Ennui the Strongman
Apr. 26th, 2010 11:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jack_babalon"Step right up, step right up... come see the Amazing Ennui the Strongman! Behold as he rises from this simple wooden chair, through sheer willpower alone, against the staggering weight of the Void! An act I must warn you that can, and often has, killed lesser men through its very contemplation alone. Watch as he must summon huge reserves of inner strength to bulldoze his way through the soul crippling monotony of the Everyday! Gasp as he wrestles, albeit very quietly, against a relentless legion of inner demons! That's right folks... trained in the psychic killing fields of Cafe Society, self-awakened from Satre's 'troubled sleep' and said to possess the actual mustache of Herr Nietzsche himself, Ennui will perform before your very own eyes the miraculous spectacle of overcoming Nothingess itself!"
***
Ennui sits perched on the steps of his trailer, slugging back shots from a flask he keeps tucked in his leopard toga for bad days. Half-listening to the drunken harlequins take turns playing an accordian and a violin soundtrack, he strokes thoughtfully his beloved whiskey stained moustache. It actually never belonged to Friedrich Nietzsche as advertised... but rather was once his father's. Ennui shaved it from his lips shortly after the old man's death, right there at the funeral in fact. He has never took it off since. It was beginning to drizzle and it loosened back up the mud from four days of solid rain. Still the harlequins played.
Ennui takes another slug.
He glances three trailers down and see's the light on in Madame 13's window.
A rolling storm moves in from the west. Sporadic lightning flashes silhouette the tent forest and decaying skyline of carnival rides. The rust mottled ferris wheel illuminates in a sick green glow, seguing in his mind into the Wheel of Fortune card from Madame 13's deck.
Madame 13, or Rhoda Fortunae as she might tell the cops or a gullible lover if questioned enough on the subject, was the axle upon which the strongman's thoughts revolved. Had been ever since she joined them, three miles ahead of a closing mob and carrying nothing but those cards and a paper suitcase.
She was quite an addition to the 'gang' and could read your fortune through over a dozen methods: By card if you will along with palm, skull bump and crystal ball. Sometimes she employed spontaneous rorshach wine splotches on a shirt or blouse. Sometimes through methods as diverse as swirling a finger through fresh goat blood, staring into the eyes of a stray cat, plunging her gaze into the center of a flock of circling crows, interpereting the wail song of distant trains, conning fate's secrets by astrolabe on starry night.
However no method was more reliable than what she could learn in a single kiss.
Ennui, poor Ennui at that, though strong enough to juggle the collective works of Kierkegaard and was one of the the only known men to have sucessfully arm-wrestled Derrida - could barely find the will to raise up his arm and knock on Madame 13's door.
He did so, once and quite meekly at that, whereupon he immediately turned around and was prepared to leave when 'Rhoda' opened the door. She coaxed him in. She poured two shots of Irish Whiskey. The shot was enough to Irish Ennui up enough to ask for his fortune read. Another round of shots. A third and she finally agrees.
She tells him to pick his poison by which she meant method. Blushing at the rumors of her kiss (one sweet enough to nullify even the most grimmest omen that may follow) he opts for the cards.
A king holding a single sword rises out of the deck. A forest of staves blooms around a lake of chalices. A magician is crossed diagonally by a devil. A woman sits between pillars. Then a shattered tower faces off against a wheel.
The images hit him with a heat fever. Sweat soaked on the spot. Shivers. She goes to say something but he can't hear anything but this persistent buzzing in his ear. Her trailer shrinks around him into a coffin fit. In a panic he tears her door off the hinges and takes off running.
He hadn't been back since.
***
Last night he dreamt for the first time in a very long time. Since he was a child in fact. Though all men dream, Ennui fancied that he had tamed the torrents of the subconscious itself into a vague trickle vanished upon each morning's emergence.
He crawled naked through an overgrown garden, one that must've once been a facotry, for entangled in the rose vines and draped in wysteria were the skeletons of tractors and forklifts. He knew that he had to crawl or else the massive hornets that swarmmed overhead would descend upon him. His leopard toga, he knew somehow, had been torn off him as he crawled through razor wire underbrush in his quest.
Finally he hit a clearing.
She sat before him on a hill filled with violet and scarlet flowers he had never seen before. Throned on a simple wooden chair, between two pillars - one white, one black - she wore nothing as well and had between her legs, a revolving ferrish wheel upon the centeer of which hung a still twitching miniature Christ.
He crawled towards her and when he reached the wheel he saw that it was not in fact Christ but rather his father and it was in that moment he realized his beloved mustache was gone. He looks up and of course she is wearing it over a wide deathshead smile.
Ennui tries to scream... but can't. His mouth frozen at the limits of his yawn gives birth to an endless cloud of angry hornets.
***
Drizzle builds into rain and the harlequins still play.
Another shot kills the flask.
With both hands he cradles the stubble of his cranium. He rocks to the music of the accordion and the patter along the mud and the tapping along the trailer and the violin in need of a tune up.
Ennui brings the hands down to form a hairy mask over his face, then folds them down into a single prayer. He sucks in a breath that sends every candle to flicker within a mile and releases a sigh that pushes back momentarily the storm's advance.
Slowly he lifts himself from the steps. Then, one thigh high boot at a time, braves the brief distance towards her shed. Each step an eternity, bringing with its wake a fresh doubt to push aside, a unique fear to contend with gallantly, a serpent to disentangle from the limbs and a maze of excruciating memories to navigate through.
When he reaches her trailer, he has done so on his knees.
Blood drawn on a bitten lip ignites the spark that allows him to raise his fist to her door. When his knuckles strike the heavens boom with thunder. A crackle of charged air and a bolt strikes the ferris wheel - uniting the two final cards of his fortune into one.
The door creaks open awkwardly off bent hinges, she steps out and looks down on him with a sad smile. He forces himself back upright on shakey legs. They both stare at each other. Then, as the rain has soaked her clothes to form a second skin, he peels off his moustache with a thunder accompanied rip.
"Tell me!" he mutters.
She nods and leans down and cups his face and...
... with a single kiss he knows at last.
Ennui sits perched on the steps of his trailer, slugging back shots from a flask he keeps tucked in his leopard toga for bad days. Half-listening to the drunken harlequins take turns playing an accordian and a violin soundtrack, he strokes thoughtfully his beloved whiskey stained moustache. It actually never belonged to Friedrich Nietzsche as advertised... but rather was once his father's. Ennui shaved it from his lips shortly after the old man's death, right there at the funeral in fact. He has never took it off since. It was beginning to drizzle and it loosened back up the mud from four days of solid rain. Still the harlequins played.
Ennui takes another slug.
He glances three trailers down and see's the light on in Madame 13's window.
A rolling storm moves in from the west. Sporadic lightning flashes silhouette the tent forest and decaying skyline of carnival rides. The rust mottled ferris wheel illuminates in a sick green glow, seguing in his mind into the Wheel of Fortune card from Madame 13's deck.
Madame 13, or Rhoda Fortunae as she might tell the cops or a gullible lover if questioned enough on the subject, was the axle upon which the strongman's thoughts revolved. Had been ever since she joined them, three miles ahead of a closing mob and carrying nothing but those cards and a paper suitcase.
She was quite an addition to the 'gang' and could read your fortune through over a dozen methods: By card if you will along with palm, skull bump and crystal ball. Sometimes she employed spontaneous rorshach wine splotches on a shirt or blouse. Sometimes through methods as diverse as swirling a finger through fresh goat blood, staring into the eyes of a stray cat, plunging her gaze into the center of a flock of circling crows, interpereting the wail song of distant trains, conning fate's secrets by astrolabe on starry night.
However no method was more reliable than what she could learn in a single kiss.
Ennui, poor Ennui at that, though strong enough to juggle the collective works of Kierkegaard and was one of the the only known men to have sucessfully arm-wrestled Derrida - could barely find the will to raise up his arm and knock on Madame 13's door.
He did so, once and quite meekly at that, whereupon he immediately turned around and was prepared to leave when 'Rhoda' opened the door. She coaxed him in. She poured two shots of Irish Whiskey. The shot was enough to Irish Ennui up enough to ask for his fortune read. Another round of shots. A third and she finally agrees.
She tells him to pick his poison by which she meant method. Blushing at the rumors of her kiss (one sweet enough to nullify even the most grimmest omen that may follow) he opts for the cards.
A king holding a single sword rises out of the deck. A forest of staves blooms around a lake of chalices. A magician is crossed diagonally by a devil. A woman sits between pillars. Then a shattered tower faces off against a wheel.
The images hit him with a heat fever. Sweat soaked on the spot. Shivers. She goes to say something but he can't hear anything but this persistent buzzing in his ear. Her trailer shrinks around him into a coffin fit. In a panic he tears her door off the hinges and takes off running.
He hadn't been back since.
Last night he dreamt for the first time in a very long time. Since he was a child in fact. Though all men dream, Ennui fancied that he had tamed the torrents of the subconscious itself into a vague trickle vanished upon each morning's emergence.
He crawled naked through an overgrown garden, one that must've once been a facotry, for entangled in the rose vines and draped in wysteria were the skeletons of tractors and forklifts. He knew that he had to crawl or else the massive hornets that swarmmed overhead would descend upon him. His leopard toga, he knew somehow, had been torn off him as he crawled through razor wire underbrush in his quest.
Finally he hit a clearing.
She sat before him on a hill filled with violet and scarlet flowers he had never seen before. Throned on a simple wooden chair, between two pillars - one white, one black - she wore nothing as well and had between her legs, a revolving ferrish wheel upon the centeer of which hung a still twitching miniature Christ.
He crawled towards her and when he reached the wheel he saw that it was not in fact Christ but rather his father and it was in that moment he realized his beloved mustache was gone. He looks up and of course she is wearing it over a wide deathshead smile.
Ennui tries to scream... but can't. His mouth frozen at the limits of his yawn gives birth to an endless cloud of angry hornets.
Drizzle builds into rain and the harlequins still play.
Another shot kills the flask.
With both hands he cradles the stubble of his cranium. He rocks to the music of the accordion and the patter along the mud and the tapping along the trailer and the violin in need of a tune up.
Ennui brings the hands down to form a hairy mask over his face, then folds them down into a single prayer. He sucks in a breath that sends every candle to flicker within a mile and releases a sigh that pushes back momentarily the storm's advance.
Slowly he lifts himself from the steps. Then, one thigh high boot at a time, braves the brief distance towards her shed. Each step an eternity, bringing with its wake a fresh doubt to push aside, a unique fear to contend with gallantly, a serpent to disentangle from the limbs and a maze of excruciating memories to navigate through.
When he reaches her trailer, he has done so on his knees.
Blood drawn on a bitten lip ignites the spark that allows him to raise his fist to her door. When his knuckles strike the heavens boom with thunder. A crackle of charged air and a bolt strikes the ferris wheel - uniting the two final cards of his fortune into one.
The door creaks open awkwardly off bent hinges, she steps out and looks down on him with a sad smile. He forces himself back upright on shakey legs. They both stare at each other. Then, as the rain has soaked her clothes to form a second skin, he peels off his moustache with a thunder accompanied rip.
"Tell me!" he mutters.
She nods and leans down and cups his face and...
... with a single kiss he knows at last.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
on 2010-04-27 05:19 am (UTC)"Ennui sits perched on the steps of his trailer, slugging back shots from a flask he keeps tucked in his leopard toga for bad days."
Just off the jump it grabs me. I dig it, I really do.
no subject
on 2010-04-27 12:19 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2010-04-28 01:12 am (UTC)and releases a sigh that pushes back momentarily the storm's advance.
wow. you paint such pictures...
no subject
on 2010-04-28 01:38 am (UTC)