textfiles/magazines/WHATEVER/stories2.txt

========================================
True Stories from Pathological Liars  II
========================================

February.1995

Another collection from (swain@cybernetx.net)

--> The Catch-22?


* You won't know if you hate it until you've already read it!


==
--> Table of Contents

1] Ben's first cup
2] Anecdotal Seniors
3] Full of nog and the three pistachios
4] The ears that always ring.
==


1] Ben's first cup
------------------

Ben felt uncomfortable in his surroundings.  Its been so long.  So
long since he's been outdoors.  

He walked swiftly through the light fall rain.  He knew he wanted
coffee, yes, indeed.  He entered the cafe and ordered.

"One large coffee please."  Money changed hands and Ben sat at a
nicely finished wood-stained table.  He looked around and viewed
mediocre paintings of old men sitting on benches.  He dug into his
moist coat and located a Pall Mall.  The flaming sulphur meets
tobacco as a cloud of smoke rose to the virgin ceiling.

An employee approaches.  "Umm, excuse me, you can't smoke here." 
Ben keeps his gaze on his coffee, barely acknowledging the four-
and-a-quarter shitworker.  "Yes I can." stated Ben, matter-of-
factly.  He takes a drawn out drag that terrorizes patrons aside
him.  "Its always something with these motherfuckers." Ben thinks. 
"Umm." the acne-plastered espresso girl hums, "look, you gotta
leave; PLEASE."  Her pitiful spineless stance annoys Ben, "Fuck
off, bitch." he eloquently gestures.  "I haven't been outside much
less to a cafe in 2 years.  I'm not getting wet and I always smoke
when I drink coffee." he stops, contemplates.  "Any suggestions?"
she begins, he interjects, "shut up."  By now Ben has a scant few
drags left.  He takes these graciously and deposits said Pall Mall
into the quarter-full coffee.  He stands, composes himself, and
walks out to the light fall rain.

"Another day, another buck-fifty" he whispers.  Ben strolled home,
quickly from the caffeine, locking his door and not leaving again
for another two years.


2] Anecdotal Seniors
--------------------

The man who sings sad songs, sings sad songs.
A tornado is coming to your town soon,
to blow you and your motor home away.
Its chilly in drafty homes.
The Jazz buzz in the room.
Everything is hip and dandy,
in our world of icon relish.
Everything then,
SO COOL NOW.
Smoking herb makes me forget,
WHAT DID I SMOKE?

People that drown sleep in the ocean.
The cold days are approaching.
Leaf by golden leaf falling stray.

Amber streetlights twinkle to the eye.
The whole picture in a bird's sight.
Oakland is a bad place to raise kids.
Unless you're on the upper tier.
Hang from one raw hand,
on the brass tube that temps your fate.
Advertising is getting to me.
My ass hurts, man.
Fortune cookies are misleading.
The old folks are taking over,
imprisoning twisted youth in lousy conditions in medicine-smelling
nursing homes located in Southern Florida.
I'd say its a conspiracy, but i've already said it once.  See
above.

3] Full of nog and the three pistachios
---------------------------------------

Aimlessly he sauntered through the desolate university.  A bitter
cold eve and a boiling hot coffee in his right glove.  His mission
was to find something to busy himself with.  Fridays always meant
something to Ben.  Ever since leaving the clinic, he's been without
things to do, friends to laugh with, kids to play with.  The pills
rattled loudly in his smoking jacket, reminding him of his
discomfort in the asylum.  He sipped his coffee and sat down cross-
legged in the fresh toxic snow.  An African American squirrel
approached him, cocked his head, and removed three lime-green
pistachio nuts from his perma-pouch.  He layed all three on the
snow and smiled, running up a maple tree to his beloved
"squirrelfriend".  "See that guy down there" said John the African
American squirrel.  "He's a weird one.  He rattles like he's got a
million nuts on him."  He went on, "I gave him a few pistachios, I
really can't stand those things."  Ben yelled to John, "What are
the implications of these said pistachios?"  John thought.  "He
doesn't even know I can speak in 36 separate tongues."  "Well?" Ben
yelled.  Nothing.  At the lack of response Ben became urked and
pulled his cold penis out, unloading coffee urine on John's tree. 
"Dick" John said softly.

Ben placed his appendage back into its holsteer and walked further
through the unviersity, stumbling across a few small hermaphrodite
elf's playing carnival tunes at a heated kiosk.  "Hey you" Ben
exclaimed.  "You guys know any Mahavishnu?"  "Nope.." a
particularily silly looking elf called.  "Look man, we don't play
covers..."  Ben was surprised.  What is Jersey but one extended
remix of a cover tune at 16rpm?  Ben watch the band play for
several minutes until he realized, it was pill time.

The pill went down with a raucous taste, being chased with the
aforementioned coffee.  It sent a chill up Ben's meager spine as
steaming bile excited his mouth, landing smoking on the virgin
white snow.  This spooked him so much that he beat feet upon a
beaten path, stopping dead into the chest of a police officer.

"Son," the pig said, "What you think you runnin' from?"  Ben had no
patience for stupid questions; completely none.  "Who says i'm
running from anything?"  Ben exclaimed.

Pressure mounts...

This reply took the cop entirely too long to process, leaving Ben
enough time to pull out his 9 millimeter double-barreled laser-
sighted flash-guarded automatic weapon with an assortment of armor-
piercing, brain-exploding, cop-killing super bullets.  And yes, he
squeezed the trigger and watched.

It was more like the sound of Jello hitting a plate-glass window at
three hundred miles an hour.

His head turned into something more resembling a thick spaghetti
sauce with ground beef in the mix.  Ben chuckled and wiped a piece
of shattered skull from his coat.  And what a stupid question.

Ben wasn't running from anything, per se, he just felt like
running.

Ben continued through the university as the snow came from above. 
He took an old shortcut through the old archways and entered the
convenience store, making sure to wipe the pieces of brain out of
his snowflaked hair.  "Too bright." he thought, walking past a
bland a probably worthless girl chewing hot-pink gum and eating a
foot-long jerky stick.  Passing through the candy aisle, Ben espied
a piece of white trash with his head displaced in a bulk-candy bin.

They do love those yogurt pretzels.  Ben approached the cooler with
excitement.  

He walks...

And to the milk section and looks...hmmmm...Through the grapevine
he had heard, Egg Nog is in.  A joyous celebration.  Ben flashed to
the days in Brooklyn eating ham and drinking whiskey nog.  

He sighs.

"Oh, the days..." But wait.  He can't find his sweetened milk,
sugar, and egg beverage.  "Where is it.." he says in a whisper. 
"The nog, its got to be here somewhere."  

But it wasn't.

"Where's my motherfucking EGG NOG?"  He screams at the cooler,
almost blaming IT for this error.  Everyone in the store hears;
loud and clear.  In one quick stroke of his boned hand, he smashes
the cooler glass with scant effort.

Not a drop of blood.

"Listen all you high-brow motherfuckers, this is a goddamn
conspiracy and you high-pedestal bastards are going to get me my
nog or those aristocratic brains of yours will be conversing with
a mop."  A disabled worker approaches him.  A hush falls.

"Well put, Ben.  What's up?"  Ben sighs.  In a dazed tone, "Oh
Chris, my regards."

Ben gives up on the situation. He reasons, "A life without Egg Nog
is a life without the rest of these miserable bastards.  I'll kill
'em."  Ben follows up.  He strolls through the store, capping miss
chewing-gum-bitch-USA with a shell to the heart, exploding the
valves into a meshy spill.  The shell continues.  Through her back,
terminates at a bag of kitty litter.  "NO EGG NOG, NO CHRISTMAS. 
NO CHRISTMAS, NO REASON TO LIVE." he mutters in a calm tone.  A
small applauds his drama and begins rifling through the candy
section.  "Anarchy!" the child screams.  

"Oh yeah, I almost forgot Chris."  "Chris!" he yells, "Where are
you?"  On the floor, slithering like a wonded snake, Chris appears.

Ben asks, "You guys got any Egg Nog back there?"..  "Yeah, just got
some in tonight."  Chris replies shakily.  

Cool..

"Can you get me a pint?  Man, I sure could use some nog."  Chris
continues his snake-like movements.  He slithers to the back cooler
and comes back with a pint.  Ben take it like a gentleman and makes
a friendly gesture of some sort.  

Down the pastry aisle to the cashier.

Ben wonders, "where's the cashier?" ... "You just shot her, Ben."
Chris reminds.  An expression, only described as rage comes upon
Ben's face.  He swivels around a balnkly aims at Chris, now
standing.  "Now thats trippy." Ben thought.  "Would you look at
that!  Thats a lot of blood, wow."  He placed a bloody buck on the
table, and exited; not forgetting to take his special shortcut.

The snow came faster now and Ben smiled, walking casually through
the snow-covered Ivy-League school.  His Converse were logged with
melted snow; not at all unlike water.  He kept on, passing the
expired police officer, passing the musical kiosk, and eventually
coming to John the African American squirrel's aforementioned maple
tree.  Ben's early footprints were barely visible, and quickly
disappearing.  

He sat.

He looked down at the three pistachios.  Inside his coat he emptied
his three bottles of heavy sedatives onto the snow, coloring it
blue, black, yellow.  He took the three pistachios and so he
sauntered home, full of nog and the three pistachios.


4] The Ears that always Ring
   =========================

"Obscenity!" spoke he.  Ben sat perched on his front steps watching
the golden glow of the sunset.  "Winter, bloody winter!" he
muttered.  The wind howled, it howled frigidity and dryness.  Ben
rubbed his pale hands together. 

The non-fiction flowed along the page, Ben's eyes gazed upon the
yellow pages of The Idler.  A coincedence he found as he became
lucid of this fact.  Ben himself was an Idler.

The phone rang.  With urgency Ben carelessly dropped his book and
ran inside.  Catching the couch with his left foot, he proceeded to
trip and fall to the hardwood floor.  But the phone still rang.

He caught the phone on the fifth ring, a mere millisecond after the
caller had abandoned hope.  Ben answered, began, "Hel"....The line
was dead.  "Its like that is it?" Ben said in a challenging tone.

The psychosis continued, even after years of therapy.  Ben gestured
his hands in a surrendering fashion.  Another catch-22.  He sat.

His mind attacked him, full-speed ahead.  Could it have been?  Was
it her?  Wait, maybe it was a crank call.  Or, was it a
telemarketer?  And if it was, what did they want to sell me?  Maybe
I needed it.

The chair was a recliner.  Not implying that it was particularly
comfortable, but that it infact reclined.  Ben never used this
function of the chair.  He preferred to sit slouched, simulating
the reclining option.  

His kitten lay masking in the sun on the oriental carpet.

He pulled a creased cigarette from its soft-pack.  He examined it. 
He produced a lighter from his shirt pocket, and ignited the tip. 
It smoked.  Ben took a long drag, watching the flaming red tip glow
shades of orange.  He relaxed.  He begin to exhale.  Slowly,
methodically, appreciating the carcinogenic connotations.

The phone, it rings again.

Ben stops, temporarily stunned from the loudness of the mechanical
ringer.  He is interrupted, the last wisps of inhaled smoke exit
furiously, outlining the winter sunbeams on the wall.  He coughs. 

He rises hastily, darting for the phone.  He stretches his arm
long, hoping to get the phone before its next ring.   But another
ring overtakes his hearing, one louder and more sharp.  

A pain surfaces on top of his head.  He questions, "The phone, it
stopped ringing.  And only after two rings.."  His vision narrows,
the room spins, he drops to the kitchen floor.  He's out.

The kitten rises, disturbed by the racket.  Approaches Ben, licks
from the mounting pool of blood on the floor.

It is evening.  Precisely 7:30pm.  The house is pitch-dark. 
Outside a light snow falls, the circular amber lights from the
snowtruck illuminate the room, disco-like.  Ben awakens.  He has
just dreamt of a phone, with a continuous ring.  It rings plugged
in, it rings disconnected, it rings when it doesn't exist.  It just
rings.

Ben surveys his environment.  His head hurts.  His white kitten lay
asleep, with traces of dried blood encompassing its small mouth. 

Odd, whats going on here?  Ben scratches his head in initial
confusion, and tempts his wound.  He screams.  How did this happen?

Ben rises and turns on the kitchen light.  Its flourescence nearly
blinds him.  He stands and tries to grab his bearings.  

The phone, it rings.

Ben interjects, speaking directly to the phone, "The devil is in
you.  I won't answer you."  He presses the button on the answering
machine; activating it.

The glow of the red light appears.

Ben reaches into the fridge and pulls a beer from its case.  His
anxiety builds.  "Who will it be?"  ..He wonders, "Will they hang
up?"  He glances at the small circle of blood on the floor, slowly
adding the facts together.

A badly recorded message begins:

"Hi Ben..Wait, I mean, Hi, this is Ben here, this is my machine
so...Leave a message!" - The sound of the leader tape hisses and
the tape completes.  A loud *CLICK* and a whirring rewind of the
incoming tape.  

The tension mounts.  The tape, it records.

"Hello, Mr. Selenium, this is Gregg Dabney from New Jersey Bell."
he stops.  Ben relaxes.  

The phone, it rings, but not in installments.  Its one long ringing
sound.  Ben freezes, frightened.  The phoneman continues:

"We seem to be having....We seem to be..." The ring grows louder. 
"Sir, could you please pick up the phone?"

Ben drops into his chair, mesmerized.  "Sir?"  Ben lifts the phone
from the cradle, wearily places it to his ear.

"Hello, what do you want?"  Ben yells.  

But the phone, it still rings.


The room grew narrow, Ben through the phone down in rage.  

The phoneman's voice continued, "And so the Idler idled, similiar
to a phone waiting for a ring."

He awoke.

The phone rang.  Ben rose and walked to the phone answering it.  

The ringing stopped.