Hey, Cruel World - (Marilyn Manson)

Literal Organ Grinder and Get Your Cann

  "Mavis," I heard Marilyn say next to me and I slowly opened my eyes. The comforter covered my face up to my eyes and I stared up at the ceiling fan, now in a bright room, highest speed as ever. The curtains were pulled shut but light streamed still through the black fabric, and I could see that Twiggy and Zim were still asleep. Slowly and achingly, I rolled over and faced Marilyn, propped up on his elbow, staring at me, and around him the bed was empty where Ginger had slept. I could faintly hear noises in the kitchen and knew he was already up and unpacking further. "It's time to get up, it's 11:30."

  I sighed and shut my eyes again, hiding them under the covers and said, "Don't look at me until I've put makeup on." I heard him laugh and roll out of bed where he got dressed. My body felt so heavy and I did not want to leave the bed. I laid there and listened to the ceiling fan, sinking back into the bed again.

  "Did you say it was 11:30?!" I heard Zim exclaim next to me and I jumped, back into conscienceness. Zim didn't always speak much and I'd barely been around him at all since he rejoined the band, so I didn't know him or his voice very well. I looked up at a somewhat startled Marilyn, who stopped what he was doing and simply said, "Yeah...?"

  I turned my head to look over my shoulder and past a still deeply asleep Twiggy to see Zim jump out of bed and dress at a quicker pace than anyone I'd ever seen. Before he could hurry out the door, Marilyn said, "Zim, what's up?" and I thought the same, frowning. He turned back to us, hand on the doorknob.

  "I'm late," he said and rushed out without another word, leaving us all awestruck.

  "Get OFF!" screamed Twiggy next to me, making me jump into the air and about two feet away from him as he jumped in the opposite direction, flopping onto the floor, the two of us like the wrong sides of a magnet facing each other. I whipped around to Marilyn who had the same amount of questioning on his face as I did mine, and then back to Twiggy, who was pulling himself back onto the bed.

  "There were spiders." He said it with a simple and deadly tone, staring gravely at us as if we were in a movie, criss-crossing his legs and folding his hands neatly in his lap. I burst into laughter at this and burried my face into Ginger's pillow to muffle the sound. "Stop laughing at me!" shouted Twiggy angrily. I looked up at him, beaming.

  "You're going to laugh at my stuffed animals, I'm going to laugh at your dreams," I said, giggling. I pulled myself out of bed and grabbed my things out of the closet before making my way into the bathroom. Four guys in one apartment and surprisingly no mess had been formed yet. I got dressed, put on my makeup, and straightened my hair slowly before coming out again nearly an hour later. They'd probably make fun of me because I took so long in the mornings. But then again, they were Marilyn Manson.

  I went into the kitchen where Ginger and Twiggy were fixing breakfast, despite the fact it was already the afternoon. They were bickering, jokingly, back and forth with each other. Marilyn was sitting at the table reading some sort of book. Twiggy turned around and handed me two plates of pancakes and bacon. I took them to the table and set one in front of Marilyn and grabbed the bottle of orange juice and the syrup and butter.

  "FIRST BREAKFAST OF THE NEW HOUSE," yelled Twiggy, causing us all to flinch as always. I glared at him before smiling. He and Ginger joined us and we ate breakfast as we talked and joked, having a good time as always. "I miss Zim," Twiggy said randomly. "He's missing out on his first breakfast with the family.

  "Knowing Zim, he'd most likely hide in his room until all the bacon was gone," said Ginger and Twiggy and Marilyn laughed. I'd forgotten Zim was a vegetarian...I'd read that online before I'd come to live with Marilyn.

  Just as we'd started putting things away and I'd finished the dishes, Zim burst into the door and said, "Guys, come help me with this," and went outside again. We all looked at each other with confused faces and followed him outside and down the stairs of our apartment complex. He had the trunk of his car open and we gathered around it to see what I wasn't exactly expecting. I took a quick count and frowned up at Marilyn, who turned to Zim.

  "Why exactly do you have ten buckets of tomatoes in the trunk of your car?"

  "Becausssse," he said with exaggerated hand movements, "I met this guy that has a huge garden right outside of L.A. and had asked if I wanted any, that I could have as many as I wanted for free, so I got some."

  "SOME?!" shouted Ginger and Twiggy.

  "What are you possibly going to do with fourteen-thousand tomatoes, Zim?!" Marilyn said in an exasperated tone. Where in the world were we going to put so many tomatoes?

  "We're going to can them!" Zim exclaimed like the answer had been such an obvious one all along. With that, he took a bucket in each of his hands, looking as if they were heavier than he was, and we had no choice but to follow him and do the same, Twiggy slamming the trunk shut with the last of them angrily, like Zim had just ruined his entire day. I doubted Twiggy missed Zim a whole lot now.

  We set the buckets of tomatoes on the kitchen floor and Zim went away with setting things up, taking charge. It was funny for me to watch him, but the others seemed a bit pissed that he was going to make them can tomatoes with him.

  "Mavis, can you get that glass pot boiling?" he asked and I turned on the flame. He then gave us instructions, having set up our own little stations. We were to fill each of our pots of boiling water with tomatoes for a minute, then transfer them to a large bowl of ice water, and finally fill the sink with them. It was definitely a good thing Marilyn had bought an apartment with such a big kitchen...obviously he wanted that more than an additional bedroom...

  After a while, we finished there and were all brought to the sink full of tomotoes, too many to count. By then, everyone was having a bit of a better time but still a little annoyed their day had been replaced with canning tomatoes. Zim showed us to core them and what spots to cut and peel off and the work began, cutting up tomatoes from there on.

  When we'd get our cut up tomatoes in a bowl at last, Zim told us to squish and squeeze them hard to get the juice out and strain it into a bowl. He obviously knew what he was doing and had done it before...probably had something to do with his vegetarian style.

  "Mavis. What are you imagining." It was more of a statement than a question. I looked up at Marilyn who was staring at my without and expression. He'd obviously noticed how hard I was digging my hands into the tomato pieces, squeezing them with a lot of power. I grinned at him.

  "My mom's intestines," I said with an evil grin...though I was actually being honest with him. He rolled his eyes and laughed at the same time. As Zim walked by and heard, he laughed too and smiled at me. Meanwhile, Twiggy and Ginger were joking amongst themselves about provacative ways to look at the tomatoes. Guys...

  The day went on from there, dragging out for an eternity, but we all a great time with Zim and his weird tomato canning, and I realized this truly and completely was my family.