Live Encounters Poetry & Writing Volume Three November-December 2024
Aotearoa Poets and Writers Special Edition
Acid Freak, story by Mark Laurent.
I can’t remember how I met Brian S. Our scene was fluid and people flowed in and out of the circle all the time. Brian had curly blonde hair, looked a bit like Roger Daltry from The Who, and was an easy-going guy. We got along well and I was with him the first time he took acid. We were invited to a party at a big, rambling house in Arthur Street, a short walk from Collingwood. A row of votive candles in sand-filled paper bags led up the path from the gate, and coloured lights had been fitted to chandeliers and lampshades. There were a lot of people, and probably a lot of drugs.
“Ah this is so cool!” exclaimed Brian, standing in the hallway and turning in slow circles. I had to gently steer him to get out of the way of the people coming in and out.
“See you later man, I’m gonna mingle and soak up the vibes.” And he was off.
I didn’t really know anybody else at that party, and had no idea whose place it was, so I found a chair in the room with the stereo and listened to music.
At some point I became aware that something strange was going on. People seemed to be leaving and I could hear agitated voices – one in particular. It was Brian. I got up and followed the voices to a big dining room where three or four people huddled at one end. Brian stood alone in the middle of the room, raving quite incoherently.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“This guy’s really out of it and he’s acting aggressive.”
“Oh, well he’s a sort-of friend of mine – he came to the party with me. He took a tab of acid earlier. It’s his first time – maybe a bad trip. I’ll try to calm him down.”
But I was nervous. Now Brian was striding around the room. He’d picked up a broom from somewhere and was sweeping glasses and plates off the dining table. Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone climbing out a window as Brian was between them and the door.
“Brian. Brian, you need to calm down man! This isn’t cool.”
“Everything is cool man. If I say everything is cool then everything is cool, because it’s all under my control!”
“I think we need to go now man, the party’s over and we should go home.”
“No, no, the party’s only just begun! I have special powers. If I think it, it will be. This is a great party!”
“Everybody’s gone Brian – it’s just you and me. You know you took some acid tonight and it’s making you imagine things.”
“Oh I’m not imagining anything. It’s all real, more real than you people can possibly know.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve had a revelation tonight. You see, I am God.”
“No man, none of us is God. I know dope can make you feel that way…”
“SILENCE! I am God and you must do whatever I command you. And I command you to push down this wall!”
He pointed with the broom handle at one of the walls.
“Man I can’t do that. You know I can’t.”
“If I command you then you must do it. You cannot disobey GOD!”
I put my hands against the wall and gave a push. Of course nothing happened.
“No, see, I’m too weak. Since you are God you’ll need to show me how it’s done…”
Brian was still brandishing the broom and he suddenly made a lunge, aiming it like a spear. I leapt aside and it hit the wall, plaster splinters flying. He stood there for a long moment, contemplating the wall, and then struck it several times with the handle, shouting “FALL! FALL!”
I was terrified that he’d turn back on me, but his addled attention seemed to have shifted to the house itself. He strode to one of the sash windows and smashed the broom against if, shattering panes. He moved to the next window and did the same. His back was now completely to me so I slipped out the back door, stumbled down a short flight of steps onto the lawn and made my way shakily around the house in the dark as fast as I could, hearing Brian’s voice and crashing sounds and half-expecting him to come after me. When I got to the street I ran all the way home and locked the front door.
The next day we heard that Brian had been arrested – he’d even made it into the papers. Before leaving Arthur Street he stripped naked and then walked up to Ponsonby Road. He tried to wave down several cars but no-one was stopping for a raving, nude hippie. On his way he relieved himself in the front garden of one of the houses, which happened to be the home of an off-duty cop. Before the paddy wagon arrived Brian had reached the corner of Richmond Road where a taxi was standing at the red light. Brian leapt on the roof of the cab, thumping on it with his fist, yelling, “GESTAPO! OPEN UP!”
Apparently it took four cops to wrestle him into the paddy wagon.
***
A couple of months later Brian, who’d spent a minimal time in jail and was on parole, turned up at Collingwood Street. He had no memory at all of what had happened, or so he said, and he seemed his old self. We went for a walk together and I thought he’d come through unscathed until we came to a power box – one of those big steel cabinets that stand near some street corners, where transformers, relay switches and other electricity department stuff live.
Brian knelt down and placed his ear against the box. “Listen man, can you hear them?”
“No. What? I can hear the humming.”
“It’s the aliens man, they talk to us through these portals. Listen. I listen to them all the time. They’ve got messages for humanity.”
© Mark Laurent
Mark Laurent is a professional musician and writer. He’s recorded over 20 albums, worked as a recording producer and session musician, as well as touring NZ, Australia and the UK for several decades. Mark has published 4 collections of poetry, an illustrated children’s book, and has written numerous articles and reviews for New Zealand and international magazines. He is currently putting the finishing touches on an anthology of poetry and short prose, as well as a candid memoir of the 1970s hippie scene in Aotearoa. He lives in Auckland.