Ken Baumann - Say, Cut, Map

“Yes or no?”

I know I’m not confident enough for the last proposition. He told her crime was down. They couldn’t move yet until the market picked up. She dropped the phone. Here’s where it gets tricky. Sunlight shifted in cubes on the far wall and he watched it, naming a place for god, making up jokes. He missed roll call.

“No time.”

He didn’t say it. New roads were being built.

The new regime was clearly tyrannical. He cradled the phone and waited, through the music. Somebody had to know.

“It’s not covered.”

She listened to him try to tell her how it sounded more dramatic than it was, felt, but he couldn’t talk, feeling crushed under all the convenience. His child opened his eyes. Two women in front of him kept looking back. He felt his phone vibrate through the ground. He’d need a new backpack.

“Do you think it’s still good?”

He fell. He tasted dirt. They decided against church.

He was ready to testify against himself. Cancer was too specific. He waited for the chorus to start. They all needed a good lie.

“It’s not hard enough.”

There was a pyramid to explain it. She laughed. He knew he shouldn’t reveal her, not like that. She took a second. Squashed, ancient trees. He’d been told they were interchangeable. He watched the movie again, not remembering he’d never see the shooter.

“Have you eaten?”

Both friends went to the bathroom to puke. He washed his hair twice. The scissors wouldn’t cut.

“Press that for me.”

Sufficiently fucked. They looked for a guide. Christmas, birthday, birthday.

It started at the playground. The meteor would appear around midnight. He drove all night. They found an alley. He just wanted to read. The neighbors knocked. He bought more. Porn would do.

“Go.”

He sat up. They’d see some music. Take some medicine. He barred out all the names. He listened to the drip.

“Why don’t you want to?”

The strap of her dress, the pink light behind it. He felt something less explicit. Just lunch. He smiled. He shook his hand. She rocked him to sleep. He dreamed. He bought a ticket, wanted to see some tragedy. He looked around as they walked, feeling the edges of what he expected only a few months ago. He thought about running. He smiled. He knew he could.

They put their faces close to the glass and shaded their eyes to see if they were open. He told her about the desert. They let the water drain.

“I’ll be back.”

She’d measure him. Kids on the neighbor’s lawn. Underneath a pile of clothes, I think. Somewhere.

“I thought it would be more difficult than it was.”

He felt her say it carefully, knew that she felt herself speaking. Bloodless transformation. Curiosity was just a hobby. He wouldn’t be the hero. The grease gunked then cooled into a gelatin. He scraped the skin off. She covered her eyes. He walked away. Pinks and blues above their roof.

“You can leave that there.”

The whole sky revealing itself, cell by cell.

Fantasies about childbirth, arson. Name the times you felt more than alive.

“You can do it.”

They needed a signal, maybe a whistle. He refused. The water came in. He felt the rush under his forehead. He touched her thigh. The tunnel’s closed.

“Baby.”

Keep it.

“You need to speak up.”

He gathered it all into a box and took it to the center of the back yard. A distant concussion.

He picked his face. Seeing and hearing an entire vocabulary assemble. He watched them, marred by some internal logic. He didn’t deny it was bountiful.

“Hang up.”

There wasn’t much more she could do for him. They burned it, probably. Familiar stomps. He knew where to look.

“He didn’t say no.”

There’s nothing to do. I hate instructions, she said. Maybe God was the weight of every ignored violent impulse, how heavy that would be. The spider waited for the other wing to give out.

“Hah.”

It was easy enough to teach to the kids. He didn’t need their language. This was their tax. She purred. He came inside her. The man reached for the pistol on the couch. The volcano warned them, essentially. It needed to open up further, but it would. She smiled. He felt alright about having just one.

“Up up up.”

The fingers were dead somewhere, too.

“The idea means nothing.”

He shouldn’t compare them. He nodded. The moon worked for him, slightly over clouds. The door locked.

The car didn’t start. He hung up and redialed. Cuts all over the soles of her small gray feet.

“What are you doing here?”

He closed the book knowing he’d never read it again. It was a simple code to crack. He leaned over and dropped the note. Doing his fatherly duties. A sour, invisible pain. She stood with him, nodding. He could lose the words for it in so many ways.

“Red or blue?”

He remembered, said there’d be depth problems. He asked for eggs. The men seemed to require a universal equivalent. He coughed. I’ve never seen so much blood.

“Watch it again.”

Asked, received.

The bays were full of ripped women. He put it on a timer so they could use the delay. He heard about the project. How could she communicate so far in advance, so widely? Genuine interest was supposed to soothe him.

“Don’t let it fall!”

Dumb, but it felt like he switched from feminine to masculine. Not knowing why he had to help other people draw the same conclusions. He distilled the positive aspects, spoke them out, one finger each. Made a joke about not having much room left. She brought her fingers up, feeling it from him.

“It’s the side we need.”

He couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment, showers always did that to him, but he told people it was after he washed his hair, a detail he thought earned some extra smile, liar’s trade, and then he said he knew it’d be the biggest mistake if he didn’t ask her as soon as possible. He couldn’t be formal. Plastic hose held them down because they didn’t have extra cloth. She patted his head. He felt simple.

“It’s your game.”

He apologized. He cried telling her how beautiful she was, how she was, how, okay.

The same age. He needed the door shut and a few hours. Retreat felt provisional. He admired the violent ones, though. She wasn’t afraid to admit that fantasy.

“What percent?”

He didn’t know if it was a problem yet. He thought they should wait. They laughed. We have an hour. Her pants were tangled. He bit into it and sucked. It was all too much, the numbers and abstractions, all the formulations present even in an empty tent. He wanted rejection, even saying so out loud. She wasn’t in the house. He came home. He opened the door. He missed.

“I don’t like you like this.”

Severe problems with inactivity. He was breathing. He felt exhausted by all the meals. A white shadow. He blinked. Fifteen minutes exactly.

“You have to get it.”

When would he stop adding words to their requests, close up their questions, extend their favors. He’s the disciplinarian, she said. She picked him up by his wrists. Sleep, no animals, just some time. He laughed. The bottle wouldn’t open.

“You should work on that.”

He couldn’t tell her. He looked where his right hand was. I wish it was more of a problem.

He’d repeat the belief that it’s just what’s needed, a critical take from the inside, a voice that shouts about silence, the murder of murder by murder. She didn’t touch him. He thanked God.

“There’s no way in.”

His body was constantly building.

It couldn’t have gone down. He wiped up the shit with a paper towel. Babies eating peaches. That’s horrifying, she said. He cracked his neck, five pops.