Shifting props behind scenes in a dictionary; a Tootsie kind of nightmare day

and so, because the session with Gerald is still too heavy to write about yet —you will have to forgive me, dictionary, if I opt to avoid

    upon leaving Gerald’s

but then, it becomes a Tootsie (the film) kind of day bumping into Nigel after

How he says that Jörn might be something vomited from Hell....? is that how he said it—?

I half don’t hear nor understand anything Nigel says after that. Maybe I short circuit more easily than the average person

I have a cap on how much my emotions can take before I need to run for cover

I say at such point,
“I must go,” to him

Nigel reaches for me as I get up from the table and throw my bag on to go

“I’m just worried about you,” he says to me

“Well—gosh, I don’t know what to say about that....” and I look right at him. I no longer see his lighthouse somehow though ... I mean I think I have a bad habit of self delusion—especially about men; I give them far too much credit and in hindsight I always realize I seem to fill in my fiction where they lack and credit it all not to myself

“Listen, I am sorry about how it went down between us,” I apologize because I have a moment of feeling guilt but I add, “maybe you hoped for something I’m not wired for—I don’t mind that you may be bisexual as so was I once but I was always monogamous and to simplify this for you, Nigel....” I study his eyes now that have lost their power over me and, yes, there is a sadness about this, to be sure, but not when you realize it was never based on a truth, “it’s not that I cannot be broad minded about being capable of having an open relationship but— well, you never asked me nor considered and still, as I’d have said no, anyway— it is not physically possible for me to be close to someone intimately once I don’t trust them. I just am not equipped that way....”

He stares back at me and after this moment when I see his eyes go red I decide I have to go

“But I—“ he begins

“No!” because I can feel what he’s about to say and actually run now for the door out of Starbucks only he runs after me outside and he says it anyway as I am rushing away from him

“I love you,” he says this

I cover my ears and say,
“No-no-no, stop! Please! You made a choice—do not make me the bad guy!”

“Don’t you think your Viking might just be rebound?”

“Please ....stop calling him that. He’s a musician, he’s not a fucking Viking—and you know nothing about our relationship, you have no business even going there, ok?”

“You know— I saw him leave your apartment building the other day and meet up with a woman,” Nigel tells me

“What? Have you been stalking me, Nigel? You know.... let me go, I need to go—I’ve had such a day, do you mind—?”

He grabs my hand and pulls at my phone that I have my fingers wrapped around and he says,
“please un-block me!” and he grabs my phone

I look down the street wanting to be gone from here.... I think that is the only way he’ll let me go so I say,
“Ok, fine,” and pull my phone from him. I open him in contacts and unblock him. I show him this now. Then I send him a text to prove it. I do a smile—

:)

I look at him,
“Ok?”

“Will you message me later?” he asks me

....?

I look at him and then again down the street. Later.... ? how long is later, I wonder

I sigh heavily and say,
“Ok, listen, I have some things I want to ask you about DNA memory and, how ‘bout I try and text you tomorrow?”” Yeah? Ok—so, yeah—ok?”

I dread the hug but then he does it

and then I start to run down the street and lose myself in the crowds

but I still hear him calling after me

It is after a few streets of weaving in and out of in order to feel free of him that I finally take a deep breath and slowly head back to the apartment building but finding myself taking the long way back

It is some gear shifting when I realize I have to face the Swedish chorus and....

Jörn which after everything

still, I arrive at the apartment building far quicker than I had expected to and find myself in the lobby standing by the postal boxes and staring at the very spot I saw Jörn for the very first time. I don’t know why but I am somehow frozen to stand there

It is awhile before I realize he is suddenly standing there. He makes me jump in fright

“What are you doing?” he asks me and comes over to me

“How long have you been there?” I ask him

“How long—? I just stepped out of the elevator and I saw you—what’s wrong?—where have you been? I sent you a text,” he says

I take out my phone as I had thrown it into my bag which must have muffled the sound, but the text messages opens up to my last :) to Nigel

I nervously cover it but he doesn’t notice and then I open to his

It simply says: where are you? Im starting to worry

Which makes me think of what Nigel said before. And the other thing he said. What woman?

I look up at him

He reads my eyes,
“what?” he asks

“I went to see Gerald,” I say through all the static going on

But then his phone does his mother’s operatic “Oooooh!!!!” alert tone that makes us both jump

He looks at his phone,
“Come,” he says pulling me back outside

“Where?”

“Mama.... I—“ still he drags me along skipping the necessity of explanation or invitation

“Where are we going?” I ask

and then we are walking to the corner convenience store

I look up at him and then at my wrist in his hand,
“sometimes I think you must must confuse me with your daughter!”

He lets go my wrist,
“yes, it must be the height thing, förlåt mig—I’m sorry,” and adds “actually, she’s taller than you but you are about the height she was at eleven so, you could be right.”

I realize we are here to do some grocery shopping as he’s methodically grabbing things

“Didn’t you say your parents are leaving soon?” I ask because I’m noticing that he is choosing items by the dozen or such that his mother likes; cinnamon buns, a few bags of split peas, a jar of herring and knäckebröd

He gives me a guilty look and shrugs,
“well—hmm.... as it turns out....”

“Oh no, what....?”

He nods,
“they are going to be here a bit longer....do you need anything? I don’t think you have been eating, you want ice cream?” he asks me

“Ice cream?”

I hand him a half gallon of milk

“Oh, that was the other thing, get the next size, Andreas goes through this.”

Maybe I hand over the gallon a little too hard as I get him in the stomach

We go up to pay

“Anything else?” he asks me partially sarcastic as he asks, “some Loko maybe?”

I decide to take it as a suggestion and go get some

We go up to pay and as the cashier asks if that’s all Jörn asks,
“do you have any straws?”

“We sell the reusable stainless steel ones,” he tells Jörn

“Perfect,” Jörn pays and hands it to me

Stockholm syndrome/Part 1 of the next Gerald session

I go to see Gerald; arrive just as a previous client leaves

—another wrapped in mystery— who passes quickly by me, her face, too, completely obscured and hidden by a bright magenta silk scarf wrapped around her and only visible, her smooth dark skin. She rushes by me and departs down the hall

So I hesitate outside the door

Gerald lives not far from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the street heading up his place always shifts my mood by association

This one like many art museums I have known, the Metropolitan is possibly my one place of refuge here in the US, like a home away from home since my life growing up in the Netherlands —where every street there is like a museum —and I think this standing there of ....how I do miss those ancient streets that have kept their gabled faces like some bridge of time that connect our present time to that Middle, medieval past

A bridge

I think this just as I go to knock on his door. But first take a breath before I do

Because time.... which is relative and a concept or perspective but really—what is time.... when a memory is forever

I believe time must play out in present and exist eternally

that repeats always in the present tense

Like my diary; my dictionary.... written in present tense; these crumbs that link my present to ....

and why I had to create my secret self; my secret world.... inside me

The veiled cocoon of misleads and false turns with the secrets folded inside the patterns

—————-

When Gerald answers he does not seem at all perturbed by his previous session, despite the evident passionate state his client left in. Instead, he is relaxed and cheerfully placid,

Today he wears, with faded jeans, what seems to be a Hawaiian shirt but I notice that there are flamingos hidden all over it like some Magic Eye optical illusion. So it makes me laugh

“Oh, the shirt? Kaylee bought it for me; most people don’t notice the flamingoes ....”

Gerald is not the Hawaiian shirt type with his wiry frame and nerd glasses but then, he wears it tucked in and buttoned up so that one can almost believe he is wearing a tie, despite the jeans juxtaposed with his neat, side parted hair and clean shaven face. And yet he exudes this Buddha serenity without the need for the costume just by his calm and collected aura

And coupled too is the scent of frankincense which hangs in the air when you step into his place and seems to wrap its own kind of hypnotic spell.

He waves me in towards the kitchen

“Chai?” he asks me

“Isn’t that intense for what I am here for?” .... shoes at the door I ask; then follow him into the kitchen

“I think we both know you are going to need it,” and already he has made it i notice as he pours from a colorful tea pot into a carnelian colored porcelain cup that sits in its own unusual saucer. He hands it to me

He pours some for himself using his usual cobalt heavy mug with its asymmetrical shape, then we sit on rug piles on the floor with just one hanging paper lamp lighting the room

I blurt unable to contain it to myself anymore

“But I don’t understand, Gerald! Why is she in love with him if he has kidnapped her and worse witnessed him kill her mother? Is it Stockholm syndrome?”

(and again re-edited) phoenix, dictionary & mirror

~Each time I burn the dictionary it is always my true Agamemnon that recalls me .... from search engines from the Internet. He is the only one who has always had the power to remind me of who I really am and why I search my reflection for definition~

******************

Back at the rooftop 

******************

I can’t breathe because something is pressing the air from my lungs until it hurts and startled awake, still unable to breathe, I hear Jörn’s shout and realize I’m still on the rooftop in the sauna. I hear footsteps running and watch Jörn chasing someone across the rooftop and run in the direction of this but lose sight of them

I reach the end where the building ledge has a kind of wall, and here is where I see Jörn sat on the ledge

“What are you doing!?” I ask in horror because it looks like he’s going to jump

but then I see the other figure who he had been chasing jump from one ledge to the next building! I hear a loud, shrill scream. It is awhile before I realize it came from me

I watch Jörn on the phone shouting at someone as we watch the person running

After he ends the call he throws his tuxedo jacket around me and as it still has his body heat it instantly warms

“Who was that?” I ask him

But now his phone rings. He answers and says,
“Jasper?” And then, “you got him?” he let’s out s deep breath and his Nordic eyes pierce me, “they have him in police custody.”

I feel my head and face drain as I ask,
“ohhh no— do I have to go down to make a statement now?”

He ends the call,
“no, we’re just saying he was trespassing and Jasper is acting as the eye witness. But evidently we need to step up the security of the penthouse.... as well as the entire building. Let me see you in the light—are you all right?”

No

Especially now that he mentions this

“Let’s go back to my place,” he says

Only I don’t want to face the Greek chorus of his family

“No! Please! I can’t face everyone right now— oh my God, Jörn—this is now twice in one day—do you want to go for your encores now?”

“What?”

“Go take your bows and encores?”

“What are you talking about?”

“How could you just act like everything is fine and expect me to waltz around pretending that it’s ok to have death threats?”

“What are you saying? Calm down, you’re hyperventilating—you have to try and breathe slowly —“

“No! How do I know you are not in on this?”

“Let’s go in, you’re shivering,” he tells me

“No, I don’t want to, Jörn!”

He leads me back to the sauna instead.

At first he says nothing and waits for me to start breathing normally and when I do he comes over to me and sits down beside me

“Do you really think I don’t care about your death threats? I just sprinted across the rooftop because I was after someone trying to kill you!”

“You yelled at me for the Loko,” I tell him

“I did not yell at you,” he corrects me

“You —well—I mean, you acted like I should be fine about what happened at the park and then you were pissed at me because I had one little drink.”

He laughs at me, and repeats
“one little drink.”

That is all he says about that.

So I look at him to read his eyes and at first they are filled with humor until it gives way to concern,
“it was only because we had the performance to go to; there was no time to do anything else—what? You are angry at me for not blowing off the performance after hours of preparing for it? You believe I’m an asshole because I am able to separate myself from emotions and behave professionally when I must?”

“Is that what you call it?” I ask

“What would you call it? Do you really not trust me all of a sudden? Or— is it something else?”

Finally I admit,
“I called Gerald before.... he told me you have been to see him several times....”

Here Jörn scratches his head nervously and looks away; I stare at the strange shadows cast on his face. He folds his arms across his chest and leans against the wall of the sauna and uses his foot to kick shut the sauna door as a sudden gust of rain showers in

He turns his head to study me

“Yes,” he says

He says this with the same gravity as one in confession

Only it is his eyes that stop me from whatever I may have continued to say. Or even think

Instead my frame of mind is derailed from those tracks by the haunted expression in his eyes

misbegotten celves found in ruins

What gets lost between the lines

~behind the scenes; i bury myself and words between.... I am so shipwrecked—this is an aside of loss; lost; there is only Electra~



“Go on, take everything, take everything, I want you to! Go on, take everything, take everything! I dare you to!”*—Courtney Love


I used to say: I believe in triumph not survival


I still believe that but I have become so much more jaded by this world weary journey upon this spiked path

I recognize the anger but not the face it claimed

with sharpened teeth and claws

but I keep it to myself

as the tanks run me over; angel means messenger, not saint and this uniform never fit me right

I’m just too wild at heart

* “Violet” Courtney Love song (Hole)

Hidden in words; Electra’s dictionary

Safety in obscurity


“I won’t come out, you must come in. To me. Into my womb-garden where I peer out. Where I can construct a universe within the skull, to rival the real.”—Jim Morrison



I sneak away to the penthouse roof to get some air.... I get drizzled on

it seems the rain will never stop

it has been for days

And yet, no mention of lightening and thunderstorms were reported in New York —
which is quite strange considering what happened at the theatre when we lost power

.... and so his family don’t notice when I leave and go through the passage to the penthouse where I walk around the hallways in the dark at first. Watch the lights come from outside, from a city that never sleeps .... wander the halls

It also seems Jörn’s family never gets tired, even after an evening of endless speeches and Jörn’s musical debut of his piece which everyone took a part of. I think the excitement will keep them up until the sun rises

I never noticed the penthouse had a patio — because it is actually more than a rooftop....

.... so I look around

because it has been winter for so long and then the rain

Ilya had mentioned something about the snow people who come to haul away snow when too much covers the outdoor area. It seemed like such an extravagant and preposterous notion....

how do they get it from the top floor roof of the penthouse to downstairs? And where do they take the piles of snow before it all melts?

So I picture a man in a dump truck swimming in the driver’s seat as he waits at a red light

I am still barefoot but at least now wearing jeans and a t-shirt instead of the see-through shower curtain at the performance.... it has begun to occur to me that the candles probably exposed even more of me by their glow and shadows than had the spotlights been working....

at least my face was obscured in the dark and hopefully well hidden so that I could claim it could have been anyone;

anonymous

It was this thought that made me need to remove from them and other worries connected to what happened before

The “patio” —it turns out—is the entire roof top....I wonder if it has a pool when I discover something that looks like a sauna

I open the door and go in. Yes it is a sauna. It still has the sweet scent of the wood and something comfortable to recline on;

which I do.... because i want to clear my head and

there is something to be said for looking out a sauna door to the Manhattan skyline from up here .... as wet breezes blow rain in like sharp needles

I decide, laying here, that I want to make the entire roof my gym

even as I know it is unlikely that anyone would agree with me but .... maybe they won’t notice

maybe a yoga garden

Should I be thinking about the death threat?

Only I have and —constantly since it happened. Frantically

I don’t understand how Jörn can be so blasé about my death threat

eclipsed by his opera

I don’t think I am angry at him for that but —maybe I am

and how do I feel about that.... that he’s narcissistic?

And how do I feel about that? Do I dare analyze him? Dissect his personality flaws

How much do I really know about him? Yes, at moments I feel like I know him better than myself but then he.... does something that reminds me that in many ways we are still total strangers. How much do I really know him?

And I wonder if I should be scared of him, how much like the smeden is he? I have thought about the dream of him with Elan’s mother; when he killed her—how the dream was not seen from her eyes, how it was strangely set in a kind of shadow and seemed different than the other dreams almost like it was not my own

like it was somebody else’s dream

It makes me think and wonder that the mystery surrounding Jörn .... should be something I should factor in the whole because I do sense he is not telling me things.... many things


I think I search for ghost wisdom and tempt any spirits who would dare to have a conversation with me tonight

the night at the opera

Vampire waltz reprise 

It is Josef who finds us outside his apartment door

“I heard the knock,” Josef says  from the doorway “is everything all right?”

“She’s.... “ Jörn looks awkward as I start to slide down the wall

he reaches for me and tries to casually lift me back up

and suddenly swings me up off the floor, “she fell—and....hurt her ankle,”

Which is.... true

He carries me in now, walking past his father, as I hear them still rehearsing at the piano; Elsa and Andreas

“Oh my god! What’s happened?” It is Elsa and I find, even under the Loko influence —her sudden concern ....must be foreboding, as it is strangely out of character....

 coupled with remembering Jörn’s mentioning her scrutiny and ....

find the only recourse I can decide on is cowardice as my best policy here

and so turn my face into Jörn’s hoodie, faking the act but actually hiding from her

“Her ankle,” Josef says

“Soak it!” Elsa says

“Can you make coffee?” Jörn asks her

“Coffee?”

“Kaffe,” Jörn says

“Jag vet coffee! You should put her in the tub immediately— oh, yes coffee is good for pain , you are right, Jörn—I’ll go make coffee. Andreas!!”

We hear her say,
“Andreas, gör kaffet!”

so as I wonder about her friendly concern

Jörn says,
“she’s told everyone that you and I are going to waltz as part of tonight’s presentation ....” he shoulders shut his bedroom door


I must have passed out from the shock

because a shock of cold makes me wake up screaming —and naked and sat somewhat on the floor of the marble shower stall

“Stand up,” Jörn says pulling me up

So at this appropriate moment I vomit —mostly all over him

.... the neon green is alarming but as the Loko is all I consumed today, only alarming for its pigmented perseverance —but for its visual affects, I don’t think Jörn is as fascinated


I feel him grab hold of my skull through my hair and turn the water back on and scrub me with too much enthusiasm

.... only it feels good

“I need you to be sober,” he tells me as he washes my hair

I say,
“I’m sorry....” a few minutes go by in silence

Then I say,
“Jörn, why were you at the park?” I look up at him

We stare at each other. Just our eyes. The water comes down on both of us as I look into that Nordic blue

that has the power to enslave me and I think this with a sense of fear and watch his pale lashes blink the water

but he does not look away. He stares deep inside and within me. He shakes his head and holds my face in his hands. But then he takes his index finger and as he stares he traces the outline of my eye and stares so deep inside. He holds my face, his eyes become red around the blue

Finally he sighs deeply

“I don’t know—and that is the truth.”

“You said.... what did you say?” but my head is still sluggish ....”yes, I remember—you said you got a call....!”

I wait and stare at him. Watch his eyes. Search for what he is still afraid to say

Only.... it is something else I find inside them

He says,
“I did get a call but—it was random. It was Tony Parker from Lincoln Center and I don’t know why but his name made me think of ‘Park’ and I had this feeling you might be in trouble or something.... I just....it’s .... it was a feeling. I knew that’s where you went somehow.... and you know....this is not the first time something like this has happened —lately .... it’s very strange....I mean it is only about you.... I’ve never experienced this before about someone.... I don’t know why but I —I seem to feel it if you are in some kind of trouble....I think this is what this dream was....”

The dream....

Because I had not expected him to say this, it has the strange affect of sobering me up. Slightly.

I become silent as I wonder about this.

He dresses me like I am his mannequin and does my make up; he makes me sit still on his bureau turning my head this way and then that way. He puts dark lipstick on me. Only he has to do it over more than once. Because each time he puts his mouth on me

he says,
“you could have devoured the whole French court with this mouth,” and kisses me getting lipstick on him

“You were teasing about the waltz, right?” I ask

“No,” he says

but then his mother knocks on his door and we both jump



I had not really thought beyond Jörn playing his music on a stage and in front of the audience.... with his family

like the dreams that start off from the balcony and I am watching him on stage

I had not considered it beyond this. That it should be his night

Hiw did I get involved?

But now I think of this.... I think of the hours he spends engrossed in the music. Every detail. How he goes back over the notes again and again. How you can hear his thoughts if you understand his notes—would it not be thrilling to be part of his creation as I’d seen it’s germination?

I only thought tonight that I would see that

The way he loses himself and becomes his piece

   I think this is what it is about him that I get lost in and ....it is only there when he forgets to be self conscious

because he is then in his real space. Like the smeden at his forge. This is the den inside

His father mentioned the artist in Jörn and I think about this and say,
“why are we doing all this?”

“It’s for the commemoration; he was a good friend to our family and —considered a genius in our culture,” he tells me, and then points to the clock to remind me to hurry

“Oh sorry, no, I meant why does anyone do their art.... do you wonder about that?”

“Min duva, here, drink more coffee,” he points seriously at the espresso cup. He says, “this isn’t the time for a Kafka conversation, maybe let’s try a quick turn—put the shoes on, “ and then he swings into a quick dance practice

From the doorway Josef says,
“I think she should do it barefoot. Isn’t that how it was written in her diary?”

“You mean her blog,” Jörn corrects him

“He knows about that?” Of course I am appalled

“Yes,” Josef smiles at me with a suggestion of wickedness

“Oh no,” I say

Josef says,
“it would work better with the music and that ‘gamine’ about her.”

“Gamine?” I repeat horrified in a loud whisper to myself because I want to protest that

“No, I think I mean ‘fey’, after all the piece is called ‘den lilla duvan’ —I like her costume!”

Only it’s not. It is only the chemise for under the dress and as Jörn explains he stops and shrugs and says the rest in..... svenska

it seems no one considers my creative in put on the matter and the manic rush for the theatre intimidates me to silence

At least I’m glad we go in separate cars. I don’t think I could have survived the ride otherwise.

At last minute as we are about to head down, Elsa stops me and says,
“Oh you are almost naked; you must be cold; come here and let me put this on you.”

Of course, it is the opera coat!

....at this point, I think I am quite at a loss over understanding any of this....


But it takes almost all evening for the performance part to happen. The first hour is mostly speeches with video footage of —the genius opera person they are commemorating. I should know who he is— it is terrible I don’t, I know, but .... lately I have been too preoccupied with life to look him up and so— I enter into all this quite cold and defenseless


Josef comes over to us and speaks in English for my benefit,
“it’s going to be another hour or so before we go up,” he shrugs and smiles at me and studies me a moment. In English he says to Jörn, “when your mother begins the Flight of the Dove part I thought it might have more impact if— Duvan.... were below her feet on the floor bent in half like Wavegirl....”

Wavegirl? Flight of the dove.....

I find that I am dizzy with the impact of ....being overwhelmed by waves

And all the speeches have been in Swedish

I sit there wrapped in his world

I think of the dreams/the prehistoric memories .... and the incessant crashing sea; the ship; the blood and the frozen land and—of course, the smeden and I get lost in thoughts

.... as we wait there

 I think that night; I think of him that night.... the first he played it all the way through— that first time I time heard it—

Because before it was only parts he kept playing.... those times I woke up there in his bedroom from dreams ....as he always left the bedroom door open..... and how this music would come to me and enter in dreams and then I would wake up to watch the shadows of him on the wall ....seeing him slamming hard the keys, the ferocity of his movements

how madly he moved with the music .... and his hair flung wild about

I think again what I just heard; The Flight of the Dove.... and then think, min lilla duva.... and

I find .... this emotion too much—it is

is so unfamiliar to me

            and

it makes me panic

I stand up and walk to a window. But it is not the kind that opens. So I walk to another area apart from all the commotion. It leads down a long carpeted corridor

Why am I doing this? How did I get caught up in this vaudeville act?

I walk, still in my shoes, and pace and try to get lost

It allows me to step away in thought. When I pace back the third time he is standing there at the end. He is dressed with the long Fred Astaire tails; the full tuxedo which seems like tonight’s uniform among the outwardly male

There is that sense, because of how he’s dressed— of time away from time

This could be any time

This could be a dream

He could be a beast .... only I am drawn to his eyes

and the look in his eyes.... I have never known such eyes; how thoroughly they possess my soul absolutely; I have never seen such beauty; his eyes

“Come with me,” he says and reaches for my hand

We go down an elevator and into an area draped off. At the center is a piano and he walks me over to it

“Sit,” he says as he sits down to play

He does not hesitate, but begins immediately. He pounds the keys as though releasing a rage

But then stops immediately and suddenly turns around with his back to the keys; he lays against them with a heavy sigh

He says,
“awhile ago you spoke of an artist’s need for expression—or was it self expression? ....to do it for the sake of the passion to express it— not for the praise nor to get acceptance.... but because it had to ....exist—I had to write it. I think you understand this the same way, min duva, I don’t know why, it is just the need to. Because in the creating of it I don’t really care about approval because it breathes on its own; it already is— all I do is compose it into sound.... and yet.... we’re here for me to share it as artists , it is what we do, isn’t it.... and here I invite my work, essentially to be criticized .... and I think it seems to contradict the purpose of why it ever came about. It is something personal. From somewhere personal to me. This was simply something from somewhere deep inside me and.... should it resonate ....?” he speaks vaguely and with reserve

only, yes, of course, I do understand this and even more, and I hear through his words. I feel it; the way he lays there as he tells me this and the expression of his fingers in repose that just lay across those keys, they still are at their instrument

I touch his fingers; there is  a kind of magic to how he creates

He looks back at me,
“all my life I have been trying to write my symphony; my opus and in these few months since that day ....it created itself for me,” he looks at me when he tells me this —such unreadable eyes; such stormy eyes of enchantment and so much mystery

I walk to the window and look outside. It’s raining and now I find I especially long for the opera coat that now hangs at the coat check; it is freezing in this building

I cross my arms over my chest as the champagne silk and chiffon chemise hides nothing, and because I am nervous I have to pace about the room

“I don’t want to do this,” I tell him

He says,
“why don’t we do it the way we did the first time?”

I look at him

He says,
“stand on my feet....”

His idea gives me a sense of relief and he smiles when he sees this,
“I’ll carry you through the turns....”

I take a deep breath and then look at him and nod

“I want you to do this. Do this for me,” he says

He motions with his hand to come to him and when I walk over he pulls me to sit wrapped around him but then

Josef texts Jörn— our turn is up and, sadly, I start to feel the Loko returning on me in the elevator up I get nauseated

When we reach the stage area it gets far worse

“You all right?” Jörn asks me

“So many lights?” I hang back flooded now with terror as I watch in a daze Andreas and Josef setting up

And at first I think it’s my stomach when thunder rolls and shakes the building; there is a storm outside. The lights flicker.

Still the show must go on so, he stands next to me as we watch people move about on the platform plugging in microphones

he says something under his breath with a restrained note of deep aggravation

it sounds like a curse but I can only guess what it means

“What?” I ask

He seems irritated as he looks down at me; eyes bolt electric that could freeze fire

“I said no sound equipment!” he does the curse again

The sick feeling I’m having seems rebounded and part of it, mercifully is, because there is still some Loko impairing me which no doubt is the only reason I’m doing this

I think

as we hide behind the curtain

It starts like I am Wavegirl from my painting as per Josef as he apparently got the idea from me;

I’ve postponed the horror over thinking about the knowledge Jörn’s father reads my often sordid minded words

Josef tells me to go into the forward bent position we practiced before

like a Swan Lake ballerina and, although I am still flexible, well maybe not as much as my ballerina days but still.... why am I doing this, I wonder....? but then I think about ....

how much this is a part of him but also....

because of how the dreams seemed partly to have created this

So as we hide behind the curtain before it goes to rise, everyone stays still except Josef who begins to to pound the keys as the curtain rises

Maybe it’s only me who hides

Elsa’s voice echoes with ear splitting vibratos and dies out sudden with the cello Andreas plays


But then there is a loud thunderbolt outside that happens as if timed perfectly on cue and then all the lights go out!

My first thought was relief because I am thinking I’ve gotten out of this public torture only I underestimated the level of Jörn’s family’s professionalism .... Elsa keeps singing and the piano and cello continue even in the dark and only after a moment’s hesitation

Somebody comes lighting candles all over the stage and Jörn says to me in a whisper,
“rise— follow me like the way we did this before.”

It is the shroud of darkness and the strange haunting notes of his music that makes me forget there are people there;

I think I only noticed him ....looking at him with his eyes focused on me as we move together in pace with the mad notes we are somewhere else

we hear the notes now played by his father as we waltz now to them

their strange haunting that kept him up those nights he composed them for hours

and remember the night he first shared this with me; wrapped around him at his piano and the way he played the recorded overdubs, standing up with me still wrapped around him as we started to dance that night

He says in a whisper against my ear at a turn,
“I could not have planned it better....” and as another flash of lightening reflect off the white of his teeth, he grins

prequel to Vampire Waltz reprise (Going Loko) (of the JM muse chronicles)edited

~even tragedy needs some comic relief~

As Jörn drives I take out my phone and text Gerald;

Text to Gerald: I need to stop by to see you

Jörn pulls into a parking garage and looks at me,

“are you all right?”

“How did you know I went to Central Park?” I ask him

He turns his profile to me. I see he grinds his teeth; watch his jaw flex and knot as he looks out the windshield and steers the van around a corner to move up a ramp

“Were you following me?” I ask him

But then I hear part of the conversation behind me of the two men questioning the guy

He says,
“I swear I don’t know who he was!”

“I think he’s telling the truth,” Jörn calls back to them and says, “I was watching on the surveillance camera at the Starbucks and they know him in there, according to Jasper they back up his story.”

“Who’s Jasper?” I ask

Jörn gives me an unreadable look and parks the van. He gets out and walks around to the passenger side then opens it. He glances to the back of the van then at me and gestures with his head to get of the van.

I slide down the side and he shuts the door

He says,
“Come, let’s go around the corner to get water, you thirsty?”

But he does not wait for my reply. He takes my wrist and starts to walk me/pull me up the ramp out of the parking garage,
“Are you all right, min lilla duva?—how’s your ankle? Can you walk on it now?”

“It’s better, I think,” I say as we step out ....how am I.... ?? oh just slightly freaked out, no big deal.... as he drags me up the street as another anxiety attack is inevitably hitting me. I begin to hyperventilate

He waits until we have nearly cleared the corner and says,
“No, I was not following you, I got a call—shit, what time is it?” he looks at his watch. Again, I watch him grind his teeth, “shit, we cannot be late for the performance! Mama would string me up by my toes—shit-shit!” and does not finish this explanation, no, he just leaves me hanging and he starts to tug me along urgently to the store. I mean in the scheme of things it is good to see how well he has his concerns prioritized; he dreads his mother’s anger over some death threatening mugger

He takes out his phone to make a call and then suddenly looks at me as if he forgot I was there

He digs into his pocket for his wallet and takes out some money which he presses into my hand,
“can you get me a water?— and buy something for yourself,” he says before he says into the phone, “Pappa!”

Get him a water....

I go to the cold beverages and find the water. I only get one for him. No, for me, on impulse, I grab a Four Loko Black —why?because I am attracted to the color of the can? Yes but mostly it’s the 14% alcohol proof printed on the label

I bring both up to pay and as I wait in line, I watch Jörn standing by the door entrance having a Swedish conversation  on his phone with his father as if expostulating with heated, emphatic words. Then I hear Gerald’s text reply come and I reach to look onto my phone screen

His text: Did Jörn tell you about his dream the other night? Is that what this is about?

There is just one person in front of me now and I text back: what dream? When?

I watch the dots of him begin to reply. I keep watching. I start to get more anxious

The person at the register shouts at me because I don’t notice it’s my turn. I go up

“ID....” the guy asks me

“Are you serious?” I shake my head but start searching for my license

“We ask everybody,” he says

“Do not— they never ax me....ax everybody my ass, I come in here every day and they done never ax me....” some lady behind me says

I find my ID

The guy takes it and looks at it skeptically and turns it over looking at it

“Here’s twenty,” I say and hand him the money Jörn just gave me

“Where’s this from?” the guy looks at it like it’s a counterfeit

“It’s— it’s from Michigan— it’s still valid, do you see the year?”

“I see the year....” he says and then my birthday out loud. Actually Real Loud. Not something anyone likes advertised. And he repeats the year twice and shakes his head.... he looks at me, “.... and—why do you have a Michigan license?”

“Because I lived there! but I don’t think you need to know that,” I say

Jörn comes over,
“we have to go, what’s the problem?”

The guy says the year again like some idiotic broken robot

Jörn looks at me and shakes his head,
“Four loko black?” But then says to the guy, “she’s not a minor, I know she looks like she’s in high school but she is not—I can vouch for her,” then to me, “come on, let’s go.”

I watch him take the bag from the guy with the drinks in it but I grab a straw

We go outside and Jörn starts to look for a taxi

“Why aren’t we going back to the parking garage?” I ask Jörn

“Because the performance is in less than two hours and by the time we get across town it’ll be another fifteen minutes, we both have to shower, get dressed....”

I open the bag he’s still holding and remove the Four Loko Black. Pop the the opening and stick the straw in.

I drink half down before Jörn realizes what I’m doing

“What the fuck are you doing?” he asks me

only I don’t have to answer because Jörn says,
“Oh here’s a taxi, you need to get rid of that.”

I take the bag, hand him his water and return the Loko back inside the bag. He pulls me to the taxi and pushes me inside.

I hear him say the address as I lean against the window sipping the Loko through the straw

“Why are you drinking that? It has alcohol, mon lilla duva, why are you using a straw? Maybe you should give it to me,” he reaches to take it from me

It makes the sound when I’ve reached the bottom of the ‘tall-boy’ can.

So I let him take the (empty) can .... hmm alcohol.... 14 proof is not bad— I can barely hear the meaning of what he seems to be saying to me, in fact

I lean against the cool window because the motion of the car seems to be bothering me suddenly

At some point we must have gotten out of the taxi and then through the apartment lobby

I hear him mumbling something to himself over and over as we go up

It takes awhile before I realize he’s mumbling in English

He’s saying over and over,
“let’s hope they’ve already left, let’s hope they’ve already left, let’s hope they’ve already left....”

“Who?” I ask

“Mama! All of them but mostly mama!”

“Why?” I ask and start laughing now

“Duva..... because you’re in no shape for her scrutiny, do you understand me?”

“No.” I say

The elevator opens and he pulls me out by my wrist and half drags me to his door. I realize he’s pressing his ear to the door as if trying to hear through it

I decide to make it easier and knock on it for him

“Why did you do that?” he puts the key in the lock and opens it.... then swings it shut again and pulls me back out into the hallway, “shit, they’re all here still....”

I lean against the wall,
“I’m going back to the penthouse....” and I start to turn

“No you can’t because we have already said you are doing the waltz with me,” he says

It seems like he says this. Or it could be the Loko. In which case it is actually funny. I start laughing because it is such a mad thought

“Why the fuck did you just drink all that?” he seems quite angry I slowly realize

“Because the mugger....” But I don’t think what I said sounded as clear as ‘mugger’

It might have come out more like ‘smugger’ or ‘sugger’

I think he, at this point was holding me up —but by my face and— looking at me like a headmistress at a convent school ready to use a ruler to punish me.... why that thought should come to me then I cannot really claim to know but it evoked some twisted ideas never the less

I look back at him and notice something in his eyes. That same something that makes me think of the pirate and then —the text message from Gerald that now repeats its alert

“Oh....” I sigh because I realize the scale of what this Loko has done to the evening

I repeat,
“the mugger....” this time more clearly

Central Park Film Noir/part 2

The attention that it creates when Jörn tackles the hooded person to the ground causes Jörn to shout at everyone watching,

“this is nobody’s business— this is a personal matter!”

“I was calling 911–“ a jogger tells him

This is when Jörn goes over to the jogger and takes his phone and ends the call. But he does all this dragging the hooded mugger who looks no bigger than a high school freshman and when I catch some of his features, he looks about that age

I see there are now two others who have showed up. They seem to know Jörn and they don’t look like they are native New Yorkers. Their features and manner of dress suggest otherwise and their accents I cannot place; not Swedish, not Northern European either

“Lemme go!” It is a young kid with a thick Brooklyn or Bronx accent, “he gave me a hundred bucks!! Idunno who the fuck he was— see?” he unravels the bill which is crisp and new looking

Jörn looks at me,
“are you ok?”

I realize I am still on the ground and actually stunned about what has just occurred and watch them in a daze as if watching a performance on stage

When he asks this I start to wonder too. My ankle.... I rub it and try to rotate it but it hurts. I stand up,
“Ouch....” I say and force myself to walk on it

“Show me the note, min lilla duva,” Jörn reaches his hand so that I may place the note in his hand

The other two ‘gentlemen’ seem curious about me and study me subversively

“He’s just a kid,” one of them says

I see Jörn’s expression when he reads the note

“Let me see that,” the other one says

“Can I go?!” the kid tries to shake off Jörn’s grip

“No, you’re coming with us,” the first one says and slips a handcuff around one of the boy’s wrists. He closes the other cuff on himself but he does this whilst looking around to be sure no one sees

I wonder where they are going

“Can you walk?” Jörn asks me when he sees me hobble

“I think so— of course it had to be my bad ankle,” I say

“Here, lean on me,” he says and puts his arm around my waist and lays his hand on my hip for support

We start to walk and I manage to keep up their pace through the park

There is a dark blue van parked adjacent to the Plaza that says “Laundry Services” in white. They open the back door and push the kid through as they follow inside. I notice there is no laundry inside; before they shut the two back double doors, I catch a glimpse of some complicated electronics inside and several monitors showing live footage of what looks like side streets

“Come,” Jörn motions to the passenger side of the van

The others are all in the back

“”Where are we going?” I ask but he just opens the passenger door and waits for me to get in before he shuts it and goes around the front of the van looking around to see if anyone is watching and then he gets into the driver’s seat beside me