down in me » Storytime

The WWAATD Getting-To-Know Interview (I always wanted to do this re: I am really narcissistic.)

Ani Smith — Sat, 14 May 2011 17:35:45 +0000

Full Name: Ani del Demonio Smith.

Age: 33.

Height: Average for a latina.

Currently Live: London, England.

Hometown: [redacted]

Instruments: Digital.

Car: London Underground, previously: 3-door Saturn SC1.

Secret Talent: Blowjobs. (No, but seriously.)

What is the best thing about your job? Hot creeps in suits and free diet coke.

What was your most embarrassing audition moment? In 8th grade I had a crush on the most popular senior. I’d gotten okay at volleyball and decided to try out for the team. He was on the team. Think: typical coming-of-age ‘rom com’ movie antics.

If you could live in any past era which would it be and why? Late 70s, early 80s re: music and coke.

Who is your role model and why? I don’t believe in role models but I wish I had a ‘sensei’ or a ‘BDSM master’ or a really good yoga instructor or a dad. I wish I was someone’s ‘protege’. If you need a bratty protege, get in touch. Oh, I used to love my kickboxing instructor, this big, rubbertread rock of a man who’d smile when I’d hit him.

What do you do for fun? Sex, drugs, rock’n’roll, books, blogs, sleep.

Do you have a good luck charm? I must do because I keep trying to get kidnapped/raped/murdered but so far I’ve only been ‘emotionally terrorized’.

Wackiest fan encounter: I have two in my bedroom but one of them doesn’t blow hard enough. Okay, this one time I sneaked backstage at an Autechre show and kissed one of the guys and gave him a demo of my boyfriend’s music on a minidisc.

Before I die, I want to: Kiss Bill Murray.

When I fly I have to have: A good pilot.

If I had to spend $10 at my favorite fast food joint, I’d order: Chips.

My coolest article of clothing: Misc. 90s concert T’s.

My first financial splurge was: Don’t remember but at age 18 I burned through a decent inheritance fairly quickly.

When friends come over, we: Fuck.

Do you like to cook? If so, what? Easy things with cheese in them.

TV show I never miss: Doctor Who (Hi, Christopher Eccleston.)

If you could interview any celeb whom would it be and why? LIl’ Wayne so I can try and marry him.

Anything about yourself you wish you could change? Lazy as hell, y’all.

I’ll eat sushi, but not: Eel, insects. Was going to say toes but then I pictured licking the toes of this boy I like and, well—

What are your best and worst subjects in school? English and Maths in that order predictably.

If you could be granted 3 wishes, they’d be… incredibly selfish ones.

If I could gay-marry anyone in the world, he/she would be… the first girl I kissed. I was seven and she smelled faintly of strawberry.

Where on earth are you most dying to go? Everywhere, then wherever home is.

What’s the last thing that made you cry? My mom leaving after visiting me for a month after not having seen her in 1.5 years after living alone for 4.5 years.

Do you ever wish you could just be a normal kid? I do.

What would people be surprised to know about you? That aged 17-28 I was in a committed, monogamous, heterosexual relationship.

If you had to name one song as your theme song, what would it be?

Have you had a starstruck Hollywood experience? Who was it with? I got a ‘Happy Birthday’ text from sexy Giancarlo DiTrapano this year. And I stood this close to the girl from Star Fucking Hipsters in a pub in Camden once. When I was fourteen I gave my digits to a football player who went on to play but not win the World Cup.

Favorite Actor/Actress: Bill Murray.

Favorite Movie:

Favorite Body Part: Skin.

Favorite Singer: Ian Curtis.

Favorite Song:

Favorite Candy: Ring Pops.

Favorite Philosopher: Simone de Beauvoir. No, Sam Pink. No, Simone.

Favorite Ice Cream Flavor: There is a Twix ice cream that is really good but it gives you massive stomachaches.

Favorite Sport: Fútbol because the only positive male role model in my childhood, grandpa, would listen to it on the radio all the time.

Favorite Sports Team: I went to a Kansas City Royals game once.

Favorite Athlete: Sean H. Doyle.

Favorite Book: Noah Cicero’s The Insurgent.

Cell Phone or iPod: Blackberry and laptop.

Summer or Winter: All have their charms.

Ice Skating or Gymnastics: Dance competitions.

LA or New York: London or Paris. Just kidding, I ♥ NY, but shout-out to Jereme Dean and Gena Mohwish in LA.

Skiing or Snowboarding: Drinking in the cabin.

Chocolate or Flowers: All of the above.

Dogs or Cats: None, I’m a shit caretaker.

More We Who Are About To Die Getting-To-Knows.

In which I discover the source of all power

Ani Smith — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 00:40:34 +0000

I developed late for a child but probably too soon for adolescence. It’s like I was 12 and showering when for the first time I realized there was a secret nook at the far end of my torso, like when an infant I discovered my own toes. I gave myself a stinging infection with the bar soap twice that year. I could not be pried. I prodded with toothbrush handles, inspected with compact mirrors, opened wide and closed tight my legs. Life rocked with the unease of discovery, I was fascinated, started foregoing panties, flirting with the slimmer shampoo bottles. The bathroom breathed new, not since the days of the primary-hued stool we stood on to reach the sink to wash, to make fists into liquid hand-soap bubbles.

When you die the asphalt will let out a cry

Ani Smith — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 20:52:08 +0000

When you hear it crinkle, walk down the road with a face like a summer moon. Stop and look right before crossing the street. Let the waft of strangers’ scent intrude you. Inhale last night’s rabid sex and curry to remind you that the second person isn’t so bad, you. They are crinkle-cracked and slain, but so you are. A handful of hurts like a monsoon of petals: say hello to them, say no to them: wrap you up in clear plastic and you say a prayer for lust. When you hear the double-headed helix, over-dramatize. Make noises with your mouth, suck-pumping out the air.

light like a river handjob

Ani Smith — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 23:57:17 +0000

Smack lips like stranger’s thighs, incipient in attitude like a hush of streets. Emboldened by catwalks, she listens, shoots up a naughty finger and bends at the knees. One, two. A simple shot, a plan to leave the noose hanging ready for the plunge. Next to the noose, a bible. Because we all want to believe that it was right. Beside that, a naughty schoolboy, dressed in leather chaps and vagabond slims, his long sharp arms like a giant’s razorblades; he does a half-circle, in roller skates, rolls over toward the painful side, cuts through the mediocre and there he stops, with time he thinks. I don’t know about the next night, but once, when the plane was propped up beside the building, we all knew it was new magic. I heard the boy had a hairstyle like a mother’s braid.

Suckjob for humanity

Ani Smith — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 14:17:36 +0000

On the train home the guy sitting across the aisle from me started twisting in his seat and the rest of us all looked around at each other. Or rather, the seven men nearest, all laying protective hands to crotches getting ready for the penalty shot, turned to look at me as though I had something to do with it. I stoically wished he’d still and stop. But he didn’t. The large bulge in his pants just kept growing, sending him epileptic near my shoe. I swallowed hard.

He was writhing on the floor between the seats now, frothing a little at the mouth and etc. I was looking straight ahead but knew his eyes were going to start to roll back. This other guy goes, you know you have to help him, right? Wearily I knew it was at least five minutes to the next stop. I mean, you know you HAVE to help him, right? Fucking why, I said. Because you’re the nearest fucking female, that’s fucking why.

One of you is gay, I said. Come on. One of you is so gay. Come on!

They looked at each other accusingly, but quickly they turned back to me. No, they said. None of us is gay and this guy, he’s not gay, look at what he’s wearing. He needs your help, you heartless cunt.

Come on! Fuck! Fuck, I said over again, outnumbered. You fucking bastards, I said. Fuck you, I said.

The train seemed to be going faster but the stop came no nearer. Fuck it, I thought and started toward him, but then couldn’t.

Look it might just pass. Sometimes it just passes. No, no, no, they said. You have to help him, bitch, you have to. Fuck, I grumbled down on my knees and took off my handbag and jacket and scarf and fuck you assholes, I growled as I ripped off his pants and he squealed and grunted like some horror movie, hellbent alien in heat.

Massive engorgement threatened to tear apart his ball sack and the skin across his hip bones. He was crying loudly now and I did feel sorry for him. Fuck I thought. Fuck. I took a deep breath and lunged into it and sucked the fuck out of it, and massaged it and stroked it and gagged and pumped with both hands and my entire body until the others, they had to look away.

Tasted earthy rot, metallic and piss-like you know he didn’t care. He knew he had the sickness and if it came to, he knew some wrong-place, shit-time girl’d have to put her mouth on it, but fuck it if he couldn’t at least try and be presentable for it.

Fuck, I thought on the upswing. Fuck, I thought on the downswing. You motherfuckers! I yelled as I breathed in and lunged right down to the hilt until I drew back with a big kissing sound and he erupted bloody pink jizz on my cheeks and my neck and shirt.

Thank you, he sobbed. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you thank you thank you thank you, he sobbed. Fuck you, I wiped my mouth and grabbed my shit and sat back down in that train seat and waited.

In a parking lot pissing behind a toyota rav4

Ani Smith — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 22:13:24 +0000

I kept telling myself: you would be very correct. I kept telling myself, TONIGHT IS THE NIGHT THAT SHIT HAPPENS. Tonight is the night. I started singing Bella Notte badly. I kept telling myself: when I was alone, I looked away! when I was together … I was never together! Ha ha, I kept telling myself.

I kept telling myself: FOR ONCE THE WORLD WILL BE GOT!

My shoe smelt like dung. I had stepped on a pie. I kept telling myself: this is okay, it must start out shitty if it’s to get better. I kept telling myself: STOP TALKING TO YOURSELF, MYSELF! TURN YOUR POEMS INTO PROSE! TURN YOUR APPLES INTO ALBUMS! COLLECT ALL THE SWEETS OF THIS WORLD! HIRE INFANTS TO NURSE YOUR BOOBIES! FIRE YOUR BREAST MILK INTO THE SKY! SAY HELLO TO SAM AND DAN FOR ME! Stop carrying on like a birthday cake. Stop hoping.

Smith on politics

Ani Smith — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:30:00 +0000

The house that Tony Blair would buy has sixty-seven rooms and a copy of Hustler in each of seventy-two bathrooms. That’s all I know about that. Oh well, that and that the knockers are fat, wrought-iron twisted motherfuckers with a grin that says HALLELUJAH! You knock one of them fucks you’d best be ready to run: down the hill, through the trees and into the small cemetery in the old churchyard behind the church. You talk about Tony Blair’s bathrooms but that ain’t his house, he never did buy the house. The town is a small town and the house is an aberration and Tony - well I used to have a crush on Tony and on Bill. I like my men older, powerful, deceitful (obviously), with Napoleonic wives and big fat wrought-iron knockers on the doors of their would-be homes.

Some kids are frightened by their mothers

Ani Smith — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 21:35:07 +0000

1.
I wade the water up to my waist. I’m shark bait. A plume of wispy pink wafts from behind me like a dissipating eel.

2.
I am standing in line at the altar. A trickle straddles the inside of my leg like a shy retiring child.

3.
There is a small coagulated mass spreading outwards in the middle of my white ceramic dinner plate: shiny, the color of chocolate syrup, the outline of a misshapen silver dollar pancake. I fork around in it dispassionately.

4.
My fingers come up slippery and smell oxygenated. The white cotton string peeks out like a thin, wine-stained tongue.

5.
Through the dirt I leave a dark, dank trail in my wake. The dry ground slurps.

6.
I turn to look behind me like the Coppertone girl. I’m being chased across the courtyard by red puddles like so many stepping stones.

The type of dreamer that leaps

Ani Smith — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 23:29:19 +0000

You’re someone I could fall in love with and those are words I use because I’ve heard them said by many people and they seem good to say. You’re someone I could easily cajole into hurting me. I could call you on the phone and you could say, I need quarters for the laundromat and I could cry, I would cry down the line. Because your need to use a laundromat is mildly worrisome but your lack of planning is tear-inducing.

You were lying on the couch and you said, come here baby girl, come here, so I did and then you said, no not you, I meant the cat. But I fucked you anyway. I pushed you back with force like I never have in dreams because I’m the type of dreamer that leaps wide when she means to fly. Then we both became naked.

I straddled you and I tried not to orgasm because I wanted it to last forever and I morphed into a fourteen-year-old boy and I thought about baseball except I don’t know what it is about baseball that you’re supposed to think about. I only remember hitting the softball, flinging the bat and running like my ass was on fire. Thinking of fire and my ass smacking against your pubic bone and upper thighs and hip bones and I came. And that’s not the only bad piece of 80s movie advice I ever followed.

When I quivered and my insides clenched your cock you smiled up at me and I smiled down at you and made a fuck-that-feels-good face and you said, I need quarters for the laundromat.

And then you didn’t reply to my email or link to me on your blog; you didn’t invite me to Thanksgiving at your parents’ or to their summer home; or to an expensive or an affordable meal; you didn’t speak to me after fingering my ass behind the shed near the sandbox after the sixth-grade dance; or at any point during the dance; though you did dry hump me several times during particularly soulful songs; also gave me an in with the other boys which I appreciated; but you never called to tell me whether your clothes were clean.

Still. I’m the one that fucks you and you let me and I keep your secret I am your secret. Not because I’m selfless or worthless but because humiliation agitates me several ways.

This boy merits a paragraph

Ani Smith — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 20:14:08 +0000

This boy is one of those people who have no chin, who take everything as a personal affront to their crooked nose. This boy’s face makes him look unintelligent so he hides it. This boy, he is lonely. His face produces facts his body cannot fathom. This boy’s only companionship is the joke. This boy, he chases the everyone dream, he lives in spirit, his face begets sadness. His face a face so big, he can’t see beyond his sallow cheekbones. Yet this boy you can see coming. This boy goes to the game to climb the cheerleaders. He doesn’t play, but this boy’s not on the bench. This is the kind of boy who ages bitterly, accumulating only products. This boy’s mouthwash is meaningless. For a heart, this boy has a feather pillow. For a thought, this boy thinks about your sleepovers. This boy feels rejected by rocks.

The passenger is out of control: a dumb tale of abject inconsequence

Ani Smith — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 19:04:57 +0000

Rounding the bend in his fast blue car she didn’t feel fearless. She never felt fearless in the passenger’s seat. The passenger is out of control. He asked whether she was nervous and quietly she smiled, tightly gripping leather. She had wanted to appear fearless, seating arrangement notwithstanding.

Had she had a premonition? It is quite possible. In hindsight, anything can be translated in terms of foreboding. In hindsight, their love was plastic, flat. But who’s to say what the properties of love should be?

He took the curve too tightly, too steeply, too suddenly. An oncoming car. A tree. Your usual. Blue like crushed paper hugging thick, ragged tree trunk. Girl pinned to the seat by large stabbing branch through her flimsy chest. Glass. Cuts. Contusions. Etc.

He shook. He cried. He did all the expected things: sat blankly, screamed a little, asked for God, begged for forgiveness, cursed. She only stared. Every so often she’d lower her eyelashes like intricate Spanish fans casting long dark shadows on her cheekbones. Gingerly she’d finger the blood spurts, looking more confused than in pain. Dribbling streams from the corners of her pale mouth. Her brows bushy caterpillars, crawling toward each other in shock.

His love-plastic melted, running rivers in tandem with her insides. I’m sorry, oh, God. I’m so sorry. Her eyes said, it can’t be helped, Jack. It can’t be helped.

Trudl machinates

Ani Smith — Thu, 21 May 2009 22:02:23 +0000

Once Trudl shopped for a happy vibration, a pretty sky blue. Make it prose, make me prose, no more poetry. Once Trudl shopped for a vibrating joyful, a lovely plaything, curvy smart waves. Light up. Serene. Blue. Did I mention blue? Old Trudl she needed a quick and hefty release like a block of ice forming torched. Once Trudl found the right one quickly she went astray. Held the thing in a fist pump like she might hold her own cock. It shook her senseless mechanically. STEP ONE Trudl places the shaft parallel to her slit and presses down on the mound. STEP TWO Trudl locks her fist around and grinds. STEP THREE the orgasm is ripped from Trudl’s clit. Trudl misses the light touch but there’s simply no time. Once Trudl never owned a clock.

What are we saying we are saying

Ani Smith — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 21:42:42 +0000

It smelled musty in a bad way. Like he’d taken a shit and individually plastic-wrapped the turds, carefully placed them in a box and placed the box in a drawer in a knotty pine wardrobe in a small overstuffed room.

We lost a lot that day. Three tiny, gold coloured safety pins. A sizeable ball of fallen strands of chestnut brown hair. Two tickets to Jimmy Johns and Jane Jannsen. Front row. A row of maize. Green, unpopped and un-movie buttered.

Some of our stomachs hurt and some of us had bad cases of the measles or pox or something else we’d had before. Maybe mumps or melanoma. Diseased mytochondria. Still, we were determined to go before the judge to have our case heard on the matter of the things we’d lost.

There were three other things, two of which we hadn’t the heart to discuss. One of which was the heart. We’d discuss that aplenty when the time came but presently the stink became unbearable and we had to turn out, our eyeballs reeking, our ears plugged, our cheeks pinched, our fancy noses stuffed.

Partial transcripts

Ani Smith — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 20:42:37 +0000

1.
The thing that you have to understand is that she’s a true professional. I mean, when you’re doing a photo shoot with Jenna, there’s no bullshit. What I most admire about her is that she has crazy control over her body. Every single inch of space is accounted for. Every limb, every curve, down to each finger, she controls it all. I think it’s all that yoga she does. But it’s not just that, it’s the way she regulates her breathing, in time with the flash. Her tongue is always at the optimum level of moisture. Seriously, I know it sounds ridiculous but she’s taught me so much. Oh you know what else? Okay, so sometimes you’ll be doing a photoshoot with someone, especially someone who might be a little inexperienced and you can smell the arousal wafting off them like fumes from a fishmonger’s. Like, you barely haven’t even grazed a nipple yet and their shit is salivating. Not with Jenna man, she can even control her arousal. So we get done with the preliminary shoot and it’s time to get nasty for the video and it’s like everything she had inside comes rushing out all at once and she becomes this gloriously sticky mess. That’s a pro yo, ha ha. That’s a true pro.

2.
I’m a kill that motherfucker, Jake. That motherfucker don’t know how much I dream of knifin’ him in the face. I’m a … OK, I’m not gonna kill ‘im. That’d give him too much reason to survive. Like inspire him to carry on. Like I’m adversity and dude’s gonna overcome ME. Hell naw. Jake exists on the motherfuckin’ cusp of the crest of my life and to kill a motherfucker is to kill a wave that washes over adversarily or some shit. Summarily, I ain’t about to. I’m a kiss that motherfucker. I’m a sit in righ’ close and I’m a whisper don’t you worry ‘bout a thing, son. This old stranger right ‘ere’s got nothing but love for his fellow man, you know what I’m sayin’? I’m a spit him some shit straight out of my favourite book the motherfuckin’ bible. That bastard’s been around and up the tree of motherfuckin’ life for too long but I’m not gonna be Judas or whoever killed the priest, oh no. That sure as hell ain’t gonna be me.

Something about some boring people

Ani Smith — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 22:57:59 +0000

So here’s me. At the end of one row. Next to me a guy. Next to him a girl, but we’ll see more about her later. Across from me a guy. Next to him a guy. The guy next to me is wearing a suit in a conservative style. The guy across from me is also wearing a suit in a more fashionably conservative style. The guy next to him is wearing a fashionable suit. The guy next to me’s suit is grey. His shirt is light blue. His tie navy. The guy across from me’s suit is navy blue, his shirt is small navy and white checks. The collar is open. He has a five o’clock shadow. Dark hair. Light blue eyes. He reminds me of Hugh Laurie. Or a model for Brooks Brothers. His thighs are large. The guy next to Hugh his suit is brown. It fits slim. His shirt is bright pink. His tie is navy blue with tiny white polka dots. It has a large knot. It is off-centre. He has a brown mop top. His skin fair. His look is carefully constructed dishevelment. This guy, the guy next to Hugh - the guy diagonal - he’s eating a pot of noodles from Wasabi. He’s not using chopsticks, as I expected when he first pulled it out of the bag. He’s shovelling them in his mouth with a white plastic fork. Hugh is looking at the floor. His brow furrowed. He’s squinting to see something far off in his imagination. Every so often, he softly shakes his head no. The guy next to me’s thighs are slim. His legs are long. His face I daren’t look at. He is talking to the girl next to him. He’s excited by the conversation and faintly elbows me every time he makes a point. The girl is also eating. I can’t see what she’s eating out of a white container. It smells like more noodles. This girl, she’s a receptionist. The guy next to me, he’s a sales guy in the same office. They’ve been dating for a month. I’m bored. The guy diagonal finishes his noodles six stops too early. He wipes his mouth with a brown paper napkin. He stuffs everything back in to the bag. He looks like he doesn’t know what to do next. I can see his socks. I can see the outline of his cock. It is pointing left. His pant’s zipper and seam are aligned with the imaginary line that separates his left ball from his right ball. I imagine his ball sack is stiff, hot. Hugh’s pants have a looser fit. Probably his balls are bigger. He keeps shaking no. No. No. The guy next to me and the girl, his girlfriend now that I have deemed it so, they get off at Westminster. A thoroughfare. They are catching another one, to her place. She uses a diaphragm. I didn’t think those were available any more, but they are. It’s in her sensible black handbag. Next to the tampon. Beneath the lipstick. Behind the boredom she’s sating with the salesman tryst.

Woods Hollow Prostitute

Ani Smith — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 03:55:24 +0000

So he goes, you were doing your same old boundary-pushing sex thing. And I smiled because it was true. And then I pretended to apologise, but I didn’t mean it. Not really.

He bought me a teddy bear. He told my mom I was a very special girl and she beamed elated. She pushed me towards him and he took my hand. His own hand was clammy and he smelled like dewy moss.

One day she beat me for letting a boy give me a hickie. It was the town fair and we made out on the ferris wheel like we’d been told to do by countless tv shows and movies. I perfectly understood the appeal of bruises begetting bruises. Sadly, mom didn’t.

He said I had an addictive personality. I wasn’t sure whether he meant that I was prone to addiction or that I myself was an addictive substance. The latter suited me. And when I blew him on the couch of my grandparents living room hiding my face behind a large cushion in full view of the window and the small, talkative town beyond it and he begged for more and again, I knew it suited me perfectly.

At seven years old I modeled swimwear in front of hundreds of faces. Later I remember thinking no one apart from mom had ever seen the bendy place where leg meets torso, though plenty had. During performances I was always blank behind the eyes.

Around that same time I had my first kisses from a girl. I can still recall her taste to my lips (moist bland strawberry) and the practised way with which she twined her tongue round mine.

This boundary-pushing sex thing has been going on for a while, kid. It’s just money’s never been the chosen reward. So now you know. I’ll take a john when things turn sour again so quite soon. Give him what little I have in exchange for not much and be done with.

Fulfilling your destiny: a thin fable of less than epic proportions

Ani Smith — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 20:00:17 +0000

*sweet sweet bunny ass by potentially nervous

The bunny hopped into the cold room wearing only a t-shirt black-marker scrawled with the words RAPE ME. She’s not an extraordinarily pretty bunny so she doesn’t think anyone will want to rape her. Nor is she an extraordinarily astute bunny. She doesn’t think anyone will misconstrue her political anti-rape stance.

In the cold room, other bunnies are being raped. On the couch, on the floor by the couch, on the coffee table, two in the hallway. Bloody downy fluff bodies are pinned down by rope, by metal, by other bunnies. Jackalopes - mostly uneducated white male jackalopes from broken homes - push flailing bunny paws apart to discover the furry goodness between. Rape-me t-shirt bunny shuffles around like a somewhat shy punter surveying a shop piled to the rafters with useless antiques.

“Hey. Hey what the fuck do you think you’re doing?” A burly brown jackalope startles the bunny. She didn’t expect anyone to notice her. Much less speak to her.

“Um. Nothin’.”

“Get the fuck out of here.”

“Why?”

“Oh my god you’re so fuckin’ stupid. Come ‘ere. Dumb bitch.”

Well. We all know what happens next, don’t we? I know you saw it coming. Rape-me bunny did too. Somewhere in the back of her small bunny brain, nestled between the make-up tips she got at the lab, the daddy issues and the extra helping of carrot cheesecake guilt she had at lunch there was a large NO BUNNIES ALLOWED sign she wilfully ignored.

Hemingway

Ani Smith — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 16:48:09 +0000

Hemingway got to the office at a quarter to three in the afternoon. He took one of the empty desks by the window and booted up the PC.

“Mister Hemingway? Pardon me, I just wanted to introduce you to your new assistant, Maria Elena. Maria Elena, this is Mister Hemingway.”

Maria Elena forced her rosy full lips into a tentative smile. Hemingway didn’t speak, he just nodded a little. Maria Elena furrowed her ashy brown brow and took a few paces back and away from Hemingway while he continued staring at the flickering screen.

“Are you sure that is him? He looks like one of the Castro brothers, or Fidel himself. Ay dios mio, I am working for Fidel—”

“Don’t be silly, girl. He is very serious and a little scary at first, yes, but really … he is harmless.”

Maria Elena studied Hemingway’s features to convince herself that he was, in fact, not Fidel Castro. He was a weathered old man, but she thought she could see a young sparkle in his eyes which she’d never seen in Fidel’s, so she reckoned that was a good start.

Hemingway was wearing black, military inspired clothes: a beat up flat top cap and a hip length coat with epaulettes. He hadn’t removed these items when he sat down, he’d only unbuttoned his coat. His salt and pepper beard was scruffy and untidy and the skin on his face was flaky. Maria Elena thought she saw him discreetly pick his nose, though he pretended he was just scratching it. She guessed he hadn’t showered today, and maybe not yesterday either, but instead of the disgust she had expected, this filled her with an odd sort of tenderness.

“Now, here is the list of things you must go buy for him. He will probably be here until around 10 a.m. tomorrow morning, maybe later depending how it goes, but you’ll be able to get some sleep in small spurts. Make yourself scarce, but always within earshot in case Mister Hemingway wants for something. Understood?”

“Si,” Maria Elena nodded solemnly.

Maria Elena is a Cuban refugee, who just celebrated her 37th birthday by picking strawberries in an organic strawberry field three hours north of where she lives. She found this choice of birthday celebration humorous and ironic, and she thanked all her angels for her many blessings with lit candles and the ritual offerings she’d been accustomed to providing for the saints since she was small.

Tanned, with wide thighs and hips like a grand, tufted sofa, Maria Elena is actually in excellent shape with a thin waist and pert, small brown breasts. Huge areolae form a couple of dark shadows under her plain white top. She owes her taut biceps and the firm calves beneath her knee-length pencil skirt to years of cleaning other people’s houses, and the years before that which she spent hiding her politically dissenting and morally bankrupt poetry from the pious crazies in her seaside hometown.

“Señor Hemingway?”

Hemingway was now lifelessly staring into an empty Word document, a still hand cradling the computer mouse.

“Señor Hemingway, do you need anything? I am going to buy the supplies for the night.”

“No,” he coughed.

Hemingway hadn’t said a word to anyone in three days and he resented Maria Elena for breaking his peaceful spell and making him cough.

“Bueno.”

Maria Elena was told to purchase Marlboro reds, hard cheese and a few bottles of mid-range white wine and was given ninety dollars. This seemed to Maria Elena like an inordinate amount and she reasoned that if she bought the cheapest items she could find, she’d be able to keep most of the ninety dollars for herself. She was told that being an assistant had its perks, and she figured this must be one of them.

As Maria Elena made her way through the rows of nondescript, office worker desks, she clocked several scenes which mirrored her own. An old man at a desk, feigning solitude. A woman, at an indeterminate point nearby, ‘making herself scarce’, a turn of phrase which Maria Elena found particularly baffling. She passed one desk, turned a corner and pretended not to try to peek over another writer’s shoulder and onto his screen, and was rather surprised when yet another writer’s assistant shot her a vaguely aggressive look. Maria Elena didn’t realize the extent of these men’s fame and the zealousness of their assistants.

When Maria Elena returned to the office and put the supplies away, she casually glanced at Hemingway’s screen. He’d only written one word since she’d been gone: HEGEMONY. Maria Elena thought hegemony probably means ‘long night’.

Maria Elena sat down on the floor and curled her legs under her bottom. The agency madam had left her a cozy blanket which she promptly pulled around her shoulders. She stared at the curve of Hemingway’s broad back and at the wisps of gray hair poking out around the edges of his cap. She stifled a yawn so as not to disturb him and leaned her head back against the wall. Her eyelids drooped almost immediately. Hemingway blurred.

A couple of hours later, Maria Elena awoke with a start. Hemingway towered over her, erect and proud, softly kicking her knee with a steel-toed boot to rouse her.

“Si, Señor Hemingway?”

Hemingway was so above her, she felt he dizzied over her slightly and for a moment she worried he would crumble on top of her. She stood up to face him on a more even keel.

“What can I do for you, Mister Hemingway?”

Hemingway turned and sat back down at his desk. He pushed his chair back and motioned for Maria Elena to come to him. As she approached him, he pointed to a spot between his shoulder and neck.

“Would you like a massage, Mister Hemingway?”

Hemingway wished Maria Elena would be quiet, but he knew that people like her rarely communicate without speaking. Maria Elena took his silence as confirmation and she lay her warm, calloused hands on either side of his head. He, too, was warm, but also bulky and tough, though Maria Elena imagined his skin was wrinkled and flaccid under his large coat.

“It would be better if you removed your coat, Mister Hemingway.”

Hemingway grudgingly did as Maria Elena instructed, revealing a dirty thin, white undershirt. She began working his shoulders and upper back and it felt so good that Hemingway struggled to keep from moaning with pleasure. Maria Elena meanwhile, kept staring at the screen on which Hemingway had now written pages-full, but she could not make out a single sentence because she was too far from the monitor and the letters blurred into one another. She squinted and gave it a good try and once even leaned forward to the point where her chin almost rested on Hemingway’s forehead, but presently he stirred and cleared his throat and Maria Elena quickly regained her focus on the task at hand.

Unwelcome guest

Ani Smith — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 14:49:38 +0000

“Hey, baby. What’s a girl like you doing in a place like this?”

“What? What are you talking about, this is my fucking bathroom.”

“Damn, baby, kiss your mother with that mouth?” he hissed and scuttled closer, all eight legs padding weightlessly across the tiles.

“The question is what you are doing here in my bathroom.”

“Alright, alright, straight up: I got into some trouble outside your window there with some nasty wasps that got caught in my web - not caught enough, course - and I’m just lying low for a bit ‘til I can go back out again. Ain’t that some shit? What? You don’t mind, do you? Come on girl, have a heart.”

“Whatever.”

“Damn you pretty! Tough, too.”

“Alright can I just pee now, please? Is that alright with you, Mr. Gangsta Spider?”

“Yeah, baby, of course. Shit. I ain’t never stand in the way of no girl peein’ and shit. That’s some nasty shit.”

“Okay, be quiet then.”

“Right, sorry … hey, you wouldn’t have some dead flies or something lying around? I’m fuckin’ starving, yo …”

“What do I look like?! Please, can I just fucking pee? That’s all I want to do! Just fucking pee. Then I’ll get out of the bathroom and you can do whatever you want. Just don’t come to my room.”

“Alright, alright baby, it’s all good. I’ll just hang back here, by your dirty clothes. Oof, what do we have here …”

“Get away from my panties!”

“Aw, come on girl, can’t I just chill here? They are so soft and warm and moist and—”

“Ew!” she squealed, snatching her panties away and sending the spider flying into the bathtub.

“Goddamn bitch!”

“WHAT did you call me?!”

“God … damn … ditch … I almost fell into the hole … whatchoo call them things? The drain, that’s what I meant.”

“Right.”

“So about them flies …”

The baby panda bear

Ani Smith — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 12:08:59 +0000

“What?” said the baby panda bear, “what are you all laughing at?”

“Aw, he’s so cute!” cried one of the women, while the rest cackled and held their stomachs and sniffled with mirth.

“What is it, I don’t understand?”

“Oh, baby panda bear, your little wee wee is showing!”

The crowd of women that was now closely huddled around the baby panda bear erupted in uproarious laughter. The baby panda bear felt claustrophobic and unable to grasp what it means for one’s ‘wee wee’ to show.

“I-I don’t understand …” he began.

“It’s like a little lipstick!” a jovial woman remarked.

“Awwwwwwww …” cried the rest of them in unison, drowning out the baby panda bear’s grave attempts to further clarify the matter. One of the women reached out and pinched the baby panda bear’s left ear.

“Hey! You can’t do that!”

But the women ignored the baby panda bear and continued giggling and squealing - “how cute! he’s adorable! look at his wee wee! aw, bless him!” - as they closed in on him.