A soccer match where I am playing all my elementary school friends all grown up. They are razzing my team before hand but I am tough and confrontational and tell them where im coming from – challenge them to fight.
In the game we score the first goal off a penalty kick when someone is unapologetically pulling my arm down while I have the ball within the 18yard line. Someone else takes the kick before I know whats going on. The second is another direct kick from farther out, when a girl I used to be friends with falls on me and then when I get up, deliberately falls on me again. The ref has been watching these things, I am controlling the game. I take the shot from the right side of the field and it curves into the left corner. No one applauds, we just run back to our positions. I drop back to stopper, I had been playing striker and instruct my team to play defensively. Our left wing is from the other side and she has her bags with her on the field, having to leave early. We put her there because that is where she can do the least damage.
Suddenly the field changes and in order to score a goal, we have to kick it into a large fish tank at the bottom of a hill. One of my teammates goes to the bottom, right by the tank and bounces the ball up to me against the glass. I am at the top of the hill and can barely see where I’m shooting for since theres a wall between me and the goal. It is like a game of tennis where all I can do is return the ball and hope for the best. On the fourth try I get it in and the game is over.
The field is set up between city blocks and there are no spectators, just buildings. I have to ride in a canoe with one of my opponents, a good looking man who I knew as a boy but do not remember. He is rowing and congratulating me. We are talking about music and I invite him to jam later, because this version of me plays guitar.
There is a bus ride home where we drive through my old neighborhood. Everyone behind me talks about the changes to the streets. I have my headphones on and am actively not participating in the conversation, but no one seems to mind.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Monday, January 4, 2010
the reaction
scene - indoor hotel balcony - early evening
we are sitting at a bar, my friend and i. we are half celebrating, half mourning the success of a scheme, having made a business of diy prayer beads. we have a collection of charms that people have wanted to incorporate into their design, each with a meaning, each with a ghost. we are feeling guilty and trying to talk ourselves, each other, into believing we are doing something good.
there is a man in a suit walking a flight below us. the floor is round and polished and his footsteps echo against them. when the sounds stop we look up and he is there, offering us something we don't want. he is tall. handsome. mysterious. he is everyone we ever locked eyes with on the subway, he is no one we've ever met.
we giggle.
he starts talking to us and we listen for traces of an accent. he is some mix of farm and city grown. he is impossible to place. this is just a way to make some extra money he says really i work in television. me too! i exclaim perhaps too excited and my friend rolls her eyes and turns back to her cocktail.
he asks for my number and stands to the side. i pull a cocktail napkin off a stack and start writing my name, but it doesn't come out right. i pull another and another, each time giving myself a new name, slightly off, slightly wrong. i am panicking. my friend is laughing at me. it has been far longer than it takes to write a name and number.
he thinks we're toying with him, deciding on a fake name or number and he comes over. nevermind bitch! he yells this or something like it, where it stings and the words are immediately forgotten, soaked up into your skin. it feels like failure.
we are sitting at a bar, my friend and i. we are half celebrating, half mourning the success of a scheme, having made a business of diy prayer beads. we have a collection of charms that people have wanted to incorporate into their design, each with a meaning, each with a ghost. we are feeling guilty and trying to talk ourselves, each other, into believing we are doing something good.
there is a man in a suit walking a flight below us. the floor is round and polished and his footsteps echo against them. when the sounds stop we look up and he is there, offering us something we don't want. he is tall. handsome. mysterious. he is everyone we ever locked eyes with on the subway, he is no one we've ever met.
we giggle.
he starts talking to us and we listen for traces of an accent. he is some mix of farm and city grown. he is impossible to place. this is just a way to make some extra money he says really i work in television. me too! i exclaim perhaps too excited and my friend rolls her eyes and turns back to her cocktail.
he asks for my number and stands to the side. i pull a cocktail napkin off a stack and start writing my name, but it doesn't come out right. i pull another and another, each time giving myself a new name, slightly off, slightly wrong. i am panicking. my friend is laughing at me. it has been far longer than it takes to write a name and number.
he thinks we're toying with him, deciding on a fake name or number and he comes over. nevermind bitch! he yells this or something like it, where it stings and the words are immediately forgotten, soaked up into your skin. it feels like failure.
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