When, due to cellars flooding, your old journals turn into a sodden mass…
And those particular old spiral-bounds are as much as thirty-five years old…
It’s taken me about twelve years to come to terms with that loss. Besides my own teenaged scribbling, there were guest appearances in those pages- my freinds and colleagues in high school, who since have vanished, some of them, into thin air- or prospered, some of them, appearing back in my life now and again, or mentioned in the news.
I wrote fanfic before there was a name for it.
I constructed a complex, logically ordered universe where Frankenfurter met the Persian king Darius, where myself as twin brother and sister seduced and tormented a rock idol, or two- or three. The first limning of When Petey Met Yuri was actually about a gay stripper named Peter Berlin, and a famously gaunt and blood-spattered rocker from Detroit…and that would have been in, oh, let’s see- 1978 probably.
Well.
There was one little tale that has come back to me with enough clarity that I think I can recapture it. It was silly and lighthearted, and I think it was one of the first stories that I actually brought to a close.
So, I’m jotting down some notes;
Imagine…
Imagine a youthful form on a dirty city street corner, in a late fall downpour. Imagine brown hair falling into miserable dark eyes, arms hugging across striped teeshirt clinging to thin shoulders, tight blue jeans darkened by rainwater, battered hightops skipping back as a passing car sends a shower of oil-slick water over the sidewalk.
Imagine a car pulling up alongside, a big old Mercedes. It’s driven by a strange-looking individual, almost skull-like as seen through the windows. Thin yellow hair drops lank from around a balding scalp. In the back, a woman, far too vividly made-up for good taste, blood red lips and deeply shadowed eyes framed by black curls. Imagine the door opening, and the kid stepping over. It’s a familiar scene, on this particular stretch of purgatory.
Imagine a short conversation, between this castoff with nowhere to go, and this wealthy woman, in her luxurious sedan. Imagine the car pulling away from the curb, leaving the sidewalk empty of anything but the dirty puddles and the streaming rain.
Imagine the chauffeur’s cadaverous smile, the blanket wrapped around the shivering body, black-lacquered fingernails passing a steaming cup into waiting hands. Imagine the dark eyes in the pale face, looking out of the streaming window saying good bye to the bad life forever…
Imagine the end of the journey. Imagine great gates swinging open, a winding drive, a huge grey presence lit by the last light of the stormy day. Imagine a flag, whipped by the storm, with a device of storm on its black face.
Imagine the passengers clambering out of the car, the kid gawping up at the tower and battlements. Imagine the other rider, clutching at wind-swept sables with one hand and gesturing grandly with the other. Imagine a baritone voice proclaiming;
“Welcome, my darling! Welcome to Frankenfurter Castle!”
