The woman that I am stalking has lately been reciprocating my feelings more and more. We are a matched pair, it seems, like two mirrors moving closer to one another. We are burning up our anytime talk minutes. We have recently agreed to limit our calls to one another to six a day. You would think that twelve phone conversations between us would not be a crunch, but that's cutting back from our previous sixteen to twenty. We've decided to stay on the phone longer, as a compensatory adjustment.
At long last, two lingering lovers…. what is there to do when stalkers fall for one another.
When we're not on the phone we are sending a stream of texts and emails; little communiqués, abbreviated sweetnesses, kisses at any distance. The sound of her voice in my ear is complete.
I wrote her quite the doozy last night; a weighty email, more than one page. I'm submitting it to the Nobel committee for consideration. I would hand it over to the Pulitzer people but they'll hand that prix-fixe out to just about anybody.
We're finding new things out about each other on an almost hourly basis, she and I. When I talk to her it feels as if I am inhaling nitrous as she speaks. The sound of her voice acts as a palliative to my central nervous system, my sense of self. I've almost given up pornography. That is how strong the feeling is, it changes behavior.
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I was sitting in a familiar cafe, having lunch, when a local nuisance kept inquiring about what I do for a living, though she has asked me many times before. I tried to let her know that it was complicated enough that I did not care to describe it. This did not stop her. She's a real go-getter. She then proceeded to question me concerning my love life, so I directed her to pictures of the woman described above, hoping that would forever establish my disinterest in her. She seemed incredulous that a man as gruff as I could lure such a lovely stalker into my view, and then gain her favor.
So, I showed her a few of my favorites, pointing out how beautiful the many details were. When I arrived at her eyes and noted how they had two distinctly different colors, one a very unique green-sih that gave way to an outer hazel ring, I encouraged her to also take note of one of the many reasons why this woman deserves to be considered in full.
Excitedly, and too much so, this woman who was nearly my age grabbed my shoulder and started jumping up and down, her heft making it nearly impossible for me to type, or else.
I tried to indicate that she was violating my sense of space, and self. She repeatedly insisted that I look into her eyes, as they were "just like" my lover's were.
I glanced away nervously, tried to diffuse the moment. This is a person whose eyes will not be stopped, though. She nearly got me in a headlock that resembled affable familiarity, though it did nothing to advance any friendship between us.
She again demanded that I look directly into her eyes and acknowledge that she possessed a quality that was indistinguishable from the woman that I love.
I obliged, and glanced through her prescription lenses for no more than a half second before I had found my response:
They say that 'The eyes are the window to the soul' and perhaps that is true enough. What I see in yours are pools of eternally unsatisfied impulses, misguided expectations dance across your pupils, and the disappointments of no less than four and half decades of weight gain have taken their cargo across the goddess Styx.
I had considered mentioning the substantial hair collection she had defending her oracular region, like a satanic goat, as that was easy enough to draw upon now that we were in ancient Greece, though she was already backing away from me as if I was the one to be avoided. Tumbling down the paths of Olympus, as it were.
Not to be beaten with confusion, she then rearranged herself in a more central position and proceeded to announce loudly to the entire bar questions pertaining to the crossword puzzle she must have assumed interested us all as much as it did her.
It had to do with California lakes, an area in which she was clearly drowning.
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Okay, so sorry, back to my subject. Hell is other people.
No. I can't write any more. Why would I even bother? Why are you even reading?
This titanic wreck of a failed woman has stopped just short of challenging me to a mustache contest. She will not be happy until she convinces an elderly gentleman that her jokes are funny.
As far as mustache contests go…. I have her on spread, darkness, and thickness of follicles, but she vastly outnumbers me in creepy near-mouth population. If I hadn't heard a stream of noxious sound emerging from that abysmal maelstrom then I may have guessed that it was only an old man's useless ear. But no. This was no old man's ear. This was a woman's mouth. Anybody could see it, even less could deny it. None could stop it.
Her lips reminded me of the inside of the Himalayan jacket that I recently purchased, though it offered none of the reasons for having purchased; protection from the elements, warmth, silence, solitude, etc.. It seemed to take warmth out of the room and cover in algae the lake of my mind with a hairy-lipped woman offering herself up to any taker, while also refusing all deniers. Her ill-fomred sentences crawled upon me as kudzu.
I felt as if I was being beaten to death very slowly at air hockey game that might not ever end, by somebody that had never even bothered learning the rules, having arrived with only a single quarter, much distracting face fuzz, and yet somehow still running the table.
I could not divert my eyes.
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