CHAPTER 1 – Across

It’s like when it’s day time and you have your window open and the sun floods in like dusty pale yellow beams, but no one standing on the street can see in, but you can see out because you are in the darker area and they are in the blinding light, and vice versa. When it’s night time, you have the lights on, and it’s pitch as the deepest part of The LaBrea tar pits outside, everyone can see in, but you can't see who’s watching you. Are you following me?

Pretty simple concept- you've been there before. Well, that’s what the dark ones and the light ones have going. The pure dark ones can see when no one else can. They can see where no one else can. It’s a contradiction really. They live underground, working like ants in an ant farm, with their complex system of living spaces in cool, airy caves and bunkers- think of the bleak and cleanliness of concrete floored lofts. The word mole meaning one who infiltrates was dubbed so because of the actions of the dark ones living down below with their dark hair and pallid skin. They also went by The Moon Kissed with eyes in the shades of the earth, brown and all types of green.

Their counterparts, the pure light ones had light hair and glowing skin. These were The Sun Kissed; and not the fizz syrupy orange soda. Their eyes were the color of the sky, gray, blue, amber at sun up and sun down. They lived in the tree tops in warm, bright and natural wood toned homes better than what The Swiss Family Robinson could ever have conceived of in their human minds.

These are two groups that never evolved to be able to always walk among us. They’re like the Amish, strict genetics were in order to retain the line. We live among The Sun-Kissed during the day. The Moon Kissed come out after the sun goes down. They sequestered themselves, trying to one up the each other. The Moon Kissed work the grave yard shifts at hospitals and everywhere else, helping people. The Sun Kissed man the day light hours, watching out for trouble.

Modern people are actually hybrids of the two, able to be out in the day and night, but not being able to see everything that is around us. Some of us have more tendencies of one or the other. Some humans like to sleep all day and stay up all night, and side more to the

traditional dark ones. Some dark leaning ones now have foresight. Some people live to bask in the sun, and cower inside in the night time. Over the centuries, we just all became mixed. The true Preterperifs were the only aware ones who monitored us all around. I’m getting ahead of myself here. Let’s start with my upheaval.

I was standing in my new front yard, watering my car. I put my thumb on the opening of the hose, sending the water spraying in all directions, making a rainbow effect. I put the house down and turned it off to let the beads on my new hybrid electric car evaporate.

I went inside my modern house- all light wood, glass and concrete- and turned on the air ionizer and let it rotate. I turned on the industrial sized humidifier too. I couldn’t deal with the dryness out there. Give me a humid East Coast summer anytime instead. Then I took the barbeque lighter and lit an orange spice candle my mom, Melissa, had just gotten at the store.

I thought how easily we manipulate elements now- water, air, fire, earth. We probably even change the weather. I’ve read up about chem trails. After the fires in LA, somehow rain was stopped, so that mud slides would take out the remaining structures that didn’t go down in burn areas.

I’m a new Angeleno, starting the summer before I turned seventeen.

I was being uprooted by my parents and whisked off grudgingly to the land of the blonde and tan. They had a shrink keeping tabs on me during weekly sessions, to make sure I was adjusting properly.

It’s not like 90210- the Walsh twins or Annie and her family, depending on what generation you’re from where you’re some naïve little thing from the Midwest learning about the big bad city. I was from the big bad city, New York City that is, and being moved all the way across the country to this place where people addressed each other with words like “duder”. I like to wear all black, go figure right? I’m like a baby-faced version of those Soho dwelling gallery hoppers, except that I wasn’t allowed wine

yet, but I was allowed and encouraged to have all the cheese.

Being in New York felt like a lifetime ago. I missed the grit.

I really don’t know how they could do this to me, with me being just mid way through high school at a place I liked, but yeah, like these stories go- my parents got an offer they could not pass up. They’re architects and won a bid on a huge new development. Yes, they’re part of the evil, part of the tearing down of nature to build these well designed, very expensive, impersonal, shiny, glass and metal monstrosities that beckoned to those whose wallets were burning a hole in their pockets, the neo-rich and well to do. They soon would go the way of glass bricks of the 80’s.

I loved dying my hair black and lurking on the subway platform, like I always have since my parents let me take myself to school, like so many precocious Manhattanite children.

Now, I’d have to learn how to drive. What a nightmare. I imagined myself getting older and going out and riding the train more, carefree as ever, getting off at any stop and wandering the streets, seeing what there is to see, smelling what there is to smell.

Now I’d have to look for parking for half an hour, pay for it and then worry about getting back in time to not get a ticket. No more carefree life for me.

See kids, when you read about Miley or Demi or whoever you’re into at the moment, their lives aren’t all that glamorous in LA. They get moving violation tickets like everyone else when they get their license. I’m trying to get through to you here, talking gossip rag talk.

Oh yeah, I’m Gabe. I got called Gabe, King of the Gays, until I was eleven. That’s when I’d had enough and knocked some kid’s teeth out and everyone left me alone. I didn’t do it because I thought being gay was bad. I did it because those kids treated gay-ness as derogatory. I was happy being asexual and androgynous. It was something I was proud of.

My parents, Ron and Melissa, thought it would be so cute if I learned how to surf. Me surf, seriously? I’d rather, ahem, gag myself with a spoon.

They sent me to driving school and got me a Prius. Now I’d look like every other kid in LA. I guess, I can’t complain; I had my own wheels and that’s more than a lot of people get just given to them.

Next, my folks would probably want me doing commercials like every other kid in this town.

I wish my parents would’ve just let me stay in New York by myself, but I guess that wasn’t realistic money wise to pay for a place just for me out there, so I tried to find even just one reason why moving was ok.

One perk was our new place had every fruit tree you could imagine in the back yard- even ones I don’t think I’ve heard of- tangelos- half tangerine/half orange hybrids, persimmons, figs, lemons, grapefruit. They all had waxy leaves and fruit that was so big it looked like it was on steroids.

Here’s one reason not involving fruit- a kid who moves equals a kid who can reinvent himself. If it worked for Britney Spears, then it could work for me, except that I didn’t want to change to be accepted, especially not here. Everyone here was a sheep in my eyes. Everything that came out of their pie holes was bah, bah, bah to me.

I had been given independence and curiosity by my former urban surroundings- all those tall buildings and new food smells on every corner, taxi cabs honking, bike messengers zipping by in their big carrier bags and camouflage shorts. This was a place where you didn’t want to wear open toe shoes unless you wanted your toes to turn black. Instead now, I was in a place where everyone exposed their damn foot digits. In LA, it was the effervescent scent of car exhaust and bimbos to your left and bimbos to your right.

Yes, I may sound older and more cynical than my sixteen years, but that’s because I’m not from here. I tried to find redeeming qualities about here- here was where Marilyn Monroe died. Here was where Bela Lugosi died. My parents wished I would stop being so morbid, but these thoughts just crept into my head. I came from a place that was so

alive to a place where everyone in their cars in traffic looked like the living dead.

What would I do with myself until I could successfully get into college back in NYC and move back? I had a year. Would my head explode? Would I actually start to like “here”? Doubtful. Would I find out that my parents really weren’t my parents, but that I was descended from a magical class of beings? Don’t get your hopes up. It’s not one of those stories.

I was just a kid trying to explore and the underlying truth burbled up on me like milk bubbles oozing from an over micro-waved bowl of oat meal- good for you, but looked like regurgitation.

I was walking on Sunset Boulevard looking around, getting coffee. Yes, I had an allowance and I could have caffeine and stunt my growth if I wanted to, but I didn’t care, I already crossed the 6 foot threshold, so what did it matter?

I looked at places I couldn’t get into. I imagined these places at night with lines of degenerates pouring down the sidewalk. I thought about the people from decades past whose haunts were in the place of the new Starbucks, Sephora, what have you.

What in the hell did this town have to teach me? Stories about movie stars and their scandals? I had to find my own brand of entertainment that did not include Top 40 hit songs or what was playing on the big screen at the local multi-plex on anticipated opening weekends.

My parents had let me see LA Confidential and I snuck a copy of Mulholland Drive one day and watched it by myself. If you haven’t seen either, I’d take a peek. They show the non-glossy side of this place, the town that inspired so many fresh faces to take the bus and take their stab at stardom to end up on the proverbial boulevard of broken dreams.

What I did come to learn about was Preterperifs, or PS for short. They are said to be “equal to the edges”, which was all around odd to me. You know when people say someone is an old soul? Or when someone says, “I don’t know why I did that; something just got into me.” Another instance is when

you’re on a drive and you go into “auto-pilot” and end up at your destination without remembering the in between parts. These can be explained by Preterperifs. Sometimes they, walk-ins, are just mischievous and take over someone’s body for fun, as in the case of the Moon Kissed.

They like to go in when people are being hypnotized, make someone smack themselves around on stage for laughs. Hypnotists are some of the people who know about them. Sometimes a group of Preterperifs will take turns with someone, making them technically schizophrenic. You’ve seen that show- The United States of Tara where they woman is a bunch of people rolled into one, right?

Preterperifs really are ancient souls. They are the originals who were where we started before we devolved and had to build monuments to ourselves, when there was no need for material things - When if you thought of it, it existed for you to enjoy.

This was when the earth was devoid of un-natural structures, when the energy roamed freely with the wind and the planets and the stars. People were united and connected, without the help of social networks and flashing digital screens. No, this isn’t me moving to the west coast and talking like a hippy. It’s what I learned. You want to know from who? I’m getting to that.

So, we didn’t have constructs before. We didn’t need shells, encasings, bodies, until someone got vain and decided we needed them- these things to flaunt, these fleshy weights that withered, that died. With them came man-made things to house them- buildings that decayed and crumbled and fell over. Things became finite with vanity, not free and ever-lasting like before when Preterperifs were just energy, radiance.

Like I said, vanity, having something to show-off, evidence that you were here is why things have been going downhill at a rapid pace, like a loud blaring video game of an out of control snow-ball picking up stuff.

Preterperifs are the ones who keep trading bodies. They can take control when they feel like it. The rest of us are blind. We go on with the same body, either as a Moon Kissed or Sun Kissed, and whoever tallies up more points gets bragging rights. Neither was good or bad, both are

just different than each other. With the material world came the haves and have-nots and the jealousy that drove the two apart, and the competition that has built what we live in today.

When we all became material, when we materialized, we got dimensions and could not see around everything like we used to be able to. The Preterperifs still can see all around, like they have a second... or third set of eyes.

When I first was told about all of this- I thought Madonna must’ve had quite a few Preterperifs, one that wanted to wear the pointy boob bras and have blonde hair, one that wanted dark hair and kimonos. You could say bi-sexuals were Preterperifs sharing the same body- one straight and one gay who took over at different times. I wanted to be jokey about it. People in New York didn’t buy into this left coast new age stuff, right?

I knew a couple kids from my high school in New York who suddenly wanted to go by their middle names. They changed their whole style too. I thought it was kind of dumb. I’d been the way I am my whole life, ever since I could remember, since I was 3, I was moody and a smart alec.

These kids went from being total nerds one day to what I suppose was them blossoming into, ya know, beautiful butterflies or something. It was just peculiar, them wanting people to call them by their middle names and suddenly doing a 180 and dressing like someone else, not being gradual about it. They’d come back from summer vacation and be magically transformed. I just thought it was a giant ploy for attention from those attention starved putzes.

Back to basics- the ones to oversee our materialization were the Kritzendens, a brother and a sister, Michael and Sonja. They each received a special gift. Michael had night sight. Sonja got foresight. Michael could see over the tree tops in the dark. He could see under the ocean in the dark. He could see everywhere, through the thickest nocturnal fog, until the sun came up and he was blinded.

Sonja was limited in the dark, feeling as powerless as Michael during what he felt to be exhausting and impossible- the day. She always looked forward and could know what would happen next. She needed the sun for

clarity. She is the predecessor of the modern clairvoyants. Their descendants inherited these traits of theirs, but became perverse and diluted over time. Some were just voyeurs, watching, waiting the fate of the material humans.

Sonja and Michael became jealous of each other’s gifts, neither being able to possess both. They began their own separate domains, to stay away from each other- the reminder of what they were not. Michael got the earth’s subterranean coolness, while Sonja, and her like, got to have the space between the ground and the clouds. What was above the clouds is anyone’s domain, but there would be conflict there.

Anyhow, back out of the clouds and back on the street. I was walking around on Sunset Boulevard before I started to let you in on what kinds of people I would encounter in my stay in The City of Angels.

I bumped right into this guy, my iced coffee going everywhere. The sugar made for good hair, but otherwise I was going to smell like spoiled milk soon. Like it mattered, I didn’t’ have anyone to smell good for. I don’t have any brothers or sisters and my parents are off being busy and sociable and keeping up with the Joneses.

I was too busy looking up, like I knew better not to, looking like a tourist at all the cheesy billboards with rap stars hawking their clothing lines, and models showing people what sexy is supposed to be like, as prescribed by advertising execs.

I had better street smarts, but I was just in awe of the corniness, the fact that billboards were digital and some had glittery stuff on them- the stuff car accidents where the driver is distracted by an ad- are made of.

The guy who I ran into was surprisingly nice. He didn’t say anything like, “Watch where you’re going, duder” or anything like I expected. I just used like twice, geez.

He looked to be my age, a tad taller than me, lanky, dark hair to his chin. Christ, he could’ve been my doppelganger. It was definitely weird. You’d think we’d both just keep walking past each other, but he actually asked me where my coffee was from and offered to get me

another one. I told him it was my fault and he didn’t have to at all, but he insisted. We decided he’d take me somewhere he thought the coffee was tasty, somewhere near- by.

Heck, I hadn’t uttered one word voluntarily to anyone in this town yet, so what could it hurt? This guy seemed for lack of a better word- neat. He has a very feminine look to him with his large Blythe doll dark moss green eyes, you know, sensitive but not emo, just what all the girls are after.

He told me his name was Mick Wallander, yeah last name and all. Usually, I’d run screaming from and be embarrassed to be seen with someone who looked and dressed like me, but somehow I didn’t mind this time. It really irks me when you see a group of people who know each other and have exactly the same image going, like all the girls have gloppy, oozing lip gloss, who wear Uggs now-a-days with their jeans tucked in and their muffin tops hanging over their pants, or all the guys who will go out on the weekend in a pack and all be wearing khakis and a green shirt or something.

Listen to me- all modern, all concerned with what people and their materials said about them. How do you kiss a girl with that much gloss anyway? Don’t you just get a juicy mouthful of petroleum jelly? All the girls who I’d ever kissed just grabbed my face, did what they wanted, and were on with it. I’d never had anyone who stuck around and saw what I looked like in the day light.

People here put so much emphasis on their bodies and spent so much money on them. They didn’t put any, well, thought into their minds. I saw it on the news, people were paying top dollar to Beverly Hills spas to have crèmes made out of umbilical chords and nightingale poop, on their faces in attempts to stay forever young. There are stores here called Forever 21 because that’s what people wanted to be. Just setting foot outside of the house in LA, I’d see so many women from the back who were dressed like part girls ready to go clubbing, who turned around and were easily fifty years old or more. No one thought would accept their true age here.

I just couldn’t deal with sharing your identity with others like that. I’m self-ish, being an only child and all, not

having to ever share my toys growing up, or share my time now.

My time was my own. I could do with it what I pleased, except when I had to be in school. It’s not like my parents would really ever find out if I was truant any ways. I was better than Ferris Bueller when it came to skipping out. I was non-descript enough that my teachers didn’t notice whether I was there or gone. I had to be there enough to get out of the hell of high school, so I could return to my beloved city.

Mick took me back down Sunset. This Sunset Boulevard was pre-street cleaning and there were smashed up plastic, paper and aluminum cans along the curbs, meters that silently screamed “Expired” in red robot text, ripe for the plucking of a meter maid that would make a fifty for the city. Girls or women rather, were wearing ankle snapping heels and trying to hobble their ways to their convertibles to find a quarter to pop into the ever hungry skinny, gray metal money pits that kept the time you were allowed to stay parked in one place.

We turned up this side road that wound up the hill a bit. It was getting residential with old Hollywood style apartments with neon signs that echoed the golden era of this place. They had wild looking greenery, but well kept by an expensive gardener- like ivy or delicate deep purple- red bougainvillea paper flower vines hanging off. There were some had cracks in the textured powder yellow or faded dusty rose and orange creamsicle colored stucco, remnants of the havoc caused by the last earthquake.

Earthquakes were something I’d never really thought about much before. They weren’t really East Coast occurrences. I imagined the massive, far reaching vibrational forces from under the sea that came up to split open the dry land that was omni-present here, and swallowed up buildings and people. I wonder if just my brain worked that way or if anyone else wearing a pink jumpsuit or board shorts thought about this in their every day meanderings.

It wasn’t a far walk to the coffee shop, but it felt far, as I somehow already transitioned into being carted everywhere like everyone else here. As you know, no one walks in LA.