Before The World Fell

The Spiral Road of the Great Eastern Center Highway Mall was brown and orange terrazzo, turning twenty times for each of the twenty floors of the Mall’s Southern Branch, with complex connections to other ramps and passages, the pride of the Eastern District, according to the mall pamphlet.

I was walking down the road at a deliberate distance from my parents. Normally, I would hesitate to listen to music for fear of being called rude, but now I was ready to try, with my new earbuds as an excuse. Trailing behind them, I put my earbuds in and chose a favorite song. The over-bassed sound of a bird-man’s death screeches put me into a good mood.

The mall continues for miles and miles. Passages to the North, West, and East branches weaved for miles under artificial lights. A nearby shop sold various ceramics, the centerpiece a bull, striped red, white, and black. Lacquer clung to bowls and pots so tightly, a touch would make them crack. Hawkers squawked from their stalls in their hawk-suits. Men sported gold, studded handcuffs. The Grim Reaper smiled from magazine covers. Beauty-witches modeled their genital trauma.

My father turned back and said something to me, which I couldn’t hear through my music. I pulled out my earbuds with excessive force to display my annoyance. The force of being pulled from my (slightly deformed) ear dislodged the silicon tip, and the flying earbud hit the Spiral's rail, dislodging the cone to which a coil was attached, which (in not-slow-motion) fell down a distance of fourteen floors.

"Fuck, I broke my earbuds!!!"

I spitefully ignored my father and sprinted down floors. Old women tried to shove jewels in my face. One man, whose accent I years later identified as Turkish, chased after me for several floors, trying to sell me an amulet protecting against the Evil Eye. Although at the time I was too furious and distressed to pay him heed, I often remember him, recalling this day, and imagine the suffering of billions of humans due to evil gazes, this fear spreading out from somewhere in the Middle East, through the Balkans, to here in Cyprus, where we now need periodic protection from the Eye. I wonder if that day I was cast the Evil Eye, and how many times I’ve been cast it since. I regret my arrogance in assuming I didn’t need this man’s trinket.

After a heroic sprint, drenched in sweat, I reached the spot where my earbuds had landed. They were glinting under the sunroof, each moment nearly stepped on by countless careless shoppers. I lunged for them, horizontally torpedoing through the air, but just before I grabbed them, they turned transparent and disappeared. That was the last I ever saw of those brand new earbuds.

A sliding elevator door nearby slid open, and out came my parents, my dad in his polo shirt tucked into his dress pants, and my mom in her unattractive floral t-shirt and black shorts.

“Fuck!!!!” I screamed, banging my fist on the floor.

I upped my pitch to a screech.

“These earbuds were the only things I’ve ever wanted to own! You’ve ruined everything! You ruined everything!”

My parents’ demeanor was unperturbed. My mom spoke first.

“I’m so sorry about that. I would be upset too. Look, there’s some earphones right there. Let’s get some new ones from that store.”

She gestured towards a Nelson’s ™ store. A disgusting man pimping Nelson’s™ Shitbuds© had watched this whole exchange. On all fours, I turned my tear, spittle, and mucus covered face to him. His tiny eyes squinted into a fake friendly smile, and his lips drew back to reveal hundreds of sharp teeth.

I refused to respond to my mom’s idiotic suggestion.

My dad, top button buttoned on his ugly purple polo, put his hands on his fat, khaki-ed thighs.

“It’s fascinating how they design these things to disappear like that. It’s amazing technology.”

I decided then and there that I would never forgive my parents.

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I’ve never thought of myself as gay. I’m just a man who is paid to fuck men. You’re just one of these men to me. By chance, I transferred to the school at which you work and became your student.

If our affair went public, the pain would be yours. This put me in a wonderfully advantageous position.

I knew that above all, you loved marine biology. I’d never seen you happier than when teaching about fish in class, including when I was fucking you.

Of my own will, I invited you to a date at the aquarium. If we happened to be seen, we could claim the date was strictly educational.

I was decked out in my best: a snakeskin suit, white shirt, and bolo tie. My generous wolf cut spilled onto my shoulders.

You showed up looking, as ever, like a nerd, in an elbow-patched checkered suit, shirt, and bow tie.

“You’re late,” I said, flicking away my cigarette.

“You’re early!” you said. I cut you off, grabbed your arms, and kissed you.

I was ready to learn about fish.

Hovering above the gate marking the entrance of the aquarium was a wrought-iron sign reading “FISH CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT HUMANS.”

Snakeheads, carps, and catfish stared out of cloudy, translucent chambers, butting against the glass, which curved in phantastic patterns. Some fish were already dead, floating upside down. Most of them were dying and lived off of each other’s shit. The whole space was darkly lit, carpeted, and low-ceilinged. Each room had a passage on each of its four walls that continued to identical rooms. Part of the fun was looking for rare, secret fish sparsely hidden in the endless labyrinth of identical rooms.

“This is incredible!” you said, as you excitedly ran to a tank, furiously taking notes, forehead against the glass, eye to eye with a milky-eyed carp. After writing a few tiny pages of notes and rereading them, you slowly pressed your hand against the tank, as if expecting the carp to reciprocate.

I walked beside you, feigning a slight smile. After a few seconds you looked at me and spoke with a deep, wavering tone. The outline of tears hung suspended round your eyes.

“Fish, like humans, all have different personalities. That’s what I like about them. Fish will do anything to protect their eggs. Their bravery makes me feel like I need to work harder. The ocean is so vast, but when we’re stuck in small spaces, we bully each other. When I feel unhappy, I look at fish, and start to feel better.”

I didn’t know what to say, so nodded. “Wow.”

At first, I thought there was some kind of technical malfunction, as terrible popping sounds and shattering could be heard from several rooms away, shortly followed by screams. We stood confused for a few seconds, until we saw screaming guests run terrified into our room. We both instinctually took off.

I felt closest to you at that moment, as, sharing the same fear, we took care to escape to the same rooms together.

It increasingly became clear that the shooting was coming from multiple directions, which made the choice of which room to escape into next more difficult. Some rooms were vacant of humans, fish silent in their tanks. In others bloody and moaning humans, suffocating fish, glass, and water were scattered over the floor.

We continued this for what seemed like about 15 minutes, occasionally passing other humans who escaped into different rooms from us, all of us flailing wildly, briefly pausing in the center to choose what room we’d escape to next.

Finally, we saw what he had both been hoping for – the front desk, now unmanned, and the door through which we’d entered. We sprinted out and slammed the door behind us.

For some time, we both panted heavily, collapsed, leaning against the door. Our suits were drenched in sweat, our boots and pant breaks bloody from stepping on bodies.

Leaning against the door, we could hear the horrible sounds from inside – the clipping boom of what must have been AR-15s, the screams of the fleeing and pleas of the dying. No one else tried to exit as our limp bodies heaved.

Eventually, I resisted my desire to fall asleep, and wordlessly, defiantly stood up. You looked up at me and similarly followed. We walked from the aquarium and into the city.

Exiting the empty aquarium grounds, thousands of people licked ice cream, held balloons, and peddled wares. Light rails sped in every direction. We too got on board, and the sound of gunfire ringing in our ears started to seem like a dream. Hearing the cacophonous noise of the city, echoes of gunfire and terrified screams didn’t seem so strange. Everything everywhere was screaming and combusting. Children demanded sweets. Steel wheels heaved into motion. We laughed on the light rail. I asked you to buy me ice cream.

As we both licked our scoops, neither of us wanted to talk about what happened. I suggested going home. We said goodbye and didn’t have sex.

*******************************************************************************************************

That night I had a dream. We joined hands and fins in a line of humans, carps, and catfish, leaving little puddles on the indeterminate ground. We all smiled and laughed, hopping and stepping as one.

When I woke up, the glow of a universe disappeared. A strange, crusty ghost world sank into the earth. Everyone I’d ever known felt like a god that I wanted to touch. I went about my morning, ate a donut, and brushed my teeth. I fluffed my wolf cut, tied my bolo tie, and donned my white suit for another day of work. I didn’t want to talk about what had happened, so blocked your phone number.

I remembered there was nothing that was particularly beautiful. Like the echoes of those gunshots, the lingering dream left me.

In the city we live in, shops are open 24/7. We can buy anything whenever we want. I don’t need to hold onto or stay true to anything. “It's better to be dead,” I wrote and underlined in my notebook.
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