BLACK MARKET LIT
About Ian Driscoll.
till death.
IAN DRISCOLL is a writer from Southern California. Ian writes poetry and prose, he thinks. He lives in Peru. He studied comparative mythology for 13 years. Now he lives in the jungle and drinks Ayahuasca full time. His eyes are going. His back hurts. He drinks too much gin. Ian keeps traveling.
she hated him. and he hated her. he had cheated on her, many times. it came out one night after a thousand beers and pestering and pestering. and he’d told her, through teary eyes and bullshit remorse that he’d fucked them. he’d fucked the little ones and the big ones and he’d lied and said that he’d been at work so late, so late.
all the while she’d made mashed potatoes and made gravy and steak, and sometimes tuna casserole and macaroni and cheese and all the rest. she wept and cried and lamented and hit him. and then, late at night, after all of it, she smiled. she would stay with him and she would punish him for every perceived offense. she would stay with him like jesus on the cross, for jesus on the cross. and deep deep down, beyond the skin and tissue and muscle and viscous organs and bones and marrow and molecules and cells and atoms, she smiled quietly in the dark. and every day after that was a beating.
he would kowtow and accept and acquiesce and submit and feign love, so much love. and none of it would absolve him. he embraced religion. he studied the voluminous commentaries of his forefathers. he forced his hand and pretended to believe it all. he had to, and it was pitiable. it was a way back to himself, maybe. or it was a way back to her. or it was a way back to familiarity. and it was the only thing that kept him. together, with her, connected, caring, breathing, alive, wide-eyed. christ, he went through the motions. what more could she want from him? it was what he had to give.
but she wanted a pulse, blood. she wanted a sign of recognition. a realization of the wrongdoing. it was not to be, of course, and failing that she would grudgingly accept blind subservience. every night, every day, she reminded him of his wrongdoing. and she drove him towards a destination that neither one of them could precisely define.
but god, did it feel good.
and she slipped the comments softly into every interaction, every conversation and it slipped into the very root of his being. and he kept telling her, no, no, please, don’t do this. i’m offering you everything that i can. i’m giving you everything that i know. if you know more than this, then please, tell me. my mind is yours.
but she wanted his heart and it wasn’t his to give. and she wanted time to move backwards and he couldn’t do it. and she wanted the man she wanted and he wasn’t it. so she pushed him and pushed him. and he cried in the quiet moments, or the intoxicated moments, and he was aimless and hopeless and retreated further and further into his head.
he wandered the streets there, alone in himself, stumbling and slobbering and hungry for the normalcy he’d known and capsized and wrecked.
she kept on making gravy and potatoes, and that was her triumph. that was her superiority. and he knew it. and she knew it. and she would come home and they would eat and they would fall asleep in front of the television as the mortuary glow washed over them. until one night when he made dinner for himself. and he put the potatoes on the stove, and cranked it to high, and he turned on the television and he played with his toys, and he didn’t mind about the food. and his eyelids got heavy as the pixelated light flooded over, and he nodded off. and then everything was aflame. he panicked and ran outside.
he stood on the cold concrete of the curb and watched the house burn. he watched the flames spread from room to room, and only eventually telephoned the fire department. and just then, after the phone call and before the firemen, did she come home from work. everything was engulfed. he’d made no attempt to save even a piece of it. not the pictures. not the files. not the dog. he just watched it burn. and she lept from the car and screamed at him and the tears ran down her cheeks as she asked him if he’d called nine one one. he had, he said. you fool, you stupid fuck, she screamed. what happened? what the hell could have happened? and she stood there, staring at the house, staring at the rotting fruit of her many years of labor, and then she stared at him.
and as she looked at him, beneath the skin and tissue and organs and cells and atoms, she smiled despite herself. and her mouth turned up imperceptibly at the corners as she yelled and yelled and yelled.
she was victorious.