One (Two) Nights in Atlantic City

The manifesto buckled in his head, stanza by stanza, then a few jumbled words at a time....he was exhausted, and his ears wouldn't stop sweating....some combination of milky liquors, malt balls and some small dosage of gummy candies that now he could just feel floating in his upper belly - the milk products and alcohol and weed was forming some kind of solid pool for them to float around, as if, even though he had chewed them considerably, somewhere after heading down his throat they reformed, but for the tiny chunk or two removed, which sunk to the bottom of this thatched roof digestive hell, as the operatic lights of the hotel casino reamed him from behind.  About thirty eyelids tried their best to open and close for him, lumbering fat pigeons that she had poisoned hours earlier.  His tie crumpled in his right hand, as he carried it smothered inside the fist he made, while his other bag, stuffed with indolent items that held no account to him anymore tonight, and a camera which he would regard later as his self entertainment, long after she got on the bus, or in a stranger's car, or wherever she decided she was headed on this sunny summer morning on the outskirts of Atlantic City.  

The part without the shine, and not even the boardwalks that liked to pick themselves up when they heard themselves referred to in old Springsteen songs.....no, these weren't those songs.....their references were even dead, and their irony complete.  She stumbled her way outside the hotel room, after pulling up her stockings, always holes forming in the netting around the crotch.  It never failed.  She pull them up so hard, just to mask it, though this morning no one was looking anymore.  Probably best to not constrict herself there; she'd been through some trials over the last sixteen hours or so, so her cunt needed some time to herself, some air in which to breathe and catch up on the all day pass she had granted him, via about 12 or so gin and tonics with overly sweetened cherries floating in her belly , likewise.  The only fruit she's eaten in some time.  The ingredients to this short weekend at the Traymore in Atlantic City, months before it was to come down via more than 1 wrecking ball, were fastened in place by their want to be in that room, paint peeling, mice and odd creatures conducting miniature roulette extravaganza and fucking each other's little mice brains out just east of the outlet next to the bed, open and raw, with no cover.  

She thought to herself, and tried to figure out the trajectory and how it had followed down the highways to this room, color of eggplant, time stands still and it bothers her that there is just...no...wind...outside.  Their laughter cackled through the halls, and somewhere during the fucking and the sleep and the dreams and the further fucking, she could have sworn they had been in the halls, sliding down slight inclines past other rooms on cheap water slides burning and delighting their skins with gin, infused cherries which turned out to be his hands smacking her ass, reverberating to her teeth, and gums, which she hadn't now bit in a while, thanks to this little Atlantic City getaway.  Was that part a dream or was the feeling of his hands gripped around her, like the great roots of a redwood warming the sides of her hips as he bit her on the shoulder, just barely of course, as he was only trying to climb on inside via any viaduct he could locate.  His milky liquored up saliva leaving tiny pools indented in average sized teeth marks, which would only last on her for about a minute; after which they were onto a whole other era of fucking.  

"Combining these drinks would lead to the apocalypse...end of the world, you know", she said, smiling, as she tugged her top a little lower, and lightly grazed the right side of her ass as she was prone to do when feeling electric and wanting to say so.

At the same time, the lights left a shadow on his face, finally, so he could open his eyes fully and not squint into hers, and take in the full view properly. "Or just a little more time in bed to be sick about it all".  She felt herself wrapping her legs around the one of his nearest to her.  Sunshine drummed up in her heart and she was wetter than some kind of rainstorm, you know the kind they talked about in novels of the romantic variety.  She felt him there, and hoped he didn't sense her stocking's holes in the inner thighs, forming and enlarging with each forward move, from above the wooden table, brimming with cocktails.

She could feel a grand woooooooosssssshhhhhhhh, from beneath her feet, inside the cats cradle crossing lines in her mind, reading his thoughts, and encircling their bellies of drink and absolutely un-bendable circumstance.  With that, they left the ground for good and dragged all their mismatched ideals and defiances with them, hand in hand and toe to toe, down flew the roller coaster and down she went, which wouldn't be the first time.  Funny that the room was able to keep the two of them inside its desecrated walls, but what a way to leave a message on the ceiling that watched the whole, sordid thing.  This ride could go on forever, since the old junkie woman who ran the levers had excused herself a long time ago, and didn't care who came and went, long as they didn't make a fuss.

He ripped her stockings and for the moment they enjoyed tearing the hell out of each other, with the strength of kittens bouncing their bound up yarns against the sky and hoping they didn't come back down to fall around their heads.  Her sweat and makeup and growing nausea from the gins left her in the perfect state - she was naked, but felt like red sequins atop a girl's big haired head, reaching for her dreams from beneath and between her legs; where he was reaching for them too, his cock an unyielding explorer who wouldn't stop until they both had broke through to the Pacific Ocean, washed clean in the waters they worked so hard to dirty up on the way out West.  They drank so much that their overused tongues ceased to feel, and they were left, struck dumb but still able to breathe, and ache, and laugh- indistinguishable but free laughter, as they stained the sheets and blamed their own souls for it, again and again and again. Sleep would come after they couldn't anymore, but then the hollywood dreams began with the roller coasters out of the windows, and the hallway velvet rope water slides, cascading their bodies back down and towards each other, to wait out the hollow of the day, under a single sheet, blanket wrapped around his head for comfort.

She got herself dressed and decided to put on only a few bits of the jewelry she had come in with - one earring was no good to anyone, so she left it abandoned on the floor near the wall and the mice, who would probably drag it inside their realm to glitter up their saturday night.  She climbed the bus, her sore cunt and bare ass now part of the holocaust remains of her original stockings, as the engine gunned loud - surrounded by strangers whose faces knew her secret games and could see him written all over her face - makeup perfectly brought down to daytime wear after more than a half day of riding the dragon they both brought inside for the nights and days.  Seconds away, he drank one single beer, to set himself right.  No milk in sight.  He wished he still had her hips in his hands, and stared off to the clouds over the city or town or highway next door, the clouds that wouldn't give rain, as the day began to grow dark again, just an aging inch at a time.  His fingers twitched, and he wondered just what colour that lipstick she wore was, after all.  Something like the cherries in the gin that soaked her soul and delivered her right down under him.  She slept with her head against the window, and didn't feel like watching the landscape go by, the taste of him working its way to the back of her neck and blowing little breezes over her, as she passed out on the strains of highway.

M. Lucia