Katsumi's house had rarely been used in the last year. Despite that fact it was spotlessly clean. Her house sat on the side of Mt. Naeba-san- she had found the house years ago and had ever since wanted to make her own. For it reminded her so much of her own childhood home. A long wooden porch wrapped around the entire house that was set in the side of the a large hill, and supported by thick beams and a smaller rocky outcropping. Inside was soft, dark wooden floors - long hallways that followed the same path as the porch - a square that led to each room of the house - separated by sliding shoji screen doors.

There was the faint smell of rain, of some sort of wetness - and green. The green of the trees surrounded the house and soaked into the wooden frame and slowly snaked its way into the inner most rooms covering everything in a sweet, wood smell. Leaves, dried leaves - that's what it smelt like, crisp and cold, and even though the house was thoroughly warm there would always be that ever present scent that clung to the fabric and the walls.

They arrived in the sitting room where bamboo mats covered the floor and the furnishings sat low to the floor.  In each corner were lit red paper lanterns, that warmly illuminated the room.  The first thing she spoke to him when she opened her eyes was: "welcome to my home, may I get you anything?"

I'm the lover who keeps appointments. . .

Re: this

    The first time I saw him I thought he was beautiful.  I had seen many men, many women and everything in between - but there was something special about him.  Perhaps it was the eyes or the lips, or it was something inside that drew me to him, whatever it was I could not name it but I longed to possess it and put a name to it.  Even now that I look back on those days I can not name what he possessed that made fall so deeply for him.  I have lived many, many years and I have seen many, many more men that have come after him but nothing seemed to compare to that first feeling of endearment and love.  Perhaps it is true what they say, that your first love is your greatest - it seems silly for me to wax philosophical about such things considering I have no heart or soul.

But this is a story about the past and a time when I still possessed wide eyed optimism and innocence when it came to certain things and sex and love were two of those things.  He taught me many things about both of those.  He taught me how to feel good and made me into a woman, and made me feel like I was the only woman in the world all though I was certainly not.  After so many years of being invisible and cold he saw me and made me feel warm, it was amazing to close my eyes and to pretend to feel my heart beating in my chest. 

After we no longer saw each other, or spoke to each other I sometimes would go to his house in Greece and lay on his bed.  To press my face into his pillows and smell him on his sheets and covers and pretend that my heart was beating once more.

The pages are scribbled and inked up from this point forward covered mostly in names, dates, and places.

343

    I know I have been MIA in the last couple of days/weeks/months but I will try to be a little more constant with this journal from now on.  It seems a bit pointless now and I suppose that's my fault but that whole self loathing thing and abuse just seems to keep going and going.  Either way, if you want to abuse Death for any of  your story lines, feel free to drop me a line, she's not doing much of anything except sitting around and watching life go on as she remains stationary. 

To amuse you, I present this Youtube VID that I didn't make of Zhang Ziyi looking stunning as usual with the score from 2046 in the background.  It's an amazing movie you should really go and watch it.

She cleans up his mess, the dinner he found unsuitable. So unsuitable, he declares, that he wouldn't feed it to pigs. That doesn't stop him from throwing it on the floor and sticking her face in it.

        Bad dog. Disgusting pig. Look at what you've done.

She cries, not because she's hurt, or even humiliated. No, she lost all pride years ago, he beat it out of her. She's crying because she tried so very hard and now it's going to waste. He kicks her in the side and she wines like a dog, scurrying away from him and cowering against the corner cupboards.

        Clean it up, this shit, this mess. Clean the whole fucking thing up. He turns to leave the kitchen but pauses, and stop your fucking crying. Jesus, it's annoying.

There have been other messes before this one, small ones, big ones. Messes having to do with money, with kool-aid, and sometimes blood. She says nothing but cleans up what he demands she clean. So she begins, she searches for her rubber gloves, for the sponge and Comet that really can get the most appalling stains out of almost anything. Except she can't find them.

Marinara crusted around her mouth, drying on the floor, and she can't find the fucking Comet. Life as she knows it, comes to a stand still.

if the police asked her, after the incident, why she did it, she probably would have told them the truth, she couldn't find the Comet, or the gloves, or the sponge. The necessities of her life.

So, she did what any sane woman would do. Blow her abusive husband's head off with a 12 gauge shot gun and then turn it on herself. Because while it might not be right to cry over spilled milk, sometimes you just have to get a little homicidal over chicken  marinara.

Now it's my mess to clean up.

(327)

            I remember very little firsts, and I believe that is because my memory was ruined in the last overhaul I received.  They took many things from me, and gave me back the scraps of my childhood and a few other random memories that I hold very close.  So now they flicker upon the wall like some silent, eight millimeter film that has been tapped together from cuttings on the floor.  There is no noise, no music or voices to play along to the movie and so I press my ear upon the stone wall as if the voices of my brothers and mother were trapped in there.  I find nothing but silence.

I find nothing but silence when I close my eyes and go back in my current memory, searching for my mother.  In moments of weakness I wish to hear her voice once more, to feel her arms around me and to smell the perfume she wore.  I do not even know if these sense memories are bogus, I could have made them by simply by watching people around me.  It is foolish to ache for made up memories, but the little girl on the film looks so happy, and the world looks so bright that it is hard to want differently.

I see her run, I see shadow puppets on the wall from brothers fingers and a bed side lamp.  I see him give me a hasty kiss before he sneaks back to his own room. From my eyes I can see the stars in the darkness, and I can see my little brother laying next to me, and I teaching him to count the stars, making sure not to miss a single one.  He follows my finger with his own, and I can imagine my mouth moving, and his following in chorus.

ichi . . . ni . . san . . . yon . . . go . . .  roku . . . nana . . . hachi . . . ku . . . juu

Ten little stars, all in a row, watch them now and see how they glow!

I tire of my movies now, these memories do nothing for me and so I turn my back on them.  Nothing but paintings in a museum, real or imagined pictures in time.  I do not turn it off though, I do not leave the cave, just turn my back and hide.  Like a child, I think that if I am not paying attention, it will come to life, like dolls in a cupboard, or fairies.  What a stupid game.

    The one story house is set into the side of a mountain, surrounded by forest with a path that leads to a large meadow filled with tall grass and wild flowers.  It is a very traditional Japanese house, with wooden floors that are covered with bamboo mats, and sliding doors that separate each room from another.  There are five major rooms, a sunken living room, three bedrooms and in the back a kitchen with a door that leads out to the porch.  The porch wraps all around the house, so at any time one could step outside and relax on the dark wood deck and look out into the bright green woods.

The only signs of life are of her and various cat toys, large cat toys.  Not some domesticated animals, but beasts one would see in the zoo, however those cats are not around.  When she sets down, it is in the living room, there a low set couch and multi-colored pillows that look a little dusty from lack of use.  Red Japanese lanterns hang from the ceiling, and light up the house when the sun goes down.  There are more rooms, sectioned off, full of various, well organized item that were either collected or made by her through out the years.  She rarely shows those rooms to anyone, why bother?

She turns to Lance and smiles slightly, her head bowed, the perfect hostess.  "Welcome to my home, may I get you anything?"

This is the story of, Botan Dôrô, and it begins like this: There was once, long ago, a brave samurai named Ogiwara Shinnojo. His wife had died many years before this story, but it is important to remember, for he was very lonely.

On the first night of Obon, he sees a beautiful woman and her maid walking past his house carrying a Peony lantern. I should explain that Obon is a Buddhist holiday that is meant to honor the dead. The girl he sees that night is named Otsuyu, and he falls madly in love with her. They vow to be together for all eternity.

But something was odd about Otsuyu, she only came to him at dusk, and leaves before the sun rose. Still, Ogiwara is in love with his beautiful girl, and continues to see her. It is not until one night, when his servant peeks into his room, does he see Ogiwara having relations with a decaying corpse.

Of course Ogiwara does not see this, does not believe it until he is visited by the local Buddhist monk. The monk shows him the tomb of Otsuyu, and convinces Ogiwara to guard himself against the spirits that torment him. He puts up charms around his house to keep the ghosts at bay, but he is miserable, for he still loves his beautiful Otsuyu. . .

One night, Ogirwara can stand it no longer. He is weak, his skin is pale and his eyes are hallow. He has not been eating, for his heart has been sick with longing, with grief. When the heart is sick nothing can cure it but the one thing it longs for. So he takes the charms and the wards off the house, he invites Otsuyu back into the house, back into his bed.

The next morning, his servants find him, the skeleton of Otsuyu in his arms, a blissful look upon his face. For in death he found a way to truly be with his beloved ghost. 

100. TEN fictional characters that you'd like to meet and what one question you would ask them.

10.  Hope -|- Why have you deserted me?
09.  Faithfulness -|- Have you become so rare?
08.  Joy -|-  Have you been forgotten?
07.  Innocence -|-  How long have you suffered?
06.  Goodness -|-  Do you miss us?
05.  Rage -|-  Do you enjoy your throne?
04.  Truth -|-  How does it feel to become obsolete?
03.  Courage -|-  When did you lose your foot hold?
02.  Beauty -|-  When did you become so ugly?
01.  Mercy -|-  Where are you?

     No one really appreciates the versatility of tar any more.  Oh, everyone hears in history class about people being “tarred and feathered” but no one really understands how horrific it is.  No, people just see it in the cartoons, some caricature of a person or an animal toddles around half covered with tar with a hand full of feathers thrown in for good measure.  This thing isn’t screaming in pain, or desperately trying to get the impossible stuff off of them.

That’s a real shame.

The great thing about tar is the pain and suffering it brings along with it.  It seems relatively harmless until applied in great quantities to the human flesh.   What was pure as snow, becomes filthy and black.  Pores begin to clog, skin begins to sizzle because you have to heat the stuff up to at least three hundred and fifty degrees in order to apply it the correct way.  Think of the smell as construction workers having a cook out while they repave your street.

Oh, it’s truly horrific.  Watching people trying to breathe against the fumes or even better, trying to some how roll around in the dirt to stop the pain.  I should just tell you now, that stuff is never, ever coming off.  Especially when it hardens fully.  I mean I suppose you could burn the stuff off, but that would be subjecting the human body to extreme heat.  You may as well put a bullet between their eyes, it’s the most humane thing to do.

If you aren’t into that kind of stuff you can pose them once they’ve gone into shock and stopped flailing around like an idiot.  You could put them in your back yard, tar sculptures.  You could sell them at art galleries to pretentious assholes who look down their nose at you, but tolerate you because you produce: “great art.”

Or, at night, when you get lonely, you could set your creations on fire, you could watch them melt away.  Everything you’ve worked hard for, everything you strove to perfect.  Dripping down into nothing but a puddle of black brittle and sharp with the fragments of broken bones.

It just goes to show you, that nothing lasts forever.

(387)

    "It's 3am and my baby's gone. . ."  The old blues man moaned while his fingers moved easily over the strings of his guitar.  "She left me sad and lonely - and she left me black and blue. . ."

    The room is smoky, filled with people who, by this time, were good and drunk.  Slumped over the bar, and the tables they sat at, listening to the old man bemoan the loss of his love.  The half empty beers at their side, and the old twangy guitar sound the only thing to keep them company.  Death sat, motionless and waiting by the stage, listening along with the other patrons, but refusing to feel the effects of the music as they did.

As the last notes faded, a few of the more sober people at the bar clapped, and the old man nodded his head in their direction.  Very slowly he reached out and picked up his glass of water, drinking the cloudy liquid he had time to pause and reflect.  When he sat the glass down, he finally turned his blind eyes to where Death was sitting.  For a long time, the man did not move, he simply watched - and Death could see his milky white eyes flicking behind dark glasses.

Finally, he nodded as if coming to an agreement with himself and then cleared his throat.  "One more song, then we can go, now?  Is dat okay with you?"  No one else in the bar seemed to hear, or maybe they weren't meant to hear, they certainly hadn't heard anything else the man had said.  But Death nodded and responded. 

    Turning back to his guitar, the old musician and entertainer nodded very slowly before starting his song.  His last song was about heading back home, about bein' all around the world and seein' a lot of things, but not really bein' seen.  Now he's old and he's broken, and he's headin' back where he belongs.  Gonna lay his head down on a pillow white, and sleep the last sleep, he's ever gonna need.

When the last notes faded, he took a moment to gather himself - standing up, he took a few shuffling steps toward the edge of the stage.  Years of practice, helped him get along fine, and with guitar in hand he made his way to the rooms in his back, waiting for that pillow of white.

(426)

10.  Every
09.  Single
08.  One
07.  Of
06.  You
05.  Worthless
04.  Pieces
03.  Of
02.  Shit.
01.  I don't need a why.  Fuck off.