laughing out loud – a new novel by dan perz (rough draft – first two chapters)PC

by Dan Perz

Posted to Stories on 2003-07-20 21:59:00

“Any symbolism attached to the blank page?”
-comment, by Mrs. Irving

laughing out loud
a new novel by dan perz

Chapter 1:
Confessions of a Midwestern Teenage Loser

“White. White. The page is White. And it’s looking at me.
Write. Write. You’ve got to write. You’ve got to stop the page from looking at me.
Right, right. You need to write. You’ve got to stop the White from looking at me.
You’ve got to stop the page from looking at me. It’s too hard to Write.”
– John Penniel

Author’s Note: Sometimes I write in the first person, as if I were telling the story. At other times I write in the third person, as if I were outside of myself looking at myself, and sometimes I get confused and mix the two together. This is because I have a chemical imbalance, and am crazy. D.P.

“Hm!”
– Mrs. Irving

Sometimes I wear a rubber band around my wrist and I snap it, every once in a while, to make sure that I’m still real.
Is that weird? Do you think I’m weird? Sometimes you give me the impression that you think I’m weird. Sometimes I wonder what weird even means. Or what word even means. I just don’t know but I do know that you think I’m weird. That’s what everybody thinks, I know. They all think that I am weird. They think that I’m a weirdo, and a freak, and a loser.
Midwestern Teenage Loser. (That’s the title of my journal.) But you, I know that you, I can trust you, O you who read this – for I know – I just know – that you, if anyone will, will understand, for you, O you, you have the Magic.

“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.”
– Albert Camus
“What is normal?”
– Mrs. Irving

A day, a night, a week, a year. Time flies by, we get older, the candle burns. And so the candle burns.
I’m dying. Goo goo g’joob.
Earliest memory is of my boot getting stuck in the seat, being pulled out of the car by someone, my boot getting stuck. I remember. Three years old, birthday in the hospital. Broken backs and ice cream. Broken glass and candles. And so the candle burns.
Happy birthday to you happy birthday to you happy birthday dear danny happy birthday to you.

And then I decided to write a poem, for no particular reason:
Because Mona Lisa’s expression is so ambiguous
Because who can tell what she is thinking
Because who can know what anyone is thinking
Because no one knows it just goes to show something about mankind’s isolation from other members of his own race, I don’t know
But Donne said no man is an island
But how can you ever really know a person
Unless you take a hammer and a shrink ray,
Crack a hole in their skull, and climb in?

“I’m a failed poet. Maybe every novelist wants to write poetry at first, finds he can’t and then tries the short story which is the most demanding from after poetry. And failing at that, only then does he take up novel writing.”
– William Faulkner
“He’s wrong!”
-Mrs. Irving

If you think life is boring then perhaps you aren’t looking hard enough.
When Ernest Hemingway had trouble writing, he said that he would just try to write one true thing, and go on from there.
These days though, who knows what’s true and what’s not?
It’s the postmodern age.

One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do.
Two can be as bad as one
It’s the loneliest number since the number one.

“No” is the saddest experience you’ll ever know.
Yes, it’s the saddest experience you’ll ever know.
‘Cause one is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do
One is the loneliest number, whoa, worse than two

It’s no good anymore since you went away
Now I spend my time just making rhymes of yesterday…

John Penniel sold out to Hollywood and now he writes screenplays under contract for Miramax. While I was in the pornography shop, he was working on an adaptation of Albert Camus’s novel “L’étranger” for the cinema. Only he’s resetting it in modern times in New York City, introducing subplots about demonic lesbians, and ending the show with Meursault on death row rocking out to the Clash’s rendition of “I Fought the Law.”

Breakin rocks in the hot sun
I fought the law and the law won
I fought the law and the law won
I needed money cause I had none
I fought the law and the law won
I fought the law and the law won

The next literary age is the age of virtual reality.
The next literary age is TV.
The next literary movement is the movies.

“All great movies are based on comic books.”
– John Penniel

Dan Perz sat down to write in Mr. VanLooy’s seminar. “I’m going to write this thing, or at least start it.” He looked down at the prompt.
He thought: “what does ‘comparable’ mean? Does that mean I have to write like Joyce? It says I have to incorporate a definite style; I can do that, but it won’t be like Joyce. I’m supposed to write about my childhood and events that have bearing on who I am. Isn’t that a little personal of a thing to do? I don’t really think I should write anything at all. It’s too personal for an English writing assignment. I’ll just make something up. I’ll talk about a snowball fight or my disillusionment with the Catholic Church or something like that. But both of those are true.”
He drew a spiral, like this:




Then he wrote:

Dan Perz sits down to write in Mr. VanLooy’s seminar. “I’m going to write this thing, or at least start it.” He looks down at the prompt.
He thinks: “what does ‘comparable’ mean? Does that mean I have to write like Joyce? It says I have to incorporate a definite style; I can do that, but it won’t be like Joyce. I’m supposed to write about my childhood and events that have bearing on who I am. Isn’t that a little personal of a thing to do? I don’t really think I should write anything at all. It’s too personal for an English writing assignment. I’ll just make something up. I’ll talk about a snowball fight or my disillusionment with the Catholic Church or something like that. But both of those are true.”
He draws a spiral, like this:




Then he writes:

Dan Perz will sit down to write in Mr. VanLooy’s seminar. “I’m going to write this thing, or at least start it.” He will look down at the prompt.
He will think: “what does ‘comparable’ mean? Does that mean I have to write like Joyce? It says I have to incorporate a definite style; I can do that, but it won’t be like Joyce. I’m supposed to write about my childhood and events that have bearing on who I am. Isn’t that a little personal of a thing to do? I don’t really think I should write anything at all. It’s too personal for an English writing assignment. I’ll just make something up. I’ll talk about a snowball fight or my disillusionment with the Catholic Church or something like that. But both of those are true.”
He will draw a spiral, like this:




Then he will write:


What is time anyway? Some people say time is like a river
(They say time is like a river
And I can almost believe them.)
but I don’t think time is really at all like a river. I think time
(He threw water on the clock
And it melted like the
Wicked Witch from the
Wizard of Oz.)
I don’t know what I think of time. Time is unbendable. Unbreakable. You watch the hands move on the clock and then you die. Time’s up.


Life is nothing at all like the Microsoft Office™ program I am using to write this. When you make a mistake in this program, you click “Edit: Undo.” And when you accidentally click “Edit: Undo” you can just click “Edit: Redo” and it fixes the mistaken correction.
But in real life there is no “Edit: Undo” button.
Only Microsoft™ could think of something like that.

.yaw yrrem sih no tnew dna em deknaht eH .zuj egnaro fo ssalg a evah dna elihw elttil a rof klat ot emit dah ylno eh ,og ot dah eh tub ,yrros saw eh dias eH .tey emit ym t’nsaw ti dias eh tub nevaeh ot og dluoc I fi mih deksa I .yaw siht eb ot dah gnihtyreve yhw dna yhposolihp tuoba elihw a rof deklat ew dna zuj egnaro fo ssalg a mih tog I dna droL eht saw eh esuaceb yako dias I .zuj egnaro fo ssalg llams a rof em deksa dna ni emac eh nehw ainraN fo selcinorhC eht gnidaer nehctik eht ni gnittis saw I
.tsirhC suseJ tem I dlo sraey nevele saw I nehW
When I was eleven years old I met Jesus Christ.
I was sitting in the kitchen reading the Chronicles of Narnia when he came in and asked me for a small glass of orange juz. I said okay because he was the Lord and I got him a glass of orange juz and we talked for a while about philosophy and why everything had to be this way. I asked him if I could go to heaven but he said it wasn’t my time yet. He said he was sorry, but he had to go, he only had time to talk for a little while and have a glass of orange juz. He thanked me and went on his merry way.

I know we were told we could embellish but I swear that is the truth.

When I was in seventh grade I met Tessa Maguire. She offered me some pot in the eighth grade, and I smoked it with her. Edit undo.
I stopped caring about life, because I realized life didn’t care about me.
We found time to get high any time that we could. It wasn’t that big of problem, I don’t think, until high school started. The only way to get through high school with any of your brains intact is to smoke lots and lots of pot.

When Tessa was a young girl, she called the fire department and told them there was a young girl stuck on a roof in her neighborhood. And then, so as not to disappoint, she took a ladder, climbed onto her roof, and kicked it away.
What other cures for boredom?

Who has the philosophy power?
Hello my name is Tessa Maguire and I do.
I’m addicted to heroin, cocaine, crystal meth, Mexican A, ecstasy, marijuana, cigarettes, alcohol, and chocolate.
(I just can’t get enough sweets.)

“Everybody was drunk.”
– Ernest Hemingway

When Tessa and I were in the play was when the drugs started getting out of hand. One time, Tessa lay flat out in front of the car that I was driving illegally. “Come on,” she said, “run me over. Do it. Kill me.” I started to accelerate but my friend, in the car with me, stopped me. Tessa stood up, laughing.
“You were really gonna do it, weren’t you? You were gonna kill me?
“That is hilarious.”

Tessa’s favorite book is The Great Gatsby. Her favorite poet is T.S. Eliot.
Tessa was a Buddhist and believed in reincarnation. She was lovely.

She liked to write poetry and stories. She once wrote a story about a boy in Essexville who had to go away to war and died. But before he had to go he had to say good-bye to his girlfriend. So he wanted to say good-bye to her quietly, in a romantic sort of way. But the girl was having a party at her house, and was completely drunk.
So they didn’t have a really great good-bye.
Then he went away to war and died.

Morning bell
Morning bell
Light another candle and
Release me
Release me

You can keep the furniture
A bump on the head
Howling down the chimney
Release me
Release me
Please
Release me

i’m a little rose bleu
short and bleu
here is my rose bleu
here is my bleu
when I get all bleued up
hear me bleu
tip me over and bleu me out

Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa Tessa

“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”
– William Shakespeare

Tessa moved to New York City last year to make it big as an actress. From there, she made her spectacular exit as an actress off the stage. She jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge and into the cool water.
I can still see her face. She was beautiful.
I need something to drink.

I am falling
I can see the flowers
I can see the falling
Flowers lightly falling
I can see the cherry blossoms in the wind
I am a cherry blossom in the wind
Floating in the air
Floating in the water
I am the lotus blossom,
Floating gently on your pond.
Life is a circle,
Soul circle, darling, love, and o darling o love?
…. see you in the next life.

As I write this I am filled with self-doubt. Does any of this mean anything? What is the importance of any of this? What is Beauty? What is Art? What is heaven? What is hell? Does this answer any of those questions? Am I even here right now?
You are stupid, Dan, stupid and ugly and weird. You are a failure in every sense of the word, and everyone knows it. Everyone is laughing at you and thinks you are the stupidest, ugliest, weirdest failure that they have ever seen. You don’t know how to write and this autobiography sucks, and besides that, it almost seems as if you think somebody would even care to read it. No one would. It is the worst thing that was ever written. You ought to have never even been born, to be such a stupid waste of flesh-matter. But now that you are alive, you’d be better off dead than to waste all the precious resources used to keep you alive. If you were dead at least you wouldn’t be such a big disappointment.
Nobody expects much from a dead person.

“There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy.”
– Albert Camus
“Philosophy makes me want to get drunk.”
– Tessa Maguire

When Dan Perz was forty years old (in the year 2025) he was working in a pornography shop in Chicago. It was owned by a sixty-eight year old lesbian named Maggie. He’d been fired from his teaching job, divorced by his wife, his daughter hated him, and he was selling porn to perverts in a bad part of town. He’d never imagined his life would turn out like this. Oftentimes he muttered to himself about John Penniel, “that sellout” and he’d wonder what the point of it all was. “Damn the masses,” he said, “they don’t know anything.”
“I was going to be an artist,” he said.






























































And then he thought about it for a while, and decided






“Any significance to this???”
– Mrs. Irving



“Dan,
I do appreciate originality + creativity, but once all quotes (borrowed materials) are removed, there’s not much left. You are bright. You can do this assignment. This is a cop-out, esp. printing the same thing several times. CR.”
– Mrs. Irving

































John Penniel looked at Tessa and said:
“I want a black leather jacket,
I want cool John Lennon glasses,
I want silver Andy Warhol hair,
I want rockin eighties shoes,
But most of all, I want you.”
Tessa snorted a line of coke. “Jesus,” she said. “You speak in fucking poetry. Could you fuck me again?”
They fucked.

Meanwhile, Dan Perz flipped through a collection of the world’s greatest art with one hand, and jerked himself off with the other.

ooooh oooh
oh yeah, that’s good
ooooooooooh
keep doin that
oh oh oh ah oh love oh love
oh love oh love oh
love oh love oh
oh love oh
oh love
oh

John and Tessa lay in bed, smoking cigarettes.
Tessa wrote in her diary. John asked if he could read it. “Fuck you,” Tessa said. She took a drag on her cigarette.
“Fuck everyone,” she said.

Dan Perz looked at the semen stained face of the Mona Lisa.
He thought a minute. Then he finally said:
“I think it looks better that way.”
He closed the book.













Chapter 2:
Crackpipes and Roses

“see the crown of purples roses
see the hypocrite lecteurs, lies!
see the bright star in the sky
burn out your fuckin eyes
fuck you and the doctor
you can go back to hell
we’ve all got cancer here in this waste land
we’ve all got cancer here in America
(welcome to America)”

– Tessa Maguire
“DOWN WITH THE WORLD BANK
DOWN WITH THE IMF
DOWN WITH THE U.S. GOVERNMENT
DOWN WITH THE ROMAN EMPIRE.”
– scratched on a desk at Garber High School

I don’t know what this assignment is supposed to be anymore.
I thought the first chapter would be enough, but I guess it wasn’t. I don’t think it explains very well what I was trying to say, as I’ve been asked to rewrite it. I guess the story was far too “disjointed” and “unintelligible.” I suppose that I expected the reader to put more time and effort into understanding it than I even put into writing it. So I apologize.
However, I am a bit angry with the reader who didn’t understand the point of part one. So I take away six points, and rescind the comment made at the very beginning of part one. I said that you, the reader, had the Magic. I’ve decided that you don’t. And without it, you’re just another normal person.
Just another normal person.
What is normal?
You are.

Okay. I admit it. I lied. Tessa didn’t die in New York City. She did go there to become an actress. I thought she would make it. If anyone deserved to make it, she did. But she didn’t. She failed. She couldn’t handle the pressures of big city life and she came back here.
I thought it would be more romantic or something, having her take the plunge off Brooklyn Bridge in utter despair over the meaninglessness of life. But she didn’t.
It didn’t happen.
She came back to Essexville, which is, in many ways, worse.

Tessa and John Penniel and I are all students in Mrs. Irving’s Advanced Placement English course, the class for which I am writing this autobiography.
Mrs. Irving told me she wanted some more plot.
I hope she’s ready for this.

Tessa drove me to the local 7-11 one day. She took me inside, and she bought a rose. The stem of the rose was kept in a small, thin plastic tube.
“Tessa,” I said, “why did you buy that?”
She said, “the tube can be used to snort coke.”
“Hey, Dan.” She grinned. “Did you ever do coke?”
I shook my head. “Well, let’s go,” she said.
She threw the rose out the window, where it landed in a pile of garbage.

This happened on Tuesday, March 4, 2003.
The same day I got back part one of this autobiography, and was told that it had to be rewritten.

“I don’t think Mrs. Irving liked my paper that much,” I said. We were in Tessa’s bedroom. I’d just snorted coke for the first time in my life. I was feeling pretty good. But still, having to rewrite this autobiography was bothering me.
Tessa did a line.
She looked at me. “Dan. Don’t worry about it. Mrs. Irving doesn’t know what she’s talking about. You’re brilliant. When you’re a world-famous author some day, I think she’ll come around.” She handed me the tube.
I did a line.
“I’ll never be world-famous. I’ll be one of those writers who’ll never be recognized during his lifetime. Only when I’m dead will somebody realize that I was a genius.”
“Hey,” Tessa said, “did it burn the first time you snorted?”
“What?”
“The coke. Did it burn?”
“No, not really.”
“Wow, it almost always burns the first time you snort. You must be a natural.”
We laughed.
I was a natural coke-addict.

Fuck. Fuck. I’m going to kill myself.


“A first sign of the beginning of understanding is the wish to die.”
– Kafka

“What’s the point of it all anyway?”
“The point is love,” I said. “The point of the meaninglessness of life is to love. Love, love, all the time the fucking love. All you need is love. John Lennon said that. Love, love, all you need is love. I love everything. Tessa. You have to make me remember this. Because everything’s beautiful right now, and I need to remember it. You have to tell me to remember this moment when I’m depressed. I’m on coke, in your room, talking to you, and it’s beautiful. I have no idea what I just said. Do you have any more?”
“I’m all out, darling,” she said. “But I know where to get more.”

“You know this is like a dream for me. Ever since I’ve known you I’ve been in love with you.”
“Life is but a dream,” she said. She lit a cigarette.

Row, row row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
Life is but a dream.


John Penniel John Penniel John Penniel John Penniel John Penniel John Penniel John

“Are you trying to sneak a look at my dick? Listen, Perz, if you want to see my dick you’ve got to buy me dinner first.”
– John Penniel, at the urinal
John Penniel was a success at everything he did.
He was better looking, smarter, taller, stronger, and cooler than me. He was a much better writer.
When he got back his autobiography, he didn’t get it back with a
CREDIT
On it and he wasn’t asked to rewrite it.
Instead, he got an
A +.

Last summer (hotter than most due to
GLOBAL WARMING
) John Penniel and Tessa Maguire were dating.
Naturally, I was jealous.

What happened was
I kicked down the door of 205 sunshine avenue tessa’s house marched up the stairs to the two them in bed naked and fucking. When I came in the room they broke apart and I took a moment to look at tessa’s naked body. Then I took out the gun and shot tessa in the heart – one two three times – she was dead – then I shot John in the head and his brains and blood splattered on the Mona Lisa painting hanging over the bed then I turned the gun around on myself tasted the gun oil and nearly gagged then blew my brains out while the headlines flew through my mind
TEENAGE LOVE TRIANGLE LEADS TO MURDER SUICIDE
zoom in on the bloodstained Mona Lisa.

Author’s Note:
I was warned by a friend who read the rough draft of this that this section of the story might get me in trouble at school. Surprisingly, and in character, I hadn’t thought of this possibility myself. So just to let the reader know: I did not actually murder two people and then commit suicide, nor am I planning to, nor is this a cry for help of any kind. And I really think it is sad that I have to write this here to make sure that you, o Reader, know this. Because it just goes to show that students don’t really have freedom of speech. Anyway, that is my disclaimer. I’ll probably be expelled anyway.

“Hey, Dan,” Tessa said, “whatchya thinking about?”
“Oh, nothing,” I said.
.dias I “,gnihton ,hO”
“?tuoba gnikniht ayhctahw” ,dias asset “,naD ,yeH”

“What do you think I should do for this autobiography thing, Tess?”
“Darling,” Tessa said, “I really thought the first one was good enough. I thought it was brilliant. Mrs. Irving doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
“Yeah, I’m sure she was just jealous of my brilliant writing style, Tessa. You just like it because you know me. Pretty much, the first story was a failure as a work of art. It’s unintelligible to anyone who doesn’t know me. I don’t think Mrs. Irving could understand it. And if Mrs. Irving doesn’t understand it that means no one will. I’m a failed artist. I mean, what’s the point of art if nobody will understand it? Art is supposed to be universal.”
“Dan,” she said.
“I’m a failure in everything I try to do. I’m a failure even in things that I don’t try to do. Do you know I’m failing like half my classes this year? I didn’t get in to U of M. I’ve been rejected by everything, and everyone, all my life. And now this. Everything I do is wrong.”

Here is Dan Perz’s rejection letter:
Dear Dan:
We’re sorry.
At this time
We’re unable to
Accept you.
So instead
WE REJECT YOU!!!
-Dean of Admissions
Story of my life, he thinks.

Tessa leaned forward.
“Dan?” she said.
“What?”
“Kiss me.”
She kissed me.

Do you believe in magic in a young girl’s heart?
How the music can free her, whenever it starts
And it’s magic, if the music is groovy
It makes you feel happy like an old-time movie
I’ll tell you about the magic, and it’ll free your soul
But it’s like tryin to tell a stranger bout rock and roll…

“Jesus,” I said, “did we just make out for like three hours?”
“Seemed more like a minute,” Tessa said.
“Do you know,” she said, “sometimes late at night on turn on rap music and strip? By myself. I can’t believe I just said that.”
“You strip?” I said. “That’s wonderful. Wanna strip for me?”
“Sure,” she said. She turned on the radio. A rap station was on.
She stripped.

Later, I had Tessa read chapter two.
“This,” she said, “is nothing but sex, drugs, and rock and roll. I like it. I don’t know if Mrs. Irving will, though.”
“But it’s our lives,” I said.
“Our lives do not make good poetry,” Tessa said.

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty, – that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
– Keats

Speaking of Keats, John Penniel’s first poem was on the subject of Keats. He wrote it when he was seven years old.

john keats
john keats
john keats
Why don’t you put a coat on?
– Penniel

Why does Tessa love John Penniel and not me?
Why is this autobiography so horribly written?
This is an awful autobiography.
Awful, awful, awful.

All this beautiful language –
It falls to ashes
Burnt paper, dust and dreams
Sound of an alto-sax next door
We Russian dancers live on nothing but
Smoke and water
We danse like you’ve never seen before
Oh out the door, before
Out the door, before
You ever see us we’re out the door
(take a breath)
hypocrite poseurs!
Artistes and danseurs and ecrivains
All you literary types
Go back to your midnight cafes
We don’t want you anymore
We’ll take care of you with the
The Fireworks
This is America
And we don’t have to take it
We don’t have to take it!

This is not the same
This is not the sane
Why don’t you just write something normal?
Always always a failure why don’t you ever try dan? You could be an a student dan. I would like you dan but you never try. You’re so smart dan but it’s all a waste so smart so smart but a waste a waste a waste such a
Waste
I AM NOT FREE.
I AM NOT FREE.
I AM NOT FREE.

I feel horrible.
About everything.
I am a horrible person.


“Why don’t you just write something about your childhood?” Tessa asked me.
“Because,” I said, “I don’t even want to think about my childhood.”
“What was so bad about your childhood?”
“Nothing. My parents fought a lot. I didn’t have many friends. Okay? I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Fine. If you don’t want to talk about it…”
“I don’t.”
“Fine.”

one time sue got really mad at sara and I and I don’t remember exactly why but I think it may have had something to do with cleaning our room or something but I don’t remember the transgression as much as I remember the punishment. she told us she was going to put us up for adoption. she told us to pack all our things. we were crying and packing all our toys in our little backpacks. we weren’t packing anything we might actually need, just toys. we packed a toy dinosaur. I remember packing a toy dinosaur. we were crying. then she took our backpacks and put them in the trunk and put us in the car and started driving. we were going to the adoption agency, she told us, where we could find a new family that we could get along with. finally we got there and she told us to get out the car go inside and told us we’d have to live there. we started crying again and told her we wouldn’t leave and that we were sorry for everything we’d done wrong. she didn’t say anything, but drove us to 7-11 and bought us slurpees

Suddenly I remembered the future.
A happy time? I don’t know.
We were sitting on the beach. (The year was 2025. The place was Hawaii.)
“Look, honey, look,” my wife said. “Look at little Tabitha.”
I looked at my daughter. She had gone out by herself, and was walking on the water.
“Look, Daddy!” she said. “I’m walking on water.”
“Now isn’t that a strange thing,” I said. “That’s awful strange, don’t you think darling?”
“Maybe it’s something to do with those vitamins we gave her. You think?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
Tabitha laughed, and it echoed through all of space-time.

Wednesday, March 5, 2003
Today was a snowday. Snow piled up in big drifts around my house. I am stranded, isolated, alone. What’s going on. Forget it. Forget it. Forget it. Is this a journal. Yes. I wish I was free. I’m free from school. There is no school. What does this mean. It means nothing. I am a genius. I am a saint. I am the pope. I am god. Who cares. I care. Only I care. I’m so self-absorbed. I wish I weren’t so self-absorbed. But I am. And I’m stupid. Don’t forget stupid. I’m very stupid. I like snow. Look at the snow. It looks like. It looks like snow. Damn metaphors. Why am I even writing this anyway. None of it means anything. You think writing things down gives them meaning. You are wrong. Why don’t you use question marks. I’m done with question marks. I don’t want to see another question mark ever again in my life. I’m done with symbols. I’m done with words. I won’t talk with words anymore. Words don’t work anyway. Words aren’t universal. Not everybody knows all words. Or my language. Well. Be like Hemingway. Hemingway wrote with little words. But then he shot himself. I don’t want to shoot myself. Even though I shot myself in the story. But that was just a symbol. I’m done with symbols. I’m done with words. I’m done with everything. I’m done with the autobiography. But nothing is resolved. Oh well. Nothing is resolved. It’s like life. I hate life. I hate the autobiography. It’s killing me. I try to write something anything but nothing makes my life sound good. It’s not good anyway you cut it. Tessa’s good but still I’m a failure. I love Tessa but I love ideas more and my ideas never work. Always failure. This is a failure. Failed art. Words can never express. Words can never express. Words can never express


pineappel


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