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Once from China - by nate

what about a cents for words for
the girl in the internet cafe
(i'm thinking tokyo girl, you're older)

saxy maxy—this guy from ghana whose name isn't really saxy maxy—dislikes the girl, or claims to dislike the girl, this pouty little thing all haircut and lips, english beyond "evening" breaking up into fragments of phonemes like the starshine glimmer of shattered glass in a parking lot, the look of confusion that makes it my windshield.

writing is a car in neutral, the engine running, a three year old kid with his foot on the gas.

maxwell—saxy maxy—says he waited, "waited and waited," for a seat, for a pc running windows with some shit slow dsl connection and no videogames that aren't jianghu or shooting terrorists with guns (i want a videogame where you're a helicopter shooting terrorists with rocks, but they don't have that, either) cuz it's close to his house, his house before (he lives elsewhere now), and this girl, the pouty waif with the hitomi hair and the ass so high and tight it stops somewhere over her spine, sat someone else first. so maxy, says saxy, was pissed, and how and rightly so.

there's a shpeel in chinese, she had to seat this guy, friend a the boss, her job on the line, maxwell saying 不好,不好,你不好, her talking and talking, he doing an impression of talking, stilted, my mouth only so-so closed, eyes on her and thoughts... elsewhere. i forget the girl in girls, all girls, every girl; just one a them things; and this girl, seventeen tops, maxy says twenny-one, twenny-two, she weighs less than the 泡泡酒 i carry up to floor four when the weekend comes the roof unraised but new holes in the door and she's making these eyes at me won't stop making these eyes.

and the fucking hitomi hair. the nose upturned just so, like alian. eyes so dark, the irises thereof so dark they blur into pupils thereof, burn into memory. no gum, no retainer popping into mouth then out of mouth, just the look, the smile when i come in, those so dark eyes lighting up the teethy flash of her smile and her "hello" before the broken and so-carefully-mended "how are you?"s and "how many time?"s that follow.

and maxy doesn't like the girl. skinny little waif that she is.

i ask him one day, maybe two days after the first i ever saw her, how old he thinks she is. we of course disagree, per above, and he says "oh, but she has a boyfriend, forget it." memories a misa (i miss misa, maybe; she had hitomi hair) her boss saying the same thing, forget it, she has a boyfriend, me being too polite to ask why, then, has she fucked me three times in the past six days, just leaving, walking the streets that lead home, i might have had holes in the soles a my shoes, i usually do, and it might a been raining, shanghai, usually is. but here no rain, just siberian katabatics, the cold not as bad as the wind, literally blowing me into the cab and back to home and 白加黑 (coughing fits are crunches, i work out but i don't break a) and the rabbit hole a sleep that is my little black pill.

and maxy doesn't like her. maybe i drool in my sleep. the pills, they make one thirsty. cottonmouth a being tongue-tied.

she was one a those, i say "空机没有了?" and she says "huh?" and starts a shpeel in english to the effect of "huh?" until i pull out a pen and set it in sinographic stroke order, then "哦,哦" my mandarin suddenly 干净 as 水晶, clean as crystal or that proverbial pistol.

an i wait an i wait for that 电脑 to up for me, index finger stuck in a book, watching her watching me, or the computer screen, they cast spotlights on people's faces when the lights are off, which is offen, 3 kuai coke in one hand, 3 kuai beer in t other, not really wanting the 电脑 to up, as the waiting is the watching, the breathing, the unopened book half read, the buzzing phone unanswered.

then some guy quits his qq and hey there's a computer open for you.

vamos. va voom.

and she still far side a the room. no gum, knees unseen i doubt them dirty.

watermelon. bubbalicious.

the girl in you. a bit too young for me to screw.

pop!