Arms and arms, layers of flesh, wavering. In the bouncing colored lights they appear myriad. Suppliant, seeking. Seeking the air, seeking the person next to them. Seeking out the famous who watch from worlds of glass above. Faces turned upward, a few of them think they are seeing God...
... Where are you....
Colored lights move against their faces. Beautiful faces. Ecstatic faces. O, it is glorious. This is a night among nights...
A night among nights...
He woke up on pillows of fantastic colors, more fantastic than these lights. He saw his reflection in the glass, the same glass that once heralded his presence in your life again. In this club. This club that became a Home. Untethered, he clung to you. He clung to you, Julian, for dear life...
For dear life...
The devastation...
The colossal wreck of millennial loneliness and despair, from which only poor memory saved him, stood in front of those mirrors. He looked himself. He looked at the wreck of his wings, bony reminders of the light that once shone there. And he stared.
Even as he is staring now, down at the waving arms of all the dancers, down at their bodies and their writhing, their pleasure and their enjoyment. They think they are happy. Some of them are. Many, many more are not.
Gorgeous, dressed in powder-pink vinyl pants and nothing else, Pharzuph stands before your Looking Glass, arms folded at his chest. He's not drinking, he's not sucking on fruit, he's not running around the room like a colossal idiot. He's just... standing there...
Standing there...
Eyes drift down to his bare feet and watch the curling of his toes with equal interest.
"What is it?" Julian asks, feet padding on the carpeted floor. There can't be anything so interesting out there. It's one night, like most of the others. A packed house, vip rooms, and unrelated rooms within Julian's space in the adjacent building. "Hungry?" he asks, not paying too much attention. This room he likes. His in-club space. From here, the vip and observation glass fronts are visible. Here? Well, everyone can spot the reflective glass, but those who see the inside number in the single digits.
"Look, Dot brought a bit of food. There's even some curry here to nibble on," Julian smiles, reaching down to tap a few spoons from a silver dish onto a small, curved plate. "And tandoori. Your favorite," he adds. The dishes rattle from where Julian stands, as he says 'shit' softly when a bit of curry falls onto the fluttering edge of his open black shirt. "Fine, I'm a total pig tonight," he laughs, reaching to pick up his pint and drink from it. Apparently he has no plans to be seen on the floor tonight. As far everyone's concerned -- save those special staffers -- he's out for the night.
A man needs to take a break sometime.
"Here," Julian whispers, walking towards with a fork, "...taste..."
When Pharzuph turns his head, the sultry smile does not follow, or the thousand scattered ruminations of an equally scattered mind. His eyes are quite clear and his expression is placidly exquisite...
But if one were to guess, one might think the expression was Thoughtful. Thought-full. Thought. Pharzuph?
He leans forward as you come to him, his eyes looking at the food and the fork quite like it was the first time to see such a thing. That's... wonder. And he closes his eyes, he breathes in the taste of it and then lets the pierced tongue complete the process.
When Pharzuph's mouth closes, his eyes open and his eyes leak. Too spicy? The first food he remembers eating. He holds it in his mouth for a tiny forever. Then you see the mouth remembering it must do something and he begins to chew, and lastly swallow. Gold-cinnamon-bronze-brass eyes sparkle with the wetness and with something one might call a Memory if one didn't know better.
A few moments later, Pharzuph smiles. And that is a look you have not seen in a thousand-thousand years. The smile knows why it exists. He doesn't lick the fork suggestively or seek to kiss you immediately, though he does openly stare at you.
"Thank you," Pharzuph says. He looks to the flat stomach disappearing in powder-pink pants, then to you in your black. "How is it made?" he asks, his voice is a smooth and soft modulation, a tenor that moans sweetly you recall. And now it reaches out like the tentative hands of the newly blind... or the newly born...
"Um," Julian says, coming out of his stare, "...I don't really know. They get it from a place in town, I guess. Pashmina's more than likely," he says for the record. Julian takes another taste, offering a second as he enjoys his.
"You never said what was going on?" Julian asks again, looking over to see out of the window. "Nothing, really." Only he can say that about such a club.
He takes a second taste. It may as well be manna. His hand comes to rest on your side as he stands with you. "I was watching the people dance. And thinking," what? "...how ... I don't remember getting here," Pharzuph finishes in a whisper. "I... do remember... Everything Else," he says.
And he waits for another bite, his eyes lowering to the fork. "They are just ... pictures," he whispers, eyes lifting at last. "They are pictures without... meaning... a lot of bodies, cominglilng. Shining towers and temples filled with ... all manners of things." He narrows his eyes at you, peering. Both in concentration... what?... and in stretching back over a canvas of memories a thousand-thousand-thousand years old.
But they are pictures, just pictures without meaning.
When he looks at you, head lifting and inclining, he faces you without artifice. Just the old sorrow of old knowledge and old wounds. "I'm sorry... it is just... I feel like I have woken from a Sleep of Ages, Ra..."
The grimace is sudden. He listened, but then the word was to be uttered.
"Julian. I'm Julian..."
Julian takes another bite, bringing the dish to his mouth first. The fork is lowered, though he stares over the plate between with some frustration.
"Maybe you have," Julian says. "Something...is happening. You came to talk to me some time ago," two years now "...and you're still here is all. That's how you got here. The mirror in my room."
Simple answer to a simple question. Julian offers another bite before turning to set the mostly-devoured course aside.
He looks out to the crowd, Julian does, seeming to make the same assessment. "They are," he explains. "That's all. A means to do what we need, to get what we deserve." Essence. Pleasure. "And we do that," he states rather unemotionally. "That's all." That's all there is. Just us.
"We have done a great many things," Pharzuph murmurs, another bite taken. "I... have done a great many things to many people. I think... I thought..." those words! "... that it was love, the way Love should have been."
But...
"What do I know... I do not know things I used to know. I can only remember Forgetting..." He came here some two years ago, some two years ago when Andrealphus left his throne never truly to return. And Pharzuph came here. He did not know why. He only thought you might know. And he stayed.
"Julian," Pharzuph murmurs, as if trying the name on, "...What ... is it that we ... deserve? Do we love them?" he wonders, glancing to the writhing mass of humanity. "The pictures... in my brain... I just see a lot of ..." He goes red, flaming Icarian red as if his cheeks were melting wings, "...copulating. I mean, you and I... and then ... me with ... so many... and you with others... and palaces full of it. I know it happened but... I don't feel it... It's like I sat back and watched it, R..Julian..."
"We did, we have," Julian says, not really wishing this conversation. "We have for a long time. Done things. It's what we do."
As for what's deserved and anything else, Julian is quiet.
"And in the night, sometime in the morning, we'll feel differently. We always do. It's essence and it's for us, alright?"
Julian frowns and turns, going for his pint, "Want a drink? I'll make you one."
It is what we do...
It is who we are...
"Yes, a drink please. And then no more questions..."
For now...
Pharzuph turns from the humanity, his eyes and mind and soul are full. Full. There is so much trying to process at once. So much to process. So many pictures. But there's nothing behind it. Chimes ring as he plays with the bells in his tongue, getting familiar with it, and likewise the chiming bells pierced in his navel. The feeling it inspires causes him to ripple. Pleasure. Rhythmic chiming of such bells, these gave birth to Fornication.
Now, that he feels...
Pharzuph's gold-brass-cinnamon-bronze eyes go incense smoky. Looking up through lashes to you, he smiles. "We are interminable," a big word, "...you and I... Julian. I am here with you and as long as we are together. You held my hand," he murmurs, "...now I want you to hold something else..."
His words and his desire are echoed by the rhythmic singing of chimes as his finger flicks and rolls over his bellybutton.
Near the bar and the food, Julian looks up. He's pulled back on a tap, and his eyes narrow as the suggestion is made. He knows it for what it is -- he helped invent it.
But you never know.
"Hold what?" Julian smiles, letting his humor show. "Your pint?" he asks, moving around the bar again. "I think you should hold it. And eat more food. Sure you don't want the tandoori?"
Tandoori...
Oh, you were feeding me this...
He looks from you to the food and then he is in motion. Not the lilting, prancing, skipping, dancing slither of the Genius of Fornication, but the soft, confident, beautiful stride of the Angel of the Songs of Love, creator of the first Love Ballads.
... Do you remember what it was like when he would walk in a room? There was metre borne in it, soft like the starting strains of what would one day become Mozart -- an inspiration given to Amadeus by an angel who once hummed the tune that Pharzuph's motion created...
He lifts the fork and begins to feed himself. "It is more fun when you hold it, as I recall," he shoots right back. "I like to see you smile, Julian. You are the most beautiful creature save One, when you smile," Pharzuph flirts but not in his usual rolling on his back with his legs in the air and both cocks in his hand kind of way. "And I like it better," he sets the fork down, "...when you feed me."
"Oh," Julian's brows lift and he smirks. "Demanding." As you used to be. As if I should follow you. And I did, Ages ago...
"Fine," he says, "...if it'll get you to eat something. Here," Julian exchanges, offering a pint for the fork. "Not bad is it?" he muses, filling a fork with rice and some curry with indeterminable meat items. "There's lentils too, and dal..."
The fork is then offered, filled with the scents of India. "If you don't eat it fast, I will," Julian notes, eyes on the forkful.
He leans in, he closes his eyes when he takes it in his mouth as if it were communion. He holds it there, tasting a land that matches the memories in his mind. Feeling each little grain, tasting each separate spice. This is cardamon. This is curry. "It is very spicy," he says, swallowing. He takes the pint as you command the fork. When food is swallowed, it is followed by a sip.
That beautiful mouth opens, the chiming of the piercing bell sweetly singing, his throat mimics the sound, and then he smiles. That is the first time his throat has played a note in a thousand-thousand-thousand years.
"After I eat, then will you hold me, Julian," the name becomes easier to use. His mouth speaks it readily, though his eyes insist on Ramariel. "I ... need you," he whispers. I love you.
"If you," Julian leans in, "...finish more food, finish your drink," he smiles, "...you'll have me. How about that?" he asks, glancing to the other bits of food on the bar. "Agreed? Maybe we'll dance a little...a shower together...and then we'll do what we do best, hmm?"
The last bit is shoveled onto the fork and offered. A slide of rice there, a dollop of curry, helped by fingers. Julian licks his own as he offers the fork again. "I can do more than hold you, you know," he reminds.
He eats again, his mouth opening and closing over the fork. And then there it is, a classic look. A classic Pharzuph face from Long Ago. A waggle of eyebrows and then they stay lifted as if to say: Well, why not?
He laughs in his throat as you shovel the food in his mouth. "Yes," he laughs a little and speaks with his mouth blessedly full, "... I think I need to be reminded." His delicate hands reach for the pint, he takes another drink to wash it all down.
"One more bite," he says, "... I will save the rest for After," with a capital A. "I will feed you then," Pharzuph says, leaning in for another bite, "...and I will sing to you, peel grapes, rub fine oil into your skin..."
"No, maybe I should be reminded," Julian says softly, mostly to himself. That small dish is all done. He hadn't expected to share most of it. "And what do you mean one more bite? I thought we were just agreeing to finishing more food. Not just a bite."
Pharzuph smiles around the fork, looking at you beneath a veil of golden lashes. "Maybe," he whispers. "Okay... I will finish it." Golden curls are tossed a little as he sits back, mouth pulling at the fork. Brat! And with a wink he curls the pint upward and a big swallow of the liquid. There's only half as much left when he sets it down.
"It is very good, tandoori," Pharzuph remarks. "I do not remember the taste of it. The word, I recall. But... the taste I did not. Until you showed me tonight... Julian. If I am going to learn," Pharzuph says as he leans in, "...I want to learn from none other than you. For I have loved you best of all the universe..."
Learn? That's what Julian doesn't get. "What do you mean, learn?" he asks, fixing another small plate. He's left the fork for now. A bit of tandoori chicken, seasoned and bright red, is put onto the plate. More curry. Must be lamb. And this time, a bit of lime pickle and slices of pineapple in rice. The last, his personal request.
"You are one of the oldest of us. What is there for you to learn?"
A golden eyebrow cants upward, "Everything," he whispers. "For though I remember all the pictures of things I have seen for this... life... they are only pictures. To be whole," such a word, "... I must taste the tandoori," a smile, "... as well as know that it exists. But that is okay, I am a fast learner," that was most definitely a purr.
He has memories but not experiences. Such an odd combination.
"I do not want to miss anything," that old curiosity, that old ... lust... for knowledge of the things of Love, now lust. He drinks while you prepare a plate. He stares at you. "Feed me ... on your lap," he suggests suddenly. "Like the other night," when you and he fed one another orange slices soaked in brandy and champagne as he swiveled on your lap.
Julian looks up again, his brows in furrows. It's that way all the time now. Memories. Demands. Satisfaction. Lust. Love. "I don't have enough energy," Julian smiles, the lie so easily on his lips along with the reticence. "Besides. We have food to finish," Julian grins, returning with a plate. He smiles once at the bar, picking up his drink and setting down his plate. Hip leans on a barstool, and with his free hand, Julian begins to handle the fork once more.
"I think it's lamb in the curry," Julian explains. "And pineapple rice."
Pharzuph leans forward in anticipation of the fork, his parted mouth forming a smile as he waits. It is an acquiescent look on the surface, but it comes with the fullness of... confidence, surity and command. Blonde curls bounce in the motions, and a hand slips out of sight.
Chiming bells sound a moment later as his hand disappears in powder-pink vinyl...
He closes his eyes, imprinting flavors and then sits a little back. "You are going to make me fat," he murrs around food, mouth full.
"Now why would I do that?" Julian asks, scooting more on the barstool. A hop up would have been undignified. "See?" he says, countering the idea by taking a large fork of food for himself. "There. If we get fat, we get fat together," he grins, following it up with a drink.
He laughs a little, appearing quite delighted at that prospect. He even leans back, his hand coming out of his pants to pat his belly. He laughs again, that same hand reaching for the drink when you finish.
"We can just...roll wherever we go, My Beloved," he whispers, leaning in to kiss your shoulder. When he sets the glass aside, he rests his hand on your thigh. Still tickled, Pharzuph laughs again. Me! Fat!
After another moment, he sits back, seemingly content to watch you sit and eat. He stares at each part of you, as if imprinting the experience of you on top of the pictures of you in his mind...
Julian gives a glance at the name, then smiles weakly as he goes to fish another fork for himself. There's quiet from him as he dances the fork in his closed mouth, the prepares another. Chewing in silence.
Pharzuph looks at you directly, then at the lights playing against the glass. "You do not like it when I call you that. Is that because of the time we spent apart...?" Gold-brass-cinnamon-bronze eyes look to you.
"No," Julian replies softly, finishing with a swallow while offering another bite. "That's not it," he adds, smiling a little as he waits for the acceptance. "What does Beloved mean?" he asks suddenly.
Pharzuph lifts an eyebrow as he leans in, mouth closing around the fork. His eyes lower, as if in submission -- as in former days. Now, it is in thought. "I have loved you," he says, "I loved you long ago. More than all the others, except for Love Itself." Of course. "And... so... Beloved is... one who is loved."
Don't you know this?
"Love is Desire," he repeats Andrealphus' old mantra, "...and desire is love. The two... are inseparable. Lust is Desire given power and so Lust if Love empowered. Who lusts that does not also Love?"
Julian sets the now-empty fork down with a clatter on the plate. He swallows and shakes his head, "It's a lie," he says, "...a lie. There is no love. No songs." Not anymore. "None of it. It wasn't real then," Julian implores, "...and it's not now. And we changed," he says earnestly, swearing by it. "We changed and we said it was no more. Don't you remember that too?"
"No, that is not true," Pharzuph whispers, leaning in, this time not for the pineapple rice. "That is not true, Ramariel," he speaks your name. He does not remember that, for what could Pharzuph of Then recall at all? He only has the pictures of all the things he's done and words and terms and data that requires Understanding.
"Love was not a lie. Hearts were simply broken. We have tried to put them back together," he looks suddenly sad. "I do not think that it is working."
"Do you not care for me? For if Love did not exist, if it were just a lie, why would I be here? Why would you have taken care of me? Why would you be feeding me?"
"Stop it," Julian says, recoiling and putting the palm of his hand on his head. The plate is pushed away as Julian stands from the barstool. He shakes.
"I have to go," he says, changing colors. Red spills across his features and chest. His temperature's rising. "I will...see you later. I'm going downstairs," he announces, looking around the room for his shoes.
Pharzuph recoils with you but in the opposite direction. He stands. He looks at you oddly, and then he turns away. He wanders with those soft slow steps back to the looking glass. He folds his arms against his chest and he watches humanity dancing.
"I am sorry.... Julian..."
"Maybe I should go. Things are ... not as I remember them to be," he finishes in a whisper. "Things do not make sense, all these ..... pictures..." Pharzuph leans forward and rests his forehead on the glass.
What he really remembers is being in Heaven, being sorrow-struck watching Love turn into Hate. He was so sad. So sorrowful. So crest-fallen. And then, he Forgot.
When it came back in a sudden flood, all the images of a Fallen life, he was still that entity standing on the Plain of Heaven trying to make sense of the cavalcade. It's like it happened to someone else with two cocks.
"Don't go," Julian says simply, "....just..."
Both hands come to his forehead now. An almost physical pain, ache, and sickness. Revulsion and fear.
"Just...come with me," Julian whispers. The airy quality of his voice doesn't suggest he's going downstairs.
Perhaps tandoori and spicy lamb was not a smart choice of dindin. His soul is swept over with sudden darkness that causes the full belly to grumble and toss. Pharzuph moves slowly now, the life sapped out of him.
When he steps over to you, he is crying silently, no sobs but his cheeks are wet. Such a mess in his powder-pink vinyl, part of himself hanging out from his hand's earlier groping.
Pharzuph reaches for your hand...
"Don't cry," Julian whispers, on the verge of the same. He embraces gently, pulling himself closer. "We will be fine, you and I. You and I together, alright?" Julian makes no steps to depart. He hadn't found his shoes yet. Instead, he sways as if a gentle cradle, providing comfort to two who need it most. His hands slip inside the back panels of pink vinyl pants, and Julian's eyes close.
I love you.
I hate this.
What's happened to us? And we can't go back. We can't. We're stuck with what we said forever.
Oh, God, forever is too long.
Help us...
Pharzuph comes into your arms, the hold is soft, the hold is tight. Tears leave those eyes, the eyes that see now, more clearly all the time. And in their seeing, and in his Knowing, how could there not be tears?
He closes his eyes, his arms go around you, his hips curl in as your hands work within the vinyl. His hands ball in fists at the small of your back. And he moves with you.
I love you.
God help us...
I love them all...
And what am I to do with that?
Don't leave me...
Don't leave me...
The last of the smoke of a fire that burns without Burning is blown out by a breath unbreathed. A shiver of the air and a temple dissolves like the myth everyone supposes it to be. And upon the plains of the Far Marches, a girded figure stands.
Forgive me...
It's not like I want to leave you...
But if I don't go, how will I ever take You with me?
And he stepped in the clouds. And he took his first step of a thousand-and-one-thousand.
I Love You...
(I hate leaving without saying goodbye)
O, God... please help Us...
Posted by rowan at October 25, 2003 11:00 PM
