Alfred's Apocalypse

When something bad happens, even the most respectable get damn voyeuristic. And as I pushed through the thicket of a crowd I chanted to myself,

I'm not one of them,
I'm not one them,
I'm not one of them.


I didn't even have a camera with me, my vision had been clear of that pounding fog for a couple of days, so there was no use for the camera, I never film anything good when I can see it. So I guess I was kinda celebrating this sudden spike in normalcy like it was some sort of damn holiday or something, my face permanently twisted into a sort of alligator mouthed grin.

It was early that morning, I woke up to the sound of a buzzing alarm instead of the sun crashing into the apartment and finally bouncing into my small cave of a bed, walled off by the stacks of old film reels I'd rescued from the mildewed underbelly of the theatre. I stumbled around, fearing that the squint of my eyes was the onset of an episode, but it wasn't, it was just a glob of sleep sand, or whatever the damn that stuff's called.

I hollered into the living room. The kid was sprawled sideways across her bed. I've learned she's a sound sleeper, not like one of those movie kids who wander around seeing ghosts in the night, or bounce around with angelic smirks at ungodly hours of the morning.

I fell into a sort of almost consciousness, as conscious as one can be at six AM, as I watered my soul with coffee.

"Can I have some?"
whispered a small voice.

Kids who drink coffee are five times more likely to get addicted to drugs. I'm sure of it.
"No."

She pouted.

I'd made of a small wallet out of film that was lying around the theatre, bits of its picture had been worn into a blur by the sun. In my rough hands, with the aid of duct tape it folded into a clumsy little pouch. I stuffed it with a couple of bucks and the phone number to the apartment and the theatre written on torn scraps of paper.

As we stood on the concrete platform I handed her a ticket and the wallet. She held the pouch neatly in her hands, flipping it around her fingers, admiring it. She was admiring it.

"This is so cool..." She breathed, holding it up to the light of yellowed pink blue sky.

The train came barreling in like a stallion, kicking up a wash of rain puddles and showering us in mechanical smelling wind.

"For emergency's only!" I yelled over the sound.

She looked at the money seriously, and nodded, biting her lips.

She through her arms around my hips, either trying to see if they really are as awkwardly narrow as they are, or, perhaps, though less likely, trying to give me a hug. I considered hugging back, instead it started to rain pigeons. Slick, shiny, rain covered birds fell out of the sky in masses, descending upon the station like a bomb brigade.

She leaped away from me with a startle, looking in amazement at the birds. I ducked my head and shoved my hands in my pockets, I'd seen enough Alfred Hitchcock to know this was no time for hugs, in fact, this was probably Watershed height's version of an apocalypse.

"Uncle Morton will pick you up at the station." I said to a jittery and fidgeting, lip biting Alien surrounded by a about a million damn birds.

"Does he still look like Elvis?" She asked, her head tilted and hands perched on her hips.

Our uncle Morton is an Elvis impersonator. He is also a plumber.

"Yes." I grimaced, surprised and ashamed at my own answer.

"Good." She added with a genuine grin.

That kid has a way of swallowing shit like candy.

Another army of pigeons landed around my feet.

"Get the hell out of dodge." I said to Alien.

"Huh?"

I sunk into the concrete, god did I feel like a dork.

"Go!"

She went, leaping onto the train just as it churned away, down the redline, taking that prematurely hot potato to her next location.

On Calloway a crowd had formed, hustling around a dead guy for their viewing pleasure these damn schmucks could come to the theatre for their viewing pleasure instead, and I wanted to holler at in each of their peering faces. I wanted to holler. That was a first, I usually prefer not to talk.

I made sure not to outstay my eye's welcome, only glancing for a moment and then climbing up the stairs of Watershed. More voyeuristic schmucks were lining the hallways, I nearly crashed into a man, who from the looks of how he was cradling his head in his grungy hands could have easily been the dude swimming in his own blood, dead in the middle of the street.

Locked inside the apartment, I brushed my hands up towards my face, dusting away the morning dew and pigeon feathers that had gotten caught in my stubble, which was really more of a forest now. And then I had the most unthinkable thought, and before long I was elbow deep in a box, subtracting a cracked mirror from its contents.

From the looks of it, I could have easily been the dude swimming in his own blood, dead in the middle of the street.

Foxes, Crows, and Rainy Day Roads.

"I forgot my Alfred." She said softly as I tugged shut the apartment door. It stuck in the door frame and locked with a click.



"I forgot my Alfred." She said again.

Who the hell is Alfred?



"Can I go in and get Alfred?"

"What's an Alfred?"



Ms. Macintyre from upstairs walked by, the damn crow she keeps on her pointed shoulders cried "Alfred!"



Alien giggled in that damn movie kid way of hers.



A fox walked by, an absolute damn fox that sent shock waves down my twisted spine and a hum in my ears that sounded like the grainy click of the projector kicking on and a reel running through it. Damn. She was movie perfect, perfect lips, perfect hips, a face that seemed to spread out like starts across the screen and swell with an auburn sunlight. She was dressed in red like a flag, and adorned in silver and studs.

Should I smile? I didn't smile. I was afraid of looking like that damn stuffy polyester job, like I'd payed hooky to go eat stale tomatoes with polyester the day of that mandatory course on how to smile that whole rest of the world seemed to pass with stickers and stars.

Everything crackled a little bit, staticky and cold.

I couldn't smile at this fox, not with Alien around, she just wasn't the right kind of person for that damn kid to see me smiling at.

But Alien was gone anyhow, no longer beside me.

Alien was gone.

I spun around like a maniac, looking for Alien who had disappeared into a non-existent crowd, in a barely existent hallway, in a possibly existing building that smells of stale, smoked covered cheese. I ran down the hallway a bit, hoping there was no one I could crash into in my fogged up stupor.

My fingers smashed into something pointy, a metal stud protruding off of a brilliantly nice face.

"Sorry..." I whispered, pushing my hair across the my forehead, instinctively trying to impress this perfect specimen of the human race. My fist closed around a patch of twisted, wiry hair; grey hair. Those damn greys have been springing up since I was twelve. "Please, don't see the grey" I silently prayed to that great big white and red role of Panavision film in the sky, that I didn't believe in. I tugged out my shirt and scooted past her.

"I wanna be sedated" she mumbled at me.

So, she's one of those people.

I could only see her shadow now, but it was perfect. Even if she was one of those people.

"Your shirt..." She continued.

I was wearing a Ramones t-shirt.

So, she's one of these people.

I unhinged my jaw and hoped it looked more like a damn smile and less like an alligator. I have a feeling it probably resembled the latter.

"ALFRED!" I heard Ms. Macyintyre's crow hollering from the other end of the stale hallway. I tore towards the unpleasant sound, begging to find Alien at the end of it, tripping on nothing and landing on the flat carpet somewhere between a fox with piercings and an old woman with a crow.

"That's Switch" I heard Alien say as if that explained everything.
"So, Alfred is my horse." Alien paused dramatically, like a damn movie kid. "Well, he's not a real horse, he's a stuffed horse" She stopped. I guessed she was talking to Ms. Macyintyre. "but he is real" Alien continued.

I stumbled in what I guessed to be the direction of Ms. Macyintyre.

"Sorry about the kid." I mumbled.

"Its ok dear" I heard a voice say behind me.

I guess I had guessed wrong. I could feel the odd looks coming at me, the piercing gaze of the fox, Ms. Macintyre's croaking glare. Even the damn kid was looking at me. I knew she was, probably in fear. Her "legal guardian," god, I sound like that polyester job, was talking to a wall. The blood thudded in my ears and spun through a projector, displaying my pathetic life onto a wall I could I barely see in front of me. Complete with credits and a theme song.

A Small hand touched my arm.

"Switch?" She said meekly.
"Let's go."
"Can I get Alfred? I always carry him in my backpack."
In the last few days she'd been toting around this white backpack littered with stains and rips.
"No."
"Ok."She murmured. "I know its kid-ish."
Well that really broke me, damn kids always think they're so above being a kid. Damn paradoxes.

We moved through the hallway, through the awkward glances and webs of mold.
As we walked together in silence my vision grew clearer, still in early black and white, slow and snowy, but as I walked beside the damn kid I could see.

Rain drops dropped down in clumps, fat and ceasing to explode across my outstretched tongue, and instead just trickling down my nose. Of course.

I caught Alien looking up at me and my tongue leaped into my mouth like a frog with a fly. A drop ran down across my closed lips. Damn.

We headed west up Sam Street, our feet sloshing in unison. The rainy day roads gleamed with energy. Alien looked with those sad, movie kid eyes of hers at the playground and that was filled with a couple miscreant youth emitting an earthy scent and a billow of smoke.

"Now Kid, let's go." I urged at Alien, she fell back into step, just a few paces behind me.

And if the sun came up, I wouldn't care, no, I didn't care if it rained. I thought about showing a movie just a little earlier tonight, Singing in the Rain maybe, campy, but a kid would like it. How about nine, we could go to the movies, Alien and I, it wouldn't be too late for a kid. At least I hope that isn't too late. We kept walking.

The world was shrouded in a sort of technicolor hue, and I was excited. Excitement, it was something. I hoped Alien would like the theatre, finds its enormous supply of captured wonder half as intriguing as I did.

A man in front of us was enjoying the rained out world as I much I was, just standing there by the old basketball court and letting the rain run down his body.

My eyes widened comically like a blond heroine in the a zombie movie as I realized the naked monster.

"Why isn't he wearing any clothes?" Alien asked.

I guess he likes to shower without his clothes on...in front of the world.

"Let's go somewhere else." I mumbled, jerking the damn kid away.

"Its ok Switch, I won't look, we can still go to the theatre..." She pleaded.

"No, its just work anyway, you don't need to see the theatre today." I grunted.

And suddenly, like that singing girl in gingham waking up from her dream, all the technicolor was gone, and I was seeing in sepia, brown lines zooming across the eyes.

"Can I come back later? When you work? Could I watch a movie?"
Nine's too late for a nine year old, it wouldn't finish til eleven. I should be responsible.
"No."
Alien pouted. "I wish Alfred was here."

And then, I couldn't see a damn thing.