Until You Come Around Everything Is Nonsense: An Exerpt: Sordid and Sacred

"You know I hate this." Jude said while looking over at me and then out the small, gray fogged window and back again. "I hate all of this--the feeling, the taste--the air--its like breathing blood, all iron and thick, sharp... Jesus, I hate this." I didnt need to say anything in return. He was speaking with the nervous abandment that comes when you feel like you might choke on all the guilt and shame you've swallowed so many times. When you speak just to prove to yourself that you still can, that you exist, that this is real.
Its a cold day in mid December. Everything outside looks foreign and dull, metallic-the color of the surface of the moon and just as familiar. The city is a storage freezer with a factory inside, menacing, heartless, mechanic. The car seemed to be still, like in those old movies, the scenery passing by. Alleys, windows, scarves, children, cafes, trucks, all flat, two dimensional, a painting rolling past. I hated this too.
We pulled into a cracked concrete parking lot and paid a man with fingerless gloves who directed us into a spot between a rusted red cadillac and a fiesta with spinners. Stepping around sick puddles of oily sludge and ice Jude's fingers were cold and pale but felt like home between mine. It was 2 blocks to the funeral home, and three and half to the rear of the restaurant where the police found Jude's brother, Joshua, three days ago. This was all horribly wrong.


--Nikky!

Just, please...

well the kitchen is cold
but the coffee is warm
and the sun's coming up
the day has just begun
and you're already bored.

you're bored of cheering me up
bored of calming me down
bored of drying my eyes
but there once was a time when you were the one.

you were the blue of the sky
you came after the storm
you were the switch on the wall
in the dark of the hall
I'm still fumbling for

'cause i'm lost in the black
I don't know where I am.
arms stretched out in front
I'm calling your name
just as loud as I can

I know there's words that we will never speak
and the questions can't be answered easily
but I wanted it to be easy so

nod your head if the plans have changed
shake it, love, if they stayed the same
smile at me and I will stay
start to cry and I'll go away
just please don't leave me guessing.

so you made me come
then you sent me away
like a messenger bird
so I circled the earth
blown away in the wind

but I always returned
with some new little song
some sad story to tell
of a brief love affair
with a girl I compared to you and she failed

you said you don't want me to beg
then you said get down on your knees
'cause you knew that I would
if I do any good satisfying your needs.

and I know all about those things we cannot speak
and just so you know well they don't bother me
so you don't have to be worried

just nod your head if the plans have changed
shake it, love, if they stayed the same
smile at me and I will stay
start to cry and I'll go away
just please don't keep me waiting

just nod your head if your mind's been changed
shake it, love, if some hope remains
just say the word and of course I'll stay
roll your eyes and I'll go away

just please don't leave me guessing.
just please don't keep me waiting.
--Messenger Birds Song, Conor Oberst


That song is pretty much perfect.


Just please, a little certainty. Something real and solid to make that knot in my stomach unwind a little, because I've swallowed all this doubt...

I finished reading Twilight this morning (I couldnt put it down, I literally read it overnight) and its put me in a rather...interesting mood...I think as much as I absolute loved it, its just made me more cynical, more sad that that sort of epic, poetic, gutwrenching, meant to be, fated, honest sort of love doesnt seem real, or possible. I think out of all the great things about Edward, the best is his unconditional, unwavering, irrational love for Bella. It doesnt make sense, and thats exactly why it is so powerful and moving. Every girl wants that. No wonder this series is huge, it hits us at our hearts and makes us want to be something nobler. To live more nobly.

I just wish we all werent so afraid of everything.