I am crusing in a 1990 honda civic livin' life like the depraved. I smell only gasoline and cigarettes as the ramones are blasting. I feel as if I am in a dream.
I have a headache that could stop an elephant in its tracks. Every rustle of dry grass is like small daggers in my head. The music is blasting and the back speakers thump and pop, my head vibrates in sympathy.
I keep telling myself, as we race to LA. that if you trust a girl you have to trust her horse (I know I read that somewhere but I can't remember where just now), its become my mantra. I made myself stop looking at the spedometer, and that helps, but when we zoom so close to a whie acura that I can actually read the expiration date on the reg tags, I start again.

This place is emptiness. I have been granted an all access pass to nowhere.

How many cups of coffee have I consumed in the last twenty four hours? I don't think I want to remember. I must remember to relax my jaw or people will start staring.

I know I am a blur to everyone outside this car, an ever diminishing shadow that that they spit curses at, I can vaguely hear the horns.

I wonder if its the sheer dullness of this place that causes my friend to go to such extremes. (expired tags on a white-gold Honda).

Sandy dunes covered in mottled scrub brush, gray white and intermittant patches of mediterranean blue in the sky. Rain is forcasted, but the sky has no real substance, I feel that if I were just standing up high enough I could reach through its bleached out nothingness.

I've taken to applying chapstick like a new addiction. Its so dry here. I put it on carefully, using a fingernail to wipe off the excess. Five minutes later I put it on again. Again. Again. (Red Honda Prelude, no tags at all) The window is cracked to let out the smoke, the air roars ferociously around us, making the window shake and causing vibrations in the conversation.

We don't talk much.

What I like about my companion is that she has the common courtesy to signal about two seconds before she changes lanes, just enough time for the potential victims to think, 'she can't possibly mean to...!' as they slam on their brakes. (red Dodge caravan, tags expire in November) Two seconds is almost enough time for a Hail Mary.

A haze has fallen over the distant mountains, giving them a saffron cast. A whole community of satellite dishes sit like upturned umbrellas, waiting for a tide that never comes.

If only my brain weren't five seconds behind everything. (Ford Escort LX, white, March) I feel underwater, and my brain is covered in peach fuzz.

An exit ramp approaches at dizzying speed. The yellow sign says 35mph, I resist the urge to look at the spedometer. We take the clover-leaf and I feel the gs sitting on me. The car tilts drunkenly to one side. I wonder idly if I am going to die. There is an audible thud the right side tires bear weight again as we pull out of the turn alive.

She digs in her ratty purse with one hand, looking for a cigarette. (Navy Blue Jeep Cherokee October) She offers me one, our eyes meet for a moment. I raise an eyebrow. Her left hand forms the lady-like claw of a vetran smoker, as she holds her cigarette up the window. It burns quickly, and we leave a invisible trail of ash behind us. I realize my life is resting in the two fingers of her right hand that nonchalantly stroke the wheel.

I dig in my pockets for my chapstick and delicatly apply it (Dodge truck, forrest green August). Again. Again.
posted at 3:20 PM 2 comments

Comments:

testing to see if my comments work!

# posted by  Amber : 7:35 PM

 

I dunno if it's just me, but I see shades of Burroughs in what you just wrote, which sounds so unlike you. I really dig this little bit... a few sentences need touching up to fit with the mood, but other than that I have to say this is one of the better things I've read from you. Keep it up.

BassMan

# posted by  Anonymous : 8:06 PM

 

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