HARD FICTION

NO.1

1 PRINTED IN AUSTIN TX

2 PRINTED IN AUSTIN TX

HARD FICTION No. 1

SPRING 20153 ISSUE ONE: “DESPERATELY SEEKING VALIDATION”

FEATURE

SKYLAR SPENCE ...... 35

FICTION

“9/2011” ...... 11 “THE ALTRUISM APP” . 25

“SHERPAS” ...... 13 “MASON TARLEN” . . . . . 29

“BEYOND 140” ...... 16 “DREAMS” ...... 44

“GEN” ...... 18 “AFTER” ...... 52

4 I’m in the magazine aisle at Hastings. My beef with magazines is that most of them exist with the tacit intent of selling you something. Men’s magazines sell you all the clothes you’re not wearing and consumer oriented ideals of masculinity. Sports magazines sell you all the things you’re not achieving and consumer oriented ideals of masculinity. Celebrity mags: the beautiful people that you’re not. Travel: the beautiful places where you’re not. Plastic wrapped Adult mags sell you back your own desire for women which itself will be used at some point by advertisers to encourage your desire for all of the above. Music mags knead your inflated superiority about your up to the minute fandom while confirming how behind everyone else is.Their game is what you’re already privy to, encouraging you to stay ahead. As shills of entire industries derived off our own sense of lack, it’s the job of magazine editors to create a version of the universe that is selectively incomplete, one that ignores all the details that undermine the fantasies of the reader. End of the day, each publication offers an aesthetic ideal to pursue with your wallet as an act of self improvement, and this is why they all usually end up disappointing. Said ideals will simply fail to integrate with hard, complicated reality, and thus fail to affect as anything more than another diversion of encouraged wants. (I’m not immediately sure about how coherent all this is on paper. There’s the overpowering airborne toxicity of a breached septic tank and right now my head hurts. Something is very wrong at this Hastings.) But while it certainly sucks that most magazines’ ideas of self-improvement have more to do with commodities than personalities, I think that’s what’s good about straightforward, unambiguous, hard Fiction; not only does it have nothing material to offer you, but any ideals in its selective universe can be digested for what they are. We know it’s all just a story, and sometimes that story can help you navigate life a lot better than the covetable things that exist in the spreads. Within an economy of dreams stringing you along with their maybe someday attain- ability, Fiction is the outstanding product in which your own want is irrelevant to the material itself. Without the standard obligation to make you feel lacking it’s free to examine anything with the widest net. I don’t see it going too well for the publication that begins its run with the lofty aspirations of totally devaluing the influence of our accustomed symbols and challenging all the unexamined protocols of the 21st century. That’s not what I want this thing to be. Too abstract. Best not to stray too far from real human beings. Talk of the “cul- ture” and you’re always ignoring something crawling under the rock, just out of sight, which I think is much much closer to what Resin Bit is about: invisible byproducts, the tar and smoldering leftovers of the cultural high just outside the common visibility of the comfort zone. What does the Hastings magazine rack look like after being chewed up and shit out? What un- seen cancer did its consumption leave in us? We commence this zine by tackling our own perceived place in the world. The first issue:Des - perately Seeking Validation, invites you to get over yourself and any ideas of self-importance. Although fear and desire are the most common elements of any good piece of Hard Fiction, consider during this issue their relevance to attention seeking. Ask: what are we avoiding with our pursuits? How often are our desires the product of our culture, or vice-versa? How many ways can we trick ourselves into feeling approved of? “Mason Tarlen” is about people striving to feel like they made a dent in the universe. In “Dreams” a doomed couple wanders a hypnagogic kingdom in the Summer of 2014, each haunted by the anxiety of being watched and the pretense that everything’s gonna be okay. Thematically I don’t see any one thread throught his whole issue. Really, I might just be working through some stuff. As it stands though, glaring at the latest Esquire cover with the stench of stagnant waste in my nostrils, the question in my gut is: If the gaze of others is what necessarily shapes us while young, what is then the best way to go about practicing autonomy as a grownup, and, even if we were to ever know, what forces would then stand to prevent us from ever wanting anything more than what we think we’re sup- posed to want? Also: Skylar Spence. Nice guy.

5

5 THINGS THAT WHORES MATTER It was around the 7th grade when I started letting my classmates punch me in 1) The strange excitement I get the face for the attention. I was undersized whenever the Amber Alert sign describes the and got in plenty of fights, so I was really exact make and model of the car I’m driving good at taking punches to the face. It began with my friends but soon and other people start changing lanes to get I’d let anyone do it. Sometimes there’d be behind me. crowds. Maybe it was because I tried to 2) Experimenting with giving myself avoid tearing up like a little bitch in public an affect disorder by constantly passing Asian or because I was so eager to be recog- MILF porn through my retinas until I feel nei- nized for something I was good at, but ther highs nor lows. there wasn’t a day for maybe four or five years that I wasn’t taking punches to the 3) A theme park ride that simulates face. being butchered with machetes and having Based of what people said after your head smashed with a rock in some third they took a good hard shot at me and world failed state. Then, after you’re good and then had to explain themselves to all the witnesses that weren’t really in on it, I think traumatized, on the walk out offers you pic- the reputation I had was of someone who tures and T-shirts to buy of you on the ride, flat didn’t really feel pain, or at least had a and wincing on the ground. (Unless of course higher tolerance of it in his face area. you flipped off the camera during the flash. People would introduce me to their They just delete those pictures.) friends who I didn’t know and tell them, go ahead. Don’t feel bad. That’s just his thing, 4) Breaking down in the lap of the it’s what he’s good at. plastic Ronald McDonald sitting on a bench It didn’t ever get me girls, just really, and sobbing myself raw under his outstretched really good at taking punches to the face. arm until I look up and see him smiling Nowadays, whenever I see desper- optimistically into the distance and there’s a ate shit like that, maybe someone on the diluted feeling that maybe everything’s gonna internet taking pictures of themselves or be okay. covertly trying to get told they’re attractive, demanding attention while not actually doing anything but enacting for the world 5) The feeling of, “s/he must never their own desire to be acknowledged while know” when meeting a new person. humiliating themselves in the most natural, adapted ways; I see a little kid version of that person, just old enough to catch a hint of how big and complicated and apathetic RESIN BIT: The everyday temptation to the world really is. The kid, who more than abandon all superego and expel everyone anything just wants to be seen--to matter in from your life with a full commitment to a giormous universe run by invisible giants, histrionic childish behavior, ignoring all I see that kid getting punched in the face, social expectations for interacting with over and over, then wiping the blood off his lip and going, yeah naw I’m cool. Y’all saw others, until the only possible view anyone that right? Wasn’t that awesome. It was could have of you is one of annoyance awesome wasn’t it? What about you? It and dismissible pity, leaving you you to feel good to you? Wanna try it again? Y’all live in your own little world of reinforced wanna see him do it again? dickishness where you will always be king.

6 7 Dear Starlight Casting, Thank you for considering me for the part in your movie. Having read the script, I am confident that I am the perfect candidate for role of Man Wrestling Dog For Pocket Change. I think if cast I can bring a realism and familiarity to the part that others simply don’t have the personal investment to convey. After spending many days pondering my own unique interpretation of the character, I can promise that once I have auditioned, the extraordinary quality of my performance will attest to the time I have spent practicing my arm bars and choke holds on subjects roughly the size of an actual dog.

Dear Starlight Casting, As I understand it, there have been some modifications to the source material.After rereading the new script I am entirely convinced that the changes made not only improve the character but make me ever the more suited to play him with even more zeal than previously committed. There will be no question, that my approach to the new role of Man Digging Through Trash While Melodically Cursing At His God, will so absolutely humiliate all other contenders for the part, no one present at the audition will sustain an erection for at least a week and might likely begin to question their own relationship with the Lord. For the read I’ve even prepared a go to list of personal grievances, each metered out to the melodies of Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore. If necessary, I’m prepared to provide my own garbage.

Dear Starlight Casting, Another rewrite? Who was it? Who did the filmmakers send to follow and spy on me, recording every facet of my real life in order to write a character that so closely resembles myself? Whoever it was, tell them I am impressed. That they even managed to integrate such minimal de- tails as my penchant for inexpensive finger instruments or the specific chalk messages I draw on fence posts signifying where a dishonest man might live or when religious talk will get you a free meal: bravo sirs. Considering the obvious matter at hand (ie. my take on/carnal embodiment of Boy With Bindle Biting Quarter To Ensure It’s Realness), I was wondering if I will still be required to audition as scheduled. I suspect not, unless as some professional formality, or perhaps a reality television situation designed to disappoint the other candidates. Which I have to say I find a little fucked up.

Dear Starlight Casting, As I understand it the part has been modified yet again. No matter. Some might think it challenging for a performer to change his entire approach on such short notice, and maybe they’re right. Myself, I can’t wait to throw my hat in to play Glaring Loiterer In Burger King Crown. If there’s one role I could really get my chops behind, Glaring Loiterer In Burger King Crown is probably it. And so there’s no misunderstanding my own confidence over this, let me assure you, I will nail this role. I will nail this role in the mouth and never say I love you. I swear to my own highly disappoint- ed god, when I get done with this role, it’s going to wobble to you bow legged with it’s underwear inside out, rubbing it’s own swollen, overworked jaw muscles and ask you, who the fuck brought in the carpenter? Cause he nailed the shit out of me.

8 9 10 9/2011

When I saw the house, I almost forgot why I was upset that day. I circled the block once before approaching the party spilling out on the dirt lawn. It was a two-story building, probably a co-op. The roof was bordered with dead Christmas lights. Everything but the front stoop was made of wood. Somewhere inside was a playlist that wasn’t quite loud enough to hear, like it was agreed that music would just ruin the good conversation. From across the street I watched the smokers dressed like FADER articles chatting on the piss flavored couches in the front yard. I sat on the curb, sipping my 40 and pretending to text. If I crossed to their side would they know I wasn’t one of them? I went through a list of generic white people names, someone I could claim to know inside the house if I was asked. I settled on Theron. If they asked, he was a sophomore Psychology major. The girl ratio was very respectable. In the kitchen a dense crowd gravitated around an icy trashcan but there was no rush to get in line. The second keg was yet untapped and I still had a quarter of 40 to finish. I asked a guy waiting for a cup where the bathroom was. Earlier that day I read the inbox in my girlfriend’s phone and left her in the changing room. I drove around town till ten miles after the gaslight came on then bought a couple of Mick- ey’s at the Texaco. I spent the next hour trying to get drunk. Then I parked my car and started walking around West Campus. Millie was the first girl I talked to. While waiting in line to fill my bottle with beer, she said she used to be a Psychology major but decided to transfer into Photography. As she told me how much she preferred the open minded streets of Austin over her native Dallas I followed the parade of ink running down her shoulder, scrolling down from the Shel Silverstein illustration on her neck all the way to the Koi fish on her tit. I was in the middle of retorting that I too hated Dallas but before I could respond in entirety the girl got a text mid-sentence and excused herself. The Mass Comm major, Cecily with stars on her wrist, she didn’t like me very much. On her right arm she had tats of Eeyore and Piglet. On her upper back was a kid with too many balloons floating away. I tried to make small talk with her and was largely ignored. She asked me who I came with. Briana wasn’t into guys, which upon learning made me try harder. She had a tattoo of The Gromble on her left shoulder. When I asked her if she ever played any sports she gave a fake laugh then turned around. As my vision started blurring I grew detached from the idea of consorting with anyone else. Gripping the sink faucet for balance, I became more interested in all the body art surround- ing me. Everywhere the flesh was like cultural potpourri. I saw lotus flowers and Einstein quotes an inch away from Nicktoons. Illustrations from picture books I never read but remember seeing on Reading Rainbow. I saw Charmander, Jack Skellington, Megazord, a lot of images I remember loving during some segment of childhood. Things I had at some point or another integrated into my identity, designated to a list of favorite things that made me unique. For the first time I consid- ered the alternative. The pantheon of things that we were all exposed to since infancy. These people were social geniuses, I remember thinking. To get a tattoo of something personal, something exclusive and distinguishing, defeats the purpose entirely. What you want is something everyone else in the room can see and instantly recognize, something universally relatable to break down the social barriers of individuality. To ensure that a lack of companionship is impossible. When I explained all this to the people by the keg they looked at me like I was talking shit. I got my fill then I found some space on the back steps of the house and I decided I would drink until I could think up a reason not to.

11 12 At the club where my cousin’s working security, Neil buys a second round of shots for him- self, Omar, and Josh while I pull my cousin aside and and I tell him we’re looking for bud. “Don’t you still owe me for a front?” he asks. “Bullshit, from when?” “I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure I fronted you.” “If I did I already got you, and it’s not for me its for them. They’re buying it.” I point at the two nineteen year olds grimacing down their shots next to Josh. Omar, the short one taking a selfie, it’s his first time in a real life grownup establishment. I texted ahead to see how much my cousin was working this week. If SHERPAS there’s no way around it, this bar might be the only place we can take the two. I only know so many security staff. “I met them?” my cousin asks. “Nah, they’re from Dallas. We’re their South-by sherpas.” I tell my cousin how, couple weeks ago, Josh and I started posting ads promising the au- thentic, local’s experience of the festival. “Skip the lines and wasted money and instead make rounds at all the free and secret shows only the savviest natives are privy to.” “Authentic mean badgeless?” my cousin asks. “Half the appeal,” I say. “One of them has a fake ID but the other can’t get in anywhere anyways. Said it’s their first time picking Austin in- stead of Padre for Spring Break. Wanted something more.. genuine. I dunno.” “They don’t know you’re full of shit?” “No more than they are. They buy all our beer and get to feel cool on Facebook for a week. Everyone wins.” Last year Josh and I tried charging peo- ple to wait in line for them, even with a backpack full of beer we ended up wasting too much time around Fader Fort hipsters for it to feel like an even trade. This year’s scheme is much better. Besides Omar and Neil there’s an older guy from California who hit up Josh on Twitter. He’s got a badge and everything but he said sometime later in the week he’s looking to go where the “real party” is. He also asked about some place he saw in the Slacker movie. If I can bite my tongue around the twat, we’ll milk it till our livers fail. Till then we’re babysitting. It’s not the worst. In the case of some unmissable 21+ event, they’ve got our numbers. We can lose them anytime and meet up when we’re getting sober. My cousin nods in reluctant approval. Says he’d help but he’s stuck at the door all day. He’ll have to get me later.

13 Before Josh notices, I step into the bath- “That’s where you go to shit sometimes,” room and sweep through my phone. The itinerary Josh says. says there’s shit on campus right now. They’d Neil raises his phone. probably enjoy that. Young people. At the corner store they give us the cash Some thoughts, I can hear myself aging. for a six pack of tall boys and some 32 oz. Styro- I text one of my other connects but he foam cups, before we all duck into an alley to fill up says he can’t do nothing for us right now because before the hike. he’s near the front of a really long line. He offers to The walk slopes upward so to distract the let us cut him for ten bucks a head, suggesting we foreigners Josh gives his guided tour, pointing out get there soon before he tweets the offer. all the historical landmarks; like the trashcan where “Found a house show for us,” I tell Josh his roommate got a ticket for pissing, and the one at the bar. “Probably a keg. No luck on the bud right corner he saw a dead guy once. When Omar asks now but we can ask around when we get there.” about it, Josh makes up a story. Josh is good at “Shit’s a trek. You think they’re down?” stories. whispers Josh. “I think I could talk em into a cab.” We cut through the capitol because it’s “You’d take ten minutes of sitting over quicker. There’s a protest of some kind going on thirty minutes of drinking?” around front that three of us make haste to ignore. We walk up Brazos street and Josh points Neil, he takes a few pictures then hustles to catch at things for Neil to take pictures of. up, slurping his beer through the straw. “What’s that old building?” Omar asks when we get to Sixth.

Yeah girl I see you. Up in the front row, center, all bad as fuck, demanding your elbow room cause you been here waitin so long. Feel good don’t you? Feel like a real fan. With your front row space so confidently secured. Like you earned it. But you ain’t paid for it yet. Right now I bet you’re probably real annoyed at all the shovers and weasel-wayers tryna step on your heels. Probably what you’re tweeting bout right this second. Hah. Jesus, fuck. You don’t even know what’s about to happen. Just behind your back I’m looking round at all the other guys who left their girlfriends at home and we’re all thinking the same thing. See, thats my spot. That good view. All that elbow room. Mine. And I’m comin right through you for it, hear me. Through you. And your boyfriend ain’t gonna say shit cause he can get some too. He done already been sized up and y’all both dressed waaay too nice to even suspect how quick the room’s gonna turn. So now that we in the crystal on whats gonna happen. You just stay there, lookin cute as shit with your phone out takin pictures of the warm up. Come at me with that fuckin phone. I’ll throw that hoe.

14 Practice vomiting and intentionally choking on said vomit, then surviving, as though choking on vomit were a progressive skill, so that some day, when the time comes, it takes a whole lot of vomit to kill you.

15 BEYOND 140 Sometimes with tweets sacrifices must be made. Unfortunately, this means that a lot of meaningful complexity can be lost in trimming down your idea to a laconic 140 characters. I think if Twitter ditched this cap, some people’s tweets would become not only less vague but a lot more forgivable. As illustrated:

Random tweet during the present 140 cap: During the cap: “Look, I don’t want to start an argument. “Ima B me. If you cant handle it then It’s just my opinion. #JustSayin” thatts your problem. #DealWithIt”

Tweet after the cap: After the cap: “Look, despite the fact that I am obviously “Whenever, on the subject of my person- unprepared to substantiate my previous statements ality, I can only deliver to you a brazen injunction to with any further insight that might establish their #DealWithIt, trust that it is for the simple reason that validity, not only do I want to feel as though I am I myself have not. contributing positively to the public discourse, I want If I were at a party and someone declared to be recognized by others for doing so. What I do that never have they ever been critically self-reflec- not want is to be held accountable for my remarks in tive, I would take no drinks and lower no fingers. any potentially negative way. In fact, by reducing my This is because, as you should already know, I am comment to an opinion, I’ve courteously signified for violently resistant towards dealing with the partic- all that what I said was only intended to be interpret- ular facets of my personality that others would find ed as the mere facade of a statement, without any offensive or unlikable, as doing so would require of the weight or greater connotative meaning usually a predictably horrifying period of introspection that attributed to the words I chose to so casually use. I am not emotionally equipped to deal with and is, Hence, I will vehemently reject all culpability for any suffice to say, out of the fucking question. inconsistencies, thinking errors, cognitive bias, or Hence, my coercive “take it or leave it” logical fallacies within my aforementioned opinion. approach, which for me serves two purposes. I will however be happy to accept any One, by their tacit agreement to remain positive replies that might offer me some personal around me, I can defer unto others all liability for any validation, which, admittedly, is all I was seeking offense they might endure, permitting me to further in the first place with my input, because although interpret all negative reaction to my words as an I’m aware that other forms of cheap and immediate external phenomena that has little to actually do with gratification are readily available through various me and for which I am virtually blameless. Thus, alternative means, one of which being any of the by viewing myself as a besieged victim to external usual banal, unobjectionable tweets I submit on a unpredictability, I can associate all my unapproach- daily basis, I’m more and more often finding the pre- able inner anxiety and deep self loathing with the dictable, affirmative Favoriting to said submissions now impotent and abstract disapproval of others, hollow and of little affective consequence. However, dismissing it just as easily. despite my desire for a more genuine, satisfying ex- Secondly, said hashtagged injunction, perience of subjective agreement, which I anticipate spoken as if from a position of confident authority, might only be achieved by testing my appropriated allows me to continue believing that I exert any perspective with the critical feedback of my peers, minimal form of command over the universe. The I find the risk of disapproval, or for that matter any preeminent act of openly granting unto others the other potentially devastating affront on my fragile opportunity to accept or reject my persona both proj- self-esteem, to be a traumatic contingency that I ects an unapologetic assertiveness that I can only am not presently capable of coping with. Of course assume is respected by my peers (What am I, some since acknowledging any of this directly would only kind of bitch?), and obscures how little control and serve to invite further undesired scrutiny, I’ve made applied discipline I actually have over myself or the my insecurity as apparent and thinly veiled as possi- things that come out of me, maintaining the desired ble in the optimistic hope that all will recognize with potency of my own convoluted self-image. civility my desperate need for attention and show It should also be entirely clear that, in me some goddamn compassion.” practicality, this approach only applies to my more unlikable, antisocial, behaviors. Otherwise, I’m

16 pretty awesome. You can’t even say that I’m not.” all ideas must be rationalized before submission, but I certainly don’t. That’s ridiculous. I’m on my phone for Christ’s sake. It’s not like I’m skywriting During the cap: my tweets over music festivals. I’m not nailing them “Im not explainin my tweets to anyone. to cathedrals, shouting: hey everyone, come dissect Not that I hav to. If you don’t like it: QUIT LOOKIN!!!” what I wrote! No, what I tweet, I tweet specifically for those decent agreeable followers that understand After the cap: the implications of a social network with no clickable “I’ve never considered that my tweets communicator of disapproval (hint, hint). Not only could be interpreted by others in any way that would do I think you should be ashamed of yourself, but I draw negative attention towards myself for having deny any responsibility for your inability to under- tweeted them. Unfortunately, this is still a frequent stand exactly what I’m thinking when I type MY occurrence for me, as I pay very little mind to how private thoughts, on MY private phone, from the pri- my words and actions actually affect other people, vacy of MY own home/job/driver’s seat, specifically who on a day to day basis I suspect are merely for those of my followers that DO understand exactly inhabitants of some greater dream of mine with no what I’m thinking without need for further annotation. actual motivations of their own outside of interacting If you’re so distraught over the so called with me. And while I cannot prove this to myself as a “meaning” of what I tweet, I’ll advise you as I have fact, the idea has led me to carry a general mistrust several others before: don’t look at them. Yup. that the feelings of those around me are in any way That’s it. Just focus your attention elsewhere, away as important or substantial as my own, if of course from my tweets. Chances are, if you’re at all like they differ at all, which honestly for me is weird to me (which I doubt very much), they will simply go even think about. away and you won’t have to worry about them any All this though is besides the point. What’s more. I already get that you’re slow to pick up on important to acknowledge here is that the tweet I’m what I’m signifying, unlike most other people in my replying to sounds suspiciously like it’s asking me to dream, but I assure you, I’m not telling you this to be clarify my views with a minimal level of coherency. mean. On the contrary, I’ve found this approach very Suffice to say, I find this request both offensive and helpful for a number of bothersome things. Why do invasive. you think I’m ON Twitter?” Now, SOME people may think my person- al tweets exist in some sort of public forum vulner- able to demands of personal accountability, where

17 What happened with Cory? I blocked his calls that’s what happened. Whole experience bugged the life out of me.

First off, his place. Awesome. Was like he robbed Waterloo. A bajillion records. Good records. Rare ones. Plus, books about music. Like, two shelves of books. Then on the opposite wall he had maybe the most intimidating movie collection I’d ever seen. Criterion foreign films. Original VHS.

Suffice to say, Cory was really into movies. And music. And TV shows… and you’d think that’d make it easy. Except whenever we talked, when I tried to learn something about him, he kept listing off things he liked. When I asked, he wouldn’t give me any reasons behind his favorite things. None other than, “It’s awesome”.

18 It was like he didn’t know how to talk to me without deferring to all the shit he was into. Like he had some debilitating reference tick or something.

At one point I made a joke, and he was like, “Ha, what’s that from?” Yeah, I know. So lame. Crippled.

But what bugged me the most was that I couldn’t tell if he was really in to sharing all these things with me, as much as he was in to impressing me with his knowledge of them.

19 Then it started clicking. Cory was a total hipster. I mean I didn’t see it at first cause he dressed so lazy and normal, but then it was obvious: appearance had nothing to do with it. What actually made him all hipstery was that he really whole-heartedly believed that he deserved social credit for all the things he was aware of, like his consumption was actually a skill that made him outstanding.

Whatever good taste he had was besides the point. I didn’t even want to validate him in that way. I felt like an enabler.

Then I thought: how much am I like that? Broken down, aren’t I the product of every- thing I’ve ever consumed, just as much as all the people I’ve met. Every new encounter with anything. Aren’t we all like that?

20 Oh.

21 Wow..fuck..But yeah, of course we are: on the internet, or any other activity that occurs mostly in our heads. Subjectively, we are what we consume, ya know.

Objectively though, to the greater outside universe that we gotta exist within, we’re only how we react to what we consume. How we process the sum of our experiences, build perspective, and develop an active and genuine personality.

Maybe the surplus of ingestible content has made it really easy to neglect this. Maybe it’s the comfort zone. Consuming media doesn’t demand feedback the way real life does, you don’t have to respond to it in realtime like you would a person or a situation.

22 Wouldn’t that cripple anyone eventually? Like, leave you socially retarded? So insecure that you’d begin projecting overly subjectivized standards of identity onto real life. Like you were viewing the whole world as one continuing spectacle for yourself. Playing a game designed to make you feel good.

Pure solipsism. God that would make you suck.

One thing I’ve noticed is that people who suck are the first to equate “being” with “having”. Those guys that pray to be defined by their taste.

23 And even if Hipsterdom is more a personality flaw than an aesthetic, it would surely explain the preoccupation with appearing cool. Like you can just render yourself likable by associating yourself with the awesome shit around you that you had no real input in producing.

I think Cory maybe slipped under the radar cause he was so Gap ad normal looking, but you really can’t trust those that cloak themselves with interesting.

Mistaking the sign for the signified will only obscure the absence of the latter.

What? Did you wanna have sex? Or something?

24 THE ALTRUISM APP He’s been dubbed the saint of social media, the creator of the first truly altruistic image sharing app that has been the buzz of this year’s SXSW Interactive Festival. Now we at FuckYouWe’reMedia.Tumblr catch up with Shyne inventor, Barry Farken to see what all the fuss is about and if he really is the holy man he’s made out to be.

FYWM: Austin man, word. Don’t write creeped. I was What? how do you like it so far? researching. Using resources. What happened though was I She goes, well they BF: I love it. F**king looked at her Instagram and was have their own pages. Just all the Austin man. S**t. I’m sorry for so disappointed at how many way offended. Like, supremely cursing. I need to stop. pictures of her I saw. offended. Like I just s**t on her dying mother or something. Sorry. It’s okay. You’ve aware people And at that point I saw what I had do that a lot? done. I tried to riff into a stupid lit- My guys tell me its bad tle point and it went over like the for PR. Executives don’t curse. Yeah, but I mean it f**cking Hindenburg. Apologize. was just pictures of her. Over and Stupid me, right? Of course she You came here today over again. Smiling in the exact had friends. I mean I saw them to publicly debut your app, same way. Completely useless. on her Facebook. In all the pic- Shyne, and by the consensus It’s like, you have a hundred tures of them smiling and being in it appears to be a hit. How do pictures of yourself and I still a club or something. Stupid me. you explain the reception? know nothing about you, except And that was it. That was a wrap that you’re possibly happy all the on Gabby. Never had a chance Well bluntly, it fills a time. I mean, I know one time she after that. It’s just one of those void unaddressed by other apps. went to the beach. I deduced that hit or miss things that happens. I What we’re most proud of with much. know that. I drank it off, got over Shyne is how it applies human it, but even after I stopped going psychology to social media. We So? down that hallway anymore there consider it to be the first “honestly was still this nagging little thing social” media app. So I eventually grow left over. Her Instagram. I couldn’t the stones to poke her on Face- stop looking at it. Every day. I I’d like to come back book. She was actually really swear not in resentment, really, to that statement. First tell receptive. We began chatting a but in a more, I dunno, legitimate me about the apps concep- little more on and off the internet, sadness. tion. What inspired you to go water cooler jokes and whatnot. through with making it? When I got comfortable enough, Sadness? I brought up her Instagram. That I was just out of perked her up. She liked that. Yes. Real heartfelt pity, college, went to Denver for a And then I asked her, hey, how in a specific way that I rarely felt coding job. I guess it started come it’s just pictures of you on before about people. Not that I’m with Gabby. Just this girl I kinda your page? And immediately she selfish, I don’t think, I just mean liked who worked down the hall. looked confused. Like, she said, it was just a pretty specific sort of Office crush. DIdn’t know how to what do you mean? Who else affect. talk to her, or even what about. I would it be? And I say, of course friended her on Facebook weeks you. It’s your profile, I know. But I Explain that. Where before I said a word. Tried to get mean it’s all just pictures of your did that come from? a feel for her. face. You don’t like, do anything? Like, with friends? I said that. I Well I guess the as- You creeped on her? really said that. And you know sumption I always had was that what she goes? everyone wanted to be under- Creeped is an ugly stood and accepted for who they

25 feel they are deep down. Like, I In that it means a lot of Right? Isn’t it? It’s dunno, a sort of greater auton- people don’t want to be under- almost like, all Dali Llama in its omy for our own private self. stood on any level other than whole, everyone’s connected This in mind, I’d browse Gabby’s a superficial visual. And when I sort of logic. I thought about it photo gallery, all those faces, and see that, everywhere, I can’t help and I was like, that’s the internet. ask, how many people do this? It but think theres a tremendous That’s what the internet’s for. I bugged the s**t out of me! Sorry. anxiety behind that. spent two years on that idea. Two It just seemed so odd and yet so years trying to apply it. already familiar. I lurked around, Of what sort? looked at all her friends profiles. Why so long? What Then I look at my friends. My The anxiety that other was the challenge there? God. It was all the same. What- than their observable happiness ever minor differences everyone’s there’s not a lot more to them that In short, research. Not profile communicated the same they feel is important. like with Gabby, but more like thing. The implicit theme was: I’m what would be technically neces- happy. No matter what I do, I’m That’s an extreme sary to make an app like Shyne doing it successfully. Sometimes presumption to make about possible. I spent most of the time that means being attractive or people. It’s undeniably cynical. looking into the facial recognition social, but always it means being technology. happy, and positive, and just I agree. Just consid- look at me. Aren’t I doing it right? ering that there could be any Tell me about that. Don’t you wish you were like me? element of truth to it was very, The facial recognition soft- With your life and all? very depressing. Not only that ware’s a noteworthy compo- but it’s also a slap to the ideol- nent of the app that has gotten There seems a hint of ogy; the idea that underneath a lot of attention this week. anger in the way you describe our normalcy, we’re all unique, Why was it so essential? it. undiscovered stars waiting to be revealed. RIght now it’s like we I think what people Not anger so much. often view the virtual plane strictly respond most to with Shyne is Frustration. Here with social me- as a means to communicate who the commitment to an idea. A dia we’ve been given this ridicu- we wish we were. conscious rejection of their usual lously useful tool to communicate social media experience. The first who we feel we are in every less You frequently credit thing the app will ask you to do is obvious aspect, and the best we the invention of Shyne to the take a photo of your own face, no can do is commit even further networks that preceded it and different from any other except for to some standardized persona? just earlier this morning stated its functional significance: from This odd, unnaturally enviable that, conceptually, it couldn’t now on the app will recognize person with all the same pictures exist without Instagram or your features and prevent you in all the same settings? Pools Facebook... from loading a photo from any- and bars and whatever places thing less than a yard away. of enjoyment. Not that I’m so That’s true! I think cynical as to believe that people Facebook had it right first by Why that restriction? are incapable of having fun, but allowing users to represent them- the fact that it’s sooo consistently selves with their likes. It made the Roughly, it’s the length there and being applied as a so- leap that people are constructs. of the human arm. It’s the first cial proof of their happiness, that You are essentially what you like rule of Shyne: No selfies on your makes me suspicious. I makes and give your attention to. What own profile. me ask: why are you working you consume every day. Google so hard to be seen this way? works the same way with your I wanted to talk to you I’m looking at your Facebook or search history. I wanted to apply about that rule in particular. Instagram with a million f**king the same thing to relationships. I don’t want to reduce it to a selfies, and i just keep think- The assumption that you’re the gimmick but it certainly seems ing, this is f**king terrible. This sum total of everyone you’ve tailored for those most jaded completely contradicts everything interacted with. by the perceived narcissism of I ever assumed about people. social media Sorry. Sorry. It’s an interesting idea. Thats funny because In what way is it contradictory? I originally intended it to be an

26 answer for those most immersed He and his spatula are added based off something you did for in the narcissism of social me- to your home page. A little later, someone else. dia. Ralph checks his profile and sees that you tagged him. Next to his That element of quid Ha! I see that, I one first selfie, the one he took pro quo. That sort of, I look, suppose. I guess what I mean make his profile, his tag counter you look back. I just find it a though is that a no selfie rule has jumped up a point. Yay for very optimistic presumption seems counter intuitive to any Ralph! Ralph feels good. On top that people would be more in- mainstream acceptance. of that, when good old Ralph clined to care about what other checks, he sees that other people people are doing. It is! That’s what was that are friends with you on Shy- so interesting about Shyne as a ne have seen your picture of him I don’t think so. If any- thought experiment. How does that you took. People that you thing people are absolutely more one react to it? How do the happen to know but that he may interested in other people than parameters of the app effect how have never even met are going to they are themselves. Even if we’d you use it? In what way can this your page and Haloing him, just never say it, we know who we program tap into a real need that for being a guy at a barbecue. are. So much that we’d bullshit everyone has? We not only, like You follow? the internet into thinking we were other social media networks, always somebody much happier wanted to provide a tool for users Go on. than we could possibly be. The to forge a legitimate connection, truth is nobody wants to look at but also, more uniquely, do this Now, because of the themselves as they are for too while taking into account peoples photo you took, that second you long. What I wanted to test with own natural insecurities. I didn’t invested in not yourself, you’re Shyne is how similarly people ac- want to the burden idea with here on associated with that tually felt about their happy public overcomplication; too many event that was Ralph and his persona. options and all that. Look-wise barbecue. He’s a part of your I first conceived Shyne as not Narrative. You earned him. And Yes, but why keep all that different from Instagram. even better, you realize that all up with others in the way the Although we ended up tweaking the subsequent gratification you functionality of this network the design for obvious reasons, a get from all of this is entirely demands? Is it not just ideal- Like is now a Halo and whatnot, but the concept is very similar. Home profile, box gallery.

It is similar in that regard. Did you worry about any legal issues?

Not at all. The big difference is the crucial functional limitation, which believe me we spent more than enough effort in developing ourselves. Ideally, be- cause of the software inhibitions, every photo you have on your home gallery is of someone else.

Okay, explain that a little more for me. Functional- ly, why is this an app people would consistently want to use?

Okay, say you go to a barbecue and snap a photo of your friend Ralph manning the grill. You tag Ralph in the photo.

27 ism on your part? What is the to involve you. And this I think software by whatever means? practical incentive for your would occur either as a result of users’ effort? you doing something someone Nah. Not really. I mean theres would want to share, or as a ways to get around it, I’m sure. I think the actual issue reciprocal gesture for a photo People are creative. But what’s you’re addressing is about feeling you posted. Either way, your real really amazing is, from what gratified. The question of: how life relationships actually matter. we’ve seen, the users like the do I achieve validation by caring With Shyne, one is seen only as rules. about others? Is it possible? Sub- much as one is tagged by other jective validation is the currency users. As we just hypothesized Why do you think that of social media. You need to with good old Ralph, this is more is? integrate it in some way and it’s likely to happen when you’re really a balancing act: as people taking pictures of other people Shyne is an app that we naturally want to belong to and relying on them to return the actually encourages real world groups and benefit them, but also favor. Effectively, those with the interaction. It encourages people without sacrificing our own sense greatest presence are the ones to be genuinely interesting, to of importance. See, I noticed that devote the most attention be engaged in activity worthy of this myself one day when I was and phone memory to others. someone else’s home page. It going through my own Instagram makes you want to be a better feed. I kept sliding between all Thats a really confident faith person instead of just feeling like these people who were famous in reciprocity. Maybe a blind one. or talented or sexy enough to faith? have followers in the tens of That’s a tall order for a phone thousands, numbers that dwarfed Not so much I don’t app. the number of people they were think. It might seem risky to following themselves mind you, anyone at first, but I think after a It’s a tall order for a and I had to admit, it really f**ck- while though we begin to notice person. But I think that has a lot ing, I mean, freaking bugged me that the more we put out there more to do with a culture than on some level that my number of the more we in the long run will anything innate. And we’ve al- followers was significantly smaller benefit. All we’re betting on is our ready seen how much that can be than the number of people I was own personal interest in sustain- dictated by mundane little things following, as if the opposite were ing real relationships or creating like phone apps. It’s exciting to some implicit goal to attain: to new ones. Once you begin pursu- me that Shyne could really be a have more people looking at you ing your Tagged more than your part of that by reemphasizing all than you would look at yourself. Tags, which you have no direct the reasons why, in my opinion, That felt wrong to me. I wanted to control over anyway, you actually you should probably be holding encourage a different approach. have an investment in sharing the your phone in the first place. activities of other people around And how did you do you. Hence the slogan of that? the app. You sound very excit- By making it so that ed when you talk about all this. “Accrue unto others.” I your numbers are no longer your believe in that. In the last decade numbers. They’re never directly I am. F**k, I am. Just we invented a million other ways about you. All your Halos are on think how better it is. All that to induce feelings of approval. other people’s profiles while your insecurity and egoism involved And in recogition of that, I’m sure page is full of Ralph. And now, in remaining visible: obsolete. there could potentially be a hand- now that you’ve sent so much A scenario where any and all ful of users trying to pad their attention in your real life buddy validation only occurs after you numbers just like they do with Ralph’s direction, he might be take the eye off yourself. And every other app that lets them. inclined to snap you whenever once you do can do that, there’s But really, why would they want he can and throw you on his Nar- a greater, more.. substantial sat- to? Just to, in some quick and rative. That was the whole gist. isfaction to every instance of your superficial way, inflate their self Nobody appears on Shyne at own very real smile. image? With the one app meant all without first taking a photo of to absolve them of that very im- someone else. Just being visible Are you concerned pulse? Frankly, I don’t know how on our network means some- about abuse? People by- to help that person. one you know actively chose passing the limitations of the

28 MASON TARLEN

Of course she's left a message. “If I sing it doesn’t mean anything.” Any opportunity to gloat. Tell him, of course. “But you are condescending,” he said. Of course you didn't pick up. “No I’m not.” Mina, she carries the same cynic's mentality of “Yes you are.” a perpetual rape victim or Illuminati conspiracy theorist, “Why are you judging me?” living their life between tragedies, waiting for the mo- “I’m not judging you.” ment they can say, see, I told you so. “You’re upsetting me.” Tell her anything. Mina upsets easily. Mina the 3D movie's like, thirty bucks. I didn't Sometimes it’s: Mina, this beat I’m making is bring all the way enough for both of us. important. I just need twenty minutes more alone. Of course, she'll say. “Of course,” she’ll say. Pissed. Mina I got a cheese pizza because I didn't Sometimes: Mina the Jack in the Box guy know what you like. says it’s past eleven. Their shake machine is down. And Of course, she'll say. also I just don’t know if I could ever raise a kid. With her power of hindsight Mina could make “Of course.” anyone feel dumb. It means she likes you, Mason would Mina I, just, I’m sorry, I dunno what’s wrong tell himself. She just wants to be humored. Validated. You with it. I might be too drunk or something. know how needy she is. She craves your monogamous “Of course.” attention. Mina your beta fish are dead. It would piss her off the time he spent bent “Of course.” over his record player, waiting for an unused sample to Mina you have cervical cancer. USB into his laptop. Mina never in her life appreciated “No I don’t.” good hip-hop. To her it's a phase guys go through. Every- You can’t just leave someone after they get thing he does is something she's already seen. cervical cancer. Two months after her hysterectomy and As Mason figures it, Mina being older means he still holds her hand wondering, how soon is too soon? she wants to date a version of himself that doesn't exist Just imagine Mina being given the chance yet. He used to find optimism in her constant disappoint- to break down over the course of weeks, constantly ment. As if, despite his worthlessness, she really thought describing the event to her Facebook friends and loved he could be the one. ones, turning him steadily into a public villain. The vile The niceness of that idea could sustain him coward that no one would know for anything but his even throughout her more unpleasant tics. treachery while Mina was steeped in sympathies. Of "Of course you'd wear that," she said last course she would gain some vague self-affirmation from week, shrugged in his passenger seat and rolling eyes at the experience, thinking no more of Mason than the free his floral five-pannel hat. victimhood he supplied. How soon could she actually for- "Why do you do that?" he asked her. "Why do get about him? The idea of it dwarfs all ways she makes you sing when you're being condescending." him feel dead inside. Every stupid rule of hers. "What? I don't do that." Since now everything’s a carcinogen to "Yeah you do. All the time. You say things Mina, Mason can only eat the more expensive all natural melodically." vegetables that have never been a mile of growth hor- She tissed. “No I don’t.” mones or MSG. Last month she made him throw out all “Yes you do. It’s like you sing to sound less his bathroom products and now it’s only chalk crunchy mean when you talk to me. Like I won’t notice your toothpaste and natural antiperspirant made of beeswax words.” and aloe vera and none of the aluminum found in regular

29 deodorant that makes your lymph He keeps fucking up on the part a 40. On the way, he ranted about rap nodes swell. In the heat the wax where he rhymes ambidextrous with related YouTube videos. melts down his arms and he finds no sexiest. “Consumption is benefit in it other than the encourage- “I thought you was talkin research,” said Muthafuckin Josh, ment to exercise. He’s been chased about cutting a professional track?” stumbling over every curbside. “The by bees twice this week. he asks. years you spend listening to rappers, When he knows Mina In the corner, Banks learning everything about them, all is home he takes long walks down just glares at his ProTools program, you’re doing is studying how to be and up Guadalupe, noticing all the scrolling down Rudy’s defective as talented and famous as they are. fresh stickers and paint marker tags sound files. All the takes are slowing That’s the only reason we eat up along the way. At 21st street he stops down his computer. new music anymore, to check on the and looks up at the toad on the wall: “Yo, from the top,” Rudy competition. Everyone you’re gonna Jeremiah the Innocent. He knows the shouts into the mic, clutching his outshine soon when you get around mural is that of a happy frog, like headphones. “Yo.. ATX it’s King to mastering your album.” Jeremiah was a bull frog he assumes, Yeti..uunh.. you already know..” When they returned, but every time Mason sees a toad. He’s been bogarting the Trixie was there with Taco Bell An ugly toad. mic for an hour. Nobody wants to and bowed sorries for being late, He remembers when the say anything because Rudy’s already emptying hot sauce baggies from her building was still a record store, flashed his pistol in a group selfie pockets. as the Frost tower was going up, with Dexter and Trixie. Banks set her up with just as he even began to care about On Banks’ bed the rest headphones and water and they music and a couple years before that of them wait and avoid making listened as she recorded the chorus Real World: Austin guy got his face background noise. Muthafuckin Josh for the first track. With the back up punched in front the world. Mason is already tippin off his 40 and the vocals she only took twenty minutes. always suspected that season to be box of wine he killed while writing “It was good, but, ya the first coordinated media effort by his bars. know,” said Muthafuckin Josh on Those who would see Austin flooded This is Banks’ third the balcony, shrugging. “Worst thing with coolhunting foreigners. A attempt at a recording session. The about non-rappers is I can’t hate PsyOp to stifle the native culture. plan was to meet up around eight on them so they’re useless to my Google the toad and you and spend an hour or two polishing progress.” get photos of people posing in front verses for the two instrumentals Mason noticed how many of the mural, throwing up horns and that needed to get spit on. Mason texts from Mina had piled up in the wearing tye-dyed, Keep Austin Weird arrived at nine and only Muthafuckin last hour. He asked if he could hit tank tops. You get pictures of Kurt Josh was there, playing with Banks’ the Black & Mild and Josh began to Cobain wearing Jeremiah on a t-shirt keyboard. freestyle, causing Mason to cough to the VMA’s in 1992. That was way “Fucking rappers,” said into his fist every bar or so. He gave before the record store was a Mex- Banks, “I said we were recording at a go at it himself but only made it a ican grill, then a noodle place. Not ten!” few seconds before lobbing it back to bad the noodle place. Inside there’s On Banks’ coffee table Josh who rhymed another eight bars a TV. Today on the news, protestors was a photo book of graffiti from before falling off to hit the Black are linking up on the far end of a around the world. In Brazil, Mason again instead. square. read, there’s a game the vandals “You’re getting good,” Mason slurps his soba play where they compete to write Mason said. and scribbles across a note pad their names in the highest, most “Fuck yeah I am. It sucks. before he looses count on the rhymes inaccessible places. On the page was I need equals goddammit. Real in his head. On his phone he ignores a full-color twenty story building motherfucking contenders in the cy- the new message from Mina and in- blanketed in Portuguese scrawl. In pher. You know when you hear that stead looks up words on the internet, his notebook, Mason flipped past his verse that makes you weep inside, scanning for dangerous sounding rhymes and on a clean page he began that raw-skill greatest thing you ever synonyms. He Wikipedias arson. In to draw Jeremiah the toad from heard, and all you feel is resentment, -356 Herostratus burned down the memory. that’s when you know you’re on that temple of Artemis. When they asked “You already got your next level.” him why, he said, so you’ll remem- verse?” asked Muthafuckin Josh. Mason cracked the door. ber my name. Mason nodded, folding the toad out In Banks’ room, Trixie pressed the of sight. headphones to her head and nodded *** Muthafuckin Josh invited approvingly to her own voice. Mason to walk with him to the cor- “I’m curious about about King Yeti asks for one more take. ner store to buy a Black & Mild and King Yeti. Haven’t heard him yet,”

30 said Josh. “Hope he’s not coming with no bullshit.” Mason had checked out King Yeti’s Soundcloud the night before. All imitative SLAB-rap, nothing to inspire much jealousy out of anyone. Listening to Josh and Trixie he wondered if this collab- oration track wasn’t a little poorly matched. He and Josh had already tried cyphering with Dexter Inc. once and Mason could tell by Josh’s absence of joyful rage that he wasn’t feeling it much. After Dexter bounced they took turns resin hitting a bowl and Josh denounced the kid’s penchant for, as he referred to it on his Instagram, “Gnostic Rap”: always wasting good beats on references to Reptilians and 9/11 and The Matrix trilogy. Credit where it was due for having a mixtape, but even Mason agreed that maybe too much of it was dedicated to the en- lightening influence of sativa and Jah Almighty, all while kicking to death phrases like “sheeple” and “wake up”. “The album art is literally foam. Before his part he listens to the chorus, some people might not him lighting a dollar on fire,” said Josh’s voice, then Trixie singing understand. The irony.” Muthafuckin Josh. “How do you the chorus. He looks down at his Banks crosses his arms. excuse that?” rhymes. The chorus ends. He inhales. “So what, our.. satire, it’s too good?” Josh hates anything with He reaches his fourth bar punchline “I’m just saying it’s really a message. Rap’s for bragging and then he signals Banks to pause the convincing.” punchlines, he often says. Everything track. “People are gonna take it else is pretense. Banks clicks the spacebar. how they take it. It is what it is.” Before his take, MF Josh “What’d you fuck up?” “Well of course it is what revealed from under his neckline “Nothing. It’s just, I was is.” a plastic trinket taped to a dog tag thinking about this song,” Mason Banks sips his water chain. says. “The title and stuff. “ bottle. “Did you finish your verse?” “It’s Tyler the Creator’s “What? ‘Bad Choices’?” “Yeah I just,” Mason inhaler. He lost it in a stage dive.” “Yeah. Well, do you says, huffing. “I don’t know if it He breathed from it while think? I mean.. Is it encouraging bad goes.” waiting for his part and spit his choices?” “I don’t really get what whole thirty-two bars in just three “It encourages fun,” says the fuck you guys are talking about,” takes, plus a back up vocal interrupt- Banks. “Clearly though, on that, I King Yeti says, pinching his nostrils, ed mid-way when Dexter Inc. and dunno, deeper level, it’s like, ironi- “but if he’s not going I can redo my King Yeti started pounding on the cally mocking people that make bad back up track instead?” front door. choices, along with whatever popular “Yeah Mason hurry the Half an hour later, Banks music that would encourage them to fuck up, I still got bombs to drop,” is pinching the bridge of his nose, do so.” adds Dexter Inc., fixing the blunt asking King Yeti: “Can you deliver “Well yeah,” Mason behind his ear before going down that louder? Into the mic.” says, “clearly, I know that, I hear on another rail of coke off Banks’ Mason is next on the that. I’m just saying, if I didn’t know dresser counter, which doesn’t track. When King Yeti is finished, he that. Just, it, the beat and all, the exactly make Mason comfortable but checks the backlight setting on his way it sounds like a lot of songs on he keeps it to himself. Condemning phone and steps up to the memory the radio, ya know, combined with drug use is totally not hip-hop.

31 Mason puts on the head- He doesn’t want to go. A lot of accidentally spraying his chest. phones and thumbs at Banks when things he doesn’t want to do. When it’s silent he shakes the can he’s ready. Afterward they listen to Recently someone from again and raises his arm. the finished take and Mason watches high school mentioned that a ten year The marble sound echoes. Josh’s face for signs of bitterness. reunion wouldn’t be that far off. He “Shit.” Dexter Inc. is next. He really needed to check his Facebook. Mason flinches. Yards spends a few minutes positioning his How many other people there would away, a hoodied young man stands spiral at a readable angle under the have kids already? Bet it would be with his finger on the button of a can. mic, which requires several books surprising, he thinks. How many of Mason drops to his heels and the weight of a portable speaker. them would. Even the good looking and steps back. “Alright! Fixin to make ones who always had money and a “You got it?” says the history!” he shouts while waiting car and junk. Especially the good boy. for his part in the song, doing a sort looking ones. Mason considers running of rhythmic dance except with only He was never one of maybe. He’s still so full of crepes. hand gestures. them. Once a late bloomer, always, “The fuck man, are you “Watch this right here,” he thinks. It’s always been like that. gonna do it or not?” he says at the mic, reaching under Since Ancient Greece. Everything Mason steps aside. The his headphones for the blunt behind good goes to those that got there boy in the hood shakes his can again his ear. first. Like the ones that got through and begins to spray. It’s effortless. “Dex!” Josh bellows. college in only four years, that never The kid’s speed makes Mason feels Dexter Inc. can’t hear him. once felt like it was all a scam and useless. “Unn, hol up,” says Dex- got all the things they always thought “Left you some room ter, raising the lighter to the end of they’d get. below it,” the kid says once done. the blunt. “Watch me bless the mic.” Maybe he needs to aim “Kaboominati,” reads Banks cuts the music just higher. Maybe he’s too comfortable. Mason. “That’s your name right?” he as Dexter inhales and the Beats by He calls Mina. asks, squinting at the boy. Dre slide off his ears. “Where the fuck are The boy squints back. His “Sup?” he asks, releasing you?” she asks. face becomes illuminated in flashing a cloud of smoke right into the He tells her, then waits lights. The police car hops the curb microphone. for her to speak some more. Then he behind them. It takes Banks one step mentions how he wants some more “Don’t move,” the cop to punch Dexter Inc. in the temple, time to himself. shouts. then cross him in the jaw. The rapper Of course, she says, ex- The hoodied boy takes folds over. The kicks to the ribs seem cept with more crying than singing. off running. The cop speaks into his excessive. Mostly cursing. radio then screams Mason to the “That’s a.. five hundred Then she hangs up. He ground. dollar… microphone,” Banks huffs, probably should have removed his The force with which he’s kicking, “You.. fucking.. fuck!” records from her apartment first, he cuffed seems excessive. His chin They do hold him back thinks. bleeds from the concrete. eventually, but everyone who would He finishes his plate, In the back of the car spring to the defense of Dexter Inc. eating until he struggles to breathe. he watches the officers through the really wants to be on the mix tape. Then he drives up Lamar to the west window. end of campus and parks far from the Did the kid get away? *** drag. He closes his trunk and walks, Maybe he’ll see him again in one straight arm clacking with each the holding cell? If so there’ll be At the 24 Hour Diner, step. questions. Kaboominati. Why didn’t Mason hunches at the bar, wait- Jeremiah looks down on Mason think of a better name? ing for his ordered crepes. In his him, smiling. Indifferent. He waits for one of notebook, instead of new rhymes, The can rattles in his grip. the cops to crane into their radio, he traces over Jeremiah the toad in He shakes it again, lifting high on his responding affirmatively, as if a Sharpie, and wonders if he shouldn’t toes, and stretching it still over his suspect has just been apprehended go back to art and making stickers head. some blocks away. like he used to. “Fuck your t-shirts,” Is there a chance they On the news, foreign pro- he whispers, tracing the air then could mistake him as the tagger? testors are throwing flaming bottles bringing the can back, ready to press That’s what’s happening right? What at police and limping their wounded down. could prove otherwise? from the scene. A car passes. Mason Mason stiffens. He has work tomorrow. tucks the can and hunches, There’s a bee on the

32 glass, inside the car. His wrists are bound behind him. He can try to smash it with his head before it springs for the kill. What if he smashes at the wrong angle? Imagine a mugshot with a busted chin and a smiling dead bee dangling from his purple swollen forehead. Forever linked to his Googled name. He watches the bee. It For this you need one of those lighters with the switch up makes no offensive move. front. Flip the switch all the way to the right. Maybe they can do lab tests on the paint samples. See how the can with his prints don’t match what’s on the wall. Surely forensic science will reprieve him. He hopes not.

Arson? First, pop off the metal part with a knife while ignoring the Attention seeking? insinct to cut at your wrists, you emo bitch. April fools pendejo!

HACK

Now, you’ll notice the switch wraps around an adjusting wheel. Bypass it by flipping the switch up and all the way to the left, then fit it back down on the gear and rotate it to the YOUR right. The more times you do this, the bigger the flame. LIGHTER !!!

Voilá. Charizard motherfucker.

33 34 “I made this song entirely out of sam- sound mixer with the blithe ease of someone piloting ples from the Cosby Show opening,” Ryan says, a spaceship. grinning. Whatever he used, it’s unrecognizable now “This is the last time I’m performing this and the beat is so good it makes me want to cry. ever,” he announces before beginning a brassy Right now we’re at the Metropolis apart- synth rendition of Kanye West’s “All of the Lights” ments just off East Riverside for a low-key day party. over one of his own beats. Presumably, the reason If Ryan has just met me for the first time ever he everyone in the room is bitting their knuckles and doesn’t act like it. He’s very much a hugger, but so squealing in excitement is that he’s playing the is everyone else here today. entire song, in real time, on the keyboard of his It’s the Saturday of SXSW, the last Macbook Pro. eventful day, and all week there hasn’t been a group Later he tells me how he first learned more genuinely enjoying themselves than the kids how to play piano on a computer keyboard. “I had dancing around Ryan, waving joints and phones, a program called Anvil Studio when I learned how watching him mix together a set. The whole event to write and play music. It was like a midi program I is being live-streamed via the SPF420 TinyChat, an got when I was like, seven or eight. You played the online music venue hosted by two very friendly ston- bottom row of keys on your computer as one octave ers named Chaz and Liz, who today have cleared and the Q-W-E-R keys above as a higher octave a sparse East side apartment for the likes of Ryan so you could play it with both hands. Then I got a and the several other digital artists in their battered regular keyboard and I still don’t really know how to Yeezusesque sweatshirts. play how you’re supposed to play. I took a year of Liz approaches Ryan, hunched and piano just to sharpen my sight reading. I mostly just sweating over his laptop, and hands him a loaded learn by ear.” pipe to hit, he motions at his throat and tells her he’d While certainly impressive, this is less much rather have a big glass of water. of an idiosyncrasy than it used to be. Like most 22 “It’s the Vyvanse,” he says, wiping his year olds in 2015, Ryan is very much a product of forehead. “It helps.” his home computer. While working his way back and forth be- “I was on the internet, like, really early as tween live-chatting with his fans and click-dragging a kid because my dad is a network administrator, in his program window, Ryan twists and taps at his so I guess I don’t remember a life without it. It’s

35 kinda creepy now that I put it into words.” It was the internet that made Ryan who he is to everyone in the room. Today he’s going by the name Skylar Spence but up until three months ago he was known as Saint Pepsi, the Long Island producer who once described himself as the ambassador of Vaporwave; a plunderphonic variant that’s been building an exponentially greater internet presence since its inception sometime around 2011, even if according to Chaz, who himself produces under the name Chazzzy, the genre has really been dead since 2013. If this is true, no one, least of all Ryan, is too con- cerned. “I always had fun with the creative control of like, manipulating samples and like, manipulating stuff from YouTube and creating something new out of that,” he says. “I’d always been writing songs but Saint Pepsi he still gets, his Vaporwave days much to his Saint Pepsi albums was kind of like a break from are over. as it does those of artists like マク that. It was actually all totally an “I love Vaporwave,” ロスMACROSS 82-99 and Yung accident.” Ryan tells me. “The music I make Bae, who as Ryan points out is After less successful isn’t Vaporwave anymore but I one of the many people logged attempts with this former band, don’t ever discredit people who into his live chat, using various The Cold Napoleons, Ryan make it.” aliases to ask the question: how released his Saint Pepsi album He used to catch a come no one likes Yung Bae? World Tour on band camp where lot of shit, he says, after being If the whole scene four days later it was picked up categorized as a Vaporwave comes off as an inside joke by by the Japanese music blog Hi- artist, lending permission to all those who have spent most of Hi-Whoopee, who declared him those making music in the vein of their young lives deconstructing someone to look out for in 2013. his now more mainstream dance the cyclical process of consuming “That was the first time sound to also usurp the label, a and producing media, it’s to an anyone had really said anything move that’s upset some of the interesting effect. What solidified about my music and it was like, scene’s purists. Vaporwave as a full blown artistic an anonymous stupid project I did “It’s a hard wire to stay movement was its commitment to over a winter break. And I was on top of. Like, damed if you do, caricaturizing familiar aspects of like, okay, this is my identity now.” damned if you don’t,” he says. a pop culture composed largely At that time a political Although he’s had of commerce friendly media, and science major at Boston college, plenty of legitimate contributions reconfiguring it into a virtualized Ryan switched to music his last as a Vaporwave producer, Ryan’s hyperreal cartoon of itself. The semester of school: sophomore more recent work while still under resulting aesthetic screams of year. Since then he’s been the Saint Pepsi moniker is more critically anti-capitalist sentiments signed to Carpark records, the accurately described as Future that while the depth which is both same label of acts like Memory Funk, a Vaporwave sub-branch varying and debatable, on the Tapes and Toro Y Moi. Now he’s that while still sample oriented whole the collective scene has Skylar Spence and he can play is generally more uptempo and embraced. pretty much any instrument in the incorporative of house music than Ryan, seemingly, was studio. For whatever due credit its classic predecessor, owing as no exception. His logo as Saint

36 Pepsi, a literally inverted interpre- having become a mindless and tation of the Pepsi insignia, was choreographed idiot. brazenly flaunted until early this The company’s indif- year when Ryan was contacted ference on the matter of online by Pepsi Co. about his infringe- videos was likely due to the ment on their brand. fact that while Ryan enjoys the “They suck,” he says. videos, he himself has had no “They heard my song and they hand whatsoever in making any don’t want me to use the name of them, a detail which speaks to anymore. I said okay so they the true nature of the Vaporwave wouldn’t sue me. It wasn’t any- scene: a disorganized composite thing dirty, they said they liked of hundreds of individual video ‘Fiona’ so that was cool. The first and recording artists; each with time they messaged us they said the ability to sample, edit, and they wanted to have a friendly create content all by themselves chat. It was really like, please with nothing more than some change your name we don’t wan- easily pirated software and ac- na have to do this. Stop selling cess to YouTube. the shirts, stop using the name “I think that YouTube is on future recordings. a gold mine for people that don’t “I don’t hate on them know anything about producing for the move,” he says, shrug- music,” Ryan says. “Anyone can ging. “I was though a lot more go online and watch thousands of willing to work on an agreement methods on how to produce from than probably any other artist across the world. On top of that in the same situation. Like, I if you’re a music fan there’s like, probably would have given up a anything you could ever want at hundred percent of my publishing your fingertips.” rights just to keep the name.” Like many amateur Pepsi Co. never even producers, Ryan began mixing mentioned anything about all the his music with FL Studio, then Youtube videos. Specifically the Logic, and eventually Ableton. music videos for Ryan’s remix Arguably, it’s the recent ubiquity of Spazzkid’s “Loving Free”, and of these home production soft- “Cherry Pepsi” off the Saint Pepsi wares and others like them that album Hit Vibes. Both quick-cut contributed most to the emer- compilations of equally quick-cut gence of the Vaporwave scene, decade old Pepsi commercials, which by now boasts legions of the videos recontextualize the participants and a comparable familiar campaign of giddy teen- number of perspectives on the agers and close ups of carbonat- genre itself, for which the preva- ed sludge fountains, and in their lent importance of YouTube as a three to four minute runtimes uniting platform can’t be under- reveal a responsive affect usually stated. This is chiefly because the lost to viewers conditioned to medium itself demands accom- tolerate such imagery in mere panying imagery, a fact that has thirty second increments. While never been underexploited by the within the alternate universe of Vaporwave genre, which from the Pepsi ads cracking open a bottle beginning was definitively tied of the beverage guarantees an with visual aesthetics for the sake immediate youthful exuberance, of creating the intended imag- after three whole minutes of inary effect within the listeners rapid fire commercial positivity, mind. And while these aesthetics any happiness promised by the vary, their consensus is that of a product is subverted by the view- nostalgic appreciation of popular ers newfound intuition that the culture from the late eighties in-your-face vitality Pepsi offers and throughout the nineties, could only be the byproduct of specifically all the least inspired

37 and banal material of the period: was really cool.” adherence to our desires and television commercials, elevator The video is a montage usual inability to appraise their music, smooth jazz, etc. From of the campaign’s escapist validity within a greater system this selected source material, imagery: Peter Pan clock towers, invested only in manipulating Vaporwave usually extracts the puffy dream clouds in the night our self-esteem for profit. In fact, most vapid or kitschy elements sky, all culminating in a twinkling once dissected, Vaporwave could and emphasizes their artificiality theme park of roller coasters and be easily read as an artistic dis- to a peculiar extremity. billboards. Yet its depiction of an course on the role of want in our Perhaps the most unmitigated pleasure carnival popular culture, especially as it effective example of this on soon becomes perversely unset- pertains to Millennials. At its peak YouTube is the video for Saint tling. As waxed by Marxist philos- in 2014, Vaporwave was perfectly Pepsi’s “Enjoy Yourself”, created opher Slavoj Zizek: any oblivious timed for infants of the early and uploaded by Australian video pursuit of an ideological ideal nineties, who’s limited exposure artist Wicked. Directly sampled unto its maximum degree inevi- to most of the decade could only from Michael Jackson’s “Off the tably begets the characteristics reasonably manifest itself as a Wall”, the song’s permissive of an obscene monstrosity. Here hazy and idealized partial mem- lyrics are looped over a re-edited we see all the enforced positivity ory. As if Vaporwave’s self-aware version of the now laughable Mc- of consumer culture caught in a fantasy were derived entirely Donald’s “Mac Tonight” campaign never ending feedback loop until from the desires of Generation Y from the late eighties. it’s too much for any grounded to meditate perpetually on their “I didn’t make that human being to accept sincerely. own abstracted childhoods and video but I made the cover for This accelerationist how everything went so horribly that album,” Ryan says, referring approach to commercial media wrong since, its narrative is set to his 2013, Late Night Delight, is common amongst Vaporwave in a virtual universe of western the album art of which depicts a artists who specifically utilize prosperity and liberal positivity, still image from the commercial. commercial sources for their where 9/11 never happened and “We were really crazy about Mac work, and although the cultural the optimistic consumer ethos Tonight. It seemed like, hella critique is undeniably there, the of the nineties extends into a weird that they used a man on a most subversive element of the repetitive eternity. It’s all not so cloud with a piano and a moon- genre is found in its scrutiny of much a direct parody of what is, head singing “Mack the Knife” to our own place in the order. It’s but a parody of what should have sell the fact that McDonald’s was less of a critique of commer- been, a Fukiyaman reverse-nos- open past midnight. I thought it cialism than of our own passive talgia for a future that never

38 happened. On the internet this faux-utopic aesthetic has been no better actualized than by the downloadable game Mall Quest. Visually reminiscent of PC DOOM clones popular in the early nineties, your mission within the game is to navigate through a labyrinthine shopping mall in search of the nostalgic 90’s items on your list (mostly childhood games and toys; Supersoaker, Mortal Combat II, etc..) The only goal is to consume well and not run out of money before you’ve accumulated everything on the list. Nothing initially complicated. What elevates the game to a work of art though are the me- andering people-bots you share space with. Each one an example of liberal positivity run amok, when prompted they’ll spout such hilariously solipsistic clichés as: “I am still lovable even if I’ve been rejected by others!” “I have a right to be wrong!” “How I think or feel is not what I am!” “I am a good person!” It quickly becomes obvious to what extent the game is a scathing commentary, not just on a culture that renders one psychologically impervious to self-criticism, but also towards the general invisibility of any greater reality which conflicts strongly enough with one’s own desires, specifically that of all the repressed byproducts of hyper- consumption. The longer it takes you to make your way through the stores, the more garbage piles up on the tile around you and the mall becomes populated with the criminal element lying in wait for you to get to close enough for them to pick your pocket. Eventually you find your- self racing in manic desperation to consume your fill and exit Chaz before the degenerate effects of capitalism pile up and ruin your ability to circulate currency and

39 40 validate your own existence. Within the most familiar setting possible, Mall Quest not only illustrates its own version of Hell, but deftly correlates all the common elements of such a place with just about everywhere else in our real life civilization. As a summarizing expression of the Vaporwave movement itself, the nature of the game’s virtual reality consciously parallels philosopher Jean Baudrillard’s take on Disneyland, in that its presentation as a work of artistic fiction (a theme park or a video game) obscures its similarities to everything outside the confines of its own medium (the [hyper] real world). The covert message being that, whether in front of or away from our screens, we all remain trapped in the virtual plaza of our own ever alienating ideology. “I’m really into Disne- yland,” Ryan admits, sucking on a lollipop infused with THC. “The first time I ever fell in love was in Disneyland.” You can tell he means it. Ryan is nothing if not earnest. On the apartment balcony we talk about the experi- ence of visiting a Disney park and the feelings of being in a dream. Listening to him describe the ap- peal of escapism it’s no wonder he’s so into disco. Mostly though, it seems like that’s just what he digs. “I got into the dis- co stuff because I really like the blend of prevalent vocal harmonies and this mix between organic instrumentation and very early synthesizer,” he says with casual erudition. “It’s not some- thing that anyone really had tried to replicate. I’m more interested in how to get really close to that sound than like, getting it exactly. I guess I just like putting my spin on the music that I like, grew up with and really enjoy personally.” It might crush the cultural theorists so attracted to the Vaporwave genre to know

41 that there’s nothing remotely seem to ask is, does it matter? based but not definingly so. It’s subversive about the things Ryan Do the self-claimed politics of music thats made with electron- himself enjoys. His playlists are a scene ever effect anything ics, and made with the same far more Duran Duran than Rage outside of it? Is subversion, espe- approach as when you try to write Against the Machine. In fact, as cially as it pertains to consumer songs for the radio.” far as his former contributions to culture even possible anymore? To this intent Ryan the scene, Ryan says his own ap- My guess is probably not, at least has already succeeded with proach has never been dystopian not via music. Whatever critical last summer’s “Fiona Coye”, a or political in nature. subtext Vaporwave may have, Nu-Disco masterpiece that not “The aesthetic I’ve it is never the less flourishing only got heavy play on Sirius but used was only to the purpose of through an ideologically friendly confirmed his transition to more encouraging the listener to feel and familiar premise: you too can universal pop sound. sort of like a in dreamland. I don’t make it! It stands to reason that “I see it in a lot of like have much to say beyond that. the cultural critique of western sub-EDM or like, people who’re I mean I do, but not any sort of capitalist ideology is something doing EDM, there’s a lot of things like, hypercapitalist critique on western capitalism has long happening now that wouldn’t the nation or the music industry. adapted to and ingrained. have been possible without the I just put a bunch of samples Also apparent: this internet and like, instant con- together and make a story out of bothers no one at SPF420. nectivity,” he says. “I don’t really it and put it out. I’ve always been Watching them break know how to gauge it, what’s more interested in the beginning up weed and Snapchat one coming next, but I think that to end process of producing and another, it’s clear that the only whatever it’s gonna be, it’s gonna making the songs.” directive of this room of twenty- be cool as hell.” He finds the songs first. somethings is trying to make the As it continues to Not the samples, just songs that most of a Saturday. All of us are evolve in real time there’s no he likes. From there, everything only here for a little fun within the certainty to how many ways he cuts and filters is all in pursuit culture we’ve arrived at and will Vaporwave will improve and bas- of that dreamlike quality he’s so someday neglect for something tardize itself, and inevitably begin fond of. “I don’t think I can rehash else. And if it’s odd how how little manifesting visibly within the every single song ever, but like, a part the unified acknowledg- greater awareness. Of course, af- you’d be surprised at what I can ment of our capitalist overlords ter meeting the punks at SPF420, fuck up.” plays in the afternoon; as stated one only gets the suspicion that Ryan’s preference for before: it’s not about them, it’s watching the mainstream pick the term “Vaporwave ambassa- about us. Today in this room the up on and attempt to monetize dor”, he says, is out of a refusal only role of the Mall Quest shop- already corporate sounding to speak of himself as an origi- per or the Mac Tonight Moonman elevator music could have only nator of the genre, or even view is that of a vague parable, the ever been the mischievous secret himself as a Vaporwave artist. manifested awareness, after two intent of the genre. But even if the label is less accu- decades of navigating our cul- rate than he’s comfortable with, ture, of who we might not want to his preference for dreamy atmo- be; an ever present anxiety, but sphere does nothing to prevent certainly always secondary to a his miscategorization. Dreams good blunt circle and dance party are a common Vaporwave ele- in a stranger’s living room. ment and for good reason: if our At today’s SPF420 dreams are the playground of our there’s no pretense that the desires then any hypnagogic aes- Vaporwave genre hasn’t already thetic coincides also with that of hit it’s crest and begun to branch the virtual plaza, whose subjects fluidly into whatever new inno- are presumably only governed by vation the culture will dictate. On their consumer instinct to pursue, this topic Ryan is only optimistic circulate, and above all enjoy. about what that next thing will This relationship is probably what actually be. has made Ryan’s work the per- “I would less like to fect candidate for those looking to refer to all this as a backlash project a cultural critique on the to EDM and be more prone to scene. Yet what none of the more saying it’s like a revival of a kind politicizing takes on the genre of pop music that’s electronically

42 It’s the most impotent form of satire to convey the evilness of an entity by illustrating it with overly sinister features. How many artists have taken Mickey Mouse and rendered him with a toothy snarl and catlike eyes--a fanged embodiment of corporate influence, cultural infantilization, and the unhealthy idealization of reality--and in doing so, ignored the essence of what makes Mickey most evil in the first place: the deception of his appearance. I don’t believe it is an authentically critical act to deface an image and make it ugly as much as it is to acknowledge the evil in beautiful things. Perverting Mickey’s image into something ghoulish does nothing to expose the dangers of sentimentality. It was already perverse: in our natural unconscious reaction to it. Thus it is within this space, of our own subjec- tive interpretation, that the critical element must occur. Visual monsterization only weakens our ability to look past the obvious. Once ac- knowledged as a veneer, Mickey’s smiling face and happy go lucky demeanor can only more effectively teach us to further mistrust our imag- es, to question them and what affect they have on us when we don’t notice them functioning in plain sight.

43 Dreams

44 he magic of Disney World: where your They checked the clubhouse but no one was dreams come true, is Disney’s omniscient there. Near the kitchen there was what looked like an ability to take the imagery of your dreams office of some kind but it was locked and there was no and manifest it before your very eyes. light under the door. ThisT though is a subtle manipulation, reinforced by the subliminal tenet that one does not simply enter Disney World as some external location; the park is already It is our fidelity to this greater fantasy of om- inside of you, waiting to be realized... niscience within the park that validates an underlying presumption: we are not individuals. Our dreams, and in essence our desires, all look exactly the same. They knocked on every door until the Maralago Cay clubhouse asking if anyone had seen the ninety-eight year old in a yellow cardigan wandering He saw her standing at the castle stage, through their yard. by the far right speaker panel disguised as stone grey “I hate Florida I think,” said the girl. “Too masonry. She was alone with her phone in one hand, many weird gated places like this. Creeps me out. It’s trying to fit both her head and her mouse eared bal- like someone’s tacky idea of heaven and then you die loon in the same selfie. for re a l .” Above her, the people and animals dressed The boy scanned between the white porta- like people disco danced and welcomed the audience ble houses. Jack was his grandmother’s husband of six to a kingdom of dreams where enchantment never years and because Mercury was in retrograde his senil- ends. The children and grownups cheered as Mickey ity had been especially worse. Earlier that morning, the stepped out and everything was supremely happy, at old man had beckoned the boy to where he sat. In his least until asshole Donald Duck had to go and shit on lap was a Calico kitten. everyone’s smiles with his aw phooey nobody believes “My.. best.. friend,” Jack said. in dreams anymore negativity, which of course derailed When Jack stroked the ears of the kitten, its the whole magical castle party with some bullshit mechanical tail wagged and it let out a recorded meow tangent that Dennis never really saw the point of other that would repeat for as long as he pet it. than an opportunity to show how good a friend and all Unsure if the old man would recognize around nice guy Mickey was, especially when instead either of them, they brought the cat along and she of calling the duck out on his contrarian garbage he cradled it as they walked. just turned and asked all his pals out there to spill their It was the day before her ninetieth birthday dreams real loud for Donald Fucker to hear. and the grandmother had asked if they saw anything “I want to be a beautiful princess at the they wanted on her bookshelf. She wasn’t taking them ball!” said a kid. with her, she said. The girl looked closely at the spines “I want to be a pirate!” said another. as her boyfriend checked the weather for the week. The first few times he ever saw Dream- Before they noticed Jack was missing, the Along With Mickey, Dennis wondered why at each of grandmother explained Astrology to the girl. the six daily shows all these similar sounding children “Human beings are seventy percent water had such similar sounding dreams, before he even you know, so we’re all effected by the planets, just like noticed those hidden speaker panels. the tides. You were born to your own particular envi- “C’mon gang lets show stupid Donald we ronment just like everyone else. We’re all unique.” all believe in dreams!” said Mickey. “Just reach down The grandmother asked the girl what deep inside and find the magic in your heart!” day and time she was born. Then the girl helped the “Dreams come true!” they all shouted at the grandmother plug the numbers into her computer count of three. Then fireworks. program and they printed out a chart. Together they That’s how they really sold it. The fireworks. looked though a book and interpreted that the girl was “See, we all believed together! And it inclined to want stability in a partner, someone who worked!” said Mickey. could leave her safe to pursue her own dreams. “What worked?” said Donald. Dumbass. The girl agreed. “The Dream, you stupid taint! It’s coming “That’s how you know we got your birth true!” Minnie squealed. time right,” said the grandmother. “If you’re reading it The selfie girl with the long naked legs was right the person should agree with everything you say.” beginning to bother Dennis. She must have caught By four-thirty, she and the boy had covered the eleven o’clock because she was on her phone the the last block on the east side of the pool. entire length of the show. Just scrolling and texting and “We just need to find Security. There’s tugging down at her creeping pink denim cutoff shorts gotta be someone in charge to make sure nothing bad with her balloon hand, oblivious all though the Prin- happens,” said the boy. cess number, and the Pirate number, and the end part

45 with the evil sorceress whose cynical and downright every hidden Mickey along the way. cunty presence everyone triumphed over by believing in “I don’t ever kill time with strangers,” she said. the power of their dreams. “If this were anywhere but here I wouldn’t feel so safe, but “By believing in your dreams, you saved the who ever heard of a serial killer at Disney World?” day!” fawned Minnie at Dennis and everyone else, but “Hah, right,” said Dennis. Dennis in particular he liked to think. They took the ferry raft and stood amongst When the show ended and the audience a trio of little girls in princess dresses with their gloved jumbled, above all the heads, Dennis watched as a single hands linked all the way to an oversized woman wafting Mickey balloon floated off into the sky. of turkey grease and sun tan lotion. Beyond the mainland “Shit!” he heard the girl shout. dock was a dense traffic of balloons and strollers en route She craned her neck and followed it up, to whatever was next on the map. Each determined adult shielding her eyes from the sun. gripped tightly at resistant and easily distracted little “Don’t worry about it. If you keep the weight wrists, the success of their day weighing entirely on what they’ll give you another one no problem,” he said to her. joy they would soon capture in the faces of their children. She turned and simpered. “Good to know. Dennis burned holes in the girl, struggling to Th an k y ou .” deduce how old she actually was. The thirst for liquor was “I can help you with that picture too,” he said. a give, she wasn’t a child, wipe your brow, but that didn’t The girl’s head tilted. “Really? That’d be.. awe- all the way make her eligible. Not these days. some. Oh, but I want to get another balloon first.” “Thinking about it, now I want an uninflated “I’ll be here,” he said. one for the plane,” she said, batting her balloon. “My “Okay,” she said narrowing her eyes and stand- friend made me promise to bring her back one of these. ing high on her toes. “Just lemme try to remember your She’s a lot more excited than I am about me being here.” face.” Dennis smiled, looking at her. Just look at her. “My names Dennis if you want to shout it,” he Honestly. Head to toe. What about her so prohibitively said. communicated that she was a too young early bloomer “Dennis, Dennis, Dennis,” said the girl. instead of a perfectly older late bloomer? What age could He waited for her. Nine minutes later there she she be? Maybe… nineteen? Twenty? If so he wasn’t so was. New balloon. much older, maybe by ten years or so. Just a number. Not “Say Mickey,” he said, raising her iPhone. ridiculously big enough to outright dismiss coming back The girl struck poses until her camera ran out to the hotel with him. Not that that was his only motive of memory. They swiped through the pictures together here. This wasn’t some pervy snooze hunt like so said that and she chose one to add filters to. irritable sorority girl from Typhoon Lagoon, or like was “So are you assigned to just the castle or do silently implied by that nervous redhead with the braces you get to walk around everywhere helping people?” at Animal Kingdom. Of course not. He wasn’t some slimy asked the girl, typing out her caption. hook-nosed villain, some vile Gaston or Jafar. He was a “I’m sorry?” pure hearted romantic scouting for adventure in a place “Like, you’re a plainclothes, right? I heard they where dreams came true. A land of fair damsels and have plainclothes people in case of stuff.” knights and true love ever after. Nothing obscene. Just “Well..” Dennis said, pausing. He noticed her good old fashioned. expression changing, not with complete disgust, he wasn’t The three little princesses looked up at him hideous or fat or anything, but with a greater suspicion with condemnation. none the less. Under the perfect blue sky blotted with cotton “No, no,” he said grinning, hand behind his puff nursery room clouds he couldn’t help but feel like head, “just a frequent visitor. Today’s my.. thirty-fourth this spry, leggy one beside him might be a bit of a stretch. time at Disney. Not just only here of course..” “Listen,” he said. “I’ma make you my good He began counting off his fingers. “Been to deed for the day. I promise it won’t take long to get back Epcot ten times. It’s a blast, Epcot. Animal Kingdom five to your family.” times. Of course, no comparing, Magic Kingdom, sixteen, The girl smirked with a semi-amused expres- is by far my favorite.” sion of: Okay? “Wow,” said the girl, who looked not so certain “I’m here with my friend,” she said. “Sorry, my how to react, unsure if he was trying to impress her. “You boyfriend. We had a fight and stuff. Now we’re doing our really like it here?” own thing for a little.” “You don’t?” he asked, smiling, boyishly run- Dennis smirked with a wry expression of: ning a hand through his hair. Fuck. Well there you go. “Yeah, just, maybe more with some drinks or No wait. something. I dunno.” “So you’ll probably meet up with him later?” They talked a little more. Then he bought her “I dunno. Yeah. Maybe.” a Coke and led her to Tom Sawyer island, pointing out Fuck.

46 “But, you know. I dunno. It’s stupid. We were are. Already. Just twenty-one and I’m already part of the gonna eat these really potent THC candies. But then he clan, getting asked about grandchildren. Yeah, grandchil- forgot them at the hotel. Like, I forgot them too, but he dren. Not: Hi, nice to meet you, what are you going to wanted to be especially sure he didn’t forget them. And school for? You know, hopes and dreams and all that? No, then he did. Then of course we had a fight because he just it’s, oh you’re with my nephew? When’s the wedding?” knew I would keep thinking about it and it would totally She took a long swig and Dennis patted his effect our fun. He said I don’t know how to let myself pockets to check how many flasks he still had. enjoy anything. He was being so mean.” “And after all that he goes and calls me anti- “Drag,” said Dennis. social. Like I’m awkward. I’m the one who can’t have fun. “Right?” Fuck that. He keeps saying he loves me but all he wants to After the several attempts made by the colle- do is wife me up. I didn’t go to school for that. I wanted to giate ferrygirl to dock the raft, the two hiked up the steps be different than everyone else from back home, not get of the hill, past Injun Joe’s cave, to a quiet rest area with trapped in some fairy tale. My mom did that. She’s still benches. folding laundry in Laredo.” “You halfway done with that?” he asked Dennis popped the cap of the flask and topped her, reaching into one of the deep pockets of his cargo her off. shorts. She gave him her Coke and he emptied one of his “You’re twenty-one?” SneakN’Drink plastic flasks into the bottle. “I know, right?” she said, shaking the bottle. She took a sip. “Coconut. Nice.” “Like, the whole thing makes me feel so old already. “You looked like you needed it.” Nobody old is unique. I hate thinking of myself that way.” “Ha. Truth told, I think I was kind of ready to “I’ll try not to feel insecure,” he said mildly. get kidnapped. This whole trip has been death.” “I didn’t mean it like that,” she said, “and you’re A nine year old stomped up the steps towards not that old. You don’t look it anyway. Probably older than them, then continued on down the path beyond, patting him, but not by much. It’s an issue with him. Makes him his mouth to make Indian noises. In moments his very condescending.” winded father (presumably) appeared, pursuing the boy Dennis squinted. Far off on the other side of further after making visual note of the benches. the Twainian Mississippi, between the Texan corrals and “I met his family,” she continued. “Down here Utah rock formations, a couple of mouse eared teenagers in Florida. And it was a big deal, like, oh that’s where we began making out vigorously.

47 “He acts like I’m such a child,” said the girl. He said even if it’s perverse, perverse is what he said, it’s “Like nothing I feel is valid because I’m so timid all the important to know this place. To recognize how it all time. I never give anything a chance and it’s always so works. He thought coming here would be like a weird disappointing for him. That’s why he was so pissed about people watching experiment, like going on safari.” forgetting the drugs: because otherwise how could I “They have that here too if he’s interested,” possibly let myself have any fun here? Here.” Dennis jeered. Dennis concealed his excitement. “That’s The girl shook her head. “Ridic- terrible.” ulous,” she said. “Amazing and all, obviously. But still, “And true!” she said covering her face. “That’s ridiculous. I don’t trust it here. It’s all too confusing. the worst thing. I don’t know if it’s me or not but I just, I Not just with the real reactions to fake things, or fake can’t get into it like everyone else. I look around and so reactions to real things, but with all the happiness every- many things just make me think: what the fuck? Like, I where: I don’t know how I’m supposed feel about it. It’s all noticed all the people in the bride and groom hats that so much. Makes me feel weird and, well, shitty. Like shitty came here to get fucking married and they look like in, and I don’t mean this to sound terrible, but shitty in they’re having so much fun and they’re really in love and a real privileged way. Like, I saw the news this morning. happy and I cant help but think, Really? Fucking really?” Those people in Iraq are executing everyone and I’m Dennis balked. “You wouldn’t want to be here? Having fun?” married at a castle?” “I’ve been to Iraq,” said Dennis. “That’s not “I don’t want to be married at all.” your fault.” “Yeah but if and when you did, a castle “I know but it still feels kind of wrong,” she wouldn’t be ideal?” said. “And I’ve been feeling that way about a lot of things “Well yeah, but like in a real castle in Germa- lately. I think, experiment aside, maybe that’s why he ny or Transylvania or something.” really wanted to take me here in the first place. He said he “It’s not a real castle here?” wanted to see me happy again. Happy with him.” “I don’t think so. I mean it’s surrounded by a She drank. Dennis drank. Across the river, theme park.” families screamed as they whipped around the crags of “Well yeah it’s leisurely, but so is Monte Carlo. Big Thunder Mountain. Monaco’s a real monarchy and they have way less money “Sometimes I’m scared for him,” she said, than Disney, people too.” “what he’d do to himself without me.” The girl swigged then bit her nail. “Yeah but “You gotta follow your heart though,” said Monaco probably built it’s castle like, hundreds of years Dennis, impressed by the spontaneity of his wisdom. ago, not in the seventies as some, I dunno, nostalgia “I know he loves me, maybe too much,” she piece. The context makes it fake.” said (ignoring his free pearl), “but that’s not all I need. Dennis crossed his arms. “I dunno.” he said. There’s gotta be something else out there.” “Sometimes I’ll stroll through Tommorowland and think “Now you sound like a Disney princess,” he about the future of everything. What life will be like. And said, which, in saying it, made him feel even more like a I’ll turn around and see it and I’ll think, oh, that makes prince. sense, why would we ever stop building castles? Who in “Ugh, my God, shut up,” said the girl, some- the future doesn’t want castles?” what amused. “You can’t say that stuff here or it’ll stick.” The girl’s eyes rolled and she stretched her “So what? Everyone wants to be a princess. naked legs off the ground. “That sounds like a bullshit You’ve never?” answer that only sounds right. Like something my boy- “Only when I was little and dumb.” friend would say real compassionately to convince me I “Why dumb?” was just being stupid.” “Why not dumb?” she asked with a direct, Dennis furrowed. “I don’t think you should be receptive look. with anyone who calls you stupid,” he said straightly. He shrugged. “It’s an ideal life. You’re rich and “He never calls me stupid,” she said. “Dumb. powerful. Important. Memorable..” Dumb sometimes, but like in the sense of unreasonable, “Outstanding,” she said. motivated by fear. I’m so predictable to him. Everything “Beautiful,” he said. “Supposedly loved, by all. is. Makes me feel dumb. He hates how dumb it makes I think in their loneliest moments everyone would me feel and calls me insecure. He wants to help me get choose a return to serfdom as long as they were the over that he says. I have so much potential, I just need roy a lt y.” someone to push me. I need to trust him, he says. Believe She stared off into the orange mountains. that if I can stick it out and not fall for what’s easy or “That’s fucked up, right?” imaginary, what I think I want, then I can be happy. “But it’s what we want.” Really happy. Not just Disney happy.” “No. I don’t like that. Even if I’m supposed to, “That’s a strange distinction,” said Dennis. I don’t like that.” “He said this trip was to learn the difference. “You don’t like feeling loved?”

48 She sneered. “Is that what they peddle here? She took a few steps away from him. “Hey.” Love?” He watched her walk further and further from “Not love, just what you want.” earshot, tossing her Coke bottle in the bushes as a plain “How do they know what I want? I don’t know looking man approached him. what I want.” “But you still notice it missing,” he said. The girl groaned and swished the contents Of course Disney knows the contents of our of the bottle. What of it was Coke was now warm and dreams: they’ve been implanting them since our childhood. undrinkable. She looked thirsty. “Ha! Well I guess you would know,” she said, “you’ve been here a lot. Are you like, rich or something?” Dennis waved a hand in limp dismissal. I stole a knife today. We were sitting in the “Define rich,” he said. Lady and the Tramp themed cafe when the idea struck. “Are you?” When I’d returned to the hotel after the fight, I He blew air into the floppy plastic flask to see noticed how rock solid the candy was. It was too large to how much was left. “I’m doing okay. I work in private eat by itself, yet also seemed impervious to blunt trauma. s e c u r it y.” The full force of an ice bucket had barely shattered off a “What like surveillance and stuff?” shrap of it. “More like if somebody wants to build in a The sun was setting. Now was not the time for war zone.” reservation. The drugs needed cutting, for this the knife “That’s not dangerous?” she asked. was a utilitarian necessity. “Yeah,” Dennis said, “Over there, wherever it I scanned the restaurant discretely, covering is, you’re pretty well equipped to handle things my peripherals with stretches and yawns until the girl- but still, anything can happen. Maybe friend asked if I was getting sleepy too. that’s what it is about here. I’ve seen There were plenty of staff but I schools get blown up. Churches. There didn’t see any cameras around us. I has to be one safe place in the world. wouldn’t of course. I mean all the way safe, not just from I could feel the eyes on me. None regular old violence. One place you’re visible but they were there. I knew they allowed to be like a kid again. All the were. w ay.” With a menu propped open, I He sucked the last of it and dropped the knife in my lap below the crammed the bag in his pocket. table cloth, sliding it with a stealthy “Somewhere you’re allowed yawn over the curve of my thigh and to,” he said, “if just for a day, catch what into my pocket, which was too shallow it is you’re chasing.” by four inches. “I think that’s like a lot of All the way to the bathroom I places though,” said the girl. walked with a slumped gait to keep my “But here you’re allowed believe that it’s all shirt from riding up and exposing the stainless steel. In real. That it’s not just some, I dunno, weird trick. Even if the stall I kept the toilet running as I sawed the rock in they profit, they’re still giving you what you always want- two, licking the dust off the teeth of the knife. ed, in the realest way possible. And that realness means I palmed half the candy to the girl and we your feelings aren’t stupid and inappropriate, they’re real both sucked on them as the waitress refilled our waters. t o o.” “And I got you an extra silverware. So sorry The girl slumped. “Maybe I am just de- about that,” she said. pre s s e d .” As we ate I felt it in my pocket. Dennis reached out to her and guided her Now what? chin to look him in the eye. “Oh my God, do you feel it,” my girlfriend “I think you’re cautious with your feelings,” he echoed. “I think I feel it already.” said, “but you should give give this place a chance. Only The knife glowed hot. Put me back, it howled. good things can happen here.” This has gone too far. The girl was still. He waited for her to close Out the open glass doors of the restaurant, her eyes. people gathered for the parade. The crowd was thick. It The silence was broken by the sound of her would be easy to slip through and vanish. iPhone. No. Don’t do it. They know your dreams. Do She looked at her screen and waited as the not test their reach. ringtone repeated before exhaling and standing. We paid and walked out the door. Down the “I should get this,” she said, swiping her finger. steps and on to the street.

49 Turn around. Back inside. happened. forearm. Lay it on the table and plead for Why was everyone so I looked at the camera mercy. It’s not too late. invisible here? When I thought of man. Am I allowed? Behind us our waitress it, I couldn’t remember one real He waved me closer. seated the next party. The glass person’s face I’d seen all day. Not Cinderella’s gown scrunched against doorway disappeared around the one stood out. Yet everywhere you my knife. She smelled of hairspray. corner. looked, people were wyling out, Oh God, she really didn’t Any second now. The carrying on without censorship as know the danger. mouse eared Gestapo would descend though everyone around them were My girlfriend wiped her and without word, escort me to the just unaffected figments of their own eyes and we all smiled for the flash. bunkers. This would be the end of particular dream. The camera guy gave me a card to me, I knew it. Why did I do this? “Where now?” my girl- buy the picture online. What was I proving? Was I a terrorist friend asked. “It was nice to meet you,” now? A villain? I examined the map. the princess twinkled. I braced myself for Yes. Where? What next? What to We quickly exited. the strike. The gods would not be do next? What would she like? Outside we clutched our shirts and mocked. Cinderella? She would enjoy meeting gasped for breath. And. Cinderella. Why wouldn’t she? “Shit! Shit, that was cra- Then. She nodded. “Yeah I zy!” my girlfriend shouted, heaving. Nothing. I looked guess that’d be cool.” “Like, religious crazy! Like meeting a around. All eyes were busy. No secret The line was short. Beside real fucking goddess or something!” police. No plainclothed but the us people waited for hours to meet “Yeah, batshit,” I said. plainclothed. Everyone gawking at the chicks from Frozen. “Do you think she knew I the parade. When we reached the was high?” she said. We followed the mob front we were directed through a “I farted at the flash,” I down the way until we stood before great doorway into a royal hall. confessed. “I didn’t mean to but I the bronze statue of Mickey holding “Wait, I can’t. It’s too did.” hands with Walt Disney. much,” squealed my girlfriend, If I was a villain, out there The knife screamed in my tugging her wrist. “No, I don’t want must’ve been some protagonistic grip. to. I’m too high for this.” someone destined to kick my ass. I was taunting Him. The We were greeted by a It was dark and there was all-seeing, smiling face of order and photographer. Beyond a velvet rope, no line for the Carousel so we both happiness. Yet his gaze was beyond under the lights she stood. found a horse. me. I was unnoticed. “Oh dear God,” said my In front of us, a I trembled. What would girlfriend. thirty-something man in a soccer happen next? What else could I be Cinderella beamed. Just jersey kicked his feet and whipped capable of? like the cartoon except, because she a pale unicorn with his safety strap, I held the girl’s hand had a real person’s face, less structur- bellowing toothily in Portuguese and and we weaved carefully though the ally ideal and sexy. laughing until he wept. crowds until the wash of people bot- Still, fantastic looking. I cupped my pocket and tlenecked and I spent the gridlock “Why hello there,” she waited for things to get ugly. examining the soft heads of all the said in a mousey voice that was more “I think I get it now,” said children at pocket level. Outside the distressing than hot, like an abuse my girl, slumped against her pole, entrance to the Little Mermaid ride victim. “Don’t be shy.” bobbing up and down. “It all really a mother screamed herself hoarse, My girlfriend inched for- is a dream. A perfect dream. Not so commanding her kids to climb up ward, squinting in the light, balloon b a d .” higher on the artificial rocks for a manic from shaking. We were just steps off picture, stalling the flow of traffic Cinderella embraced her that ride when we peaked. I went around her with an outstretched lovingly. My girlfriend stiffened, then first. A sublime gravity pulled me arm. We all watched, waiting for went slack. I caught her balloon. to the ground and I quivered at the the photo, but the little boy and girl “Is this your prince?” immensity of stimulus. It was as if a seemed scared and immobile. Cinderella asked. great veil was lifted and the essence A park employee arrived My girlfriend stood gap- of the world was exposed as an and tried to wave down the two ing, transfixed at the sparkling blue unspeakable and awesome magic children. The mother ignored him dress. beyond the span of my own reason until she got the picture. Then they “Yea, I’m hers,” I said. and any coherence of usual fantasy. all got in line for the ride and every- She smiled (she never Without complaint, the body continued as if nothing had stopped) and extended one gloved girl followed me to the pavement

50 and we sat cross-legged in the mid- the concrete. Glaring at everyone in “Baby, are you crying?” dle of the plaza. And at her touch, I line. Laughing. suddenly felt raptured outside of my The operator of the ride body, observing myself as a character saw it and looked up. Midair, a dot- in some greater vision, viewing this ted line blipped between us. His eyes whole important event from above, widened in alarm. as a voyeur gazing down from the Maybe this is what they highest spire of the castle, watching were waiting for. as the boy below pulled the girl close Without breaking the and kissed her, swelling with air, as stare, I kneeled and slid the knife though his heart were filled with back in my pants then led the girl absolute certainty that this was it, out though the exit. this is what he was meant to find, “Wait! My balloon!” knowing full well that with this sin- Through the gift shop I gle casual gesture, every other shiny gripped her hand and we fled Tom- thing the boy could ever possibly morrowland towards the castle. desire had been indifferently traded “Hold on!” she panted. out and forgotten. He was free now. “Why are you running?” Nothing else would ever matter On Main Street U.S.A. again but the perpetual reenactment I found a vendor and bought a of this perfect moment, and for as flaccid replacement for her to take long as he could do so there would home. The street was packed for the be a completeness in him, one that fireworks show and we were able to made every next day obsolete and weasel through the thick of it for a liberated his dreams from all but her. decent view just as the music swelled And he would never feel alone. and the castle began to glimmer. It scared the boy how he I held the girl close. couldn’t discern how much the sin- “I love you,” I said in her cerity of this feeling might have been ear. caused by the park, and the drugs. “I know,” she said in “I’m scared for the mine. future,” the girl told him in the Fast- “I love you,” I said again. Pass+ line for Space Mountain. “Do “Whatever happens, believe that I you think I’ll be okay?” love you and that this was real.” “We’ll be fine,” he said She kissed my neck and embracing her from behind. said nothing. “I just don’t want to have The sky bloomed with regret,” she said distantly, “I don’t explosions. Over the speakers a choir want to be like my mom. There’s so of children’s voices sang about desire much I have to do with my life. I and pursuit and how you could have can’t settle. I can’t be old and sad.” anything you wanted if you believed “You won’t,” he promised. you could. “When we get home I As the spectacle went think we need to talk about some on there was a montage of familiar things.” voices. And he meant to say “I wish I could go to the something, but then the gates ball!” opened and they boarded the ride, “I wish, oh I wish I could and once it moved there was no be part of that world!” more third-person distancing on my “I wish we’d never have to part for overwhelming fear of head grow up!” being cut off. “You know any wish is Once we returned to possible,” said the voice of Jiminy Earth, I clumsily maneuvered out of Cricket, “all it takes is a little courage my capsule seat. to set it free.” Then I flinched. There I began to notice the was a klang of metal. moist tugging on my shirt and I My utensil laid naked on looked down.

51 AFTER

We’re sitting in the vacant rubble of what years tops before something bad happens.” used to be a piñata store before being flattened I asked him if his recent health concerns without due notice by its landlords, when Josh disallow dropping acid. Austin Psych Fest looks tosses back his 40 and begins telling me about how good this year. Lately I’ve been spending a lot on swank his lawyers office was. concert tickets trying to give Josh more to look for- In his will, he says, he’s made sure I got ward to. This whole week was supposed to be good both his mixer and his MPC 1000. Josh, he’s been for him. really melodramatic lately since the paramedic Today I talked to my friend Jarrod, the incident. sound guy. Turns out this last year, despite the early “On the Deep Web,” he says, “there are numbers, people succumbed to their injuries and people who will kill anyone you want for five-thou- the death toll was twenty-two. After press like that sand in Bitcoin. Only real risk is you never really the SXSW committee has been paying people off to know if they’re FBI or not.” keep mum about all the incidents this time around Josh says he’s been thinking of putting and the cops are avoiding arrests just to keep the out a hit on himself and just seeing what happened. stats down. Maybe taking out a big insurance policy before get- Despite the news coverage, it’s been ting murdered. Not immediately before. Of course a violent few days: drunken riots in the streets, he’d wait a year. Could have them make it look like curbstops and tramplings. Last night Josh and I saw a robbery. a staggering man with a raised iPhone cursing out “What are the odds that every time a guy, the police in ways we would only dream of doing, a black guy, gets shot in a robbery the insurance slackjawed when the guy was allowed to proceed guys check his Tor history? I mean they couldn’t uncuffed. Just minutes after the incident, a girl right? That’s whole the point of Tor, so you can get jaywalked confidently across 35 and rolled off the away with murdering yourself for vast sums of mon- hood of a car. She wasn’t moving as the rest of us ey. Which by the way, will-wise, you’d see a good crossed. deal of.” “Riot wouldn’t be a bad way to go,” Josh I tell him his plan is stupid. Why wouldn’t says, throwing a rock at an exposed breaker box. people think I was the one who killed him? By my foot I find a quarter and wonder if it fell out “Besides,” I say, “Suicide before thirty is the cash machine when they bulldozed the place. I for pussies. Plus you still got a mixtape to finish.” dig around in the dirt, it’s damp from the rain but still I’ve been referencing Josh’s mixtape pretty solid. more and more since he told me he put together a Around the area someone’s been putting will, an entirely separate incident from a week ago up Whites Only signs on all the business as either when he called the hospital and they told him, just a weak social commentary or ingenious black pro- from the sound of his voice, that he was obviously paganda. When I saw one, I was troubled by how I in great pain and should let them know where he didn’t really feel any way about it. was. “Do you understand how much it takes to At first the doctors thought his ribs were get there?” Josh slurs. “Knowing your death is ap- broken and he spent the night taking expensive proaching and not wanting to step out of the way.” x-rays. Then they said all his heavy breathing was Sometimes I worry about how indifferent from his elevated diaphragm. I’m becoming to the future. I think a lot about a few “Turns out,” Josh said, “you can only years from now when every street is Rainey street, guzzle alcohol on a daily basis for maybe four, eight and each block east the condos rise higher and

52 higher above the nightlife attractions like a theme park resort. As the traffic booms into an aneurysm, someday the locusts will lose interest, complaining that it wasn’t what it used to be, before moving on again as they alway do. Imagining Austin after a bust, whored out and used up and left for it’s own natives to salvage, that’s what now qualifies as a best case fantasy. California’s gonna run out of water soon. Imagine what that’ll look like, when the great exo- dus comes our way. You already see it everywhere, at least you think you do. Might be that’s just dis- respect for the ability of things to become so much more exponentially worse. Considering how predictably every other familiar thing in life will soon vanish without an echo, how much sentiment should I reserve for Josh? Just an hour ago, we’re leaving a show on East Sixth when it begins to shower again. Under a bistro canopy Josh trades a cigarette for a lighter and makes idle chat with one of the men sharing our cover. He seems to be doing better today. Josh. Then from sidewalk across the street there’s a cackling laughter. Two girls ignore the traffic and sprint straight towards the two of us, (and I suppose also the other man with the lighter). One wet foot on the curb, they each cock back aggres- sively, arms heavy with official wristbands, and extend their index fingers. “Flannel, flannel, flannel!” they shout, poking us each in the chest. “Oh my God, are you guys like, in a flan- nel band?” asks the taller, blonder one. Josh looks down at the cigarette knocked from his hand and steaming out in a puddle. His overshirt isn’t even flannel, it’s just plaid. Not getting the positive response she expected, the tall one rolls her eyes. “Okay, gosh, sorry. Just enjoying ourself. Not a big deal.” Josh glares from behind his dreadlocks. “Sorry, we didn’t mean anything,” coos the little brunette. “Just please go,” Josh says, swatting. “Oh my God dude, chill out,” says the blonde. “It’s South-by. If you’re not having fun like, maybe you shouldn’t be out right now.” “Yeah, says the girls obviously from out of town,” Josh cuts. “Well actually we live here so you’re wrong on that,” the blonde snaps. Literally snaps. “Yeah. Two years,” says the little one. That might be a long time to them. They look almost twenty. “Really?” Josh perks, “Where you from?” “Well I’m from Dallas,” says the snappy one.

53 “Of course,” Josh says. “You are so rude,” the All of it. It wasn’t like this before. “Of course you are.” blonde girl says, shaking. No one It’s like it all crept up at once “What, is that sup- has ever talked to me like that.” and never stopped since. I think posed to mean something?” the “That’s because your about crying. I really want to cry little one says, smirking. father didn’t love you,” Josh and there’s nothing in the world “Yea, it means you’re bellows. that can do it anymore.” an uptalking cunt with shit bound- “Oh, my, God. Is he With a breath he tilts aries. Why don’t you go the your friend?” she asks the actu- out the last of his bottle. I tell him fuck inside or wherever the fuck ally flannel wearing guy with a to shut up but he doesn’t. you’re going.” lighter. He shrugs. “Theres not really a The blonde stretches “Is he your friend?” she soul, right?” he asks me. “It’s got- out her neck like a cartoon buz- asks me. ta be just this and only ever this. zard. “Wait, what did you say to I spit at her shoes. This or nothing. Wouldn’t make her?” My keys are firm in my grip. any sense otherwise. Can’t have “I said this isn’t a god- Her feigned confidence is like manic depression and heaven.” damn playground,” Josh shouts eggshell in her mouth. The white Josh says, the way in her face. “Stop pretending like knight behind her, I’m sizing the world just keeps cranking out you own everything!” up the corners of his jaw just in more people, there’s gotta be by- Arms crossed, she case, but I think he understands products. Defects that just don’t makes herself a little taller on the the situation. He props the door belong. How fucked would that front step of the doorway. She and begins easing the girls be to be one of them? The only won’t see any cops from there. inside. reality ever to exist and you’re in “Are you like, being The blonde girl resists. the wrong one. satirical?” she asks. “You are way out of line. You I tell Josh he could use Josh squints in dis- can’t just harass people like that.” a sobriety attempt to try and seek belief. “No you oblivious bitch, Josh’s balled fists go the real help he needs. this isn’t fucking TV! When some up. “Are you fucking autistic? He shakes his head. stranger starts choking you this What part of get the fuck away “You know better. How long and week you’re not even gonna from me.. know what, no.. I’m hard I’ve already tried. If you know why because your biggest done. I’m done.” don’t fit after all that it’s because defect is how goddamn safe you He turns and steps into you weren’t meant to. It’s like you always feel!” the rain. I follow. know there’s happiness in the From inside, one of the “No, that’s bullshit,” the world and none of it was actually men in the diner sees the conflict blonde shouts behind us. “We meant for you.” and opens the front door to insert have every right..” Before this place was himself. We make it to the a dirt lot I would slap the piñatas “Oh so you’re making corner store just before they stop whenever I walked by and the threats now?” says the blonde, selling. Josh looks his 40 up and whole row of them would dance tiny hands gripping her purse down then cracks it decisively. on their strings, smiling and void. strap, confident as someone “All privileged cunts I imagine Josh as a staring down a shark on the other know there’s a million ways to piñata: beating him open with a side of the glass. “Well guess say nigger and most of them stick and instead of candy it’s just what? We’re not afraid of you.” don’t even have to do with race,” blood and the occasional Tootsie “Did you even hear he says. “The worst people, they Roll nobody wants. what I just said?” Josh says. turn everything into a goddamn What’s really stupid “Hey, did you just stupid joke just so they can feel about suicide, I think, is doing it threaten her?” asks the white in on it without you. Another way before you’ve actually considered knight from inside. to make them feel like a they got everything. Josh turns on him. “If a VIP wristband.” Josh is an idiot. “You’re you give a fuck why don’t you In the empty lot we try no different from those girls,” I get her ass away from us!? All freestyling a bit, but the fall off is say. “Idiot.” three of us, we’re standing here quick and permanent. To make him feel minding our business, then this “For another five grand better I tell Josh about this shit cunt, these cunts, come up and the Deep Web guys’ll torture I read, about how there’s three start poking me in the chest like you before you die,” Josh says ideas on happiness. they own me!” sprawled on the ground, squint- One idea is that you “Ok, you are overreact- ing to find stars that are no longer can just buy it whenever you ing,” says the little one. there. “I really hate this place. want with drugs and stuff, like

54 most people do. then keeps going. “Two,” I say, raising my middle finger. He should practice adapting more, I tell “You gotta work for it, long term. And C, it’s all ran- him. Maybe between now and whenever he finishes dom as fuck. You take it when things are merciful. that mixtape he should stop self medicating so Trying at all will eventually backfire. much, get whatever prescriptions he needs. Maybe “When all these theories are integrated then he could start looking for dumb bitches on rationally, it can only spell one thing,” I say, lowering Sixth like everyone else. all three fingers. “It’s all crap. Happiness was never And then I wait for an answer but Josh is important. Nothing about it makes you objectively asleep in the dirt. better. In fact, it’s a goddamn wheelchair. The only Looking up at the sky, I imagine it framed real reward in life is more struggle. And Josh, for by the roofs edge of another tower, its tenants your entire life’s worth of bullshit you really need to laughing and dropping their cans off the balcony, get better at struggling.” trying to hit my face, and how indifferent and absent A cop car passes. It slows in front of us the stars are above all the extra light.

NOTES:

*Holy fuck it’s the last page. I’m writing this while in Pasadena, Texas, where all the intersections look the same. Fam Vito’s got dabs on dabs on dabs. I’ve been in and out of comas for three days now, lumbering and eating and defecating in a retarded state of semicoherence. I’m here to shoot the last of the last of the B L A C K I E tape. I like the mag. The time wizard on page 9 is a friend I made who told me how the internet was a form of control. *This is all fiction. Most of this is all fiction. This issue’s theme might be frequent but I don’t think it should. Scum might be the theme of the next issue. Sex and Violence should pursue but probably not right after, or together. *‘Dreams” was a long write. I like it. Everyone should work on accepting reality with dignity. Theme parks interest me. Vaporwave is interesting too. Houston still has a Smooth Jazz station. Smooth Jazz has the habit of exposing the artificiality of most other kinds of music.Although both genres are fixated on human pleasure, the way you are pleasured by listening to Vaporwave should kind of make you sick. *Pleasure is interesting and terrible when people simply equate it with “good”. *The manipulation of language for the sake of comfort is the most dangerous thing in the world. *Self love is not a virtue, it’s a form of indiffernce. Self hatred is as cancerous as self love. *I still don’t know what Resin Bit actually is. I thought about making it cooler but most cool shit is really fucking dumb. *I think it’s funny whenever people post something to declare that they’re quitting social media. It’s like a crackhead bargaining for just one last hit. *Writing fiction is a product of feeling dishonest when referring to yourself in any definitive way. *Fictional events exist outside of history. They’re lies that could exist according to how real they feel. There’s something horrific to that. *I don’t know why I couln’t have just made a simple photobook and had fun with it. I’ve never been good at fun. *Page 2 is a picture of Trey, who will probabaly appear more in the next issue. Josh will appear less. This one was really Josh heavy. *There will be an error somewhere in this bitch that I won’t catch until I’ve printed a hundred of them. Fuck you error. *More stunts next issue. Stunts and vandalism.

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