(Shorter) City Light Night Life - Writers Forum

mybluehell · 04-26-2005, 07:50 PM

City Light Night Life
(((Again, I'd love to hear any feedback, + or -)))

We're steaming and stinging under street light city night sky, electrical wires woven more daringly than I remember. The hum and snaps of sharp electricity sounding off, sounding like one thousand one hundred thirty seven bees, but we don’t mind the mock swarming.

Pinpricks from elation and of relief, we talk and windows pass but I only see us reflected and it feels like it’s been about a year since we saw each other. One of us secretly knows just how many months, weeks, days it’s been, but won’t say. It’s good enough to see each other again.

We have no direction, don’t know if we ever did, and she suggests a movie but nothing looks good. The marquee looks desolate and dried. We didn’t read really anyway so we settle for some drinks. Flash passing time while we imbibe and over-exaggeratingly detail our own and favorite-foreign success stories. Laughing now, but each secretly saddened a little when our hands accidentally brush one another.

Something like cold steel, a feeling washing up vertebrae then filter flow into the organs. My mouth is especially dry, considering how much we’ve been drinking.

I think she notices my mood, maybe shares that metallic taste and chilling callous, and I notice her poise change, her demeanor diminish.

Figuring it fitting to kiss, for old time’s sake maybe, a taste to chase the shakes or just something to do with our mouths, our tongues linger a few moments, not daring to open our eyes. Slowly, I break the seal our lips created, keep my eyes close and draw my head to one side then, as if waiting for some delicious aftertaste, open my eyes to see her looking at me. I don’t feel anything and from the indifferent look on her face I just assume she doesn’t either and we both silently agree to drop it and to just keep talking.

We just end up walking through and throughout into the city, vaguely aimed toward the lake. I run out of ideas, it’s getting late, and soon I’ll have nothing left to say, so I stop and buy some wine.

The beach is empty, and the wind picks up quite a bit and I almost put my arm around her out of habit, to keep her warm, and she almost leans in to let me, out of habit. I offer my black hoodie and she accepts.

The bottle feels empty and so do I. I normally don’t litter but right now I just don’t care so I toss it into the lake. There had been clouds but now the moon was back out, semi-reflected by the water but since it’s so breezy only a bright and rippling gray shines on our faces.

Paths of our pupils cross and meet; I get a glance through swooning eyes at a face ripe with agony, obviously something inside her needs out. I ask what it is but she seems to curl up, retract. I know she wants to tell me so I pry and finally it comes loose.

Her kiss is hard, presses my lips to where I might be biting or being bitten. I almost want to just shrug her off, but somehow I feel that even though we’d done this, been here in the past so many times, that it has been so long that it almost feels fresh. So I give in.

I’m bubbling, she’s blistering, and combined our organs radiate waves of indulgence which is overpowering at first, but then it just works and I’ve got bites and scratches. Some are from her, some probably from the ground and what creatures walk so small and unnoticed on these Midwestern midsummer nights.

Somehow I feel like something is watching me, watching us as we move together but I wouldn’t care if there was and the sad chords loop through my head “…we kiss on the mouth but still cough down our sleeves…”

So much energy used that I don’t feel drunk anymore and I’m pretty sure neither does she but she doesn’t care like I do.
She tenses up, arches, recedes.

I’m realizing how really beautiful she is with this flushed skin, especially with this eerie wavering glow, but at the same time I remember a lot of things about how it used be with us, and I close my eyes to force it out. It now feels like lukewarm water, tastes like a cucumber, smells like a book I once read; everything just on the edge of being recognized as something, but hopelessly fixed betwixt palatable and offensive. But it works.

I dress but she stays as she is, evoking demons, desiring for me to objectify her so she can attain her now obvious design. I play along but she doesn’t know that I know, and we end up sleeping for the last hour or so of darkness.

When I’m awoken by her stirring arm, I realize where we are, what we did, that she is still naked and has sort of sandy flesh. I wake her and she dresses, we leave, get some coffee, and the whole time, even on the subway, not one word is exchanged between us.

This is fine with me, since I’m still not sure what my plans are about this whole situation with her now, but I start to wonder if she is longing for me to say something and I’m a little bit bothered. I realize that we haven’t even touched since I shook her to wake her.

Whatever it is about her, she seems to pick up on the fact that I’m thinking about it and she leans her head on my shoulder and I let her as we sway with the car, dashing in the subterranean tunnel.

It’s been so long since I’ve ridden that I’ve forgotten where the tunnel emerges into sunlight, when you can see the city left behind. We eventually come from underground, and I glance at the skyline as we travel from all of that and I think something out loud, barely audibly and she lifts up her head hopefully but I only say “nothing.” She sighs and returns her head and I finish thinking to myself that I only half miss this city light night life.

MattIndeed · 04-27-2005, 12:17 AM

My first post I'll start by saying Hello.

I really liked this work =D> . It felt dreamlike to me. As for feedback,I would reconsider the use of the 'black hoody'. It gave me pause because it felt too concrete in contrast to the purposeful vagueness.

mybluehell · 04-27-2005, 11:35 AM

thank you very much. i see what you mean about the "hoodie", it certainly couldnt hurt to use something more fitting. but thank you again for reading and your feedback.

greenbananas · 04-28-2005, 02:31 PM

I really like this story. Your writing is excellent. This story has a very indie movie feel to it. You made getting drunk and hooking up sound very classy.

Great job! I look forward to reading more of your work!

mybluehell · 04-28-2005, 03:48 PM

haha, that's awsome, because i was totally thinking about some idie type of movie when i wrote it. thank you very much greenbananas. and by the way, who ever said that getting drunk and hooking up isn't classy? sinatra did it every night of his life. he was the king of class.

greenbananas · 04-29-2005, 11:44 AM

hahaha. I didn't mean to say that it couldn't be classy, I was just referring to the style you chose to write about it in.

Chris Miller · 04-29-2005, 01:04 PM

Hi mybluehell,

Quote:

...sounding like one thousand one hundred thirty seven bees

You need 5 hyphens here.

Quote:

We have no direction, don’t know if we ever did, and she suggests a movie but nothing looks good.

I think "she" should be "you" (from here on) but because I am still kind of vague about what's going on, I guess I could be wrong.

Quote:

Something like cold steel, a feeling washing up vertebrae then filter flow into the organs.

Awkward, unclear.

Quote:

...keep my eyes close and draw my head to one side then...

"closed" "drawing"

Quote:

...but now the moon was back out...

"is" -- careful with your tense, stay in the present.

You can probably tighten up the grammar and tense a bit more. But, aside from all this, I think it is a really nice piece. I really felt for what was going on. I love this relationship stuff. I found the story very perceptive and interesting from this standpoint.

I feel that a few specific details tossed in from their past here and there might beef it up a bit.

Nice work though.

mybluehell · 04-29-2005, 03:25 PM

thanks, chris. i always screw up the tense. in fact right after i wrote this i was writing something else in past tense and seriously half of each page i wrote on got scribbled out because i kept screwing it up, and ya know, there are always those errors you can't catch on your own. thanks for the feedback.

also, greenbananas, i understand. thanks again guys.