Worms and Riddlers

  The fat diary, sitting on his table. He could barely read the chaotic scribblings, the dusty pages, the cracked lines, and the damage to the cover. The inscribed detail, the thousands and thousands of words. The man who had owned it was dead. Killed himself in a lonely apartment, near upper Manhattan. A single gunshot wound... Found with blood everywhere, staining the beautiful bedsheets...Buried in an unmarked grave... One momentary glance and he had taken it, hid it underneath his thick raincoat, across the road, silently trudging... It was a beautiful little book, with a strange allure to it... A fantastic grandness to it, with its fading gold... The words rushing through the pages... He flipped open the first page, saw the date, and stared at the title. January 1st, 1999. I know everything... Everything... Every day, the moment, the present, the strange past... I know every detail in every view... I can tell the number of flits the fly that lives in my lonely apartment makes... H

  As I sat inside my local diner, sipping a coffee and wine, I listened to the music from the jukebox. Wonderful, wonderful music flowing slowly, so that I could hear the humming at my fingertips. Graceful, graceful heavy metal... Like empty ribbons of lead that ground in a strangely harmonious melody, swinging back and forth through his bones, again and again. I sighed and sighed, thinking I could hear my brain buzz and my eyes water and my heart scream out in pleasure. Ah, yes! The dully lit jukebox playing random notes, placing those strangely chaotic, fast, screaming notes in glorious melody. Nostalgia rippled down my spine while I thought about grand pianos and the flickering color of blue screens. I went up to the bartender, a fat, gross man who could barely stand up, and ordered a round of drinks for myself. Drinking and drinking those grand martinis and gross little olives out of the cup, I felt a shock of bliss and transcendental emotion that pumped through my shriveled heart

My lawyer, a poor, cheap man who wore little and knew little, knocked on the door of my run-down apartment with a forlorn expression slicked across his plasticine face. "Are you Mr. Frauk?" He pulled out a card, offered his rubber-gloved hands, but I refused. He offered it again, but I pushed it away and smiled in false respect. "Mr. Frauk?", the lawyer repeated in his ancient German accent. "Frank", I paused, and beckoned him in, "My name is Frank. What is this about?" "Mr... Frauk", his lips curled as he grimaced to pronounce my name," Frauk, Frank, Frauk... Nonetheless, I'm here because of a recent uncle of your kin. If I remember him properly, his name is Drew Trijark." "Trark", I repeated, but in a different accent, mocking him somewhat. "Trark, Trijark, Trark... But what I wanted to talk to you about is his inheritance", my lawyer paused as if in sadness and contemplation, turned away, hiding his