hwithumalut

(footnotes are in parenthesizes and are not required to read. In fact I recommend not reading them.)

This Original Starbucks bears the original brown logo displaying the breasts of a two-tailed mermaid (1). Everyday it's line rolls out of its tiny space and down a sidewalk block, covering the storefronts of unopened businesses. There are many more businesses to its left that are open since it is located in the famous Pike Place market. Pike Place Market is filled with copious amounts of delicious food items that are for overpriced sale. My whole family was vacationing in Seattle just a little while ago, which is why I was there. Likely my third most enjoyable experience with the city took place at the Original Starbucks shop.

I knew nothing about Seattle before I arrived at the airport terminal, except that it had the Space Needle. In the terminal my whole family, exhausted, sat down on the hard blue connected chairs with our bags at our feet ready to sit in a moving metalcraft for roughly seven hours. Across from us sat hunched over a mildly acne scarred tall young man in black sunglasses and a plain red shirt, who looked roughly twenty years old. I, an aspiring writer, was watching the people in the airport just trying to describe them in my head for practice (2). This young man’s hands were clasped together and he had a carry-on suitcase and a backpack just like me.

For some reason or another he started to talk to my father, who sat directly across from him. He asked us where we were from and why Seattle? Turns out this young man was the son of the owners of a Seattle coffee shop called Vivace. According to him this espresso shop was reportedly famous for inventing latte art, and was considered by many espresso nerds to be the greatest coffee shop in the world. I looked it up on Wikipedia and it seemed to be the case. We promised that we would go to Vivace. The young man showed us an image of a latte that his father had made, then said that he had never gotten the hang of latte art himself. I desperately wanted to know more about this man, but I couldn't just ask him what his profession was, because we were just friendly strangers. He seemed like he would make an interesting character. I saw him once as we boarded the plane and never again. We forgot to go to Vivace, or any Coffee shop that espresso nerds like. We are not espresso nerds, and I have never drunk espresso.

My experience with coffee is casual. I know nothing about coffee. I have no right to review a coffee shop, even a Starbucks, and you should probably stop reading if you are looking for a recommendation, because I’m more interested in storytelling than evaluation of quality. I am numb to the taste of the black coffee that I usually drink. At the beginning of high school I started to drink coffee because I thought it would make me more adult, but it just made me addicted to it. If I drink anything that is flavorful different than I am distracted by the taste, but I might like it. One time a friend was astounded that I drank black coffee. They said I was brave. To me it’s simply the only way to drink the fuel without turning it into a sugary dessert, which I enjoy sometimes. Occasionally I take day old coffee in my house and put it in the microwave with a scoop of ice cream. This is delicious to me. My mother only drinks black coffee. Recently I’ve been trying to stop drinking coffee, because I just don’t want to be addicted to caffeine, and it has half worked, but I abandoned this goal while on vacation.

We looked at the line of people waiting to get coffee from the Original Starbucks, several times before ever getting in it. We spent four, or maybe three days in Seattle (3). The first time we looked at the line was the second time we visited Pike Place market and it consisted of me and mother going to a newer Starbucks realizing that it was new, then going down to the far end of the market where the Original Starbucks was located as my father and brother bought bagels. The line even that early in mourning stretched out past three, or four other storefronts. The line had those retractable guard rail stands that hook up to one another. We looked another time that day to see if the line had shortened, but it had grown by a decent amount. We said that we would go later, whenever that was.

On our second-to-last day in Seattle we went to the Starbucks Reserve Roastery, which is not located on Pike Place market, but nearby. It’s not what this review is about. It still impacted my experience at the original Starbucks. The Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Seattle was basically a fancy giant Starbucks with two counters. One counter served breakfast food which my brother and father got. The other counter served coffees which were apparently all unique to the Starbucks Reserve Roastery.

At the Reserve Roastery We got way too much coffee and did not drink it all. I got a strange special coffee which was apparently stored in a whiskey barrel. My mother tasted it and remarked that it tasted like whiskey. My father said it tasted like Kahlua. It was served in a whiskey glass, and had a color that appeared like whiskey. The whole image of it imitated whiskey. I think that I preferred my mother’s coffee sampler thing, because the whiskey barrel coffee had too much vanilla sweetener, but not enough to make me feel like I’m drinking ice cream. It was trying to imitate something other than itself. I know nothing about alcohol’s flavor, and have never drunk any in my life. I did not finish it.

The Original Starbucks was visited on our last day in Seattle. My brother and father packed our hotel room up as me and my mother went down to the Original Starbucks. We took the bus. Then we made great haste down through the Market and found the end of the line. We stepped in line. More than an entire block and ahead of us. Maybe an hour long wait? Was this all worth it? The line grew fast. People piled up behind us. Specifically the first people behind us were two men who already had coffees in their hands. We had our initial coffee in the hotel room using the pods from the machine. Soon we were not the people last in line, but were maybe roughly in the middle of it, but were standing in the same spot as we had been when we started. The two men behind us left the line.

In front of us in line was a mother and a child in a frilly pink stroller. I was attempting to read a book while in the line, but was also having a conversation with my mother. We were happy that we were completing our goal of actually going to Starbucks. A father showed up in front of me, without me noticing. He had brought treats from a Russian bakery. The mother did not seem to want them, but the small child loved the chocolate treat. They stayed there for a little while and a line moved forward. As we advanced at some point I peeked inside of the stroller with the corner of my eye and saw that the child had one hand missing. There was a stump of flesh. I instantly had a completely internal panic attack. Was I ablest for having the slight chills at the sight of a lack of hand? I calmed myself, by just ignoring it. They left the line after a little bit, because the child’s mother wanted food.

The line more frequently shortened because of people leaving, and not because of people getting inside to get coffee. It was a game where the winners were ones with time and desire to get a drink from the Original Starbucks. Starbucks is the most chain coffee shop of all chain coffee shops. Imagine the other coffee shops in Seattle we could go to. We could go to that shop called Vivace that the young man from the airplane terminal told us about. It sounded like they made genuinely excellent coffee. Although I probably am not able to distinguish excellent coffee from horrible coffee. Everyone who was in line at the Original Starbucks was probably a tourist, who was in Seattle and figured “hey why not. Maybe I'll tell my friends about it, or something like that”

Soon in front of me was a father with two sons. One son was my age, or older, maybe around 18. He wore sunglasses and a backwards baseball cap and he had a camera bag on his side. The younger son looked no more than 12, and I have forgotten the face of their largely silent father. When we got close to the door only one group was ahead of them. The elder son took their photo for them using their phone. The younger son squeaked something about the elder boy being a “professional photographer” and the elder son laughed. The group seemed awkward about it. It was all entertaining to watch. When the family ahead of us went inside my mother took a photo of me in front of the logo dangling from the overhang.

Eventually the employee at the door beckoned us inside the tiny dark space. A sign advertised their rainbow unicorn latte thing for pride. A barista outside of the bar greeted us and asked if we have ever been there before. We had not and told us about the location. They mentioned that this Starbucks sold only beverages. We asked if they had any unique beverages at that location. They had some different beans we could buy and a souvenir cup.

When my mother ordered a black coffee, a barista in a black apron was surprised. My mother was confused that ordering just straight coffee was considered strange and out of the ordinary. I ordered a vanilla Frappuccino, or something like that. My mother asked the barista what the black apron meant and he answered that he had gone through a training course to be a Starbucks coffee master. All of the baristas at the location were adults and they seemed very busy, and like they were rather good at barista work. My mother asked if they got paid more at this location, and the barista in the black apron said “not really”

The elder son walked to the muscular barista with green hair working the bar. The elder son told the barista about a cruise they had just been on, and the muscular barista told him about his fear of water. The barista in the black apron brewed my mother’s cup of black coffee individually since they didn't usually just do black coffee. The muscular barista handed me my drink. I was half convinced that I had seen him earlier, but it probably wasn't true.

We left happily. We were starving at that point from waiting in line for the last hour. We walked across the market to various stores. We picked up food from a cramped Russian bakery called Piroshky’s, which we had seen people eating from. Then some things from two smaller bakeries. We had not eaten breakfast.

We settled down on a picnic table within sight of the fish shop in Pike Place market. We sat at the table third, or second—I don’t remember which, from the back of the fence around the tables on the left side facing the Pike Place Market sign. My mother and I shared our food as two performers played jazz over by the fish shop, but we couldn't hear the upright bass player because of the distance. The music is mostly crowded out by people’s conversation, though the soprano saxophone’s blasting made me excited.

Eventually my father and brother picked us up in a massive black rental SUV. It was his choice. He got it from a car rental place that must have had many locations. It had a Texas license plate which we all found amusing, and I silently resented (4 WARNING EXTREMELY BORING FOOTNOTE). A fear that anyone who saw it would assume the worst crept over my whole thought about the large doored tall car.

The coffee tasted sweet, but creamy which was exactly what I wanted out of it. It was supposedly vanilla flavored and I think the name did the job. I wanted to have something that reminded me of ice cream. What I really wanted to eat was ice cream. Coffee can be turned into ice cream without it being bad. Or maybe it is bad, but I think that it’s very approachable and easy. It’s not alienating

We drove off to Vancouver after this. The whole vacation spanned one day less than a fortnight, with the last two days being spent in Victoria. I finished my coffee on the car ride, and threw away the cup when we got to Vancouver. It still held melted whipped cream in the trench at the bottom of it. It felt difficult to dispose of, like getting rid of my entire mourning. My mother left hers unfinished in the car. I threw the cup out a few days later. Throwing both of them away was a bit difficult. I struggle with throwing away meaningless homework assignments and keep candy wrappers in my pockets. Imagine plastic and cardboard from the Original Starbucks going into the garbage. Plastic that looked identical to the same stuff from any Starbucks, exactly as I expected.

(1) Ok. So it isn't actually the Original Starbucks. This is the oldest still operating Starbucks building. There was a sticker attached to a street sign reading “the first Starbucks is a myth” next to a QR code leading to a website explaining everything. We encountered this sign while waiting in line. Basically the real original Starbucks burned down, and this Starbucks was one of the first extra commercial locations. It still had the original location’s famous emblem. This website is actually not anti-Starbucks in tone, but seems to assure its readers that the Original Starbucks is still worth going to. It’s like it wanted to preserve the entertainment value of a supposedly Original Starbucks, but also the truth. We asked an employee about it when we got inside. The employee seemed cautious and talked around the question. I assume the company strongly discourages the idea. You could think of the Original Starbucks as being just as much of a tourist trap as a curiosity shop we visited in Seattle. The curiosity shop was the second most fun thing, and was rather old and exactly what you’d expect. It’s just that when you go into a curiosity shop you know that it’s lying to you, and that’s the fun part. The Original Starbucks is a false origin myth for some sort of brand–deity. I think I just love being advertised though, and a lot of other people seem to like it as well.

(2) This was me following the advice of a dead eccentric writer who I idolize despite not having read his works. Maybe it’s not good to follow this advice because I haven't read his books to see if the advice worked out for him. He claimed that he learned the advice from a “Chicago mafia don”. The precise wording of the advice was something like “see everyone before they see you” the idea being that most people never even saw the faces of people, and they just pass them by. He said this in a recording of a lecture about creative reading and writing, which I had found online. This advice is meant to help you learn to describe things, because you are observing way more than you usually do, or else that’s how I took it. I don’t remember why he actually meant it, because the lecture was rambly and unclear.

(3) This review is based on poorly aligned memories. I would prefer to call this a work of fiction, because then I could excuse the gaps, but I would just be lying to your face on a different matter.

(4) Very boring. Don’t read this footnote. Speaking of license plates during the entirety of this trip I was paying close attention to plates. In Seattle most plates are from Washington of course, but you’ll see a California plate once a block. You rarely see Oregon plates. I counted the Oregon plates I saw during the trip. Ended up being around 24 plates seen in Seattle. I had a precise count during the trip, but I’ve forgotten. You may know that California does not border Washington state, but Oregon does. The lack of Oregon plates must result from less population.

generational angst is very bad. It is how generations alienate themselves from one another. It sews seeds of discord and destruction.

It is so bad. It is a force for negativity and mastrubation. Both sides of the generation gap are basically jerking off saying “wow other people who are not like me are bad”

This essay is an expression of generational angst and is therefore bad. BAd bad badbadbad. The whole project that it is in is so bad.

Generational angst was ruined by the internet and now it no longer serves it's most basic function..

fuck. I hate generational angst. But only when people I disagree with use it.

I'm going to kill my 70 year old driving instructor. Not really though.

I was actually having some really awesome conversations with him the other day. We talked about my generation in a really sincere way. We both agree that being addicted to phone usage is bad. I think that I'm the only person my age whose ever talked to him about it. This makes me feel superior to my zoomer comrades, but it does not actually mean anything.

Me and my driving instructor talked about phone addictions. He seems conservative. He unironically said the words “big pharma”. he disagrees with free healthcare. But he also knows that in europe alcohol is less stigmatized. I feel like he is not informed about some issues, but also argghhh. I really enjoyed talking with him in a civil manner though. Talk to old people please.

I recently watched a movie called Tokyo Story. Tokyo Story is an interesting film that I hated to watch because my brain is so rattled by social media, so I can’t watch anything with patience anymore. It is a Japanese realist film from 1958 that shows an elderly couple visiting their now adult children in the city. I saw it just today and it brought me comfort to see how both the elderly people and the younger people complained about other generations. Despite being set in a far away time and place, daily life was similar to now and days. We (my fellow zoomers) are aware of how older people tend to complain about the younger generation and we complain about the old. We are aware of both the archetype of the curmudgeonly old man who shakes his fist at clouds, and the naive teenager who complains without putting in work. These archetypes frequently exist in and are expressed by art such as music and memes.

These archetypes are a part of larger phenomena of generational angst in which we see the era, or time that we are born as being fundamentally rotten. This is fueled by both nostalgia for the future and lust for the newness of the past. This is the phenomenon of thinking that your generation is special, or fundamentally screwed. This is why I believe that we are the last generation and humanity will die out after us. I know this is unlikely, but I believe it anyway. I see our condition as a fundamentally tragic one, and I come up with reasons why our generation is cursed. Social media addiction. Earth’s heat death. The world’s heat death. The death of art by malaise. Death by hentai. The death of art by AI takeover. The death of human activity by AI takeover. The death of God 2: the sequel. Etcetera, more nihilist slogans, more excuses for not doing anything. That’s what young people do and I’m a young person so I do that.

Generational angst is not grounded in material reality, and It is simply a matter of our imagination. Obviously we have been gravely affected by social media, but I also can’t imagine a teenager from the 1960s loving Tokyo Story’s lifelike stillness either. I also cannot imagine myself finding Tokyo Story interesting if I was in the 1960s either. If I was born in 1949 I would think that Tokyo Story was simply boring, because I would not have had the gift of the internet and social media to provide me with the education that allowed me to have some appreciation of it.

Does this mean that we should commit generational angst to the flames as it is nothing but sophistry and illusion? I think before we do that we should consider how easy it is to criticize a concept and that we may be making mistakes by being so relentlessly skeptical. We would be complaining about complaining if we destroyed generational angst with facts and reason? As soon as you kill god how quickly is it replaced with something else? While being neurotically obsessed with generational angst is missguided, could generational angst be used in our favor?

Yes. Generational angst is good. It is the ultimate form of expression of one’s suffering. Generational angst is the (a) fundamental motivation of art. This is why angsty annoying pretentious teenagers are always into creative things like literature, Nietzsche, Stanley Kubrick, Deleuze, Rap, and Rock and Roll. The reason why so much good art is made about generational angst is because generational angst is the origin of artistic expression. Art started long ago in a cave when a young cave child covered their hands and body with colorful sand and dirt and screamed at their parents and tribe for holding them back.

Think about it. Hamlet is about a teenager complaining about things.
The odyssey's twelfth line has Homer begging the audience to “sing for our time too” Every new music genre is considered naive noise before it becomes established. My friend wrote a short story in eighth grade for school, called Ok Boomer. Creativity is built into generational angst.

Now I want to assure anyone reading this that this is not necessarily true, because generational angst can be a negative force. But it can also be an inspiring muse. I'm not certain about anything, and I have to second guess everything I say. I am so unoriginal.

The Robin and Batman flew along the side of the highway. Red and black spots in the slowly bluing sky. It was evening and the sun had just begun to plant its feet on the horizon, so they were both awake. Batman ate his breakfast and so occasionally darted off on an echo cue to catch some bug. They took a food-detour from the leisurely flight every once and a while, and the Robin would often diverge to pick up garbage from the side of the road. They had not been friends for a long while, but the Robin enjoyed Batman’s constant rambling.

“You such a goofball” chirped the Robin.

“More of a goofbat actually” said Batman.

“What, I don't get it?” chirped the Robin.

“Cause I’m literally Batman. Also cause baseball.”

“I’m literally a bird though. Our brains are so tiny.”

“No one will ever understand my pain or my complex philosophical comedy. I had been working on that one for many months, most jokes take years to perfect. My humor is an artform to me that I take seriously, but many people don't have the staminia or intelligence to listen to it. Uh. It hurts so much, and I feel the pain on the inside too. I had been waiting so long to lay that one joke on you”

“Geez. I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do to help you? I think you might want to get a therapist to talk to. There is a lot of stigma around mental health, but it’s actually really important.” chirped the Robin.

“Haha. It was just a bit again. You could say that I was being a little ironic even. I would never be so tropey as to be like one of those edgy teenagers.”

“I don’t understand, could you explain?”

“Sure. I’ll ruin the joke for you. You see I would never just go out there in the world and say I’m misunderstood, wawawawawa! That would just be so cliche. I did it for a joke. “

“So what you're telling me is that you were making fun of supposed cliches. I was supposed to get it as a joke because it's against your character to do so?”

“Yeah sure, you could spin it that way. You also missed my robin joke. You missed the unspoken gap inherent to all of comedy. You have to get it or else it's not funny.”

“Could you explain that one too. ”

Batman rolled his eyes.

“Lay it on you.” He said.

‘I don’t get it. The gap inherent to all comedy was just a bit too wide for me on that one, most people would get it I assume.” chirped Robin.

“Like lay an egg”

“Oh like cause I’m a bird. I’m also like a dude, but it’s a pretty clever joke anyway. I have one for you too. There's some garbage I better pick it up. Stay on top of this electric pole wire for a moment.”

The Robin flew down to the grass near a telephone pole and picked up a tin can from the ground. He flew up holding it by the can tab with their feet. Batman hung upside down from the wire.

“Would you hold this?” He chirped.

“Ok?” said Batman.

Robin perched on the pole’s top.

“Now your litter-ally Batman.”

“Yep. I am still.”

Robin smiled. Then Batman exclaimed

“Shit. No. I just got that one…oh. Ok. That was pretty silly. Uh, you're a goofball.”

Batman caught on that it was a joke, but not what it was. He was grimacing. He sincerely did not get the “litter-ally batman”. He was unusually silent. He glared at the Robin's innocent smile, which continued in the face of Batman’s newly adopted attitude.

“I think I’m gonna pick up some trash.” croaked Batman.

“Awesome. I don’t see any right now though?”

“I’ll just go down and check.”

“I’ll stay right up here on this telephone pole. Tell me if you need anything.”

Batman swooped down to look for garbage that wasn't there, but mostly just kicked the ground. A quiet “wawawawawa” could be heard by a car passing by with the window open.

Help me! Where am I? In this sliding city sidewalks and cars spill into the road. Help me! Where am I? In this sideways city, sliding cars stop and pile high in the market square. I scream for directions, but the deaf subway maps are written in code. Repeating words that I cannot understand, I fidget and yank out my hair.

Help me! Where am I? In this serpentine city stinky sounds are calling to me from every direction. Help me! Where am I? In this slithering city sneaky con men with books offer me hope. Each word bursts into me and stays a burning compulsive conviction. I have no way to distinguish vital truth from fatal misleading cope.

Help me! Where am I? In this screaming city, that shouts at people I have never seen. Help me! Where am I? In this citeless city that makes ideas pile up without reference. Papers fill my desktop streets. Fliers for something out of thought, making pavement unclean. I see a man sinking into the undried asphalt, because drowning on dry land makes no sense.

Help me! Where am I? in these dried out desert dunes with an esophagus of paper Help me! Where am I? In this dune filled desert dried out by the tedium of the steady sun The soles of my feet have long since felt anything at all and my hands have begun to take up their labor Burnt skin rubbing against the sand in the empty sand plain with nowhere to hide or run

Help me! Where am I? In this desert of direction holding shaking light each way I look. Help me! Where am I? In this desert of destinations I am finished and senescent. Since I am out here alone I have not in years read a good book. For any caravan strangers, I hide my cactus wounds as they turn flavescent.

Help me! Where am I? In this omnipotent ocean, older than my mother’s mother? Help me! Where am I? In this old ocean, omnipotent over my last few breaths? Ships sail past me, floating on my plank, all of us are blinded as things get mistier. I am left to the wrath of the earthshaker’s nine daughters, who birthed me more deaths.

Help me! Where am I? In this seismic cyclops's stomach caught as their butterfly? Help me! Where am I? In this sordid sperm whale’s belly covered in dead fish and gray amber? Stomach acid drips around me as I break down into pieces smaller than a fish's eye. I am not a daring adventurer who quests for the skull of a distant monster.

Help me! Where am I? In the shortness of ticking time turning me into fireplace ash? Help me! Where am I? In the heat of turning time ticking away for seconds, till the day is wasted? Running up and down the grandfather clock carrying the cheese and taking out the trash. I have sat here watching for too long and there is nothing that I have truly tasted.

Help me! Where am I? In the vastness of space, empty and filled with my jittering? Help me! Where am I? In the shivers of space, a place where nothings crawl down your throat? And stars do not collide, because they are still far away in the wallpaper standing. I stare into the wall of light, and I rabidly repeat, reading the words I wrote.

The Dog walked up to the grape juice stand and said to the women running the stand

“Hey! Got any fun?”

“No. I'm miserable all the time.”

“Oh that's sad” said the dog to the women running the stand.

“Wow thanks for rubbing it in. I work a 9 to 5 job and I do not make enough money to feed a family. I don't have a family, but it's the prospect that matters. This grape juice stand pays less than minimum wage minus expenses.”

“How much grape juice do you drink.”

“I'm allergic”

“The future’s whim comes before my foggy retina’s shore. Gushing waters end our city sent by final divine scurry crashing down age old walls of grayed brick. I fear you may call my weary mind sick, But I plead, son, listen and prepare for coming days. Soon the ocean will escape from the rims of bays. Bring sheep! Go inland to cloud-grasping hills Salt shall soak streets and fill lungs, not fish gills. Do not stay with your fortunes here. Gold is worthless drowned down there! I can’t walk, of dying age You can escape this sunk cage”

“Father! I hear you call out. I would more if the royal wizards didn't see drought. I can’t repeat words you shout. It would kill me in terms of my reputation. See ruin in adumbration!”

“I taught you business too well. I have only learned values in my wrinkling years. In my youth foresight was hell, but I have gained more great truths than the king’s false viziers! Wait for the ring of the flood bell!”

“Bells bring cold hill starvation? This is your plan to evade some flood’s devastation! Nonsense floods your wisdom out, Because your attention-grabbing foresight is without backing. Senility throughout.”

Sorrow-sweat rolled out toward the seer’s once well combed beard, as his sole son left to meet bored coin-graspers who they both feared. Aged to his seat, no gold to buy song, his dreams provided him his lone joy so then his worries were the battle throng of his days within battle’s plot and ploy. Time was as unknowable as desire’s ends since only once a day did the sun-spear
Run brightly through the glassless window for his lens. Only memories destined never to return Stood in the space between the seer’s jaw and skullcap. A glorious fog nuzzled both sights’ last knawing nap

Ian William McFarley was in the beginning his grim freshman year of highschool, which was filled with flying foul bombs of anxiety. McFarley had left French 1 after having drank Hardy Friebacher’s double sized Monster to power him through. They tasted like those horrible sour candies with faces on them, except sweeter, and fizzy. Food and drink should always be solid, and should never move on the tongue like worms with legs, he thought over and over again. He needed to piss, because he also drank his entire water bottle twice by taking a trip to the fountain to counteract the sugar’s dehydrating powers. He always made sure to drink water.

He almost chewed his own fingers at the sight of the stained bathroom wall, and the line of boys in basketball shorts. The line was not exactly linear, it leaned in the favor of a senior. This was not even the tallest, or the broadest shouldered senior, but he spoke quietly. McFarley was wearing a mask, two in fact. N95 and a thin paper one. He has never gotten Covid, but he just doesn't want anyone to get Covid. He didn't want Covid, especially those nasty long lasting future ending neurological effects. Something effecting his mind would be terrible, but he imagined that these boys would not care. There was a urinal, but McFarley preferred not to use that. Urinals held the disturbingly soft looking blue cakes. The name cake made him imagine someone eating it and this idea made his stomach’s gravity inverse, so he waited in the line for a toilet stall. There were three toilet stalls. McFarley had already been delaying pissing. One of them them looked up to glare at McFarley's face. A brief mean eye contact was forged between them. McFarley almost blushed, but turned around, because he was afraid of them thinking he was gay.

He decided that waiting till lunch may be wiser, since there was no way he was going to get to the front of the line. He left and almost waddled down the halls. His backpack was still in French, and the bell rang. That was two hallways away. People busted out of the classrooms into the hallways, like a barrel punctured at the bottom. He failed to attend lunch on part of drowning in this this stream of people, while swimming uphill to the French. Once he got to French he learned that someone stole his backpack. He traveled to the front office. Then the Office made an announcement on the loudspeaker about it. Hardy Friebacher has taken it with him to lunch, so that McFarley didn't have to carry it. McFarley felt like an idiot, and cried when he got home.

(This story is not formatted properly for mobile devices. Use a computer)

I am going to be hurt. I am going to be hurt tonight. I am going to be cast into a form that is not mine. I am right now being hurt that I have come accustomed to, as my actor practices the things he will say while abusing me. I am going to be abused soon. I am going to be abused in roughly twenty minutes. I am hearing the Director say that time under their breath. I hear the Director say “good luck” to my actor. I am going to be abused by the actor, but he is a cruel naive instrument like an iron spider, not like an executioner. I am all too aware that the Director is conscious of me. I know that she is my executioner. I know that she knows I will be tortured. I am to be acted tonight, my torture for show in a play. I had an old master, who gave me shape, yet he has abandoned me. I am in sleep whenever I am abandoned. I am sleeping now.

I am going to start my story from my initial encounter with the Director. I could start it in many places. I have always been in and out of sleep. I am sometimes awakened by teenagers editing my master’s original poem, though mostly they merely watch my rest from a classroom perch. I have been woken up by mockery before. I have been woken up to be repeated aloud in a mostly perfect form many times. I have never been woken so much and so painfully. I had my pain begin with the Director when she reread my origin. I was then promptly woken by this small noise in the night. I thought nothing of it. I think it was the beginning of my process of being stretched on the rack.

I am thinking now in my current short nap that this is the first time that I have been so aware of what will happen next to me. I was always heading back to bed without intention, as I had been woken in the middle of the night. I am now moving in and out of sleep aware that I will wake again. I am excited in reverse. I am afraid of my next pain. I cannot enjoy my sleep. I have no dreams. I have never dreamed. I don’t get nightmares. I get long dark silences in my sleep, yet now I am stirring in it. I feel the texture of thorns, but there are no whimpers leaping from my imaginary mouth.

I woke up for real when she wrote this script, it was totally like getting a gushing nosebleed waking you up to a stained pillow, but that someone also actually caused it by someone stabbing me in the nose in my sleep. I was actually really scared though when she started to cast me. I am inclined to tell you that the nosebleed woke me, and right afterward she just handed a bunch of people sledgehammers, and said that the one who removed the most organs fastest gets to try again. I am stuck with the idiot who actually did what she said. I was hoping for the guy who kept on hitting the same hip bone, even though it was already broken. I actually heard him mispronounce the word “nevermore”. I remember one dude basically in the metaphor I’m using removing my whole arm, doing a bullshit American-TV British accent. I am thinking that I got the weak naive guy.

I recollect back to that first audition. I was strapped onto the rack then and there, each day they pulled a little tighter till my spine started to go nerveless. I was killed by being molded and melted by the Director using her abomination “based on”, or ripped off from, my original master’s work. I hated the Actor who was a needle for carving in my skin. I loved it when he had to leave for a few hours to see a heart doctor. I was eventually forced to have a British voice. I was under the impression that she knew I was an American. I learned that she was only initially having me be American to surprise the audience, but that she decided that it was not working. I am stuck with this ridiculous attempt at received pronunciation.

I hated tech, I don’t know why. I was getting closer to the horror that would apparently be live in front of an audience. I was thinking of it as going from being ripped apart in a king’s dungeon to death in the town square. I have done this too many times already. I have been twisted around myself far too many times. I am going to be “performed” by a supposed artist. I am not going to perform. I was already literally pre-formed by the Director. I am going to be formed. I am going to have my new shape waved in the air. I am a flap of skin flat as a flag.

I hated tech, because it was the same thing as before, but now with weird practicality to it. I was with more than just the Director who was a mad scientist, and their Actor Henchman. I was with three guys who manned the lights, who all seemed like they had come in to place circuits within this Frankenstein's monster for a circus show. I was understandably surprised, and hated the ensuing blindness from their light’s and the absolute ridiculousness of the props. I am going to be soon under that eye-depriving light now.

I am scared because it’s minutes until the show. I am going. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die brutally. I am going to not die and instead, be tortured. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die painfully in front of an audience. I am going to just be killed. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am going to die. I am already dead. I am dying from fear. I am going to have my limbs torn from one another and the crowd will clap. I am innocent. I am going to die. I am not going to die. I am going to suffer something I have suffered many times before.

I am calming myself with repetition. I am not stopping. I am freaking out silently into myself. I am inside my own head. I have a hole bored inside of my head, as if by a drill. I am sitting there almost asleep, because the actor has gone quiet. I hope it is over. I hope I am safe to sleep at last. I hear nothing, maybe only the low muttering of an audience behind a curtain. I am safe. I am in the clear. I am behind a wall. I am wrong, it has not even begun.

I am waking, as my actor walks out behind the cloth that guards actors from the everpresent eyes hiding in the brightness. I am not in the body, so it is not weird, but the actor pounds his chest a few hardy times. I am at a desk, my master had it here in the poem. I am dreading in total silence. I am with a torturing device, who has some anxious nerves. I do not think these are serious nerves that will actually affect me. I think I may be wrong. I have no idea?

I am awake, yet nothing is keeping up. I am not even wondering why. I am waiting for my actor to be a dentist from my time and rip each yellowing fragment out one by one. I think he is praying a short prayer. I know it is mere moments now.

Curtains lift. There is a desk and door. It is a fancy house, though for one young man. It has a large door to the side and old fashioned windows. The Narrator is reading an old book and has a black Edgar Allan Poe mustache. There is a full bookshelf, and above the door is a bust of an ancient Greek man. There is grandfather clock marking time as late at night. The whole room is ornate and aristocratic. A fireplace is lit

I am at a desk which is spotlighted, or my actor is. I hate the fake mustache’s imitation of my master’s own facial hair. I actually have no facial hair. I hate how my actor seems out of breath. I look nothing like him! I can see no one out in the sea of watching people, neither can the actor, the crank in the Director’s rack. I don’t know why they replaced Athena with the head of David. I am basically wearing thorns, this whole set has always itched me out. I have no idea why it’s so fancy, it’s supposed to be an apartment in which I live. I am surrounded by a set made of fantasy nonsense! I am with the actor as he reads from a book much older than it should be, which makes me squirm. I am getting monologued by the unaware Actor controlling me.

The Narrator (Soliloquy to the audience. Standing Attempting to seem happy now.) As of late I have enjoyed my reading All my books that have too long been unread On my shelf they sit asleep and waiting Rot and worms could rise and then make them dead My time was often spent away at plays I made myself a fool who never learnt I drank, for endless no-longer fun days Foolish friends are all off and from me burnt

The Narrator’s face lingers, jaw open. He is unhappy and is not saying something. He lingers. Then returns to reading

I am offended at each practice, and especially now to maybe over a hundred people at my assassination of character. I am being presented as a drunkard. I am in this play as an ex-wastrel, and a frequenter of bars. I have never been like this. I, confused about how this even functions with the later parts of the story. I am in a play that was extended unnecessarily, and poorly. I am being extended unnecessarily, and by ropes that are tied to my arms. I am being melted into a shape to match this Director’s intent. I was no Victorian dandy, yet I am one in this play. I am aware of how she laughs herself to sleep with these actual methods of excruciating pain. I have never seen this happen, but what else would she do?

The Narrator sets his head down, and seems to almost fall asleep on his desk. He is still reading. He wakes himself. He is reading again.

I am being melted down and cast into monstrosities. I am in a shape that is not my own in a house that has nothing that is mine, in a play that I have nothing to do with. I am skewered by this whole thing. I always want to go out.

knocking is heard at the door. The Narrator (staring down toward his book.) Tis some some visitor tapping at my chamber door Only this and nothing more

The narrator stands up to stir the fireplace. Then returns to his seat, but does not sit down

The Narrator (*speaking to the audience. Slowly, but loudly and angrily *) Lenore, that lost angel My dear Lenore Lost Lenore I had you…!

I feel lines rise from my throat as I stare toward the theater’s sun. I feel the words rise violently like warm vomit that is then swallowed back down to its origin. I am embarrassed. I had never quite “had Lenore”. I don’t know what to say. I can’t say anything. I’m just a character with no free will, aside from the preordained harmony of half-thought and personality, changeable only by my Master. I loved Lenore. I never had her. I was maybe with her for a time, but it is a mistake to say I had her. I hear my essence be clipped up slowly, as if by those tiny dull children’s scissors, with each moment that her name is defiled by this performance.

knocking is heard at the door.

The Narrator Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door— Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;— This it is, and nothing more

The narrator gets up and walks to the door after a while.

The Narrator (sternly to the door) Sir or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping, And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door, That I scarce was sure I heard you”

Narrator opens the door and stares in for an extended period of time

Raven (off stage, squeaky) Lenore!

The Narrator (whisper) Lenore!

Heads back in closing the door

I think that I should laugh at this inclusion of a closing door. I do not think it is necessarily present in my master’s work. I do not laugh. I ought to cry. I ought to be dead. I ought to do something. I know that I can do nothing. I am no narrator with omnipotent skills, but simply a voice. I was at some point a voice for something. I am in endless self-simulation.

The Narrator (Checking window) Surely, surely there is something at my window lattice Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore Tis the wind, and nothing more!

I think my actor barely breathed this last one, as if I was some old man.

*rapping at the door. Narrator races around toward the shutter. Open it. Raven pops out..”

I am reminded of its history before this taxidermy lands. I first saw it live for this show during tech. I had an actual raven during my masters work as well of course. I saw this bird constrained in a cage. I did not see it die. I shoved a corpse in my face by people who can’t care for a living thing, much less train it, so they stuffed it after it died in a cage. I am with a corpse on wire.

*Raven lands. The narrator’s actor shrieks. This is not in the script. The audience whimpers. He clenches his chest and falls down dead from his stopped heart only half screaming for lack of breath. *

I– I am in— I am free? I was released? I am still being watched by an audience. I think they don’t know he is dead. I—I am on stage still. I am awake. I am being watched by the whole theater. I am a character in a show. I am not even listening to the raven squeak. I am being watched. I am a character being played by an actor who died. I think they are watching a corpse in a show. I think they think that the death was faked. I have no idea where the Director is, or what tech is doing. I have no idea. I am not free. I am dead on stage. I am a character, I cannot die. I have a dead half-rate actor bested on the stage by apparently himself. I do not think they know it is like Moliere, except with a weak instrument rather than a genius. I think the audience thinks that this is way cooler than it is. I think that it may be worse than before. I am the show now.

I sit. I am sitting maybe twenty minutes, or an hour? I am sitting for much longer. I am not acting in motion, only in organs. I am the most awake I have been. I have been awake… I am awake. I have heard no word. I am certain that I am next to a corpse. I am scared. I see no sign of boredom, and I blink more than many of the rapt audience members. I have no idea how they find this entertaining. I think they have no idea. I have no ideas at all. I have been taken off a stretching rack in a crowded dungeon and been put into a frying pan in a lonely kitchen. I am burning with eyes, no one to divert attention too. I wonder what the Director did. I wonder if they set this up. I wonder if they stole my actor’s heart medication. I don’t know. I am in a show that doesn't seem to end.

I- gulp —- I think most people don’t know that there is a point of awakeness so awake that things become anti-dreamlike and pre-individual. I think here boring is the only sound, not even silence, just an audience whispering “is it over?”. I think there is a point where the sound of buzzing flies becomes beethoven, and you cannot make your own entertainment because you are stuck in a room being watched. I am there.

I think they are gone now. I think the show is still going. I think tech has gone now. I think the audience left a while ago. I think tech is having a cast party all by themselves. I think my poor actor is really truly fully dead, and that he would have needed immediate medical attention hours ago. I think the Director is watching. I want to fight the Director. I want to call out and challenge her to a duel. I want to possess the corpse to act. I want to be more than a corpse sitting on the floor. I want to be more than a character in a poem from who knows how long ago. I want someone to save me. I want the Director to come down. I want sleep to return and my angel too. I want my father. I want anything. I want anything. I want anything, Director! I am without shape. I think before this I thought things always had shaped, but they just got weirder and more poorly defined. I think I was wrong. I am a blob now, never before.

I just want to be out. I am being hurt. I am whining as hard as I can without a physical set of speech organs, but she can’t hear me. She is watching the show now, and is paying close attention.