It’s hard to watch Akihiko. He’s angry at the cops, but he still has to make jokes and small-talk with them at work. I wonder why it took four cops from two different branches (█████ PD and LAX Police) to bring in a suicidal old lady. How slow was it that night for them. Also. I didn’t know Los Angeles hired Wal-Mart greeters for airport security. TSA officers don’t have to be fit or know that peanut butter contains peanut oil I guess, but you would think the largest police agency in the United States dedicated exclusively to 24-hour airport activities would hire someone less… decrepit. But maybe she does clerical work. I can see her being a dispatcher.
It’s rare to see a suicidal cop. At least it is here.
The cop that was nice to Ant talked to her about her garden. He has a garden too. And Hitler loved dogs, and banned smoking. I’m sure Hillary Clinton has cute old lady hobbies when she’s not orchestrating war crimes in the Middle East. There was a lady that Kyle met. We won’t vote for hate!” She was the former head of logistics for Northrop Grumman. Very proud of her lesbian daughter, went to Pride with her and all that.
And I remember a guy we used to know. We don’t talk to him anymore. Politically we have to be on the same side. But he was a transphobic ass and said that gay pride was stupid, because people are born gay, so why be proud of it. Didn’t care that it was about fighting homophobia by reasserting our dignity as human beings and celebrating queer culture and history (he probably denies that exists, too). I don’t know if I’d trust him with Chief’s health and safety. It’s supposed to be that in the heat of the class struggle, if you’re armed with an internationalist perspective, people like him will forget the fact that you’re black, you’re gay, you’re trans or whatever and they’ll fight by your side. Because you’re all that each other has.
There was an old guy that Ant met a long time ago… Before us, and the injury… He was a WW2 vet and used to be vehemently anti-Japanese. When he found the American Trotskyists, he made friends—no, comrades—with a Japanese-American woman in that current. One day he even went with her to her parents’ house and introduced himself, and they were shocked. “Kimie’s my friend!” He asserted proudly. I think they married, but Ant can’t remember. There’s a lot she’s lost to the brain damage.
If it weren’t for that injury, we would’ve never met. She would’ve never met Ansel or everyone else, either. It took away almost everything that she had (and gave her the terror of chronic pain, and PTSD…) and I don’t know if I’m a good “consolation prize” or whatever. I want to live up to her dad. Giovanni did, too. I tried my best to support Giovanni every way he needed, and now I don’t know what to do with myself. That must be how she feels. I get cold, and shivery when I think about it.
Bedivere blocks me from thinking about this. He doesn’t want me to worry about this stuff. I guess it makes sense. He knows what it’s like, having your life fall apart in front of you, and your dreams go to ashes—twice, thrice now. Sometimes, when he helps me up, he looks very young. Well not like child-young but he looks… kinda like Giovanni did. And that’s funny, because Giovanni looked older than he was, when he got serious. Sometimes they look like the same cohort… Bith must be getting a chuckle out of that. Flattering an old man with compliments about his perpetual youth.
That LAX police lady’s considerably younger than him but she looks older.
Yumeka’s bought himself 212 old books for ten bucks and Ant wants to play Opoona with the kids. A sex magick-casting witch and twin children. Is this the kind of life that Blast Ant wanted? No. Never.
We’re all that she’s got and I don’t know if she’s ever coming back from this. Maybe she can be happy, but… I can’t let go of what Giovanni and she wanted. If I do, it’ll feel like really letting them die.
Now’s not the time to think about that though. We don’t have time… At any moment we could lose even more of our income (half…) and they’ve doubled health insurance premiums for 2021 and I don’t ever want to see another fucking cop again, especially not another fucking SWAT team with a jolly fat redhaired copwoman in a long ponytail providing moral support. I don’t ever want to see a detective with a placard around his neck again, and I especially don’t want see one talking to her about mint and bougainvillea and garlic and rosemary.
Cuz’ got Yumeka a knife and I think I’ll go practice with one to blow off some steam.