and somehow this thing happened
This is weird and dense and symbolic. firefly99 will get this, most likely. I knew that dream would lead to something.
For the most part, I had no clue as to why two teenage girls were leading me around a series of Mexican restaurants. Thoughts had been sparse that day. Sun-bleached morning on the deck of a ship had led to day in a strange new city (Californian, if my suspicions are correct) and the realization that I had nothing with me to remind me who I was the day before. The lack of clothes at first was unnerving yet oddly nostalgic. I met no resistance trying to obtain a new set from the crew, who were numbly and pleasantly oblivious to my nakedness, and just barely cognizant of my presence.
When I asked where we were and why I was on board, they responded in Chinese.
God’s voice briefly rang in my head. He called me Jack. I asked if that was really my name. In painfully forced English he said that he liked the name Jack. I left to sit at the prow of the ship. It was cargo vessel with big Chinese letters on the side, which gave me a very brief thought of two symbols like skeletons left under a waterfall.
In less than an hour we made a landing in a city to my left which I had never seen before. Without a word to the crew I wandered down the gangplank to the docks, half-blinded by full sunlight on concrete. No shoes, so I was careful to avoid stepping on glass.
Found myself in an open market. The language spoken there was balanced between Spanish, Chinese, and English, so I left my ears on autopilot. Sound was unimportant. Sights weren’t worth it, either. I chose to smell, which meant a lot of food-scent and sweat. Flowers, too. Roses meant it was June. Someone had left four dollar bills in my pocket. I bought a burrito and ate in on the street corner, next to a one-armed gang member who smelled of gunpowder. The scent tainted my food, so I threw it away and left. Two girls who passed me saw and led me towards a long, low building. The shorter one said that it was famous for the restaurants, Mexican ones with real, good, authentic food, not like the burrito I just threw away. Their mother was waiting there.
So there I was, blank slate, looking at large-printed menus taped to cool stone walls, wondering if I should say that I only had one dollar left in my pocket and couldn’t buy anything with it. I decided against it.
I pride myself on only having one artsy sentence fragment in the whole thing.
For the most part, I had no clue as to why two teenage girls were leading me around a series of Mexican restaurants. Thoughts had been sparse that day. Sun-bleached morning on the deck of a ship had led to day in a strange new city (Californian, if my suspicions are correct) and the realization that I had nothing with me to remind me who I was the day before. The lack of clothes at first was unnerving yet oddly nostalgic. I met no resistance trying to obtain a new set from the crew, who were numbly and pleasantly oblivious to my nakedness, and just barely cognizant of my presence.
When I asked where we were and why I was on board, they responded in Chinese.
God’s voice briefly rang in my head. He called me Jack. I asked if that was really my name. In painfully forced English he said that he liked the name Jack. I left to sit at the prow of the ship. It was cargo vessel with big Chinese letters on the side, which gave me a very brief thought of two symbols like skeletons left under a waterfall.
In less than an hour we made a landing in a city to my left which I had never seen before. Without a word to the crew I wandered down the gangplank to the docks, half-blinded by full sunlight on concrete. No shoes, so I was careful to avoid stepping on glass.
Found myself in an open market. The language spoken there was balanced between Spanish, Chinese, and English, so I left my ears on autopilot. Sound was unimportant. Sights weren’t worth it, either. I chose to smell, which meant a lot of food-scent and sweat. Flowers, too. Roses meant it was June. Someone had left four dollar bills in my pocket. I bought a burrito and ate in on the street corner, next to a one-armed gang member who smelled of gunpowder. The scent tainted my food, so I threw it away and left. Two girls who passed me saw and led me towards a long, low building. The shorter one said that it was famous for the restaurants, Mexican ones with real, good, authentic food, not like the burrito I just threw away. Their mother was waiting there.
So there I was, blank slate, looking at large-printed menus taped to cool stone walls, wondering if I should say that I only had one dollar left in my pocket and couldn’t buy anything with it. I decided against it.
I pride myself on only having one artsy sentence fragment in the whole thing.