Everything about life in Paris was exaggerated, even if it meant ending things, by guillotine. Starting with the despicable garret apartment they rented from a hag who despised everyone. She occupied the ground floor and they had to pass her and climb worn stone steps in a turret to their third floor cramped home. It was mostly dark brown exposed brick and shag, it was dismal and on cold mornings, him gone to sketch at his studio, she pondered escape. But they were in love. Plus, they had friends to visit who operated within splendid creamy palaces protected from the rabble by wrought iron gates. Indoors everything was padded and soft and anything might be happening and anyone might be there. The most famous mingled like decorations. Amuse bouche, amuse yeux! Drugs abounded. The young couple was invited everywhere. Besides, they got along better in public.

At a party a friend handed them the drug ecstasy. This was the 80s and the drug of the day. They swallowed the pills and a few hours later they wanted more. They tracked down a lot more. They found themselves outdoors, indoors, sometimes in bright daylight, other times raining and midnight. They rode the Metro and trod cobbled streets and danced to the music in their minds.

On the wane of the third night their bodies were wearying. She wanted more. He said, No! He won the fight. She pouted.

They slept long enough when they awoke they were beyond the cravings. Later they learned it hadn’t been ecstasy. It was heroin. This was entirely shocking news but it made sense. Both were horrified by the revelation and while he felt vindicated she felt shame. That is way too good! They laughed, We can never do it again.

They didn’t.

image by ALEXANDER SIMPSON©2016

On behalf of mankind I shoved off the sofa and headed to town in need of a story.

I was soon intercepted by a dude, thirty-something and although drunk, not slurring.

I’m Alexander the Great. What’s your name?

Cleopatra. I think we are going to get along.

Don’t call yourself Cleopatra, you sound like one of the strippers.

Well, Alexander the Great, I’m looking for a story.

I’ll get you a story. Follow me.

When I realized we were headed for the strip club, I balked.

There’s no cover charge, I know everybody there. Any case I have to go back to pay my tab. I was in earlier.

Alexander was greeted like a returning hero. Indeed he knew everyone by first name, even if those names were suspiciously inventive.

We lolled at the bar and chatted with the dancers who were playful with Alexander despite knowing he wouldn’t be handing out bills. They didn’t seem to care. It was obvious they liked him.

We assessed asses as if we were shopping at a market. Alexander indicated the best body belonged to the bartender; a blonde twenty-something who never takes her clothes off yet flashes fulsome breasts.

The nearly naked ladies were mesmerizing with sculptures for bodies. Confidence goes well with high heels and glitter.

So here’s this fellow, this Alexander the Great, a mechanic of a sort, he moved to Key West from some place cold. He came here, as he says, to make money and live a decent life. He is three-quarters covered with tattoos that suggest an elaborate past, the real story, which I’ll never get. All I mined was he owns his business and is a master of his time. Smart guy. Of the little I gathered I had to agree Alexander’s life is great.

What’s with fat? How did ‘fat’ become a dirty word? Only in the United States of America has this ‘F’ word sidled along in infamy with the other ‘F’ word. And don’t get me revved on the stupidity of assigning words this title of the ‘whatever letter’ word and how that somehow renders its meaning toothless? Letters against Humanity! So ‘f’ing’ dumb.

Why is it that in America to call someone ‘fat’ is a hate crime? Try it, you’ll make a lifetime enemy, might even illicit tears. Anywhere south of the border and ‘fat’ is a term of endearment. Gordo, Gorda, Gordito, Gordita, all these pet-names will get you a smile, maybe even a friend. Here in America you’ll get a fist in the face or a summons and a fine, or possibly worse.

I decided to conduct a fat experiment, for LARS of course (Large Animal Research Station). Whilst hanging with my Manhattan based WASP acquaintances I took to sporting for a handbag a miniature canvas tote and in place of my initials I asked the saleslady to embroider F.A.T. She tried to refuse, claiming ‘corporate’ wouldn’t approve. But I insisted.

Whenever I carried the bag I watched eyeballs of women swiveling, widening, even glaring, but not one had the courage to question.

Until one morning a lady in high-end sweatpants at an uptown bakery frowned as she read the provocative word sewn onto my bag, “I don’t believe those are your initials!” she declared, and raised an eyebrow at me. I had to laugh, “You are right and you’re the first,” I told her.

As an aside let me add she and I are of average proportions but because she has a sense of humor, after our purchases, we waved goodbye, and yelled, “Have a great day, Fatty!”

As tourists visit Key West so does stormy weather. Each leaves his own detritus, whether teardrops or raindrops.

Eating a sunny morning alive a wind might stir. Dry leaves clatter attracting attention to those paying it. Cats drag indoors, birds quieten. A mass of clouds trap light beams like swords falling to earth, until lusterless. Raindrops clank on cars in elephantine tears. Branches crash-land through antique banyans, scents explode blending pines and honeysuckle and hot peppers. Tall palm trees sway jerkily, like frightened horses. The storm is a show to behold.

The end is heralded by the chirruping of birds, and the sky pulls itself up so fast you must shield your eyes.

All that remains are squalls, tail ends flipping off farewells as they travel on across the open ocean. The daydream resumes. Even when it’s bad, it’s so good.

Locals scarcely bother traveling out of town for vacations, “We’ve got it all here!” They know it.

Recently I was asked by a tourist, “I live in the North East, in the suburbs. I spend my days in a cubicle. I dream of a life like this. Tell me the truth, is it how I Imagine it?”

I knew he wanted me to say it was all a mirage so that he could more readily return to his self-imposed constrictions.

“It’s paradise, Fool!” I told him, and his flinching reaction was such I thought he was going to cry.

I live with a rat. Possibly he is a mouse. I’ve never seen him. At night, when he is certain I am secured beneath the bed sheets, I hear him dragging things around and banging into stuff. Perhaps he’s partially blind. Whatever the case, this rodent has shabby eating habits.

On the counter in the kitchen are bags of croissants, bags of nuts and fruit but he will only help himself to the Cheetos. He makes one careful slit in the sack and then plunders from the gap. Due to hanta virus I have to sadly throw out the tampered treats.

This pest was brash and reckless. If he had gone after something besides Cheetos perhaps we could have worked out a deal.

One day I found out he had ramped up his technique. I discovered in a drawer in the kitchen that he had secreted a stash. Was he planning a new nest? I had to ask around but I didn’t like the suggestions, from glue boxes and traps to poison. I’ve watched too many crime shows not to see where that was headed. Jail for one!

A wild man from Tennessee showed up with ‘country’ ideas on what to do with vermin. ‘I’ll handle this,’ he said and retrieved a handful from the bag, coated them with dishwashing liquid and placed them carefully in the rodent drawer, making of them a fierce face, like an Aztec mask. ‘Are you hoping to frighten him?’ I asked, incredulous. And when the next day the tainted food was gone, not even orange dust particles remained, I proclaimed, ‘Failure!’

After castigating the wildling from Tennessee for his misleading vim gradually, as the days piled up, it was clear there would be no further sign of the nighttime raider.

I can’t say I miss him. Equally I can’t say I don’t.

I was minding my own business bopping along to something at the Hogs Breath Bar deep downtown Key West, when a young man spoke to me.

YM: What is your name?
CO: Cleopatra
YM: Where are you from?
CO: Egypt
YM: What’s your last name?
CO: Patra
YM: Can I get you a drink? Don’t tell me you don’t drink.
CO: I don’t drink, I don’t high five, I don’t say awesome and I don’t twirl on the dance floor. I’d love some water.

When I was seven I remember being dispatched for a week to the house of an old lady, a friend of my mother’s. In the house was a piano and I took to sitting on the wood bench and tapping at the black and white bars, beguiled by the sounds. The old lady claimed arthritis prevented her from using the thing and I begged her to ship it to my mother’s house.

When the piano arrived my mother was not amused. She said, ‘You’re taking lessons!’ I said, ‘Perfect!’ I was triumphant until the lessons began and it was evident I had zero aptitude. Instead of creating music I was exasperated with dull discordant hours of practice. One day, without explanation, the piano was gone.

Later, in boarding school aged thirteen, on nights when I could not sleep I would creep along the dark corridors to the music department with its wall of narrow rooms, each with an upright piano and space for two, tops. I’m still afraid of the dark and the experience of getting there and back to my dormitory was terrifying, meanwhile I was compelled to go hide, alone with the tunes, my sanctuary.

I would choose notes until I found pleasing combinations which I would repeat and gradually get lost in, my escape. Boarding school on the English coast in the winter was always damp and cold. Rain drizelled day and night. Wind shook windows and thrashed tree limbs against the red brick building. England in the 1960s was Dickensian. Sure London was hopping, but in boarding school it was all about cold and hunger and abuse. I would rather have moved in with Fagin. Doubtful I pictured a life in the tropics, definitely I daydreamed of escape, even if only in my mind.

Today I live on an island in the Caribbean and someone is delivering a piano. Mainly to store it. Perhaps I’ll toy with it. Better yet someone else will, someone with talent, and I’ll dance.

NB: This applies equally to males and females. You know who you are, I hope.