Newsgroups: alt.prose
Subject: 4th Street and Main Dreamscape
From: sralsto@eis.calstate.edu (Scott)
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 01:15:24 GMT
Organization: Calif State Univ/Electronic Information Services
Note: This piece is fictional.

-=-
                 4th Street and Main Dreamscape

     The woe originated in my foundation.  It was there that my
technicolor nightmare began.  It was destined to occur, so I made
no effort to change it.  The events were already bronzed into the
fabric of time--so in some perverted way, this chain of events
was meant to unfold.  I wonder who deemed it so.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     The path twisted out ahead toward its destination.  I
noticed it was bordered by subservient grass.  Pretty and nice,
this grass was meant to be.  My feet paced their cumbersome way
along the path steadily--for I had an appointment.  Sweat dripped
methodically from my forehead, rinsing the sockets in my skull. 
And it burned, so I tried to wipe it away.  But it came back,
because at that moment my eyes were meant to sting.

     The trail finally reached its destination, a small glade of
trees.  It looked out of place, just as I felt, so it made me
happy.  I sighed a little at my revelation--there are some fringe
benefits involved in insanity.  Knowing that an appointment was
willed to occur, I looked at the trees expectantly.  Who would
this grim stranger be?  An infusion of fetish was ready to take
place.

     I soon realized a figure crouched in the shadows.  Sunken in
the shade of the grove she rose to attention.  I think she felt
my exposed innocence; I think she knew everything about me in
that unkind second that her eyes met mine.

     It was a nice feeling, when infinity stopped.  It made me
feel warm and fluid, dense like mercury, smooth like magma. 
Infinity stopped when her eyes touched mine.  How could this
vulpine beauty bear the arrow destined for my Achilles heel?  It
all seemed so unlikely, so I constructed a crystalline bridge of
faith to divert my fears.  Consoled by my blanket of naivete, I
clutched concepts close, and dreamt of her electric touch
accented by her gaze of blithe perfection.  She saw my dreams
manifest, and she smiled benevolently, fascinated by my
imagination.  She grinned as she saw me take her as an
abstraction and then readily weave her into the fiber of my
being.  That was my first mistake--I let her in.  And the ground
became a conductor, imbedding a beautiful tumor in my foot.  And
so it is that I say the woe originated in my foundation.  It
would work its way up.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     I feel cold.  Purged of thought, of all that was dear to me. 
While once my iniquity soothed me, it now amounts to nothing. 
Fantasy is no longer my mentor--it has since passed me by,
leaving me alone.  What can I cling to now that she has been
lost?  She was lost from the start, yet I entrusted in disbelief. 
I thought that I could trap a small shard of perfection, but it
slithered through my hands and escaped before I had chance to
disapprove.

     I loved my disease; I diseased my love.  Infected by false
beliefs and misguided attentions it convulsed its way slowly to
death.  Watching my love die I went into denial, something that I
learned about in Life Education in the seventh grade.  It is
because of that I am now able to identify it instead of continue
denying it.  Seventh grade meant nothing else to me.  Eighth
grade taught me that.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     "Our contestant is losing his mind!" screams the host with
zeal.  This is what he lives for.  The audience replies with
obvious approval--this is what they live for.  A tapioca-walled
room houses a slew of observers, gazing upon a two stair high
stage upon which a game-show host waltzes his dance of deception. 
"I love it when we receive contestants like this, and I'm sure
our observers at home do too."  One sane person in the audience
notes that the host sounds like he has been drinking Crisco oil
and butterflies.  His words float through the microphone and rain
upon the observers as they sit zanily.  How can people sit
zanily?  Watch a game-show of this category and you too will
understand.  The sane observer finally reaches her apex of
dissatisfaction and decides to leave.  The game-show host
pretends not to notice the iconoclast, thinking "Its her loss;
what we do here is to provide high-quality, low-budget
entertainment to a dormant nation!  And this nation rebukes our
embrace.  How could they?"
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     The above figure is a line of dashes.  When you see it, you
will make due note that the perspective of this writing has
changed.  This has been a community service announcement, paid
for by the likes of Ronald Reagan and George Bush.  Be my
valentine.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     My hand is quivering as I think upon the syllables of her
lovely name.  The tumor has reached my hands.  It doesn't have
much farther to go before it reaches my brain and corrodes my
consciousness.  I feel like I'm in a bad alien movie and when
this tumor indeed reaches my head that an alien will pop out.

     My legs and arms, my abdomen and thighs, the inner-workings
of my body are no longer under my control.  They are hers.  She
contorts them, she twists them, she uses them to her advantage. 
I'm her puppet.
               How long does time last?  When will I not be hers?
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     "Ta-da!" drums roll.  "He doesn't understand time" gurgles
the bobbing host.  He then becomes solemn, like a wolf in
mourning, crooning "Time is our friend, folks.  We must accept it
for what it is--omnipotent and all-encumbering--alleluia!"  The
crowd barks their approval.  The host looks especially oily as he
grins out at the audience, rubbing his ornate knuckles upon the
folds of his lavender suit.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     Small children plague the elementary school playground.  I
don't pay them any attention.  All of my attention is strewn
about her.  Although my little sister would be destined to play
with Strawberry Shortcake dolls, my favorite outfit that she
would wear is her Strawberry Shortcake dress.  It has a white
apron-like appendage in the front, complete with a strawberry
pink belt.  She wears navy blue shoes accented by frilled socks. 
I wonder what this longing is that I'm experiencing; where did it
come from?  I'm too young to understand.  How is it that upon
starting my life I am already a prisoner?  Maybe she knows. 
Somehow I know that I'll forever struggle to escape it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Futility.  I should have known.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     Her speech is an acidic cloud, hovering above my head.  I
didn't know that she could be evil--I learned very quickly.  She
is anchored to me as I sit convulsing.  But she doesn't realize
my suffering, and if she did realize, I'm not sure that she would
care.  Anchored to her iniquity, I'm bathed, and finally crushed. 
I never thought that something so beautiful could have pulled me
down.  Lovely to the sight, yet her touch is poison.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     "Poor baby.  Do you feel sorry for him folks?"  Canned
laughter is the only reply.  "Ahhh!  Yes!  My thoughts exactly! 
What a beautiful comedy of errors!"  Violent nodding from the
crowd, their lethargic bodies framing plasticine eyes.  The
host's complexion then becomes sly as he coils up a little and
says "This is what happens when we attempt to really understand a
person.  This is what happens when we pursue love, a concept
which can never be realized.  Myself, I don't need love.  I have
other things, things more solid, things more dependable."  The
crowd synthesizes this as an insane home-viewer thinks in reply
"So I'm not the first one to have tried to forget that I'm
human..."
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     Putrid slime flows from her the sides of her mouth, bubbling
and seething.  Her eyes are crusted with flesh and her cheeks are
peeling and moldy.  Yet she bears on her face a look of ignorant
joy, a look that tells me that she doesn't really know what's
happening, but is happy in this realization.  Her look notifies
me that her consciousness is shallow, like a wading pool.  She
has no concept of reality, she has no concept of love.  Lust on
her breath and materialism framing her eyes.  What she really
wants is an executive gallivanting down the free-way in his
expensive car, his hair slick and his smile like plastic.  I
think she wants someone on her same level, born of lust and
imported materials.  But there is some sort of fascination in the
strange, in the new and different.  All she wants is what she
cannot have.  For now, I will do.  But the future holds many new
dolls waiting to enter her collection and wither by her mock
embrace.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     Oh how I dance under her touch.  She has complete control. 
I clog along to her will, a forced smile upon my cheeks.  Inside
I'm melting, but outside everything seems perfect and good. 
Sometimes I try to ignore her commands, though I am not often
successful.  I'll look into space or dodge her glances purposely,
but in the end she succeeds, nudging into control and contorting
my actions at will.  Why can't I tell her she's hurting me?  Why
can't I tell her how this sickens me, or how perverted she has
become in my eyes?  I try to tell her by subtle indications, low
whispers bearing my disenchantment.  But she doesn't heed them,
and continues in her 4th street and Main dreamscape...
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     The host can only smirk at this junction, and doesn't really
have anything witty or condescending to add.  However the smirk
he wears connotes a thousand words, each one soggy and depraving. 
Slithering to the wings of the stage, he leans upon a monitor and
resumes scrutinizing the contestant.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     The time has come to escape her grasp.  I need to start
again, resume festering within myself.  So I push her away,
abandoning my dream and leaving a small part of me impaled upon
her ring-finger.  She has many ornaments on this finger, those of
the many trophies she has won in pursuing her hobby.  Maybe I
should feel good to be named upon this finger, maybe I should
feel that it's alright.  It could make me feel normal... but it
doesn't.  It makes me feel unclean and foolish.  I'm really just
another number.  Nothing more, nothing less--or at least it'd be
a lot easier to think so.

     And with this I walk away, returning to what I once had: my
insanity, my revelation, and my fears.  I'd tried to share them,
maybe dilute them a little in what I thought were kind and
understanding eyes, but instead they were multiplied.  I'm sorry
if she misses me.  I think I'll miss her, but not her
specifically, more the concept of having a female companion.  The
concept that I could possibly have someone to fall upon, and also
have someone who I could hold on to.

          Goodbye to you my angel
          Though you've since become deluded
          Goodbye to you my angel
          And all your fleeting enchantment
                                
          The spell you bore was potent
          For it shook me to the core
          It maligned me and fractured me
          I surrender to your roar

          For what I thought was purity
          Has become a withered tree
          For what I thought was hope
          Has imploded inside of me

          I'll leave you to your world
          Your world of molded clay
          Where people hide from phantom truth
          Where dreams are turned away
          Land of sickness and depravity
          The doleful arrow that you bore
          
          4th street and Main dreamscape
          Don't feel sorry for what you've done
          For I could never wish to hurt you
          Though I hope you'll be outdone
------------------------------+----------------------------------
-----------------------------+++---------------------------------
------------------------------+----------------------------------
     The sane being who was once in the studio returns, a grim
look of determination on her face.  The host is mumbling
something about the contestant's performance being so dismal as
to not even merit a parting gift.  "What ever happened to the
good old days when we'd have a contestant who wasn't so critical? 
One who was easily deceived and lured to our viewing pleasure.."
he sighs, "it isn't like it used to be.  He escaped relatively
unscathed..."  He then becomes rigid and keels over.  A small
stream of blood flows from the side of his mouth as he stares out
at the audience in ultimate disbelief.

     Holstering her revolver, the sane woman turns around and
strides toward a door marked "EXIT" in glowing crimson.  The door
swings shut behind her gracefully on well-oiled hinges.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
     They buried the host on Golgotha.  The funeral was
televised, and subsequently received very good ratings.  The
producers were experiencing a mixed euphoria, for they could not
decide whether this event was good or bad for them and their bank
accounts.  The host was made up very nicely by the morticians,
his smirk was very life-like and the bullet hole was plastered
over.  He wore a magenta suit to his grave, illuminated until the
last few seconds by the reflection of a diamond imbedded in his
front tooth.

-=-
Thank you for reading this.  Comments greatly appreciated :)