he's the bushy man in a suburban pub - he's got no-one to drink with, so he smokes outside alone - the condom machine graffiti reads - packets hide, check inside - there are no women in sight, not on this side of the bar anyway - two weeks ago, someone's wife commits suicide - it's been raining so i find a seat by the open fire - my jumper is too hot, but im too cold without it - i see an old local man play pool against a young asain girl - he wins and so they play again - no-one enjoys themselves - it's a sunday so the beers are having no affect - there is an uneasiness that swirls warmly around the bar as we all know the young girl pouring beers behind the bar is young enough to be someone's daughter - i zone out as much as i can - horse-races are called through a prison of crackle and static on the dusty old radio belonging to the old man sitting next to me - his name is dusty - i don't think he's even listening to the call, just enjoying his beer by blankly staring deep into the bar-mat - before an even younger girl hands me the sandwich i ordered on a plate - it looks better than i expect - a retarded boy collects the empty glasses from my table and i order another - outside i see the rain and the trees down and drenched the empty car-park - a cacophony of wind rain creating natural random dances - we're waiting around to die, i think to myself - all too gutless to live, all too gutless to die
rain stained mail - typed letters typed by computers themselves informing everyone of just how much money they owe to a name - so much demand
i find some crystals - just enough to turn the oceans into jelly, volcano spewing lamb gravy, the chunks that somehow dodged the lava tumble into dust and powder - most deadly to the civilians - one plastic world, wobbling as one plastic world - everyone works together to make sure that wars don't begin due to an unexpected "unbalancing" - a still silent world bobbing about it's business, smoking and drinking alone, oblivious to the billions of fearful cancer-cells that hide and wait, hoping they will survive this era of existence
***
later i walk inside and smell dinner is cooking - who won the footy? - another week of finding money in the most absurd places dawns on me, being another sunday night - televisions left on, their light warm family entertainment nauseating me - i sit on the couch, struggling to shrug the need to re-read a certain book just because and ever since a close friend asked to borrow it - dim lounge room lights, they make me sleepy - another sunday beer does nothing - i lie down and stare at the walls and ceiling - to hell if i even knew it - hours of thought spawn from blank lounge room walls and dim-lounge room lights - sunday evening and their last minute beers
he arrives home later, and im asleep at this time, despite the fact i had no idea what the time was - look what i found - he is angling a large piece of glass through the loungeroom door - i focus through my sleepy-fuzz - what have you got? - it's large broken piece of glass - he's already cut his hand on it at least once as i can see the unmistakable violent red has dabbled itself over a quarter of the glass like the hand-print of a blood-soaked skeleton - i catch a glimpse of myself in the glass, before i realise it's not broken glass at all, but in fact a large a broken mirror
he places it in the corner in the room, not before spilling some more blood on the floorboards and walls - where did you find it? - we both look into the mirror, angled just so we can't see ourselves, but only each other - it's somehow been cracked and broken in the most perfect shape a broken mirror can be - even the blood seems to have streaked, dabbed and smudged all in the right places - it's edges, short sharp, long straight, curved and smooth, all in corners and places and directions that seem simply perfect and make perfect sense for a broken mirror - he stares into my eyes but i ignore them - his are filled with pride and achievement, im sure - mine, i can only assume, are filled with admiration of such a perfect result that was thrown to chance - i care not for the reflection, only for the beauty and divinity of the edges and curves and the blood of my friend - such perfection not meant for existence but only for twitching minds and a warped sense of time and space - a paradox to stain life as we knew it
it would make a perfect wedding present, if i was ever to get married - with the sense he was still staring at me through the reflection he was given, i ask if we know anyone who is getting married anytime soon - it's forgotten, and we both agree to nail it to the wall as is - half the dusty lounge-room wall now nothing but cracks, sharps, blood, and my vision of holiness
three years later and im engaged - living in her house, but living my life all the same - all the same, nothing has changed - and she's wonderful - i went to visit him maybe two weeks ago - he still has the mirror and still stares at my reflection whenever he gets the chance - i ask if he's ever thought of changing it, if he's ever wanted something different to stare at - he says he's never really thought of it before and that he didn't really care, and i believe him - we laugh at the fact that im actually engaged and he offers me the mirror as a wedding present - i decline but pat him on the back as a sign that i appreciate the offer - we share a couple of beers and promise to catch up again soon - we shake hands and i start my walk home in the mist and fog, red, orange and yellow of autumn - wiping the blood off my hands, i think myself as the luckiest man on earth, and carry on with my life
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