I can hear them talking about me, they’re gonna kill me, but I can’t see them. Yeah, okay.

I’m the king, man, they can’t touch me. They can’t do anything to hurt me, man. Yeah. But I can hear them talking about it and it’s making me nervous that they’re gonna try something, gonna try something real bad. Okay, I’m okay. Yeah.

They won’t find me in here, can’t find me in here, not at all. Can’t relax or go to sleep or eat or drink or piss. Gotta stay here, gotta stay right here, then they can’t get me. Where’s this sweat coming from, Jesus. Don’t got a towel or nothing in here, no, but that’s okay, they can’t get me in here. I’m safe in here.

It’s dark in here, but the light’s bad for me, hurts my eyes, and they’ll know I’m in here. Gotta be dark for now, yeah, gotta stay real dark, okay? Where’s my card? Where the fuck is my card? There it is, okay. Gotta calm down, find my baggie. Right next to my card, there it is. Gotta open slow, yeah, don’t wanna

Fuck. Fucking fucking fuck of a son of a fuck. Fucking everywhere now, spilled the whole fucking thing all over the fucking place. Relax. Calm down. They’ll hear me, yeah, hear me real good. Okay. I can feel it, I can feel it sitting on the floor. Clean, I think, I think the floor’s clean. Hope so. Okay. There we go, pull it all together, yeah, that’s the ticket, that’s the milk and cookies right there.

Wallet. Wallet wallet wallet. Don’t move too much, shh, the bad men’ll hear me. My mouth hurts a lot. Blood, I think I taste blood, I hate blood. Relax, calm down. Wallet’s here, good, got my wallet, don’t wanna get pulled over. Hey officer, how are ya, lovely night, license? Don’t got my license, officer, figure you let me off the hook just this one time, yeah? Okay.

Can’t go driving anyway, stuck in here. The bad men’ll hear me if I drive away, then they’ll kill me and then it won’t matter if I got my license or not. Calm in here. No violence or death or nothing. Gotta stay safe, gotta stay here, yeah, can’t kill me now, you sons of bitches.

Where’s my wallet? Good. Open it, get a dollar, gonna buy me a soda, gonna get me a coke, yeah, gonna get me some real good coke with this dollar, just a buck is all it takes. Put it in and pull it back out again, yeah, cheat the system, okay? Key is to roll it up, nice and tight, stick it in, get the coke, pull it out. Good shit. Cheat the system, use the same dollar over and over, yeah. Fuck the system, ‘cause if you don’t, they’re gonna fuck you anyway.

Yeah. That’s good, that hits the spot, that hits the sweetest fucking spot. Jesus. I can feel it on the floor, but it’s less now. Fewer? Less. Words are hard. Me too, dunno why, nothing in here but me, no girls or nothing, hell, no guys either. Just me inside and the bad men outside, but they ain’t gettin’ in, no sir, not if I can help it, ‘cause I’m the goddamn king and you can’t touch the goddamn king. Gotta shut my mouth real fast otherwise they’ll hear me, yeah, they don’t know I’m in here, not a fucking clue.

Still holding the dollar, don’t know why, cheated the system already, okay? Don’t need to do it again so soon, no, gotta stay real quiet so the bad men can’t get to me. My last dollar. Can I stand? I’m lying down and I need to stand up. Legs won’t move, arms neither. Fingers, yeah, fingers wiggling around real nice, toes too. Can I get a hand, haha, can I get a hand over here, really could use a hand, yeah, there we go, got a hand, got two. Try to move my arm, feel it pulse and twitch and ache and spasm and we got liftoff, Houston, got liftoff all over, yeah.

One and two and I’m sitting up. Rush of blood to the head and I wanna fall back down but I gotta get up, gotta do it today ‘cause I sure as hell won’t do it tomorrow, I know. The cold’s going away, thank God, the cold in my nose is getting warm again, feel the headache start to go and my ears are clear for the first time since I slept last.

Think. Gotta think, gotta be on my toes now, yeah, I can still hear the bad men outside. Whispering now, real low, real quiet, don’t know what they’re saying but it’s about me, I know, can’t be good at all. Gotta stand now, stand up for my rights now, gotta stand up oh what the fuck oh fuck shit my ass. Gonna be a bruise there, but I can’t cry ‘cause then they’ll hear me, and then they’ll take me to my sister and I don’t want that, I don’t want to go to my sister.

Take two, ladies and gentlemen, take two, please clear for standing, yeah. And a one and a two and I’m up, haha! Take that, world, take that yoooooh fuck fuck fuck my head ow sonuvabitch my head! Goddammit, that fucking door! They’re gonna hear now, there’s no way this missed that, okay, no way. Gotta make myself real small, gotta sit back down, shhh, shhhhhhh, gotta be quiet, yeah, hide in the corner. Curl myself up into a ball, make myself invisible or else I’m going to see my sister and I don’t want that, no I don’t, don’t want that all.

Okay. Quiet. Safe. Shhh. Calm. Shhh. I’m real tiny now, they can’t see me and my knees touching my chin, too small for that, too dark in here for that. Where’s the king, he’s hiding, come and find him, shitstains. Dare you to come find me, give you your money back if you find me, wanna play again, double or nothing, one king and two blanks cards, step right up.

Nosebleed. Doesn’t hurt, but I can hear it drip drip dripping on the floor, cold hard cement, yeah. Can’t see it, everything’s black in here, but the light hurts my eyes and the bad men’ll see. Gotta stay dark for now.

Where are the bad men? I don’t hear anything except for the dripping from nose that just won’t stop, goddammit, stop. What a pain. I wonder if they left, can’t hear anything from outside, they must be gone, gave up looking for me. Don’t have to see my sister, okay. Good deal, good deal right there. Relax. I’m relaxed. Everything is calm and peaceful and tranquil and shit. Monks’ nirvana, or something, I dunno, but it’s good. Real good.

Give anything for a girl right now, or a guy, or something. Awful lonely in here, could use the company, yeah, too quiet. Okay, standing up now, put out my hand or something, gotta get balance and there we go, finally, took long enough. My hand is scratched, but that’s fine, can’t even feel the pain, but my head hurts and my ass is sore. Metal door hurt like a motherfucker, damn legs couldn’t stand up straight.

Gonna turn on the lights, ‘cause the bad men are gone and my eyes will be fine, okay? Find the switch, find the switch, Jesus my footsteps are loud. My hands are getting scratched, but I gotta find the switch so I can get outta here, there it is, there’s two. Red wire or blue wire, man, red or blue, one’ll blow you up real good and the other saves the city. First one seems good, let’s go for door number one.

Got real windy in here real quick, goddamn. Cold as hell now, which is kinda funny ‘cause hell is full of fire and shit but they still say ‘cold as hell’ anyway, make up your minds for once, Jesus. All right, second switch it is, gonna turn off that first one, here it comes.

The light doesn’t hurt my eyes, not at all, it’s this little yellow thing hanging from a wire. Close my eyes, must’ve got some dust in them or something, light’s not too bright. Open my eyes, see the world, my world, my little world for the past few days. So dark and I never even slept, can’t tell you why, not tired, I guess, didn’t want the bad men getting me while I slept, okay? Didn’t want them to take me back to my sister.

Wind dies down, and so does the fan above me, cooled me off a little, which is nice. Getting hot in here, much better now. There’s my baggie and card and dollar on the floor, right next to a trail of blood, my nosebleed, yeah. There’s blood on my shoes and jeans, gonna take a week to those stains out in the wash, haha, Ma can do it, she always did my laundry.

There’s water on the shelves near the wall, away from the door, all along the bottom in plastic jugs, enough water to drown California, they need it more than me. Food’s on top, cans and bags and boxes that are New and Improved and Only 100 Calories and Heart Healthy in big bold letters, still not hungry even though I haven’t eaten in a few days.

Throat’s dry and lips are cracked, though, take one of the jugs from the bottom shelf, God, has water always been this heavy? Can’t get the lid off, some sort of plastic band in the way, nothing my teeth can’t handle, I think I cut my tongue, but it’s fine, doesn’t hurt. Sweet sweet water, rushing down my throat, surprised I haven’t choked yet, nice and cool and delicious and my mouth feels a thousand times better, yeah. God, that’s so good, so good, I’ve been inclined, bah bah bah, to believe there never was. I love Neil Diamond, okay.

No water left, that’s fine, not thirsty anymore. Yeah. Light’s not bright, eyes still watering, don’t know why, too much dust or something, I dunno. Canned pineapple on the shelf, maybe have some of them, don’t know, not really hungry, but I haven’t eaten in days. Probably should, y’know, just to be safe, yeah. I don’t like pineapple anymore. She liked pineapple, my sister, and now I feel sick to my stomach ‘cause I don’t want to see her again.

Can opener, there a can opener anywhere here, gotta be a can opener, what’s the point of all these cans if you don’t got a can opener, there it is, on the shelf. Not much else in here, just me and my card and my baggie and my dollar and the light and the shelf and a box. My box. I think it’s my box, but I don’t want to open it, nothing but trouble in the box, and the box is near the shelf.

The pineapple’s sweet, too sweet, full of juices and preservatives and other shit they put in there, can’t be good for you at all, but it’s fruit, right, how bad could it be? Ugh, too sweet, thank God there’s water in here, lot of water, whole fucking ocean in this room. There’s like a hundred of ‘em, hundred gallon jugs of water but I drank one already so it’s really ninety-nine, okay. Big shelf, bigger room, but there’s not much in it, man, this ain’t a room for a king. No toilet or bed or nothing, just the shelf and the box and my stuff on the floor. That’s okay, yeah, king’ll live, king’ll live to fight another day, maybe, ‘cause you can’t stop the king.

Fuck, this pineapple is good. Bad but good, yeah, and my sister likes pineapple and I don’t want to see her, not really. Kinda, but not, know what I mean, sure you don’t, nah. ‘Cause if I do, the bad men’ll find me, and the bad men can’t find me, they can’t they can’t they can’t. Gotta be crazy, gotta be mean if you wanna see the bad men kill you and clean. Not a trace left, learn how to disappear completely, catch my drift, okay.

Don’t know when it got wrong, why I’m shoving pineapple into my face and hiding from the bad men, ‘cept that’s a lie, I do know. Lotta water in here, man, lotta water for a king. Gotta get another can of pineapple, there’s a billion of ‘em and there’s boxes and other things here too. Spaghetti and corn and green beans and shit, all packaged up real nice, but it’s so fake, why doesn’t anyone else see that? New and Improved and 100 Calories and it’s all so fake.

My sister never bought this shit, all fancy and colorful and it makes me sick just looking at it. I’m jealous of her, had a real job, big fancy degree from school, and I’m just stuck on the farm all day, but it’s all right ‘cause I love my sister. Good for her, y’know, good for her, fucking excellent her taking time to get a degree and a job in the big city. All my friends are in my head, yeah, but she had friends, real pretty ones, okay.

My head still hurts but I think the pain is going away finally. Wish I had some coffee, no cream or sugar, black and bitter please, I’m sure there’s a joke in there somewhere. Toast, or something, eggs and orange juice with a side of bacon. Natural stuff, yeah, grew the wheat myself, got the mill out back near the barn, gonna make some flatcakes for breakfast. She bought oats by the barrel, though, I didn’t grow them. Just wheat and sometimes watermelon or other vegetables. Potatoes, carrots, from the ground up like a miracle of God, can you say alleluia.

Voices. Voices of the bad men. I can hear them outside the door again I gotta hide gotta turn out the light gotta get real small again, shh, shhhhh, they’ll hear you. Wish I had a mask, wouldn’t know the king is here, ‘cause the king wears no mask, yeah, gotta hide, shh shh, make it dark, like that, good, sit down curl up head down knees to the chest. I’m safe, I think, but I can still hear the voices, and they want to kill me, want to make an example out of me, posterboy for the bad men, king of the posterboys, but they can’t touch the king.

Wish my sister was here, she could protect me, but I don’t want to see her again, not now. Calm down, relax, okay. They won’t hear me, not if I’m real quiet but everything hurts now, my head and my hands and my legs and my ass. Gotta stay still, stay here, otherwise they’ll get me, the bad men. Can’t move, no, gotta stay here. Where’s my baggie, gotta find my baggie, it’s all over the floor, big mess all over the floor. It’s all right, lemme get my card and my dollar and I’ll have some of it, yeah, help me relax.

Still awake somehow, it’s been days, not confused, though, no plants in here, no sir. Not tired at all, feel like I could run a mile bare naked, got the old birthday suit on, yeah, running through the wheat fields in the dead of August, what a treat, those lazy Sundays. But I can’t run ‘cause the bad men will hear and take me to my sister and I don’t want to see her anymore, can’t see her anymore, no.

She was happy once, long time ago, back when we both worked on the farm, real young, before she went to school and got that fancy degree and job and all, okay. But now she’s not and it’s all my fault, all my fault, shh, calm down, the bad men’ll hear. Where’d my baggie go, ah yeah, there it is, right, gotta get my card and my dollar and then I’ll relax and the bad men will go away again and then maybe I get my happy ending and I can go home and cry.

Fucked-up world, man, not a world for a king. Pretty and fake and dead and I hate that, okay, I hate it so much. But I’m safe here, I’m away from the world in here, it’s real in here. It won’t be soon, I know, but it’s real now, that’s all I want. Gonna get fucked real soon, I can hear it in the voices of the bad men who want to kill me. Gotta get the card, use it, there we go, roll the dollar nice and then

Perfect. Oh yeah. It’s perfect, man, absolutely exquisite, can you say divine. Nose is bleeding again, pain never killed nobody, never hurt anyone, can’t feel it anyway, so who gives a shit? Pain is good for you, builds you up strong, real strong, yeah, like my pa used to say sometimes on the farm back when we were plowing in the fields, couldn’t afford a tractor, no sir, all by hand. Callouses out the wazoo, yeah, unreal hands I’ve got, but I didn’t mind, still don’t.

It was real back then, that was life, that was the realest fucking life you’d ever seen. And now I’m in a ball in a cement room with the lights off and canned pineapple and water in my stomach hiding from the bad men who want to kill me. Where the hell’s the life in this, it’s not here, that’s where, it died on the farm, too many things died on the farm, circle of life and all that bullshit. When you’re dead, you’re dead, and there’s no getting back.

Pa scares me, big man, y’know, real big. All muscle, okay, used to plow in the field all day, spreading seeds and watering them and doing all that farm stuff. We fed the chickens and pigs and cows, me and my sister, had to, didn’t have a choice, yeah? Get punished otherwise, Ma wouldn’t do nothing, ‘cause Pa’s a big man, yeah. Can’t do nothing to a big man, not him, and I don’t want to see my sister anymore, can’t.

Stomach feels weird, oh God, feels really weird, and my throat is burning and my stomach’s bad and I vomit all over the place and everything is on fire, oh God, Satan in my mouth. There’s pineapple everywhere, but mostly water, and my stomach is sick and my clothes are wet and now I guess I’m the yellow-green king, king of chartreuse, the king in yellow-green who wears no mask, except that’s a lie because I do and I have been since I left the farm.

My ass still hurts, but not as bad as before, but now I’m sitting in my puke and I can feel my nose bleeding again, isn’t pain just weakness leaving the body even though the world is fucked-up? I’ve gotta shut my mouth, otherwise they’ll hear me, the bad men, and I can’t let them hear me, because then they’ll take me to my sister. My head hurts and so do my hands and legs but my throat is worse, I’m still coughing up water, gotta stand up, gotta get out of my puke, it’s burning me.

Waste of pineapple, waste of water, but I wasn’t really hungry anyway, hell, haven’t slept at all, either, not since I left the farm. I don’t know how long it’s been, ‘cause I don’t know how long I ran for, I know there was a train, train just rushing through the country, yeah, but that was before the room and the bad men and the pineapple and my baggie, okay, that was before I was the king and the king in yellow-green. Stand up, turn on the light, not the fan, no, stop it, get the light, yeah, the light doesn’t hurt my eyes.

My baggie is empty, all gone, nothing left, and I want to run home and cry to my sister, but I don’t want to see her again, not anymore. The bad men are outside again, and they’ll kill me if I’m loud, if I scream. They did it before and I don’t want it to happen again, no, can’t happen again, not again not again not again, shh, calm down, relax, okay.

Wet face, face is wet, light’s not bright, must’ve got dust in my eyes, the smell is bad, the smell is real bad, gonna throw up again maybe. No, stop, keep it down, fight it, there we go, the moment’s passed, good. I can still hear the bad men outside and they want to kill me, but they can’t touch the king in yellow-green, not anymore, not since I left the farm. My dollar is covered in vomit, can’t see my card, probably underneath, and my baggie is empty, damn dust in my eyes making my face wet.

Neil Diamond was right, good times never seemed so good back then, no good times now, haven’t been any since before I left the farm and left my sister and Ma and Pa there, I was scared and I feel bad but I had to leave. Why couldn’t Ma have helped him plow and spread seeds and water, why was it me and my sister, I dunno, I dunno, but I wish it wasn’t us. Maybe she was sick, yeah, maybe was she was real sick or something and she couldn’t plow or spread seed or water, that must be it, I hope she’s better now.

Everything’s so complicated now, didn’t use to be like that, when I was small, everything was simple and fun and free and now it’s all ruined, God, it makes me sad. Everyone was happy back then, on the farm, all good and great and then it wasn’t and now it isn’t and it’s just the worst thing. Pa met the bad men and then everything was different and Ma was sad all the time and my sister cried a lot and I didn’t know why until two days before I left the farm, and I don’t want to see her again.

Pa did a lot of work on the farm, plowing and spreading seed and watering, used to help us feed the chickens and pigs and cows, get the eggs and the milk too, he got those a lot more after he met the bad men. We all had to help him plow, except Ma, she must’ve been sick or something, she was always sad after Pa met the bad men, just cleaned and cooked all the time for him, glad it’s quiet here even if the bad men are outside, it wasn’t quiet on the farm.

I can hear the bad men again, but I don’t care this time, not really, just wanna go back home and cry and cry and pull the laughter from the sky, welcome back my friends to the show that never ends, and the show is my life and it doesn’t have a happy ending, I don’t think.

I don’t know where I am, honest, I remember the train through the country and the rain in the country and I ran away from the farm. Met a man, crumbling land, world falling apart around me and he gave me a little baggie, my baggie, and I gave him all my money except my dollar, gotta keep my dollar, and I kept my box, too, grabbed what I had and ran away from the farm, away from Pa and Ma and my sister, who I don’t want to see again, except I kinda do, but I can’t now, too late.

Pa put something in the box, it was his box, but I couldn’t let him keep it, I took it with me, took clothes and money and food which is gone now and I ran away. The bad men are gonna get me because I ran away, I was bad, that’s what Pa always said, Ma must’ve agreed ‘cause she never said otherwise. My heart is beating very fast, it’s the box’s fault, I think, or maybe my baggie’s, I’m not sure. My throat still burns, but it’s better than it was before, better than it was before I ran away.

My heart is beating very fast now, why is there so much sweat, don’t have a towel, can’t wipe on my shirt because there’s vomit everywhere, vomit makes me the king in yellow-green, man, you can’t take that away from me. You can’t touch the king, not anymore, not since I did a bad thing and ran away from the farm, I’m the king in yellow-green, motherfucker, what are you gonna do about it?

Need new clothes out of the box, but I don’t want to look in the box because Pa put something in there before I took it and ran away from the farm in the rain, don’t wanna look in the box, but I need clothes. The smell is real bad now, got hot in here, everything is so warm, it’s October, or maybe August, I don’t remember.

Breathing fast, real heavy breaths, head hurts, not as much my sister’s must have before I ran away from the farm, the farm with the big red barn outta of a kid’s book, but it wasn’t no kids book, no, not at all. There were cows, yeah, and pigs and horses, but the barn was bad, it was a bad place, but it’s not anymore, I left the bad place behind, left it behind in the bad smell of the barn.

Light in here’s not bright, not like the light in the barn, barn had really bright light after Pa met the bad men, spooked the animals sometimes, okay. Went into town one day, met men, the bad men, and walked home, yeah, he did, something about sales and advertising and profits and he was never the same after that, got a tractor finally, but he didn’t use it, nah, he hired people to work the fields after that. Good men, they didn’t know better, just wanted to make money, what’s wrong about that, yeah, but it’s so fake, the whole thing is so fake, everything was fake.

Probably should eat something again, plenty of pineapple left, don’t like pineapple, hey wait, there’s something on the floor, oh yeah yeah yeah yeah gotta get my dollar and my card, wipe ‘em off, just like new, not a problem, bit soggy, okay, that’s fine, fuck the bad men, I don’t even hear them but I know they’re there and I know they want to kill me.

Everything’s closing in, I can feel it, my safety room won’t be safe anymore, no, not for much longer. Gotta be quick, man, but not too quick, ‘cause if I’m too quick, the bad men’ll get me, that’s what Pa said, I should know, it’s happened once. That’s in the box, proof that the bad men happened once, I should know, I watched Pa put it there while my face was wet and other parts of me were wet too.

Walk over to the stuff on the floor, squat down, squat down real low, I don’t like squatting, but I have to now because of the yellow-green. Take out my card, get it all together, last one, here we go, get my dollar, still damp, okay, don’t care, gotta do this now, yeah, and then

Fuck that’s good, that’s real good, but my heart’s beating real fast again and I’m bleeding again and I don’t like blood, I bled a lot back at the farm. And after I was done bleeding Pa took my sister and they plowed and spread seed and watered and she didn’t like it and didn’t want to, she wanted to see her friends and the feed chickens maybe but she didn’t have a choice, okay, neither of us had a choice, Pa was the man of the family, bringing home the bacon all the time.

He went to meet the bad men in town, came home, everything was all right for a while, yeah, until a few months later when my sister was milking the cows and Pa came in and watched for a while, stared at my sister on the stool, Ma must’ve been sick, then, and then Pa sent me out to the field, and I’ve gotta throw up again except there’s nothing to throw up. Pa sent me to the field and then there was lots of shouting and then it was kinda quiet but I could hear my sister crying and I peeked back in for a minute and my father looked like he was milking the cows, except it wasn’t a cow at all and my sister was sitting on his lap, and the lights were bright and there was a camera.

And then a few months later I’m feeding the horses apples they loved apples loved ‘em and he came up behind me and we plowed fields and I didn’t want to but I kinda did at the same time and it was good and bad and I’d never felt anything like it and Pa said I was the king and I’m still the king but I’m in yellow-green.

The lights hurt my eyes and I was bleeding a lot it hurt real bad and I felt my face get wet and I screamed and then Pa was in front of me and I wasn’t able to scream anymore and then he told me that bad men would come if I wasn’t real quiet and my sister was watching and made a noise and Pa heard her and took her to the trough and pushed her underwater and my hands were all scratched and my legs and arms hurt and my ass too and it smelled like pineapple and it tasted like pineapple.

Then he took my sister and an axe and then he cut her and then he took the box and put her in throat-first and told me the bad men would come and I just cried and I ran away that night and took the box with my sister and he didn’t hear me was asleep or something and I heard as voice as ran past the train in the rain and I had to get out of the storm but the storm was all around me and I knew the bad men were coming to get me and the guy who gave me the baggie said it would make me feel better and oh God my throat oh God oh God I just want to see my sister and now I can’t because if I try to go back the bad men’ll get me and it’s all my fault and I’m sorry and I’m sorry and I’m sorry and I’m sorry and I’m sorry and I’m sorry and I’m sor