"People are afraid to merge..."

But at least Clay and Sean attempted, halfway.
Or is that worse, to only attempt halfway?

"[Chicago] is a Vampire..."

"[Bloc Party] is playing at the Whiskey tonight..."




"Don't you wish you could go back?"
"Go back where?
"I don't know, just back."

All he knew, at that moment, was that he was a 37 year old man, sitting on a stoop, drinking his 3rd beer, and it was dark out. The stoop light stopped working when the neighbors moved in a couple of years ago, and it never started working again after they left. Not after they left, or the Squatters for a few weeks after them left. The bulb is in the socket, but no electricity seems to enter.
In between brick walls, staring out into the street, he watched black boys on bicycles circling the block.
Over and over and over again.

He watched Mexican families walking slowly down the sidewalks, dragging folding chairs and toddler 3-wheelers, going home from a day and evening at the park.
He watched gangs of roving teenagers, all dressed the same in white t-shirts and jeans, roaming the streets, pissing on the lawn in front of him, passing joints, and starting fights.
He watched the police cruisers drving both ways on the one way street. Twerping the siren, and making the blue lights dance in the heavy hot night air.
No one greeted him, and only one out of, like,twenty replied if he greeted first.

He watched.
He watched.
He watched.

And felt nearly nothing.

Maybe a little fear, when the boys grouped up in front of him, asking for a cigarette.
Maybe a little anger, when he heard how all these kids talked to each other. Their voices sounded like violence, even when speaking "sweet nothings" that "hey girl!" they run across on the corner.
Maybe a little nostalgia, when the mind wanders to different times, different places.
Maybe a little regret, when watching the glowing ember flicked down the stairs into the darkness, onto the thin film of sewage on the concrete from the last big rain.
Maybe a little sad yearning, when he sees the couples walking under the streetlights and whispering leaves.
Maybe a little boredom at the way this whole thing turned out.

"The billboard said, 'Disappear Here.'"