& there was no reason, and every reason...
3:42 a.m. ~ A person in loose bellbottoms, biker boots, grey ranger surplus sweater taylored strangely, knitted gloves that leave fingers bare, cabby hat with an incidental buckle on one side, mad rockstar curls, with a leather messenger bag and a cat carrier -- enters the diner that hasn't turned its stoves off since 1931. Outside, a man paces and screams into a cellphone, "Baby, baby, it wasn't my van, baby," and his breath comes in scattered clouds in the cold early autumn air. Inside it's warm, the cramped quarters already patronized by a smattering of other curiousities, inventions and spawn of the hours most of humanity never gives a thought to. These are the hours and the children reserved for the brave and the tragic, for mothers in emergency rooms, for lonely busdrivers listening to the songs and the mumbling of the bums who do nothing but ride all night long, and for the stars -- they shine clearer now than ever.
Inside, filled with brightness, an ancient television broadcasting (of all things) a hazy picture singing with ironic pep, Underwater friends, you are my underwater, underwater friends... The person in outdated hand-me-downs pulls two stools next to one another and sets the cat down on them: a pretty creature, his yelling drowned out by the sizzle of the perpetual stovetops. Purse down, hat off, two eggs (scrambled) and a side of bacon. The eggs are generic and tasteless, the bacon is burned; the walking daughter-son of witching hours hasn't eaten in a day and a half, and isn't hungry, but for $8 there is strength and warmth to be had, and the cat eats, too.
They don't stay long. Even lingering, they leave by 4 a.m. The city is still empty. They wander up the hill balancing on the curb and know that far out in the suburbs, the trickle that will become a flood of inward-gushing men and women in suits and masks has just begun. A garbage truck beeps and thunders its slow way by. A familiar gesture summons their chariot, and soon they have returned to the castle-house.
The cat is let go to weave his way through the junipers, the same Ghost but for a new tag that assures he has been vaccinated and sterilized. His tall-companion lays back over a footstool to watch the sky's clear burning, and smiles, and yearns for a time and a place where the stars will be truly uncountable, and life truly full, outside the city.
Chardonnay. Footsteps above. A pleasant hum of sleepy inspiration. The sound of the cat's collar-bell drifts through an open window. Companions even without seeing one another. There is hope, and joy, spiced with the forever dread of the parental Nazi eyes that will -- oh, they will -- come peeking soon through the doorway from the hall, and snip, and bark, and grumble, and the cat's companion, the night's child, be sent off chained and strangled, but more alive than ever.
5:00 a.m. ~ Someone is singing...
Inside, filled with brightness, an ancient television broadcasting (of all things) a hazy picture singing with ironic pep, Underwater friends, you are my underwater, underwater friends... The person in outdated hand-me-downs pulls two stools next to one another and sets the cat down on them: a pretty creature, his yelling drowned out by the sizzle of the perpetual stovetops. Purse down, hat off, two eggs (scrambled) and a side of bacon. The eggs are generic and tasteless, the bacon is burned; the walking daughter-son of witching hours hasn't eaten in a day and a half, and isn't hungry, but for $8 there is strength and warmth to be had, and the cat eats, too.
They don't stay long. Even lingering, they leave by 4 a.m. The city is still empty. They wander up the hill balancing on the curb and know that far out in the suburbs, the trickle that will become a flood of inward-gushing men and women in suits and masks has just begun. A garbage truck beeps and thunders its slow way by. A familiar gesture summons their chariot, and soon they have returned to the castle-house.
The cat is let go to weave his way through the junipers, the same Ghost but for a new tag that assures he has been vaccinated and sterilized. His tall-companion lays back over a footstool to watch the sky's clear burning, and smiles, and yearns for a time and a place where the stars will be truly uncountable, and life truly full, outside the city.
Chardonnay. Footsteps above. A pleasant hum of sleepy inspiration. The sound of the cat's collar-bell drifts through an open window. Companions even without seeing one another. There is hope, and joy, spiced with the forever dread of the parental Nazi eyes that will -- oh, they will -- come peeking soon through the doorway from the hall, and snip, and bark, and grumble, and the cat's companion, the night's child, be sent off chained and strangled, but more alive than ever.
5:00 a.m. ~ Someone is singing...