what it looks like on the other side

there are things you do to stop your own memory
some reason it out, try to rationalise a re-interpretation of events
others just heap on the denial until the memories look different
i guess i was never one for distorting the truth
then there’s distraction
arguably distraction takes a lot of noise, a lot of colour
like the denial, you just heap on the experiences, one after another
maybe it amounts to the same thing
i don’t know – i suppose that just wasn’t going to cut it

i didn’t think about it
i didn’t formulate a system by which i would forget the past
or start acting out of desperation
from the moment the bullet hit her, i disconnected
everything – hope, desperation, anger, disappointment
all the meters snapped to zero
not positive, not negative
the sound of that shot was the sound of my brain logging out of reality
the cord that connected my soul to whatever meaning there was in life was yanked
i’d stopped and was staring at her falling to the ground
looking down at my own hands, they weren’t the hands of a coder
or even a human
they were just shapes
dead, lifeless, useless shapes
objects in reality where matter had gathered together
apparently there was another sprinkling of gunfire
someone, probably Auckland, threw themselves against me and we hit the ground
it all had no meaning
i didn’t care
i wanted to open my mouth and tell whoever it was
– leave me here
but even that shred of will departed from me
i don’t remember the rest

i felt so disoriented inside this body
some cumbersome shambling thing i was forced to live inside
i wondered around the world
moving from city to city at random
some distant part of my brain kept me clean and washed
barely fed
i remembered fragments of time in laundromats
fast-food vendors
anonymous hotels
i remember hookers taking one look at me and turning away
even police and peace-officers never gave me attention
i don’t know whether it was because i looked dangerous or hopeless
probably an even mixture of the two
or perhaps some strange aura of disconnection was clearly visible in my body
that if a peace-officer wanted to saw my head off, i wouldn’t care

eventually i started waking up, or whatever it is you want to call it
it wasn’t just laundromats and cafes
the rest of me started paying more attention to the logistical side of life
where i was going
why
reasons were simple – eat, wash, money
i must have punched a thousand terminals during that time
just like a normal citizen
one day i decided to be more present than usual in my consciousness and looked at my bank balance
it should have scared me
normal people don’t have that kind of money
wealthy people don’t have that kind of money
the most bent of criminals don’t have that kind of money
but they were just numbers
numbers i couldn’t exhaust with my current lifestyle
numbers i couldn’t exhaust even if i tried
it didn’t matter
i still only ate when i needed to
cheap deathly stuff
diners, booths, street vendors
i learned to live off next to nothing

i wasn’t haunted by memories then
it was as if the passageway to those memories had been entirely cut off
i was nameless
without identity
a mass of matter collected in the form of a human
who did things only to keep itself alive
i didn’t access the net
didn’t read books, or listen to music
didn’t watch Media
with my growing awareness i realised that when i wasn’t tending to my immediate needs, i walked
i walked to wherever my feet would take me
always moving
i must have walked all over Europe, Asia, North and South America, Oceania
never seeing any of it
one moment i would be waking up in an alleyway
the next i would be clean and on a plane
maybe it would have been better if somewhere in my brain there wasn’t stored the access protocols to my bank account
maybe i would have just starved to death
maybe i should have

i don’t know how long it was
eventually i found myself with some guy out on the street
in some massive random city
he tells me about these places to stay, figures i need one
tells me i need to be someone though and if i could sort-of sort that out, or if i couldn’t, he knew plenty of people who could fix me up
i don’t think i said anything to him
i just appeared the next day with a chip and a personality
the look on his face wouldn’t register in me until much later
or what he said
– oah man – you for real… sorry, i though you know, you were on the run from the law or something
– hey that’s ok um… just ah, remember the kindness you know? don’t tell the feds nothing. i got no reason to tell them about you, see?

– cos you’re a normal person

he handed me this chip-key and sort of stood there
daylight
if there was a moment i was to pin down as when i fully got back with the program, it would have to be then
and the first words i remember speaking in a long time
– thank you
i took the key and went into the building
down some hallways, he must have shown the apartment to me once already
inside there was a mattress on the concrete floor
nothing else
i laid down and immediately slept

i don’t know how long i slept
there are holes in my memory i don’t think will ever be filled
i woke with the sun as there weren’t any curtains over the window
everything felt different
one side of my brain was logging everything that had happened in recent history
when i’d last eaten, the newly acquired apartment
the other side felt like a door, bending at its hinges
holding back something that would flood over me and drown me in a second
i turned away from it and let the first side take over
i opened my front door and felt like i was seeing the complex for the first time
walking out of there, many of the apartments didn’t have doors and were empty
there was stuff in the hallways, looked like it had been there forever
some places where the walls had been knocked out, rubble all over the floor
hardly any carpet, wallpaper or decent paint
i finally got outside, and it was like the inside of the complex had been replicated outside
countless buildings with smashed up windows
decaying walls
in the distance there were what looked like projects
the sort of tenements you saw all over the world
it was like a sea of decay and dilapidation
then at some point, the sea met the land
interspersed with the ruined buildings were sparkling glass structures
monuments of blue, gold and chrome
eventually it took over
and there was only sparkling city

it wasn’t about decisions then
i didn’t decide to stay, or decide not to go
i just didn’t go
slowly i walked around the local area close to the complex i was staying in
over the next few months i ventured farther out and into the city
something in my brain wanted to map everything out, and i let it without questioning why
i learnt where to buy food
where to go for ordinary things like clothing, cheap furniture – a bed
i went about my life, using the personality i had built for myself
a nothing person with a nothing name
never speaking to anyone much, never establishing relationships
no-one would know my name, who i was
and i sunk myself into it
into the great nothing that was the city
so that i would never have to think about Kyoto ever again

until now