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By Convention Bitter
An excerpt from Cold Stone Silence. This chapter was written in 1999.
Let me set the scene for you: his name is Con Martin. A fine-looking young fellow, they all said. Almost a modern-day Amory Blaine, but without the literary affect. He was one of those ghosts who just walked through life, walked through lives, passing and not staying long lest the cost of karma be a price too high to pay.
Which isn't to say he didn't twist little pieces of reality between his fingertips. He carried worlds in his hands, he broke worlds with his eyes. His hollow tyranny may have been corrupt, but at least he knew.
It could have been any day, that day when he decided. It was everyday, it was none of them at all. The tyranny once felt was replaced by that futile tragic madness, that madness which grips the souls of lost prophets and makes their eyes turn skyward to offer themselves in humble service -- "Would you like fries with that?"
Con couldn't see how he looked, he [could feel] it. He looked good, had the social graces of metabolism and manipulation. Couldn't see his surroundings, but he felt them -- loud music, tragically hip people, beautiful girls, the heady euphoric rush of that last party before the Tower came tumbling down. And of course, the hand of God reaches down to chastise them because in their jigsaw world, there's no picture; and if there's no picture, there's no pieces; and if there's no pieces, there's no God and only me; of course, the problem is evident. Me's are local gods, with little jurisdictions.
So was it the finger of God that tickled Con? The finger of God that tickled poor hapless Con and made him stop drinking beer for just a second and made him stop rubbing the back of that pretty young thing sitting next to him? No, of course not, God had more important things to do, like try to exist, than hit Con upside the head like somebody's little old grandmother.
But it was something. For Con stopped. What was he doing here, here like he'd been 1000 times before? Looking good to everyone but himself. Didn't they see it, the slowing, the gradual way the lights were flickering out? How much longer could he be the great debuacher before he became a parody of himself, some gaudy Las Vegas showman, working with tricks of light and pancake makeup? In that moment, he felt like Hedda, pregnant with the foreign thing. The foreign thing in him was age, creeping death [chasing] youth away. Every day it grew and he became more silly and futile.
What a realization. (Yes, the finest thing about man is not his absurdity, but his ability to know it and go on like there's nothing wrong, like there's never been anything wrong.) So he got up like in a daze, like in a dream, amidst his friends and their "Why are you... where are you... what are you..." pleas, but he didn't answer, just walked with unknown, aimless purpose, and so he fed his own lore for a while, again. He realized, maybe all too well, how important was that mythology, the one you cultivate to feed the enigma of who you were once you're gone. (So maybe it's all riddles.)
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