#DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I HATE THOSE!?!? AND YOURE NEXT TO ROBERT MITCHUM AND ROBERT RYAN

[mifunebooty]

Robert Young is so lame and old that he helped make a documentary stressing motorcycle safety training for teens in the 70s

[janiedean]

Your mother is a hamster and your father smells of elderberries! Now submit or I shall taunt you again (Thunder road plz, it is my fave)

sure thing u hateful anon have some analysis u__u

SOOOO, Thunder Road is the opener of Bruce’s third record, 1975′s Born to Run, ie his breakthrough album, and sets the mood for the entire thing (more or less) and for about a good half of the themes we can find in his non-political songs (ie: finding love later in life, wanting to get out of a crappy small town, wanting something better in life), albeit in a more optimist way than his subsequent songs on the topic in Darkness (in The River it’s a healthier 50/50). It also has the peculiarity of not having a refrain - it’s rather one single, long rant that starts slow after a lovely harmonica introduction and then builds up in a crescendo up until the sax solo in the finale which can’t fail to leave the listener smiling until it hurts if they have followed, which made it both a perfect opener for his Live in ‘75-’85 record and a perfect closer for his concerts on his last couple tours, where he’d perform it solo/acoustic and while that version is slightly more bittersweet and not as full of joy it’s still amazing and a good update to the song which of course will sound different now that he’s nearing seventy than how it did when he was twenty-six.

So, without further ado, let’s go into it.

The screen door slams, Mary’s dress swaysLike a vision she dances across the porch as the radio playsRoy Orbison singing for the lonelyHey that’s me and I want you onlyDon’t turn me home againI just can’t face myself alone again

First thing: here we can notice how Bruce has a certain tendency to start songs slamming you right in the middle of the action in a kind of very cinematic way and this is a perfect example of it - the screen door slams, Mary’s dress sways gives you exactly the image of it, as in you can literally see a girl dancing like a vision across the porch while her dress sways and the screen door slams and you’re already put in the mood. Mind that we had the sweet slow harmonica introduction which tells us that this is a love song and that the dude is in love with a girl named Mary (like a good number of women in Bruce’s songs and we can go into the catholic imagery for a long time but next time).

But there’s more: with Roy Orbison singing for the lonely (Orbison is a direct influence on this song but also a singer that hadn’t been too famous at the time and had fallen out of the spotlight after a series of tragedies befalling on him so it already gives you the idea that Mary has old-fashioned tastes) we already know that Mary is a lonely person who’ll dance on the porch to a singer people already don’t know and who is for the lonely, which gives us the idea that Mary isn’t having a great time.

Then the narrator shows up with that’s me and I want you only, so *he* wants her, but we learn that Mary has turned him down once and he’s trying again because he can’t face himself alone again, so he’s also one of the lonely people Orbison sings for.

Summary: both Mary and the narrator are outcasts and not teenagers at their first rodeo.

Don’t run back inside, darling you know just what I’m here forSo you’re scared and you’re thinking that maybe we ain’t that young anymoreShow a little faith, there’s magic in the nightYou ain’t a beauty, but hey you’re alrightOh and that’s alright with me

That’s confirmed immediately in the next part where the narrator says that they aren’t that young anymore and she’s scared of a relationship with him rather than not wanting him, while he’s certainly sure of his feelings - he calls her darling and he wants her to stay and he’s more optimist than she is since he tells her show a little faith, there’s magic in the night which is an extremely sweet and romantic thing to say before dropping the bomb in the next two parts of the triplets, as in: you ain’t a beauty but hey, you’re all right (Mary isn’t beautiful but she’s all right and let me tell you if you don’t think of yourself as such that’s way better a pick up line than trying to convince people of how beautiful they are) and that’s all right with me, as in, the narrator can’t give two fucks about whether she’s beautiful or not - she’s all right and so he’s all right with her, and at this point we can assume that he has gotten her attention.

You can hide ‘neath your covers and study your painMake crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rainWaste your summer praying in vain for a savior to rise from these streetsWell now I’m no hero, that’s understoodAll the redemption I can offer, girl, is beneath this dirty hoodWith a chance to make it good somehowHey what else can we do now

At this point, if you listen to the song, you can notice that the beat picks up slightly as he presses on - he tells her that she can hide from life (hide ‘neath your covers) and think all over again about how much it sucks (study your pain) and analyze all her failed relationships (make crosses from your lovers) while thinking about her knight in shining armor (praying for a savior to rise from these streets) while he is right outside.

Now, our narrator is not a knight in shining armor - he can only offer some redemption (note the choice of a very religious-catholic themed theme which comes back and back except that differently from the washing of sins that dominates Darkness here we have redemption which is a way more optimist thing) beneath a dirty hood, so he just has most likely a dirty beat up car and no white horse and not much money, but still, he is there and he’s real while the prince charming most likely won’t show up. And still, he has one chance to ‘make it good somehow to offer her. And I broke it off because until what else can we do now the tempo is the same as above, but at:

Except roll down the window and let the wind blow back your hairWell the night’s bustin’ open, these two lanes will take us anywhereWe got one last chance to make it realTo trade in these wings on some wheelsClimb in back, heaven’s waiting down on the tracks

The tempo picks up again (told you it’s a crescendo) and as it picks up, he gets more heartfelt and tells her that hey, they can roll down the car’s window and let the wind blow back her hair (an image that suggests immediate freedom), and the free imagery is again brought back up in the next line - the night’s bustin’ open so it’s in front of them and those two lanes will take them anywhere so they can go wherever they want if they just take the leap of faith and trade the wings for wheels, and again, he offers redemption? Heaven’s at the end of the road.

Oh oh come take my handRiding out tonight to case the promised landOh oh oh oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder RoadLying out there like a killer in the sunHey I know it’s late, we can make it if we runOh oh oh oh Thunder Road, sit tight, take hold, Thunder Road

Now he goes on blatantly asking Mary to take his hand - a gesture of trust - to ride to case the promised land/Heaven (again with the catholic-ish imagery) that surely waits for the two of them if they just get out of their crappy small town. Now this is probably the time to mention he took Thunder Road as a title from a noir flick with Robert Mitchum which immediately is obvious in the choice of terms here because ‘like a killer in the sun’ could be a title from a Chandler novel and gives the entire thing a certain sense of urgency reinforced by it’s late but we can make it if we run - so they’re not young, but there’s still time for them to change their lives.

Well I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talkAnd my car’s out back if you’re ready to take that long walkFrom your front porch to my front seatThe door’s open but the ride it ain’t freeAnd I know you’re lonely for words that I ain’t spokenTonight we’ll be free, all the promises will be broken

Here the tempo goes down a bit slightly when he tells her that he has a guitar and learned how to make it talk (so he’s a musician who’s most likely better at talking through music than through words even if he certainly has good pick up lines) and goes again with the proposal - his car’s out there if she’s ready to take the long walk ie the leap of faith and go with him. Of course from her front porch to his front seat the door’s open but the ride ain’t free because she has to leave her vulnerability behind and take a chance on him which is harder than just stay in your comfort zone, especially for someone lonely for words he hasn’t spoken (she’s most likely waiting for someone to tell her he loves her and he hasn’t yet) but in exchange, they’ll be free and all the promises will be broken, cementing a clear cut with their pasts.

There were ghosts in the eyes of all the boys you sent awayThey haunt this dusty beach road in the skeleton frames of burned-out ChevroletsThey scream your name at night in the streetYour graduation gown lies in rags at their feetAnd in the lonely cool before dawnYou hear their engines roaring onBut when you get to the porch they’re gone on the wind, so Mary climb inIt’s a town full of losers, I’m pulling out of here to win

And now finally the tempo picks up way faster as the song builds up to its climax - Mary has apparently turned down boys that are ghosts now, haunting the beach road in the skeleton frames of burned-out Chevrolets, a very poetical but haunting way to say that Mary has sabotaged all her relationships because she couldn’t get out of her comfort zone and now all the Chevrolets (spoilers: GOOD cars, not dirty hoods) that she could have taken along with those boys are empty shells/skeletons gathering dust on the beach. They scream her name at night in the street reminding her of everything she’s given up/lost/didn’t manage to grasp when she could, along with a graduation gown lying in rags at her feet which suggests that her life post-graduation has been gone to shit same as the above suggests.

Mostly, in the lonely cool before down she hears their engines roaring on, except that how can they roar if they’re burned-out skeleton frames? Explanation: those people are actually out there in the world catching their chances, Mary is not and hearing them roar just reminds her of how much she failed in life.

But when she gets to the porch they’re gone on the wind, so she can’t hear them until she’s in her comfort zone - the porch…..

And then the narrator just cuts it all of with a direct so Mary, climb in cutting through all her problems and exquisitely ends up with the most liberating, cathartic line he could have.

As in: it’s a town full of losers (a small place that they both hate and that didn’t give them opportunities) which he hates and she hates and he doesn’t want anymore… and so he’s pulling out of there to win, which is like honestly the most han solo thing anyone could have said in that sense (or maybe han solo talks like the guy from thunder road? all is possible) but in all seriousness, coupled with the fact that it’s the peak of the song and that then it’s followed by that long, joyous sax solo gives you the idea that the guy and Mary did leave and got on their car and won and left all those losers behind them.

From Darkness we know that most likely it didn’t go like that or that there’s a high chance they failed but here we don’t know yet, and honestly, at this specific moment… who cares? You don’t want to know because you want to believe they succeeded, if you look at who sings it you know he left a town full of losers and pulled out of there to win and win he did and it gives all of us - both Marys and narrators - the idea that even if we feel like it might be too late one day we also will pull out of our small town full of losers and win as long as we have a little faith and follow the magic in the night and excuse me Monty Python-loving anon, but it’s honestly beautiful and a better love song than most people can say to have written and it’s such a gem I can’t even and did I say I love Springsteen because I do, thanks for coming to my ted talk.  

[therealkn]

David’s Resolution: Day -2

Day -2 (December 30, 2018)

The Night of the Hunter (1955)

“And then the good Lord went on to say, ‘Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly, they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit. Neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits, ye shall know them.’”

There have been plenty of actors who’ve tried their hand at directing films, with varying degrees of success. A big example is Ron Howard, who started out acting in The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days, then went on to become an accomplished filmmaker with a lot of good films like Apollo 13 and A Beautiful Mind. Clint Eastwood’s had a pretty solid career as a director, with films like Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby. Same with Rob Reiner, who went from being known as Michael “Meathead” Stivic on All in the Family to being known as the director of This is Spinal Tap, The Princess Bride and Misery (and also North, much as we’d like to forget that film exists).

Mel Gibson took on directing Braveheart himself, and that film was also a big success commercially and critically (also has a great soundtrack by James Horner); same thing with Tom Hanks and That Thing You Do!. But not every actor who goes into directing met big success, at least initially, and one such example is Charles Laughton.

Charles Laughton was a great actor whose more memorable roles include William Porterhouse in 1932′s The Old Dark House, Dr. Moreau in 1932′s Island of Lost Souls (a really good old horror movie where he is the best thing in it), and Quasimodo in the 1939 adaptation of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, which portrayed Claude Frollo as a judge over 50 years before Disney’s animated adaptation of the story. He was a fantastic actor who sadly directed only one film, but at least the film he made is fucking incredible and one of the best thrillers of all time.

The Night of the Hunter is the story of one Rev. Harry Powell, played by Robert Mitchum. Powell is a traveling preacher who also happens to be a serial killer operating in the same vein as Bluebeard: he finds wealthy widows, marries them, kills them, takes their money, rinse, repeat. And his latest target is Willa Harper (played by Shelley Winters), a widow living in Depression-era rural West Virginia. Willa’s husband Ben (played by Peter Graves) was arrested, sent to prison, and executed for bank robbery and killing two men during the robbery, but it just so happens that Ben’s cellmate was Rev. Powell himself, who was serving time for car theft. And Powell learns that Ben, before his arrest, gave the money to his two children - his son John and his daughter Pearl - for them to hide, meaning that not only is Powell going to go after Willa, he’s going to go after her kids.

So after Powell is released from prison, he goes to Willa’s town and begins charming his way into the town and endearing himself to the townsfolk, which does two things. One is to show Robert Mitchum’s talents as an actor: he is legitimately charming and charismatic as he tells the now-famous story of why the words “hate” and “love” are tattooed on his knuckles, and he quickly endears himself to the town and to Willa and Pearl, even to the viewer in some degree. And that’s where the other thing comes in, and that is that it shows how goddamn terrifying Robert Mitchum can be.

I ended the It Happened One Night review saying “Robert Mitchum is a scary motherfucker”, and this movie shows why. There’s a reason the American Film Institute put Powell on their list of the 50 greatest movie villains of all time. The way Mitchum plays Powell is captivating not only in how charismatic he is, but also in how sinister he is. At all times, even when he’s singing hymns with the townsfolk at an outdoor picnic, there is always this sense that something doesn’t feel right. Even when he is played a little more for comedy, like when he’s peeking upside-down at Ben in prison like he’s Kilroy, or when he’s hollering like Daffy Duck after getting shot in the arm (we’ll get to that later), there’s still this feeling of unease around him. If anything, the fact he can be more comedic makes him scarier because it makes him feel more like an actual person. It makes him more grounded and fleshed out and all the more disturbing.

Powell soon marries Willa and kills her, but not before convincing her that she has been a wicked woman - their honeymoon is him making her feel ashamed for wanting sex in a marriage, and she soon adapts herself to her beliefs. This leads to what I feel is the most disturbing and terrifying scene in the movie, where Willa is preaching to the townsfolk about her “formerly wicked” ways, surrounded by torches as she preaches her rhetoric. It’s legitimately terrifying to see her indoctrinated into these beliefs and speaking these words in this way.

Willa dies at Powell’s hands, and it eventually leads to John and Pearl striking out on their own, travelling downriver to avoid the pursuing Powell. This eventually brings them to Rachel Cooper, an old woman played by Lillian Gish who takes care of stray children, and who takes them in to live with her. Rachel is established as a badass old lady who does have a very kind and understanding side. The film reaches its peak when Powell tracks the children to Rachel, who doesn’t buy his sob story about Willa’s death for one moment and, when Powell goes after John, immediately goes for her shotgun to force Powell off, leading into a tense nighttime standoff between the reverend and Rachel. And how it ends... yeah, not spoiling this one. You’ll have to see it for yourself.

Put simply, it’s really depressing that Laughton didn’t direct another film. This is one of those movies that took some time to be seen as a classic. When it first came out, it did not do very well with critics or audiences, and it really got to Laughton to where he didn’t direct another film. It sucks because I’d have loved to have seen him direct more films, because if The Night of the Hunter is anything to go by, he’d have given us more great classics like it. This makes me wonder if after his death, he saw the film’s reception even today and how so many see it as a classic.

All the acting in the film is great, from Mitchum and Gish and Winters to the child actors, even to the Spoons, an old couple who are friends with the Harper family and whom the wife Icey (yes, her name is Icey Spoon) I absolutely fucking hate as a character. That’s not a bad thing, I think she was designed to be a character you hate, and if that is the case then it’s done very well. The music by Walter Schumann is excellent at conveying mood, especially when things get dark. But then you get to the cinematography and the lighting, and that’s the really good shit.

That screenshot I used for the film is the perfect example of that. The use of lighting in this film is god-tier and there are few films before or since that have used light like The Night of the Hunter. The symbolism behind it is very simple - light and dark, good and evil - but it’s absolutely striking. There are shots that are beautiful to look at and haunting at the same time: the ethereal depiction of Willa’s body in her car at the bottom of the river, the whole thing framed like a painting; the shot of John and Pearl sleeping in a barn when John sees Powell on horseback in the distance, searching for the kids; and the scenes with John and Pearl floating downriver, with the night sky above and the animals watching on the ground. There’s some really beautiful imagery in the film and it’s worth watching just for that.

I highly recommend this movie. Just the cinematography and lightning’s enough to make you want to see this movie for how great it looks, but it’s also a top-notch thriller with one of cinema’s greatest and most terrifying villains. Also, this is the first movie that I’d recommend you watch in the dark, preferably in the evening or in the early morning before the sun rises.

Next time: a Joan of Arc film, but not the kind you’re thinking of.

[storiesbybrian]

Jane, His Wife (September, 2014)

Paul is about to miss his plane. A viable excuse is right up his ass, a cannaboid suppository purchased as a kind of reward after a very contentious meeting. He could probably amuse his boss into forgiving him for not even making it to the airport with a straightforward account of his inability to resist grabbing something from a shelf labeled “Edibles and Anables”and then, being on such an impulsive roll, marching straight from the register to the unisex bathroom where he pretended to defecate but really went ahead and dented his anal virginity right there in the dispensary, higher than Robert Mitchum before the water from the fake shit flush  finished swirling. But the real reason Paul’s flight takes off without him is a girl he used to know. He thinks her name is Sonja.

Emerging from the bathroom, more of a man/less of a man, too confused to know which codes to honor at the moment, Paul bumped into a guy engrosssed in his smartphone. He was very muscular, with a barcode tattooed on the back of his bald head, and he wore a coat, tie and acid washed jeans. Ironic or resolutely earnest, again Paul couldn’t decipher. So, before manners or fear could stop him, Paul peaked at the phone screen, hoping it might give him a better sense of what this guy was all about. And there she was, holding a baby, grinning unabashedly at the semi-well-dressed man and telling him something about a movie she was almost finished watching. Over the past 25 years, Paul had imagined seeing Sonja again many times, but never in fulfillment of Jetsonian prophecy by the bathroom at a legal weed emporium.

Paul remembers her name as evoking kerchiefs and ice skating, so maybe it’s really Brigitte or Helena. Theirs had been one of those acquaintances that advanced too rapidly to ask for a reminder without compromising the probability of sex, especially since she made a big point of knowing his name, shoehorning it into nearly everything she told him. And then, after what had happened, the mutual acquaintance that had introduced them never mentioned her again and Paul was not about to ask after “your friend, you know, that depressed girl with the ungainly feet and Jupiter spot on her eyeball?” Those feet. They seemed to be clutching something delicate, or maybe she was just trying to make them seem smaller. Anyway, Paul follows her husband out of the dispensary, knowing he has to call work, and his own spouse, and no surer what to say to either of them than how to broach a conversation with a stranger whose physique and pants might imply a penchant  for violence.

Paul follows Mr. Sonja across Rainier Avenue to Chinook Beach Park. This must be where most recreational customers go to light up as now, with one acid washed leg draped over the other, far less threatening seated than upright, the bar code-necked man rolls himself a blunt. For a moment, Paul is afraid of being mistaken for some kind of moocher who hangs around the parking lot waiting for someone to come out and offer him a puff. But just about any misrepresentation, no matter how unflattering, would be preferable to who Paul really is to the mother of this guy’s child.

Meanwhile, what about Paul’s more pressing concerns, like the personal and professional upheaval he causes by being here instead of home in two hours? And in an irony he feels like he has to be very still to keep straight, Paul notes that he is drumming up excuses for the homefront to delay his encounter with a sartorial schizophrenic, while he very well could have mistaken the visage on the guy’s smartphone and set off in pursuit of resolution 25 years in the making to put off the stresses inherent in maintaining all of the routines he is forsaking to be here.  Like he’s avoiding returning to the life he’s now invoking to avoid further avoidment.

He pulls out his own phone and starts dialing Anna Lyza’s mobile number. Her name is not symbolic coincidence, just the product of really strange parents. Paul has made vague allusions to a girl he traumatized in college, but never told Anna Lyza the full story of his day with Sonja. And to go into it now would sound like he was lying to cover for something far more nefarious than a digital goose chase.

So Paul needs to lie to his wife, tell half truths to his boss and come completely clean to this weirdly dressed stranger on a bench. Great, let’s talk to the very strong guy who has good reason to hate you. While he’s high. Paul starts repocketing his phone when it rings. It’s Dan.

“Hello?”

“Paul! So glad I caught you!”

“Oh hi Dan.”

“Listen! Can you talk?”

“To you?”

“Funny. Look, at the meeting earlier today? Jordy said he licenses all of his material through Quatre Saisons? Not true, my man.”

“So we don’t want to…?”

“Dude doesn’t license any of his stuff!”

“Like it’s all-?”

“Open-Sourced! So why were we about to shell out 2nd round funding for free shit?”

“Because you said-“

“Ehnhnhnhnhnh! I didn’t say shit Paul. You said we needed to deal with the Franco-Vivaldi fuckers.”

“Well…”

“Alright, whatever. We’ll talk about this when you get back.”

“Yeah well-“

“Hey Paul?”

“Yeah?”

“Dude, you sound higher than me right now.”

Paul hangs up the phone and rubs his head, appearing far more stressed than he actually is. Sure enough, he gets Sonja’s husband’s attention from the next bench over. Paul gives him his best hangdog and the guy smiles and offers him the blunt. So phase one initiated, but Paul’s resorting to manipulation to make progress toward amends for 25 year-old emotional abuse makes the whole thing feel tarnished before it even gets off the ground.

“Thanks man.”

The guy nods, then thinks better of silence. “Hey, what’d you get in there bro?” His voice is raspy.

Paul takes a deep breath and points to his ass.

“No shit!”

“Not right now.” It gets a laugh.

“So gimme that back, yo. You’re already baked!”

Paul nods enthusiastically. “Appreciate the company though.”

Either the guy will accept the friendly overture or reject it and maybe get suspicious. If the suspicion can manifest itself in a way he’s supposed to notice, Paul will flash his wedding ring and broach the topic of spouses (though the irony of grousing about being married to women as a way to tell men you are not gay is not lost on Paul). But the guy just blanks out and it occurs to Paul that people can say “bro” without awkwardness and still have gaping social deficiencies. In fact, how many times has Paul mistaken one or two words for more comprehensive coolness? He needs to restructure his entire socio-evaluative process but now is not the time. Or is that more personal procrastination and cowardice? Why not now?

“Nice here,” Paul tries.

“You ain’t from Seattle?”

“San Francisco.”

“City by the Bay. Nice bro!”

Paul nods. Briefly he considers just asking the guy what his wife’s name is. But he can only see it seeming  like he’s got a jacket lining full of hot watches for sale. And maybe the guy’s impression of Paul is still unformed enough that coming across as sleazy and awkward himself will not seem out of character, and might even arouse compassion. Like maybe the guy will assume that Paul’s life is so pathetic that sharing the details of his own will seem charitable. But that’s a stretch, even between two stoned strangers.

“Been there? I mean do you live in Seattle? Actually I don’t know what to ask.”

The guy laughs and slaps Paul on the back. It hurts.

“I like you, bro. Name’s Paul.”

“No way! That’s my name too!”

“Bullshit!”

Paul pulls out his driver’s license. The whole time he has been trying to seize the opportunity to bestow an apology whose due is old enough to rent a car, he has assumed that Sonja relegated their afternoon together to some minor episode that never bore recounting to anybody. And before he can consider otherwise, his ID makes Acid Washed Paul potentially angry.

“Did you go to Boulder bro?”

It would be easy to say no, catch another flight and try to smooth everything over back home. But Paul can not chalk all of the other things he’s neglecting to be here up to larkishness.

“Yes.”

“This might sound fucked up, but I know who you are.”

“I saw you FaceTiming with her. I was hoping…”

Paul clamps a hand on Paul’s shoulder and squeezes cruelly. Paul tries to squirm out of it but the grip is too tight. With the other hand Paul holds the blunt close like a paintbrush.

Paul has never been in this much physical danger. He thinks that if he had, or anyone had ever hurt him very badly, he might not carry as much guilt around. As the ember glows an inch from his face, black trees past it swaying by the water, he realizes that maybe he wants to get burned. That rather than explaining to Sonja that he enjoyed being kind to her when she expected cruelty, but then couldn’t help switching to contempt when she started expecting or even demanding kindness after only knowing him for two hours, it might be more satisfying to all parties concerned if her husband damaged him permanently and then brought pictures of it home to his dear sweet wife as sort of a trophy, first prize in the KarmaBall League.

“I wanted…”

Acid Washed Paul’s eyes narrow, but the ember bobbles and his threat of burning seems to recede. Paul almost starts crying and wishes that he would.

“I wanted to apologize to her. She’s… She’s told you what happened?”

“You know what she says? She says it was like you lifted her up to the greatest view she’d ever seen, and then you kicked her lower than she’d been before you’d ever met. She didn’t even wanna know anybody else named Paul, much less marry me! You know she’d just gone back to school after a suicide attempt.”

“No. I didn’t know that. I really didn’t!”

“And it’s stayed with you too, huh?”

Paul nods.

Paul stubs out the blunt and unholsters his phone, weighing it in his hand.

“Well this is a buzzkill.”

Paul tries to maintain eye contact and now he does begin to cry. To his shame, it’s probably out of relief that he escaped a mangling.

“Jesus. You need a drink more ‘n me!”

“I don’t drink.”

“What?”

“I quit when I turned 40.”

“Like W.”

“Oh yeah, that’s right. Well, he is disciplined I guess.”

They go to a coffee shop that serves beer. Paul seems to know several people there, though Paul can not tell how highly they regard him.

Paul gets a pint of something dark and frothy. Paul has Earl Grey tea.

“Is she… happy?”

“Who Anna?”

Paul rocks back in his seat. All this time he had her name wrong but meanwhile married someone else with the same name. And of course so did she. He thinks it’s a coincidence that shouldn’t mean much, but worries again that dismissiveness is tantamount to cowardice. Paul does not know anything else about Paul. If Paul shares more information, the coincidence will gain the freight of expectations and make the whole thing look like some time bomb detonating at the altar. But he cops out and sits on it, pretending he knew Sonja was Anna all along, and that her San Francisco counterpart is named something other than Anna Lyza.

“I mean… If you’re askin’ how guilty are you supposed to feel, I can tell you that plenty of dudes have done her way worse than you managed in one afternoon.”

“But, well, do you know all their names too?”

“Oh yeah. All named Paul. Every last one of ‘em!”

Inhalant Paul looks bewildered for a moment, then cracks up loud enough for dozens of faces haunted by laptops to stare at him. He can not stop laughing. The faces plead for quiet. Rectal Paul is not sure whether to laugh along, stay mired in the horror that seized him when he thought Paul was serious, or take the spectral freelancers’ side and admonish Paul to simmer down.  He sips his tea without committing to anything.

“Man, I don’t even think she remembers every one’s name. And trust me, it ain’t like I ain’t done my share of damage too. But I’ve stuck around so…”

“I really would like to apologize to her.”

“Yeah that probably works for you bro, but I’m not sure it’s such a good idea on her end. Mad hormonal since the baby.”

“I hear that! We have a two year-old.”

“Tell me it gets easier.”

“It does. I mean, you get to start sleeping through the night again. But that’s right around the same time they learn to move on their own so there’s more chasing ‘em around, instinctively covering every table corner with your hand.”

Paul does not ask Paul any follow ups, how old, how masculine, any others. Paul is relieved by this. If Paul were generous enough to be curious, he would occupy the high road more imposingly. But being all about his own deal, Paul does not have to cede as much moral leverage for his past sins.

Music has been playing continuously, though a specific song comes on before Paul notices. It is a classic rock anthem that Paul’s high school classmates used to sing along with and quote in yearbooks while he felt alienated for cherishing the knowledge that the song was the musical equivalent of shit past its expiration date. But now he smiles and feels the urge to sing along, nearly certain that Paul will join right in.

Before the verse drives up to the chorus, a giant hand tries to pry the coffee shop’s roof from the top of its walls. Everything quakes. Coffee cups chit and shatter. The song keeps playing. Nobody wants to be the one to shriek. The giant hand can not separate the roof from the walls. The quaking stops for a moment, then the giant hand punches through the roof, smashing into a pinball machine. It tries to shake the plaster and glass out of its wounded knuckles. It has a wedding ring that knocks people down.

Paul and Paul look up through the hole in the building. Giant Anna glares down at them, raising her foot til it blocks out the light.

Paul says, “Holy shit that’s my wife!”

Paul thinks with so many people under threat of imminent smushing, he might have pretended otherwise. But in his final moment before Anna grounds him and everyone else there into the carpeting, he envies Paul’s lack of guile.