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No. 3840251

for Steve

Hello, door! Hello, wall! It’s me, it’s Kevin, I’m back! Don’t you remember? Oh, yes, you must remember me. It has been a long time since I last saw you, huh? But I still know every inch of you, I do not have to look to see the red letters on the door, probably written by someone who had come in here earlier. Just by moving my hands over the wall, I can feel the little holes. They have not changed. Neither have you. Or I. So you must remember me, too.

It seems like ages when I last shut the door behind me. But I keep coming back. It is almost an obsession to me: trying to get out, and when I’m out, wanting to return. Obsessional love, haha. Chambremonial infatuation.The doctor says he cannot understand me. He likes me, though. It is impossible to understand and like somebody at the same time.

Of course, Janice is a different story. Not that I either liked or understood her. She was different. She hid all the mysteries of the earth in her ebony, bright eyes. But Janice Tarvell is not anymore. All of her soul dripped out of her eyes yesterday. It is her own fault. I could not help her anymore. She had to go. She had to be punished.

Oh, I can’t remember the time when I did not know Janice. My whole life seems to be built up around her person, every inch of my brain is adapted to her. In my teenage years already I knew my breath, my taste, my soul were meant to be adapted to hers.
She did not recognise me immediately when I stood in front of her yesterday. I had passed her house six times already that morning, to see if she was home. After I had seen she was, I could not lift up my hand to reach for the bell and waited for hours.

Finally she opened the door herself, the elegant Miss Janice Tarvell: tall, dark and beautiful. The sun shone in her hair as she shut the door behind her. Her lips were smaller and redder than ever.

When she saw me, she started to scream and scream. I could not control myself anymore. Another day, and I would have known how to cope in front of the long and beautiful body. But now, I could not.

Well, I’ve got to see the doctor again now. He wants me to tell everything I have been hiding for years – but he knows I won’t talk. I never spoke a word when I was in here, except to you. You know it, don’t you? I could not ever speak to a human being again. I have you for that.

Obsessional love?

Maybe.

But not in the way I felt about Janice.

It’s just different.

Groupie


for MWP

Ah, the doorman-look! A look that says, 'Sex?' in three capitals. My dear, not every man who likes football can be called a hooligan, so why call a woman who is into music a groupie? OK, you're right: I am standing in this nerve-numbing cold for a reason. But that reason isn't necessarily sex. Man, I've had enough of that for the rest of my life, and I'm not even thirty yet. It's the most overestimated pastime of the combined 20th and 21st centuries. If I were just after that I would not be standing here backstage. You're a doorman at a club, you should know better. Nothing is easier than bedding a stranger after walking into a London club. I leave that to people with a low self-esteem.
You frown. Who am I to lecture others on issues like morals and pride? And am I not just being defiant in order to avoid answering your first question: What am I doing here? As if anything and anyone in life have got causes and reasons or plans. I personally believe that this is not the case.

In a way you're more ridiculous than I am, for you're doing this for your bread and beer and I am here voluntarily. Would you like to know what's really silly? Standing on a podium with a guitar is. Take away the podium and you'll see a quite normal person making a fool of himself. There's a thin line between the ridiculous and the sublime. But I'll be the first to admit that Daniel (on stage, with his guitar) is sublime.

What's this thing about men on stages? you may ask. I agree with you: they are no better than men without one. It's all in the mind of course. And I am well aware that the Daniel who exists in my mind may not resemble the real-life Daniel at all. We all need little lies in order to live, don't we? You disagree? If only you would realise what a lousy job you have, waiting outside theatres on freezing nights on end. What do they pay you? It can't be much for the number of hours you put in. Will you do this until you retire?

I see. There's a wife and kids. I'm sure life is great when you spend your Saturday afternoons at Tesco's and your Sunday afternoons watching Village United play Middle of Nowhere Utd. I longed for a life like that once. At that time I was dating Mr. Normal in person. It's just that his normalness really got to me in the end.

You see, I'm happy to admit that I'm odd. All my friends have had their first babies and here I am, playing the teenager who will not grow up.

He's gone now, has he? I wondered about that. You wouldn't exactly guide his fans to his car, of course. I understand. No, I'm not angry with you at all. You're doing a great job and I've come to dislike you a bit less. Are you afraid you've robbed me of my dream? Don't be. You may have helped preserve it.