Noah Cicero: The Collected Works of Noah Cicero Vol. I

“I told you, I thought about you the whole time.”

“Don’t think about me the whole time. Live your life. We don’t love each other anymore, we can never be again,” I say.

“But, I love you.”

“You don’t love me, you love the memories you have of me. All we do together is have sex. We give pleasure to each other’s genitals, that’s what we do, and that’s all.”

“But you mean so much more.”

“I don’t mean shit.”

“I know, you don’t. I don’t even think about you when you aren’t around.”

“I don’t think about you when you’re not around either,” I say.

We finish smoking our cigarettes, and then hold each other.

We lie there silent with our eyes closed.

I think about the night ahead of me.

I have to go to Denny’s and read for a little bit. Then to the strip joint. Then to the bar for crapieoke.

I don’t know what will happen tonight.

I hope something happens.

I stand up and put my clothes on.

She lies there quiet staring at the television.

“Where are you going tonight?” Kendra says.

“I’m going to Denny’s to read, then to the bar for crapioke.”

“You have fun.”

“I will.”

“Don’t kiss any girls,” Kendra says.

“I won’t.”

I kiss her on the lips and leave.

I get into my car.

The radio is talking about the war.

Useless speculation.

I don’t know why I fucked Kendra.

I don’t even know why I went over there.

I should just leave her alone.

But I can’t.

There’s something beautiful about her that I need.

Something my heart cries out for.

She could always make me laugh. Most women don’t make me laugh.

I’ve known her for so long.

It’s hard to live without her.

She is such a comfort to me in this time of crisis.

Since September Eleventh we’ve been in a crisis.

My father’s generation had to fear the Communists.

Now we fear Arabs.

Most likely when the Arab problem disappears, America will find someone new to fear and fight with.

It’s so childish to fight.

When I was in school, I fought a lot. They kicked me out of school.

People go to jail for killing people.

But a soldier becomes a hero.

I don’t understand that.

I don’t understand at all what America is doing.

And what Iraq is doing.

I don’t understand at all.

I feel very alone.

I will walk this world alone, not understanding anything.

One hour till war.

I get to Denny’s.

I go inside and see the glory of Denny’s.

It’s a shitty Denny’s. It hasn’t been refurnished for years. It’s probably one of the worst Denny’s in America.

I sit down at the counter.

I start reading Proust while I wait for someone to get me coffee.

A waitress named Cindy comes over.

She’s about thirty.

She’s white trash.

She’s missing teeth.

“How are you doing today, Mark?”

“Good, how are you?”

“Oh, fine. Coffee?”

“Yeah.”

She goes over and pours me a cup of coffee and puts it down in front of me.

I put two Sweet N’ Lows in it. And stir.

Steam is coming up from the warm coffee.

I take a sip. It’s still too hot to drink.

I go back to reading.

I love reading.

It’s the only thing that keeps me together.

I need books.

I need those dead man’s lines.

I need their truth.

I like writers that write out of necessity.

Writers who write because they have to.

Who are compelled to express.

They are driven by one thing only, and that is the written word.

I see books as the purest representations of an era.

When anthropologists a thousand years from now need to understand the psychology of the people of a time, they will look at their books. Not their bridges, computers, and skyscrapers.

There is an older black man sitting a couple of seats away from me at the counter. He suddenly says to me, “Civilization.”

I look up from my book and reply, “Huh.”

“Civilization.”

“What about it?”

“I’m tired of it, that’s why I moved into the woods.”

“You moved into the woods?” I say.

“Yeah, deep in the woods of West Virginia.”

“How’s that?”

“It’s beautiful. I live a peaceful life there, free from television, microwaves, computers, and religion. I’m free of everything technological and oppressive.”

“Why don’t you like civilization?”

“Civilization is war, a race, a battle for power. People are run by two things, jealousy and power,” he says.

“You have a point there.”

“People are primitive and too monkey-like. I can’t stand them, and I can’t stand myself either while I’m with them. They make me turn into an insane monster, that’s what civilized people do to each other, they turn each other into monsters.”

“I feel like a monster a lot.”

“That’s why I went to the mountains, I had to escape their madness. It’s repulsive living in civilization… I didn’t leave my cabin for a year, and then I decided to leave to go see my mother in Ohio. And I find out there’s a war going on. It’s disgusting!”

“You don’t believe in the war?” I ask.

“No, I don’t. I’m a pacifist. I believe all problems can be solved without violence. There is no need for violence. People react much better to peace.”

“But war is part of being human. Violence is natural.”

“Violence might be natural, but that doesn’t mean we need it,” he says.

“Perhaps we do need it.”

“If we do need it, I’m glad I live in the woods.”

“You’re probably right. I wished I lived in the woods. Can I come with you back to West Virginia?”

“No, people are annoying.”

“What happened to you to make you think this way about the world?”

“I was in Vietnam in the infantry. I killed a lot of people, a lot of innocent people.”

“How many do you think you killed?”

“Over a hundred… I have to live my whole life knowing I took over a hundred lives away from people who deserved them just as much as I do.”

“That sucks.”

“No shit it sucks! I took orders to kill people, I could have said no, but I didn’t, I said yes sir, and did it. I killed and while I did it I liked it. Then years later while I was driving my car I realized it, I realized that I killed people, that I took people’s lives. Then I became depressed for several years. No one understood it; I was such a happy person… Then I became religious but that didn’t help, so I bought a piece of land in West Virginia, and I’ve remained there ever since. Except for once a year I go and visit my mother.”

“I can see why you’re a pacifist.”

“I have good reason to be.”

“I think it’s wrong how the government gets young stupid boys to join the military right after high school. Those kids are so dumb and naïve. It’s like the government is taking advantage of them.”

“I was once one of those young stupid boys. I was so dumb, I thought I was doing it for freedom; I wasn’t doing anything for freedom. I fought for rich people that I would never meet. I should have become a hippy and protested. But instead I beat up hippies; I didn’t know what the hell was going on. I was sure that what I was doing was right, but it was wrong, it was cruel and wrong.”

“I’m sorry you have to live with that.”

“Listen to me kid, never go into the military. Read your books, go to college, have sex, but never go into the military, they’ll brainwash you, and make you believe that fighting for America has meaning. It doesn’t. Personally I would only fight if a nation was directly attacking America. If they were bombing Yellowstone, or the Rocky Mountains, then I’d fight. But not for oil, fuck no!”