This Is What It Looks Like

A Story by Mad Mezi

a thought

The music seeped through the skin like rain on a tree.

The pores were livelier than ants, crawling up and down the dirty flesh and making melodies out of twigs and rocks.

“This is what it looks like, Holly,” Poe exclaimed.

Holly puffed a cigarette and for nearly half of its length she dragged its corpse through a hellish antipathy that leaked well into her conversation.

“It looks like what? What looks like what?”

“This--this! You know what I am talking about: all this fluff and frizz and jazz and gore! It’s all about this. We’ve made it. You’ve made it. Take it separately, or with me. Whatever you must. Just enjoy it while it’s here.”

What the f**k is he talking about? That’s okay, it didn’t matter.

Holly had arrived. She was there.

She was with this, with it, all of it--all of this--hers to keep for as long as she could hold it.

Which wasn’t long. Fame had a way of being elusive. Even famous people will tell you they never feel very famous.

It’s an illusion. There is no such thing as fame. Only names. Only persons. Only illusions and magic tricks and quick bicycle races. That was it. All of this.