It’s (52) fifty-two minutes past (2) two and I can hear a chainsaw outside. It is the middle of the night and I can hear a man sawing down a tree. If I had a BB gun I would shoot him in the ankle to make him shut up. Why the fuck would somebody be sawing down a tree at this time of night? I remembered, yes, that there was a big storm during the day. The man was sawing down the tree because somebody had told him to do it. Everybody is doing something more meaningful than I. Insomnia is my curse. With nothing but communism and crippling agony to look forward to I cannot sleep so I spend all of my day in near-constant, building, pain tired and grumpy and my night’s longing for solace, or peace. I rolled my body on to my good ear so that all I could hear was the ringing in the deaf one.

It was windy when I woke, it’s dangerous pushing the wheelchair under such conditions but I got a car-service and the wind only caught me in the Junction. The doctor’s surgery was packed full of people but looking there appeared to be nothing wrong with them. They all looked relaxed, they looked happy and comfortable, like they were waiting for a bus. Some people were taking to each other when I needed medical assistance. There were two beautiful women who both looked at me smiled and played with their hair when I wheeled in. I have become so isolated and alienated in becoming so disabled. I joined a brain-injury support group but haven’t found any solace in knowing that there are people worse than me. Slick-cats are always telling me to not give up. I get sick of platitudes when I know they do not have the power to change my situation, there is a reason for my pain and isolation. I asked the receptionist how long the wait would be, she said about an hour and three quarters so I told her I would eat then come back.

I went to the Japanese restaurant down the road; they used to shout, Irasshaimase, but they know me now so just grunt and nod. I had Eel on rice and caught up on my fried food for the week. One of the chefs always smiles at me like he knows me, he wears a cross earring on one ear like George Michael did in the Faith video and he kept looking at me and smiling throughout my meal. I spent about forty minutes (38 Dollars. 50 cents) there and then left. I have stopped taking my cigarettes out on the streets but I wished I had brought one. It would have been nice to sit and enjoy being outside. People watching used to be a pastime with an ex. Now wherever I go people watch me. I was taught to look but don’t stare, most Australians haven’t been raised with the same manners. I am in pain almost twenty-four hours a day and the more time I spend in the wheelchair the more the pain increases. The push back uphill to the doctor’s was an effort but eventually I got there. I stared at the telly in the reception area but could not hear what was being said. The same patients were still there and the two beautiful women still sat there smiling at me as I sat in agony.

There was a small old lady sitting next to me, she was wearing prim and proper attire and it would have taken her at least twenty minutes to achieve her elaborate coiffure. She had giant breasts but perfect posture. She sat perfectly upright, like she was once a ballerina. There didn’t appear to be anything wrong with her apart from the fact that she wouldn’t stop staring at me. She stared at me wearing a look of disdain. If you do not think it would be uncomfortable I could loan you my wheelchair for the day and then you would know how rude it feels to have people staring at you. I eventually turned to look at her and she looked away. I pushed my wheelchair forward slightly to let her know that it was actually me that controlled the room. She didn’t look at me but shuffled in the reception chair, I saw four flies buzz around her. I stared at her for longer than is considered polite. I stared at her to let her know that she did not have the right to put me down by her facial contortion, it’s actually me that controls this room, you do not have the right to stare at me with that look on your face. She shuffled again and farted. I could smell her as six flies appeared. The fart smelled worse than death. She kept shuffling in the seat and every time she did there were more flies. The flies were coming form her. She knew that I finally knew so she sheepishly turned back and smiled. Her teeth were very straight and white. Wueough wueough wueough, she said. I nodded at her then looked the other way, there was somebody here that needed a doctor more than me. She said, fah fah ah ah, loudly forcing me to turn back. One hand was beckoning me while the other clutched her handbag to her chest. The wheels on the chair felt hard to push because I have been feeling so weak but I got nearer to her. As I got closer a swarm of flies darted out towards me making me duck. They strung up Lennon Kennedy Lincoln Malcolm X and MLK just like they did Christ and now they are doing the same to me, she said. How, I asked? I have become a martyr by becoming so old. My Grandfather built this country and now look at it, she said, it’s full of Muslims and Asians. They don’t belong here, she stammered. Where is your family originally from, I asked? Scandinavia, she replied. I didn’t say anything to her but unless you are Aboriginal or a Torres Straight Islander you really don’t belong here either.

The doctors in this country are overworked just like the nurses. Both are noble professions and a little arrogance is to be expected but they are too busy to give it all to every patient. I have noticed my posture gets worse the longer I have to sit in my wheelchair. All of the patients sat there smiling at me as I sat in agony. The sick looked happy and the old ones looked lonely. I pushed the chair next to the toilet, just in case. By the time it was my turn my posture was set at 45 forty-five degrees and the old lady had a swarm of flies around her. It was a doctor I hadn’t seen before and he seemed nervous as I told him why I was there. I told him I didn’t want the same pills as before as they didn’t work. His brain was working quicker than his eyes as he searched the computer screen. He said, I have to book you in for a specialist but there is a six-month wait. I just spent over two hours waiting in your reception in my wheelchair and now you want me to wait six months for an answer, I asked? He said, yes. I said, okay, and left with a piece of paper in my lap.

I pushed my chair out of the surgery and a gust of wind took the referral off my lap down the street. The wind was too strong and I was feeling too weak to have ever found it again. I turned and looked back inside the doctor’s surgery and saw the two women were both still sitting there and were both still smiling at me. Four more people walked past me inside the surgery. The cue had only dissipated by one, and that one was me. Icare haven’t helped me to find a doctor who will do house visits because of the cost. I needed the referral so badly but was not sure if I could be bothered waiting again. I pushed my chair up to the reception area and it was a new receptionist. I told her what had just happened and she said that there would be a two-hour wait.

My friend came over last night and he told me that I smelt like shit just before we went out. It’s only sitting here writing about it, late at night, that I remember I was on the toilet for nearly two hours in the morning. I had been constipated for nearly a fortnight and yesterday morning it all came flooding out my bum. Bum titty bum titty bum bum bum. Of course he smelt it, I had two weeks worth of fecal matter come out of me in a day. I am not writing this to make anybody feel ill or nauseous, this is just the way I have to do things so I can feel normal. If I didn’t write I would have lost it a long time ago. Think of my stories as the equivalent of driving past a car-crash really slowly and seeing all the damage. There have been many things I have had to get used to but one of the hardest has been the loss of my bladder and bowel control. I have to take a laxative at night and then insert three enema’s in the morning to go boom-boom and now my urine comes out of a catheter tube inserted into my lower abdomen. My sense of smell has been affected by the brain injury so I could not actually tell if I had. My mate kept asking if I had shit myself. I keep tissues inside the bag under my wheelchair and after spraying my bum with deodorant three times, still to be asked if I had, I finally reached down and pulled one out of the box. I elevated out of the wheelchair with one hand and the other went down there and wiped my bum with the tissue. I pulled it back out of my pants and it was still white. I held it up and showed it to my mate and he looked surprised. I was just doing a long continual fart, and it was a bad fart too. An able-bodied person would be proud of the stench. My friend looked satisfied, by the still white tissue, that I hadn’t shit myself. We headed to the pub.

The pub was packed and very noisy so I went to the street to have a cigarette. My mate followed to bum one and asked about her. I told him that she played me out to her advantage and I didn’t see it happening. A beautiful woman wears the best camouflage. I have always been sensitive but as a younger man I threw playing sports, then drinking alcohol, ingesting ecstasy snorting cocaine and non-stop fucking at it. At middle age I am a man with multiple acquired disabilities and am now overly sensitive. I cannot do many of the things I used to be good at and can’t see why a woman wouldn’t choose an able-bodied man over me. Flaws are the reason I hate myself. I have never been compensated to move on with my life and have been fighting, upstream, a never-ending battle for my insurance claim. I am alone but for the ringing (tinnitus in my head) and injustice. A lot of people do not give me enough credit, I have had a brain injury but I am not as stupid as most people (they) think. She said out loud, I know how I can use you, and then did. I thought that it was a Freudian slip, it wasn’t. I saw the moment joy overcame her as the thought hit her and was watching as her mouth made the words, I know how I can use you. Being used for anything other than sex feels terrible. I cringed and raised my shoulders before taking a sip. I feel like I am too sensitive. She told me her plan but did not give me the details. A horny male is the perfect victim. It was a flawless crime. I am as stupid as I look, just because I am a man. My friend laughed raised his glass as a punctuation mark and said, cheers! We both drained our bottles then headed to the bar again

One of my mates has told me they cannot tell the difference between fact fiction and fantasy when they reads my stories, trust me my friend this is all real. I sat in the wind and thought about my options. I wish I had brought a fucking cigarette. The old lady was watching me from the window. She suddenly stood up and walked outside and then beckoned me after her. It seemed inevitable so I followed her up the road. I could feel somebody watching me when suddenly a lady stepped in front of me and asked what had happened to me? She was cute so I told her then she asked if she could heal me. I looked at her and knew that she would feel better if she thought she had special powers. I asked what church she went to and she told me some whack-a-doodle offshoot of Christianity. She would have been in her early twenties and was wearing a tight white body suit and had a good bum so I let her. Her face was full of curiosity when she asked exactly what happened to me? She told me to close my eyes then placed her hand on my head and asked God to give me back what has been stolen from my brain and then placed her hands on my ears then all over the other broken bits of me asking God to give me back all of my function. I opened my eyes as I felt her leaning into me and saw her cleavage almost touching my face. The wind had made her nipples erect. Now this is entirely my own fault but I find these people to be condescending. We were in a public place and yet I didn’t see her ask anybody else if she could heal them. As a disabled person all I want is the same thing as you, to be left alone. As I said her bum was more than good and I think staring at it was the best thing she did for me.

I looked about and the woman with the flies was still standing there waiting for me. When I caught up to her she pointed and asked what she wanted? I told her she was the Patron saint of Patronising, she thought she could heal me. She asked me if that happened often? More than you would believe I replied. She gave me the warmest smile and she smelled beautiful all of a sudden. She smelled like daisies so when she made me follow her to her house around the corner I did. The flies had all disappeared as soon as she left the surgery. I felt like asking about them but didn’t. I went inside her house and the entire home smelled of leek soup. The wueough wueough wueough disappeared into the house. Take your clothes off, I ordered. Ok, she chirped. I found her bedroom. I left my clothes on and sat on the edge of the bed. She walked in naked and she looked good. Her breasts were huge and the best I’d ever seen but I ignored them because I knew that she knew it. She pushed them out a bit further and I smiled. She knew that was why I followed her but I was going to make her work for it. I beckoned her towards me and she followed. I rubbed my left hand lightly up and down the left hand side of her torso ignoring them. They were perfectly shaped and the white skin looked soft, so soft. My hands rubbed all over her but I purposefully ignored her breasts. She shifted her weight but as soon as her breast touched my hands I moved them away. I ran my hand down between her legs firmly and moved my mouth down five ml over the nipple and breathed on it. She tried to jam my face into her breasts with her hand but I was too strong and pulled away. I picked her up and placed her body a bit back. She moaned. I asked her to stand still and I moved up behind her. I ran my index finger lightly down her nape and got stronger as I went down her back. She shivered and it made me feel good. Making a woman feel like that is what I was put on this earth to do. I reached down and cupped her left bum and squeezed then pinched it. She drooped slightly and I knew I had her.

I told her to sit on my face and she did. She rubbed her wet pussy all over me but she hadn’t wiped her bum properly and I could smell shit. I laughed out loud. What, she asked? I wondered how a woman that hot could have got this far in life without learning how to wiping her bum properly? Nothing baby, I said, I just can’t believe how lucky I am to be here with you. She was old and lonely just like me and my words had melted her heart. She looked bashful, as though she had forgotten how beautiful she was. I nodded slowly. She looked grateful as she sighed and her left hand went to her heart. I couldn’t help but smile back. She remained on my face and had multiple orgasms. Jerry Seinfeld once said that men cannot tell if a woman’s orgasm is legit or not, I can tell. She had multiple orgasms on my face. If a woman is shuddering like she is being electrocuted and can’t stop you can pat yourself on the back, well done. Also you can taste a woman’s orgasm, a subtle difference occurs that can be tasted. There are some things that can’t be faked. I could taste it over the tartness of her bum. I smiled because I could taste it. I licked my lips and they tasted sour.

She lay draped over me with her head on my chest after she stopped coming and I could tell that she already loved me. She kept asking me questions about my condition and I kept telling the truth. I told her why I haven’t let a woman into my life. I could feel her opening her heart to me while I thought of all the ways it couldn’t work. I am a helpless romantic but I am also a realist. My right hand massaged her head lightly and she was still, so still. If you know how to touch a woman she can be yours. She looked up and asked me if I ever dated a woman in a wheelchair before I became disabled? No way, I said. Would you have, she asked? Probably not, I replied, she would have to be bloody sexy. She was quick and said, so do you think it’s fair that you expect an able-bodied woman to show you any more respect than you previously showed the disabled community? Of course I do, I do not see myself as being disabled. What are you crazy, she stammered. I decided it best not to answer her so I smirked as she waited for a response. I rubbed her back softly but decisively, I have never met a disabled woman pretty enough since the Indian woman from the Prisoner Of War, it’s not that I haven’t met one but none have been hot since the Maal in the ward. She had perfect facial symmetry and bone structure but I met her at the wrong time. I met her at a time when I was learning to think again, that was when I hated myself. She was traditional and mistook my brain-injured befuddlement for being arrogant or aloof. It wasn’t that baby, my baby please know that I didn’t know what was happening from moment to moment and couldn’t imagine another woman wanting me again. I am slowly getting better and can now see this as my truth, I couldn’t think of anything smart to say so I didn’t respond at all. She looked up at me and I smiled in silence until she realised I am cooler than I appear. She relaxed completely on my body and she smiled at me as though she had melted. Her head felt heavier as I understood that she had mistaken my inability to respond as a sign of strength. She asked me if it hurt when I landed on my head? Even though I do not remember I said yes. She smiled and cuddled harder into my chest. She seemed happy at my lie.

A lie makes it a joke. I am lying even when I am telling the truth. The joke is on me. Have you heard the one about the woman that didn’t wipe her arse properly…

Andrew Stuart Buchanan