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- The LiveJournal Team

pseudonymjones

As foretold, the waters rose a third time. Men in masks descended on Matthew's office and tore the walls asunder. Knocked over cabinets, disassembled desks, and ran great polyurethane tubes through the rubble. Industrial fans rip the humid air and disperse the spores the sprouted in the moist carpet.

Matthew sits in his swivel chair at the pile of bent metal and drywall shards that occupy the same space his desk once did. He takes a deep breath of stale air, and pokes at his phone. Eventually, someone from upstairs comes to retrieve him. 

His temporary desk is nearly identcal to his old one, except it is above sea level and deep - deep - in a cube farm. One neighbor streams Vivaldi, and the others chatter about unfamiliar children. The walls of his cube are ragged, slashed by a quasi-human hand. The corners of the desk appear to have been chewed on, impressions of molars in the simulated wood. Matthew considers the desk's previous occupant as Vivaldi storms.

pseudonymjones

Delvin opens the closet door to find a number of aromatic candles flickering atop his desk, casting a dancing shadow down around his bed. "Hey." says a smoky voice from the shadow. He lowers himself to see under the desk and as his eyes adjust to the dark, they meet hers. "Hey," he says.

Counterpoint pauses, frowns. CTRL+A DELETE. The problem he has with writing is that he can't imagine writing anything that anybody would ever want to read. He thinks about writing about the things that are important to him, but he doesn't like actually thinking about important things. Important things are upsetting. Better to occupy himself with fiction. He closes his laptop and crawls out of his nest. 

The condo is quiet during the day. Matt and Lish are out, Bananacat tends to sleep. Counterpoint tends to sleep too, but today he's restless. If it was dark out, he'd take a long walk to clear his head, but he doesn't like to go out in the sunlight. 

Bananacat sleeps in a perfect circle on the carpet. CP kneels down to pet her on the shoulder but she wakes up and bites his hand, teeth sink into the meat between his thumb and forefinger. Counterpoint returns to his nest, shuts the doors, and gives sleep another try.

pseudonymjones

"Ew," says Lichelle, her manicured fingernail picking at a buckled corner of countertop laminate. "I thought we agreed that granite is a must." 

"And look at this," says Aiden, "Would you just look." He opens the oven and he opens the dishwasher, and when they are all the way down the doors overlap. "How are we supposed to get any work done in here?"

Lichelle and Aiden flit around the space, calling out flaws to the realtor that anxiously tails them. This condo is a third-floor end unit, one bedroom one bath, and "open concept" in the sense that the entryway and dining room and living room are all the same room. Duct tape holds a small section of the ceiling/molding in place. Lichelle gestures toward it and the realtor notes it on the growing list of complaints:

• More than the acceptable number of holes in the ceiling
  
• Kitchen too small
  
• Counters not granite
  
• Spiders living in windowframes
  
• Ugly paint in closet/office
  
• Some sort of nest in the closet/office
  
• Two people asleep in bedroom (rude)
  
• Bathroom tiles crooked
  
• Excessive dust
  
• Walls are too lime green
  
• Carpets are not hardwood floors
  
• Cat smell
  
• Broken lock on door to hallway
  
• Building's security door easily forced

Matthew wakes to the sound of early-morning traffic. He climbs out of bed, stretches, runs a hand through his hair. He stumbles to the kitchen and fixes himself a bowl of cereal and spills it when he trips over the oven and dishwasher doors.

pseudonymjones

Counterpoint lives under Matthew’s desk. He’s made a little nest in the accumulated detritus, broken video game peripherals and spent sketchbooks. Matt offers him a hand to help him up but CP just shakes it. “Hey,” he says.

“Hey,” says Matthew. “How are you these days? Is everything okay?”

“Oh I’m just fine,” Counterpoint says. “Getting a lot of rest. Spending a lot of time thinking. I may write a novel.”

“That’s great. You should do that.”

"Yeah," says Counterpoint, "I think I will." He smiles weakly.

They continue shaking hands in silence.

pseudonymjones

Matthew has a computer in a closet. The closet is sort of an office, in that it has a desk and a chair and a computer. Matthew can sit in his swivel chair and put his arms straight out to his sides and press his palms flat against either wall. The walls are a vibrant blue.

This is a color that Matthew selected from the children’s section of the paint store. According to its paint chip, this color is called Surf’s Up. The walls are cool on his palms. Matthew sits at his desk in his tiny office and lets the surf wash over him.

pseudonymjones

Matthew lives in the present. Not that he’s the carpe diem sort — it’s more that he clings to the present like it’s a bit of flotsam in the sea of an ephemeral past and unknowable future.

He doesn’t plan ahead or look back. He lives moment to moment.

Matthew takes these moments and crystallizes them. Captures them before they float away, pins them down with words. Solidifies these moments and carries them with him.

( or, rather: )