Date: Fri, 2 Mar 2001 01:34:41 EST
From: Gemmini999@aol.com
Subject: You Know Me

Disclaimer- Not real, don't think it is

No introduction. Hope you enjoy!

***********

You Know Me


The words vibrated around the room, ricocheted from the corners, bounced
against the walls, slammed violently into people before being dispersed
again. The same words, the same feelings, each with a different image
attached, each with a different significance. Each with their own meaning.

The words were almost visible, almost cloudy with dew and sweat and anger
and fermentation. They were drunk by everyone, spilled out with careless
regard for personal safety, personal comfort. There was no personal in this
group, they knew everything from the good to the bad to the horrendous to
the evil.  They knew the inner workings of each other almost as well as
they knew how to breathe, how to talk.

It was innate, but what could you expect? They had practically lived
together for years and years and years. Only, more so because a bus was a
small space, smaller then most apartments, more crowded, more dense with
emotion, with feeling. More dense with lust.

So, the five thought they knew each other. They knew when one was angry,
when one was sad, when one was so hurt they were really shattered, soul and
all. The words vibrated through each conversation, almost randomly.  They
would talking about fishing or sports or any other sort of outdoor
activity, and casually someone would say something about JC getting fucked
sideways the night before, and the others just accepted it and went back to
the main conversation, but each had an image planted in their minds now
about JC, and how they wanted to be the ones to fuck to sideways, or even
upside down.

They thought they knew each other.

The words thought they knew each other.

Both were wrong.

*****

It had started out simple, a word here, a look there. Both were recognized,
both were acknowledged, both were accepted.

But then the look, the word, turned into a simple touch, a simple kiss.
Those too were recognized, acknowledged. Neither were accepted, yet they
were.

"I'm happy for you man, Happy!"

"Good luck, You deserve it."

Lies became common place, lies became home. Lies became the words that
vibrated and ricocheted and bounced and were inhaled like smoke and exhaled
like air. They became normal, and in time, the truth.

"Yeah, we're best friends. We know each other real well. We know
everything."

The lies spread. The lies took lives. The lies vibrated into the
conversations and out, until no one knew the truth from the lies, the lies
from the truth, or even who had started them.

They were jumbled, twisted, stretched, enlarged, disfigured. They were
home.

The apartment, the bus, soon became too close. Too crowded. They spread
out, two buses, two apartments, two groups.

The couple on one, because they needed the privacy. The estranged members
on the other. The bitter members.

"Remember before..."

"Yeah man, before..."

They talked, the lies stopped. The couple wasn't there anymore, the couple
wasn't there. The lies weren't there. The lies were elsewhere, in the hotel
rooms and bars and stages that they performed on. Every hug, every present,
every look. Every whispered word of friendship that was only skin deep,
only no one knew.

No one knew.

The lies were home, they jumbled and twisted and stretched and enlarged and
disfigured until they became home. Until they became the truth, but not.

Until they became the friendship, the barrier.

Until they became the group.

*****

The words still vibrated, still bounced, still stretched and listened and
did everything they used too, only now the words weren't words spoken in
truth, they were words spoken in hate and in lust and envy. Only, they
became loud, angry. They became impossible to slip in and out of
conversations. They were the conversations.

"Man, don't you two EVER stop?"

"Gross! Guys, I didn't need to see that!"

The group died.

Slowly.

The couple died.

Slowly.

The words were visible, in the dew and anger and fermentation and early
morning, but no one saw. No one was there. No one was friends.

They were blurry in most lights, blurry and dreary and generally looked
upon as inferior and stupid and never worth the time it took to say. Never
worth the time it took to talk.

They weren't worth it, anymore.

The group was gone, the easy friendship that came with years and years and
years of living together, of telling the truth and nothing but the truth.

The lies remained.

They didn't know each other anymore.

*****

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