Early Lasting Sunlight
J. J. DeCeglie
February 2006
February 2006
He found a place deep in the library. One of solitude where he could smell the delightful must of the books. Where he could feel himself amongst them. With his writing now there was no way out for him, he’d delved too far, reached the depths, he’d written of the realities he’d been dealt, he felt few had done this, few had the ability, in Fremantle with a girl of his once walking at the wharf as the sun set blood orange against blue black ocean with licks of fire lapping pylons in close and the horizon out deeper, seawater winds, sharing beer bottles, she tried to convince him that his writing these words would kill him, would kill them, that no one wanted to read words like those, that he should just teach and quit his literary ambition, or write some other way, he paid her no attention, he didn’t talk writing, she knew that, he asked her to be quiet, to shut up, told her she was prettier with her lips pouted, full and still, she took a long suck of the beer they were sharing, went to speak, didn’t, he kissed her eyebrow, watched the sun sink and the ocean go pitch and choppy, so you could hear it more than see it, at the library in New York he missed her so that it was painful for him, like after you’d been suckered in the gut. He wrote from it. Thought you can’t fuck them all can ya. You can only try. He wasn’t sure of whether he meant women or publishers.
He didn’t care.
Before he goes out into the night he reads in the bathtub. Smokes a quality cigar. Sips at bourbon. Early evening with the window open and water balmy. Reads someone trying the short story out, some New Yorker, not getting it right. He throws the book. Breathes the good smoke out through his nose. Picks up Bukowski. Reads and smokes. Looking out the window now, at university girls moving their asses from side to side, laughing or dead serious, he only reads one or two poems, he knows each very well already. With Bukowski that is enough. The cigar in his teeth, never wet, with practice he had become expert at it, blowing fine smoke out the window as the dark of night loomed up, smoke and steam, he rubs his shoulders forceful with his hands, slaps them, pulls his balls out from between his thighs, grabs a towel and dries his hands, takes the cigar from his mouth and places it by the mirror, drowns his face and hair, feels well, strong, the night will be a great one, he stands too quickly, is hit hard with light-headedness, more brutal than he had been on the train, the room spins anti-clockwise express and he staggers, orange bulb light and mist whirling, has enough sense to step out the bath, though slipping, falling to his knees firmly, then weightless down and dead to the planet, shoulder smack then head, slumped wet and naked, Bukowski saturated and ruined, the other guy safe.
He woke ten minutes later. His ears ringing, head and consciousness there though distant and painful. It was dark now, he noticed it through the window. The neon throb and streetlight warmth. He was cold on the tiles and sat up. He was mostly dry. The dizziness subsiding slowly. He steadied himself as he stood, he could hardly recall what had happened. It took him a few minutes to remember he was in New York. In his own apartment. A writer. Bukowski was on the floor drenched. He walked into his bedroom and lay down naked. He was so tired. Partly ill. He hadn’t eaten well all day. He picked up a book by the bed, read the same sentence ten times over and put it down. His head hurt. Fremantle was so far away, and his writing was all he had, all he could give everything he had to, his time was owned by it, he would work at it strongly all his life, find ways for it, he knew that even then, even being where he was. He rubbed his eyes hard. Missed girls who didn’t miss him. He fell asleep quickly.
Wakes all sudden to the words I’m gonna die. The dream was him on the plane that hit the second tower, woken just minutes before the monumental hurtle, soaring too fast through sky unsteady and booming into the city limits, the pilots had a visual on the target, he’d been sure he could get control of the plane back and the words I’m gonna die didn’t come with the imminent threat of the massive explosion and jet fuel inferno, but rather with the notion clicked that even if he did assume control of the thing and win that scene they’d still crash and die. It would still all end. He didn’t even try to decipher it. It was still dark and he felt better now, he’s slept maybe ten hours. He showered for a long time. Sat down in the hot rain. Smoked near the window and decided on a vast breakfast of eggs, muffins, toast, hash browns and much coffee. He’d take some Hemingway to read, the new African text. He didn’t shave, dressed and threw on a coat and cap, the all night diner was just down the street near the university buildings. It would be quiet this early. Neat and crisp outside. He couldn’t get rid of words that played through his head now though, couldn’t dislodge them, they were there with occasional ear buzzing deafness, brief and harsh static in his head, not painful at all, the words said that as far he could tell nothing had any meaning, repeated clearly, that as far as he could tell nothing had any meaning, he disagreed, for him, writing had much meaning, and he was trying to gain some back with girls, with whatever they and love could offer.
As far as he could tell nothing had any meaning, he ate and read, heard the sentence in his mind, heard it and heard it, in the fluorescent dull light alone reading and eating as the traffic occasionally came by, as wild men walked their dogs in the gloom of not yet morning, him drinking much milky coffee, he wouldn’t allow it to convince him, he wouldn’t allow that, there was no way, though he knew he had to write from it, he must, it was important that he did, not just for him he reasoned. If he didn’t write from it he would lose it and it was an important sentence and shouldn’t be lost. He finished up and paid. As far as he could tell nothing had any meaning, walked home, he wrote til noon, nothing had any meaning, read some then, walked and got the paper, had any meaning, read over his work and cut it down, any meaning, rewrote it all and drank some bourbon whilst reading the sport’s pages, meaning. His head had been well all day. He should go out tonight. Drink and meet some girls who think they’re intelligent enough to fuck writers. He knew that someone he knew would know a place. As far as he could tell nothing had any meaning.
Out that night with others who wrote, some acted, others had paint, a brooding and noisy unit, drunk and sharp miscreant mob most handsome, he was asked questions thick and fast mostly on who he thought could write well, who he aspired to beat, he drank strong bourbon mixes with much ice, they offered him benny but he said politely no, maybe later, a lovely little painter girl commented on the strength in his arms and shoulders, on the cut of his jaw, another girl, a writer with long wheat coloured hair and glasses said she enjoyed his work, said it was very fine writing, stylistic to himself alone, though the influences were clear, he just listened to her charmingly, drank constantly, not paying for many, attention or drinks, he talked baseball a while to some agent, wished he was talking cricket, as he drank further he felt better, still tried to avoid talking writing, here it was difficult, he praised Faulkner, convinced another guy to find Gutierrez, said read all of Hemingway and Kerouac, search hard for Fante, he bought the petite painter girl some melon vodka and asked her not leave without him, she said of course, we were leaving together from the instant you walked in, he just smiled, walked away to some group passing a bottle of tequila around and throwing around argument on the Russians, he lit a cigar, sat back on a couch, drew in the smoke and breathed it out adding to the cloudy murk of the place with it’s thick sinister carpet laid on wood board hollow floors, red and blue lit orbs tinging everything, making faces and eyes evocative, their lips plush with fucking and variations of the act, stipulating that it was so, the painter with her short hair and fringe plastered across her forehead leading him out with her small hand gripping his, kissing him rushed and heavy in a thin alleyway down the street, pretending to sleep but blowing him gently on the cab ride to her place, he thought he saw the girl from the coffee shop lining up to see some late night Goddard film, wasn’t at all sure, couldn’t be with speed of the cab and shadow of night, she could paint the colours of any fuck she’d ever had were her words when reaching the curb at the front of her lush studio, he was very drunk and the night sky was clear, the air was good outside, she snorted coke and drank red wine in gulps from a bottle she handed to him on occasion, asking him to take her from behind because she was self conscious of her facial expressions when in bed, he said just turn out the lights and she said but we need the colour to have brighter orgasms, she had tiny breasts and wide hips with a very flat stomach, her backside was ample and fit, all her skin was the colour of vanilla ice cream, her bush an immense broad and beautiful forest spanning from under her belly right into between her salty thighs and beyond, all tucked away, it’s darkness making her skin look purer, it was his favourite portion of her, so unkept and coarse, he didn’t finish, she sprawled and passed out, in the morning he left her asleep, he could taste just charcoal filtered bourbon and good cigars in his dry mouth, her pretty flavour was only on his hands, his cock, some on his neck, perfume and sex smudge, for his nose mostly, he thought on seeing the coffee shop girl for much of night, felt a sadness he thought had left him back at university or just after, wondered if it was her he’d spotted, he had better visit her, explain, ask her out for real this time, though it did mean catching the train, it meant that and a shot at something that he thought was finished, he didn’t want another bout of what he’d had the other time, both with girls and trains, it was early, the sun up just a few hours, but he’d been there before at this time and sometimes she was there, and if not who cared, nothing mattered anyway.
As far as he could tell. What could he tell. He wasn’t sure. He was quite sure he could write, somehow she made him surer of it.
Just by pouring his coffee. Just with her eyes and skin. He’d rather kiss her than sleep with her. I’ll get a cab there. He walked through a green dewy park full of faint shadows and sunlight that seemed wet and yellow, he smoked, enjoyed it, the park reminded him of Russian land he’d been to when reading, Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky earth, it had some of his home in it too, the greens when wet, sky clarity adding, at home the dew would dry off by around nine in summer and the heat would kick in heavy and hard, the light very intense and clean, in the winter you could smell the ocean better off the wind even deep in Fremantle and he took pleasure in walking much at those times, finding a place to smoke a cigar and read, the beautiful occasions of full grey sky and thick rain in the evening with a orange haze over the whole universe, sweet rain fragrance remembrance, seeing the fuller colours and damp roads, dry blond grass wet, burnt grey coastal horizons the sun behind clouds, going to a bar and drinking expensive fruity beer, raindrops on shirtless skin, exquisite feelings of lost love and hurt, sleeping in a not bright room with rain hum fresh window open double shadow in the afternoon, his head felt fine, he felt something he hadn’t for long time, something he’d felt was finished in him. But he was wrong, it was still there, strong and real, not dead or completed, it lived in him and pushed him on now. He just hoped now that he wasn’t wrong with other things just as important, things just as true, even if he were somewhere, it if didn’t work for a time, he knew he could find it anyhow. He had that ability.
Walking out of the park and into sidewalk sparkling light, he was sure of it.
J. J. DeCeglie is born and raised in Fremantle, West Australia. He has lived in Europe and traveled thoroughly. He is the author of the underground novel the sea is not yet full. He is 24 years old.
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