First off: I lied.
I said in an earlier post that I intended to approach this story as a challenge in experimentation with epistolary storytelling.
I started with the best of intentions, but then things took on a life of their own once I started developing and writing this story. There is significant daylight between what I said I was going to do and what it has become.
“Everything Falls Apart” is not epistolary. Not really.
It is more “salvage” fiction.
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kali · 19:57
73 — r u still interested in your little dive w/sixpenny?
Alice · 21:36
Hey kali. I was wondering if u had ghosted me. Yes. still interested.
kali · 21:42
Not my style.
Had to wait for 6p to come to the club. He went dark on mobile. Says digital messes up his zen or some shit. His zen ain’t bothered when HE wants to talk, tho. “Where are you, kali of the night?” Gets on ur nerves.
[Note: The dates of photographs and images are based on the timestamp of photos or when they were saved.]
[Image: A newspaper clipping that has creases worn soft, with tape across corners where the fold lines meet. The clipping appears yellowed, but may be a result of inadequate lighting when the photograph was taken. The article’s date is not legible in the photo.]
Neighbor charged with second-degree murder; residents say dispute over noise had simmered for weeks
By Hazel Peterson, Star Tribune
Kyle Donovan, 55, of Lowry Hill, was fatally shot during an argument between two of his neighbors on Sunday morning.
Witnesses said Donovan stepped between the two men and was urging them to calm down when the gun went off.
(more…)[Note: There are no emails from kali in Alice’s inbox or trash. These are the earliest messages I found between them. Signal doesn’t label who’s speaking; I’ve added names. ~a_boojum]
kali · 21:12
Thanks for the move to signal. More secure.
Alice · 21:15
NP! Your email explained enough. Sry you had to hold my hand.
From: MikroMachine@[withheld].com To: Alice.Donovan.73@[withheld].com Date: 30 Jul, 01:13:02 -0500 Subject: Apologies and...
Hey Alice,
Hope you don’t mind me reaching out to you via the email you use to comment with, but I wanted to apologize for Dan’s (DK) asshole behavior. He’s usually an ok kind of guy, even fun to be around at times IRL. Except when he’s drunk. Well, a couple of nights ago he had been drinking again. He’s an old friend of my buddy I’ve known since high school, Ekul. I knew DK too, but didn’t. If that makes any sense. We were never close friends or anything. We just end up hanging out because of Ekul.
(more…)[Note: I’ll let the record speak for itself, adding only descriptions of what I found or context that seems relevant. Longer notes beyond descriptions are signed “a_boojum”. If you see that handle elsewhere online, it isn’t me; I use it only for Alice’s story.
This is the first real trace of Alice I could find, and the thread that led me to the code that unlocked her phone. ~a_boojum]
by MikroMachine
Category: Ancient History
Tags: EFA, 80s ‘zines, minneapolis, the scene, music, aurora records
[Image: the front cover of a 1984 Minneapolis punk fanzine titled “E F A” in heavy distressed cutout block lettering across the top, subtitled “everything falls apart” in smaller typewriter font.
The ‘zine image is in high-contrast black-and-white Xerox. Grainy black-and-white live photo of a sweaty hardcore punk vocalist shouting into a corded microphone in a packed, dark basement club.
Crooked paste-up typewriter clippings mounted on torn slips: “Review: Are you ready for a Hootenanny?”, “RIFLE SPORT: fully loaded”, “What took the punk out of the ‘burbs?”, and “Subterranean scene. Page 14”. Bottom margin typewriter text: “$1.00 — or free at Aurora Records”.]
Wow! This brings back memories. I found a stack of these sitting in the bottom of a box in ma’s attic — not because she was an avid collector, but because we all forgot about that box of my shit I left behind when I went off to college.
We had grand aspirations at the time when we slapped this together. The model was the “Your Flesh” ‘zine, but we probably expected too much for people to pay us a full dollar at the time (as you can tell from our free distribution at the local record store).
Needless to say, in spite of Ekul’s many attempts to drum up advertising dollars, we just couldn’t get the breakthrough in revenue to keep it up. I think we got out a solid six bimonthly issue (a full year!) before we folded. Pretty good for a couple of sixteen-year-old shits back in ’84.
We gave out a shit-ton of this issue at one of the after-hours basement parties at the Aurora, which is why we had so many copies left.
Didn’t help, LOL.
Let me know if you want a pristine archive copy for your own collection. Give me your details with $4 postage and handling on Venmo, and I’ll send you a copy while supplies last.
I expect remaining supplies will last for about five years, so don’t rush me all at once.
[Image of a Venmo QR Code]
COMMENTS:
Alice.Donovan.73 replied:
For real? I totally forgot about EFA. my brother used to let me read them when mom and dad werent home. (to be fair, dad was never home) mom said that stuff would rot my brain.
page 14 brings back memories. Kyle used to tell me about the after-hours parties that leaked down in the tunnels beneath the old aurora. i mean, he did until he stopped going.
Those parties ended right before they tore that place down in 90. By then, my brother had quit and they wouldn’t let me in because I was still underage.
Wish i had been able to see them. The stories he told were pretty wild about waht they found down there.DK replied:
building still stands. They moved one of the theaters on the way to 1st (forget which) in 91 and demo’d Block E, but that one stayed. people get that shit wrong all the time.
MikroMachine replied:
Play nice, Kennedy. Alice is good people. Unlike your sorry ass.
DK replied:
😝 I’ll behave. Promise. Maybe.
DK replied:
It weren’t in 90 either. I went to the “demolition party” to give city council a piece of my mind via a middle finger. Worst. Decision. Ever.
It was october 18 1988. My arrest record can tell no lies.
Alice.Donovan.73 replied:
That’s right! My bestie played with her school jazz band her freshman year at the demo. That would have been 88 alright.
I wonder if you can still get into the tunnels from Aurora. I’d pay someone , they could get me a peek at Kyle’s old stomping grounds. Kinda need it, if it can happen.
DK replied:
sealed the motherfuckers up when they renovated Eblock.
Alice.Donovan.73 replied:
Damn…
kali.nótt replied:
There’s still egress.
DK replied:
@kali, U sure bout that? I heard they welded it up tighter than a coffin.
kali.nótt replied:
🤨 Really DK? You have to ask?
DK replied:
@Alice, knew a Donovan back the day. Went by Grendel. He your brother?
Alice.Donovan.73 replied:
🙂 Yeah. Did you hang with him?
DK replied:
I knew him, ran a different crowd.
He was a dick and poseur. Sorry, if that’s news to you.
re: those tunnels: leave it alone. you dont want to know.
MikroMachine replied:
@DK 🤦♂️
[This post and its comments were deleted after I captured them. MikroMachine answered one email with a version of DK’s “leave it,” and hasn’t replied since. ~a_boojum]
Saturday morning — well, closer to afternoon than morning by the time I dragged myself out of bed. There was that phone with the clock moving slowly across the screen like a new toy for the bored house cat that I was.
I tapped the screen to life and gave a good long look at Miss Alice before the screen faded to black. I tapped the cracked surface again, glad that the spiderwebs were localized on Mister Handsome, with only a stray fissure touching Alice’s shoulder.
Something about her eyes as they looked into the camera made me want to know more about someone who would abandon both car and phone. She didn’t have the look of someone who would just go with that kind of flow.
Alice Donovan.
(more…)I waited until I got settled in my apartment to give the phone a closer look.
When I tried to turn the phone on, I got a whole lot of nothing aside from a flashing battery icon telling me the thing was out of juice in a critical way. No surprise there.
When it finally charged enough to turn on, the corner of the screen read “Emergency calls only.” A large clock sat over a picture of a woman, the grey just beginning to show through dark, shoulder-length hair loosely tied in a small ponytail. Younger-looking than she probably was. Beautiful in a natural way, not made up or phony.
(more…)This is not my story.
I am only the momentary caretaker of the story. It is one of those stories that drops in someone’s lap without warning. Except, in my case, it made its appearance by being underfoot.
A recent transplant to the Twin Cities, I had been warned by a friend that January and February were bitterly cold, and buses were less dependable on those frigid days. His advice: just buy a decent car and an engine block heater and plug the car in at night so it would start the next day. That way, he said, I wouldn’t find myself standing in twenty-below wind chills waiting for a bus that may or may not come.
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