Concrete Underground, Moxie Mezcal [best books to read for teens .TXT] 📗

fussing over me. "Wow, this thing is really heavy," she commented as she lugged it out of the room.

I circled around the couch and picked the TV remote off the coffee table. There were no buttons on it, just a touch screen. I tapped the screen a couple times, but nothing happened. Then I felt around the edges and found a small black button. I pressed it, and two bottom panels butterflied out from under the accursed thing, presenting a full keyboard. Disheartened, I gave up. It felt like I had gone through a time warp or something; they didn't really keep the patients up to date on the latest technological advances in the nut house.

"Here, let me help you," Jenny said as she returned. She took the control from my hands, slid the keyboard panels back into it, and swiped her fingers across the touch screen deftly. The TV came to life; a news anchor was rambling on about some new war we had got ourselves into.

"What's with all the notebooks in your suitcase?" Jenny asked.

"You snoop too much," I replied. She laughed.

"Are the clothes you're wearing the only ones you have?" I nodded my head in response. "Okay, we'll go find you some new ones first thing in the morning. I already told the office I'd be working from home for a while so we could spend some time together. Anyways, I left a couple of towels and some sweats by the sink in the bathroom in case you want to take a shower while I get dinner ready. But we can watch a little TV first if you want."

"No," I said, glancing back at the images of soldiers marching through piles of disembodied chunks of human. "A shower sounds like the right call."

I picked up the remote and tried to turn the TV off by imitating Jenny's earlier finger movements, but I only succeeded in turning the volume up. "Here let me," she said as she took it from me again and turned it off.

"Fucking hell," I mumbled as I headed off down the hallway.

I felt out of it. Too much was happening too fast, too much newness to take in all at once. Retreating into the tight, enclosed space of the bathroom was a relief. I kept the light switched off and enjoyed the peaceful darkness.

I stared into the mirror, mesmerized by my own reflection, which I saw more clearly as my eyes adjusted to the dark. It had been years since I looked into one, and to be honest I was a little surprised by what I saw. I had aged a lot more than I expected, and I'd never really got used to all the scars and bumps I'd picked up before being locked away.

I ran my fingers over the unfamiliar terrain of my face and started to laugh.

As my laugh died down, I saw my reflection begin to frown, and it asked me, "What's so funny?"

I returned from the shower wearing a Yeah Yeah Yeahs reunion tour t-shirt and a pair of gray sweat pants. Both were a little too big for me. I found that the table had already been set for three places for dinner. Jenny was on the couch, and when she turned to see me, her jaw dropped.

I had shaved, and not just my beard - I had also taken the razor to my head and eyebrows. With my pasty, barren cranium, I looked like Bowie in The Man Who Fell to Earth.

"It looks... good," she offered. After a pause, she added, "And by good I mean creepy."

The sound of a buzzer rang out, and Jenny reached over to pick up the TV remote. The bottom of the screen displayed the word INTERCOM. "Come on up," she said aloud and tapped the the remote. INTERCOM flashed red and vanished from the screen as a the buzz sounded again.

"I hope you don't mind some company for dinner," she said as she jumped up and ran to the dinner table. She uncorked the bottle of red wine that was sitting out and filled all three glasses.

When the front door opened a minute later and I recognized the visitor, I let out a boisterous laugh.

"Tricky Nicky!" I exclaimed.

He grinned as he walked over and held out his hand. "Whatever," I scoffed and knocked his hand away, then gave him a hug.

"How the hell have you been man? You look good." I said.

"You look like a Hare Krishna," he replied with a chuckle.

"How're Andrea and the kids?" I asked.

"Actually, we've have been separated for about seven years now. She and the kids live in Arizona," he responded.

"Sorry to hear." I patted his shoulder, then looked from him to Jenny, who was smiling a bit awkwardly. Then I looked down at the men's clothes I was wearing that Jenny just happened to have lying around. "Oh man, you're fucking my sister aren't you?"

Jenny and Nick spent most of dinner catching me up on what I had missed over the last couple decades - what they'd been through in their own lives, what happened to old friends and family, stuff like that. I just soaked it all in, enjoying the taste of a home-cooked meal and savoring the half-glass of wine Jenny allowed me.

"So, D, what are your plans now?" Nick asked as he finished the last bite of his steak.

"Watch some TV, probably take a shit, then go to bed," I replied. "Maybe rub one out before I fall asleep."

Jenny nearly choked on her mouthful of wine, but Nick just laughed. "Same old D," he said. "You know what I meant, though. If you want, I can help you find some work. Just let me know what you're interested in."

"I don't think D would do very well in a nine-to-five," Jenny objected. "He's a writer who's days away from seeing his first play produced. Who knows what kind of opportunities he'll have after that?"

He looked skeptically from her to me, then drained the last of the wine in his glass. "They're really going through with it?"

"Why shouldn't they?" she asked defensively.

"Just seems like it's in kind of bad taste," he ventured.

"It is," I agreed.

Jenny just shook her head dismissively, as if to say that we both couldn't be taken seriously.

Soon we had cleared the table and settled down on the couch in front of the TV. We were watching some sitcom full of slang and pop culture references I didn't understand. I kept an eye on the other two for cues on when I should laugh so I could pretend that I got the jokes. I was afraid they might get uncomfortable otherwise.

"Oh, I almost forgot," she said suddenly as she jumped up from her seat to retrieve my gift. "Open it."

I slowly untied the silver ribbon and tore away the blue wrapping paper, revealing a large white box. I opened the lid and pulled out a mass of crumpled blue tissue paper. At the bottom of the box was a grotesque black gunmetal mask, covered in boils and with a large bulbous nose. I lifted it out of the box and looked at Jenny.

"What's that?" Jenny asked in confusion.

"Why are you asking me? Didn't you wrap this?" I asked her.

She shook her head. "No, I had it wrapped at the store. They must have got your present mixed up. It was supposed to be a computer for you to write with."

I looked back at the mask in my hands and began to laugh uncontrollably.

"What's so funny?" Nick asked.

41. All Your Dreams Ground to Dust

Dawn was just breaking, but the air was still gray and cold enough that I could see my breath. I wore a hooded sweater that I found in the coat closet by the front door; it had a Police Officer's Association logo on it so I assumed it was Nick's.

I hadn't slept at all that night and instead just sat up waiting for the morning to come. As soon as it was late enough for the first joggers to start emerging onto the street, I decided to go for a walk.

It's always weird coming back to a place after a long absence. The city was just enough like I remembered to make it disconcerting when I saw something new and unfamiliar. I suddenly felt like a very old man, resenting a world that continued to grow and evolve while I stood still. Every place, every sight that I recognized filled me with a strange, nostalgic sort of comfort - a Halal market, a thrift store, a dirty little taqueria - all refugees from the incessant march to homogenization and corporatization.

I wandered aimlessly for nearly an hour with no particular route or destination in mind. Eventually, I found myself at the corner of Mission and 27th. At first it didn't even occur to me where I was, but then I recognized the alley that led behind the storefronts.

I went down the alley and came to the place where the "Bell-out-of-order" door had been, but it was gone. Instead, there was a solid brick wall covered with graffiti. One piece of graffiti was a warped, monstrous drawing of the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland holding a Dali-esque melting pocket watch with the cover flipped open to the side so that the two circles together formed a figure-eight. The hour hand was positioned just before the four, while the minute hand was two ticks away from the 12. There was a caption to the right of the image, stenciled in block letters, that read: All your dreams are ground to dust in the gears of time.

I let out a chuckle.

Doubling back to the front of the building, I found that the store had been reopened for business. I walked in through the front door, noting with amusement that it was my first time coming in this way.

Inside, I found a small, cramped used book store called Invisible Ink. The walls were all lined with jam-packed bookshelves that stretched all the way to the ceiling. The front portion of the store was filled with tables placed so closely together that there was only room for one person at a time in the narrow little walkways between them. The table tops were covered with boxes of books marked "Clearance", with even more boxes sitting on the ground underneath.

No one was at the register.

I made my way further in and went up three small steps to the back of the store where long columns of bookcases spanned the full length to the far wall, again leaving only narrow passages between them. I continued down one of the aisles until I finally found the doorway that led to the back room. It was an covered by a curtain of dangling strings of red beads. As I reached in to sweep them aside, I met a woman walking out carrying a box of books. She was startled to see me.

"Oh, hello," she said in a distinctive high-pitched voice, regaining her composure. "I didn't expect anyone in so early.