Daydream Surrealist

Saturday, July 20, 2002 8:42:39 PM

h.m.

The girl sat at the round table in the kitchen, chatting with her friends. It felt strange, for her, with the extreme hangover that seemed to plague her like death. The sun was moving across the horizon; it was the usual. They were talking about sex. Which was almost the usual, almost, mainly because they are adolescences and adolescences have the tendency to dispense their hormones in a safe way.

It was.... strange. Normal, perhaps, in that strange sense. She felt more like puking so she stood up, and started to pace around. It made her feel better. Probably it was the malt and barley drink and buncha corn chips, barbecue flavour.

Somehow it just wasn't the same. Earlier before she stepped out of the room, she'd taken a peek at the mirror, of herself. It seemed strange. Perhaps oddly beautiful. Only in her perception. Her eyes were tinier, probably because she had cried beforehand. And then there was the messy hair that fell over her shoulders. And her face was pale. Totally pale, almost porcelain. It signified sickness, probably, because she felt... like puking.

But still it wasn't the same. The smell lingered in the air. The smell of a girly scent, the memories of it. It plagued her almost like the hangover, almost like death. It felt stranger than death, even. Death was a certain thing. Having sex with friends is not.

She was tired. Really tired, but she couldn't sleep. And her homework, which couldn't be done on a hangover, was going to get her killed. Probably she could explain it. Oh, I was sick and so I couldn't draw for nuts. It just wasn't right, at least, in her mind.

Wasn't right.

Her other half had felt that it wasn't right. The world. What made the girl seek such ecstasy. She hadn't formed an opinion of it. Ambivalent, her horoscope had said she was. Which was half true. She stared and stared at the ceiling, at the surroundings, at the two other girls who were talking, and realized that it seemed like reality. Even later as she expressed certain strangeness she felt ambivalent. Maybe zoned out.

Whichever was the case.

Memories of her friend's life, dancing around. In her brain. It should have been disturbing. If only she could feel. But she couldn't. Maybe that was the problem. Even as she walked around she felt like she was walking in a surreal setting, and she couldn't feel anything emotionally viable.

It was at that time that things seemed too strange for her.

The whole thing. She had been... Doing it, almost as if it was natural. And feeling like she was puking. It was almost like a postmodern novel from Japan, with all the jazz about Nibrole and heroin and stuff, all that sex, the smell of it, puke, human mannequins with something stuck up their asses.

Everything was surreal. As she watched her other half hold her friend she had been merely a spectator.

What happened to her life? Who was living it? She couldn't tell.

Couldn't tell anymore.

That morning before they crashed at her half's place, they were at an art exhibition. Both of them had won something, gotten something exhibited, and she was extra. Which wasn't the point, because she wasn't feeling anything about it. Trompe l'oel, Chinese ink, it all didn't matter, to some extent. Appreciating them for the statement they were made to make, although it seemed to her some people had less brains than the others, and the judging criteria was the brainless portion. But for the junior category it had been different. Really different. Quite... Strange. Negative, probably, like postmodern novels.

All those stuff about reality, male domination, the uncanny, life, urbanization, suicide, whatever.

All those youths calling for help.

Probably.

She watched them all, and found the Singaporean landscape more beautiful than anything else. Boats were floating on the river, and a few were driven. Somehow it seemed to remind her. Four boats chained together, from big and magnificent to small and insignificant. Which one was she? She didn't really know, couldn't really put her finger on what made her so relate them to her.

The people were all crowded. None of them interested in the scenery, more interested in people and paintings than anything else.

Stop, she wanted to say. She had been watching them all from the beginning, from the cute boy with ruffled hair who won something of a distinction award to ministers talking to award winners.

Stop, please, stop.

But she continued down the roller coaster. You can't get out of it while you're on it. It's life. C'est la vie.

Probably like sex.

She still felt like puking, later, after things got back to seemingly normal.

She hadn't enjoyed it. She felt the sensations, smelt the smells, felt like puking. Laid there really turned on, rubbing the sheets, and never really getting down until she sobered and it all disappeared. Thinking of those things. It was strange. She knew it before she experienced it. Wrote about it before, the sense of nausea. And watching beauty. Just watching. Watching the beauty of watching.

Saw it all. Been through it all. Felt it all?

God save the youths.

Saturday, July 20, 2002 9:04:19 PM