....and the wind buries it deeper and deeper...

A sequel to "Menaces: Yearning, Burning".

I can see her now: she is sitting on the beach, with her drink in her hand and her slippers next to her on the sand. Both the slippers and the sand are located, geographically speaking, somewhere on the south-eastern shore of England. Yet it is neither warm, nor pleasant: the sky is Manchester-gray and the waves are unsually bulky. She is watching two boys, well, fellows, as they swing flat stones into the water one after another. After a particularly lucky shot, one of them clenches his fist and drives his elbow down and closer to his stomach. She chuckles at the childish motion and moves her hair away from her eyes. They are young and carefree. Childen of workers, or maybe with low-middle class parents. Born spontaneously, accidentally and for absolutely no greater reason.

I hope they got clean. They look sober. What if they didn't?

Her favourite club snack was acid. The boys indulged in the dizz.

She liked how her eyes would feel strained, itchy and pleasantly fluid. The boys liked the confidence of the ecstasy. She wore bright colored tees and camo pants to the dancefloor, yet was surprisingly reserved while dancing. Step to the side, clap, step to the side, clap. The dudes would show up in dirty, black trainers and an ancient sports jacket. And oh how they would break it down. They would fistpump, they would push through to the front of the crowd, and when the deejah would put on "Freedom to the Lions", they would mosh, sometimes forgetting said trainers and coats in the middle of the jumping, shoving, falling over and getting up again human mass. Then they would go outside to smoke, because cigarettes seem to amplify any drug; they would search their pockets lazily, as if in deep thought, for rolling materials - filters, papers and, most importantly, tobacco, finding them and immediately losing in the myriad of the pockets (these would seemingly double and multiply every time). This went own painfully slow, waiting for the dedicated tobacco holder finish rolling was an absolute nightmare, and so they would just rip out the pouch and the papers out of each other's stale fingers. He whose pouch it was, didn't mind - their brain was slowly filling up with serotonin. Every breath was a pleasure, every step was an orgasm, they wanted to stay outside but their bodies would drag them back to the dancefloor after hardly having one puff.

There they would eat and drink, stuffing their mouths, wiping their palms on the tablecloth. The waiters would run up and down the restaurant hall, serving them fish after game after oysters. How long can this go on for, whispered the old cook to the waiter, while one of the guests was examining the other's throat trying to locate a stuck rib. The waiter smiled cheerfully and said, well, the gentelmen must be hungry, it happens, it's been a long day at work, no doubt. Then the maitre d'hotel flew in and, having caught the very end of the waiter's phrase, slapped him with a towel. Alle! he roared. The waiter picked up the heavy silver tray, stepped forth out of the kitchen doors with a funny circle in the upper half of each door and ran to the table, throwing fresh napkins, forks and knives down onto its surface as he approached. The dining hall was filled with the chomping, muching and gulping, but only two figures were engaged in consumption of food and beverages. Sitting with their backs turned towards the kitchen, their bold spots stood out like hilltops and their gray striped suits were bursting at the seams. Here's your pollo a la Gascogne, whispered he, staring onto the floor. Thank you, one responded in a thin sing-songy voice. Don't forget your tip, monsieur. The waiter raised his head and saw a part of a hand, covered in slivers of white burnt skin, the fingers crooked and slimy from the delicious boullion, and open ulcers. When they are not eating, they are gnawing on theur own flesh, he realised.

They know how the hunger feels, and they knew that they had to feed the fire if they didn't want it to spread to their very insides in an attempt to nourish itself. This is why, almost inevitably around three o'clock in the morning, one of them would blink in an almost conscious way, and the falling sensation in the pit of the stomach would make the smile tremble on their lips. Slowly, the panic would set in in all of them, spreading through their gazes or the taps on the shoulder or the hugs as they grasped at straws, trying to overwhelm the impending comedown with a warm body of a friend. It was never enough, friend. There were never enough friends to warm them up. So they rummaged around their pockets, their pouches, their socks and underpants with the dedication of miners looking for nuggets of gold on the bank of a river. Every crumb counts, every crystal matters. They have gone out with their pouches full and their hearts on their sleeve, but towards the end of the night their eyes become cruel and vicious, examining the room, recalling the favours, the debts and who's the most likely to be hosting the afterparty - them you do not touch. Their supply will come in handy later. But mostly they would just plead and beg. And then disappear in the toilet stall, only to emerge rubbing their nose, bopping again with the crowd, vibing, loaded, energized. They merge their hands and their foreheads glisten with sweat of reckless camraderie. But this is already the beginning of an end.

The pit in the stomach grows with every passing minute. The steps above the floorboards draw closer and closer. The soldier stops, slapping his baton on his own thigh. We hold our breath, but the monotonous beating of our hearts is capable of raising the dead. We can feel them staring at us from the dark of the basement, pointing, smirking, miming paragraphs from the rulebook to us. Do not leave anyone behind. Do not abandon your fellow soldier. Yet how were we to escape the rats if not for the poor old Steven, whose ample stature and, most importantly, whose waterproof coat held them back enough for us to slip out of the sevice trench and throw a dynamite stick into the grey cloud of whiskers and little paws. We have made it to a small house on the far edge of the battlefield - it is a mystery and a testament to God's never-ending mercy that none of the rockets hit it - where a nice elderly couple let us stay the night. The old man's clutch on his hunting rifle grew weaker once he saw our shoulder marks; we agreed that after brief rest we will let them come with us. We didn't tell them about the rats, and now Steven, we can't see his face but it is surely Steven, is standing right above us, wearing fresh grey uniform and a helmet with a spike on it, and he will scream "heil Kaiser" as he drives his sword through the floorboards and I will walk up to it and let it come right in and out of my side, because it should have been me in the first place.

But they had only stared at me with the coals of their eyes and said nothing. How was I supposed to know that such was their way of telling me that I will be the one who will live, or maybe the only one who won't. Their beach is secluded, it is lost amongst the English hills, and with them lost is my chance to be the stone slapping the crests of the waves, to be the white ulcer under the mourning hills; my eternal youth is lost in the sand and the wind that misses me buries it deeper and deeper.