My Story   1 .0

                         
                         
                         
I am the ageless consciousness.I have an offer to write columns in a national daily. I might do fitness. A friend already does the agony aunt.                        
                       
Most of my adult life so far has been spent posing-my hair sprayed and done; my cheeks touched, rouged and highlighted, my eyes shaded and blinking twice every second-from too much amphetamine and wee-hour partying-showcasing my drooping eye lashes and the lab-tested eco-friendly eyeliner.                          
                         
This, of course...                          
                         
When I am not snorting Columbian crystal coke smuggled in condoms or taking botox on my chest plates in non-descript buildings. Parties are pre-included in the bundled package.                      
                     
Welcome to my life.                          
                         
My teeth ache from chewing on this bland wad of gum since the start of the universe. My legs shudder every now and then. It's not bubble gum. Nicotine. Low tar content. My second week of no cigarettes. A go-getter's story. It has been ages since I had an orgasm. And I have a growing urge to go to the loo. For unknown reasons.                          
                         
Right now a hardcore realist can't mark the difference between me and one of those African kids with unnaturally big eyes from those large black and white potraits that win awards. Pulitzers. At the exhibitions, those 22 X  18's are the centre of all the eyes. Tch Tch.                          
                         
I am wearing a rag which someone else will wear on the red rug. On the big event, flashing in front of the shutterbags. Red Carpet. Show openings. P3P. The list is endless. Everything I wear feels the same. An unfamiliar and distant emotion. Akin to induced-lightheadedness. What I am wearing is the show-stopper. The one before this was the most-talked about gown at some event.                          
                         
Prices on request.                          
                         
I took three tablets with my glass of champagne. Yawn. I hope noone caught that. Fingers crossed.                          
                         
This photographer smells of fame and cologne from here, what is seemingly a mile across. I actually don't know him. He is not my regular. I can see the raised & moisturized thumb of him. That is the bridge between us. His ponytail and goatee look is so passe. And his hot chief assistant has a bad accent.                          
                       
Pseudos. Phoneys. Male Bimboes.                          
                         
Finally I guess it's time. I get a thumbs-uo from the DoP. He will now give me directions. His assistant tests the light every five seconds. All around me eyes travel across my bronzed and exposed self. On the moniter my three dimensional self looks even more flat.                          
                         
Anoxeria Nervosa. Bullimia. In another world-Marasmus. Kwashiorkor.                        
                       
The whole room has three moniters. The assistant's reads Panther. His Tee reads Puma. Both of them seem to be always adjusting the moniters.                          
                         
The photographer looks at me staring at him in the moniter while in reality I am staring at the moniter. I don't blink. Essentially I am staring at myself in the moniter staring at myself in the monitor staring at myself in the moniter staring at myself in the monitor, on and on, trapped in a reality loop. Eerie. Eew.                    
                   
The assistant checks the light again. I bet he is gay. But I read in college that fellatio is safe as the skin fold is sterile. Rather his tongue must be a safe haven for bacteria.                      
               
The photographer comes closer. He hands back the empty can of Redbull. Hasselblad. Here he goes. This is everybody's cue to look at me.                          
                         
My dress is making me feel righteous and immoral. I am both elegant and sacrilegious. Milan. Paris. NY. London. Recycled emotions. Flash of the strobe. My thoughts are running berserk. I should stop my pills. It's an addiction. Every addiction is for the same problem. To find peace. To escape. My mind has been hijacked. My thoughts train wrecked. It cannot not be an overdose. Holy Mooo. I feel like having REM dreams with my eyes open. Lips jutted. Face in a pout. In an ape-like curvature.                                
My life is all about me. me me me. Eccentric yet outgoing diva. Armchair Philosopher. Five thousand followers on each Facbook page.                          
                         
The meter is running. Canon. Flash Flash Flash Flash. Now the camera sounds like a semi-automatic gas powered weapon firing five hundred metres away.                          
                         
What if all of this is a dream?                          
                         
Flash. Someone says 'smile'. I want that someone to give me peace. Or may be release.I am the new queen of migraine town. The new face of latest lunatic expedition. This is the world we live in.Conditions change and we mutate. Conditions apply.                          
 
Just go with the prompts. That is the only thing that is recurrent in my mind. Someone daubs something on my forehead. Another assistant gives the touch up on my cleavage. Rogue. Gold. Silver. I want someone to give me dad's phone number. Or may be true love. I have a strong urge to change the things. And pee too. I don't know what is happening all of a sudden. May be it was Truth Serum. Now I want someone to give me inhibitors.                            
               
Click. Click. Flash.                          
                         
I spread my legs and hold the strap of my flimsy top. A sweeping tide of nostalgic childhood yearnings sends me hurtling across my centre of gravity. I hope I am not having a DMT trip.                          
                         
The photographer comes closer. Linlof. Close-up. Centrefold. Time to step up. Make a pout. My heels make me want to give the final push and float into empty space at escape velocity. Thank heavens, they aren't slippery. At least shoes have character. I have to clutch my dress. Dense nets dotted with glinting whatnots. Parachute silk. A layer of solid starched crepe. Small tufts of tulle and gauze with hexagon-shaped rhinestones, cut out by third world elves. And they say I am underdressed?                        
The assistant steps behind and checks the light. Unblemished skin. His veins stand out from too much vertical lifts. I want his wet fingers prying my open. His thick leather belt around my neck. I must have popped sidenafil. Holy Molly. Still I want him. And I want ecstasy racing in my veins. Chemical. I want to be rubbed so raw by the stubble around his mouth that it will hurt when I let go. I might need the loo.                           
                         
For fuck's sake, give me asexual reproduction of Goose Barnacle.                  
                 
I had peed in front the whole class when I was in kindergarden. I want that unmixed innocence. I was sent home then. What if I do that now? Will I be sent home?                          
                         
My parents. They have not seen me in the last seven years.              
I wanted them to approve of my life, validate my existence. Post leaving home I still called them when I was in crisis and needed something. Usually it was for cash or late payments.                          
                         
Past. No matter what it catches up. Surprises you. The seemingly redundant-somehow-sorry sorry past towards which we all fake our indifference. Like orgasms.          
           
I wish I could attain the speed of 32.8 Metres per second.                                
           
The hairdresser lets a storm of hair spray. He is tossing it up. Messing it up. Chaos theory. Some writer on Facebook told me that all the hair we have is just vestigal fur with mousse on it. Truth is we are just atoms. Five elements. Whatever. Carbon base. ATP.                          
                         
Well how about using vaselline for too long? With the check ups stopped. And going to the hill stations in summer. Ten thousand feet above sea level with the sun kissing you. That will give birth to two things. Tan and Cancer.                          
                         
The idea is to let the cancer spread and you will see. A few million atoms perishing every time. A few steps closer to subcutaneous breakdown. The hydrocarbons with additional rings. And watch all of your Dior and Chanel and Jimmy Choos and Boss and Maybeline and Giordano going down the drain. If that was a little heart breaking then may be ingest a hundred grams of lab-prepared thalium and wait for all your hair to fall out.                  
                 
A slow controlled suicide. A prolonged existential ahh-gasm.                      
                 
But let's not get engulfed by negativity. Breathe in.Breathe out. Set an appontment with your life coach. Remember Charbaak's Philosophy. Easy girl. Easy. Even Monks sell Lamborghinis.                                 
               
Smile. See the approval in their eyes. They will make a goddess out of you. These faces in the placental dark with CREW written on their tees. The faceless, nameless. These are the Facebook profiles you get pokes and friend requests from.                          
                         
Laughter. Peels of laughter. Click. Click. It's the assistant.                        
                       
Why is it so that you feel like a waste of space when you laugh  alone? Truth is that's how you usually end up sobbing. Behind   your sunglasses, during your shower, on a phone call. Why is it that the lachrymial glands seem to be always on surplus flow. Is it dwindling Serotonin and low dopamine levels? Even the theobromide of dark chocolate and slower Kreb's cycle post vodka martini is not always handy.                          
                         
The photographer is lost in his Apple. He has a bunch-in his denim pockets, in his leather case. A modern age Adam thrown from the garden of Eden. To make Eve the calender girl.                          
                         
Someone is brushing my cheeks. He smells of cheap deodrant. Or may be it's his chewing gum. Give me a break. My next costume is here. Leather pants. Corset. Price on request. Finally I have my purse. It's Dior. Swarvosky.                          
                         
One orange pill. A gulp of low calorie orange pulp. And I am all good. Are you?                            
                       
                       
               
             
             
             
                    
                       
                         
To C.