EROstation vol. 2

So it's a celebration, but aside from this one epochal discovery, no one really knows what it's all about. So-called black magic, sprinkled with artificiality, shrouded in misunderstanding, and furthermore, forced into a four-sided form.

Okay, I guess I brought them here after a year of negotiations and insuring my place against emergencies. My house is full of people, the first is surprise. Usually, it's empty. These people wear circus masks, wild eyes, and completely inappropriate costumes, uniform factory-assembled.

They don't know that this is all just experience; they're absolutely convinced nothing will happen to them here. But... undoubtedly, something has to happen; they themselves provoke events. Here, the party is governed by universal, almost animalistic laws: smile for smile, and glass shatters on heads and heads against walls, and corpses are dressed in black robes and buried in the garden. Such honors belong to the people who come here. After all, we know each other well and we have fun.

A strange conviction permeates their words and movements. Everyone gives the impression of being watched from all sides, taking small steps to the restroom, relaxing there, and telling themselves that everything will be alright, that their joints will loosen, their entire bodies will decompose, and they'll survive the entire session in a makeshift, relaxed manner. But nothing happens as they stride, as if on a catwalk, to their esteemed seats, with only an unusual post-bathroom smile plastered to their faces. Then they sit rigidly in their seats, awaiting some spectacle, surely incomprehensible to them, that will soon unfold. They open their eyes and part their mouths in delight, ready to be poured with a single portion of carrion or a pill called "perdition."

I'm supposedly the commander-in-chief here, directing traffic, saying, "You go with this here, you with that there." Generally speaking, they obey me as never before. But I won't be fooled. I know that appearances are their specialty. Then they'll sneak into every nook and cranny and brazenly read my text messages. Why did they even come here? To be trained? No, no, no... they want to reveal themselves amidst sweat, laughter, moaning, smoke, and food scraps scattered across the floor.

It's 55/55. I'm the only one who doesn't quite fit in, but somehow I feel normal about it. After a while, when they're settling into their seats, they start looking around, indiscreetly, and ruthlessly gossiping about the whole room. They pray to themselves that they can hide from the eyes, and they find the strangest corners of my belongings. For five minutes, they glimpse some unusual plastic food, which disappears into their guts. They pack it inside, almost everything. It's like a free supermarket. And so I know it will all end with sex in various corners of my hermitage. Sex determines everything.

I'm just rambling and heading to the kitchen for some aphrodisiac in the form of breadsticks and chips. I know that soon, like a time bomb, an orgy will explode across the room, no strings attached, an Asian love affair between tables, chairs, and food.

Okay, I deliver these aphrodisiacs right under their noses, like garbage. The beasts throw themselves at the table and practically devour me. I pretend not to notice, but somehow I lose respect for them and their animalistic habits. I'm losing all respect for them, for everything they're about to do here, which they're not yet aware of.

They're still strangely obedient and polite, joking around, chatting to each other about work, school, on TV, on the street. Generally speaking, they're very good at slipping from topic to topic; these people possess an animalistic nature, and nothing will eliminate it. I'm supposedly wandering from table to table, but I know perfectly well what's going on, their banal conversations and monotonous thoughts. I feign obliviousness and lick my lips, and something sticks to my knife.

Meanwhile, some pathetic sounds—so-called commercial melodies full of folk—resonate throughout the four-walled rooms.

Here, at the back of the table, somehow closer to the terrace exit, a bottle fight is taking place. I watch with pity, sipping a sparkling, natural, low-sodium drink myself. If only they added powdered intelligence to such drinks...

Those who are bored at home are also arriving, as are those who clearly know how to and enjoy playing board games. No one leaves; everyone is stuck in their assigned seats.

I look around and see that the smartest ones have found an audience who are listening intently to their inane ideologies. This makes me smile even more, inwardly. Someone there is taking on the noble role of serving pieces of meat. A meaty boy who flips them. Sometimes I don't understand them, sometimes I just can't seem to get into that mindset. I smile at them so incomprehensibly that they rise from their seats and begin their wanderings. It's a huge crowd, some I don't know. In fact, I don't know every single one of them. But some I can't quite remember.

I can already see that things have become quite lively. They're swaying to the folk rhythm on the dance floor in the large hall. I bounce from one person to another, exchanging trivialities. We're playing with banalities; everything was long ago predicted by me. Now I stand squarely in the middle of this dance mess and show them the art of breaking down a melody. They're surprised, some imitate, others continue their epileptic choreography. I look at the counters, where a lot of faith has grouped itself together.

Everything is undoubtedly heading towards a climax. I look around. I encounter someone unexpected. A non-human is sitting on the couch, sneering at the crowd crowding the hall, already clinging to the walls, sweating and laughing loudly. Contempt and superiority flow through his long, dark hair as he gazes at the already dispersing crowd. A certain pity radiates from the very intelligent face. I certainly don't know him. And I don't know what such a creature is doing here.

Suddenly, a visual confrontation occurs between us. He smiles, and so do I, because such are the rules here. A quid pro quo. I approach, as his head movement clearly indicates a vacant seat next to him.

A step – contact with the slippery surface of this path of choice. I think, I'm just going to collapse with laughter, because I was only supposed to be here as an observer, conducting an experiment, not getting involved and experiencing it myself. The second step, I'm emotionally aroused, I see the green light, my green room upstairs. The third step, he'll doubt me after a few minutes, this supposed human being whom no one knows who let in. I'm already sitting down next to him. I look at him, breathing long and hard, my heart pumping blood that spreads through my body and warms it. I lower my head. In this situation, I can't hide anything anymore.

I ask him what you're doing here, Ervil. The answer is, you know. I don't know. This isn't Erostation anymore, you have the power here. He whispers it in my ear, but I already know the reality is different. Because I'm no longer in charge here; now I'm just observing from the side.

He leans down to my ear again and touches it with his lips, so inconspicuously, as if he's about to tell me something. I can only hear his breathing and feel his moist tongue sliding against my ear. I feel as if, every now and then, my heart stops and then beats with redoubled force. I look at him, completely out of control, confused by all the smoke and the swirling figures around me. An inexplicable certainty radiates from him. He watches me.

A man approaches me. He says something, and I point him to a vacant room upstairs. I carefully explain the route, saying the second door on the right. He takes a girl's hand, and they climb the stairs. A pattern.

A few minutes later, he grabs my hand, presses it to his lips, where my fingers disappear, then reappear. Now I'm completely out of rhythm. He stands and leads me up the stairs. A pattern, like in lethargy, everything will be the same from now on.

The door, the doorknob, my green room, a candle burning on the table. The scent of jasmine in the air. He says nothing. I was supposed to be conducting an experiment, not experimenting! A pattern! I tremble slightly, first with anger, then with fear. And he lays me down on the bed and leans over me, just looking, looking at me, smiling.

It must have taken a long time, I don't know. I almost scream in my mind. Leave me alone! You know very well that I... the vision of this form is overwhelming, closing my mouth. My eyes are closed. I feel his face approaching in slow motion, his breaths overlapping. He touches the tip of his tongue to his lips, then his teeth, moving slowly across them, as if in no hurry, back and forth. I open my mouth. I register the individual images that make up the whole. I feel warmth. Surprised, I hear the clatter of metal on metal. A spark. A rhythm, out of the ordinary, an etude created by tongues. Saliva remains on my lips.

The end. I hear footsteps. I open my eyes and see him leaving, closing the door behind him.