Rated M for adult situations mxm, drug abuse, violence and language.

Disclaimer: All these characters are mine. If the unlikely situation does occur that you want to incorporate them into your own writing, please ask.

Summary: In a world of consumerism and mindless drones, Oliver is a prime example. His day-to-day life is scheduled with eerie precision and nothing special, or even remotely interesting, ever happens. That is, until the day that he meets Jonathan. From that point forward, Oliver is thrown into a chaotic search for an ‘inner utopia.’ But this utopia is not the perfect place they imagined it to be, will they be able to escape with their sanity intact?

Author’s Note: Well, another story. I know I should be working on Well Smack My Ass and Call Me Sally and Sex and Sports Cars, but I umm, well, you know how it goes, inspiration struck and all. And I am rather attached to Oliver and particularly Jonathan. But yes, this is a prologue. Whoo hoo! Exciting ain’t it? Yeah, I’m signing off because I really don’t have much to say at the moment. Cheers. Reviews are greatly appreciated. And WSMAACMS is still a priority, considering it’s getting along rather well too. Oh yeah, one last thing, this is written in a completely different style than both my other works-in-progress. Mucho love. Silania.

IGNIS FATUUS

PROLOGUE

Their first meeting contrasted Oliver perfectly: it was something special, something intensely and disturbingly different; it disrupted his schedule and clashed horribly with his mousy appearance. What he wished he had known at the time was how fast his life would spiral into chaos if he continued his strange friendship with Jonathan. Looking at the two of them, seated at opposite sides of a small, round table in a warmly lit coffee shop, most people would have said that they were polar opposites.

The differences between them went beyond the visual, though those were rather drastic as well. Oliver was like a puzzle of pieces that fit together perfectly: not a strand of hair out of place, not a single wrinkle on his suit or shirt, Jonathan appeared to have dressed in the dark, after a tornado had swept through his house: curls flying all over the place, a multitude of bracelets and other various accessories… But while the latter radiated with self-confidence and a flyaway nonchalant air that drew people in like moths to the flame, Oliver looked as though one harsh word could shatter him like Humpty Dumpty.

“So, you’re Ollie.” Jonathan spoke and sipped from a flask as if it were not illegal, and if it were, well, he certainly did not give a damn.

“Oliver...”

“What did you want, Ollie?”

“Oliver… Well, your c-“

“Another faithful reader, I presume,” Jonathan interrupted mercilessly, lips dampening the tip of a hand rolled cigarette, “I don’t want to hear it,” he uttered between clouds of smoke blown into the unsuspecting Oliver’s face, “You are not the first and certainly not the last to throw mindless compliments my way, and I’m bloody well tired of all of you droning little bees. Particularly,” he paused to take another sip from a flask that smelled disgustingly of rubbing alcohol, “Your type. The little sheep.”

Oliver could only look stunned at the malice in Jonathan’s tone; but simultaneously, he knew that nothing more could have been expected.

“Cat got your tongue, Ollie?”

“Mr. M-“ In a sudden bout of nerves, his stutter escaped, and the nervous twitch which caused his fingers to tap out a staccato rhythm on the scarred surface of the wooden table.

“Don’t apologize, Ollie. You can’t help it after all,” Jonathan ground out in his heavy British accent, the half-smoked cigarette tossed into his companion’s rapidly cooling coffee. “Call me when you’re ready,” he continued as he placed a business card on the table. “And for god’s sake, call me Jon.”

Wide-eyed, Oliver could only look from the soaked cigarette in his coffee, to the business card, to the columnist’s receding back. And while a rapid blush the color of embarrassment streamed across his cheeks, the newly dubbed ‘Ollie’ couldn’t help but think one though: My, that was certainly different.

Perhaps in his world, one painted entirely in the grays and whites of monotony, difference was a good thing; but as he walked into his apartment, a full forty-three minutes later than the usual, the usual being an utterly precise five thirty-three, Oliver could not help but shudder at the rudeness that had unceremoniously accosted him that day. Working nine to five as an accountant, truly, nothing could be quite as boring as that, but simultaneously nothing could be quite so comfortable. And by nature, he couldn’t stop himself from fearing the disruption that had, twenty-nine minutes ago, put a dent in the shiny surface of his perfectly, pleasingly dull life.

Now, one must understand that Oliver was one of those people that disliked changed while secretly craving it. It was, simultaneously, his darkest fear and his unquenchable thirst; half phobia, half desire and to be quite honest, within the confines of his minimalist apartment, it drove him absolutely mad. So perhaps our previous judgments of Oliver were not exactly fair, beneath that exceedingly boring and disgustingly suburban exterior is a mind crawling, squirming, flooding with new ideas. Perhaps all he needs is someone to coax him open and banish his fear; but, then again, with an exterior like that, who knows, perhaps he is just another, boring accountant with an early mid-life crisis on his mind.

You see, Oliver does not drive a sports car, nor will he ever even think of owning one. Instead, every morning at exactly eight seventeen he catches the city bus and takes exactly twenty-one minutes to get to work. Oliver wears a suit everyday of the week, expect for weekends - then he dresses in sweat suits and goes jogging in the milky fog of the early morning. Those are his favorite moments; the clouds that swoop in from the bay like hungry eagles hunting a rodent in the grass swallow him up. With the light mist clinging to his face and the damp wind raking gentle fingers through his hair, Oliver feels safe and concealed; in fact, he’s quite convinced this is how he felt in his mother’s womb, he’s just as convinced that he remembers what it was like in there.

Those are times he does not want to forget; good times, comfortable times, moments that echo with a distant, nostalgic pang of happiness or something like it. But that’s always the problem with growing older; you begin to forget things, precious or not they fade away with time and that is Oliver’s greatest fear. He may be only twenty-eight, but the memories have begun to slip away and that is why, perhaps, he is searching so desperately for something new. That may be the reason behind reading columns like Jonathan’s: utopian manifestos, harbingers of apocalypse, long-winded existential threads and hippy-bourgeois rants.

Oliver does not trust Jesus and he most certainly does not believe in God; like many children of his generation, he is a strict atheist subconsciously considering Buddhism. He writes ‘democrat’ on his voting registrations only because it is something that society expects him to do. But in truth, Oliver knows nothing of politics and he hates debating. While there is much that can be said about him, while there could be further elaboration, none of it is as interesting as what looms in his future, it is not this Oliver that we are interested in, but rather, the one that at this exact moment in time, precisely 6:47 PM, September 3, 2006, has begun to evolve. Note this time, remember it, from this point forward, Oliver will, even if he is not aware of this himself, will only be Ollie.

So there it is. Prologue is up. Review, s’il vous plait?