Hits

The girl in the black fishnets is crying. She is swatting her hands around her body as if she has been caught in a swarm of bees, not a swarm of mind. You try not to look at her. Her eyes...it was just a second, but they saw. You know she knows. You know you can't help her.

The guy with the glow-sticks is such a canker-sore of a fucking cliche, you want to hit him. But you are too busy watching the glow. You wish you had something that looked so pretty.

You close your eyes tight and realize that the world inside is even more terrifying. Blood drips off sodden statues, monuments to the moments you repressed, saving them for just the right moment. I guess this is the right moment.

You rub your jaw and your skin feels slick and cold. You can't tell where the sensation leaves your face and transfers to your fingers. In a second, you become aware that you are in a roomful of people and they all look like fucking lunatics. They are in clusters giggling, staring stupefied into the lights, clutching something tight to their chests. They hate you, but you can't figure out why. You wrack your brain to find something. It has to be. They know. Somehow, in this warehouse, the truth was plucked without your knowing.

A girl grabs your hand and you snatch it away from her like she is fire. She smiles at you gently. She passes you the joint she's smoking and says something, grinning. You can't fucking hear and you don't trust the girl, but she grabs your arm and resistance proves too confusing.

Outside, the black sky morning is falling over the dreams of the civilian masses. Outside, the strobe light can't hurt you. Outside, you can hear the girl, and she has a lovely voice that speaks in emotion, words lost to the drone of reassurance. You lean your head on her shoulder and let the voice wash over you.

The cigarette is your connection to everything. You can't explain it, you just know. It is an anchor, a talisman, it is your life's breath painted white for your amusement. In a few hours, your lower back will ache. You will try to remember where you got the little locket in your pocket. You open it and there is a small square of paper inside. There is a picture of a flower on the paper. Alice never questioned it and you don't either.

Safety

John held the small, yellow flower in his hand, clutching it for all he was worth. The rest of the gang sat around him, speaking in low voices, offering cigarettes that he took, lit, forgot about. John's world was full of color and bemused confusion. He was close to the edge. He knew it. He wished everyone would stop talking to him like he was holding a grenade. If his mind blew, there would be little collateral damage. The flower. The flower was everything.

The flower had been given to John hours before. A lovely girl with black hair had handed it to him, and a maelstrom of chaos had erupted inside him. Who was she? She was pretty. Then she was gone. But he had the flower. His need for the flower had nothing to do with the girl, who seemed more like an apparition in hindsight - no, the flower was an anchor. Safety.

The girl had given John the flower because he looked scared. He always looked scared. He wasn't scared, but you couldn't convince some people. John ran his fingers lightly over the bark of the tree holding him up. The tree held John up. John would hold the flower.

The mushrooms were the cause of it all, of course. All the day-glo wonderment and uncertainty. Sky bulging and leaves dripping off trees. Hilarity that blossomed into gasping laughter. Soft voices. Cold beer.

Sen took the flower because that was his trip. It was fucking hilarious. John's face crumpled like an old love letter. The flower hurtled through the air. John couldn't process it. If the flower was gone, then everything was gone. Without it, he was nothing.

The others were angry.

"Why'd you do that, man?"

"That was fucked."

"What? It's just a stupid flower?"

John hugged his knees and rocked slowly. He shut his eyes and plasma blasts of neon exploded behind his eyelids. He was thinking about the time he'd lost the big game. Ten years ago, but he could still remember it. The bat in his hand. The knowledge that he would fail. The grumbling from the bleachers. They'd had the same kind of flowers in that field. John picked one once and the coach called him a faggot. The other boys laughed. John didn't know what it meant.

He could hear the laughter around him, but John was going to a very small place inside his mind. A cool, dark place. The place he used when his Dad was drunk. In the blackness, everything was nothing. John stretched his mind to fill the blackness and barely noticed when the stub of a cigarette burned his hand.