THE CORRIDORS OF ECTOPLASM

Chapter One

April O'Neil applauded unenthusiastically as Rick Moranis triumphantly landed a kickflip over the overturned shopping trolley. He had only fucking been trying it for half an hour. They were outside Livingston Shopping Centre, beside Safeways supermarket. It was a mild afternoon towards the end of autumn.
Egon Spengler was hanging out too. He had happened by 15 minutes ago and was now crouched against the glass facade of Safeways with April, watching Rick. He had an observable erection.
Rick wore grey slacks, a blue cardigan and black Vans Half Cab sneakers with an ollie hole in the right one (he rode goofy).
"Let's head down the skatepark, ya doss cunts," drawled Rick.

At the skatepark they found Peter Venkemann sauntering around. He was at that brink of inebriation where he was still coherent yet overly cocksure and given to erratic, unsociable behaviour.
"THE CORRIDORS OF ECTOPLASM!" he roared in a New York nasal whine upon seeing Rick, April and Egon.
"Shut it, ya doss fanny," retorted Rick. Egon snickered nervously.

Heat: they all yearned to return to the womb. Venkemann had found an alternative; whisky induced stupefaction. Within the next five years Egon Spengler would find an alternative; black tar heroin. Rick Moranis was given to abstract poetics and all manner of surreal rapping, April O'Neil to compulsive promiscuity.

April O'Neil was a whore. Her pimp was a cadaverous black man named Winston Zeddemore. He had pimped her for over 15 years, since she was 14. He had been sure to sample the product many times over the years to ensure it was still up to scratch. He estimated that she had another five years left on the game. Then he would turn her loose, return her to the windy streets, to a life of inevitable drug dependency and self-mutilation.

Later that afternoon Rick, April, Peter and Egon caught a bus out to Edinburgh Airport. They had spontaneously decided to go on vacation to Chicago, USA. Fuck, they didn't even know if there were any direct flights or how much it would cost. But they didn't give a fuck. They were given to spontaneity of the most inane, decadent variety.

The afternoon had turned overcast by the time the bus trundled up to the wasteland at the outskirts of the airport.
They stepped off the bus and the driver disembarked with them, seemingly to take a smoke break.
"Where do we go now?" Rick asked the driver in a feeble voice, grinning sadly. The driver grimaced as he took a powerful draw on his cig. He (the driver) pointed silently towards the outline of a distant building, a look of supreme disdain clouding his dim, cadaverous features.
They trundled en masse to the airport, the bus driver inexplicably joining them (just kidding).
They had the collective deameanour of bored teenagers. The sky was suddenly beginning to darken. Then it lightened, returning to a pale grey hue as they neared the terminal building.
Outside the airport, beside the automatic sliding door, a shrill middle aged woman was hysterically berating a stoic looking older man in a wheelchair. The doors slid open and shut open and shut due to the continued proximity of the wheelchair.

Inside the terminal building they found themselves in a nearly deserted cafe. Dull clattering sounds of dishes being cleared away. It was roughly 5pm. A special meditative ambience settled over the terminal building. It seemed all flights had arrived or departed some time ago. The airport bore the spectre of frenzied transit, now everything settled into peaceful grey skies, runway dust, distant echo of wind voices.

Kim Gordon of the rock band Sonic Youth sat in the airport cafe sipping black coffee. She wore black shades. She looked somehow different. Rick Moranis shuffled up to her and asked for her autograph in a pitiful, simpering voice. She pretended not to hear him.

Undeterred by this spectacle, Pete Venkemann approached her table and proffered a copy of SYR5 for her to sign. He held out a black marker pen. She took the pen, signed the record sleeve and then tossed it onto the floor. Pete bent down to retrieve it, his mannerisms those of a furtive dog. An aloof teenage girl standing nearby wearing shades snickered caustically. Kim remained infinitely glacial.

Egon Spengler shuffled up to Kim's table, his hands in his pockets. His overly rigid stance betrayed the true anxiety behind his nonchalant posturing.
"How do ye coax such glacial abstractions out of ye guitar?" he asked in a casual, husky voice. Kim continued to silently gaze straight ahead. Egon retained his blase demeanour as he shuffled slowly away again.

The sun was setting over the observation deck. Egon, Rick, Pete and April stood watching the planes depart and land. Kim Gordon had joined them but remained mute and indifferent. April O'Neil had unfastened the top three buttons of her blouse. Her brassiere was almost visible, a fact all three men had separately noted. Egon Spengler was harbouring a fierce, pulsating erection. Pete Venkemann farted but the sound was obscured by the roar of an airplane taking off.

Chapter Two

Raymond Stanz was absorbed in a solitary game of Subbuteo in his garage. He moved from one side of the table to the other, flicking the plastic players to and fro. It was mid-summer 1994, approximately three months before April, Pete, Rick and Egon's encounter with Kim Gordon at Edinburgh airport.
Ray looked decidedly boyish in his shorts, t-shirt and Vans sneakers. He looked like a fag is what he looked like. He had the surly temperament of an impatient, ineffectual pederast. His man tits jiggled as he danced to and fro from either side of the table.
Enter Pete Venkemann.
"Yo bitch," said Pete.
"Hey." Ray barely acknowledged Pete, still engaged as he was in the Subbuteo. By the way if you don't know what Subbuteo is, fucking Google it.
Pete wasn't really here to see Ray. They were both aware of that. Ostensibly he was, but that was mere pretext. He was here to see Ray's luscious sister Janine. Janine and Pete watched the same avant-garde sitcom everyday. It was entitled The Corridors of Ectoplasm. It was set in the autumn of 1992. It was about the distance between desire/longing and the reflection of amber streetlight in shallow puddles. It was a cult hit. Crude, boyish 25 year olds with asymmetrical haircuts and unnecessary spectacles discussed it in reverent, girlish voices.
Pete and Janine would often watch it together side by side on the couch, an achingly unbridgeable gulf between them.
Onscreen, Marco the humourless Spaniard was engaged in an impassioned rant to a dog sleeping on a leather couch. The dog was snoring. Marco had a pained, pious expression on his face.
Pete dozed off for a while. When he awoke, a shriveled spectral woman with red eyes was speaking onscreen.
"Her ectoplasm will hold a special place in our hearts."
He felt as if she were addressing him directly.