The family gathered in the Midwest. A larger city. Maybe Missouri, I was never exactly sure. The unlikeliness continued. We all shared one room and it wasn’t even that big.

At some point in the evening my brother stabbed me with a hypodermic and a little later he did it again. I don’t know what was in it or why he did it. I didn’t feel any effects. But of course this could not stand.

I got up very early and planned to go out. It was crazy hard to find all my scattered shit and I almost put on the wrong shoes, the shoes of the brother who stabbed me. We’re a lot alike in some ways.

Getting out was the plan. Then find some eggs and coffee maybe. And then a store that sold backpacks, an REI … I could go back to the room, shove my clothes in it, and go somewhere else.

Then I remembered I was still a nicotine addict and went out to some construction maze just off the standard property. Found a lawn chair. Settled in to dose myself.

While that was happening I started to sort what I had on me. It kept multiplying, too much stuff. I found that my brother had a wallet identical to mine too, the tall coat-pocket kind, and that now I had both of them. His had an incredible amount of paperwork that kept blossoming out of it. I also kept finding small bags of various kinds.

The first little girl wanted to play. She was climbing on my chair. I yelled for her parents to come take her. Finally they did, and I said it wasn’t a bother, just that I doubted they’d want her near my smoke. They nodded vacantly as breeders will.

I didn’t strictly need an REI now, except I had too many Things, and the wrong ones. First things first I guess. Let’s haul this stuff onto my shoulders somehow and find a bathroom because I really need to piss.

I don’t know why I didn’t just head back into the big fancy hotel for the purpose, but I found myself in a neighborhood nearby. I saw a coffeeshop I’d seen before and never been in. Why did I not stop there? Again, it made no sense.

But around the corner from the coffeeshop there was a wide weedy backyard with a lot of angles made by fences. That would do. I covertly found a place I couldn’t be seen and started to let out a stream with relief.

But almost immediately through the nearest fence I could see someone riding toward me in shadow on what appeared to be a small camel.

I zipped up just in time and stepped out from the cover. He must have seen me duck down here at a distance. He was all smiles.

He said he had a daughter for me to marry and that she would be here any minute. Come, please come. This way.

I was absolutely certain that I wouldn’t be marrying his daughter. But this situation had never happened before, and probably never would again. The was a uniqueness, and in the name of art I had to see it through.

We got back to the corner with the coffeeshop, and the man pointed to a bus coming down the street.

He leapt up onto a building to hail it, though it was clear that it had no choice but to come exactly toward us. It was a remarkably athletic feat, and it was clear he was almost in a frenzy with anticipation.

As the bus pulled up the whole front of it melted away, so that as I looked into it, it was more like a living room, with all the seats facing the same way. Not usual bus seats, but comfortable ones scattered all over. There were about two dozen people in it and most of them were women.

I offered my hand and helped one or two of them down to the street. But for the most part they stayed, unmoving, but definitely appraising me.

I saw the daughter looking hardest of all from under her mother’s skirts. She might have been eight or nine. Oh God no.

There was loud general conversation. Eventually I was seized on by a kid in his early teens. He had so much to say to me, about what my country had done to his. After the first few sentences he pulled a cloth up to his mouth, as if where he came from having his lips read was a normal thing.

He pointed out the third little girl, writhing in a makeshift bed. Whatever had happened to her had caused a lot of neural damage. She rocked and trembled and cried. It was a very hard thing to see.

It was not easy to follow everything he was saying because of the shock of the words, and the accent, and the other conversations shouted around us. I bent my ear to him close so I could follow most of it without having to look at what he was describing. Everything became a low rushing indicting murmur.

During this period of black noise, my eyes found a woman on the street through the glass of the bus. Of a certain age, which is to say near mine, Perfectly coiffed and made up–I noted particularly the gloss of her lips. She was no stark beauty but she looked intelligent and well put together.

She passed on out of my view as the boy’s hellish story went on and on.