The Sarcasm Diaries

Around 7 p.m. Zoran arrived, still wearing his work clothes. Since I was still running on my 3 hours of sleep, my contact lenses started popping dryly out of my eye sockets as we were talking, making me blink rapidly like an epileptic. Zoran wore short sleeves this time, showcasing his thoroughly tattooed arms, making him look even more like a Slav gangster from the Bronx. 

Thursday morning I received a call from mother just after I tiredly rolled to the ground from bed and tried to fit myself into my clothes. It was short and sweet, so I knew something was grandly off. "Hey sweetie, do you want to go to Salzburg for the weekend and earn 200 euros?" I asked if my kidney was somehow also part of the transaction but she denied it. "So where's the catch?" "No catch honey. No catch at all. It's just you and me, on the endless road, with mountains, cows and Mozartkugeln." Of course there were multiple catches and they slowly blossomed into my periphery. To start with, there was the huge white vehicle of a size I haven't had the pleasure of sitting behind the wheel. Driving it through hundreds of miles and on roads untraveled, seemed hella' fun and dangerous and really cripplingly frightening. Yet I wasn't going to let this tiny factor ruin my weekend. The second call caught me at 9 P.M.,when trying on a pair of new leather shoes in the mall. Reducing my lace-tying tools to one hand I grudgingly picked up the phone. "What?" "I just wanted to ask; do you really need me going with you? I mean like, really? Because if no, I could do something else.." "No, you don't have to come." "Great!" she beamed a smile of relief through the speaker and we proceeded in handling the details of the trade. Katja was put into quite the dilemma with this suddenly surfaced dream trip. Should she stay or should she go, her default state always being pushy on unreasonable trips that I have no wish to participate in, and yet this time she paused hesitantly. Stunningly she needed additional convincing. I got a lukewarm 'maybe I'll go'. Once we arrived home the catches were popping up like refugees in Switzerland. I received the map to the planned road and couldn't help but notice that somehow we needed to chip in a detour into Germany, racking our tour-meter well over a 1000 km, which left me feel not happy. Then there was the faint promise from Vili about he himself booking an apartment in some undisclosed point in the future, rejecting my attempt to secure a sure pillow under our head right away. He cringes when whole euros are at stake. My mood fell from not happy to straight out irritated. I was puffing fumes sleeplessly turning in my bed bubbling over the few hour drive to the Alps with mom and lodging turned to a 12 hour trip in the dark with sleeping alone in parks. In the morning I was ripe to turn the offer down when the third call caught me by surprise. "You know what? I am coming with you." "Make up your mind." "I did, it's final, I promise." And surprisingly it was. Katja was inconsolable. She went from 'I shouldn't be going anywhere' to 'I can't believe you're not taking me to my dream trip' in 5 seconds. Yet I felt a much welcomed sense of calm with the arrival of my mom into the equation. We woke up at five and the sharp jaggedness I felt ripping at my intestines promised a difficult upcoming day. We silently drank our dark coffee with our semi-glued eyes blinking blankly. Dry salami sandwiches were packed in cheap tinfoil not unlike every trip I took with mother in my life. And we finally got inside the car. It gave the feeling of an airplane cockpit and while the heating was eating the ice off the windshield, I was acting cool, as if my heart wasn't planning an escape through my throat. I slid the gear in clumsily and we rode out into the dark. It took over an hour for the light to break through the darkness as we rolled in the middle of nowhere to some three-house junctions that were sprinkled randomly over the landscape. The view was golden and crimson and the grass was a freshly cut glowing green that really pissed me off. How does everyone cut their lawn all the time. Those pretentious motherfuckers. The first customer was the first prime sample of a farmer we met that weekend. He was short, voluptuous, with a big nose and a colorfully checkered shirt, he opened the front gates graciously but there was no way I was parking there. Or at all. We lifted the heavy thing out and he gave us an 8 euro tip for the great service we provided. That would not happen again. We skidded through misty mountains and carefully tended vineyards to a village embedded into stone, without a two-way street. We parked and blocked that one direction. The customers were old friends who decided to buy expensive farming equipment from the Vili co., a grave mistake, as they soon found out that their order was incomplete and unorganized, all the while the blond lady from Slovenia with her slight Russian accent was roaring at her boss through her iphone 6 about how unprofessionally they must look now in front of the customer, ironically thus looking even less professional. We continued our ride but soon the customer phoned that we rode away with an essential spare part he is missing. As there was no chance of me turning that car around, he drove after us and swiftly disappeared with the box. We were fiddling with the maps on the same spot, when he called again that we gave him by mistake two spare parts. So he drove his car back once again, with his face a shade darker, shoved the small piece in mother's hand and flew away. State of the art customer service. Noon was slowly approaching and we were off the highway indefinitely. Beforehand I had planned to listen to french audio lessons as I drove, to feel a sense of intellectual accomplishment while smashing my whole day away behind the wheel. I encouraged mom to try it out, and after the hour she spent trying to unlock my touchscreen pattern, she plunged in the earbuds and enjoyed with closed eyelids the knowledge that flooded her. It was a dreadful experience. The radio was softly playing when suddenly the voices came without warning. "Voolai... vuulei.. vuleivu.. mahngei... moungai.. vuleivu mongei... sen pa.. sn.. s.." After the first few minutes when it was still funny it swiftly became unbearable, it felt like a child with down syndrome barked out slightly mispronounced french words in an epileptic seizure at random intervals. I turned the music gradually up to a roar yet it still couldn't drown out her voice, but at least she paused the tape and didn't turn it on again. The roads were slowly downgraded to what I felt like bicycle trails and the heightened focus that was required took a toll on my mental freshness. I needed a switch behind the wheel but I could wait until our stop in Germany. Just at the border to the promise land we encountered a small obstacle in the form of forty German policemen armed up to their necks and waving us to stop with a stiff arm. Forty icy pair of eyes were suspiciously firing at the enormous white van with the license plate from a third world country pulling up slowly to a halt. I rolled down a window as two young men in kevlar and machine guns walked up and asked in sharp German for a series of documents. The papers were all packed away and it took excruciatingly long until mother's fumbling numb hands of panic could locate all of them. Seeing her distress, the officer apologetically added some gentle words. "Please, lady, there is no need to be afraid." It felt more like an apology for his predecessors, who built a cringe in foreign travelers at the frightening sight of German men in uniforms. As we produced the papers he asked us some simple standard control questions. "Where are you headed?" "To Weg..something, this small town right at the border." "You mean Wegscheid." "Exactly what I said." "What is the purpose of your visit?" A heavy silence fell on the car. The correct answer to that question was that we transported goods produced in Slovakia to a German customer, possibly without the necessary legal paperwork for such transaction. As I was truly unsure I hoped for mother to grab control of the conversation, yet there was just the deafening silence, so I gave it a shot. "We are ... visiting a friend". "Visiting a friend?" "Yeah.. or mom? Are we visiting a friend?" It was the most awkward lie of border-control history and as I waited for mother to correct me anytime with the truth, her face drew a snow-white expressionless blank, with her eyes staring nowhere. Like a psychiatric patient in his happy place or a drug addict on LSD. As long as I can remember she had an inmost dread at the sight of policemen, and the German were undeniably the worst kind. Police were her kryptonite. "What are you carrying in the van?" What a good question. "Mom, what are we carrying in the van?" Blank. Back to the police. "Some stuff... nothing, really." "Could you please open the back?" "Why not." I jumped out of the vehicle and before I closed the door, mother with the speed of Internet Explorer finally gave an answer to a question that already expired, as if awaken from a dream. "We carry company materials." I opened the back doors and they didn't show a pretty sight. Pieces of metal laying unorganized while crumpled half-open cardboard boxes packed with second-grade construction equipment were stacked in rows. It looked like we were on our way from one black-market to another. The officer took one quick look at the refugee-less inside and closed the doors himself, handing me my documents. "You may go." The adrenaline from the encounter propelled us up to Wegscheid and beyond, while mother sincerely congratulated me on keeping my cool, which felt more like a joke. The next stop was surprisingly another farmer family, with some greasy tractors and a new Mercedes, part of the standard German low-life. A middle aged lady greeted us beaming with a terrible accent, begging us for patience, for his husband hasn't yet arrived home, from the farmers market I assume. Their middle aged son was stumbling around awkwardly with his head hung, belly popping and feet shuffling him around. He was the pride of the family, so the mom told us, a business person in Munich, the one who broke the chain of a dynasty of chicken farmers. Then the father arrived home and with the help of his wicked tractor-spinning skills he lifted the over 300 kg machine off the van and put in the used one instead. I was pacing there absently, not lifting a finger to help the three men giving their last to move the weighty iron parts, or joined the conversation between the two mothers of one's family and the other's quest for German language excellence. When mother moved forward to provide the lifters some much unneeded guidance, I had a chance to ask the truly important questions. "What dialect are you speaking?" "Oh, it is a mixture of Bavarian dialect and Austrian accent." "It sounds very.. melodic." It's an insult to my ears. "Really?" "Yes." No. "Your German is very nice though." I answered with a shy smile. Compliment for compliment. The goods have been exchanged yet the customer still lacked satisfaction, claiming he was promised undelivered parts, which was lego-like in line with what I've seen from Vili's business thus far. And long after. Mother of course didn't back down and with the business guru of Munich they faced off in a battle of minds. Sparks filled the air at the clash of their chiseled business acumen.

The hour of the ball came and we waited for our friends well dressed in front of the town hall; they were arriving fashionably late. It was quite odd as groups of people well aware of each others' existence greeted each other before the entrance. The whole event was more of a case study for social dynamics. People who despised, fancied or longed for each other were thrown in a bowl together, in tailored suits and fashionable dresses, drinking cheap gin from disposable plastic cups. People were greeting each other with warm hugs scented with laugh all around me and then gossiped horrible things in a whisper that grew louder with every consumed drink, until I could hear them rumble from the adjacent tables. It was an unappealing mixture of class and of moral trash and in its middle I was drawn in myself. I was sipping one plastic cupped gin and tonic after another until the evening became manageable and I continued long after that, until I found myself in a bar next to a double borovicka with Sramo spitting words in my face. Janci was also there, leaning in with his small glass of beer he faithfully committed to and waiting for nothing in particular. My second shot I refused to drink which is the surefire sign that I am not going to do well in the morning. I have passed the limit. I stubbornly convinced Janci to come upstairs to the ballroom, lazily forgetful of the fact that Sramo himself had a valid ticket attached to his wrist and didn’t just walk in dressed in his old sweater and torn baseball cap. We walked up and walked in and as I was petting my shoulder for the job well done, Janci was taken by the arm and escorted outside by the doorman. I stood there dumbly for a few seconds, then progressed further to get another drink.There was a drama unfolding that was sadly intriguing between Lenka and three guys who were somehow determined to gain her favors despite it being diamond clear that they will visibly suffer a social downfall by doing so. Lenka being undecided as she is left all of them agog, their willingness to publicly make a fool of themselves was rewarded with solely a few stolen dances. The end of it I didn’t witness. We got in an unnecessary fight with Katja about my hands being locked in my pockets  and my drunken swooning on the dance floor didn’t satisfy her dancing needs. We were tearing at each other to a point that I was ready to turn around at the front door of her apartment and walk out into the cold Rosenberg night at three in the morning. It didn’t come to that. I was seething for some minutes and then fell asleep puffing out soft clouds of evaporating gin and borovicka.The moment I woke up I was fine, but I did the math and it just wasn’t adding up to being a nice un-headache-y day. Soon I found the one position I could lay without feeling the need to puke all over the room and I proceeded in staying motionless as long as I could. Katja’s parents were wondering why I refused breakfast and what the strange noises slithering from the bathroom were. I told them it must have been the washing machine.I rolled over finally and showed my face outside, ready to receive some much needed council from mr. vili about how to deal with my hangover. He had considerable experience in the area and was eager to help, since he did get drunk back in his days. Namely once. Ever.I was anticipating an acidy eruption any minute and my head seemed to be nailed with an iron hammer, hence I suggested a walk outside to Katja, to counter my vertigo with some fresh air. It was drizzling outdoors but I needed to escape the apartment, the stiff tepid air and mostly Katja’s parents. Getting rid of the latter wasn’t as easy though, there being an unwritten agreement in place stating that they have the right, but not the obligation to join any walk taken in an area inside 20 km. By the time I put on a sweater they were all lined up fully dressed and excited for the trip. I was just happy I could still stand on two feet.The fresh air was a priceless change and even though the rain started drumming on the windshield, the view was amazing. After some left and right turns on roads unfit for adult cars we came to a stop where all mountains around us were visible and milky from the softly floating mist. In the end I was glad we all came. We walked a few steps where a hoard of goats and sheep were turning in circles, not far from them a 21st century shepherd named Ricky, with worn out clothes, hands in pockets and a face showing surrendered misery whistled to two shepherd dogs who tended the flock. A picturesque location right at the feet of Rosenberg.Back at the apartment I risked stuffing the heavy pork meat in my stomach, with onions, mustard, eggs, cheese and pretty much everything imaginable that could help itself end up on my clothes. I was eating it like a handicapped child. Everyone was waiting at the table with me, conversationally talking of their peculiar eating habits while three pair of eyes followed every draggingly slow movement of my food from plate to my mouth. Their table ethics didn’t allow them to leave for the whole half hour.And slowly approached the moment of me leaving the Liebscher residence. An emotional departure. They grouped up in the hallway, waiting patiently as I tied one shoelace at a time, packed me up with food for the ride, which practically was enough food for the next two days. We hugged goodbye, I thanked them for everything and I flew out the door. It was the Liebscher way of doing things. Which wasn’t a bad way at all.

My Friday started slowly, I snoozed my alarm a couple of times while burying my face heavily into my pillow. I heard some faint noises from outside, but no turning of keys, and I hoped once I walked out, the car that the day before covered the complete entrance of my driveway wouldn't be there anymore. It was. It irritated me beyond belief. I was walking circles with my cell in hand before making the call to my uncle, preparing for the possibility that he would suggest me walking down for his car keys and for the subsequent fallout where my nerves would snap out of my head. As I was walking outside I noticed the open doors to the garden and then him shoveling concrete into a hole he just dug. I turned around uneager to meet him. I played a tune on the violin and sang a song playing the guitar, slowly savoring the melodies, then hurriedly threw everything I needed in my bag and drove out to the post station where I had a letter delivered. I parked the car drifting on two parking spaces. I had a minute to spare, at most, but a group of people were dragging themselves toward the building just as I was stealthily approaching it. One got in before me. One was already there at the window drawing checks. Two behind me were cutting the line to make a quick request. I bid them farewell and directly drove to the hospital.There were lines of cars everywhere stuffing the roads as I felt inappropriately late, the irony of having a surgery in ten minutes did not escape me for longer periods than a minute. I wanted to honk randomly at immobile cars, but calmed myself by drawing a deep breath and counting to a thousand.It was 11.02 when I got to the right door and to my unpleasant surprise it seemed I wasn't exclusive, there were dozens of people with shady faces and loud kids, waiting for the doctor to call them. The door opened and they invited in the next person. That quarter second while I processed the situation my legs already started involuntarily towards the door, but it quickly closed with the new patient on the other side. A second later the door next to it opened and a voice called out my name. So far so good.I took off my shirt and laid down on my stomach, I waited with my head resting on my intertwined arms listening to the noises from next door and the accelerating heartbeat in my chest. It seemed I was afraid, unsure of why I needed this, and thought about standing up and walking away without a word. Thankfully my panic didn't prevail. The nurse made some comment about the bulging gigantic birthmark on my arm but I had an answer prepared beforehand. The surgeon walked in and wetted my back talking indifferently about some widowed cat-loving lady they both knew while he punctured me with a filled syringe. At first they didn't know which birthmark they were removing. I had to give them the heads-up. It was fast and painless, once they stitched me up we sat in a circle in their office like old friends, them flying through tips to keep in mind while I was unsurely nodding to everything. They asked for the 30 euros in the faintest voice and I handed it to them without hesitence. They sent me with a piece of my back to the lab for analysis where I hit a wall with the window where they accepted samples. It said no ringing, samples will be collected one at a time. So I sat down. And waited. A blonde in the shortest skirt walked in, walked up, knocked, the window opened and someone took her sample. I jumped up fast feeling foolish for my lack of understanding and walked with shame dragging my huge wintercoat and scarf to hand them my birthmark. Our train arrived to Rosenberg after 10 p.m., Mr. Vili was waiting for us with a straightened back and a bulging belly, talking kind fast Czech sentences to us as he guided us to his parked silver car. They were talking about inconsequential things while I silently looked out the window resting my head on my fist. There is a deep secret need in every boyfriend to be in great terms with the parents of their SO's, and though I was, it was a battle for sympathies each time we met. I had a reputation to keep in place.In front of their home there were a handful of parking spaces in a dark corner, but Mr. Vili didn't want to hear about it. Legend says kids with drugs do unspeakable things on those slots, which seemed slightly far-fetched, since everywhere around the wast unending nothingness encompassed us. Logical reasoning was of no help, so I bit deeply into my lips to keep my reputation intact, in the name of love. So Mr. Vili parked elsewhere, he parallel parked to a tight slot with an inch of space in front and an inch behind, and terribly askew. We waited at the elevator until he tried to satisfy his mania. That took some time.The family sat at the round table as it always does and eagerly told stories and dissected fresh experiences. It was uncanny. The eagerness for time spent together, I have realized this before, was far from what I am used to, or prefer for that matter. They talked until midnight and I grew more tired and irritable by the minute, and plotted my escape to the confines of Katja's room. I had terrible odds. I glanced at the wall clock from time to time which slowly meant every minute, closed my eyes for seconds, grunted here and there. Everyone saw my irritation but no one freed me from my misery. By the end of the night when we scattered to our rooms they must have thought I don't enjoy their company at all. We slept in separate beds but Katja slid in the morning beneath my sheet to compensate somewhat for our scarring long distance experience. Her parents were outside awaiting our company and I feared more of the same from last night. They left shortly to buy groceries giving us the opportunity to satisfy our unquenchable carnal needs with quick sex in front of the mirror. We had a meeting scheduled for one pm with Darina and the father of her child whom my instincts earlier labeled as bordering dangerous. Our icebreaker was chatty but from my pulse it was clear that my first impression still lingered heavily. Darina and Katja were having their girl talk and little Alex refused to acknowledge any of us, so it felt like falling from one bucket of boredom into another. Zoran was snapping out his phone every half minute and I had a hard time keeping track of the chitchat. Then suddenly business came up and the real estate he plans to buy and rent out, and I was very interested in what he had to say. We switched places with Katja so they could also continue without interruption, and we talked for the hours to come about visions, plans and experiences. There were some valid ideas. He had a partner who handled the bank loans in Croatia and he knew the people in Serbia who could cross the border and stitch up the buildings. He would renovate everything, making it clean, new and pleasant. There would be a pool, a sauna, a gym, a dock with a boat and jetski, all as bonuses and rent free each. He produces window panels back home and installs them in Switzerland, thus being cheaper than the opposition. Very willing, full of action and a mindset that could push it through. He wasn't particularly bright though, he had heavy thick glasses, a face that gave a feeling of being chiseled into rough stone, and eyes that were in constant search for the right word. He did remind me a lot of Noro, yet in a way they were worlds apart. We raced back on his car to our apartment and said a hearty goodbye, I wished him good luck and he said it was great meeting me. They had a troubled relationship with Darina, but it didn't seem probable she would end the drama anytime soon.At the apartment there is always constant preparation of food, finishing one meal always instantly means preparation for the next one. They were in prep mode once again, while I snapped through the channels to find the game that was on at four. I was all alone, which almost never happened in the rooms other than Katja's. Then Mr. Vili came in and sat down next to me, bringing in some leather necklaces he wanted to show. They were pretty and so I've told him, while I gave my best efforts not to watch the game as he was telling me of past experiences from another life. It was the Mr. Vili equivalent of looking women with crazy decolletages in the eyes. It wasn't easy. We talked about his father, about leather artworks, opportunities given by the Internet era, and in the end we talked about football. I mentioned the Nou Camp and the moment he hooked we watched football as men do, throwing mostly undeserved insults at everyone that happens to be near the football.For the second half the rest of the family joined and watched the channel they previously had no idea they possessed. They dimly remembered some programs where over-motivated men clothed in strict dress code kicked a ball for the enjoyment of thousands of attendees.

September 5th. I woke up dazzled, a little crumpled and buzzing, but not in the good way. At night I was restless due to the raging storm and the ghost that was supposedly walking around the house and materializing in the rich storage of dust which we didn’t give enough fuck about to clean up. I turned on the coffee machine, glanced out the window and there he was. The dog that turned up one-day from nowhere and acted like he was part of the family for months. Then as suddenly as he came he disappeared, with no hard feelings of course. He was walking with intense self-consciousness, something I have never seen in a dog before. He ran up the stairs. I opened up incredulously, not sure if it really was him, but yes, no doubt, his legs shaking from the overwhelming emotions and the guilt for leaving us behind. I sat down on the ground and he happily accepted my forgiveness by jumping on my face and licking it repeatedly. I checked my hand for all five fingers and I wasn’t dreaming, it was truly him. Whatshisname. He had a cheap blue collar embracing his neck which gave me a considerable pause; he was loved and taken care of, branded as one of their own, given a name they later remembered, possibly brought to the vet to get his shots. Then he left and came back where they didn’t care about him enough. There was a laughably sad irony in the situation that I was acutely aware of. Especially since I was parting for Bratislava in a few hours. I gave whatshisname some leftover dog food, but there was nothing left for him, truly, I gave it all to Mufasa the day before and he didn’t seem all too pleased with what he got. I piled on some duck fat for him. He graciously licked it up. I was sending some photos to Katka to share my shock with someone and I was not disappointed, she recognized him right away AND by name. Arthur. Of course. How could I forget. I went inside to get some clothes on, to make the fucked up weather at least tolerable, and Arthur went on a whining rampage for being left alone, an understandable feature in other dogs yet surprising from him. Not being whiney was Arthur’s top shelf skill he possessed, up until that point. Now he ruined it all. I spent hours on my phone next to him and he seemed perfectly content with all that, at times he came close to me to wiggle his tail right into my face. I assume he was at one of my neighbours this whole time, a wise choice, but he seemed hungry and shaken at first, as if he had traveled great distances to walk up to our door, say hi and then watch us how we leave for the week. Very Lessie-like. There was some noise at the gate and my uncle stopped by in his half-drunken walk with Tarzan, the German shephard that had teeth of the size of Arthur. He staggered up the stairs letting his dog loose resulting in a vicious speed dating between the two canines, ending with mixed results. -Hey, what’s up? I’m Tarzan. -Yo you better walk away you punk ass bitch! This is my house! And he really acted as if it was his house. Not unlike the last time he lived with us. Tarzan seemed very patient with the dog that was the size of his paw tearing at his neck with his teeny-tiny teeth. Then Tarzan pissed all over my front porch. My uncle was in a good mood with a considerable level of alcohol in his blood for his 1 p.m. arrival time. Not a nice sight yet not an unusual one either. He asked for some money, for his electric bills, then, after by his account I saved his life, he told me a story how he spent yesterday at the football game inviting his pennyless friend to rounds of shots. Lending money to family is always a mistake. Sometimes it’s inevitable. He begged for a glass of schnaps and then grabbing his pissing dog by the collar dragged himself in a zigzag line home. At 3 p.m. I was leaving for the bus and I dreaded the moment I had to leave Arthur behind. I had a feeling he won’t take it well. I walked out, locked the door, gave him a last embrace and made my way to the bus station without looking back once. I wasn’t sure where he gave up on following me. At the bus stop I found out he didn’t. He was waiting for the bus next to me, running through some busy roads and roaring cars to get there. I wasn’t sure if I could shake him off by stepping on the bus, he could just as well jump after me. And the driver would say - Get your dog off the bus. And I would have to say unforgivable things. - It’s not my dog. I don’t have a dog. Arthur, understanding every word, would stop dead, and roll down the stairs lifelessly, loosing all will to live. I would reach out my hand but it would be too late, the door would close and we would roll out to infinity.. The bus came and I stepped in and Arthur didn’t and that was that. He was left on the station waiting all alone, not sure of what he did wrong this time. Maybe, if he would’ve wiggled his tail more in my face, I wouldn’t have left and we could have lived happily ever after.

The devil himself sat opposite to me. Me, layed back in my chair, but with crossed legs, I didn’t want to show him open body languge, making him believe sure of his victory. I was playing hard to get. He was oddly sneering with his ugly crooked teeth, in need of serious stomatological expertiese. ‘Whacha thinking about buddy?’ ‘Not much, you know. Chores and stuff.’ ‘Didn’t you want to tell me something?’ My best facial expression of incredulity ‘What makes you believe that?’ That got him a little confused. ‘Well, you summoned me.’ 'Can’t someone invoke the five seals of hell without wanting something? God you’re so full of yourself.’ We sat in silence. A ball of hay rolled away next to us. 'Don’t mention God in front of me.’ Ah, here we go, what a sulky, whiny bitch. 'He’s an ass.’ He added. 'So you’ve said.’ 'I’m not sure where you’re going with all this. I mean you used up like half a gallon of blood to smear that pentagram up on the wall and now you’re not talking to me? Maybe it’s better if I go.’ 'Maybe.’ 'Okay.’ 'Whatever’ 'Yeah whatever.’ For being the lord of the underworld he sure was easy to annoy. And I wasn’t even trying hard. For my standards. I opened my eyes and woke up from my bed, Katey still peacefully snoozing next to me while her alarm clock was rocking the appartement. I hit snooze and proceeded to the bathroom to wash my face. I stuck my head under the hose, and released a stream of ice, though they claim it technically still is water. This was my third meeting with the devil. This week. It was quite unsettling, even though I still refused to believe it was real. My mouth was dry and my nose still felt the smoke. Katey woke up and walked in to put on some coffee. 'Hey Doggie.’ 'Hey you Clown.’ We were adorable. 'You’re up early.’ 'I see nothing escapes your attention.’ 'Yeah, I’m that good. Also, the buttler is the murderer. You know what I mean.’ I didn’t. Some kind of cliché, surely. She left for work leaving me the unbearable task to agonize over not having to go to work. I grabbed the keys and headed to the park. I took my Agatha Christie book with me. I hoped the buttler didn’t do anything crazy. I must have been sitting there for half an hour when I realized I’m still on the same page and my mind was racing through thoughts like an italian driver in meter-wide dank alleys. Was it possible that I was meeting with the devil? Yes. Why not. Was it more probable that I was verging sociopathy and slowly loosing my mind? Far more probable, undoubtably, but the two weren’t necessarily mutually exclusive. It was a pleasent mid-summer morning with enjoyable baking sunshine and caressing breeze, but other people were ruining it for me by walking past and breathing. It’s surprising how many toddlers you can meet on one sitting. I spent a lot of mornings in parks lately, and it is a constant tirade of young mothers with strollers, loosing their shit over their little unpolished gems smashing their toys and clothes on the ground. This morning was no different. 'Are you kidding me? Mark, pick that up!’ Mark didn’t pick that up. 'Mark, I swear to God, if you don’t pick that up I’m gonna slap you here in front of everybody.’ 'She’s not gonna do it’, said God, suddenly appearing next to me on the bench. 'How do you know?’ 'Because it’s the same thing over and over. Mark this, Mark that. She’s never hit him once.’ A sudden slap almost dropped little Mark next to his discarded teddy. 'Well what do you know.’ 'Aren’t you supposed to be all knowing?’ 'Good me no! It’s all propaganda. No one can forsee the future.’ God was wearing a dark suit with red tie and diamond cufflings. Very ungodly-like. 'I met with the devil the other day,’ I told him. 'Really? How was he doing?’ 'He said you’re an ass.’ 'Hehehe. Good ol’ devilo. His name is actually Phillip.’ That sounded plausible. I always disliked the name Phillip.