layla's lawn
i am standing on layla's front lawn with layla, ben, boris, and two other people i recall only as being friends of layla. we're standing there, waiting for people to show up so that we can go watch a midnight showing of a shakespearean play. they're not showing up and time is running out. two of my friends from pinetree who's names i can't recall show up and stand their car opposite layla's lawn in a bed of large white flower petals. a skytrain whistles past, and i realise that layla's lawn has recently had a skytrain track built across it. i collapse in a fit of giggles as she glances at me incredulously.
finally, our transportation for the show arrives in the form of a hoverbus that we've exclusively rented. everyone piles on, but i'm before them all and secure the Command Seat (really just an office chair with wheels on the ends of the legs). our guide walks beside the bus outside and informs us that he is in charge, but i scream at him to keep his motherfucking authority to himself because we paid for this service. he cringes, and i have an epiphany: kind man with wife and kids fufilling duties of job to put food on table. i apologise quickly, and the trip continues.
slowly drifting past downtown now, which is unlike any version of vancouver i've ever seen. there is barely any sidewalk to speak of, so the storefronts are right in my face: huge neon designs, decrepit movie theatre box offices reminiscent of the old YTV show are you afraid of the dark?, torn porno flick posters with 80's era fashion and hairstyles (rosario dawson circa sin city), and, most amazingly, the entire city is blanketed in warm snow. thick snow is falling, it litters the streets, and i get the impression that it is chilly but i'm never cold. walking now, with a first-person camera angle panning in all directions to capture the surreality of it, i'm passed on the street by a pretty girl who looks vaguely familiar. she seems angry, and as the moment passes she brushes past me. then another, then another, then another. they were part of my life once, but i can't place them now. then, one i can't forget bounces into my vision, curly thick brown hair and all: cassiana, my brazilian. i let her pass me out of pure shock, but as she pulls away i call her name and chase after her. she turns and smiles, that i've remembered her.
she intercepts and jump-tackles me into the snow, planting the familiar cheek-cheek-cheek genevois kiss greeting with unacustomed fervour. my shakespeareans are far ahead of me now, and always pulling away in search of the show. i walk and talk a while with my friends, whom i all remember now. i'm glad to find that my french still comes easily despite almost a year of disuse.
time drifts on and i run to catch up with the shakespeareans. i realise during this that i've forgotten a thing that held me back in switzerland, so i run in a different direction and emerge on a soccer field smothered in snow and bejweled by huge stadium lights catching falling snowflakes, turning them prismatic. cassiana is walking across from me, getting away, and i run until she's in my arms again and this time i kiss her properly.
black out. wake up next morning, inside a house i know to be layla's but which doesn't look anything like it. the point of view is erratic now, switching from first to third in frantic pans. strangely enough, i'm now black and cassie is black. we're both black and lying in a bed, and what we're doing is somehow being broadcast nationally. my fucking wife is watching it, and calls me to say so. everything is going wrong.
cassie tells me there's a way to fix this. we run from the house, running down the street and change is flying out of my pockets. now i am seperate again, and the black man is still me but no longer me; i acompany him, and attempt to help him. we go to a nearby mall and into the ralph lauren store, where the black man cannot find a single thing to wear. he's a big guy, and they seem to be fresh out of XXL's. for some reason ralph lauren has all manner of chocolates available to sample, and we do so in great hedonistic manner. grabbing handfuls of chocolate everything and stuffing it into our mouths, cassie stuffing it into her purse. a white couple saunters by and mocks us.
a racist sales associate is watching our every move, waiting for us to slip up. once again one with the black man, i walk up and hit him hard enough that his head clips and destroys a concrete pillar as he flies through the back wall (no doubt subconsciously robbed from megatokyo). an M4A1 carbine assault rifle is now in my hands, and i pump round after round into everything i see. cassie and i turn back into our old selves, for good this time, and we flee the store.
bang, bang, bang. bullets are flying. SWAT members are crying and bleeding. people are crying and bleeding. they're all enemies for some reason, i feel no remorse leaving their corpses behind. it's pure bloodlust, and i'm flipping off of walls and dodging behind pillars to get the job done. i feel alive.
not anymore. we make to an escalator that stretches miles through the roof the mall, miles into the sky (although not to heaven). as we get there, bang. everything slows. cassie is hit, dead before she hits the floor. i try to shoot round after round through the glass at my pursuers, but the bullets don't come. i squeeze the trigger but they don't come. i'm on the escalator and they can no longer come after me, it's of no consequence.
there is a glass wall and ceiling to this escalator, and through it i see another escalator running parallel to mine, about a mile away. i can barely make out layla's face, and her friends who's names i do not remember. they wave and i wave back, and then ... i begin to weep. i fall to the steps of the escalator weeping as i've done only once before in my life, when my aunt died before me. i mutter, "i killed them all. i killed them all in the kitchen." i know that this means i've killed layla's younger sister, and other younger sisters, those of her nameless friends and of my friends. my vision goes blurry with tears and it doesn't return until i open my eyes to see that i'm late for school.
finally, our transportation for the show arrives in the form of a hoverbus that we've exclusively rented. everyone piles on, but i'm before them all and secure the Command Seat (really just an office chair with wheels on the ends of the legs). our guide walks beside the bus outside and informs us that he is in charge, but i scream at him to keep his motherfucking authority to himself because we paid for this service. he cringes, and i have an epiphany: kind man with wife and kids fufilling duties of job to put food on table. i apologise quickly, and the trip continues.
slowly drifting past downtown now, which is unlike any version of vancouver i've ever seen. there is barely any sidewalk to speak of, so the storefronts are right in my face: huge neon designs, decrepit movie theatre box offices reminiscent of the old YTV show are you afraid of the dark?, torn porno flick posters with 80's era fashion and hairstyles (rosario dawson circa sin city), and, most amazingly, the entire city is blanketed in warm snow. thick snow is falling, it litters the streets, and i get the impression that it is chilly but i'm never cold. walking now, with a first-person camera angle panning in all directions to capture the surreality of it, i'm passed on the street by a pretty girl who looks vaguely familiar. she seems angry, and as the moment passes she brushes past me. then another, then another, then another. they were part of my life once, but i can't place them now. then, one i can't forget bounces into my vision, curly thick brown hair and all: cassiana, my brazilian. i let her pass me out of pure shock, but as she pulls away i call her name and chase after her. she turns and smiles, that i've remembered her.
she intercepts and jump-tackles me into the snow, planting the familiar cheek-cheek-cheek genevois kiss greeting with unacustomed fervour. my shakespeareans are far ahead of me now, and always pulling away in search of the show. i walk and talk a while with my friends, whom i all remember now. i'm glad to find that my french still comes easily despite almost a year of disuse.
time drifts on and i run to catch up with the shakespeareans. i realise during this that i've forgotten a thing that held me back in switzerland, so i run in a different direction and emerge on a soccer field smothered in snow and bejweled by huge stadium lights catching falling snowflakes, turning them prismatic. cassiana is walking across from me, getting away, and i run until she's in my arms again and this time i kiss her properly.
black out. wake up next morning, inside a house i know to be layla's but which doesn't look anything like it. the point of view is erratic now, switching from first to third in frantic pans. strangely enough, i'm now black and cassie is black. we're both black and lying in a bed, and what we're doing is somehow being broadcast nationally. my fucking wife is watching it, and calls me to say so. everything is going wrong.
cassie tells me there's a way to fix this. we run from the house, running down the street and change is flying out of my pockets. now i am seperate again, and the black man is still me but no longer me; i acompany him, and attempt to help him. we go to a nearby mall and into the ralph lauren store, where the black man cannot find a single thing to wear. he's a big guy, and they seem to be fresh out of XXL's. for some reason ralph lauren has all manner of chocolates available to sample, and we do so in great hedonistic manner. grabbing handfuls of chocolate everything and stuffing it into our mouths, cassie stuffing it into her purse. a white couple saunters by and mocks us.
a racist sales associate is watching our every move, waiting for us to slip up. once again one with the black man, i walk up and hit him hard enough that his head clips and destroys a concrete pillar as he flies through the back wall (no doubt subconsciously robbed from megatokyo). an M4A1 carbine assault rifle is now in my hands, and i pump round after round into everything i see. cassie and i turn back into our old selves, for good this time, and we flee the store.
bang, bang, bang. bullets are flying. SWAT members are crying and bleeding. people are crying and bleeding. they're all enemies for some reason, i feel no remorse leaving their corpses behind. it's pure bloodlust, and i'm flipping off of walls and dodging behind pillars to get the job done. i feel alive.
not anymore. we make to an escalator that stretches miles through the roof the mall, miles into the sky (although not to heaven). as we get there, bang. everything slows. cassie is hit, dead before she hits the floor. i try to shoot round after round through the glass at my pursuers, but the bullets don't come. i squeeze the trigger but they don't come. i'm on the escalator and they can no longer come after me, it's of no consequence.
there is a glass wall and ceiling to this escalator, and through it i see another escalator running parallel to mine, about a mile away. i can barely make out layla's face, and her friends who's names i do not remember. they wave and i wave back, and then ... i begin to weep. i fall to the steps of the escalator weeping as i've done only once before in my life, when my aunt died before me. i mutter, "i killed them all. i killed them all in the kitchen." i know that this means i've killed layla's younger sister, and other younger sisters, those of her nameless friends and of my friends. my vision goes blurry with tears and it doesn't return until i open my eyes to see that i'm late for school.