Cartoons in the Suicide Forest

by Leza Cantoral

  We took the acid in our cabin. I was swinging in the hammock, waiting for it to kick in. It took about 20 minutes. Suddenly swinging on the hammock was the funnest thing ever and I was laughing my head off. A moment later I caught myself in this deep enjoyment and knew that the adventure had begun. I felt like a child again. Inocente. Feliz.

  We grabbed our cigarettes, a big towel, and a giant bottle of water. I stuck a joint in my pack of Marlboro Reds.

  We headed out to the shore after the sun had set. The moon was full and bright. On acid it looked huge. The sky was full of giant, fluffy clouds in all shapes and sizes. The ocean waves were crashing high and loud. The whole scene came together in a very mystical way for me. In the ocean I saw strange Lovecraftian sea creatures lurking and cavorting in the frothing waves. I imagined their giant tentacles beneath the surface of the water and I saw their heads and bodies bobbing out of the foaming waves.

  In the clouds I saw the faces of angels and demons, beatific, grotesque, looking down on me like I was one of them. They told me I was a goddess and that this was my world. My mind easily accepted this reality. It was easy to imagine with no one else in sight and nothing but ocean and moon to reflect my fantasies back at me. I was in a church that was bigger than any of the cathedrals of the world.

  The churches in Mexico are Spanish churches. They are decorated with elaborate engravings and sculptures of saints and angels in the ceiling and walls. The ceilings are carved out of plaster and inlaid with gold. These churches always seem like other worlds where emotions are heightened. Jesus is on the cross and his torment is palpable. The blood in his wounds glistens like it’s freshly flowing. Religion is a living thing in Mexico and the churches are the physical reminders of the muted and buried spirituality of the Aztecs and Mayans, whose temples slumber in ruins beneath these Spanish churches.

  Mexican Catholicism is paganism in disguise. The melodrama of polytheism is distorted within the Catholic ideology. All the formidable gods and goddesses of ancient times are repackaged as Jesus, the Virgen de Guadalupe, and the endless pantheon of saints.

  As I looked up at the heavens full of living angels and demons, I realized that I was in the real church. I saw how all other churches were simply recreations of this church. The church of existence is vast, endless, and unfathomably magnificent.

  Of course, every paradise must end and so the drugs began to wear off after about six hours. Dawn was approaching and I was not ready for my fantasy to end, so I smoked the joint I had stashed in my cigarette pack. Me volvi loca. I lost my mind.

  Suddenly the whole world went dark. Everything vanished. The fantasy evaporated along with my entire sense of self. I could not see the things around me and I cowered hopelessly in the sand. I thought I was lost in another dimension because I could not feel my body or see with my eyes. My senses had been hijacked. I plunged headlong into an onslaught of audiovisual hallucinations for a solid hour. During this time my boyfriend was talking to me, telling me I was just on drugs. I must have been talking gibberish but I don’t remember. I kept looking at his lips moving and the sounds coming out of his mouth made no sense. I would grasp it for a second and then it was all nonsense again.

  I remembered A Wrinkle in Time and I concluded something similar was happening to me. I was lost in another dimension and I hoped desperately that he could somehow rescue me. I did not know which world to return to even if I could. Should I return to the world where I was a goddess or the world before that one that I dimly remembered like a long-forgotten dream?

  My hallucinations were pop culture-based. I saw snippets of commercials, music videos, TV. shows, movies, news broadcasts, all coming and going and overlapping in rapid succession. I heard sounds that did not match the visuals, though they were also bits of songs, commercials, and other audio-media. It was like my brain was a scrambled antennae receptor. I was nowhere and no one. I did not know my name, gender, location, or memories. It was terrifying. It was a total loss of self. Estaba completamente perdida. I was terrified.

  My boyfriend walked me back to our cabin and told me to light some candles. The instant I lit the lighter I came back to reality again. The reality of the fire in my hand and my hand making that fire brought my brain back into my body.

  After the acid trip I began having strange dreams.

  In one dream I flew into outer space and right up to the moon. The planets were big balls the sizes of skyscrapers and I heard the music of the spheres, understanding that this was music made by the movement of the planets themselves, and that this was the music of existence in motion. The dream ended with me sitting upon the Milky Way like it was just a puddle of glittering and swirling stars. I touched the water and it was electric upon my fingertips.

  In another dream I was chasing a white unicorn in the Hollywood hills, only to find it decapitated in an art show that was also a crime scene and a carnival, complete with cotton candy and hot dog vendors, carnival barkers, and sideshow freaks. But neither of those dreams matched the power of the dream in which I encountered the Cosmic Bruja.

  She appeared out of the shadows. She wore long sky blue robes. She was an old woman but she was full of mischief and life. Her eyes twinkled with mirth and a deep, ageless wisdom. She was a more crone-like version of the Fairy Godmother from Disney’s Cinderella. She came toward me and looked into my eyes. I did not feel like she was a dream-conjured character. When I looked into her eyes, an intelligent consciousness looked back at me. I did not know her but somehow she knew me.

  Like a scene from a Carlos Castaneda book, she asked me if I wanted to learn to fly. I wanted to learn this lesson and so I said yes. She told me to hold my arms out to my sides so that she could hook hers under my shoulders from behind. I lifted my arms, she hooked me with hers and we were off.

  We flew high and far and I saw beautiful vistas unrolling beneath me. I could see them in great detail as we skimmed over them. We flew over mountains, valleys, and fantastical cities, through daylight and the night within a matter of seconds. My heart filled with wonder as I became more and more lucid of the fact I was flying and seeing new and vivid wonders.

  Excitement turned to panic. Panic distorted my vision and I thought the Bruja was evil and this was all some horrible trick. I did not trust her and I was terrified to be in her arms. She read my thoughts and laughed out loud at me. My panic was hitting fever pitch and it was shifting my visions into horrors. The cities became dark and ominous and full of danger. I was falling down that familiar pit of terror.

  “Focus, look at what’s in front of you,” she said to me. I made the effort to see through the fear. The whole world was blurring and disappearing the same way that it had when I lost myself on the acid trip. I anticipated the chaos with ever-increasing dread. She kept saying, “you already know, you already know, ya sabes, ya sabes.”

  I tried to focus on my vision. Blackness and chaos dissolved and the world finally came back, to my relief and amazement. I realized she had not laughed maliciously at me. She had laughed to show me how foolish I was. She laughed to show me there was nothing to be scared of. The Bruja came to me to teach me how to cope with my crazy brain.

  “Take a deep breath. Focus. Open your eyes. You already know.”

  It has taken me years to unravel this strange astral event. This was a flying lesson unlike any taught at Hogwarts. She was teaching me how to navigate my own psyche.

  Falling becomes a metaphor for every kind of loss of control. Falling means madness, falling means loss of my self and my mind.

  Sometimes I don’t know who I am. I never felt like I belonged in Mexico because my mother was American and we spoke English at home. My parents read American and British literature to me and we spoke of Western culture. I might have lived in Mexico but I never knew Mexico. I never knew that part of myself. In my heart I was American. I identified with American rock stars and writers. American culture was woven into my perceptual framework.

  But when we moved to the suburbs of Chic
ago I felt completely alienated to a degree I never had before. I had not realized how much of Mexico was in my soul. Even if I did not entirely understand the culture, it was the water that I swam in, it was the air I breathed. I was a part of Puebla the way the bougainvillea bushes were a part of Puebla, because they were born there.

  My idea of my self and who I am does not always match up. I let things that people have said to me poison my thoughts. I let the way some people have treated me deform my image of my self. I am not Mexican. I am not American.

  I am a child of the universe.

  Dreams like this one have shown me that I need to see past the surface of things and that perception is subjective.

  I am learning to fly. The voices of self-doubt are only as strong as I let them be. I can laugh at them and laugh at myself, because I might be done with the funhouse mirror but the funhouse mirror is not done with me.

  Gracias, Cosmic Bruja, you are always welcome in my dreams. In the meantime, La Luna illuminates the dark side of my mind while you are off teaching other girls how to fly.

  FIST PUMP

  The music pounds in my skull. I feel the multicolored trickle of my senses spilling out of my ears and down my neck. You don’t come to the Smushbox to fuck around. The beats are hot and if the light show doesn’t melt your retinas, you are in the wrong place. Blowpop Reds shift into Mr. Freeze Blues, and Killer Bee Yellows screech and melt into Bruise Me Magentas.

  There’s people fucking in the bathrooms, doing lines off razor blades and the Fist Pimp Van is parked outside tonight. I’ve come for one reason only: to meet Big Ru and his boys. Big Ru holds court in his usual corner, surrounded by his bruisers. People pay big for a kiss from one of these bad boys.

  I am scared but I am ready to face his whole crew. I’ve got a plan. It’s wrapped in tin foil and it’s burning a hole in the back pocket of my leather pants. I had to maim a few people to get it, but it’s totally worth it. People kill for a taste of Deadly Black Snail Pussy. Or, as it’s known on the street: Slime Puss. Even Heroin dealers won’t touch this shit with a ten foot pole.

  As I work my way through the throbbing wall of sweat and bodies, my heart races and my lips parch.

  They flash their big white smiles, like sharks at midnight. Their diamond collars gleam against their chocolatey necks. I’m shaking and sweating as I near the power pack. These dogs are always hungry. When I get close enough I know they will smell me right away.

  “Hey baby! You got something for Big Ru?”

  I smile and inch closer. Big Ru laughs a booming huge laugh and his belly bounces. His teeth are gold capped and his shades reflect my pale face back at me. Nodding, I waste no time and lean in to his ear, almost nuzzling it, and whisper, “Black Snail Pussy.” His eyes light up like a marquis and he signals a nearby waitress. “Bring this young lady a glass of Mud Rain.”

  The waitress flashes me a withering stare with her one good eye. “Yes Mr. Ru. Comin’ right up.”

  “Here, sit by me.” He pats the seat beside him, which is already being hastily vacated by “Angry” Bill Montoya, the Peruvian bodybuilder.

  Big Ru takes out a huge cigar and puffs pensively for seconds that seemed like centuries. “So, do you mind if I ask how you managed to score Snail?”

  “If I told you I’d have to kill you.”

  His eyes grow wide and the whites stretch from end to end. Then he breaks out in a roar of laughter that startles me so bad I jump in my seat.

  “I like this bitch! She’s got balls!” he laughs heartily and orders another round of drinks for everybody.

  The Mud Rain hits me hard and by my third I am not sure if I can stand on my own. When we finally leave the club I am being carried out, like a rag doll, buoyed up by a guy on each arm. In the dimly lit and almost vacant parking lot I see the Fist Pimp Van. The blue lightning bolt glitters in the black of a moonless night like it’s radioactive.

  It is much larger on the inside. The floor is covered in thick pink zebra fur, the sides are lined with mirrors and there is a huge spinning disco ball hanging from the ceiling.

  We all sit down in a circle Indian style, and strange tripped out techno beats start booming from invisible speakers that seem to be everywhere. The floor vibrates to the bass line and an air of holy reverence falls over the men as I unwrap the foil and put the Snail Pussy directly on my palm. They bow their heads and lean in, gently licking the small pinkish gray blob till there is nothing but an inky stain smeared into my palm. I lick it clean and sink back into the hot pink fur, spinning down into the vortex of snail whirl. For ten minutes we might as well be dead.

  Then the manic beast rush kicks in. I sit up like I got an adrenaline shot to the heart.

  Their eyes have turned dead black. They smile and look at each other and then me. They move together toward me, a dark hive mind buzzing between them.

  Jeremy “The Death Machine” reaches me first. He socks me across the face, cutting my lip with his huge diamond heavyweight championship ring. First hit. First blood. The others laugh and whoop. Their blood is up and they come at me faster from all sides.

  Ronny “The Body” Horror grabs my wrist and decks me right in the boob. I almost cry, but I bite my cut lip and keep a stony face. Chris “The Grin” Brown sneers at me, “Had enough baby?” I shake my head as my vision blurs and my eyes tear up. He laughs sharply, like a psychotic jack in the box, lays his thick thumb on my chin, turns my head gently to the side and punches me dead in the left eye. I scream and instinctively try to shield my face from further blows. But they’re not anywhere near done with me. Soon, my stomach is being pounded by the best boxers in the world. I imagine my spleen exploding inside me.

  I cough up a sickly green fluid and crouch forward cradling my abdomen. I’m shaking violently and pain is shooting everywhere. “Big Bull” Reggie takes the opportunity to charge me from behind. He bites into my ass with his gold capped teeth and growls as he swings his head from side to side. He tears off my pants and my chainmail thong. He slides right up to me, bites down on the back of my neck and begins to work his fist between my ass cheeks like a corkscrew. I scream so loud I go hoarse. I’m coughing and crying and begging them to stop.

  A white rush shoots through my body and bleaches out my thoughts.

  When I open my swollen eyes, I see stars. Naked, bloody and bruised, I am lying in a muddy puddle by the highway. I manage to lift myself up with my elbows to peer at my reflection in the clouded waters.

  Noting the multicolored splotches of bruises already shaping across my face, I smile. I’m a work of art, reconstructed by the hands of masters. If I can make it to a hospital before the internal bleeding gets the better of me I will be the newest member of the Purpura Club.

  I sink back into the cold wet soil and wait for my ride.

  SUICIDE PIGS

  Read her skin like braille. Her blue eyes bulge with terror. Flesh angel on her knees. You know the ways you want to use her. You run your gloved fingertips lightly down the contours of her tattooed ass. You smack it. The blue heart on her butt jiggles. She flinches in response. She cannot speak because the ball gag is between her teeth, and she bares them.

  “Oh, you’re a fierce little one,” you say as you press your fingers into her wet, slick pussy from behind.

  “You little slut, you like it when I hurt you, don’t you?”

  Guttural growls come from her throat.

  Pretty soon she won’t know her own name. Pretty soon she will be your slave forever because she will be too dumb to be anything else. Pretty soon that pretty pink pussy will drip just for you. Pretty soon there will be nothing inside that blue head except her hunger for the release that you give her.

  And then you unleash the beast. You beat her until she is too exhausted to fight. You take out the ball gag. Drool drips from her swollen and parched lips. You give her a tin dog bowl full of icy water. She crawls over and laps it up. Gratefully. Thirstily. You stroke her hair.

  You feel a strange t
enderness for this creature that you are about to break.

  Suicide Girl

  The great thumping in my belly grows. His hands are covered in thick black rubber gloves. I cannot see his face. It is covered in an expressionless black mask with eye, nose, and mouth holes. I don’t know what he feels. I do not want to be touched here, like this, but the way he touches me makes something inside me leap and thrill. I know he knows me. The way he pulls my hair. The way he puts his index finger into my mouth and commands me to suck it as he fingers me with his other hand. The way he says “good girl” when I do. The way he says it with a silky growl, I know he means it and I feel like I have won the lottery. Like I am a beggar, starving for his touch.

  He fills my mouth with his fingers, inserting one at a time, slowly. I feel my jaw widening to fit them all in. He slides them in deeper. Blood rushes to my pussy. I gag on his fingers. I am instantly wet. Involuntary gag. Involuntary wetness. Gag. Wet. Gag. Wet. Gag. Choke. Vomit. Deluge.

  He takes out his fingers and wipes them on his black rubber apron. He spreads my mouth wide, spits a gob of phlegm into it, and slaps me hard across the face. Tears burst from my eyes. I gasp.

  My pussy has become a shameful stream. My body begging to be entered the more I am degraded. I feel something changing in me. My mind is slipping into non-thought. All I see is a black deep space. All I feel is fear and arousal. There is a strange tingling in my tail bone.

  I hear a roar of laughter. He flicks something that bounces on my butt and I hear that roar coming again. He pulls on it and I hear myself squeal in protest. The roar is deafening. I run around on all fours. I try to say something but I cannot speak, even though there is no ball gag in my mouth. I look down at my hands on the dirt floor and I see hooves!