The French District –
by PhilipHarris
Posted to Stories on 2003-06-04 08:09:00
It was all a hallucinatory spasm. The child, the girl, and the old woman. All pigmented stardust, mindscrews lost from celluloid. She first found him drenched in his bathtub, floating with his ears submerged and eyes closed. Her entrance, created a chill, a sickening freeze that stopped everything for the brief second of her being. She clung to the ceiling, crawling along the fans and heated airflows, and slipped down straddling the sink basin, breathing her chilling breath against the fogging mirror, and busily draped her languid body over its mass. Then, as fast as she had arrived, her black dank cloak disappeared in a snap of heat, bringing the room into life. Startled awake, he looked up from his bathtub, written on his dilapidated mirror, in long scribbles, was her first message.
The french district of St.Cloud, mostly run by spanish merchants, was dead. Their shops stood open for several random hours throughout the day, only long enough for the varied out-of-towner to squabble in and barder their life. The Presidente walked those streets, his gatored heels clicking on the 1900 brick walkway – past the orthodox church – past the general store – always whistling his snickering tune. Presidente had half a tongue, the other half was bit off by the angels he slurred, damning them and everything else through his toothless gleam. He had large cartoon eyes, red, seemingly growing larger everytime his stare passed your way – his flowing soiled coat, stunk from garbage, and pock marks. The inside of his jacket was lined with everything. The Presidente was the man to see when you needed something, he marked his location with musk, and was a beacon for the starved – when joo nee’ somting, falow mahscent.
She stood on NewYork avenue, straight through the heart of St.Cloud. Flapping her crazed arms. He sat on a parkbench sleeping, when her cold glance shattered into his dreams, speaking through pictoral emotions;
Too you, sent, many messages, ago
-Who are you
many me, look on the rue, through France, below death
-where can I find you
I sir, found you…in death
;Then he was awoken by a long crack, almost sounding like a back being snapped, across the street, he saw a grey arm sheathed in black, fade into the French district, motioning in his direction.
The French district was for merchant peddlers, runnaways, junkies, and the dead. They came there everyday, the dead that is. Lining the streets, conversing about the olden days. Sometimes you heard of them beastily devouring an out-of-towner, but no one cared for the out-of-towners, and those incidents were rarily reported to the Central and if they were, they were mostly ignored. All of the trees were false, all of the grass was false, everything was plastic – from the outside, the french district looked exciting and lively, a cartoonish kind of place, but once one set foot on the bricked walkways, the chill hit you, it started at the back of you neck and continued throughout your body. The dead knew the smell of a new foot stepping into the french district, they flocked by the masses, dragging their heels behind their heads, with decayed flies laying eggs on their exposed brain matter. The horrific sight of the dead, paralyzed the body, many out-of-towners were still alive and coherent as their flesh was being torn completely away from their muscle tissue, there was no pain, so they could never pass out and relieve themselves from the horror of seeing their own bodies being eaten. The last image that an out-of-towner sees is his heart being torn and fought over amongst the starved dead.
She wrote him letters with crusted 1800’s photographs, usually of a little girl frowning in a frilly bell dress, standing in front of a church or in a garden. The most interesting thing about these photos was that the little girls pose, facial expressions, and outfit, were always the same. Haunting, it seemed that the girl never changed, but her surrounding grew older and fell apart. The envelope had an apartment building address from somewhere inside the French district.
The Presidente, refused to make deals with the dead, some thought that he himself was dead, making him a hypocrite of his own people. He instead focused his attention on the runnaways and hooked them into being junkies. He smiled at them handing over a used kit, with blood stains. The runnaways were always trying to get away from life; they were usually bankers, businessmen, housewifes, and senators. They realized their own failures in life and wished to have everything, null. Wished, to get away from money. So, they came to the french district, unknowing of its strength, they followed the scent from their homes – and stumbled their way past the dead, sniffing for the faintest touch of musk, scattered along the brick – until they found, the Presidente. They would leech onto his skin and start to hungrily suck at the mucus oils – Presidente would calmly pick up their heads and hand them a kit. Then direct them to the orthodox church, with one long yellow finger, so that they could hide their heads among the pews and eat the bibled canons for food until their slimed junk ran dry and they joined the dead.
He stood at the boundaries, looking into the quiet and beautiful French district. The lively trees, dancing flowers, bright green grass, and white washed church shining inside and outside underneath the sun. But something puzzled him, a dark feeling battered his knees locked, refusing to move. A deceptive evil was inside, he was sure of it, but the scenery was so beautiful and he had to discover who that little girl was by going to the address pasted on the outside of the envelope. So he took a deep breath and crossed the line dividing life and death gripping tightly to a picture of the little girl and the envelope with the senders address.
