From the Teeth of Angels by Jonathan Carroll

Author:Jonathan Carroll [Carroll, Jonathan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-1-4532-6497-3
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2012-06-26T23:45:00+00:00

Then this quote from Diane Ackerman’s A Natural History of the Senses:

A breath is cooked air; we live in a constant simmering. There is a furnace in our cells, and when we breathe we pass the world through our bodies, brew it lightly, and turn it loose again, gently altered for having known us.

Cooked air? Photos that showed me parts of myself I was never aware of, letters I carried around and reread constantly Who was this guy? I tried hard to reconstruct what he looked like, but all I ever came up with was a nice face, glasses, tall. So when he called again, the first thing I asked him was to tell me what he looked like. He said enjoyment, spontaneity, and affection. I went, Excuse me? And he said, You asked me to describe myself. I said, Yeah, physically. Know what he said?

“I knew what you meant. Next question.”

I took a deep breath and said, “Will we ever see each other again?”

“I don’t know. Do you think it’s a good idea?”

I said, “Don’t be coy.”

“Oh, I’m not being coy. If we were to meet and it was a disaster, what then?”

“Well, it wouldn’t be, because we’ve already had our disaster; the day we met I thought you were a camera creep.” He said, “I am. I’m a professional camera creep. I don’t know, Arlen. I love writing those cards to you; they’re my oasis down here, but getting together ahh, that’s something else.”

“Why?”

“Because we both have expectations. We each know how we want the other to be. But hopes don’t usually work out in real life. As long as I can talk to you in postcards or over the phone, then you’re the Arlen I love from the movies—Lady Cool, pretty And face it: you were put off by my photos, but I was the one who saw you that way. Why would you want to meet the guy who insulted you?”

I screamed at him that I wasn’t insulted. I loved most of them, and the others Medusa wouldn’t be thrilled to see herself in a mirror! I told him Maris saw the one of me in the cafe and said I looked like the Masque of the Red Death!

He laughed and said, “But don’t you love that story? All those dumb people trying to party their way through the end of the world? Death has a sense of humor. He didn’t just come in and bust up their soirée; He dressed up in a costume like them and walked in with a drink in His hand!”

I was not interested in Edgar Allan Poe and asked him point-blank when he was coming to Vienna again. He said he didn’t know and wanted to think about it some more, the shit! I was dying, Rose! I was throwing myself at his feet, and he had to think about it some more. Talk about a smack in the face!

So fade out on that and fade in on Minnie and me sitting out on the front step, taking in the first sun of the day, when he arrived.

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