Aloysius Tempo Read Online Free Page A
Author: Jason Johnson
beat off the volume of these people in their heads. Some people see it as a problem that was designed to be unsolvable at the time, designed to fit their weakness, their age, and they grow away from it.
But I’m generalising here, every case is different.
My case?
If you ask me how Father Barry survived?
He didn’t.
That example I gave you?
That was the last time he hit me.
Chapter Three
9 March 2016
Birthday of St Aloysius
BEEP.
Awake.
Stars above. Hundreds of them, coming into focus, getting clear in the darkness. Neatly drawn locked-together luminous-penned triangles, over and over on the ceiling of the flat.
How and why? Who and why? How long did it take to do that? How sore would your arm get doing that?
I don’t know.
A yawn.
Beep .
Another yawn, a short, angry one. I rub my eyes and say, ‘Ninth of March.’
Beep .
I need to think about this flat, about how I am not getting used to it. A one-bed box, three floors in the air. I can’t fully live in it, can’t sleep long or deep in it.
Beep .
It always feels moments away from being cold, as if there’s an open door or window I have never found.
The place came with total blackout blinds, with those secret Stars of David on the ceiling. It comes equipped with some story that is not mine to know.
It sucks the frigging life out of me, this flat. There’s no welcome here, no sense that anyone has ever had a wholesome day in this place. It’s not a space to think, and I’d like a space to think.
Beep .
They test vehicles in the garage below. It’s the APK, the Dutch MoT, their NCT. Cars and car horns get checked every day from 7 AM to 7 PM , and I am losing my mind.
I remember I was never used to fancy-living. I stayed near an airport, getting a dirt-cheap house nobody wanted right under a full-on flight path and listening to magnificent jet engines climb in and out of my head, in and out of the sky, and marveling all day at the hands-down brilliance of aeroplanes.
Or even some abandoned coop by a good road, some crumbling brickwork kip at some half a highway where engines blend in and out of my personal space.
But no, this kip is my domain. It’s like living in a checkout, in a dishwasher, in a microwave, in a reversing fucking truck where the sound is meant to annoy, to spit and stab.
Beep, beep.
Beep .
I’m thinking now about the faces I saw yesterday, the random bodies in Amsterdam, and I’m calculating people’s ages by slashing numbers apart and throwing others together to find bits that fit.
And I’m lying here counting stars and beeps, adding up chunks of useless and chopping one sum from the other.
This mind, like a silent battleground, is the mind of a man who turned forty on this day, a mind that has three seconds worth of ambition today, one calorie of ambition today.
Beep .
I roll over and breathe in, nice and slow.
I reckon we’re talking 7:10 AM .
And I close and open my eyes.
Beep .
I reach out for glasses, slide them on, lift up the faintly-lit luminous watch and can’t be sure what I read because the lenses are so smudged, but it’s about 7:10 AM . I throw off the specs, get out of bed, walk to the door, shrink my pupils.
Now I’m looking in the bathroom mirror at a man of forty-four, a man who was yesterday thirty-nine. I see a man who needs a haircut, a shave, a wash, a good night’s sleep. A man who needs a style, a smile a—
Beep .
I shower and dress-flick on the TV, pre-parked on my news nipple of choice, where Germans talk about America and Europe like they’re warring lovers.
Beep .
And that’s the shortest beep, and there’s a guy who always does short beeps. It’s more of a wee blip, of a little toot, of a bee.
There’s a double beep guy, a long beep guy, a mid-range-beep guy, a short-beep guy. And the double-beep guy kills me. His second beeps go like javelins into the ears. That double-beep guy’s after-beeps have me turning up the TV, have me turning on taps and flushing
But I’m generalising here, every case is different.
My case?
If you ask me how Father Barry survived?
He didn’t.
That example I gave you?
That was the last time he hit me.
Chapter Three
9 March 2016
Birthday of St Aloysius
BEEP.
Awake.
Stars above. Hundreds of them, coming into focus, getting clear in the darkness. Neatly drawn locked-together luminous-penned triangles, over and over on the ceiling of the flat.
How and why? Who and why? How long did it take to do that? How sore would your arm get doing that?
I don’t know.
A yawn.
Beep .
Another yawn, a short, angry one. I rub my eyes and say, ‘Ninth of March.’
Beep .
I need to think about this flat, about how I am not getting used to it. A one-bed box, three floors in the air. I can’t fully live in it, can’t sleep long or deep in it.
Beep .
It always feels moments away from being cold, as if there’s an open door or window I have never found.
The place came with total blackout blinds, with those secret Stars of David on the ceiling. It comes equipped with some story that is not mine to know.
It sucks the frigging life out of me, this flat. There’s no welcome here, no sense that anyone has ever had a wholesome day in this place. It’s not a space to think, and I’d like a space to think.
Beep .
They test vehicles in the garage below. It’s the APK, the Dutch MoT, their NCT. Cars and car horns get checked every day from 7 AM to 7 PM , and I am losing my mind.
I remember I was never used to fancy-living. I stayed near an airport, getting a dirt-cheap house nobody wanted right under a full-on flight path and listening to magnificent jet engines climb in and out of my head, in and out of the sky, and marveling all day at the hands-down brilliance of aeroplanes.
Or even some abandoned coop by a good road, some crumbling brickwork kip at some half a highway where engines blend in and out of my personal space.
But no, this kip is my domain. It’s like living in a checkout, in a dishwasher, in a microwave, in a reversing fucking truck where the sound is meant to annoy, to spit and stab.
Beep, beep.
Beep .
I’m thinking now about the faces I saw yesterday, the random bodies in Amsterdam, and I’m calculating people’s ages by slashing numbers apart and throwing others together to find bits that fit.
And I’m lying here counting stars and beeps, adding up chunks of useless and chopping one sum from the other.
This mind, like a silent battleground, is the mind of a man who turned forty on this day, a mind that has three seconds worth of ambition today, one calorie of ambition today.
Beep .
I roll over and breathe in, nice and slow.
I reckon we’re talking 7:10 AM .
And I close and open my eyes.
Beep .
I reach out for glasses, slide them on, lift up the faintly-lit luminous watch and can’t be sure what I read because the lenses are so smudged, but it’s about 7:10 AM . I throw off the specs, get out of bed, walk to the door, shrink my pupils.
Now I’m looking in the bathroom mirror at a man of forty-four, a man who was yesterday thirty-nine. I see a man who needs a haircut, a shave, a wash, a good night’s sleep. A man who needs a style, a smile a—
Beep .
I shower and dress-flick on the TV, pre-parked on my news nipple of choice, where Germans talk about America and Europe like they’re warring lovers.
Beep .
And that’s the shortest beep, and there’s a guy who always does short beeps. It’s more of a wee blip, of a little toot, of a bee.
There’s a double beep guy, a long beep guy, a mid-range-beep guy, a short-beep guy. And the double-beep guy kills me. His second beeps go like javelins into the ears. That double-beep guy’s after-beeps have me turning up the TV, have me turning on taps and flushing
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