CRAZY MORE SENSE

I’d just gotten so tired of going to the toilet. It seemed ridiculous. Do I really have to do that? I couldn’t believe that it just comes out of me like that. What a thing, to have it come out of you like that. I thought of how many times I’d gone before. I could no longer be bothered. I let it happen. Right down the left side of my trousers. It felt good, hot and wet. I’d been drinking so I wasn’t afraid of it being smelly. It felt good ‘til it felt bad. I had just pissed my pants. I looked around and no one had noticed. It felt bad, cold and wet. I had to go outside. It had felt hot but now it felt cold

A homeless man walked up towards me. He carried all of his possessions in a black plastic rubbish bag. His face, scowled by a million drinks, hung until he saw me. His long black hair was dirty but looked clean. His black beard was long and thick. There was a big piece of tomato stuck in the hair on the bottom of his chin. A mad smile stretched across his face as he pointed at me. He barked like a dog and walked towards me. He stood in front to block my way. I wondered if he’d noticed that I’d pissed myself? He had or he hadn’t. He hadn’t. He wasn’t looking at my urine. He was looking into my eyes. It felt like I was inside him for those seconds. We were both within the eye of pain. His pain was my pain and my pain was his. He asked me what I knew? I don’t know anything so I’ll tell you what I said

-I keep looking for signs…
-What do you mean, neon signs or stop signs?
-Neither
-What, give-way signs or sign language? What kind of signs are you talking about?
-If you’d just shut up for a minute I’ll tell you a story
-Of mice and men?
-I keep looking for signs… if I meet a woman one day I’ll tell myself it’s a sign if I see her the next
-That’s a sign?
-Probably not but I’m always looking for signs so I take it as one
-Take it to the limit?
-Or if I see a woman smile at me I’ll think she wants me. It always turns out to be a mirage
-A Mitsubishi Mirage?
-I used to have a hot girlfriend that my friend named Mitsubishi.
-Was it stolen?
-What?
-The hot Mitsubishi
-…
-…
-Mitsubishi couldn’t speak English very well. She asked me to move in to her studio with her
-It’s pronounced study, not studio
-I can speak English, I didn’t say study I said studio. She needed to study
-How could she ask you to move in with her if she couldn’t speak English very well?
-She spoke enough for me to understand that
-What else could you understand?
-Not much else really. All we did was fuck
-That doesn’t sound so bad
-It wasn’t
-What did you mean used to live with?
-Just that, I used to have a girlfriend called Mitsubishi who asked me to move in with her but she kicked me out. I tried to get it on with her and her best girl friend
-What?
-You heard me
-So you lived with a Mitsubishi and tried to root her best girlfriend? What was it on the same day?
-No I mean I tried to have sex with both of them at the same time
-So you lived with her and she had a girlfriend?
-I meant she had a friend who was a girl
-A lesbian?
-No if she was a lesbian I might have had both. I was just saying that it’s getting frustrating misreading all the signs
-I think you should learn sign language
-I’m not that deaf you pri ck
I know I was just saying you should learn to sign
-How would that help me?
-Well at least then you would know a sign when you see one
–

He was insane but there was sanity in his madness. I lowered my stare and went past him. I hadn’t been able to stop looking into his eyes. His eyes gave him away. He thought he was twelve. He looked like he was playing. It was staring into the eyes of madness. The sun burned brightly on me and it reminded me that we are all on fire. Some of us know how to put it out.;’]+> Sometimes crazy makes more sense

Andrew Stuart Buchanan