Casper has never feared death that much. Sometimes the concern lurks somewhere in the shadowy distance, ‘I am human, humans rot’ but it is always too far off to be chilling yet. He has never, and never will, go hungry. He has never even had to go without cigarettes, and his disheveled style is rooted in aesthetic, not thrift. Sure, lately things have gotten tighter, the bills choke the letterbox and sometimes the internet goes off, or the hot water, or the lights, but he always has a bed and a duvet and an escape down the road at Jenny’s.
Casper’s survival, as the son of middle class parents in a first world country, is assured. Yeah, realistically, the incessant smoking and drinking might churn his innards, but that death will be based in excess, rather than need.
What Casper does fear, has the luxury to fear, is insignificance. His father works nine to five. His father watches Wheel of Fortune. That is enough for his father. There is no reality left, just an assault of simulacrum, from the tabloids his mother leaves on the coffee table that he flicks through with feigned nonchalance, to the print out of the Mona Lisa on the wall. Casper’s father will never see the real Mona Lisa, or the pyramids. He hardly even cared for Big Ben when they went south and did the tourist thing around London, craning back briefly to stare up at the clock face miles above and then returning his gaze to the tourist guide in his perspiring hands. He likes the reprints fine enough, even finds them more accessible, a better representation of the opulence he has worked for. Who needs to travel the world when you can go to Las Vegas and see it all reproduced for you there, within walking distance, with an oasis of bars in between each splendor? Or better yet, buy a crate of beers, flick on the computer, and experience it all from the sofa. Why even move?
Casper wants to be entombed in the grittiness of reality. Once, outside a kabob shop, after a night out, a man punched him in the face. He was mid-bite, and the blood that gushed into his mouth intermingled with chunks of half-eaten lamb. He choked, swallowing the blood and the food and tasting the sharp, clanging flavor of his wound. He spat, and the mixture created splattered constellations on the concrete. Corn kernels became asteroids, regurgitated meat absorbing the orange glow of the streetlamp like black holes. Casper received several more blows and didn’t fight back, and eventually the owner of the shop started shouting and the guys ran off. He didn’t press charges, he didn’t mar the experience by placing it in a report and filing it away, flat, cold, and lifeless.
Casper’s survival, as the son of middle class parents in a first world country, is assured. Yeah, realistically, the incessant smoking and drinking might churn his innards, but that death will be based in excess, rather than need.
What Casper does fear, has the luxury to fear, is insignificance. His father works nine to five. His father watches Wheel of Fortune. That is enough for his father. There is no reality left, just an assault of simulacrum, from the tabloids his mother leaves on the coffee table that he flicks through with feigned nonchalance, to the print out of the Mona Lisa on the wall. Casper’s father will never see the real Mona Lisa, or the pyramids. He hardly even cared for Big Ben when they went south and did the tourist thing around London, craning back briefly to stare up at the clock face miles above and then returning his gaze to the tourist guide in his perspiring hands. He likes the reprints fine enough, even finds them more accessible, a better representation of the opulence he has worked for. Who needs to travel the world when you can go to Las Vegas and see it all reproduced for you there, within walking distance, with an oasis of bars in between each splendor? Or better yet, buy a crate of beers, flick on the computer, and experience it all from the sofa. Why even move?
Casper wants to be entombed in the grittiness of reality. Once, outside a kabob shop, after a night out, a man punched him in the face. He was mid-bite, and the blood that gushed into his mouth intermingled with chunks of half-eaten lamb. He choked, swallowing the blood and the food and tasting the sharp, clanging flavor of his wound. He spat, and the mixture created splattered constellations on the concrete. Corn kernels became asteroids, regurgitated meat absorbing the orange glow of the streetlamp like black holes. Casper received several more blows and didn’t fight back, and eventually the owner of the shop started shouting and the guys ran off. He didn’t press charges, he didn’t mar the experience by placing it in a report and filing it away, flat, cold, and lifeless.