Topless darts on cable TV as the land outside my window sways the same as a palm tree. On the table by my feet, there’s a giant blob of ketchup on a dinner plate as big as the stars in outer space. The ketchup is in my beard. If I stick my tongue out far enough, I can taste it. If I unzip myself while slouched on a crumby second-hand settee stained with the remains of a thousand heartless wanks, through droopy eyelids I see women’s dangly bits and dangle they do as the sharpened rod of a silver dart adorned with decorative feathers pierces the air before embedding itself into the bullseye of a majestic if not well worn board. To the jubilation of dirty men everywhere, the women jump in triumph, and for a second, the stars reveal themselves in the rocky landscapes of many jiggling areolas. The feathers are as brightly coloured as their streaks of hair. They catch the studio lights just right. I’m not sure if it’s the game I’m excited by or the flesh tainted by home-baked tattoos and sunspots from years of tanning shop addiction. In the many blemishes, I see religious iconography, The Virgin Mary’s seductive grin and the Queen’s long-awaited and long-overdue death mask. If I pull back my foreskin and squint, I see something more, but I’ve no idea what it’s for. If I catch the scent of corn coming through the window, the image of you on some foreign shore haunts my dreams as beneath the door smoke billows like a pillow of dreams. A stretchmark is a question mark, but I have no idea of what I want the answer to be. Even if I could pick one, my mind keeps wandering to disused shopping malls, and empty convenience stores. Places littered with the ghosts of yesterday. How free they play, escaped from the burden of today.

X and I: A Novel and A Journal for Damned Lovers on Amazon UK

X and I: A Novel and A Journal for Damned Lovers on Amazon US