Point of Disgust

Outside my window a man is being assaulted by a bunch of the rogue clowns from the carnival. The clinking of piano keys echoes from below. Sister Wendy is playing a new hymn as the other nuns sing in a wavering chorus . It's an ugly day and my window's ledge feels familiar and calm. The clowns stand in a very unbalanced way, their faces are glazed from indulging in liquor too often. Easy to overcome, and easy to pity. The man stands with chilling confidence. A gun is pulled and each clown suffers a bullet to the head. I wonder how this man ended up here, under my window. He looks pleased. A twinge of fear stirs in me. Someone should tattoo on his forehead "WARNING - VERY DANGEROUS PERSON". A man's voice shouts "Johnny" while I turn away from the window.

JESUS DON"T WANT ME FOR A SUNBEAM

Today was WEIRD. To start out I bumped into some guy in drag who clomped off in platforms while saying something like "GURL! You best watch where you go, or else I am gonna have to get all up in your face!". Let me remind you this is the second time in a week I've been referred to as girl by a gender defying person. My feet kinda just scritched over the pavement today, and staring down at them I notice I have two different shoes on. Then I notice directly in front of my feet are two ginormous purple blobby things, and located on top of these ginormous blobby things is an even more ginormous blobby thing. BARNEY!! His squishy six foot frame looms over me like a childhood nightmare. On either side of him are two women who look like they smoke 10 packs a day, all dressed up like hoochie mamas. Barney's permanent grin doesn't leave his face as he shoves both women in the limo to his left and ducks in after them. His deliriously cheery voice chirps to the driver to floor it if he doesn't want to get his mother fucking head blown off. I continue to scritch my way to Garret Lanes. My life long dream of being a hot dog eating champion is no longer. Now I realize my true calling is bowling. Upon arriving at the bowling alley a white paper is tapes to it's doors. Written in a scrawl is the word closed. No explanation. I continue to scritch down the street.

ZIPZAPZOT

This morning I woke up on the floor. I guess I never got up after collapsing in a heap underneath the window. Sister Wendy is in charge today. She's a batty old coot who speaks with a lisp but all in all she's pretty nice. After a day of extra good behavior I have managed to get her to take me to the carnival again. When we arrive it's just as it was before, pandemonium and joy. At the ticket booth I'm relieved that there's a different vendor, it would be bad if the one from last time recognized me in front of sister Wendy. Just as we exchange our cash for grubby crumpled tickets a loud eruption comes from the center of the festivities. Suddenly the carnival is more pandemonium than joy as peaks of fire roar over the crowd. Everyone manages to get out in time even though the exits are hard to locate. Later we find out that some guy who calls himself "Brockman" pushed a fire eater into the food cart which is pretty much a barrel of oil and grease. It ignited quicker than a match and caught the neighboring bootleg liquor stand alight in less than a second. I have a feeling the carnival will be gone tomorrow.

FUN FROGS

Today the carnival came. Yesterday I was grounded by Sister Joan till next week. I don't care though. Tonight I can just climb out my window, and down the thick ivy that lines Madeline's House. Once it's dark I proceed with my plan. I can feel little legs scuttling over my fingers as they clench into the ivy. In there it must be a whole other world. The last couple of feet I just jump off the wall and land on the grass with a soft thump. My feet slap down the street, headed towards the pale glow coming around the corner. A wave of sound and smells hits me and joy wells up inside my chest. I only have around ten dollars which won't buy many tickets but the mannish lady behind the both croaks at me that I remind her of herself at my age and throws in five free tickets. I'm just going to assume she looked like a little boy. Inside the carnival is more like a mad house. Men are running about swallowing swords and fire, and a troop clowns keep bumping about in the crowd jostling everyone. The constant swaying and sickeningly oily smells coming from the food cart make me feel slightly queazy. I get out of the crowd as soon as I can and find myself by a small dark shack. a Skittish looking man is selling small bottles marked XXX. I can only assume it's some sort of alcohol. A woman approaches the booth so i quickly slip behind the side and peak around the corner. I'm not all that surprised to see it's Sister Joan slipping him a 20 dollar bill in an obviously sneaky way. After making sure she's well out of sight I decide to hve a few rounds of bumper cars and then head out. The bumper cars are my favorite part of carnivals. Most people complain about how they randomly come to a shuddering jolt but I seem to have some luck and never end up in those. Keezy Le'Breezy gets a crappy car three times in a row which throws him into a rage. He ends up tripping out of the ring while trying to show up some of his dance moves. My time in the carnival is euphoric if not queer, but it's time for me to go. As I leave the bright lights behind me I see that the whole block has lost power. The thought that this is odd doesn't occur to me until the next day, but luckly I know my way around here so well I don't need the light. The ivy is waiting on the side of Madeline's House for me to climb up. At the window I topple in and just lay there still thinking about what it's like between the ivy and the wall.

Start

The crowd was cheering, my stomach was in agony, but I had never been happier. My dream of winning the World Hot-Dog Eating Championship had come true at last! The months and months of training were finally paying off. Eating 30 hot-dogs a day might sound delicious, but it was the hardest thing I had ever done. Just the thought of having to eating another one was enough to make me puke. Holding in the slew of hot-dogs I had just churned down I stepped up to accept my trophy. Flashing Camera's blinded me but all I could do was beam at the crowd. Booming voices chanted my name. I could almost feel the ground rumble they were so loud. Wait, I actually could feel the ground rumbling. Something wasn't right, the mass of voices was twisting into metallic grinding and screeches. My legs had become jelly, which was the last thing I needed considering the rickety pavilion hanging over everyone's heads was about to come toppling down any second. The people around me were melting away. Grinding screeches grew nearer, sending violent shock-waves through the ground. I knew I didn't have long, and in a desperate effort to escape I forced my legs to work. There was just enough time for me to make it out alive, but a few yards from safety my stomach clenched into a cold brick. The trophy. There it was, sitting on the podium where I had left it. The sunlight gleamed off of it, as if beckoning me. Suddenly my legs were heading back to it, no matter how strongly I resisted they just kept going the wrong way. The sound of screeching gears grew louder and I knew there was no longer a chance of escape. Just as that thought left my mind I looked up, to be crushed by a slab of concrete.
I bolted up. Rough familiar sheets were clenched in my clammy hands. It took several minutes for my breathing to return to normal. Outside the room's grubby window an eighteen wheeler was squealing by. I cursed it for ruining my favorite dream. It was the closest I could come to realizing my life aspiration. After all I was only a nine year old boy with no parents, what hopes did I have of becoming anybody? Let alone a world renowned eating champion.
My alarm clock flashed seven thirty at me in glowing red numbers. For a Saturday this was too early to be getting up, so I rolled over in hopes of my dream returning. After thirty more minutes of twisting and turning in blankets I realized sleep wasn't going to happen. Groggily stepping out of bed I looked over at the mirror in the corner of the room. My bony frame was swallowed by the extra large t-shirt advertising Mario's Italian restaurant. There were hardly any stains on it, so I just pulled on a pair of red running shorts and crusty old sneakers. After swiping a sour tasting tongue over my teeth I found that they weren't too fuzzy and therefore nixed the idea of brushing them. Now the only though on my mind was FOOD.
The Orphanage almost never had anything worth eating. I decided to go get a doughnut from the shop down the street as usual. Once I hopped down stairs and out the door my feet automatically headed in the right direction, guiding themselves over the treacherously cracked sidewalk. This gave me time to contemplate what type of doughnut I would buy. The though of custard and jelly fillings spun around my head until I bumped into a large, sweaty, wolfish man. When I say wolfish I mean he was exceptionally hairy. Seriously, there must be some sort of award for this amount of hair. Looking down at me like I was a bug, he removed the cigarette from his mouth, and opened his lips just enough to growl "Watch where yer goin' kid." Rather than nodding and skirting away like a reasonable person I found myself frozen there. Not because I was traumatized from the experience of being in contact with his once white wife beater or the tufts of hair sticking out of it, but because of the vehicle he was standing by. It was an eighteen wheeler, with the words "Piggly Wiggly" stamped across it. Probably the same one that jerked me out of a blissful state of peace this morning. I know that it really wasn't that big of a deal but the rage boiled up inside of me. All I could do was stand there. An awkward silence lingered in the air until he muttered "Weirdo." in a disgusted voice and hauled himself back into the behemoth of a machine. My mouth twitched holding back a smile. He was headed straight for the round-about, a disaster of an intersection that most regular sized cars had trouble maneuvering. A blast of warm exhaust ruffled my dark hair, and I tore myself away from the distraction to buy my breakfast.
Most people might find large delivery trucks common in their neighborhood, but not here. The Piggly Wiggly in the neighborhood is pretty small, it's never gotten a delivery from anything larger than a sixteen-wheeler. What could be in that truck? I pondered this while munching away on the chocolate extra sprinkle doughnut I had just purchased. The rest of my day was spent at the pond doing normal weekend things. I almost caught a fish, well not really, but I saw one.
Besides my dream of becoming a world class eating champion i seem like a pretty regular kid, and I am except for one thing. I live in an orphanage. I don't know what happened to my parents, I was just left on the door step one day. The permanently tan pigment of my skin and slight curve of my nose tell me that I must have some Indian heritage, but the bright blue of my eyes suggest that I'm not full blooded. So pretty much all I know about my parents is that one of them is Indian, that's it.
Once the sun begins to sink I decide I should head back home. I keep an eye out for the eighteen wheeler, but it's nowhere in sight. By the time I've choked down the dinner of green mush and meat-ish substance sister Clara plopped down on my plate, I still can't get the thought of truck out of my head. I decide that tomorrow will be devoted to discovering the secret of that truck, and find myself drifting to sleep hoping that good weather is on its way.