I wrote this one without mentioning that I’m in a chair. I kept reading through it thinking how clever I was. I didn’t have to mention the chair. Yes I got a flat tyre. When I write I like to mix reality with the absurd. Re-reading this story I had to mention the chair. I had to add it to show you how absurd my reality is. I am in a wheelchair

SEXY GUTTER ANTS

I hadn’t wanted to be late so I’d left home early. She is so sexy it would be better to be an hour early than one minute late. I was halfway towards the end of the road before I realised I had a flat tyre. Shit! Man. I transferred down to the concrete. Fate had conspired against me. I couldn’t figure out if it was a sign. I went to punch the flat one and saw that they were both flat. The best laid plans of morons and men. I had to let her know. My mobile was on a private caller setting. I called her phone twice but she didn’t answer. I didn’t leave a message. Leaving a message would have made me look dumber. I wondered as to my luck. Is it better to have bad luck or no luck at all?

I don’t belong to a club so I just sat on the ground. I sat on the edge of the footpath for a moment considering my options. I saw a trail of ants leading a path to a baby possum on the side of the road. There were hundreds of ants clambering all over it. I went to see if I could help it before I realised it was dead. I didn’t feel anything when I saw it was dead. I looked at its form and became jealous for a second. It didn’t worry anymore. I saw three different people walk past it and take a photo with their iPhones. They made me feel ill. They were ghouls. It was lying on it’s back on the asphalt with its mouth open and all four of its little paws sticking up in the air. I got closer to it and saw a pink tongue sticking out the left-hand side of a mouth that will never close again. The possum was nothing while it was alive but now that it was dead it will live forever in their virtual world

I sat in the gutter and thought about my tyres and all these people walking around with cameras. It made me think of when I see people taking photos of their food. Why? The food is about to end up as excrement but as a photo it will last longer. Do you think the photos relevance means anything? Is there somebody sitting at home with their pants around their ankles masturbating over a plate of Singapore Noodles? Photography is dead as an art and has been stolen by the hoi polloi. The art of photography has been killed by their art of capturing. Some cultures believe that a piece of the soul is lost when captured by a photograph. Does the dead feel its soul being captured?

A man pulled up beside me in an old beaten Ford. Do you want a tow, he asked. I said, yes please. He got out of his car and went to the boot. He came back with a long piece of brown twine. He reached out his hand and told me his name was Turnip. I shook it and told him mine was Rancid. We had a good grip. He took off his sunglasses and handed an end to me. I looked at his eyes and saw one was missing. There was just an empty ocular cavity. It looked dry red and lonely. I asked him if the twine would hold me? Do you have any other choice, he asked? I shrugged my shoulders and reached for the other end. I had no other choice so tied it to the front of the chair. He started towing me. I had to get there so I rode the road on my flat tyres. Every time I rode over a bump I winced. I knew I was fucking the rims but I had no choice. I had to get there

The tyres of my life were flat but I want her desperately. Every time I rode over a bump I winced. I had to get there. When a man is in love he will destroy everything he owns. The boundaries of love are not seen. There is now more than one generation who no longer believe in love. They grew up watching their father’s boning their secretaries and their mothers sucking off the milkman. I knew that I could love her if she gave me the chance. I saw her from afar and I started blushing again. I called her name but she didn’t turn. My hand went up to her shoulder and she turned smiling. I gazed into her brown eyes. They were such a dark brown that they were almost black. All but one of my girlfriends has had blue eyes. She had brown eyes too. The brown-eyed girl didn’t introduce her parents to me when they came to Sydney. I’d moved in with her but when they arrived in town she told me I had to go. Go where, I asked. I don’t care, she said, you’ve just got to go. I went out that night and fucked another woman and slept with her

I had arrived outside the address but didn’t know how to let the man towing me know. I shouted, hey, he shouted back, hey, and kept driving. I saw his left hand go up and start waving at me. I slammed the brakes on my chair and almost somersaulted. I watched my end of the twine snap back towards his car. I waved my hand at him before I head him toot again. I saw his hand come out the car and change into the finger. I laughed before my hand changed into the finger also. At least we had something in common

She’d asked me to come over to her house. She had eliminated all of the guesswork. I like it when a woman makes the first move. She said, I’ve noticed that you don’t hang out with any other people in wheelchairs. Why would I? Should I hang out with them in solidarity? I don’t like most able-bodied people so the chances of me liking somebody else in a wheelchair are pretty slim. I know this is because I’ve aged. A younger person can like anybody but an older man is harder to impress. As you get older the criteria for friendship changes. Upon meeting I asked her if she believed in love? She said, for me there is no such thing. Only the dead will ever know what love is. There is now more than one generation who no longer believe in it. They grew up watching their fathers boning their secretaries and their mothers sucking off the milkman

The inside of her house was as I imagined. It was tidy and tastefully decorated. Her television was on and she was watching Man Has A Heat Attack. It’s a programme celebrating, no glorifying the gluttony of our culture. There was a morbidly obese man eating a kilogram of fried chips smothered in melted cheddar cheese, eighteen rashers of bacon and two tubs of sour cream. The man’s face was covered in grease. Both of his hands were covered in grease. He ate with gusto. The smile suddenly drained from his face as his hand clutched over his heart. The man collapsed forward into his half-eaten pile of chips. She pointed her remote at the television and said, good he’s finally dead, as she switched it off

She went to the kitchen and pulled out a large bottle of lemonade and handed it to me. She pointed to her collection of spirits. She told me to pour a couple of drinks. I told her to put the booze in. I didn’t want to be accused of trying to get her drunk. I handled her the bottle and left the room. I pretended to be busy and then came back. Both the glasses were full. She smiled at me over the top of hers.  Cheers, we said and clinked. I took a sip and coughed. Shit, I said, you like a stiff drink. They were poured straight. She smiled as she raised the drink to her mouth. She stopped with the glass before her lips and said, that’s not all that I like stiff. I blushed as I took another sip and told her I was glad. Can you get stiff, she asked? For you I already am, I replied. She looked down at the bulge in my pants and started blushing. We were even

She asked me how old I was? I told her I’d forgotten. She asked if I smoked grass? I told her no, it’s because I landed on my head. I used to know a man in NZ who grew it. I remember that. I was at his home one day when he was trimming all the cabbage from the buds. He had a big bag of it. I asked him what he was going to do with it. He told me that he normally just threw it out. I told him I would bake some biscuits with it. I don’t know if it’s because I landed on my head or because I’m getting old but I can’t remember how I found out how to do it. You had to simmer it in butter for hours or something. I think I may have left it steeping for days? It took ages for them to start working. I can’t remember how long it took but when they did we were wasted. I’ll never forget his dog. We heard its nails clattering on the hard wood floor towards us as my friend called its name. It slid into the lounge and found us. We all couldn’t stop laughing as we each called his name. The dog looked around and stopped panting. The dog had walked into the room with its tail wagging but stopped when it saw us. He looked at us then his head lowered. The dog started backing out of the lounge. It was the funniest thing I’d seen in my life. We called its name and kept laughing as the dog kept backing out. It slept outside that night

Her drink had gone straight to my head. My whole body was flushed. I couldn’t stop staring at her. My heart was in my mouth wondering if we were going to fuck. She started looking back at me. She told me, you’re lucky to have blue eyes. She said I should be proud. I shrugged my shoulders and said, whatever. It doesn’t make me proud. I didn’t have anything to do with it. I said, well you’re lucky to be so sexy. She smiled and said thanks. I had to go to the bathroom so I excused myself. I pissed, flushed then washed my hands and fixed my hair in the mirror. I must have spent too long looking at myself in the mirror because she shouted, Andy where are you? Coming, I shouted. I made it back to her. I looked and saw her cheeks were flushed. The drinks were working. I told her to hurry up and finish hers. We were about to be lucky together

Andrew Stuart Buchanan