Free The Art of Self-Destruction by Douglas Shoback Page B

the
tube constricts, energy dispersed into the mattress, and flings it
across the room. It lands in a patch of sunlight, the whiteness of
the cotton refracting the light and glowing brighter.
    Matthew rubs his foot for a second and then
returns his gaze to her. She sits up from her prone position and
smiles warmly at him, "All better?"
    She hears floorboards creak underneath the
carpet as he shifts the minute pressure of his foot, balancing on
one leg while crossing the other in mid-air, supporting and
massaging it with his rough hand. She giggles-the airy and lilting
giggle of a small girl; the sound of fetish, of idealization.
    "You can put your foot down you know. The
carpet won't hurt you." She flutters her eyelashes at him, forming
her lips into a half smile-paradoxically lust filled and innocent;
virgin and seductive.
    He sets his foot down, the many carpet fibers
crushing against aged and warped floor boards. Fiber grinding
against fiber, music for the dust mites.
    "It's cold" Matthew says, looking down at his
foot, wrinkling his toes in the faded fibers of the carpet.
    "Doesn't matter though, right?" she says,
leaning backwards onto her elbows. Her breasts thrust forward,
accented by the maroon silk robe, images of flesh pouring from the
opening slit.
    He shakes his head and then leans over her.
She is fully aware of his eyes drifting across her body, hovering
at the exposed flesh and immense rise in the fabric.
"Something's...not quite right," Matthew mutters.
    "Have you ever done this before?" she says,
lifting her leg from the floor and slowly caressing his bare foot
with her toes.
    He moves his foot back, avoiding her probing
toes, "Yes, once. But it was different, not like this. You?"
    "Too many times to count," she says, waving
off the question.
    "Well, then I'm not sure you want me, being
all inexperienced and all. Don't know how good I am." His voice
cracks at the end of the sentence, an ancient adolescent curse
reemerging at the least constructive moment.
    She giggles again, shaking her head
simultaneously with the sound. Her dark hair drifts slowly in the
stagnant air, settling gently back onto her shoulders. Her robe has
opened further, exposing the inside curves of her breasts and she
wonders if this is causing his nervousness.
    Ancient pillows stained yellow with sweat and
spit are strewn haphazardly on the flowered comforter. Various
unidentifiable liquids have stained the bed's linen into a
decomposing rainbow: red, yellow, brown, green. The mattress sags
underneath her weight.
    A small window lets in a cold light filtered
through greasy yellow glass. Shabby purple curtains hang askew over
the window attempting to add warmth to the room. They succeed in
adding to the desperation permeating the place. She stares at the
curtains, fixing them in her head, making the room more pleasant.
"It stinks in here" she says, frowning.
    A ceiling fan creaks above her, shifting the
dust and air, scattering it to all corners of the room in an
entropic fit. There is no breeze, only the slight movement of air,
of smell. The cold light from the window puddles on the floor, an
oblique rectangle of bright green carpet fibers lighting the entire
room, washing it in rust; a rip in the stasis of things, something
dynamic, malleable, moving, chaotic. And the sock, his sock, in the
middle of the pooling light, brown and ripped at the toe, full of
his sweat and energy, moments of his life. It looks alone and sad.
She can almost smell it cooking in the light, sour and earthy. A
real smell.
    His shoe, on the other hand, is non-existent,
disappearing into the shadows, masked in corrosion.
    He hovers over her, his eyes wide. Dark
tussled hair hangs over the tips of his tiny ears, bangs touching
eyebrows; a spire sticks up from the back of his head, reaching to
the sky as if to receive radio signals.
    His clothes drift loosely off of his thin
body. A once colorful shirt is now faded by bleach, grayness taking
over the blue. His