Free Technicolor Pulp by Arty Nelson Page B

either… Ringing… Raging…
     Burning… Hissing… The birds and my nightmares marry… On an altar of my hate… Ill-fated gifts awarded on lechery… Fucking birds…
     And death… Virus… And AIDS. Words ring off Lindsey’s lips in memory as she wonders. Where are the pirates and princesses of
     my sillybaby dreams? All the places and all the wondering? Am I growing up or am I dying? Were the birds a message singular, taken
     the form of many? A rush creeps over my body, pulling at my cock and grinding my face into a mass of blood and shredded flesh…
     Seeping… They want me… I’ve done the walking and then want to fly me the rest of the way… Hissing and… Dying….
    Christian comes back into the room, irritated.
    “Look… I don’t think she’s coming back… And I gotta leave. So can you guys just take off?”
    I don’t even so much as look at Louis or Donald.
    “Yeah, good to meet you. I gotta go anyways,” and stumble out the door. “See you guys later; thanks for the pints.”
    I run through the square, lost for about twenty minutes until I find a tube station and jump on a train back to Southfields
     where the Helms’ flat is. Sweating and chilled on the train, feeling good as long as I’m moving. Still hearing the birds,
     hoping they’re only a memory. Not wanting to face anything those fucking birds brought out in me. Just riding the train. Just
     riding a train through London….

PUIP 24
    I’m sitting in the flat, drinking a cup of Drano-strength tea, looking at Sonja and Loren while they play more cards. I stare
     at their beautiful faces, faces from other ends of the world. Faces of women. Deep in my most primal recesses I need them,
     and yet, I act as if I could care less. It’s my only and weak defense. As if I need a defense, as if they wait for me to like
     them. Needing the sex, the violence of the act, remembering mostly the beauty. Orgasms abrupt, a shower of lava, soothing,
     draining rage and frustration. Looking for her to cleanse me. I need to come. It isn’t about wanting. I’ve never had a fucking
     choice in my life. It’s got nothing to do with me. It’s him. It’s fucking him that isn’t satisfied! Lindsey doesn’t understand.
     It’s not always about candles and fucking
Bolero.
Scream comes from the hollow, echoing out, lost and crying. I need them.
    I listen to the girls talking. Voices delicate, laughter. The way they smoke makes vice an art. Soft between the lips, dangling,
     then out between thin strong sexy fingers. Fingers that control. I can watch a woman smoke for an hour. I’ve done it sittingin Washington Square Park with a dollar in my pocket. My last dollar. Listening to the comics and the musicians, deciding
     who gets the last buck. Who’s the greatest artist on New York’s streets that day. Watching the girls smoke with gloves on,
     with hats on. Little berets… Watching… Staring through sunglasses… Watching secretly… Watching Loren with her pearly smile.
    “So what are you going to do after you take your little holiday?”
    “That’s a good question, Loren, maybe you could give me an equally good answer as well.”
    “I’m serious… I mean I don’t… I’m not prying, I mean to say. I was just wondering.”
    “I know… Um… I don’t know really. After school, I bounced around the States working shitty jobs and basically, I decided that
     I was tired of working shitty jobs in the States, so I came here.”
    “That’s what we’ve been doing here for three years. I wish I could give you my job,” Sonja adds.
    “Yeah, I met Sonja three years ago and we were only going to be here for a summer,” laughs, “I’m finally leaving, in a month,”
     laughs, “a five-month safari through Africa. It’s taken forever to get out of this place.”
    “I don’t think I’ve been in a place or a job that I didn’t eventually hate… And for all the same reasons I hated the job just
     before it. Routine’s just a long spelling