square_the_circle_chapter_4_ unhinged kayla patted her face with a wet paper towel to try to take some of the flush off her face. she threw the paper towel in the garbage and headed for the door. she whipped the door open and suddenly clara was in front of her kissing her on the cheek and pulling her back in the bathroom. 'what...?' she mumbled through all the kisses. finally, she pushed clara away. 'kid, we can't be making out in the bathroom. what if your mom comes back in here?' 'oh come on. she won't come back.' her pouty face was unbearably cute. the oxy/weed buzz was giving kayla nasty thoughts. 'not in the bathroom sweetie.' kayla tucked the loose hairs behind clara's ears. the bathroom door opened and they darted away from each other like guilty children. a small, frail old lady inched her way into the bathroom with her walker. 'well where are you on your way to?' 'me and my family are headed to up state new york to visit my mom's parents.' clara rolled her eyes. 'on your way from where?' 'reno.' 'well i'm on my way to l.a. how bout i give you my cell number and we can at least chat sometime?' 'cool.' clara grinned in that supressive way where you want to smile with all your teeth but don't want your excitement to show through. 'yeah, reno isn't that far from l.a. you could be my angel.' she grabbed kayla's hand. kayla had found a piece of paper and a pen in her purse. she wrote her number down and stuck it in clara's front right hand pocket and patted her hip. 'i gotta go catch my bus babe. call me.' she let clara's hand go and turned around without a second look. she made a beeline towards the door and ran into scott and tim. tim was up in her face 'so what was that all about?' he glanced in the direction of the bathroom as clara stepped out towards her mom and brother. kayla glanced over her shoulder and clara waved. tim elbowed her. 'what were you two doin in the bathroom?' scott stood there quiet. 'nothing tim.' she pushed past him out the door. 'yeah right. so you go down on her?' 'in the bathroom? you're fucking sick man.' she turned around to smack him with a smile on her face. 'oh oh oh...see. you got some in the bathroom' 'oh shut up already.' the three of them climbed back onto the bus. 041213 ... crOwl the miles fell away like the black paint from kayla's fingernails as she sat next to scott absent-mindedly chipping off at his endless questions. he wanted to know anything and everything about her and she willingly complied, what else do i have to do, she thought, sparing no detail until it emotionally drained and utterly exhausted her. her eyelids drooped with the heaviness of sleep until she could not hold them up any longer. slack jawed and open mouthed, she slept like a baby for the first time since she had agonized over leaving. scott pressed his head against the window and felt the brutal cold of the penetrating world as it sped by. it had started to snow when kayla began her story as a young girl and as she poured over her adolescence and turbulent junior high and high school years the inches had piled up, turning the pale grey illinois landscape into a ghostly white. when she had reached college, present day, her escape from sammy, and her future in los angeles, the yellow lines of the highway were gone, the passing cars were diminished to blurs of wind driven spectres, and the greyhound was slowing in respect of the hazardous conditions. soon, the fading light of afternoon yielded to the approaching evening and darkness descended, creating an eerie silence within the the bus. most of the travelres slept or read. the hispanic grandmother knitted away at a blanket while her grandson snored. tim had been drawing some new ideas for a graphic novel he was working on and then succumbed to sleep. his black-rimmed, bespeckled philosophy spouting partner said he never slept, experiencing instead an everflowing stream of subconscious impressions. outside, snow flakes bounced violently against the black glass, raging in gusts that sometimes seemed to shake the bus. inside, small beams of overhead lights twinkled like captured stars. scott turned his on while kayla continued to doze and when she inadvertantly set her head on his shoulder, he slowly and carefully removed the leather journal from his carry-on as not to wake her. he flipped the switch to the i-pod and plugged the small earfones in. joanna newsome's 'milk-eyed mender' kicked on again. kayla's soft hair against his oxford shirt immediately reminded him of paige and it was with her memory, painful and remorseful, that he began to write. "all i want," he scribbled in a chicken scratch that only he could decipher, "is to be a good man." he had so much he had to write, a desperate attempt to capture the feverish desire to begin again changed, renewed, to stop this cycle of self destruction, and his pen practically ripped the blank pages with its impetuous pace. a black rage on the white canvas creating a self portrait of a man who had destroyed all that he knew to be beautiful, all that he once had of happiness. he snapped the journal shut like the lid of a coffin and felt kayla stirring against his shoulder. he pulled the earfones out and gently returned everything back in its place in the carry-on. she was murmuring in her sleep, incoherent mumbles that formed troubled furrows in her forehead. scott listened and felt the weight of his own eyelids threatening to shut. unable to hold them open, he clicked off the overhead and drifted off into dream. he wasn't much for remembering his dreams. he used to write every one down when he was in school. but now, sleep seemed to be an only means of escape from his revolving world of self-reproach. this particular dream began as usual with scott looking for paige but instead of its normal location in their brooklyn hang-outs, it appeared to be a rest stop similar to the one they just left in indiana. it took place in the women's restroom. clara, the teen-age punk girl was there and scott was with tim. they were smoking a fat blunt and the acrid smoke nearly filled the small space with an obliterating fog . they were laughing as clara opened three stall doors one by one. in the first one scott saw himself sitting on the toilet, the seat down. he was using it as a chair and he was writing with an impassioned vehemence against the flourescent orange walls of the stall with a broken white crayon. "square the circle," it said. "that dude's full of bullshit," tim said with a voice that rolled off his tongue as if in slow speed. clara put her finger to the side of her head and twirled it in a languorous fashion indicating the insanity of what she was beholding. and then she moved on to the next stall and yanked open the door. it was kayla riffling through her purse, pill bottles falling out, rolling along the vinyl floor. one of them reached all the way to tim and scott. tim passed the blunt and bent down to pick it up. he popped open the lid and scott saw they were m&m candies, but they were all brown ones. "want some?" he asked. scott hit the blunt hard and he doubled over and coughed out blood against the stark white floor. it formed the shape of a heart. he stood back up, laughing, and held out his palm. "hit me, dude." tim turned the bottle over and a some weird-looking bug came flying out. it flew around, cutting the fog, and came to a solid rest on scott's lips. instinctively, he reached up to grab it and could no longer feel his mouth. he frantically felt the rest of his face with trembling fingers and it seemed nothing was there. "dude, you GOTTA look in the mirror!" tim said, hitting the blunt. scott rushed over and leaned heavily across the sink. his face was stone. "hey! look at this guys. it's me!" it was clara's voice. she had opened the third stall door. scott turned away from the mirror and slipped in his own blood and hit his head hard against the floor, he scrambled back up and followed tim over to the last stall. "taDA!" clara yelled. she thrust out her chest and both arms in a dramatic flair. scott peered in. it was clara alright, completely naked sittng on someone's lap, her legs straddled around the other girl's clothed waist, making out with an erotic fervency. "who is that?" tim asked. scott watched drops of blood falling from a cut he sustained on his forehead drip to the floor one by one like the ticks of a clock. he looked in. "i don't know," scott said, but he knew. it was paige. scott startled awake. his heart was racing. kayla was still asleep, but now turned, facing the aisle. he blinked his eyes and inhaled sharply and then let out the cleansing breath slowly. outside in the swirling darkness, the snow continued to fall. 041214 ... unhinged they took a turn off of mahoning avenue down into mill creek park. it was mid-spring in all it's green soft petalness. the park was closed down for some marathon. they kept driving until they found a parking lot that wasn't blocked off. they took their coffee and walked out along the path into the old forest. mill creek park was a strange oasis in the middle of youngstown. the city was old, rundown, dead, and in the middle of it there was this beautiful thriving park. it was probably the most beautiful season of all for the old queen. a road worker chased them down. 'you guys can't stay long. we're closing the park in 20 minutes. there's a marathon coming through here today.' sammy and kayla turned to smile at each other. 'don't worry. we just wanted to go for a walk. we won't be long,' he flipped the guy a chesire grin. they kept walking along the path into the woods. 'look at these trees. look at how old they are. i wonder what they say to each other. you know, trees have to talk to each other.' she just smiled at him in a way she hadn't smiled in years. she just liked to hear the sound of his voice without the ugliness of hers fucking it all up. they found a big rock to perch on and sat for a few minutes wordlessly sipping on their coffee. 'i guess we better go now.' 'i guess you are right.' she sighed. she wanted to spend more time with him in the park. it was too perfectly beautiful. the path back to the car melted into a snowy street. she was in her best friend opal's car on the way home from the bar. they were listening to the thirteenth step by apc, more specifically the noose. opal was rather ocd about music. she could listen to the same song one hundred times if she liked it. their friends bobbi and shawn were passed out in the back seat. sammy and kayla had been fighting. kayla got incredibly drunk and still there were no messages on her cell phone. typical. the stupid fucker wouldn't call her. it was her turn in the back and forth of his stupid fucking games. she couldn't stand the bullshit and as stubborn as she was, even knowing that he wouldn't pick up the phone because it was 'her turn,' she was waiting for him to call. if she really was his angel like he said, he would call. they drove past the cemetery that her and sammy always used to cruise past in the mornings while he took her home. the music, the alcohol, turned into slow thick tears. she blinked them out of her eyes quietly. she couldn't cry in front of bobbi and shawn. opal was fortunately too drunk to notice herself. and suddenly kayla gasped awake. she could feel the sting of forming tears in her nose and the back of her head. she blinked rapidly and realized she was sober. damn. double damn. she turned to see scott fumbling in his pocket to pull out his handkerchief. why was she such a stupid idiot? why was she doing this? unloading all this stupid shit on a guy she barely knew? why was he putting up with it? she waved him off and got up to lock herself in the bathroom again. she needed to cry. she never felt more ugly than when she cried. she needed to cry alone. 041223 ... crOwl square_the_circle_chapter_5_ 041226 ... a must read red blathe . 050728 what's it to you? who go blather from