost eleven in the morning, her head ached, and all she wanted to do was sleep. The doctor had given her nine stitches inside and eighteen outside—twenty seven in all. Blood seeped through the spaces between them. The room seemed to swell with silence. “What?” Juliet asked, looking around suspiciously. “You can’t leave,” the nurse said. “What?” Juliet repeated. “You won’t be going to work for a while,” her father said gently. She stared at them, realization dawning. “No,” she said, jumping out of the bed. “No! You can’t lock me up someplace! I’m a fucking grownup!” Benvolio reached out for her, and she lashed out, backing into the corner of the room, still screaming. “You can’t do this to me! Don’t you understand? I’m an adult now! I’m an honor student!” No one else moved. The room was silent but for her screams.)

When she opened her eyes her first thought was that it hadn’t worked again; impatiently she lifted the razor. Then the blood began to pour. She leapt up, startled. “Oh my god,” she said out loud. She looked around wildly, feeling as if she had just awakened from a dream. “Oh my god, Juliet, I think you just fucked up,” she told herself, arm positioned over the sink. She grabbed a towel and wrapped her arm in it, trying to think straight. “Benvolio!” she decided. “I’ll go ask Benvolio what to do!” She opened the bathroom door.

(They made her take an ambulance to the psychiatric ward. “Do I have to lie on the stretcher?” she asked. “Sorry love, it’s th’ rules,” one of the men replied. He was big and bald, yet gentle and soothing. He spoke with a heavy Scottish accent. “What made ya do this?” She lay back, resigned, muttering sleepily: “My boyfriend killed himself in April.” The next thing she knew, she was being wheeled through a new building. “This thing is so comfortable,” she whispered, struggling into wakefulness. The Scottish man laughed heartily. “Ya must be tired then, miss, ‘cause you’re th’ first I’ve heard say that before!”)

“Juliet, is that you?” her mother called sleepily. “What’s going on?” Juliet stopped outside the door. “Mom? I think I just fucked up. I-I think I just-cut my wrists.” She paused awkwardly as her mother leapt out of bed, adding hastily, “But I’ve changed my mind!”

(She cried so bitterly over the strip search that the nurse allowed her to put a robe on before taking her clothes off. But when she demanded her jewelry, Juliet refused to submit her nose ring. The nurse left and returned with a man. “I’m sorry,” he said amiably, “but its hospital policy. No one can wear jewelry in the intensive unit.” “Well,” she replied calmly, “we’ll just have to come to some sort of compromise.” The man approached her. “Here’s the compromise,” he said. “Either you give us the earring or we’ll hold you down and take it.” Some compromise, Juliet thought as she handed it over.)

Her mother took one look at the blood in the bathroom, staggered back to her bedroom and passed out. “Let me see,” her father said calmly. Juliet dizzily peeled back the towel. “Get your shoes on,” he said abruptly. “We’re going to the hospital.”

(Her mother and Benvolio showed up a short while later. “I brought you some clothes,” her mother said. “How you doing?” asked Benvolio. The both looked tired and scared, as tired and scared as Juliet felt. “Exhausted,” she said. “Yeah,” he agreed, “you’ve had a rough night.” They kissed her and left, and she collapsed on the bed, tears seeping through her closed eyes as the blood seeped around her stitches and stuck to the white bandage around her arm.)

The world started slipping to black. Juliet grasped at the banister and missed, falling to her knees at the top of the stairs. “So this is it,” she thought. “I’m really going to die.” Her father’s voice burst through the ringing in her ears: “Juliet, get the fuck up now!” and she thought, “I can’t die. My father won’t let me die.” Her skin tingled hot and cold as she struggled for consciousness. Romeo dangled behind her somewhere in the nightmare world she had come to inhabit. The Dali poster lay crumpled on the floor.

(Her arm lay on the bed before her, awkward and bandaged. As she drifted off, she felt Romeo touch her outstretched hand. “Romeo,” she thought sleepily, “look at what I’ve become. Did you ever think I’d come to this?” The tears slipped hot down her cheek onto the bed. He squeezed her hand tight and watched her as she slipped into unbroken sleep.)

1996