The Eye of the Beholder

            “Nice job picking that one.  You have about as good of eyes as she does,” Eagleman cackled, taking a sip of Old Style.  He was talking about my girlfriend Jane who was on shift at the Bright Light, a shady little hole in the wall that I would never be caught dead in if she didn’t work there.  She was a bartender, but more importantly, she wore a patch over her left eye.  I looked away without responding as Jane spit a series of expletives at a regular.  Eagleman kept laughing.
            I met her at a party, and she charmed the hell out of me.  She was loud, and arrogant, and punched me six times the first time we spoke, and we had a hell of a night.  They had to pry us out of a disheveled bedroom the next morning, still drunk and half naked, with a pokemon card stuck to my bare ass.  It was a Halloween party, and I thought she was a sexy buccaneer.  She hadn’t dressed up at all. 
            But I was willing to look past the eye patch.  What the hell did I care?  I had a beerbelly and a set of cans that were bigger than hers, and she didn’t mind a bit.  She would rub my stomach and call me her “magical Buddha.”  I never brought up the eye.  It had this wonderful element of character that I couldn’t but my finger on, (or in,) and I never really wanted to dissolve the mystery of it all.  Sometimes, I would hold her close and daydream about how she had lost it.  Perhaps a disgruntled customer at the Bright Light who had a few too many, and fish-hooked her right at the bar.  Or maybe it was some kind of childhood injury, like a stick to the eye, or neighbors BB gun.  Could have some fucked up uncle in an asylum somewhere who cradled her in his lap before taking a spoon and scooping it right out, flicking the eyeball across the room like we used to do with mashed potatoes at lunch.  The thought made my stomach turn.
            At the same time, the gaping hole in her head was a sexual turn-on.  She would be on top of me, her head tilted back and the world moving a little bit faster than it ever should, and all I could think about was that eye.  Sometimes in the heat of things, I would mash up her hair, and “accidentally” tug on the side of her patch, hoping for a moment, I could see inside.  But she would always be quick to correct it, and things would continue as though it never happened.  I could hold her for hours without any other thought than how much I liked her, and what the hell was under that goddamn patch?
            I had this dream, and it was a sick one, I know.  It started out boring, not much going on.  It was like a camera was following my morning routine, all from the waist up.  I took my morning piss, brushed my teeth, showered, so on.  Then, I sat down and poured a bowl of cereal, with a great big smile on my face.  But as the camera panned out, I was eating them out of the hole in Jane’s face, as she lay dead on the kitchen table.  And worst of all, it wasn’t one of those shocking dreams where you wake up at the clincher.  I seemed to enjoy eating those cocoa puffs out of her face, too much to ever wake up.
            I realized that I needed to bring it up somehow.  I wasn’t sure how.  I knew it would probably offend her, considering she had never brought it up herself.  I had been around people with situations that were awkward, and usually they would be the first to flirt with the subject.  She had always flown right by it.  Do I just put all the chips in and say, “so what’s with your eye?”  Or do I sneak around it, and put in a subtle hint, like, “I just got a call from mom.  Our dog Lucinda has the glaucoma…might lose her eyes…”  She would probably see right through that.  So I went with plan A.
             It was breakfast, around nine A.M. on a Sunday.  Why we were up so early, I have no idea, considering we hadn’t fallen asleep until four or five.  Or at least she hadn’t.  I couldn’t sleep a bit.  I was still considering all the things I could say in response to the crazy uncle story, or even something worse.  Like maybe she keeps a bird in there or something, I don’t know.  But I decided to forward about it: straight to the point. 
            “Babe.  Tell me about your eye.”  She stopped cold.  I think she assumed I would never ask, and more importantly she would never have to tell the story.  Slowly, she put her fork down and began a sad story of a childhood filled with insults and mockery.  How her family never had enough money to correct the problem, and how she had done the best she could to get over her torment.  And she took off her patch, and it was nothing like I could have expected.  There wasn’t a hole there at all.  Not even a glass eye.  And certainly not a bird.  Instead, it was a normal eye, that just looked a little bit to the left.  She had a lazy eye.  That was all.
            She asked me if I could still be with her, and I said of course.  I told her that I wanted her even more, because of her honesty, and I held on to her a long time after that as she cried into my shoulder.  I stroked her hair and listened to every word she had to say.  I promised her I didn’t mind. 
            After that, she never wore the eye patch again, and she was closer to me than ever.  She seemed to gain a new confidence about her eye that she had never had before, and I was the reason.  I broke up with her two weeks later.  I told her she was suffocating, and that she and I just didn’t have personalities that match, but in all honesty, that eye just looked fucking weird.

Spirit of the Union.

The election is one lonely day away.  I’m sure you were aware.  So instead of preaching everything you should do on election day, all of the intricate details and the sorrowful woes, I instead beckon you to a different arena. 

5 Ways Not To Support Your Candidate on Election Day:

McCain edition:
-Beat the people in front of you in line with your cane, nor call them “whippersnappers”.
-Tell a racist joke to lighten the mood at the polling point.
-Slaughter a litter of newborn puppies “for the sake of America.”
-Shit yourself.
-Post crosses in your opponents yards, and light them aflame.

Obama edition:
-Get liquored up and urinate in the booth in a fit of pre-victory celebration.
- Attempt to have sex with Cindy McCain.
-Ever utter the words “once you go black, you never go back.”
-Punch a pregnant woman in the stomach, and scream “choice!”
-Blackface.

Happy voting, you bastards of democracy.  You sloths of the republic.  God bless you sons of slavery, you daughters of internment.  And may the best man win.

Red Bear.
Blue Bear.

P.S.  I will be updated throughout the day tomorrow with updates and thoughts.  Stay tuned.

 

A Short Reprise

Tonight is a busy night, so I would just like to bid a Happy Halloween to everyone.  So go out and get dressed up like sluts and half-assed puns, for the sake of Halloween hijinx.  Please share your Halloween tales.  Goodnight, and goodluck.