with the whole of the citizenry looking up to see if he gestures a hand or slips an off-way look that may reveal some telltale sign of some hidden agenda that exists behind his monstrous character or the awful poetry that stirs them to believe in their own spirit as if the truth of the worlds were incubated there, dormant, and only needing to be roused by him.
-- Narrator, How Expectations Are The Same As Homicide

Party People,



The lights are off.

Looking out the window so high up, the mayor stands hands in pocket. From when he first took office to now, the view never ceases to amaze him. What amazes him more is the inescapable urge to slide open that window, let the cold air of this elevation moaning and rushing like ghosts in. Step out onto the ledge. Jump.

This is not a suicidal thought. He is just reminded constantly of why he ran for mayor and with pride he knows he has never swayed from pursuing the change the city needed. He loves this city. This is not a bad thing. The people appreciate this fact about him. Such beautiful people. Such a beautiful office. Such a beautiful view. he steps closer to the window.

Nothing strange. He only wonders about how it would feel if he lept, spread arms and legs like a star, the air coming up wrapping around him and then hovering above as he kept falling, his tie vertical and shivering. Falling with the city lights so small below but expanding as he got closer and closer. All the people down there milling, walking or in their cars or on their bikes, every voice and laugh rising from the streets, the squeal of tires and slamming of doors, all sound sharpening as he fell faster and faster. How wonderful it must feel to be speeding toward this and then becoming one with it all.

The phone rings. He turns away from the window for a moment. In the dark, the red light that flashes on the phone looks like a wild beacon of some distant boat. He's not here. The phone clicks and the answering machine kicks in. He turns back to the window. He's down there with them.

There is a boy and a girl who are meeting right at this moment in a dark corner of some park. Their parents don't know about it. They dodge the orange circles the street lamps make on the sidewalks and each step is light. In the midst of this tryst, they revel in the secrecy of it all and savor it in the warmth of their holding hands and the giggling and at the end of every kiss where there is tingling and sparkling on their lips. It is a school night. That makes it that much more awesome.

Somewhere else, a group of women sit somewhat cramped on a couch, as one of their own stands in front of them pantomiming as they try to guess what she is. It's silly. Nerdy. But it's fun because they're all together and no one talks about how one among them just revealed she has breast cancer earlier today. They are all on the verge of laughing so hard there is no sound, or breaking down and crying because this is what they all need and they love each other so much unable to think of a world without their friends.

An old homeless man, smelling rotten, sitting against a concrete wall with his head down facing his lap. The ache is there in his neck and everywhere else, he knows, but he doesn't feel it. He keeps his head down when he hears the jingle of coins tossed into his cup. He fights within himself whether the change is going to be part of the drug he wants to pump in his body or to actually buy food this time. People don't know what he's going through. They think they do. They all think they do. Fuck them.

Someone else out there is having hot sweaty sex.

An old man stands alone in the bathroom of his apartment. He wears a tuxedo and he is fixing the bow tie, elbows out, eyes squint reckoning the dimples in the cloth. Tomorrow is his daughter's wedding and he is thinking about her. How as a child she used to run through the house trailing mud on the carpet, holding up a stick. That stick was her magic wand she ruled the world with. Her mom yelled at all that mud. When she fell and struck her forehead on the corner of the table, she cried 'Dad'. Now when she gets hurt, it will be another she calls to. That's okay. This has been a good life.

A baby being born. To the expecting father, the room is blaring white and the crowning head looks too gruesome and he feels sick, telling himself he is about to faint. The mother giving birth is yelling at him. She is yelling not to faint. She is commanding him not to look away. Through all this, there are doctors with their face masks on and their foreheads sweating, a nurse is saying comfortable words to her. She expected this to happen, the delivering mother. And this is going to be a perfect birth. Part of this perfect birth is her husband witnessing the whole damned thing. Then he will know fully what she goes through. She yells at him to watch. He will always know, and he will carry himself accordingly.

Someone is asleep. In the real world she is a she, 'A' cup breasts and thinly shaved vagina, but in the dream world she is a he, paunch belly and penis and wild pubic hair, and when she wakes up she doesn't understand what it means. She's been reading her horoscope lately and going to the library to read books about being gay. It's just so hard, she thinks. Being gay. They were told they can marry and now are being told they can't. People waffling on the law more than people waffling on their sexual orientation. It's a crazy mixed up world. Yes it is.

Somewhere in the darkness there are other people, people with their faces covered, dark hoods on and bottles of spray cans in their hands. Two of them. They slink under the bridge waiting for the squad car to pass over. They have planned this one moment for a few days now. One night. They will strike so many walls with their tags and the whole city will know their names in just a few more hours. Their hearts rattle in their chest just like the bits in the cans when you shake them. They breath. They exhale paint.

A family. Two boys, a mother, a father and a grandmother. They sit around the dining table in their house. They have reached the part of dinner where everything is quiet. Conversation has died. But in that wordless, hanging moment, one of the boys looks up at the rest of his family, faces to the plates concentrating on the meatloaf. He notes everything that must be happening just outside their house. The whole city is heaving. After he is deployed, they will never have this moment again where they are doing something simple together. Where nothing is too urgent or painful. The world will move on and things will change. He clings to how much he loves them all right now despite what fights have been and will be, what stupid things they have done and said and will do and say. To them, it is just a quiet awkward moment. They won't ever know how hard the sound of a fork scraping against a plate can hit when it carries a life on it.

The mayor of this fine city thinks, who wouldn't want to dive into all of this?

---------------------------------

He looks now toward downtown. The tree looks like a massive shadowy hand poised to snatch up the surrounding lights. It has cleared a few blocks, rendered a few buildings unsafe. Traffic horrendous. Calls and letters and more calls and people yelling and other people scratching their heads. This is a problem. No matter how all those beautiful tree hugging fanatics might love the damned thing--they say it's a symbol of nature's unyielding beauty and order--it's a big pain in the ass and the cause of many migraines these past few days.

It has grown faster than anyone had expected, now 20 stories tall. And someone in the recent city council meeting put forth the scary prospect that the thing's roots will undo the foundation and by its very weight sink this whole city into the ocean and no one knows what to do. It's something he doesn't have an answer for. He hopes that someone down there does. But that's just a dream.

All he has right now is love. Would they take that? If he stepped out there on that ledge and spread his arms out and offered to embrace them and hug them and tell them it was going to be alright? Could something like that make everything better?