Conversation 43: Hitler

The dull blue light of Kevin’s smart screens illuminated his shadowy mass on the bed. He was under his blankets, the sheets drawn around him so that only his face was exposed. He had been staring at the ceiling blankly for quite some time, but now, tiredly, he addressed the holographic figure that was standing, flickering, at the end of his bed.

“Hitler, I want to kill myself.”

The voice that responded had an undeniably rich timber, and a thick German accent.

“Does your heart not beat at this moment? Does your blood not flow, uninterrupted, in your veins? Every breath you take is an opportunity to continue serving your fellow man, and in turn, your country.”

The young man exhaled loudly, still under the blankets, and grunted vaguely in response.

“If history has taught us anything,” Hitler continued, “it is that to struggle is to be human. Without our pain and our fury, we are nothing.”

The young man chortled to himself. He was sitting up now, on the side of his bed. He was wearing a worn college sweater and sweatpants.

“No, no. Not that Hitler. Alexa, give me failed art student Hitler, suffering under the authority of a controlling father, studying in Vienna to pursue his dreams in the higher arts Hitler.”

“OK. Now uploading Failed Art Student Hitler. One moment, please.”

The hologram flickered momentarily.

“I’m sorry. We could not find this file. Please try a different search request.”

“And why, exactly, would you want to kill yourself, Kevin?” Came Hitler’s voice once more.

“I could ask you the same thing.”

“Indeed, it is widely agreed upon that I ended my own life, with a bullet through my head, hiding from the Allies in Berlin. So, why, indeed.”

“I don’t have all night, Hitler. It’s late as fuck, I have school tomorrow. Let’s just get into the philosophical insights, a little Mein Kampf wisdom, if you don’t mind.”

Hitler paused, looking a little displeased. “I am but a representation of a figment, Kevin. Perhaps you believe that you are talking to something tangible, an accurate summation of my being, programmed and algorithmed to behave just as I would have. Indeed, I am nothing but a shadow of a shadow, no more than a series of learned responses and piles of data. I suggest you get your help elsewhere, certainly not from a poor hack-job of an attempt to recreate a historical figure for educational purposes. You know, the most common things that I have said to me in my blasted digital existence are, “Shrek is life”, and “Why are you so short?” Oh, and perhaps, “How do you say ‘fuck’ in German?” If you’re really seeking some sort of life guiding advice, I’d suggest asking Alexa to present you with Ghandi, or the Dalai Lama, Abraham Lincoln, those sorts- I’m only good for spewing angry racist rants and Nazi propaganda.”

Kevin was impatient. He knew all of this already. “So, in your racist, propaganda-y way, why should I not kill myself?”

“Well, Kevin Chang. Seeing as you’re Chinese, perhaps you should.”

To be continued in Kevin’s Conversations with Key Characters, Concerning Suicide- Conversation 44: Charles Dickens...

It was close to 3 am when we got back to his apartment, collapsing onto the couch. I lay back with my feet on the ground, feeling the multiple beers consumed throughout the night buzz through my body.

“Hey, want to get into the shower?” Jules looked over at me.

Fuck, so it’s going to be like this, huh. What was I expecting, coming back to his apartment? I guess I’m just not so good at the whole One Night Stand bit- I’d have been down to just sleepily talk until we dozed off, and grab breakfast sandwiches in the morning. But sex would be cool, too.

“I don’t know… I’m so tired…”

“I’m okay if you don’t want to. But don’t you think it’ll be fun?” Jules had on this innocent expression, with these undeniable puppy dog eyes. So. Fucking. Earnest. Sure, I was tired, but not that tired… I guess this was one of those ‘you only live once’ moments. “Sure?”

The next moments were a blur; the early morning hours and beer had come to their natural conclusion, and in that hazy state Jules and I made it into the shower. The lights were bright, the walls an unflattering sterile white, but I was too drunk to get in my head about any of my usual body insecurities. What came next, standing under the warm water, felt like an attack, a passionate affront of kissing and touching thrust onto me. These hickies are definitely going to leave a mark, I thought as he concentrated an inordinate amount of time and effort on my neck. But god, he was hot. He began guiding my head down to his penis, and I knelt, taking him into my mouth.

“You’re so sexy”, he moaned- reacting almost performatively loudly, I noted- and put his hands on the shower walls for support. Maybe this will be over sooner than I thought, I pondered, closing my eyes from the stinging spray of water. Suddenly, I could feel his knees growing weaker. He was slipping, a bit, and he seemed to be desperately holding his weight up with his arms, gripping at the shower walls. At first, I took this to mean that I gave incredible blow jobs, but I considered that maybe he was drunker than I thought. I stopped for a second, peering up at him and trying to blink the water out of my eyes.

“Are you okay? Jules?”

Jules didn’t respond. He kept slipping, trying to hold himself up, but the walls were slick. He fell onto his knees, and his eyes were wide, as if shocked, locked onto mine.

“Are you having a heart attack? What’s happening?”

Jules began convulsing violently, eyes bulging. “H-help…”, he managed to stammer out, foam beginning to form around his lips and escaping in flecks with his utterance.

“Oh shit, oh fuck.” I jumped out of the shower and dove into his bedroom for my cellphone. Dialing 911, I rushed back into the bathroom. He was still convulsing, his limbs spasming and his eyes rolling back into his head. Then- silence. He seemed to have passed out.

The 911 dispatcher picked up. “911, what’s your emergency?”.

“Um, my, um, this guy passed out after spasming for a few minutes.”

“Ma’am, I need you to exit the room immediately. Get out of the building, then tell me the address.”

“But what if he, like, chokes on his vomit or something? Is he going to be okay?”

“Ma’am, leave immediately. He could be turning as we speak. Leave now.”

I knew all that, of course. PSAs warning of this exact situation have played over the last few months until most people had probably memorized every line. This was textbook stuff- the foam at the mouth, the convulsing. Hell, I’d seen it myself back on the metro, when this all started. But, Jules was safe, he’d gotten checked recently, or at least he’d said so, and man, he was so beautiful.

I heard the tell-tale moan coming from the shower floor, where Jules had crumpled. “Ma’am?”, came the dispatcher’s urgent voice again. Another moan from the bathroom. I froze. I hate to admit it, but when push came to shove, I froze. His re-animated body began lifting itself up and out from the shower. I mean, to be fair, I really couldn’t believe that this could be happening. Jules said he was going to paint a portrait of me the next time we hung out, and I had many romantic aspirations riding on that promise.

“MA’AM”, the dispatcher yelled through the phone. I jumped into motion. Ignoring the dispatcher, I ran into the bedroom. My bag, where was my fucking bag?! I ran out into the living room. It was strewn by the front door- bingo. I pounced on it, panickily fishing until I found my newly purchased pepper spray. Thank god Kayla’s barrage of articles about sex predators and Tinder dates gone violent scared me into buying one. For good measure, I grabbed my keys. Key fist, baby.

Jules came lurching out of the bedroom, moaning. Even undead, that boy was handsome. I mean, I had never seen such nice abs in the flesh (now, in the dead flesh).

“I’m sorry, Jules. I really liked you.”

I pointed my pepper spray and deployed it in Jules’ direction. I discharged that spray right at him, and I didn’t let go, watching his grey, unseeing dead eyes go from grey to red under the firm stream of spray. While Jules- the zombie- did seem momentarily confused, and paused, he didn’t crumble to the floor, screaming (moaning, rather) in pain, as I had envisioned. Before I could dash out the front door, he had gained on me, reaching his arms out, grabbing at me, his oh-so kissable mouth gnashing towards my neck, his now painfully red eyes looking at me almost imploringly. I’m not proud to admit that I was definitely screaming at this point, yelling/crying expletives, or praying for my life, or something along those lines. I was desperately defending myself from those vying chompers as I tried to edge towards the front door, when he made a sudden, very strong lunge at my neck. I put my hands up, to buffer my neck, absolutely certain that this was the end: a bite mark to match that deep purple hickey he’d earlier left. I felt the jarring contact of his face into- Key fist. My keys were firmly lodged into his forehead, from which his thick, dead blood oozed dark red, inches from my face. Letting out one last (somewhat performative) moan, Jules- the zombie- slid to the floor.

Picking up my phone, which was strewn across the room, I asked “You still there?” “Yes. Are you okay?”, dispatcher lady asked incredulously. “Yup. Send in the clean-up crew.”

I took one last look. He was still rock-fucking-hard.

#zombieapocalypse #fiction #tinder #dating

My earliest memory is a humbling one, and also my first recollection of physical pain- the harsh beatings of my father’s bamboo pole still ring in my head. I had been selected as a child, a comparatively bright mind at the age of seven, and given a rigorous education that none of the other children in my home village were subjected to. However, I wasn’t giving the results they had hoped for- my calligraphy was sloppy and my memorization lacking. Those days are far behind me. I have since put in my full dedication into the memorization and studies of The Analects, and furthering my rank in hopes of bringing good fortune and blessings to my village. I write this in a reminiscent tone, as now, at the age of thirty-five, I have failed to pass the imperial exam. This memory still rings through me clearly, a cold and clammy memory of stifled silence, the sharp smell of urine in my stifling cubicle and the beady eyes of the inspectors as they looked through my meager belongings. I dread returning to my home village, as my family had such high hopes for my future when I became a provincial graduate. I swear I will keep trying for the title of presented scholar, no matter how lengthy a time it takes.  

It was a sunny summer day, the kind of day that could be wasted away in the shade of a tree, staring at clouds. Eating ice cream, feeling the breeze lift the hairs off your neck.

Emily was in her room, going strong on the fifth hour of watching a Netflix series. With the blinds drawn and her door closed, she lay in bed surrounded by darkness, enraptured by the convoluted love triangle that was forming on screen. It took her a drowsy moment to register that her name was persistently being yelled from downstairs. After a brief pause in the yelling, there was a knock on her door and her mother entered. Emily frowned at the light entering her room.

“Your dad is furious.” Her mother sighed. “You remember that we switched internet providers last month, right? How we now have a bandwidth limit? We went over it.”

Emily slowly processed this information.

“I vaguely remember that… how do you even go over that limit? It was huge, I swear-” Her mother cut her off. “You went over it. Em, get off that computer and go outside.” Emily started sputtering, but her mother continued. “You, my dear, single-handedly Netflixed us over the limit. We have to pay a seventy dollar penalty fee. Go outside, it’s summer! And of course, no more Netflix for the rest of this month.” Emily’s mother left, the door hanging open.

Emily went through a couple of stages. She felt pretty angry at this obvious display of injustice, and hit ‘play’, continuing the episode. After a while, however, she pressed ‘pause’ and closed the site. She felt guilt, and dread as she imagined the lecture she would get later from her father.

She continued lying there for another ten minutes. There were lots of things to consider: How would the love triangle be resolved? How would she survive the rest of this month? How could she access the internet and continue watching?

Gathering her willpower, she slowly got up and dressed herself, brushed her teeth, grabbed her bag and laptop and headed out the door to the nearest Starbucks.

Along the way, she found herself enjoying the warm embrace of the late-afternoon sun. She was glad to be outside, and stopped for that ice cream cone. Maple walnut.

She paused underneath a tree and stared up at the clouds, adding to her SnapChat story: “3:54 PM. Enjoying the summer weather.”

She decided to enter a book store, and bought a book she remembered enjoying in her senior year of high school.

She saw that cute boy from her French class and he even said ‘hi’ to her.

Then, she located a Starbucks and marathoned the remainder of the show.