—you have a diary dont you
—WHAT no...that was
—YES YOU DO
His friend went on ahead of him laughing so he threw a rock at him. He didn’t think it would hit him but it hit him in the back of the head. Drops of blood spilled onto the pavement...he ran away. The whole time he was running he thought he heard police sirens so he jumped the neighbor's fence to hide, but it was just the wind in his ears. An old woman standing in the window next door peered at him. She picked up the landline and dialed a number...the phone in the house whose fence he jumped rang.
—yes mrs june this is mrs july from next door
—you know i just had a dream about you i broke a snowglobe in a shop and they said you break it you buy it but it was really expensive like $1000 and you helped me pay for it
—i wouldnt do that anyway theres a young man in your backyard dont you have a virgin daughter
—why yes shes just getting ready for ballet practice
He looked into the adjacent window, like two movie screens side by side. It was a pink room with a girl in a cropped white shirt on her bed pulling on black ballerina tights. She was singing a song, or maybe just mouthing the words...he was reading her lips:
see em pray so naked juvenile sammy
enjoy kissing a sea messy entertain felines
create a star so yonder
quandary too maybe so saucy
They looked soft and he liked the way they quivered awkwardly as if they didn't know the language. Then she covered her mouth, as if to scream but without screaming; she was looking out the window directly at him. The same moment, the mother came out the back door with a butcher’s knife crying who the hell is out there and slashed in his direction. A snowglobe shattered. It played the melody of that song the girl was singing though he couldn't remember what it was exactly. He jumped the fence again and ran down the street. He thought a helicopter was after him. There really was a helicopter. STOP SNEAKING AROUND, said the psa. WE'VE BEEN WATCHING YOU THIS WHOLE TIME. So he hitchhiked a ride from an ice cream truck. The driver called himself El Principio and was listening to an unfamiliar but familiar song on the radio.
—you shouldnt hitchhike you dont know i could be a killer posing as an ice cream truck driver
—what song is this it sounds familiar
—siempre soñé que tú vendrías a mí
y hoy que es así me siento tan feliz
creo estar soñando
cuando tú me besas así
After El Principio dropped him off at home he checked the news. The ticker tape read MURDERER WANTED FOR BRUTALLY MURDERING FAMILY. ONLY SURVIVOR SAYS: IT'S NOT FAIR WHEN YOUR FAMILY IS BRUTALLY MURDERED. DEPUTIES ON GROUND AND IN AIR LOOKING FOR SUSPECT. ALIAS EL PRINCIPIO. REWARD $1000 FOR INFORMATION. Immediately he knew what he had to do. He took his car and drove to the closest ballet school. Once there he looked for her class and there she was, stretching with her heel up on the barre...she saw him in the mirror. He knew that she saw him. He watched her the whole time, in that room of mirrors. When class was over he was waiting for her.
—whats your name
—my mom said youre a murderer
—no that wasn't me
—oh well my name is bidden hbu
—my name is omen
—i can tell youre bad omen
—dont jinx it
—its okay id like to try something new
—what are you looking for bidden
—i guess thats what we are to each other isnt it
—you mean i have to have you and you have to be afraid of me
—my mom is coming to pick me up are you going to run away or steal me
[He picks her up and carries her to his car. She likes his arms.]
—what are you going to do to me
—i can show you my new telescope if you want
—sure I love space
So he put her in the passenger seat and they drove out to the desert. He stopped the car among the rocks far from the highway. She rested her head on his shoulder. A song was playing on the radio: si te miro bien, no me puedo contener / yo de amar, y te beso así... She looked up at him and he looked down at her, and as the sun set the golden light flowed gently into his heart. Pero también tengo miedo de perder tu amor / oh, mi amor, no me dejes... When it was dark she whispered, I want to see your telescope. So they went outside to set it up. On the ground there was a plant with dark green leaves and pale purple trumpet-shaped flowers. She asked him if he wanted to eat it. So she crushed up a flower for him to eat and in turn for her he crushed a leaf.
—whats that really bright one
—thats the evening star or venus
—whens the next full moon
—it should come up over the horizon any second now
—what is the name of the moon of pluto
—charon is too small and far away and i dont know where it is why
He was put off by the last thing she said for some reason but then realized it wasn't her who said it. He looked around. She was standing at a distance, with her back to him. She began to pull her white shirt up over her head...tattoos covered her whole back. As she danced and spun around the ink became like black rain clouds sparkling with electricity as if powered by her movement. Soon she was gone and there was only this charged fog of darkness, turning. It began to rain, and the earth filled up with water like a bathtub. He got into the car but drove into the water and sank; her ethereal likeness took him down deeper into the water, which was up into a different world similar but different
Did you bring me here because you wanted to touch me, she asked him in the movie theater. It had red seats that looked dirty with the lights on. They were sitting in the very back row. No one else was there. He responded with a no, I just wanted to see the movie —to tease her. It went dark, and the projectors rolled; there were two. Two screens, two scenes. The one on the left was a static shot of the seats in a movie theater, facing the audience from the front. It was totally full. Everyone tilted their heads to one side. The screen on the right was a closeup of a boy and a girl whose names were About and Assign. She was kissing his arm and asked sweetly, what are you thinking About? He stroked her behind the ear and said, I'm not. The audience laughed, then tilted their heads again. Now he had his hands in the back pockets of her jeans as he pressed her against the wall in back of her mom's house. Give me a sign, he was murmuring to her. Give you what? she said, confused. The audience was cracking up. They couldn't take it seriously. That was when she walked out, apparently distressed. He considered whether to follow her or not...ultimately he did.
[In a passageway with mirrored tiles on ceiling and walls; doors to theaters numbered in roman numerals II-XII along both sides.]
—i couldnt take it everybody laughing its not funny its actually kind of scary and
confusing
—what do you want to do now
—i dont know i just love you
—whatever you ask for bidden
—huh what do you mean forbidden
—i mean you are bidden arent you
—bidden to what no i am assign
—a sign of what
—what are you on about
—im not on anything
—no i mean what are you going on about
Just then the audience, or audiences, began to file out of the theaters: 72 people in total, two from theater two, four from three, six from four, eight from five, ten from six, twelve from seven, ten from eight, eight from nine, six from ten, four from eleven, and two from twelve—in other words, each theater was a dice roll, and each pair of people represented one possible combination giving that result. The mysterious theater number one was that mirrored hall that existed in endless singular duration, adumbrating itself in 12 and 72 over and over. Only just then, he realized that to which she was assigned as a sign: that which he was, and was about.
[The lights come back on, they are still sitting in the red seats.]
—are you ill omen
—no not anymore
[He tries making out with her but she doesn’t move.]
—what are you anxious for bidden
—im afraid im still the same as i was before
They left and walked westward through the city. At one street corner was a professor with a telescope who said would you like to see the moons of Pluto? They both said NO and passed on. They had to get her home before sunrise. The asphalt became ocean and she had to take off her leggings, so that with the light of the moon which was descending before them he could not resist kissing her earlobes...but Bidden shrieked as if bitten. A police siren wailed and the cop said, I see what you did there. So he booked him, put him in the back of a truck and took him to a high security mental ward. He shared a cell with a schizo who called himself El Fin.
—es cierto que mataste a su esposa el fin
—claro que no yo la maté en el principio
He asked the guard for a bible and a crayon which were given him promptly. He didn't read it but simply crossed out the words and wrote in the margins: Dear diary, what is there that does not go in circles? Then he was summoned to make a phone call, if he wished to. He didn't know any numbers by heart so he asked for dice, rolled them five times and dialed the resulting digits. Some guy answered the phone: hello? He could already tell who it was.
—im sorry for hitting you in the head with that rock
—what are you talking about who is this
[From the background of the call can be heard a familiar tune on the radio.]