2: The National Anthem

There is most of a city between these two. The roads between them split and dip and end, frustrating any chance at a straight line. Concrete walls stop bullets, they swallow one's voice and deny one's image.

Other way round there is most of a planet with valleys and rivers, deserts and oceans, plains and canyons, and towns that read like punch lines on a map. Some of them make for adequate meeting sites.

9: The Late Greats

With the earnings from the race they go into that little record store across from the Barnes and Noble. They're there until closing, carefully selecting; this will be the soundtrack to their entire October and maybe even November if money's tight.

On the road they test out their new materials. As the tones and stories fill the Civic they slip in and out of new characters. Testing them out. Gripping the wheel a certain way. Twisting their features into unfamiliar expressions. They are renewed.

20: What a Shame about Me

The heavy silver ball rolls up his spine

Rumbling

Picking up speed and mean

The gray loosens up

Ready to embrace the coming destruction

The end is blind

Skin gets the final solo

The silver ball makes no decision

It shakes a memory loose

It took a week to heal

And is propelled through the gray

Until it hits another cluster

The cold gritty wall at his back

Hot breath rushing out his nose

Waiting for Carl to give up

It's getting darker in his own head

And all sound is collapsing into pink

Standing in a stream

Water is not

One thing

But many snakes

Each with a slightly different coldness

The silver ball is the same

All over and to the core

There is a clear separation

Between the pole pushing up against his leg

And the leg giving up

What was a closed circuit is open

To the whole world

And the world to it

Communicating through pain

The silver ball

Does not loose speed

After a collision

Fifteen thousand pounds

Fifty four miles an hour

Feet off the ground

26: Night by Night

On the way down

The body is the instrument

Fell by drink, fatigue, or violence

That describes an arc

A shift in perspective

With point of view doggedly intact

A paradox for moron

A short trip with a Keystone punchline

On the way out

There is usually a quiz

A pretty pointless one word query

With answers that devolve into explanations

Then strengthen into stories

Anecdotes illustrated by scar tissue

Bunched up beneath epidermis

Discreet but fully present

On the way up

There is nothing

A blank page

An empty glass

A clearing of the throat

A kind word toward your mother

To set up the night's entertainment

33: Kamera

Understand that this inventory does not include the trunk or the glove box. It takes no accounting of those places where things go to hide, but it does include all objects that, by some accident, find themselves out of sight.

In the civic we find:

A pack of Marlboro Reds, three left

A pack of Benson and Hedges menthols, one left

An eyeglass repair kit, no screws

A pack of Merits, five left

A crumpled Wendy's bag with two Whataburger bags inside

Five dollars and forty-three cents in loose change

Three Euros

Five packs of Turkish Gold, all empty

Two atlases, both falling apart

That morning's copy of the Arizona Republic

A pillow

A Tom Waits cd case with Shakira's "Fijacion Oral" inside

The latest copy of the New Yorker

The latest copy of Swank

An old copy of In Touch with a subscription sticker for a Doctor James Bannon

Ticket stubs for a Fellini retrospective

An open bag of trail mix

Eight lighters, most of them green

A paperback copy of "Stars In My Pocket Like Grains Of Sand" by Chip Delaney

A Steely Dan shirt

A switchblade

A half full bag of Sun Chips

An empty wallet

An Oregon traffic ticket

A laptop

Evan

Kadrey

46: The Morning Bell

INT. CONVENIENCE STORE-NIGHT

[C-NOTE: Let's try to keep as much of this as we can in one shot. Preferably let's not cut until the electrician walks in.]

[S-NOTE: I've asked Jerry to find something that sounds like Morricone for incidental. I'm thinking more Corbucci-Morricone than Leone-Morricone. The Great Silence, shit like that.]

EVAN walks into the convenience store. Everything is bright and shiny and new except for Evan and the CLERK who is the only other person there.

Evan looks like he hasn't washed in days.

The Clerk is a teenager dressed in black, he's bent over a notebook, I-pod buds firmly in place he's probably listening to NIN.

Evan walks over to the chips aisle and ducks. We can't see him.

Evan:

[off camera]This must be your busy time.

Clerk:

[oblivious]...

Evan:

[standing up] I hope you don't live on commission.

Clerk:

[finally notices Evan. takes one bud out] Do you need help?

Evan:

[striding up and down the aisle, picking up random snacks and putting them down in the wrong places] Help? I think I'll help myself to a little bit of this, little bit of that. Since I'm in the land of plenty and all.

Clerk:

[putting his bud back in, returning to his notebook] God bless America.

Evan:

Not one for conversation, uh? Well it's late, your business isn't chitchat.

Clerk:

[oblivious]...

Evan walks to the back where they keep the beer, crouches down to the cheap, nasty shit, pulls out three cases and with some effort jogs up to the register and slams the cases on the counter.

Evan:

[catching his breath] Your business is convenience.

Clerk:

[standing up straight, pulling out the buds, and looking really uncomfortable] I can't sell you these.

Evan:

What are you talking about? I have cash.[he pulls out a crumpled bunch of bills and lays them on the counter.]

Clerk:

[pointing to a clock behind him] No it's cut-off. We're past cut-off, I can't sell you alcohol.

Evan:

What.. What's the... Who needs to know?

Clerk:

Mister, I can't do that. I really really can't.

Evan:

Yeah? [he pulls out a beer from the top case, pops it open and starts to sip]

Clerk:

Take it. Take it. I just can't sell it to you.

Evan:

[very slowly] But. I. Have. Money.

Clerk:

It's not my job to get fucked up. Just... please take it.

Evan tries to hop over the counter slips on the surface and falls at the clerks feet. The clerk backs up, still afraid of Evan. Evan gets up and returns to his original mission unembarrassed. He takes the clock of the wall, adjusts it and holds it up to the clerk.

Evan:

Now it's eleven thirty. Problem solved.

Clerk:

[pointing to the register] That receipt isn't going to say 11:30.

Evan puts the clock down and goes up to the register. The clerk has noticed a mop in the corner he's trying to disappear into. Evan pushes the register onto it's side. The clerks hand closes around the mop's handle. The door opens. It's some DUDE probably coming from a late shift, he's haggard looking and sweaty. His shirt reads: "if it's not grounded, it's not dead."

Evan:

[to the Dude] Hey! Hey, you know anything about electronics.

Dude:

[hesitantly] I'm an electrician.

Clerk:

Certified?

Dude:

[Grinning] Almost.

Evan:

Good enough. You have time for a job? A quick one.

Dude:

Who's paying?

Evan:

[pointing to the wad] I am.

The Dude trots up to the register. The clerk is more obviously holding on the mop now, but it clearly functions more as a life raft than a weapon. The two men are not interested in his state of mind.

Evan:

I want this to say 11:30

Dude:

[examining the register] But it's past one.

Evan:

I know. I want the receipt to say 11:30

Dude:

[still scrutinizing] Isn't there a simple clock function.

Clerk:

No.

Dude:

No? I don't buy that.

The Dude comes around the counter and produces a small screwdriver and a flashlight from his pockets. He starts prodding the register.

Evan:

These are your official tools?

Dude:

You're paying for the knowledge. Not the hardware.

The clerk has been letting himself slide down. He's now sitting on the floor, wrapped around his mop.

Clerk:

You can just have the beer you know.

Evan:

[looking at the clerk with some sympathy]I know...

Dude:

Shit!

The register has started sparking. The Dude makes a break for it seemingly propelled by expletives. The sparks are turning into small flames. The clerk snaps to, grabs an extinguisher from under the counter and lets loose a jet of white powder.

Evan, exhausted and defeated walks around the counter. He's facing the clerk now. Things are back to square one except for the dead register and the retardant still hanging in the air.

Clerk:

You can have it you know.

Evan:

I know [he grabs one case] It just didn't feel right.

Evan walks out, case under his arm. The clerk watches him leave, waits a moment then pockets the crumpled wad.

48: Side With The Seeds

On his shoes

The dirt from three states

Caked thick

No wind at his back

No wind on his face

No wind

Nothing to rush and fill the voids between palm and thigh

Up above

Empty sky

Cruel blue and hard light

Moisture sucked from every pore

No wind to cool his brow

No wind

No hope for clouds

and shade

and rain

In his pocket

Lousy talismans

Bent cigarette, six keys around a circle

Kadrey's estate

He holds out the keys

His fist a porcupine

There is no wind to make them chime

Nothing

No wind

To carry the sounds growing in his chest

He smells the keys

Gives them new names in the absence of doors

He presses into the body of the cigarette

Rolls it back and forth

Paper disintegrates

Dry leaves fall through his fingers

Like sand

Like ash

No wind to alter their trajectory

No ladder to bring him the fragrance of tobacco

The leaves gather on his shoes

He is buried