24 Comments
User's avatar
Michael Ross's avatar

„So THIS is the locomotive!“. Classic line. And aahhh, that kiss…..

lchristopher's avatar

That locomotive bit went over like a bag of bricks slung through a stained glass window at Sunday 11AM.

It was a kiss and a half all right. Kissing the right person the right way is so insanely intimate.

sara's avatar

wonderful storytelling

lchristopher's avatar

it means so much to me that you think so, sara! <5

Teabagg's avatar

A glint in your eye

something unnamed,

sheltered behind the lid,

melded into the mind.

Bougie Hippie's avatar

I can't get enough of this writing x

"i see everything when i am pharmaceutically vacant and perhaps that is why i run from my real life every chance i get"

Howard Salmon's avatar

What a remarkable piece. Your ability to thread chaos, tenderness, danger, humour, and that sharp self-awareness into a single arc is extraordinary. I love how the story keeps circling back to those small moments—the books in bed, the quiet breath between kisses, the way a single afternoon forces you to take stock of the life you’re drifting through.

And beneath all the movement and misadventure, there’s this unmistakable shift happening in you. You capture it with honesty and without flinch. Thank you for sharing something so raw and so fully lived.

Trevor Cohen's avatar

a wild ride. i could really feel the muscular infrastructure of nyc, as you dragged me all around town. this reminds me of days that are half mishap and total victory. i want to meet your lawyer.

Michael Ross's avatar

More intimate than sex.

Rosalind's avatar

oooh love this!

lchristopher's avatar

Which what when where why - be more specific, Mexico! :DDD

Rosalind's avatar

Well, I liked how you turned a perfectly ordinary and annoying occurrence into something so good, a good story, a good love story, but with additional stuff like the car was someone else's, which made me laugh out loud. It was a helluva date for sure, and I loved the detail about making the bed ...

SweetSweetHeart 🌹's avatar

This is one of my favorite’s of yours so far.! Very Holden Caulfield, but if he was sweeter, and outgrowing his own B.S. The way the inner dialogue juxtaposes the outer-world works especially well. You’ve painted the characters and the city (one I know well) with such vibrance and warmth. It has such a unique colorfulness and panache.

lchristopher's avatar

hi there! now **this** is what i mean when i say "be more specific/BMS!" I've never once had that analogy or comparison posed: [re:Holden/Mr. Caulfield - I met someone who actually NAMED their son that once. i cannot imagine the years of therapy that must have transpired since...digression!, as is yelled in one of the numerous schools that kicked him out]. the main character [syndrome] here is not from money; Holden absolutely was. I remember reading Catcher for the first time...

[[[[after telling my English teacher at the time that j.d. salinger was full of shit but that I would humor him; this was on the heels of turning in a twelve page literary criticism of *Richard Bachman's "Rage" which *Stephen King has since personally [it was proactive, not reactive] removed from publication, as it is all about a school shooting [many of his early works were, some at high school, some at college]]], I still have it in my fireproof filing cabinets, somewhere...

...that Holden just helped himself to cigarettes from the box on the table and thinking: holy shit, no one in my family would ever leave a pack of cigarettes on the table, they would just disappear.

it was a date a date a date a date a date. and yes, i always thought it was colorful, more brightly lit than most of my work, which can lean towards the end of love, the end of the world, the end of the pizza - quite negative, in other words!

it's always a pleasure to open up my correspondence/comments section post-longform and find you here. it's nice. thank you again! :DD. <5

SweetSweetHeart 🌹's avatar

It is sincerely my pleasure! I really enjoy reading your work. It has a pulse - so engaging, it is my privilege! Happy I stumbled upon it :) I actually know someone who named their son Holden too, crazily enough! I’ve never read Rage, I did know that Mr. King removed it. In high school I loved Catcher, and I brought in a New Yorker article about The Bell Jar being the female Catcher in the Rye - my English teacher made photocopies and passed it out to the class and made everyone read it. In my high school the popular jocks were hockey players and that class was disproportionately full of them, and they were hugely dumb. They were all forced to read OF the Bell Jar, and apparently I would always “put them in their place”, and my English teacher thought it was funny (I was good friends with his daughter.) All this to say, I think we would have gotten along haha. I also worked at The Met and had to commute there from Greenpoint (zip zap zoop*) partially via the green line, in a past life. So this story in particular resonated, I felt like it was describing something I have partially lived. It captures the vibrancy of Enwhysee that is colorful and warm like fireworks. Bravo! 👏 Can’t wait to keep reading! :)

Kate Curry's avatar

Cool.

It’s like I was there with you.

lchristopher's avatar

you were first! don't think i didn't notice. and that is a stupendous compliment you have just paid me. the whole idea, the whole shebang, the whole ball of wax, the big to-d0, etc. et. al. is what the big man, SK, says [i am having a moment thinking of channel 31 television with rik mayhall and Adrian Edmondson as Vyvyan "VERY METAL" in the young ones premiere, where he keeps screaming VIVA LA PRESIDENTE]. It's all about clairvoyance, like all of the truest pedagogy - taking what is out of my mind [the writer] and putting it into yours [the writer-reader]. To say it was like I was there with you, in short, proves SK's point. Thank you kindly. +1 <5

Kate Curry's avatar

See, that is what I mean. Cool.

lchristopher's avatar

Cooler than cool. Like a ninja.

-True Romance

Kate Curry's avatar

Oh I love that movie. Now I will have to revisit it.

Dorie Snow/雪多丽's avatar

I feel like I just rode a roller coaster! That was vivid, she sounds like a woman I’d like to meet. A hundred dollars on roses?!?? Damn!

lchristopher's avatar

this woman was working for one of those black company megacorps where her company INSURED companies like Apple Inc/Microsoft, et. al. You're talking money beyond Croesus.

it was a few dollars. but i broke the date. see how that works? :D

Linda Blatnik's avatar

Wasn't that the nicest date? mmmmmmm

lchristopher's avatar

It was a date, all right.