The House on Ash Tree Lane

Fiction - Prologue

2012-02-13T13:22:00.003-05:00

“‘Andthis also,’ said Marlow suddenly, ‘has been one of the dark places of theearth’.”

—JosephConrad, Heart of Darkness

Dad clambersinto the boat with the grace of a roller skating giraffe. Clutching the tacklebox in one hand and lugging our rods in the other, he’s able to muster upenough balance to keep him from toppling right over the other side and into thelake. Me reaching out and grabbing the edge of his lifejacket probably helps aswell.

“Whoa geez,” hemutters. It takes him a second or ten to regain his equilibrium, the now sharprocking of the boat from side to side not aiding the process in the slightest.Arms spread, he shuts his eyes, takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly. By thetime he’s fully exhaled the boat’s perilous oscillations have been reduced to aslight lateral bob. His eyelids flick open and the corner of his mouth turnsupward, removing a few lines (and a few years) from his face. “Thanks, hon,” hesays.

“You shouldn’tcarry too much at once,” I scold him lightly.

Lowering himselfonto his haunches, using his posterior to locate the boat’s cold, metal rearbench, he wheezes, “Yeah, well, you weren’t any help.”

“Hey, I hadthis,” I say, chipper, holding up the backpack containing the day’s sustenance:four mortadella sandwiches, a handful of granola bars, a couple of bottles ofbeer for me and a two litre bottle of Coke for Dad.

“Neat thingabout backpacks: you can wear them on your back. Just imagine what you can do with not one but two free hands,” he chides.

“Oh hush, wemade it into the boat, didn’t we?” I set the backpack down between the tacklebox and the bailing bucket and turn toward the river. The sun, just barely overthe horizon, has turned the surface of the water an incomparable shade ofreddish gold. The splashing of our little boat against the dock has hardlydisturbed the vast stillness encompassing the river’s surface.

“True. Now letus hope I can actually get us away from the shore.” He braces one foot againstthe stern and begins pulling on the starter rope.

I eye hisattempt warily. “You do know how to work one of these, right?” I inquire.

“Oh God, I hopeso,” he says through gritted teeth. But the motor churns to life on the sixthyank, the suddenness of the ignition enough to make Dad jump.

“Easy now,” Isnicker.

“Ha ha.” Hestraightens up, grabs the tiller and revs it quickly with a twist of his hand,churning the water at stern. “Now we’re talking.”

“Hey Dad?”

“Yessum,” heanswers inattentively, too focused on the intricacies of the outboard.

“Maybe we shoulduntie the boat, first.” I nod toward the two ropes still lashing us to thedock. Dad doesn’t look up, but slowly takes his hand off the tiller and reachesfor the rope closest to him. “Be a dear and get the other one, would you.”

A minute laterand we’re puttering away from shore, Dad revving the motor with an almostchildish glee. I wonder if it’s possible to get noise complaints this farnorth, especially at this hour. Then again, cottage country residents tend tobe early risers.

Yesterday, whenour car crested the hill overlooking the campground, I thought the river below wasa lake at first: the distance from the dock to the forested wilderness on theother side is three or four times the width of any of the rivers I grew up withindriving distance of. Mom says the cottage area is located along a bay, whichexplains it a little, but it’s still almost too much to behold. It takes a fullminute for our boat to reach the middle of the waterway before Dad takes iteast—there’s better fishing near the rapids to the west but he says he’s notcomfortable enough with the boat to risk running us aground or smashing intothe rocks. Always the optimist, Dad.

As we round oneof the river’s wide, almost imperceptible bends, his arm shoots up. He’spointing at a sixty foot cliff jutting out over the water. “When we were in ourmid-twenties, your mom and I went diving from that spot.”

“You’rekidding,” I gasp. He has to be. The man gets nervous stepping onto a descendingescalator. No way anyone, my mother included, could get him up on that bluff,let alone make him leap from it.

“I might havebeen more than a little inebriated at the time, mind you,” he elaborates. That’s fair. “I would have had to have been. She didn’t say how shallow thebottom was, or how rocky.”

“So what, didyou and Mom leap hand-in-hand, like lovers committing suicide?” I prod,chuckling.

“Hey, you laugh,but that probably isn’t too far from the truth.” He guns the boat, taking usnear a round, rocky island near the more heavily forested side of the river.It’s decorated by a few poorly irrigated trees, their trunks bleached whitefrom constant exposure to the sun and not much else. “And later that evening,we swam out there and built a bonfire.”

“On that tinyisland? What’d you use?”

“Driftwood.Ridiculously dry, so it goes up like a rocket when you take a match to it.” Hepoints the tiller at the other side of the boat, veering us away from theisland, this part of his story done. “You need a fire out here at night. Nolight pollution, so it’s dark as Hell.”

I twist aroundon my seat to face him. “You ‘more than a little inebriated’ for that as well?”I tease.

He peers slylyover his glasses. “Hey, you let me have my indiscretions, missy, and I’ll letyou have yours.”

“Yeah, right.”

“No, I’m serious,”he amends, gunning the motor. The river is narrower up head though it’s stillthe width of a small lake. “And, I won’t lie, it’s part of the reason I tookyou out fishing today.”

Consider myeyebrow cocked. “Wait, really? We’re notjust here to fish?”

“I’m not goingto lie about that, either: we’re probably not going to catch anything. I’mterrible at fishing, and I don’t think you’ve ever done it, so we might as wellmake the best of our time.” With his free hand he unzips the backpack andretrieves a s’more granola bar. He eyes the wrapped snack for a second beforehanding it off to me. “Open this for me, will you? I can’t one-hand it.”

Dutifully, I ripopen the wrapping, break off a half-inch of gooey granola, marshmallow andchocolate, and give the rest to him. He bites into the bar, shakes his head,and mutters “Cheapskate” through a half-chewed mouthful. I respond by poppingthe snack tax into my mouth.

When themorsel’s well down my oesophagus I go on: “So is this some kind of seriousdiscussion we’re having? Are you ‘rapping’ with me?”

“In a sense. You might consider it The Talk.”

“Oh, ew. Nothanks.”

Quickly, heclarifies, “Well, maybe that was a poor choice of term on my part.”

“Seriously?You’re not getting Mom to do this?”

“Out here? Noway, not with her motion sickness. And in any case, it’s my story—one she’sheard in horrifying detail several times before.” He takes another deep breath.“Annie, up until this point I’ve avoided the whole overly-protective fathershtick, partly because I never wanted to alienate you but mostly because I lackthe energy to chase off every boyfriend you’ve had with a hatchet.”

“Like UncleXavier did?”

“That’s between him and the authorities.” He coughs into his fist. “Regardless, thethought of you going off to Ryerson in the fall is enough to make me a littlenervous.”

“Right, you’reworried about me alone in a sea of Ryerson horndogs.”

He holds up afinger, says, “One: oh God that’s a horrible image.” Another finger. “Two:horndogs, really? Do people still use that word?”

“Hey, you tellme language is cyclical how many times a year?”

“Very true, butwe digress.” He takes us closer to the southern shore. Another cottage area haspopped into view along that side, dotted with cabins so extravagant only therich could afford to rent them. “I won’t wax moral or alarmist, or anythinglike that, but if you take anything away to school this September, it should bethe admittedly very strange story I’m about to tell you.” When we’re nearlypast the rich-person cottage ground, he lets up on the throttle, slowing theboat to an easy trawl.

“Annie, do youknow what one of the original purposes of a fairy tale was?” he asks.

I pause toconsider. Of all the countless literary conventions and trends he’s breathlesslyexplained to me over the years, this hasn’t been one of them. I shake my head.

“A cautionarytale, meant to scare the crap out of children, keep them from doing anythingunadvisable: ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ teaches us not to stray from the well-litpath, shows us the danger of talking to strangers; ‘The Three Little Pigs’shows us the importance of not half-assing a job. Basic folklore.”

“…and mostfolklore is educational,” I add, remembering one of his many lessons.

He nods. “Well,old folklore, anyway. Modern folklore is primarily for entertainment, but thisis beside the point.” He takes his hand off the tiller, allowing the boat tocoast along the shore. “Today, I’m going to tell you one of those old fairytales, the scary kind. Or the funny kind, depending on your sense of humour,which if it’s anything like mine means you’ll probably get a kick out of it.And while you might come to doubt me over the next couple of hours—for verygood reason, I should add—let it be known that everything I’m about to tell youactually happened. Rather, happened according to the best of my memory.”

I stretch mylegs, find a more comfortable sitting position, and nod. “Well then, go forit.”

“Right then.” Heclears his throat. “Have I ever told you about my friend Richard?”

Review - The Twisted Adventures of Animal Man

2012-02-06T11:35:00.001-05:00

Late lastAugust, I wrote about the impending DC comics reboot, wherein I detailed a fewof my hopes and concerns in the process. A full five months have passed and asof this writing a quarter of the “New 52” series have put out six issueseach—the typical length for a completed storyarc, or at least enough to gleamwhere each series will be headed. I confess I haven’t read much of the newmaterial, with most of what I know being cribbed from ComicsAlliance reviews orfrom flipping through individual issues at the Silver Snail; this doesn’t makeme a very good critic, but my income doesn’t exactly support my habit, so tospeak.

That being said,I’ve managed to invest—monetarily and intellectually—in two series. One of them, Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo's Batman, is pretty much a given, with the former's tight writing and the latter's fluid art combining to make an incredibly enthralling addition to the Bat-legacy. But as you mightexpect from glancing at this article’s title, I’m not here today to talk aboutBatman. Actually, I’d be surprised if you’ve even heard of the character I’mabout to mention—provided you haven’t talked comics with me over the last fewmonths. It’s not a bird, nor a plane, but the humble Animal Man.

Travel Foreman

Created in 1965by Dave Wood and Carmine Infantino, Animal Man—known to friends and family asBuddy Baker—has effectively been a C-list character for most of his existence,a fact that comes up at least once in nearly every major appearance he’s made.But rather than continually remaining the butt of the joke like Aquaman, AnimalMan has taken his minimal fame in stride, eking out a living as a Hollywoodstuntman and occasional actor while being superheroic on the side, occasionallylending a hand Justice League Europe. When not wearing his costume, he’s openabout his superpowered identity and lives comfortably with his storyboardartist wife Ellen and their two children, Cliff and Maxine.

In his youth,Buddy stumbled across an alien spacecraft—in truth the laboratory of twometaconscious beings, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves—only for it toexplode in his face, incinerating him. The beings, known as the Yellow Aliens,rebuilt Buddy’s physical form from scratch, in the process adding several “morphogeneticgrafts” that allow him to temporarily access the ability of any animal onEarth. In essence, he’s every specific animal-themed superhero rolled into one,being able to fly like a bird, run as fast as a cheetah and ward off enemieswith a dog’s bark simultaneously.

To date, AnimalMan’s biggest outing was in Scottish writer Grant Morrison’s 26 issue run from1988-90, which saw Buddy adopting a vegetarian lifestyle, becoming activelyinvolved in the animal rights movement and even bringing attention to SouthAfrican apartheid. Beneath all this Morrison artfully explored various “meta”storytelling concepts such as retroactive continuity, characters abandoned tothe sands of obscurity and that pesky fourth wall, culminating with Buddy havinga lengthy conversation comic book existence with Morrison in the final issue. It’sheavy, at times confusing stuff, but when viewed as a cohesive whole Morrison’s26 issues constitute one of the best series in the history of the medium andcertainly the most innovative.

Chas Truogg

In 2011, DC waswise enough to push Animal Man to the forefront once again, this time assigningCanadian Jeff Lemire (writer/artist of Vertigo’s Sweet Tooth and the critically acclaimed Essex County) and penciller Travel Foreman to the title. I pickedup the first issue on a whim the day of its release, Foreman’s disturbing coverart (pictured at the top of the article) having caught my eye, and I’ve beenaddicted ever since.

Anyone put offby the complicated details of Animal Man’s back story need not worry. WhileLemire maintains the status quo for continuity’s sake he also manages to startthe series off in an accessible place, with Buddy having just come off astarring role as a washed up superhero in an indie film à la Darren Aronofsky’s TheWrestler, and now considering getting back in the tights-and-flights game. Inthe very first scene, Lemire establishes the Baker family dynamic and Buddy’seasygoing, everyman character. He’s not a highly trained billionaire like BruceWayne or a superpowered alien like Superman, but a caring dad and husband witha good head on his shoulders—and, yeah, a taste for excitement. Theartwork also impresses the relative normalcy of his life, with Foreman’spencils favouring realistic human anatomy and posture rather than the posingand puffed chests typical of most superhero comics.

Things take aturn for the strange (well, stranger,given the many superhuman denizens that occupy the DC universe) when Buddy discovers his daughter has been reanimating dead neighbourhood pets courtesy ofpowers no one knew she had, quickly learning that his precocious little tyke is somehow vastly important to the future of life on Earth. To top it all off, she’s inadvertently drawn theattention of the Hunters Three, a trio of absolutely fucked up-lookingabominations who serve as representatives for the domain of organic corruptionknown as the Rot.

Travel Foreman

At this point,Lemire and Foreman veer away from the usual superhero narrative. Rather thandonning his tights and slugging the baddies in the face with a superpoweredfist, Buddy follows his daughter’s vague, dream-guided lead in trying todetermine what the Hell is going on, with the two of them entering the “Red,”essentially the lifeweb connecting all animal life. It’s in thesesegments that Foreman truly runs wild, his character renderings and panellayouts taking on a Salvador Dalí-esque twist, the detail visceral enough tomake one’s gorge rise.

Travel Foreman

Meanwhile, Ellenand Cliff are making tracks and searching for safe haven while being pursued byone of the Hunters, the creature at first inhabiting the body of a zookeeper,later that of a detective with whom the Baker family is on good terms with. Theresulting moments of body horror are on par with a mid-’80s David Cronenbergfilm. Without spoiling too much, the human and superhuman halves of the familyare eventually reunited in the fifth issue, albeit with the help of an animaltotem god who’s taken the form of a housecat (long story), only to be set uponby an entire forest’s worth of corrupted animals.

Lemire andForeman have taken a truly ingenious approach to the material, using theaesthetic trappings of the superhero genre to tell a genuinely fucked up horrorstory. What started as a fairly quirky series about a superhuman everyman (how’sthat for an oxymoron) is now, in itssixth issue, about a family on the run from what’s basically John Carpenter’s The Thing. As mainstream comics go, it’spretty far out there, but it features one of the best cast of characterscurrently on the shelf and a neat twist on the superhero formula that helps itto stand out from its ilk. There’s certainly a lot more to see from this series—nextup is a crossover with the Scott Snyder-helmed Swamp Thing—and if Lemire and Foreman continue forward I have noreason to think it’s going to diminish in quality anytime soon.

Plus it producedthe single greatest comics panel of 2011:

Travel Foreman

And God help me,I have no idea why I find this so awesome.

Review - The Annotated AvP: The Story, part 1

2012-01-30T22:05:00.001-05:00

As some of youmight know, in November of last year I started work on a novel for NationalNovel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). The goal was to write 50,000 words over thecourse of 30 days, a feat I was able to accomplish. However, the resultingdigital tome—equivalent to half of a first draft—has sat untouched in itsfolder ever since, partly because I wasn’t satisfied with how it was turningout, but mostly because a story dealing with homicide investigations andacoustical science requires a lot more research than you might think. Whilethis draft has been sitting in solitude I’ve been working on smaller pieces, asevidenced by this site.

But here’ssomething only a handful of you might be aware of: Threnody—as the work was tentatively titled—was not my firstattempt at long-form fiction. In fact, I wrote and completed a novel nearly a decade ago during my time as a grade7 and 8 student. However it is, I am quite loathe to say, a lengthy piece offan fiction—specifically an adaptation of Monolith’s 2001 computer game Aliens versus Predator 2, itself basedoff the two respective film franchises—and a terrible one at that. Sure, it’s aHell of a lot more legible than a lot of similar derivative works you’ll findon the Internet, but nearly every sentence exudes all the faults of a12-to-13-year-old writer with few ideas and a lot of ego.

So, in the veinof Rob Bricken’s Fan Fiction Friday (a link you should avoid clicking on at allcosts unless you want your computer to show up on watch lists for theRCMP/FBI/KGB/whatever), I’m going to select a few choice cuts from various chapters and provide my own runningcritique/commentary. Many apologies in advance.

(from AvP: The Story, Chapter III—Surprise,Surprise)

ProfessorMary Sheilington of the Weyland-Yutani Science Committee walked down thehallway towards the man standing at the end. Looking at him, the professor’seyes narrowed. None of them in the WY Science Committee really liked thisperson, only regarded him as an ambitious scientist, hoping to finally fit in.Still, Sheilington was the only member of the committee who liked traveling,and at certain times dealing with the most unwanted.

Theman she was looking at was Dr. Allan Eisenberg, Ph. D. in Xenobiology and aBachelor Degree in Basic Synthetics. As said earlier, Eisenberg was ambitious,though not in a cruel kind of way. He simply just wanted to go as far aspossible to study the deadly Aliens and the elusive Predators. Though, many ofhis colleagues had heard much, much more than what this doctor said.

Eisenbergwore almost nothing but black. His sweater was black, his pants were black, hisshoes were black, his hair, that reached down to the bottom of his neck wasblack; the only thing that wasn’t black was his pale face and left hand. He wasknown to always wear a black glove on his right hand, for reasons unknown. Thisapparel made almost everyone timid and frightened when they spoke to him.

Hestood there, fondling a black pen, until he noticed Sheilington standing at thehallway entrance. He perked up and turned toward her.

“Dr.Eisenberg, I presume?” Sheilington asked.

“Yes,”he said in a Semi-English accent. “And you are. . . “

Man o manatee, I wasn’t wasting any time. From theprofessor’s awkward-sounding (but surprisingly existent) name to telling thereader everything they ever needed to know about a character right off the bat,this has all the hallmarks of preteen literary hubris. The bachelor’s in BasicSynthetics garnering such esteem shows how much I knew about university degreesat the age of 12. Also: black hair? black pants? black sweater? semi-English accent? Guys, I think thisEisenberg fellow might be evil.Though, granted, that’s how he actually looked and sounded in the game.

Moving on:

“Haveyou done any successful experiments?” Sheilington asked, half-sneering.

“Infact, yes,” Eisenberg said. “We’ve finally proved the Sub-Species theory.Basically we see some Aliens with smooth craniums and some with ribbedcraniums. We originally thought the Aliens acquired the ribbed heads via age.We were proved wrong.”

“How?”

“Wefound a smooth-headed Alien that was older than a ribbed-headed Alien. Wefigured out that the smooth-heads were Workers, who build and maintain thehive. The ribbed-heads are Warriors, who protect the hive and the entirespecies.”

“Howis that useful information?”

“Wenow know who to especially stay away from. Warriors have been found to be muchmore intelligent and volatile than the Workers.”

Okay, so, some necessary exposition: at the time Iwas a member of an AvP-centric message board, and one of the hottest topics wasa debate over whether the ridge-headed creatures in Aliens were a distinct caste from the smooth-headed creature thatappeared in the original Alien, or ifthe ridged heads simply denoted age. Believe it or not, I poured paragraphs into that debate and this wasmy fuck you treatise on the subject.

Sivartand Evets walked across the work-yard. They were technicians in the colony, andhad just gotten back from a long day’s work.

Funny names, aren’t they? Vaguely European, thoughyou’d be hard-pressed to find anyone with one of those as their family moniker.That’s because they originated from me taking names of two of my grade schoolclassmates, Travis and Steve, and writing them backwards. You’d think I’d hadan allergic reaction to generic names—a fact which becomes increasingly apparentas the novel progresses.

A handy guide: any regular sounding name—Harrison,Tomiko, Eisenberg, etc.—came courtesy of the developer; anything sounding liketwo or more random syllables crushed together like the contents of a carcompacter, well, that was me. Feel free to develop a drinking game based onthis fun fact! After all, unless you're completely smashed while reading this you'll be clawing out your eyes in short time.

Sivartstopped short as he stared into the animal warehouse. Crouching inside was themost terrifying creature ever.

Thecreature inside was eight feet tall, and was covered in lizard scales from headto toe. Its torso was like a human skeleton’s and its hands and feet wereclawed. The creature’s skin was of a brown tint; it had a barbed tail, plusfive dorsal spines. Its head was elongated, like an upside-down canoe, andwithout eyes and a nose. The creature’s cranium was ribbed from front to back,and it had a tooth-filled mouth.

Thething opened its mouth, and extended a tongue with another mouth at the end. Asthey looked at the creature, they realized what it was: an Alien, the mostdeadly species on Lv-1201. It stared at the two humans and growled.

Sivartwhimpered. “Run. . . like. . . Hell.” BOOM. The Alien launched himself atSivart, and the man was ripped to shreds. Blood was sprayed all over Evets, whostood there, dumbfounded. Unknown to any human there, this Alien was Jimrakh,and things were about to go to Hell.

If you’ve ever seen one of the xenomorphs from the Alien franchise you’d find that to be asurprisingly accurate description. So way to go, preteen me. In hindsight,though, BOOM probably isn’t the sounda human body makes when it’s torn apart at a hundred miles an hour. More like SPRATCHTH!

As well, Jimrakh’s (take a shot) introductorysentence in the last paragraph reminds me too, too much of this (intentionally terrible)Song of the Sorcelator panel from Penny Arcade.

Afterdisposing of the threat, Jimrakh continued looking at the door labels. Lab 5,Medical. . . where the Hell are the humans keeping my captured brothers? Hewondered. Finally, he saw what he was looking for: Specimen Observation. He toreopen the door and killed two more technicians. The room had to sections: thepart he was in, which had the specimen and security controls, and the part hecould see through the window, which had fifteen of his captured brethrencontained in glass tubes.

Jimrakhpoured over the controls, trying to find out which buttons turned off thesecurity systems and opened the tubes. Any other one of his species would havebeen amazed at what he was doing; none of them had ever had the intelligence tooperate machinery.

Finally,Jimrakh found two buttons beside each other. He pressed one, and thecontainment doors opened, shutting off the security. He pressed the other, andthe fifteen captive Aliens burst free of the tubes. They immediately ran out ofthe containment room, reeking havoc as they went.

“Mehtsa kan,” Jimrakh said in his language. “Translation: Let’s rock.

Oh yeah, I totally forgot that I developed a(rudimentary) language for the Aliens… which they then used to spew actionmovie catchphrases. On a somewhat related note, I’ll understand if no one wantsto be my friend anymore.

Justthen, Dr. Eisenberg walked into the room. It was barely mentioned, but wheneverEisenberg entered a room, the temperature seemed to drop ten degrees Celsius.

“What’sgoing on here?” he asked.

“SixteenAliens might have broke loose in the Lab Complex,” Andrews replied.

“Sixteen?”Eisenberg puzzled. “We don’t have sixteen.”

“Exactly,”Cole said.

“Doyou think we should deal with this?” Andrews asked.

“Ofcourse,” Eisenberg said, nervously gripping his right hand. “Lock off the LabComplex. Every single door. We can at least stall them before they get out.Also, get a security team ready.”

Remember, kids: evil scientists violate the laws ofthermodynamics. Additionally, I’ll draw your attention to Eisenberg’sparticular little tic, namely gripping his right hand in times of stress. Iactually kind of like this bit for containing elements of both characterizationand foreshadowing—pretty neat for a grade 7 student, if I may be so bold.

That’s it for this week. I have a funny (read:disquieting) feeling I’ll be returning to this long-forgotten text on occasion,with hopefully a larger set of drinking game rules. Until then, I’m so sorry.

(The original chapter may be found here, at PlanetAvP.)

Fiction - Richard's Ribald Romances #1

2012-01-23T17:11:00.000-05:00

"Don't Call Me a Hero" or, the Misadventures of One Young Rogue on a Cold Winter's Eve

By Richard Costello (as told to David Merrick)

December 16^th, 2008

The Rodeo, whosename I automatically process as the “Hoe-deo” for its largely sleazy and easyfemale patronage, is a cheap C&W-themed bar located in the heart of Vanier.On any given night of the week you can step onto its hardwood dance floor andbe grinding up against a drunk chick to the sound of “Save a Horse (Ride aCowboy)” in ten seconds flat. Its head bartender, Jacques, sports a mullet andworships at the feet of Billy Ray Cyrus. And every Tuesday—KaraokeNight—there’s bound to be at least one girl belting out a particularly sloshedrendition of a Dixie Chicks tune. It is, to be blunt, a redneck dive.

Two years ago,stepping out of my high school’s auditorium with my diploma in one hand and afake I.D. in the other, I would have glanced at the mural of silhouetted,lasso-twirling cowboys stencilled along the building’s façade and dismissed itwithout a second thought, preferring to spend and get smashed at a classierestablishment. Since then my standards have plummeted, both in regard todecorum and the kind of women I like to fuck. So when I stumbled in front ofthe Hoe-deo one fateful spring evening, reeling from a bad breakup and athree-day bender, its front doors seemed like a mother’s embrace.

I’d made theHoe-deo my home away from home every weekend since, less so in the fall, when Iwas going to school and had to conserve more of my mental faculties than mysummer job at the frozen food plant required. This week, however, I’d just saidgoodbye to winter semester and hello to the Christmas break. As soon as I’dtucked away my last exam (post-French Revolution Europe—bitches love the Reign of Terror) I put my asson a train headed for home, with the first goal on my list being a round ofdrinks at the old watering hole. By which I meant I was going to get absolutelyfucked on Moosehead and rye and then see where the night would take me.

In tow thatevening was Ray Matheson, a high school dropout who worked full time at thefrozen food plant and who had made my summer there a lot more bearable than itmight have been otherwise. Working on the line, he had a tendency to react toany and every shitty joke with a barking, oddly high-pitched laugh, earning himthe nickname “the Seal.” Ray being Ray, he took it in stride and had adopted itas eagerly like a knight would his title, unironically referring to himself bythe moniker whenever he saw fit.

“The Seal’sgonna get his bone on tonight!” he shouted, oblivious to the bemusedexpressions worn by close to every other passenger riding on our bus.

I glared back atone elderly woman who was giving us a particularly dirty look. Once she hadbeen thwarted, I slouched in my seat, grinning from ear to ear. “I can’t startto describe how much I need this, Ray. I’ve been wasted only four times overthe last three months. The scales must be balanced.”

Ray snuck a sipfrom his hip flask—another item he always kept on his person—and went on:“Shit, you’ve been missing out. You missed the September Burst.”

“SeptemberBurst?”

“When school’sback in and all the fine, newly-minted 19-year-old ladies give their driver’slicenses a spin,” he explained.

“What the fuckare these ‘newly-minted’ ladies doing all the way out in Vanier?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Inever said they have good judgement.”

The bus stoppeda block from the Hoe-deo, the snow-laden path from the shelter to the bar’sfront doors made brilliant from the glow of the streetlights. Ray traversedmost of this picture-perfect lane at a shuffling, lopsided gait, already halfin the bag from the contents of the flask he’d been sucking on for most of theafternoon. I, on the other hand, was completely dry for the time being, wantingmy first sip of beer that night to be like the tender kiss of a long-absentlover… before I ploughed into the next round of drinks as one would with said long-absent lover.

The place waspacked. Packed. Ray and I stood juston the other side of the threshold, agog—well, Ray slightly less so—at thesight of countless, writhing, wall-to-wall human bodies. It was like a Romanorgy, but with far more clothing and with a couple of drunk assholes slurringtheir way through an early ’80s power ballad over top of it all. Ah yes, Irealized. It was Tuesday, and thus Karaoke Night.

There was a tapon my shoulder. I turned to my left to see friend and old schoolmate XavierJoyce—“Joycey,” as we called him—sitting in the booth adjacent to the frontdoors, twiddling his fingers in a decidedly fanciful wave. “Evening, ladies!”he said loudly over the din of the bar.

“Motherfucker!”I yelled back, squeezing past the bouncer—evidently too occupied to noticeeither myself or the clearly buzzed Ray—and into the booth next to Joycey. Hewas nursing a bottle of Labatt Blue in one hand, idly peeling off the labelwith his fingernails. Held between the thumb and index finger of the other was,I was shocked to see, a half-smoked cigarette. Staring at its glowing tip, Iwatched as Joycey casually took a drag off the coffin nail and then tapped theash into a tray on the table. Catching the shocked expression I had to havebeen wearing, he smirked and nodded toward the bouncer.

“The doors areopening too frequently for any of this shit to linger,” he elaborated,indicating the blue line of smoke rising from the end of his cigarette. “Hesaid as long as I’m not blowing it in anybody’s face he won’t kick me out.”

“You have to bebreaking a bylaw,” I said.

“Oh, several!”he corrected with a laugh.

“Fuck, I lovethis place! It’s like once you step through those doors you just forget everylaw that binds society together.” I sighed, energized yet paradoxicallyrelaxed, making no attempt to hide my amusement as Ray wormed in next to me,the oaf slipping and sliding as his hand-eye coordination abandoned his bodylike a negligent father would his child. Turning back to Joycey, I asked,“What’re you doing here?”

“Enjoyingmyself,” he grunted through the cigarette currently clenched between his teeth.“Not to mention keeping an eye on these jackasses.” With his bottle hand hemotioned toward the stage, where I spotted not one but two of my old classmatesstanding next to the microphone, each wailing the chorus to Foreigner’s “I Wantto Know What Love Is” in a different key. Steven Bourque, on the left, hadfronted for a couple of garage bands throughout high school and as such wasdoing a fairly faithful rendition of Lou Gramm’s vocals in spite of hisapparent inebriation. Todd Mudford, on the right, looked and sounded a littleworse for wear and wasn’t as audible in the mix, possibly because he wasshouting the words into a glass of beer.

“Does he realizethat’s not the mic?” I asked Joycey.

The other mantilted his head from side to side, unsure. “Maybe, maybe not. That’s his fifth,so on a purely cognitive level he has to be out of touch.” The song reached thebrief instrumental chord change between the chorus and second verse just asJoycey finished speaking. As if in answer to our question Mudford took a hugegulp of his beer, only to continue crooning into the mug when the verse startedup a second later.

“Huh,” we saidat once.

A server approachedour table, flipping to a fresh page on the notepad she carried. Her top was cutso low there was really no point in her wearing it. Not that I had any problemwith that, of course. As she came up to the edge of the booth I did my levelbest to avoid looking at her chest. That quickly failed.

“What’re youhaving?” she asked, either oblivious to my stare or immune to it after years ofbeing subjected to drunk jackass after drunk jackass. I felt kind of offended.

With a flourish,I slapped my wallet on the table and withdrew a stack of twenties, displayingthem like a magician would a hand of cards. If the gesture impressed theserver, she didn’t show it. “If you’d be so kind, I’d like to order three pintsof Moosehead,” I said, showing her a winning smile.

I watched oneparticular part of her body as she scribbled a note on the pad and clicked thebutton on the end of her pen. She muttered, “You can pay when you’re ready togo,” and then turned on her heel to leave. The woman had waded back into thecrowd before I could even compliment her on her appearance. I frowned. Theservice wasn’t as good as I remembered. Perhaps the crowd had brought down herspirits.

“Three?” Joyceyrepeated. “There’s fuckin’ five of us, man.”

“Oh I know.These three are for me.”

The end of hiscigarette jabbed upward as his mouth contorted in discontent. “Really?”

I gesturedtoward the stage flippantly. Stevie and Mudford swayed drunkenly next to themic, the latter gazing into his now empty mug with a look of childlikedisappointment. “Do they look like they need any more?”

“Obviously not,but I might.”

“Buddy, I’vebeen saving up all semester for a night like tonight. Guess the last time I gotdrunk.”

A moment’spause. “Last week.”

“Well, yeah,this is true, but that was just studying-my-ass-off drunk. I want to get soutterly destroyed tonight that when I wake up tomorrow afternoon, I’ll have torelearn my tenses.”

“And what abouthim?” he asked, indicating Ray, who was currently leaning over the side of ourbooth. The man’s glazed, thousand yard stare was aimed with a laser’s focus atthe ass of a girl standing in the coat check line. When I poked him in thesmall of his back, he didn’t budge.

“Hey, buddy, youwant anything?” I hollered.

A full secondpassed before Ray responded, his tone of voice taking on the monotonous, detacheddrone of a lobotomy patient: “The Seal’s good for now.” While I couldn’t seehis face from where I was sitting, I doubt if he even blinked.

“See?” I said toJoycey. “He’s good.”

I looked acrossthe room, over the heads of innumerable cowboy hat-wearing douchebags and theirslutty girlfriends, past the stage Stevie and Mudford were now leaving—Steviemaking a masturbatory motion with his hand at someone who’d apparently takenissue with his choice of music—and saw our nameless server heading our way,precariously balancing a tray displaying three glasses of beer, all of whichglistened with the sublime beauty of a trio of Holy Grails.

She stopped atour table, swiftly deposited the trinity without spilling a drop, and onceagain left before I could compliment her chest. I shrugged at missedopportunity and reached for the closest glass.

I admit I don’thave the best recollection of what followed over the course of the next hour. Ican clearly recall that first, savoury sip of beer, but in its wake came themental equivalent of a French New Wave jump cut and suddenly I found myselfgazing at three empty glasses, all of them reeking of hops, all of them mine.My hand shot up almost on its own in an attempt to get the attention of ournameless, impatient waitress. I found myself peering up at my newly-independentappendage, feeling not betrayal but… well, whatever I felt, it was disquieting.Disquiet! That was it! I spent thenext minute marvelling at that word’s sublime beauty, all the while feeling theblood drain from my arm.

Smoke waftedinto my nostrils. My head swivelled with the oiled grace of a rusty bike chainand I came face to face with Joycey, who was sucking on what looked to be anewly lit cigarette, judging by its length.

“Yo,” hemuttered.

I grabbed hiscollar with both hands, bringing him and his cigarette what I later consideredto be uncomfortably close to my face. “What year is it?” I interrogated.

He blew a cloudof smoke with the intensity of a sawn-off shotgun blast into my eyes and mouthand grunted, “Two minutes since you last asked me that.”

“Oh.”

His cigarettedipped. “You’re not looking at another round, are you?”

Glancing at thetriumvirate of empty glasses, I bit my lip and said, “I dunno. I’m thinkingthat one hit the spot.”

“That was yourthird.”

I cocked aneyebrow. “Come again.”

“That was yourthird round.”

A cloud of confusedprotests whirled about my muddled brain, colliding into each other like atwenty car pileup in Times Square. The only one to come out unscathed (read:the least abstract) was “No fucking way.” I could work with that. “No fuckingway,” I said.

Joycey nodded,reached awkwardly with one hand to pluck the cigarette out of his mouth, andwent on, “I thought the very same thing. So, with that in mind, let’s considerthe possibility of, oh I dunno, easing off for the rest of the night.”

I consideredthis. “Maybe.”

“And perhapstaking your hands off me.”

“Can do!” I saidcheerfully, releasing the nonchalant bylawbreaker from my grip. While he easedback into his seat, readjusting the angle of his cigarette between his teeth, Isurveyed the room, feebly trying to get my bearings on what changed in thelast… shit, how much time had actually passed?

On stage, afake-tanned bimbo was letting loose with a warbling take on the Dixie Chicks’“Landslide” cover. Figures. Our server looked to have abandoned us for the evening,being nowhere in sight amongst the crowd or against the bar. The bouncer seemedto be as ignorant as ever, waving through two guys who looked barely older thanme and a blonde chick who had to be fresh out of high school—

My mentalprocesses jerked to a sudden stop. Again, all that remained was that singleconcrete thought: no fucking way.

Megan Barrie.Another fellow high schooler. Christ, tonight was turning into one fucked upreunion. I’d acted alongside the girl in a couple of school drama productions—heras some nameless extra, me in the lead of course—and she didn’t look like she’dchanged much since: still skinny as a rake, blonde hair still streaked withblack, and wearing perhaps a little more shadow under her eyes than Iremembered.

And, it neededto be said, still two years younger than I was. Me, who had just turned 20 thatsummer and who was still getting carded at every other licensed establishmentbecause of my boyish good looks. So unless she’d been kept back a grade andhadn’t told anyone, it was mathematically fucking impossible for Megan to beallowed in here. But there she was, waltzing past the bouncer who I was nowcertain was in the throes of soul-crushing ennui.

I had toleratedour server’s negligence, as I had Joycey’s persistent illegal smoking, but thisI couldn’t stand for. Something had to be made right in this world. Rising upon my haunches I hollered, “Hey, Barrie! Who’d you fuck to get in here?”

Jean-Luc Godardmust have high-jacked my brain once more, because the next thing I knew MeganBarrie was splayed across my lap, her back shoving Joycey against the leather cushionof our booth, her legs holding the mostly-limp Ray in place.

“Richard!” shescreamed with girlish glee. My eardrums recoiled, threatened. The frequency ofher voice managed to do what pounding bass and God awful karaoke hadn’t androused Ray from his semi-slumber. When his eyes regained modicum of focus, theyhad the dilated-pupil cast of a trapped animal’s. He mumbled, “The Seal don’tlike this.”

I ignored himand turned my attention to Megan, although it wasn’t like she was giving memuch of a choice in the matter. “Hey, long time, no see—” By the time I’duttered that last syllable she’d wrapped her arms around me and her tongue wasbusy seeking out some hidden treasure in my mouth. Huh. Unexpected. Back inschool I figured she’d had something for me, but then again who didn’t? Ishrugged and went with the flow. Getting it on was getting it on. Out of thecorner of my eye, I could see Joycey cough and turn away, seemingly attemptingto give the two of us as much privacy as was physically possible. I silentlyapplauded his efforts.

There wasanother jump cut at this point and suddenly I was standing outside, my lefthand shoved in my coat pocket, my right around Megan’s shoulders. Ray stoodacross from me, his glare still mostly unfixed but looking at the girl in thesame way a small animal would regard a potential predator.

“The Seal’sgonna be honest,” I said. “Waiting around outside while you to do the nastyisn’t any fun.”

Evidently I hadagreed to sleep with this woman during my last blackout. I was about to feelviolated when I gave her a once over and figured, yeah, I could live with that.

“Then what theHell are you going to do?” I bellowed.

Ray nodded downthe street. “There’s a Tim Hortons down that way.”

Megan reachedinto her pocket, producing a pencil and a dollar store receipt. She scribbledsomething and handed the scrap to my semi-conscious wingman. “That’s myaddress,” she said. “Meet up with us there when you’re done.”

Ray snatched theslip out of her hand, looked lazily over its surface, and pocketed it without afurther protest. He pivoted and made straight for the coffee shop.

“Well then,” Isaid to her. “Shall we be off?”

A philosopheronce said that a man has a penis and a brain, and only enough blood to use oneat a time. Said philosopher did a whole lot of coke in the ’70s, though, so Idoubted the accuracy of his observations. As Megan led me by hand down MontrealRoad, I was mildly concerned my higherbrain functions weren’t operating to the best of their abilities but I was alsopretty sure my wang wasn’t calling the shots. Or at least not yet. In any caseI was able to selectively ignore most of Barrie’s prattling as we weaved downseveral side streets, each visibly seedier than the last.

After tenminutes of cold, drunken loping, we came to a sudden stop—well, I did, mymomentum grinding to a halt just before I could slam into Megan at full tilt.In front of us stood the filthiest looking townhouse I’d ever laid eyes onoutside of an episode of The Wire.The screen door hung loosely on rusty hinges, its metal chassis banging hollowlyagainst the frame every few seconds. When it swung, the resulting screech feltlike someone was working over my balls with a sponge made out of steel wool.

“Here we are!”Megan said, chipper.

I leered at thebuilding’s unkempt two-storey bulk, wary. “This is where you live?” I asked,aware of several notes of apprehension lingering in my voice.

“For the moment.My mom and I got in a fight a couple weeks ago and a friend of mine had anextra room. Sweet digs, if you ask me.” She stepped forward, grabbed the doorby the handle and yanked it open. I winced at what was probably theworst-sounding screech yet. She beckoned with her hand. “Come on in, monsieur.”

My mouthstretched itself into an ear-to-ear grin, in spite of myself. I followed herinside.

Ever seenpictures of the now-demolished Pruitt-Igoe housing complex in St. Louis? Whothe fuck am I kidding, of course you haven’t. But the interior bore an uncannyresemblance: exposed drywall, hastily-rendered graffiti, trash piled near thedoor—the works. An incandescent light bulb very obviously near the end of itslife cast a sickly yellow glow over the entrance hall. At the very rear of thefoyer, where this ring of illumination met shadow, an unnervingly tall and skeletalman with several tattoos and three days of beard growth stepped into thebarely-light, nodded ever so slightly in our direction, and disappeared downthe adjacent basement steps. He made not a sound.

“That yourfriend?” I asked.

“No, that’sHawk. He pops in every few days.”

A few secondspassed in uncomfortable silence, and then, echoing from the bowels of thehouse, came the vacant drumbeat and churning synths of “Goodbye Horses.”

“Huh,” Imuttered. That settled it: either Megan lived just above the den of a serialkiller, or this place was a crack house. Since Hawk hadn’t returned with ashotgun in hand I assumed the latter. For most people, this realization mighthave set off a few warning bells or even deterred them from seeing the night throughto its bitter end, but I pride myself on not being most people. Hell, I’dhooked up in worse places. With a cock of my head and a click of my tongue Isaid, “Lead on.”

Megan started upa narrow, rickety staircase, the tenacious young lady avoiding the crushedcardboard boxes and the occasional beer can scattered along her path. Too lazyand too drunk to be as careful, I stomped up the steps, crushing card andaluminum indiscriminately. The upstairs hall was no less neglected than itsdownstairs equivalent though it had the distinction of reeking of ozone. Awraithlike girl with her hair in cornrows stood in one of the doorways, staringaimlessly out into the hall, her pupils the size of dimes. She made no gesturesuggesting she perceived us, let alone recognized us.

Megan’s room wasthe most Spartan chick’s domain I’d ever laid eyes on. An aging mattressadorned with a moth-eaten comforter and a seat cushion for a pillow served asher bed. Clothes were either piled in a corner or at the bottom of her closet.The room’s sole light hung from the ceiling on a chain, and the minisculevibrations our footsteps sent through the room made the bulb flicker, creatingan eerie strobe effect. On top of all this, the room lacked anything resemblinga door. My eyes searched the area for an alternative, but the only object talland wide enough to block off the entranceway would have been the only thingpreventing me from screwing on the hardwood floor. This would not do.

“Do you know ifthere’s anything we can prop up against the doorway?” I asked. Megan was busypulling off her shirt and didn’t hear me, so I asked again, adding, “You know,so we can be more discreet.”

She shook herhead. “It’s cool, though. My roomies won’t mind.”

I suddenly picturedHawk standing at the threshold, wearing a woman’s scalp, staring down at us aswe got busy with the mambo funktastic. The thought chilled me to the bone, andin more ways than one. I might even have shuddered. “Let’s phrase thatdifferently: does any room in this fire hazard have a working door?”

She paused forthought, her bra halfway off. After a second, she said, “The bathroom.”

Something likeicy fingers crawled up my spine and reflexively I whirled on my heel, ending uplooking out into the hall. Branching off the opposite side of the corridor was thedarkest, dingiest bathroom I’d ever had the misfortune of seeing. It could havebeen used in an early David Cronenberg movie with hardly any set dressing. Themedicine cabinet mirror was marred by a long, jagged crack. The grout betweenthe floor tiles was the blackish-brown of grease. It may have been a trick ofthe eye, but I swear I saw something bonyand pale skitter into the darkness behind the dilapidated toilet.

But, it had adoor.

“Fuck it,” Isaid, and tore off my shirt.

I’m going toskip the next bit. It’s not that I’m ashamed of what ensued—my shame glandsnever developed, see—but the details might shake one’s faith in a higher power.So I’ll be considerate and sum it up as such: I’ve had better; I’ve had worse.

For now, I’lltake a brief detour and try to the best of my ability to outline the journey ofRay “The Seal” Matheson from Hoe-deo to Megan Barrie’s crack house hostel. It’snecessary partly because what follows might not make any sense otherwise, butmostly because it’s better than the alternative (i.e. my dirty deeds, done realdirt cheap). So, cobbled together from what I heard and from what I was able toextrapolate, Ray’s voyage:

Five minutesafter parting ways with the would-be underage drinker and yours truly, Rayhalf-walked, half-slid down the road until he came to a Timmy’s where he hopedto score, in his words, “a double-double and a three of my vanilla dip homies.”Alas, a trucker snatched up the remainder in the case and Ray was forced tosettle on chocolate glazed to get his sugar fix. Just as he stepped back outinto the cold so he could smoke a cigarette while wolfing down his donuts, twopolice officers pulled up in a squad car.

Ray said he thenpressed up against the store’s windows, hoping to avoid drawing any attentionto his less-than-legally inebriated state. The cops were almost to the doorwhen the cigarette smoke trapped inside Ray’s mouth from holding his breathtriggered his gag reflex, and a second later he vomited the partially-digestedremains of the donuts, his half-drunk coffee and the flask full of whiskey he’dconsumed onto the new fallen snow, right in front of two of Ottawa’s finest.Ray swore they made a move for their cuffs, but I know Ray, so it was morelikely the officers asked if he was okay, only for the paranoid jackasscrouching before them to shout “IT’S THE 5-0!” and book it into the night.

Perhaps theywanted to take him in. Maybe they were genuinely concerned for his well-being.Regardless, the cops got back into their car and drove off after him. Ray saidhe ducked onto a side road, whipped the slip of paper Megan had given him outof his pocket, scanned the address, and made a beeline in the general directionof where he figured her house was located. As the saying goes, “any port in astorm…”

Ten minuteslater, and about five minutes after Megan and I stumbled into the bathroom, ourlips locked (me taking special care to shut and lock the door behind us), Raycame upon the crack house. He bounded up the front steps, tore open the screendoor, and darted inside. At this time I knew something was up, because I dimlyheard my name reverberate throughout the house’s slipshod frame. Despite beingin the heat of semi-passion in the (thankfully drained) bathtub, I broke awayand looked up. “Ray?” I called back.

I heard someoneclimb the stairs at a rapid pace, the steps groaning under their weight, andsuddenly they were outside the bathroom door.

“Rick, is thatyou?” he asked.

My mouthtwitched angrily. “Who the fuck else in this dump would know your name?” Ispat.

Below me, Meganwhined, “Hey, this is my house—”

“Shhh,” I hushedher. “Grownups are talking.” I barked through the door again, “What’s goingon?”

“Uh, the Sealgot himself into a bit of trouble.” I rolled my eyes. Christ, what else wasnew.

“Is that so,” Isighed. “What do you want me to do, then?”

“Go downstairsand keep an eye out?”

I couldn’t stopmyself from growling. “Ray, I’m kind ofbusy.”

“Just for fiveminutes, man!”

Beneath my breath,I grumbled, “The nerve he has to bring up five minutes.” I cleared my throatand shouted, “Five minutes. Right on.”

Megan’s browwrinkled. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Bracing my handon the tub wall, I pushed myself upward and clambered out onto the bathroomtiles. “Five minutes. I’ll be back in a jiffy,” I grumbled, pulling on my pantsand stepping into my boots—there was no way in Hell I was going to walk onthese floors in my bare feet. Turning the knob and wrenching the door out ofits frame, I heard Megan murmur, “I love you—”

I slammed thedoor shut behind me. Ray was standing near the top of the staircase, peeringedgily down into the foyer. When I caught his eye I threw my arms up, bemused.“Really?”

“Yo man, theSeal’s in trouble here!” he pleaded.

I waved him off.“Fine, fine. I’ll keep a lookout for the Nazgûl for you.” I turned towardMegan’s bedroom, intending to grab my shirt and jacket, but the wraith girl wasinside, sitting on the edge of the mattress and carefully rolling a joint. Resigned,I went down the steps, jumping over the last two and into the foyer. Amblingout the screen door, I called, “So, who exactly am I looking fo—”

That’s when thecop car pulled up out front. Siren silent, flashers dim, but a cop car nonetheless.The two officers within opened their respective doors, stepped out and lookedup to see me aglow in the headlights, naked from the waist up, pants barely on,and standing in front of what was probably the most notorious crack house inthe National Capital Region.

They froze, I froze.

It was Ray whobroke the ensuing silence, creeping up behind me, catching sight of hispursuers, and shouting “RUN BITCH RUN!”

Needless to say,I took his advice. I spun around, nearly sending Ray flying, and sprinted downthe main hall toward the kitchen and what I hoped was the back door. I justmanaged to avoid Hawk as he stalked out of the basement, clutching a roll oftin foil in one hand and what looked like a live quail in the other. I heard itcoo softly.

Ray and I chargedinto the kitchen, each of us trying to squeeze past the other, and burst outthe rear door into the backyard. The five by five metre lot was packed full ofstandard white trash fare: garbage bags, rusty garden tools, even a wreck of acar up on cinder blocks. The last item caught my eye and I made a dash, jumpingonto the old Geo’s hood, hopping onto its roof and—after uttering a quickprayer—vaulting over the fence and into the adjacent yard. When I recoveredfrom a duck and roll, I looked up to see Ray execute a similar stunt, though hedidn’t make the landing quite as well. Nevertheless, he was back on his feet ina couple seconds, and the two of us raced around the side of the house thisyard belonged to, hearing shouts of “FREEZE! POLICE!” echo throughout thesurrounding buildings.

In spite of thefear coursing through my veins, in spite of the icy air bathing my shirtlessbody, and in spite of my balls oh so blue, I felt alive. I caught a second windwith this realization, the adrenaline pushing me to twice my originalspeed—though I made sure to let Ray catch up at the next intersection; I wasn’tthat heartless. We made it back tothe main road in short time, ignoring the stares from the few pedestrians whocaught sight of my bare upper half and the vomit stains on Ray’s jacket.Slowing our pace to a jog, we glimpsed Hoe-deo in the distance.

I looked at Ray.He looked at me. He shrugged. We made tracks for the bar.

Joycey wasstanding outside, enjoying another cigarette. Evidently the bouncer had foundsome purpose in his life and kicked the man out before he could do any furtherrespiratory collateral damage. As we came within a block of the bar, his eyesnarrowed.

“What. Thefuck,” he uttered, looking down at the two of us as we bent forward, trying tocatch our breaths.

“Just. A head’s.Up,” I said between breaths. “We might. Be fugitives. From. The law.”

Joycey took adrag off his cigarette. “And this is surprising how?”

Huh. Fairenough.

A bus pulled upout front of the bar right then, its doors sliding open with a hiss. Withoutconsulting me in the slightest, Ray made his way over and hopped inside, already countingchange. He probably had the right idea. I was about to follow when I noticed the signage out front prohibitingmy current shirtless status.

I turned toJoycey. “Can I borrow your jacket?”

The man paused,took another drag, blew smoke in my face.

I tried analternate approach. “Can we share a cab?”

Another pause,this time followed by a nod. “Sure.”

I clapped Joyceyon the shoulder, the grin on my lips nearly splitting my face it was so wide.“That’s my man.” I whipped around to see Ray standing in the open doorway ofthe bus, the driver growing impatient behind him. “Same time next week?” Icalled to him.

“Sametime next week!”

Analysis - "IT'S THE BEATING OF THAT HIDEOUS HEART!!!"

2012-01-16T16:37:00.024-05:00

"Lisa's Rival" is perhaps the greatest episode of The Simpsons ever made.

For fans of the show, this might be a controversial statement, given the justified popularity of "Marge vs. The Monorail," "Last Exit to Springfield" and "Homer's Enemy," but do hear me out. While "Lisa's Rival" may not be as hilarious as the "Monorail" episode or as innovative as "22 Short Films About Springfield," it best encapsulates what made The Simpsons so great in its prime--said prime lasting a roughly seven year period from season 2 through season 8 (just less than a third of the show's actual run, you might be interested to know).

At its peak, The Simpsons contained some of the best writing on television, and not just for its era; we're talking all time. During that seven year period, writers like George Meyer, John Swartzwelder, Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein brought a level of sophistication to animated television that hadn't been seen since the epoch of Looney Tunes, mixing snappy, wonderfully-timed dialogue with pop culture references ranging from the mainstream to the esoteric. Throw in some great character development and the most talented bunch of voice actors on TV and you have a show whose quality is easily on par with that of The Wire (or so it was from 1990 to 1997).

"Lisa's Rival" showcases this combination of elements in what's effectively a "how-to" guide for writing The Simpsons. Written by Mike Scully and first broadcast on September 11, 1994, it primarily depicts Lisa Simpson's jealousy toward and competition with new student Allison Taylor (voiced by Winona Ryder). Normally the intellectual guide and voice of reason for not only her second grade class but the show's entire cast, Lisa finds herself outclassed on almost all counts by Allison. The new girl is a year younger, can come up with anagrams on the fly, and becomes the go-to source for answers in their class, all the while being humble and genuinely decent towards Lisa. To boot, she plays a mean sax.

The episode eventually climaxes with Lisa attempting to sabotage Allison's entry in the school diorama competition, only to be driven to confess and apologize in a wonderfully on-the-nose parody of Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart." Both she and Allison lose to loveable doofus Ralph Wiggum's Star Wars action figure set, Lisa comes to accept her own intelligence and the two end the episode as friends.

Lisa's situation strikes a pretty personal chord with me. Like her, I was the "smart kid" in my class for most of grade school, being more knowledgeable about the solar system and the human digestive tract than any first grade student ever should and walking away with four academic awards at our Grade 8 graduation. The role wasn't anything I aspired to, just the natural consequence of watching a lot of The Magic School Bus and absorbing every trivial bit of information like a sponge left next to a decent size puddle. I never grew cocky, just content, satisfied with the knowledge base I'd accrued and taking my status for granted.

But then came high school, and with it a veritable boatload of borderline prodigious classmates. Like Bruce Wayne in The Dark Knight, I came to know my limits in a manner both sudden and (in my case egotistically) painful. Some knew more about inclement weather systems better than I could ever hope to. For others, transposing a musical score from one key to another was second nature. And to add insult to injury, math, hitherto my friend, turned traitor and stabbed me in the back with the twin daggers of polynomials and the quadratic equation.

Now, my situation isn't comparable to Lisa's on a 1:1 level (I was never a genius and I never tried to academically sabotage someone else) but the episode's emotional resonance helped to put that earlier insecurity into perspective and ultimately exorcise it. And that's one of the episode's key strengths. It's one thing if a comedic work makes you laugh--any decent humorist can do that. It's another if it leads you to reconsider or reevaluate some aspect of your life. In the words of Adrian Veidt from Watchmen, "only the best comedians can accomplish that." "Lisa's Rival" is far from being the only Simpsons episode to work in such a moral but the craft with which Mike Scully executes it puts it at the top.

Of course, "Lisa's Rival" isn't all inferiority complexes and Poe analogues. As with pretty much every Simpsons episode--or Hell, every sitcom ever aired--it contains a tangential 'B'-plot played entirely for laughs, like Bart's factory in "Homer's Enemy" or Maggie's escapades in the Ayn Rand School for Tots during "A Streetcar Named Marge." In this case, it's not just funny, but hands down one of the most hilarious, balls-to-the-wall insane plots in the entirety of animated comedy. And it all involves Homer getting his hands on hundreds of pounds of sugar.

Driving around town with Bart, Homer stumbles across Hans Moleman's crashed sugar tanker, and offers to "protect" its contents while the feeble old man goes for help. He and Bart immediately shovel the "white gold" into the family station wagon and Homer starts up a lucrative but ultimately fruitless door-to-door sugar business. Further complications arise from bees, a pair of Adam West- and Burt Ward-inspired beekeepers and that horrifying solvent, rain. The subplot also results in what is safe to say the most bizarrely hilarious minute and forty seconds of television known to man. I'd describe, but I feel the clip speaks for itself.

Courtesy of 20th Century Fox Entertainment

Tea-drinking aristocrat interlopers? Homer ranting in defence of his nouveau riche status? That's mathematically hilarious. Furthermore, the B-plot's a good example of what made Homer a great character early on in the show's run. While stupidity has always been a key aspect of his personality, during the show's golden age it served as a means, enabling all sorts of harebrained schemes on his part, rather than the instant punchline it's been pretty much ever since. Old Homer was stupid for the purpose of setting off a chain of increasingly amusing events; new Homer is stupid for the sake of being stupid, like a milder take on Family Guy's Peter Griffin.

And as a cherry on top, there's an even less tangentially related C-plot where Bart for whatever reason frames Milhouse in a brief (two scenes) but great parody of The Fugitive.

While "Lisa's Rival" may not qualitatively be the funniest or most memorable episode of The Simpsons, it is manifestly what made the show such a hit for all those years, a pitch-perfect balance of the poignant and the absurd. It's "great" in the same way that the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's is great, perhaps not the absolute best but everything that made it wonderful distilled in an easily accessible package.

Interview - John Cheese

2012-01-09T19:10:00.006-05:00

Oh hi, small but dedicated reader base. It's been months--Hell, an entire season--since the last time I posted here, but I have returned, both with the promise of new and utterly trivial entries on the Simpsons, Die Hard and Animal Man, as well as a Very Special Announcement. Mack Leighty, best known to the Internet by his pseudonym John Cheese, has been entertaining and enlightening people for the past year with his weekly column on Cracked.com. Whether he's writing about overcoming his alcoholism or the Hell of being a video game sewer repairman, John's been consistently funny and touching in his output. To boot, he served as the basis for the eponymous character of Cracked senior editor David Wong's comedic horror novel, John Dies at the End, the film adaptation of which will be premiering at the Sundance Film Festival later this month.

Recently, John gave any random schmuck on the Internet the opportunity to throw a few questions his way, an offer I had a physical inability to pass up. So without further ado, Mr. Cheese holds court on humour, influences and cinematic doppelgangers.

DM: Looking at your older Magic Pimp Bus articles ("Teaching David Wong," "Hitler Stole My Belt," etc.) and the columns you write regularly for Cracked, do you think your sense of humour has changed, and if so, how?

JC: It definitely has, and it will for everyone in life. There are two reasons: time and experience. From a "real life person" perspective, age does that to you. When I was nine, I would laugh until I couldn't breathe when someone made a fart joke. By the time I was in high school, I'd roll my eyes at them. When I was in college, I was into the stereotypical angry comedian because angst was the feeling of that whole Generation X, grunge era. Now, I like my comedy to have some semblance of subtlety--little jabs that catch you off guard and set up for a huge, in-your-face uppercut.

From a writer's perspective, you just can't do the same type of humor perpetually and expect to stay relevant. A perfect example is Ron White. He's the "Tater Salad" guy. Chance are, if you're alive, you've heard the routine. If you haven't, look it up on YouTube. It's actually pretty funny... the first four thousand times I heard it.

Ron had plenty of other material that was just as funny, but his audience wanted to hear that story, so he told it over and over and over again. Eventually, people just started knowing him as The Tater Salad Guy, and now his entire career has been defined by it. For a writer, that's death. If you're not changing and keeping things fresh, not only are you going to burn out your audience, but you're going to burn yourself out, too.

DM: Who has primarily influenced your particular style or sense of humour? (counting friends, family, writers, comedians, etc.)

JC: I was a Seanbaby fan when I first started writing, and I've never seen a person who is more efficient with comedy to setup than him. The guy is a goddamn master. And David Wong. He taught me that you can write an article that has an actual social and personal impact while still keeping it funny. He's more subtle, using jokes that come out of nowhere, just when you were balls deep in the serious portions. After years of writing pure comedy with no other value than strict entertainment, this is the style I've adopted.

DM: You've mentioned before that the wackier style of articles (e.g. the Cracked Christmas party) don't get as popular a reception on the main site, with you citing the "in-universe" mode in which they're written. Do you ever consider creating a separate venue for this format?

JC: I've done it a couple of times with some now-defunct websites of my own. But the problem is that the traffic is so low on these types of articles, they're almost not worth the time required to make them. However, I am planning to use Tumblr for this type of comedy because though they're not really Cracked's thing, one does need an outlet for just straight-up goofy comedy like that. As a writer, it's not a good idea to be locked into a single outlet. Things can get stale really fast for you as a creator, and that's not good for you or the website that pays you.

DM: Craziest running-against-a-deadline story: go now.

JC: I had an article--I think it was about safe for work videos that were uncomfortably sexual--that was running right on schedule. The draft was approved, and I was almost ready to send it to layout. Then at the last minute, we found out that two of my entries had been used in an article written by Soren Bowie, several months prior. So I had to re-scout for videos, and I wasn't even sure if I could find ones that fit.

Eventually, I did, and ran it by Wong. He gave it the stamp of approval, and I spent the rest of the night rewriting those two new points. I think the whole thing was finally ready by 4am, which only left a couple of hours before it hit the front page of Cracked.

After the article ran for about an hour, half of the videos I had embedded in the article were removed from Youtue because of policy violations. Throughout the day, though, I was able to find other versions of the videos from other users, and replace those on the fly throughout the day.

DM: Even though John Dies at the End was written by David Wong, how does it feel to see a character you had a large part in creating [John Cheese] make it to the big screen?

JC: Absolutely surreal. I talk to Chase Williamson (plays David Wong) and Rob Mayes (plays John) through Twitter and Facebook. They're both incredibly nice guys, and they have the same twisted sense of humor as us. So I think it's going to work out well. I really, really wanted to be at Sundance this year (JDatE premiers there this month), and it's an absolutely crushing disappointment that I can't go. I really wanted to meet those guys in person and see how they portrayed the characters. Plus, seeing the movie with my best friend at its premier... it just feels wrong that we can't see that together. But Sundance is one of those festivals that fills up like a year in advance.

DM: Lastly, is there a particular subject or topic on the site you find funnier/more interesting than any other?

JC: I'm a huge wrestling fan, but we don't get to write about it very often. I'd like to do more with the subject, but it's one of those articles that has to be phrased in a way that grabs both the wrestling fans, as well as people who could give a shit less about wrestling.

And there you have it! Much thanks to John for taking the time out of his day to answer my questions. If you have any inquiries of your own, he'll occasionally field them on his Tumblr.

Rant - "All this has happened before, all this will happen again."

2011-08-31T23:50:00.007-04:00

This is going to be unforgivably nerdy.

This month, DC Comics is rebooting nearly all of its titles. Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Action Comics, Detective Comics, Green Lantern et al. will all be reset to #1, as will (presumably) the stories of those depicted in each one’s pages. If I’m to use the hastily improvised analogy of DC as a militarized force, Justice League #1—August 31st—is the forward scout, and the flagship titles set to premiere next Wednesday will make up the first wave. I suppose the new Hawkman will head up the air squadron, though judging by the pang of shame I just felt it seems I’ve taken this metaphor too far.

It’s fair to call this sweeping editorial move unprecedented. While the Ultimate imprint Marvel launched in 2000 reintroduced its characters with revised origins and characteristics, it exists as a parallel continuity, with the “mainstream” Marvel comics and characters continuing to print to this day. And while DC’s 1985 limited series Crisis on Infinite Earths attempted to streamline the continuity (see how long that lasted) it did so without erasing or invalidating the iconic Golden Age of comics, wherein Superman and Batman fought alongside American troops in WWII. Perhaps I need to do a more thorough search, but it seems DC’s decision to hit the reboot button is the ballsiest move in the history of the comic book industry.

Two pertinent questions arise: Why? and Will it Work?

Non-comics readers, being unfamiliar with the DC universe and continuity and all those things people with social lives never have to worry about, might miss the significance of this move. Resetting not just a few but the vast majority of the series in the DCU isn’t just knocking each issue number back to 1. Some of these series have accumulated roughly half a century’s worth of developments, twists and revelations, quite a few with lasting effects: Barbara Gordon, most famously known as Batgirl, has been confined to a wheelchair since being crippled by the Joker in 1988’s The Killing Joke; Superman and Lois Lane have been a married couple since 1996; and let’s not forget all of those who have taken up the mantles of the Green Lantern and the Flash, with the most iconic Lantern, Hal Jordan, having briefly become the supervillain Parallax. Long story short, rebooting the DCU is like paving over the entire history of Coronation Street, but with more explosions.

If you imagine the above set to this music, it's even better.

A lot of readers, me included, are peeved about this to varying degrees. After all, it’s a kick in the nuts to be invested in all these developments and then see them flat out ignored. Personally, I will be saddened to see Dick Grayson, the original Robin, busted back to Nightwing after having been a stellar Batman. Generally speaking, the reboot is a dick move... but I get why DC did it. Green Lantern’s Blackest Night storyarc is an engrossing ride for anyone familiar with the history of the DCU and its denizens but, simultaneously, it must be perplexing to any casual reader. Kind of like The Wire.

"Where's Jason, Joker? Where's Jason?!?"

Unless there’s some way to fill in the reader with every issue (short of directing them to overly long Wikipedia articles), this type of continuity isn’t incredibly appealing to newcomers. In this sense a reboot, like Donne’s Death, is the great equalizer. But, again, this egalitarian practice by its very nature will be aggravating to the existing legions of established fans. In short, it’s a risky business decision, one that will either inspire growth (new readers) or losses (those online who’ve said they’ve cancelled their subscriptions in disgust/exhaustion).

So the Why is out of the way, clearing a path for the second, more important question: is this even going to work?

If I can think of a single good reason to start back at square one, besides the whole not-as-alienating-to-new-readers issue, it’s that DC’s continuity has neither been incredibly consistent nor permanent in its three-quarters of a century run. As previously mentioned, Crisis on Infinite Earths attempted to reconcile contradictory and dated elements that had amassed in the DCU since the mid-1930s. The resulting continuity would be firm, Goddammit!—except it wasn’t. While Babs Gordon may have been spinning about in her wheelchair since ’88, Jason Todd, the second Robin, has been both killed and resurrected in less than two decades. Grant Morrison, otherwise one of the finest writers in the business, spent not one but two storyarcs building up to Bruce Wayne’s supposed death (the first one being ironically titled Batman R.I.P.), only to send the original Bats back to prehistoric times and forcing him to fight his way back to the present. And of course, the DC landscape over the last decade has seen one game-changing crossover follow another, each intended to be more catastrophic than the last. And for what? for Bruce to end up donning the cowl again less than a year before the reboot came into place?

One major problem that has plagued both DC and its main competitor Marvel over the last few decades is a lack of risk and permanence in storytelling. It’s difficult to fear for Bruce Wayne’s life when you know, almost for certain, that he will be brought back within a couple years, max. Comics fans have felt this reassuring but dull certainty since the Man of Steel was resurrected after the much-hyped Death of Superman event. Year after year superheroes and villains have been duking it out on the ground and in the air with powers that would be the envy of several Greek gods and yet it’s only the civilians that seem to stay dead. If I were to write an unstoppable character who had zero chance of dying or even being hurt in any given situation, that would be poor, boring storytelling. DC and Marvel have been doing the same thing, except they’ve had the temerity to say, repeatedly, that these recurring catastrophes will have lasting effects.

And again, I understand. The major comics houses are businesses at their cores and will naturally try to get as much bang for their buck as possible. They’ll do so by building up hype, insinuating that this crossover or the next will be truly climactic, and then leave a few loopholes that will allow for the resurrection of a supposedly dead hero. And they’re going to keep going it because, by God, it fucking works. I’ve read the complaints about this reboot from tons of people online and yet the pre-orders for Justice League #1 are record-breaking. Hell, I’m going to be laying down a pair of toonies for Batman #1 next Wednesday because in spite of my mostly-muted nerd rage I’m still interested to see in how this all goes down.

Nerd rage: if regular rage needed Cialis.

It’s because of these trends that I fear the storytelling won’t necessarily improve, that within a decade we’ll see the same problems and clutter that plagued the DCU in 1985. It happened with Marvel: the Ultimate universe was a sleeker, meaner beast until it was eventually bogged down by character resurrections and world-shattering events. They recently killed off the Ultimate version of Spider-Man, and while they’ve introduced a new character to take up the Webslinger’s role I wonder if they’ll bring back Peter Parker within a couple of years, if only because he’s a more iconic character—see Bruce Wayne, or Hal Jordan, or countless other secret identities throughout the decades.

I could stay cynical, simply accept the cyclical storytelling/business model of modern comics, but Hell, series with truly mortal characters and a clearly defined storyarc do work and are successful, critically and financially. DC has been telling stories like these for two decades through its adult-oriented Vertigo imprint. Sandman, Preacher and Hellblazer are hands down some of the best stories in the medium and it’s not because the characters are allowed to say ‘fuck,’ but because readers can form emotional ties with these characters and truly fear for their continued survival. Similarly, Image’s The Walking Dead is so successful because any of its well-established characters can be killed off, zombified or permanently mutilated at any given moment.

For God's sake, the protagonist has been missing his right hand for over half the series now.

I’m not saying Batman should be held at gunpoint in every issue. But if we’re to believe in his humanity and empathize with his struggles, convince us of his mortality. It might not seem like a good business decision, but history has proven otherwise.

Analysis - Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart"

2011-07-14T16:53:00.018-04:00

Scrolling through my iTunes playlist can be a little odd. It’s an even balance of rock, electronic, jazz, movie soundtracks and some lighter, folky stuff, with a dash of pop or alt country thrown in to taste. I don’t consider myself a connoisseur, at least not on the level of my dad (“Check out this Norwegian saxophonist.”), but I like to think that by this point in my life I’ve acquired a decent musical education.

This post is not about my iTunes library, however; it is, at least, initially, how the alphabetical arrangement of my iTunes library led to the calming strains of Bon Iver’s “Calgary” fading out and being replaced by the opening notes of Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart. But primarily it’s about how the music video for “Total Eclipse” is simultaneously the most inexplicable and awesome short film ever shown on MTV.

Here it is, for initial judgement.

And here, I feel, are some of the most salient points in support of my thesis, arranged in chronological order:

· T-minus 15 seconds: waiting for—in my case, at least—the unskippable video ad to end, my eyes flit down the page and I realize that Bonnie Tyler, Welsh crooner and as close to a one-hit wonder without actually being one, has a frakking YouTube channel.

· 15 seconds: music videos at the height of the MTV era tended toward either the cool (anything by Van Halen) or the awesomely abstract (Talking Heads, Peter Gabriel, etc.), presumably to appeal to youth or wannabe film school students, respectively; director Russel Mulcahy, in this case, wished to capture the niche “Victorian Era-philiac” demographic.

· 16–32 seconds: combination of moonlight, blowing wind, a random dove and a bathrobe-clad lady convince me at least a portion of this video’s footage was taken from an aborted perfume commercial.

· 40 seconds: cue a sullen and creepy looking child, head bowed; debating whether this is Damien or Akira.

· 44 seconds: I’m actually getting more of a “tyrant psychic child from that Twilight Zone” episode vibe.

· 50 seconds: either this house has quite the draft or one of its tenants is a poltergeist.

· 54 seconds: a room full of young men, presumably studying for a test; one gust/poltergeist caress later and BAM, nubile chests.

· 1 minute, 3 seconds: quite literally an angelic child; does this house represent Heaven? and if so why does the ultimate fulfilment of Bonnie Tyler’s hopes and dreams include perilously-clad teenage boys?

· 1 minute, 7 seconds: “FUCK YOU! DOVES!!!”

· 1 minutes, 10 seconds: more nubile young men, this time wearing goggles and Speedos and being doused with water; seriously, it’s like this video was conceptualized by Victor Salva.

· 1 minute, 15 seconds: as Ms. Tyler enters the great hall, we shall try to deconstruct the so far erotic imagery that pervades—holy shit, is that what I think it is?

· 1 minute, 18 seconds: fucking ninjas out of nowhere; who the Hell came up with this video, a pederast or an actual 10-year-old boy?

· 1 minute, 25 seconds: “Gentlemen, to evil!”

· 1 minute, 30–50 seconds: first iteration of the chorus features fencers, acrobats and, at 1:41, what appears to be the Foot Clan.

· 1 minute, 55 seconds: it seems Jedi Master Sifo-Dyas commissioned a clone army from Corey Hart’s genetic code.

· 2 minutes, 14 seconds: I know Bonnie Tyler’s unsettling schoolmistress character has to indulge in the objects of her lust from time to time but seriously, those half-naked football players lack adequate padding.

· 2 minutes, 18 seconds: “Once upon a time I was falling in love, / But now I’m only falling apart;” come to think of it, this video representing Bonnie Tyler’s mental collapse would explain all the hitherto inexplicable shit that has appeared in this video.

· 2 minutes, 35 seconds: normally I would like to avoid snarkiness, but given everything I’ve typed thus far it would appear I crossed that line some time ago; so I’ll just say it: she looks like she’s going to collapse under the weight of her own hair.

· 2 minutes, 58 seconds – 3 minutes, 25 seconds: bridge portion of the song dedicated entirely to more half-naked teenage boys, food fighting and hurricane force winds; it’s like the collapsing dream portions from Inception decades before Inception was even a thing.

· 3 minutes, 28 seconds: oh Jesus Hell there’s an army of the little creepy bastards.

"One of us! One of us!"

· 3 minutes, 30 seconds: Ms. Tyler doesn’t so much belt out the lyrics as emit a high-volume croak; I think she recorded her vocals all in one take without clearing her throat.

· 3 minutes, 32 seconds: ahhhhAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!

· 3 minutes, 50 seconds: it’s like a really gay version of the dance sequence from The Matrix Reloaded.

· 4 minutes, 16 seconds: I’m now convinced these glowey-eyed wunderkinds are the spirits of Bonnie Tyler’s victims, given the way they seem to haunt and crowd her.

· 4 minutes, 31 seconds: yes, Azrael, enfold her in your wings and end this madness; reap, I tell you, reap!

· 4 minutes, 50 seconds: daylight, now; Ms. Tyler seems to be congratulating her students/boarders upon their graduation; both a joyous and solemn moment, for while they enter the adult world they never knew how much they figured into her nightly fantasies.

· 5 minutes, 5 seconds: handshake lingers for a little too long; was there something “special” between her and this particular student orJESUS CHRIST!

· 5 minutes: 20 seconds: look at her bemused expression as they file past her; they know, Bonnie, they know.

And that’s it. The music video for “Total Eclipse of the Heart” is the demon offspring of a Harlequin romance novel, a horror flick and some man (or woman’s) paedophilic fantasies. In other words, it is the greatest music video ever made.

EDIT: I was pondering this post and the dissected video on my evening walk and realized that while I had accused the video's conceptual artist of borderline paedophilia for the sake of humour, it is actually only through these accusations that the video make a lick of sense.

Think about it: Bonnie Tyler plays some Mary Kay Letourneau-esque headmistress for an all boys boarding school who constantly fantasizes about her student body, with the bulk of the video taking place in a dream (seems my Inception comparison wasn't too far off). The children with the illuminated eyes are, perhaps, those she has physically taken advantage of, and the reason they seem to torment her is actually a manifestation of her subconscious guilt. In the end, during the waking hours, she sees them off into the world, only to notice one of her students has the glowing eyes seen in her dreams, with the others singing the song's lyrics in a detached, haunting fashion. Has her subconscious guilt seeped into the real world, resulting in insanity?

I'm honestly not intending to poke fun at the notion of taking advantage of children. This is just seriously the only way of making any sense of the music video. Intentionally or unintentionally, and in spite of its cheesy aspects, "Total Eclipse of the Heart" is actually one of the darkest and sophisticated videos of the MTV era.

Review - The King of Limbs

2011-02-18T19:59:00.000-05:00

Written and Performed by Radiohead

Produced by Nigel Godrich

Released under Ticker Tape

I woke up at 5:50 Monday morning with three journal entries due for 11:30 and my system still incredibly fatigued from little sleep. Yet by six I had been jarred awake—not by coffee or a similar stimulant, mind you, but by the completely unexpected announcement of a new Radiohead album to be released later in the week.

It’s a rare occasion to find oneself on the same footing as most major music publications, and let me tell you it’s strangely refreshing.

Released a day earlier than planned, The King of Limbs is the latest entry in Radiohead’s discography. It’s a short record, eight tracks topping out at less than forty minutes, but it shouldn’t be dismissed as a rush job or overloaded EP.

The opener, “Bloom,” sets the stage with an array of electronic loops structured around an unbalanced drum cascade, Thom Yorke’s unusually rich vocals adding something of a haunting, even warning, effect.

The following three tracks—“Morning Mr Magpie,” “Little by Little” and “Feral”—are similarly layered and busy. The first two combine the familiar guitar work of Jonny Greenwood and Ed O’Brien, the last is harsh and somewhat tuneless but manages to augment the middle of the album with a sense of danger. I imagine “Magpie” and “Little” striking a chord with fans of Hail to the Thief, being rough and a little rambunctious, though the former bears some resemblance to Yorke’s solo piece “The Clock.”

“Lotus Flower” signals a shift in the album’s tone and construction from frenetic and elaborate to subdued and minimalist. Driven by a trip-hoppy drum rhythm, this fifth track sounds like Radiohead channelling Massive Attack. “Lotus” is a lot like “Idioteque” off of Kid A in its tight construction and the fact that it actually makes me want to dance. It’s the album highlight and a single if there ever was one.

And then we come to “Codex;” lovely, lovely “Codex.” Like Trent Reznor, Yorke is able to produce magic any and every time he sits down at a piano. While it’s somewhat of a mournful dirge, the song is nevertheless proof of how Radiohead can do so much with so little.

And this king, with his many limbs, comes to a close with “Give Up the Ghost” and “Separator.” Both are fairly relaxing, the acoustic guitar riff of “Ghost” reminding me of “Go to Sleep” on barbiturates. “Separator,” however, is an oddball: though tightly constructed, it lacks the oomph or resolution of Radiohead’s other closing tracks. “Separator” is too fast-paced, too upbeat, and has too little at stake to properly end The King of Limbs. If anything, it sounds like it should belong on the first side of In Rainbows, fitting in well with the likes of “Weird Fish/Arpeggi.”

Having listened to the album a remarkable number of times today (honestly, probably 10 iterations), I’m reminded not of previous Radiohead albums but Talking Heads’ Remain in Light, fast-paced and heavily layered pieces in the first half giving way to restraint and experimentation. And like that seminal record, The King of Limbs ends on somewhat of a weak note. It’s a fine record, without a doubt, but in some need of rearrangement. Even something as simple as switching “Codex” and “Separator” could rectify this issue. It’s a holistic concern, one that doesn’t devalue the individual songs, but the end result is a fine, danceable record that leaves its listener waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Review - Ravenna Gets

2011-01-25T21:11:00.001-05:00

Written by Tony Burgess

Published by Anvil Press

A story:

A person—who they are, what they do, what cares and woes they may have are all irrelevant—goes about their daily business, maybe slacks off, maybe quibbles with another, and is then suddenly and horribly slaughtered.

Rinse and repeat and the final product is Tony Burgess' Ravenna Gets.

It's a slim, if horrific, work, less than a hundred pages and not structured in any fashion befitting of the term "novella." Even "short story collection" doesn't quite describe it.

Set for the most part in the small Ontario community of Collingwood, Ravenna Gets is a series of short vignettes depicting the final moments in the lives of some of the town’s residents. Shut-in, babysitter, by-law officer and small child find morbid common ground in their brutal murders at the hands of the neighbouring community of Ravenna.

This rash of violence remains unexplained for the duration of the story, the final chapter—its final line, even—revealing nothing akin to motive. The small-scale genocide that plagues Collingwood is as arbitrary as it is uncompromising.

Where the compilation lacks reason it certainly makes up for in rhyme, so formulaic it could be the output of a mathematical function rather than the offspring of creativity. Its individual stories are slices of life, scenarios beginning in medias res and ending with the same quantity of exposition with which they began. Burgess includes names and professions for the afflicted characters, but whatever potential empathy these could provide is quickly eradicated with a swipe of an axe or blast of a shotgun.

Perhaps Ravenna Gets is an experiment, albeit it an incredibly gory one. Burgess attempts and manages to top every successive act of murder with each vignette, the apex being the truly disturbing death of an obese pervert at the hands of his borderline invalid mother. Yet through the blood and entrails—and believe me, there are entrails—we see little indication of what purpose, if any, this experiment is supposed to have. It’s an exercise in method, one certainly wielding results, but no clear conclusions can be drawn.

The book’s synopsis perhaps provides some kind of answer, it being more informative than the compendium’s own contents: “There is one thing missing, however, as the bodies fall from what might have been better stories, better novels, and it’s this: everything.” I agree, but if there’s anything constructive in this overarching absence I can’t see it.

While the idea of a rifle’s shot as analogue to an editor’s rejection stamp may be an interesting one, the novelty wears off after the third or fourth iteration. Surprise is replaced by shock, is replaced by a sort of twisted amusement, and finally by boredom. Certain elements of storytelling can work as a guessing game; wondering in which way a child will soon be butchered certainly isn’t one of them.

2010: A Cinematical Retrospective

2010-12-31T17:13:00.000-05:00

Oh hello,

I'm just sitting at a six-years obsolete computer, drinking coffee, firing off emails, and generally slacking off on my last day of 2010 (pronounced "twenty-ten," because it sounds more futuristic and therefore awesome). And seeing as I have just over 12 hours of free time before I have to start committing to my New Year's resolution--whatever that may be--I figure it wouldn't hurt to rattle off my lists of whatever burned down the (movie) house this year. Beware of spoilers, naturally.

So, without further ado:

The Five Best Films of 2010:

5.) Black Swan, Directed by Darren Aronofsky

A confession: despite being hailed as a seminal work of body horror, David Cronenberg's The Fly never made me cringe. I love it, of course, but certain celebrated sequences like Jeff Goldblum pulling his own fingernails off didn't have the effect on me as it does with most others I've spoken with on the subject of that movie. Actually, until Black Swan I never thought anything related to fingernail removal--sans yours truly doing the actual physical act--would make be squeamish. Thanks, Aronofsky. Though marketed as a psychological thriller--which it certainly is, no doubt--Black Swan is also body horror at its finest. I never considered the twisted, even contortionist nature of ballet until seeing this film, and that notion will probably be in my mind for long afterward.

4.) Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Directed by Edgar Wright

Edgar Wright's third feature film, an adaptation of Toronto comic artist Bryan Lee O'Malley's series, was probably too idiosyncratic to win over a large audience, hence its box office bombing, but it's an incredibly endearing flick, essentially a musical with over-the-top fight sequences instead of song-and-dance numbers, and one that both trashes and embraces indie/nerd culture. Michael Cera steps out of his comfort zone and plays a character that, at least for part of the flick, has some actual cajones, lending to some chuckle worthy moments (e.g. leaping off his couch to accuse Brandon Routh of being a "cocky cock!!!"). Extra kudos to Kieran Culkin for pulling off one of the few casually gay characters in Hollywood, and to Ellen Wong for being both cute and terrifying.

3.) The Social Network, Directed by David Fincher

If you told me a year ago that one of my favourite movies of 2010 would have been the story of Facebook, I might have laughed in your face--which is saying something, considering I much prefer to laugh at myself. Granted, I wasn't even on the titular social network at that time, but I couldn't possibly see how a movie about a website would make much sense; it was too soon, if nothing else. But then I heard David Fincher, one of the best directors of the past two decades, was at the helm, and then I learned the one-man-band himself Trent Reznor was scoring the film, I was intrigued. It was the theatrical trailer, a montage of intense conversational snippets set to an unsettling choral rendition of Radiohead's "Creep," that convinced me this movie would be of the utmost quality. The Social Network has nearly everything I look for in a movie: engrossing dialogue, an against-the-grain musical score, and--this is going to sound cliche--star-making performances from Jesse Eisenberg and Andrew Garfield. Also, you know Justin Timberlake's made it as an actor when you don't remember he was once in N'Sync until partway through the end credits.

2.) The Town, Directed by Ben Affleck

I was pleased after first seeing The Town. I felt it was a great film, though maybe not as good as Affleck's 2007 directorial debut Gone Baby Gone. It was Heat, albeit set in Boston and with fewer characters, a solid heist thriller that wasn't as introspective as that other film but definitely worth a purchase. But rewatching it at home, specifically Alffeck's nearly half hour-longer cut, I truly appreciated The Town in all of its intricacies. I haven't read Prince of Thieves, Chuck Hogan's novel upon which this film is based, so I don't know how much of the dialogue was adapted verbatim, paraphrased, or added, but the movie's conversations have a genuine rhythm, brought to life by the regional accents donned by Affleck and most of the primary cast. On top of that you have solid performances by all of the leads, especially Jeremy Renner as Jem Coughlin, taking the otherwise tired "loose cannon" archetype and making something likeable and strangely humorous out of it. Affleck takes the cake, though. Ever since seeing Chasing Amy, I've asserted that the guy has the proper acting chops, provided he has good direction. In 1997, said direction was Kevin Smith's. Now it's his own, and he anchors the movie without it seeming like a vanity project.

1.) Inception, Directed by Christopher Nolan

This took a lot of consideration. Though Inception thrilled me--and has continued to thrill me since--the moment I walked out of the theatre, I've frequently wondered if I just got sucked in by the hype. For all the--hopefully not wasted--hours I invest in pondering the themes and craft of certain movies, I nevertheless get swept up by their more emotional aspects, my appreciation of a certain movie perhaps fueled by adrenaline and maybe not perceived in an objective light. However, watching Inception in my dad's intimidating home theatre, I concluded that it was, even if by a close margin, my favourite film of the year, one that is both philosophically ponderous and intensely emotional--what The Matrix could have been. This movie consumed a decade of Chris Nolan's life, and it shows. Nolan leaves much up to interpretation without it seeming like he doesn't know the answers to his own questions, and you have a great cast all around. I could go on and praise Inception in all its aspects but that would require another blog post entirely, so I'll just leave you with see this damn movie.

The Three Best Performances of 2010:

3.) The Social Network--Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg

If Eisenberg's performance secures Best Actor award at the Oscars, it will not be for, as Brokeback Mountain author Annie Proulx once accused, an act of mimicry. Eisenberg's Zuckerberg is only like the real man insofar as general appearance and a sense of detachment. The real Zuckerberg, as I've seen in numerous videos, comes off as an unassuming nerd out of his element. What Eisenberg loses in accuracy he makes up for with intensity and some of the most articulate wordplay I've heard in years. He's the ultimate spurned geek, a strangely intimidating mixture of envy, indignation and, even, suppressed rage. His best, and simultaneously most hilarious and chilling moment, comes during a deposition scene when he declares his accusers to be incompetent, even idiots, accented with "Did I adequately answer your condescending question?" I will not be surprised if this clip accompanies the mention of his name at the Oscars this year.

2.) Shutter Island--Leonardo DiCaprio as Teddy Daniels

I was eight when James Cameron's Titanic hit theatres and, repulsed by it's super-sappy tone, I declared my eternal contempt for anyone involved in its production, including leads Leo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. Thirteen years later, I count both of them among my favourite actors, DiCaprio having first entranced me during his performance as a South African smuggler in Blood Diamond, and won me over as the pesky but likeable Billy Costigan in The Departed. With Shutter Island, he's put in a performance I feel is worth of Best Actor. His take on Daniels is verbal and intense, which some might regard as annoying, even overacting, but I genuinely enjoy seeing characters pushed to their absolute limits, as Daniels is during the course of the film. One wonderful moment sees him effectively intimidating a violent mental patient through pencil scratches, quiet accusations and an unbroken stare--grating even on my nerves. Shutter Island, both Lehane's novel and Scorsese's adaptation, are certainly not the first to use the twist ending that has drawn some derision, but both were wise to imbue the affected character with as much emotional resonance as possible, which Leo portrays wonderfully.

1.) Black Swan--Natalie Portman as Nina Sayers

It's funny, but Natalie Portman's first critically acclaimed role, that of young, wannabe hitman Mathilda in Léon, is in some ways the inverse of the performance that nabbed the top spot on my list a decade and a half later. Her Mathilda was wise beyond her years, opposite the emotionally retarded title character played by Jean Reno, and possessed all the attributes that came with such wisdom: adaptability, a--naturally unsettling--sexuality and even a kind of death wish that, understandably, doesn't quite often accompany child roles. On the flip side, Nina Sayers is very much a child: virginal, unassuming and, for most of the film, an island of innocence. Metamorphosis is a central theme of Black Swan, be it transforming from child to adult, obedience to rebellion, or White Swan to Black Swan, and Portman engages in each one of these transformations, with Sayers not merely playing but becoming the title character in the film's final moments. But so far I've only described one side of the role. Portman's performance is also intensely physical, dancing all but the most complex moves, all the while horrified by the--imagined?--changes her body endures throughout. I'm putting my--metaphorical, of course--money forward for her winning Best Actress this year.

The Three Best Soundtracks of 2010:

3.) Shutter Island--Various, Arranged by Robbie Robertson

Shutter Island lacks a traditional score, with Robertson (of The Band!) assembling a cohesive compilation from various 20th century composers, including some abstract and experimental works by John Cage and Nam Jun Paik.

2.) Tron: Legacy--Daft Punk

Tron: Legacy was a pleasant surprise, a fun, well-crafted flick featuring Jeff Bridges as, as best as I can describe, a stoned cyber-wizard. But it's major appeal was the Daft Punk-scored soundtrack, one that is both a throwback to 80s electronica--tell me you can't hear a little bit of Blade Runner--and enjoyable even without the nostalgia factor. So kudos to everybody's French electronic duo, for composing one of the few movie scores with a house beat.

1.) The Social Network--Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

I own all the major Nine Inch Nails releases, have seen NIN perform live, and regard The Fragile as the soundtrack to my life, so I might be biased when I say there was no way in Hell the score to a David Fincher movie composed by Trent Reznor wouldn't be the best this year. And it is. Reznor and Ross draw from their work on the NIN instrumental-only album, Ghosts I-IV, at one point sampling "35 Ghosts IV" as "A Familiar Taste," and the end result is a paradoxically organic and industrial soundscape. Reznor and Ross' work underscores many of the scenes with ambient unease, even if it's as something as mundane as a deposition hearing. Choice tracks include "In Motion," a piece that hearkens back to the earlier days of video games, and "The Gentle Hum of Anxiety," with what is possibly the most self-explanatory song title in the history of music.

The Five Best Cinematic Moments of 2010:

5.) The Town--Jem Coughlin's Standoff

The last stand of James "Jem" Coughlin in Ben Affleck's crime drama reminds me of nearly every time I've had a go at any game in the Grand Theft Auto series: surrounded by the fuzz, low on ammo, and having committed some serious felonies. Which is not to say that Jem's blaze of glory is some adolescent power fantasy put to celluloid. Rather, it's an intense, darkly hilarious climax that hits all the right notes: he chases Jon Hamm's FBI Agent Frawley around a car, firing his Tec-9 wildly; when cornered behind a newspaper box and ordered to throw down his weapon, he pauses and responds with a distant, mostly off-camera "Fack you;" and when he realizes the jig is up, he gulps down a half-empty cup of Coke lying nearby before shouting "I SURRENDER!!!", rising with both guns ready to fire. He's dead before he hits the ground, the violence over so quickly it's hard to process.

4.) Black Swan--The Swan Lake Performance

The climax to Darren Aronofsky's psychological thriller takes place over the four acts of Tchaikovsky's famous ballet. Though understandably compressed, this performance can be appreciated even by itself: wonderfully choreographed and shot, immersing me in the rhythm and flow of the ballet. It embodied the film's tone, a blend of terror and grace, and I could hardly breathe for its duration--though maybe this was because the laptop playing the film was resting on my chest. Still, magnificent.

3.) Scott Pilgrim vs. The World--"Launchpad McQuack"

Edgar Wright's adaptation goes from quirky dialogue comedy to an in-your-face musical-with-fistfights within the first five minutes, the whole film shifting gears without a clutch (a largely outdated, but still satisfying, idiom) as Alison Pill as Kim Pine screams "WE ARE SEX BOB-OMB!! ONE! TWO!! THREE!!! FOUR!!!!" and the best theme song of the year blasts into sonic existence. The ensuing pull-back shot, accompanied by Mark Webber's muffled vocals and the film's retro aesthetic title, amps up the adrenaline and you're quickly plunged into the frenetic, possibly seizure-inducing opening titles. It's strange saying this, but I've never enjoyed opening titles as much as I have with this movie.

2.) Shutter Island--Teddy's Second Dream

When watching movies, I often look for moments of pure cinema--that is, when all the elements of filmmaking (acting, writing, cinematography, sound, editing and direction) come together in a wonderfully holistic fashion. Scorsese, being a master of all things awesome, crafted such a moment in Shutter Island as Teddy Daniels slips into his second dream of the film, a rather Lynchian scene taking place largely in snowswept Dachau, underscored by John Cage's "Root of an Unfocus." Since watching this sequence, I can no longer tolerate listening to that jarring piece late at night.

1.) Inception--The Rotating Hallway

In 1968, Stanley Kubrick used a slowly rotating set, complete with fixed camera, to bring the artificial gravity centrifuge of the Discovery to life in 2001: A Space Odyssey--to date one of the most impressive practical effects in film history. Christopher Nolan took it a step further in Inception by having former-child-star-turned-badass Joseph Gordon-Levitt duke it out with a stuntman as the hallway set turned on its axis. The sequence was one of the few to have me physically thrashing about in my seat in amazement, professing my love for Chris Nolan. Since the movie's theatrical release, I've probably watched that scene in particular ten times as much as the whole film itself, and it still blows me away for the same reason: when Christopher Nolan needs to create the impression that an environment is spinning on its axis, he does exactly that. Counter-intuitive, really. Oh, and one more thing: Best. Fight scene. Ever.

Well, that's out of the way. Here's looking at a fine 2011, folks!

Saturday: An Ottawa Story - Twelve

2010-11-20T23:10:00.002-05:00

12.

Dinner had just taken a potentially disastrous turn, although only one of its five participants were aware of this fact.

As well, "just" was debatable, as David was certain the stimulant now coursing through Richard's body like cholesterol in a fat guy's bloodstream had almost certainly been in the man's system for an hour. To add insult to injury, its effects were so glaringly obvious David was shocked he hadn't noticed it until mere seconds ago. Richard's face was flush, his cheeks flooding with red and sweat beading on his brow, and his friend thought it very unlikely that the paprika Alex had sprinkled over the potatoes could provoke such a physical reaction.

The host hid his alarm with a swig of wine, sneaking a glance at his wife as the stem of the glass partially obscured his widened eyes. Alex, evidently, seemed unperturbed--or at least no more so than when submitted to Richard's usual behaviour. A small part of him wanted to alert her to Richard's perilous condition, but a larger, arguably more practical part thought it a questionable move to broach, however subtly, the subject of drug abuse at the dinner table.

Instead, he refocused his gaze on Richard, who was now approximately a minute into his latest disorganized rant, this one dedicated to the subject of whichever drunken escapade he and some of his hockey teammates had embarked upon.

" . . . which is why we now call him Wallaby," he finished.

"Really?" Alice intoned.

"Yes really. An accomplished Friday if there ever was one." Chuckling, he gulped back his entire glass of shiraz, oblivious as kernel-sized droplets of sweat fell into the emptying goblet, his perspiration diluting the wine with each successive sip--though this wasn't lost on Alyssa, who had grown increasingly wary of Richard's eccentricities over the last few minutes. Intrigued, as well.

"I've been told that you teach, Richard," she said.

"This . . . is true." This response more resembled a groan than an actual verbal response.

"Whereabouts?" She sawed a potato in half, eyes on Richard's fingers as they now massaged his left bicep through his sweater.

"Uh, fuck . . . " He trailed off, his hazy vision attempting to focus on the bottle of wine in the centre of the table.

"Come again?" Alyssa prodded.

David coughed and, hoping his aim was true, thrust one of his feet forward. Richard immediately yelped, a jarring mixture of pain and surprise so sudden Alice dropped her fork.

"Oh, shit, sorry. Glebe Collegiate." The curve of his chest puffed and sunk, Richard now visibly panting; at some point between yelping and resuming his increasingly disorganized pattern he seemed to have forgotten how to breathe through his nose. "History. Occasionally English."

An uncomfortable silence descended upon the dining room's occupants, this conversational vacuum peppered only by Richard's hoarse breathing that, to David's ears, sounded less like a functioning respiratory system and more like an fevered volleyball game between the Intense Inhalers and the Exhaling Experts. He couldn't guess which side would upset the other but figured it wouldn't be a crowd-pleaser.

Unsurprisingly, it took Alice to break the silence. "Rick, are you alright?"

The teacher stiffened in his chair, tilted his head as if though he gave the subject some thought, and answered: "Have you ever heard of the Battle of Okinawa?"

David quickly rose, discreetly wiping his mouth with a napkin and starting to circle the table. "I think it's best if Richard got some fresh air." First gingerly, then with a jerk, he pried the nearly-rigid Richard out of his chair and started to lead him toward the front door.

"Dave . . . " Alex began.

"He's been cooped up inside today, is all." Flashing one last grin, he turned on a dime and shoved Richard headlong out the front door. With a wave, he added, "Be back shortly."

He slammed the door behind himself so hard the light fixture hanging above the table shook, briefly casting shadows across the equally bemused looks on the sister's faces. The eldest cleared her throat; her middle sibling poked absently at the potatoes on her plate; the youngest swished her glass.

"Dave knows some interesting characters," Alyssa commented.

"Mhmm." Alex didn't really feel like saying much of anything at the moment, let alone properly explaining their guest's sudden affliction and departure.

"I will admit," Alice began, "Kind of cute."

She drank as the others stared.

* * *

On the porch:

Richard stumbled, the sound of the door being slammed shut so powerful it sent a wave of pain through his skull. "Ah, fuck, was that really necessary?"

"No, probably not," David replied, brushing his hair with his hand. "But maybe this hand." And with that he delivered an open-palm slap to Richard's face. The other man stopped straight in his tracks and, as if his entire body was broadcasting with natural satellite delay, fell back onto the couch four or five seconds after the fact, one hand lightly dabbing at his assaulted cheek.

"The fuck? . . . " he groaned. "That really hurt."

David nodded, rolling his head about to work out a kink that had been building in his neck during dinner. "Kind of the idea."

Creases formed on Richard's forehead and he tried to drag himself up off the couch. "You son of a--" He slipped, falling back on the seat with a huff.

"Don't hurt yourself, it really isn't worth it at this point." David rubbed his hands together, in particular caressing the palm with which he had struck his friend. "Ouch," he winced, "that kind of stings."

Richard threw up his hands in exasperation. "See?" Grunting primally, he pitifully attempted to straighten himself in his seat, only to discover his limbs were being uncooperative. "This . . . this is problematic."

"Quite possibly." The other man wrung his wrist and gestured for his friend to scoot over, gently lowering himself onto the chesterfield once enough space was available. "Richard, Richard, Richard," he said. "What are we going to do with you?"

Rick looked up, cautiously regarding his friend. "You aren't mad?"

"I was, but I'm pretty sure I used it all up with that slap." Try as he might, the burning tingle in his palm just wasn't going away. "Jesus, is it supposed to feel like that?"

"You've got to snap your wrist," Richard explained, demonstrating with his own hand. "Snap, then slap. Snap, then slap." He caught himself rocking back in forth in time with his cadence. David looked at him with pity.

"You need help."

"I will admit I've made some poor decisions lately," Richard said weakly.

"I'll take 'Understatement of the Century' for $500."

"Ha, ha, very funny."

"Well, let's consider the facts." He started to count off on his fingers. "You cheated on your girlfriend--"

"--Admittedly a bad move--"

"--brought drugs into my house--"

"--again, sorry--"

"--consumed these drugs at an alarming rate--"

"--truly--"

"--and nearly had a heart attack at dinner. Not quite a champ move."

Richard held up a finger in protest. "Still, I'm going to be a conversation topic for years to come."

"No," David corrected, his tone stern. "Your death will be a conversation topic, because that's what's going to happen if you stop this shit very, very soon."

Richard waved him off. "Ahhhhhh, fuck off."

"Hey," David said, "Psssshaw all you want, doesn't make it less true. I could go on about how you're being way too irresponsible for someone of your position, but I'd just be pussyfooting around the larger issue."

"Which is?" Richard asked innocently.

David was dumbfounded, so much so he had to bite his tongue lest he fly off the rails. "'Which is?' You're a Goddamned train wreck."

"People slip up," Richard argued, a little weakly this time.

"Nice try. I'd list all the reasons how and why but I'd just be repeating every thing I've told you since 9:30 this morning." He sighed, stood up, brushed off his lap. "Quite honestly, I'm this close to not giving a shit anymore."

"Hey, just wait a minute . . . " Richard touched his friend's arm, was shrugged off.

Hand on the doorknob, David looked his friend in the eye. "I'm not going to waste an extra minute of my time chastising somebody so deluded they don't realize they've done something wrong." He twisted the handle. "I've done enough of that already."

And before Richard could say another word, his friend had stepped over the threshold and shut the door in his wake. His body still tensed from the effects of the drug, he attempted to maneuver into a more comfortable position, failed, submitted to gravity, letting his head loll against the padding of the seat back.

The rustle of metal against wood to his right. He turned to see David poke his head out the door, his expression neutral.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," Richard replied.

David nodded slightly. "Your bag." He dropped the beaten overnight satchel onto the front porch, throwing up the dust that had settled into the welcome mat. With that, he retreated into his home once more.

Richard, left with no other option or aid, remained as he was, contemplating his satchel in the day's dying light.

Saturday: An Ottawa Story - Eleven

2010-11-13T20:38:00.001-05:00

11.

A brief introduction to Alex's sisters:

Alex's parents, the Prochnows, were an active couple, and fertile to say the least, the three girls having each been born within a year of one another. David's late in-laws were also quite insane--or so Alex had deduced in her early teens, noticing the painfully alliterative similarity between her name and those of her sisters, Alice and Alyssa.

Taken by themselves, these monikers were mundane, even pretty. But with the three sisters a grade apart in that acme of childhood cruelty known as elementary school, Alex quickly realized it probably wasn't a good idea to name one's children after reading a baby names book on acid which, she also deduced, her parents very likely did.

Alice evidently hadn't let up on her verbal barrage during the five hour drive between Toronto and Ottawa--Alyssa's beleaguered expression testifying to this. Alex caught sight of what looked like a fresh wrinkle in the corner of her older sister's eye as they leaned in to hug.

"Long drive?" she asked, tilting her head to the side and lightening her voice in order to convey as much sympathy as she could muster for her older sister.

Alyssa chuckled, a forced guffaw if there ever was one. "The T.O.-Cobourg stretch wasn't too bad," she said below her breath, casting a cautious eye as her littlest sister besieged David with the unfiltered stream-of-consciousness narrative of her life. "But once we hit Belleville I would have strangled a child just to get out of that car."

"Cruel, but I get the idea," Alex commented, reaching for Alyssa's overnight bag and feeling every tendon in her body groan in protest. She figured the major hurdles of the day had been successful leapt over and left in the dust, what with dinner nearly prepared and anything and everything Rick-related taken care of, but something said otherwise--intuition, superstition or even plain, simple cynicism, it didn't matter, just that something was off.

She found her trading glances with David as he shared a half-hearted embrace with Alice. The brief look she caught in his eye was similarly beaten. She beamed lightly at him, in spite of the day's events, and saw her muted gesture was reciprocated.

"So, Alice tells me you have another guest? . . . " Alyssa began. Her voice, laced with a nearly homogenous mixture of apprehension and discomfort, suggested Alice had told her exactly who it was.

"Oh, yeah, Richard," Alex said, a little apologetically.

"Oh, yeah, him."

Alex shrugged. "He showed up this morning, kind of imposed a little," she elaborated.

"Well, I suppose it'll be nice to catch up with him," Alyssa sighed.

"Really?"

"Actually that was flagrant sarcasm."

"Yeah, I should have guessed," Alex said, wincing. Her spirits lightened a little, seeing Alyssa tip her head to the side in a sort of "well, what can you do?" fashion, but nevertheless she sensed her ominous feelings were already starting to be justified--and it wasn't even 5:30.

Taking Alyssa's coat, Alex snaked past her elder sister, muttering a barely-audible "Sorry" and went to retrieve Alice's leather trench coat as well.

"I'll take that for you--" She turned her head sharply to look David in the eye. "--Hey, help me grab something from the kitchen."

And, like that, she was away, leaving David and Alice in a mutual state of mild bewilderment. A few seconds passed, and David raised a finger and slipped off to the kitchen without a word. For once, Alice was speechless.

He found Alex leaning over the range, feigning checking on the potatoes in case either sister became too inquisitive--a likelihood, seeing as both had been left suddenly by themselves in the foyer. David sauntered up to his fairer half, waved at Alice (who was now peering curiously from her spot next to the staircase) and lowered his voice to little more than a whisper. "Um, what?"

"How's Rick shaping up?" she asked, keeping her attention focused on the potatoes for reasons that, like her current sense of foreboding, that weren't entirely clear to her.

"Fine, I guess. Why?"

"Did you talk to him about . . . " Again, she shot a careful look over her husband's shoulder, assuring that neither Alyssa nor Alice were close enough to listen in. ". . . you know, that."

"I've been talking to him nearly all day about that but, yeah, sure."

"I mean, how clear is he on the being-a-respectable-human-being part?"

David thought about the exchange in the basement minutes before, mentally noting his friend's dampened mood and all the little idiosyncrasies that went with it. "He seemed, hmm, on another wavelength, maybe a little more moody." Yeah, he thought, that seemed about right. "Maybe what we said actually got to him for once in his life."

"You sure?" she asked earnestly.

"Yeah, yeah," he asserted, nodding. "Well, I assume so."

"You assume?"

"Hey, he wasn't acting like he normally does, so by all accounts that's a good thing--"

A sudden rush of air, swiftly followed by the crack of a brass doorknob against the wall. They both pivoted to catch sight of Richard standing on the threshold of the basement entrance, leaning against the door in what he assumed was a casual manner, though his face, contorted into a murderous-deer-in-headlights facade, betrayed his new, alleviated mood.

"Lady, gentleman," he said. "Are we going to begin with the festivities?"

Once again, husband and wife traded glances.

"'Another wavelength'?" she asked.

"Yeah, t'would seem so," he replied.

Richard twirled his arms windmill-style, then gestured toward the foyer entrance. "Guests?"

David nodded weakly.

"Fuckin' a!" He started off toward the staircase and the women adjacent to it, creeping forward in an unsettling half-walk, half-dance. He abandoned the couple to stew in their own bemusement.

"Huh," David said.

* * *

In hindsight, David felt dinner could have gone better.

The five of them crowded around the dining room table--a small yet strangely dignified piece, a recent layer of varnish cutting twenty or thirty years from its (considerable) age. As Alice sat down next to Alice (optimum gabbing distance, of course), Richard silently dropped into the seat on her right, Richard quietly noting this with some amusement.

Wine was poured, bread was broken, all the little pleasantries exchanged. And, obviously, food was enjoyed--a simple but rich course of prime rib, greens and the aforementioned boiled potatoes. In short, all the requirements for hosting a successful dinner party were met.

At least until Richard opened his mouth.

"So," he began, looking first at Alyssa, then Alice, "I heard you two were bridesmaids at Dave and Alex's wedding."

"You heard?" Alyssa replied, her voice flat and devoid of enthusiasm.

"Yeah, earlier today," he said through the whole potato currently in his mouth.

"Were you at the wedding?" Alice, this time.

"Shit yeah. Best fucking man!"

Alex downed half of her glass of shiraz.

David coughed, correcting his friend: "Just an usher."

"Oh, my mistake. Fuck me, these potatoes are good."

"Mmm-hmmmm," groaned David.

Alice pivoted toward Richard. "But weren't you? I mean, you did that speech."

Oh no, David thought. He emulated his wife's sudden wine consumption.

"Shit yeah!" Richard popped a green bean into his mouth, continued his spiel whilst chewing. "You know, the others--some of those other cocks wearing tuxes--they didn't think I should do one, what with me not being the best man, and all that, but Dave was--and still is--the fucking man, so he was all like, 'Dude, speak,' and I was all like, 'Bitch I'm gonna' sermonized like you never heard'."

He flopped back into his chair, having risen slightly from the seat while rambling on. He speared a clump of beans with his fork and brought the utensil to his mouth, Alyssa regarding him with what David realized in retrospect was muted fear. "Alex, my commendations: these are some great Goddamn beans."

She swished her glass in thanks and hid her quickly advancing aggravation with her own forkful of beans. "Couldn't have said it better myself."

Richard's face twisted into a frightful, clownish approximation of a grin, rubbing his nose like a child with a cold. Alyssa shifted her chair an inch or two away from his.

After a moment, David contributed. "I don't remember that," he said to his friend.

Richard perked up, the tip of one green bean sticking out from between his teeth. "Come again?"

"That stuff, at the wedding party--me allowing you to speak even though you weren't best man, all that--I never said that. Any of it."

"Fuck off, I had to have."

"Maybe you did, I didn't." Dave looked at Alice. "I didn't bar anyone from speaking at the wedding. Believe it or not, your brother-in-law isn't as big a dick as you might think."

"But he said the others wouldn't let him," she pointed out.

David nodded. "This is true. But not because of any rules we had instated." No, it was more because of the two glasses of merlot and the six bottles of beer Rick had drank prior to his groggily standing up at the wedding party table, wailing on a glass with his spoon and devoid of any sense of rhythm or volume. Come to think of it, the best men and remaining ushers had something going with their whole prevent-Richard-from-speaking-while-trashed policy.

"Yeah, what a bunch of stuck-up jackasses."

"Indeed. What kind of horrible people would stop you from talking?" Alyssa asked drolly.

"Exactly!" Once again, he had to sit back down. Collecting himself, he ran a hand through his hair once, twice, three times. "Shit, that's some great conditioner you have up there, Alex. My head feels like a baby chick."

Interested, Alice's hand left her fork and reached for Richard's head, but a sharp glance from Alyssa stopped her.

"Ahhhhhh, party pooper," he lightly chastised before stuffing a chunk of meet in his mouth. As Richard munched away, David noticed his friend kept massaging his scalp, fingers absentmindedly moving down his face, a dim smile forming.

The Hell? David thought. The bastard acted like he had chickenpox, scratching and rubbing the way he did. Reddened knuckles chafed nostrils, finger nails left the briefest of divots on his lips . . .

And like that, clarity: Richard's mannerisms, oral deluge and disposition explained in one fell swoop. Suddenly, David knew exactly how his friend had disposed of the cocaine.

Palms? Meet face.

Saturday: An Ottawa Story - Ten

2010-11-06T23:07:00.001-04:00

Evening

10.

In and around 5PM David descended the basement stairs to find Richard tooling around at the computer, his leg jiggling as though it belonged to a rabbit with ADHD. The wayward schoolteacher had multiple tabs open on the web browser, alternating between flipping through Facebook, performing various Google searches of--David hoped--an innocent nature and, oddly, looking at a long-range weather forecast. He turned with a start as one of the lower stairs creaked with David's weight.

"Oh, yo," Richard said, his voice having taken on a distracted tone despite his jumpiness seconds earlier. As he hadn't packed for a nice, sit-down meal, Richard was garbed in one of David's old sweaters, a navy blue piece with a black Charlie Brown zig-zag running across the chest. Due to his difference in build, he seemed awash in the fabric, explaining--in David's mind, at least--why he looked more gaunt than usual.

"Alex said they'd be here in a couple of minutes," David said, buttoning up his cuffs. "We probably won't be eating for another hour, so if you want to hang out down here, avoid all that small talk and chit-chat, no sweat off my back."

"Nah, it's cool," Richard replied, clicking off the weather website and pivoting in the chair to face his friend. He rubbed one hand up the side of his face, tugged it through his hair, and let it slide back across his cheek, repeating this gesture a couple more times as he continued to speak. "As you said, fine, fine ladies await."

David's eyes narrowed. "I never said that."

Richard brushed him off with an aimless wave. "To-may-toh, to-mah-toh."

"That saying in no way applies to this conversation."

"Whatevs." Casting an apathetic glance at the computer monitor, he clicked off another tab. "Dude, am I a dick?"

This, more than anything--well, maybe not anything, given the powdery surprise from earlier that day--threw David for a loop, so much that he fell, rather than sat down on the couch, gravity having taken over as a lazy autopilot in his surprise.

Pulling himself into a more comfortable position, David pondered an answer: Richard, near as his compatriot could tell, lacked a certain measure of self-awareness when it came to his own reputation, having developed a habit of gliding through life without the knowledge that others might have a word or two to say about his behaviour. David had prepared a fairly short answer to this query some time ago, in the off chance it might ever escape Richard's tongue, but now the elephant in the room had sauntered out from behind the sideboard with a sheepish posture he found himself at a loss for words.

"Uh, what?"

"A dick. A jackass, motherfucker, son of a bitch, the like."

"Wow, quite verbal."

Richard nodded, drumming the index and middle fingers of one hand against his temple in a tic that David assumed signified impatience.

"I suppose there's no point in beating around the bush: you are quite proficient at pushing people's buttons." He switched a low mumble. "Today being a perfect example..."

"Yeah, sorry about pissing your old lady off."

David raised a hand in protest. "No, no. That's my fault as much as yours."

Richard nodded and relaxed a little bit in his chair. "Good, that feels a little better."

"Note how I indicated it's still partially your fault..." He trailed off, noticing that Richard had turned his attention back to the laptop, now starting a game of spider solitaire. "Nevermind, miles away."

He pried himself off the couch and shuffled over to the desk to peek over his friend's shoulder, trying to engage with a man who was otherwise unable to shut up but now at a conversational standstill. It could be guilt, it could be fatigue, but for all intents and purposes Richard wasn't operating on his usual wavelength.

"So... you coming up?" David asked.

"Oh, fuck no. I've never been good with that small talk bullshit."

"Well, neither have I."

"Hey, it's your house. Just call me up when dinner's ready." Having run into an obstacle in his spider session, Richard quit the game and reopened the web browser. "In the interim, I'll be searching for potentially illegal porn."

"'Potentially'? I imagine porn is either legal or it isn't." He paused, thought about this. "And that's not cool."

Another non-committal wave. David waited a moment longer, trying to gauge a reason for Richard's oddly disconnected behaviour. He knew the answer was there, something concrete and very close, but for all his attempts he couldn't see the forest for the trees. He supposed he was just too tired to give a damn, and glanced at his watch only to realize in mild horror that he was already physically and mentally beat by 4PM.

Steeling himself, he turned to the stairs and prepared for the next hour. Dinner would be the tasty reprieve he needed. Clearing his throat, he ascended, as Richard continued to idly browse the Net and rub his face in the semi-darkness behind him.

Saturday: An Ottawa Story - Nine

2010-10-30T22:03:00.002-04:00

His stomach gradually and painfully tightening into a ball, David pocketed the misplaced baggie of fertilizer, tucked the twelve-pack of pop under his arm, and stepped out onto the damp driveway to face his wife. Alex was now standing, the strains of Richard's off-key tenor ("TEENAGE AMBITIONS YOU REMEMBER WELLLLLL...") emanating behind her from the depths of the house. When the barely-resonating warblers were suddenly silenced by the screen door swinging home with a muffled click, Alex crossed her arms and David knew it was time to come clean.

"So," he began, "I might have fucked up."

Silence, save for the hardly audible pitter patter of rain on the roof of Richard's Geo. In the absence of Alex's response, he let his face contort into a facsimile of a grin.

He made another attempt: "My bad?..."

"There was a bag of cocaine in our shed, Merrick," she monotoned.

"Okay, so I guess that cat's out of the bag," he mumbled, quickly correcting his volume to add "I guess it won't really help if I say it's not mine."

She gave the slightest of nods.

"Well, shit."

Without another word, she turned on her heel and grabbed at the door knob, missing the burnished brass knob the first time and angrily fumbling for the second. As she disappeared through the door, Richard's dim, ad infinitum repetition of "HEEEEAAAAAT OF THE MOMENT!" could briefly be heard from within.

"Alex!" David called, starting off at trot, carefully paced so not to shake up the contents of his case of pop. "Can we not do the angry yelling thing?" He managed to wedge his foot between the frame and the swiftly-closing door, reopening the glass-set portal with a little leverage. He saw Alex disappear into the kitchen on hurried feet, wherein Richard was now strutting along to his own rendition of "Paint It, Black."

"Oh, Hell," David muttered, and set the twelve-pack down on the third step of the stairwell. Continuing his speed walk, he rounded the corner into the kitchen and came face-to-face with his wife, now holding the bag of coke in her outstretched hand. Whatever awkwardly-worded apology David was about to utter died on his lips right at that moment.

Richard, of course, was oblivious, still grooving and bopping to the seminal Stones hit, his chin jabbing in alternating directions with the beat, much like a seizing bird. Alex waited for him to tune to their station, but after five seconds of continued bellowing ("I have to turn my head until my darkness goes...") she cleared her throat, her cough audibly lined with years of repressed annoyance.

Finally coming back to Earth, Richard said, "Yeah, what is itohhhhhhhhhhhhh..." His eyes had suddenly locked on the powder-filled bag mere inches from his nose. "Right, wow. This isn't good, is it, Dave?"

"I wouldn't think so," his friend replied, whatever steam that had powered his protests having vanished in the last few seconds.

"Now that I have both of your respective attentions," Alex started, "can I ask why there was enough dope to set off an entire K-9 unit in our shed? or on our property in the first place?"

"Yeah," Richard replied. "Yeah, that was me. I did that."

Alex allowed herself the slightest of smiles, defined more by her eyes than the curve of her mouth, before chucking the bag back on the counter. "Thanks for the honesty, Richard." She looked her husband in the eye. "See, sometimes it is the best policy."

David shrugged, guiltily.

"Now, before I blow up at either of you, let's attempt to... fix whatever it is we have on our hands," Alex suggested. "Richard?"

The other man looked up from his fingernails. "Yessum?"

"Can you give me a reason why I shouldn't kick your ass out of our house right now?"

Richard pondered this query for a few moments, his eyes tracing an invisible script while he parsed through possible responses, as if he were filtering the least damaging response from anything else that would result in verbal immolation. "Um, I didn't lie to you about the cocaine being mine?..."

David scoffed, "Yes you did!"

"Hey, but only to you!" He turned back to Alex and reasoned, "Right now, I'm the only person in this house who hasn't lied to you today."

"Rick, you brought, what, ten grams of coke into our house. Nothing you say can possibly get you on my good side, so stop trying."

Richard nodded. "So, do I leave, or what?"

"Stay." Now she faced David. "You."

"Yeah," David groaned, not meeting his wife's gaze.

"Believe it or not, your friend is staying." The two men traded confused--and in the case of Richard, relieved--glances at this utterance. "Staying only because he had the balls to fess up rather than tiptoe around the situation in the most lummox-like fashion possible."

"Dude, whipped," Richard whispered.

"And frankly, now that all this is out of the open--and now that you're both consumed with guilt, I imagine--I can continue working toward tonight's meal in a bullshit-free environment. And before you start with the oh-so-sincere 'thank yous,' Richard, just know that will only add to the bullshit cesspool. You're not still in this house because you're a beacon of responsibility. You're a jackassed freeloader if there ever was one, but after all this I now have someone else to put up with my sisters tonight. So, congrats, by the hand of God or Satan you've managed to engineer both your disgrace and your salvation."

David raised a finger to interject. "Do you even want to have this dinner in the first place?--"

"Shhh. My only catch is that you dispose of that poisonous shit in the next two hours. I would have flushed it by now but honestly I don't want to put any more of my fingerprints on the bag. So, your call."

Delicately, she set the bag back down on the counter and used a wooden stirring spoon to shove the coke Richard's way. After another awkward pause he reached for the baggie, briefly eyed its contents, then let it disappear into his coat pocket."

"Now, go downstairs and let me talk to my husband in piece. Deal?"

Flashing his pearly whites, Richard silently assented and fled for the basement door, his socks hardly making a sound on the varnished hardwood. The eternal nuisance gone, Alex faced her husband.

"Alex, I am so sorry," David said, his words drained of any strength at this point.

She exhaled through her nose and sat back against the counter, having resumed feeling the bumps and divots of the overly-large potato in the last minute. "I lied. I guess that isn't helping to keep the bullshit bucket empty."

"I wouldn't think so."

"I confess, I've had zero tolerance for Richard for a while, now. The drugs--sure, that's something, but it's also just a catalyst, a straw breaking the camel's back, all that." She sighed. "I lied because it's not my business at this point. He's your friend, so the ball's in your court. I can't decide how you deal with him and every problem, every lay, every stupid habit he drags with him, but at some point you need to stop beating around the bush and confront him about all his shit."

"I did, at the pub," David protested.

"Yeah, over a pint. I bet that was really cathartic, what with you two blaring Asia between here and Catherine St." She made no attempt to hide the sarcasm. "I don't doubt you brought the issue up, I really don't. But ask yourself: was that guy, prancing about our kitchen, shouting the lyrics to the Stones, blind to the coke--his coke--I was holding in his face, really affected by anything you said over lunch? Conflicted, guilty, anything at all? Or was it crocodile tears all over again?"

Her nails were digging into the soft, wrinkled surface of the potato. She caught herself doing this, stopped, and lobbed the root into the corner garbage pail with a perfect arc. "Hmmm," David vocalized. "That was good."

"Thanks." She brushed to the side some hair that had fallen in front of her eyes, and as her forearm paced in front of her visage David caught a glance of something--not a self-assured smirk, but a smile. Of relief? closure? It was so fast, so peripheral, he couldn't tell.

"Talk to him, sometime tonight. I don't care what you say, just make sure he understands it." Finished, she turned back to the stove. "In the meantime, you can try to get on my good side again by shucking this corn." She indicated one of the grocery bags Richard had brought in with a tilt of her head.

"As you wish." He finally stepped over the threshold, set the baggie of fertilizer on the spot atop the counter where the cocaine had only recently rested and draped his coat over a chair. Quietly, he took an ear of corn from the bag and held it over the garbage bin as he commenced stripping the leaves and wispy silk from the golden kernels beneath. After awhile, he pivoted to look at Alex. "You know, you aren't morally obliged to invite your sisters to anything."

She chuckled. "Like that thought hadn't crossed my mind."