c. 1995


"The good mixers, liked by all." Alan Davies
"We ask for a catharsis, we get a cathexis." Abilgail Child

Unfinished business. A fragment broken off from
a dream object. What is a dream object. An
object to dream on . So long since it was said
hello to. A voice gone, or hidden.

T.C. a theoretical construct, yet real. You
can't really object, in words, to a dream created
by another person. Technically, it exists. That way,
T.C. is loved, the way anyone known to all,
accessible to all might be loved. Also hated
according to a similar process.

Something was created, then hidden away. This
is part of its metaphysical charm. Part alive,
part dead, half poetry, half real, a centaur or
griffen to readers. Another character (A.C.?)
might walk by T.C. and notice him. She is, or
was, almost created. They may, or may not,
have noticed each other.

Certainly T.C. had to create something, just like
H.C. had to create him. Who am I to stop
him or decide?

"You notice the sound of a day, its smells,
some children clustered on a stoop, a man in
a car just sitting there and staring. You'd think
someone had died. In fact, someone has died"
thinks T.C. looking at A.C.as she walks by.

A.C. almost, but doesn't, say "Hi." This is
because you might say she heard what he was
thinking. This isn't, of course, telepathy. It's
just possible in theory.

H.C. has wondered whether the blurbs
for this book might be asked for in advance of
its writing, since no money will be involved,
they way a cash advance might be offered to the
writer of a book before it has been written, the
credits being an integral, even a structural
part of the whole creation. H.C. reasons,
however, that T.C. , still coming into existence,
and still possibly never coming as fully as possible into existence,
might strongly object to this. In his own case
realizing that this book might be aptly called
Six Authors In Search of A Character. He decided
to consider it, but not to do it yet, recognizing
that this creation (T.C.) was being formed and
effected further in this way. So far, in any
case, there is little to distinguish T. C. from
H.C. A chip off the old block.

What is fully palpable, T.C. reasons,
is anger. I know I am an excuse to distance
myself from H.C. Yet
I still have my own opinions, thinks T.C.,
my own ideas. H.C.already knows I am not
fully in his control. I see anger everywhere
about me, when I look. Rage oozes from...
the streets, from the sidewalks, in the cracks of
voices you hear on t.v. They are angry at
everyone and everything. They are constantly
angry. And for good reason. They needed
objects to dream on, metaphysical objects,
and what did they get? Death, disappointment
and disease.

H.C. suddenly imagines what A.C. might
think of this. A.C. appears and looks impatient
and annoyed. Then, absent mindedly she goes
back to her painting. Leave her alone, thinks H.C.
Without saying a thing, A.C. touches a
brush to the canvas and disappears right into
it. H.C. wonders about this effect. About the
colors, specifically, the green. Besides, thinks
H.C. I hadn't planned on this text being so
seamless.

Mine wouldn't be, thinks T.C. To both their
surprise he has noticed A.C. "I like the
painting," he says.

"You do?" she says, incredulous and delighted.
"T.C. meet A.C., A.C. meet T.C." H.C. says
sarcastically. Both ignore him.

What do words approximate, wonders H.C. while
A.C. and T.C. stand there wordlessly
in A.C.'s studio. Now they are talking but H.C. can't
quite make out their words. Or is it that I
just don't want to interpret them, thinks H.C.
He looks at A.C.'s painting. Lines over lines over
lines. Scratches over scratches, indentations. He wants
to say something to A.C. but now she and T.C. are
far away. "I need some space," T.C. had
whispered to him earlier. "So we're going to
move over here."

They were still in her studio, but at this
distance the room loooked like a room in a doll's
housed with one wall removed. A.C. was showing T.C.
her paintings