Fuck.
I force myself to fall back asleep, but my body won't comply, fitfully tossing, searching for a way to rest comfortably. I stretch out, the bed is finally my own, the woman and dog long gone, yet I still can't get back to the dream.
I don't remember what it was, but it was definitely better than this, somewhere better than here, even if it was an illusion concocted by my subconscious. Probably some everyday circumstance, too lowkey to recall, to differentiate from the mundane, but with just enough fantasy to make it significantly more tolerable than reality.
Fuck it.
I tossed aside the covers and swung my legs off the side of the bed. I rubbed the back of my head, running my fingers through my hair smoothing out my pillow mowhawk bedhead. I kept my eyes closed, basking in the final moments of unconsciousness, before slowly raising them up. I came face to face with the lying alarm clock.
It read 1:37 PM, but I knew that I set it forty something minutes ahead so I'd wake up for work during the week. So, just about 1 PM on a Saturday, kind of a record for me. Ugh. I guess I can get a headstart on the day and maybe try and get something done. I need to get started on this screenplay. Today's the day.
I shuffle off to the bathroom, and I don't want to brush my teeth, but I must. My mouth is like dusty sludge. I brush aggressively and feel a tinge of pain on my back teeth on the right side. I shove my forefinger back there and push around a bit. Feels sort of loose. I can't afford the dentist, even with my benefits from work. Useless health insurance.
Yanking open the fridge, I grab the OJ to find it just about done. I down what's left, barely a swig, and put the empty container back in. Let her deal with it. The dirty dishes are still there glaring at me, and for a moment I think about doing them. But I have a whole day of nothing ahead of me, so later it is.
I drop into my papasan in the living room. I look around for the remotes, and can't seem to find them. Why can't these goddamn things stay in the same place? I heft my body up and flip over the pillows on the couch, check on either side of it, before finally finding them over by the table next to the television. Why put the remotes right next to the damn thing? They're remotes for a reason.
Remotes in hand, one for the tv, one for the surround sound, one for the new DVD player I got, I redrop into my seat. Balls. I forgot to put the DVD in. Dammit. I go to my pile of Hong Kong discs I ordered online, select the appropriate one, a low budget sci-fi, kung fu fantasy epic, and pop open the tray. Carefully, I slip it into place, and push it closed. I know you're supposed to press the button to close it, but I never do.
Again I fall back into my chair, only to realize I forgot the most important aspect of this, my holiest of rituals. Another heave gets me back up, I go to the drawer of my computer desk, grab my bowl and the bag of weed. I pull out a hunk and stuff it in. Grab the lighter and take a huge hit of marijuana.
Plop into my coccoon of safety, the giant catcher's mitt chair of mine, positioned directly before the 32 inch screen, the speaker volume set at optimal awesomeness, I pressed play and the movie began. Anti-piracy laws in Chinese flicker on the screen before I get to a section with three options. From experience I know these to be PLAY MOVIE, AUDIO SETUP, and either BONUS FEATURES or some sort of randomness.
I started the movie and my mind began to drift immediately. I thought of several great ideas for stories, movies I should write, and the credits had just begun to roll. I kept myself thinking of guns, and fists, mid-air flips as weapons are fired and cars smash into buildings. Hone in on the action.
But it drifted back to her. She who lay in my bed, held me tight on the deck, smiled at me at a show last night. All three female auras aligned and suddenly every girl was one girl.
Beside me, asleep, she dreamed of dogs wagging tails and silly whale songs, simplicity at is finest. Hoping ghosts lingered about her, scared at the unseen horror, sexually charged by the vulnerability, her mind filled with imagined cardboard and crayon creations. A ducky, dancing in his pants, with a hat on.
Idiot. Goddamned simpleton. She was the dumbest creature he could imagine. Completely incapable of higher thought. No plumbing the depths here, good sir, there is only vacant acres of puddles. A rippling mirage of yourself, that's all you'll find here.
In slow motion, Chow Yun Fat leaps over a skidding motorcycle, cocks his shotgun as he flies through the air, then fires blowing away a nameless thug dressed in black leather. The gas tank explodes, a grenade is thrown, a car explodes, close up gunshot, a man's chest explodes.
What was I saying?
Oh right, her. She never saw a kung fu flick before. She watched black and white movies, classic Hollywood stuff, romances and gangster films, fedoras and runningboards, dames in pencil skirts. First movie we saw together, her pick, Citizen Kane. Pinnacle of Western Civilization Cinema, or perhaps the world.
Second date was my choice. We plopped down on that couch in my apartment over in Park Slope, bottle of wine and blanket, and I flipped on Fight Club. It's as good a place as any to start a girl on the enjoyment of men hitting men. Fine acting, hard abs, and it also warns them of my schizophrenic, Christ Complex obsession.
Three years later, we just got to watching 36th Chamber of Shaolin; total masculine enlightenment. She played me Breakfast at Tiffany's, admitting it was her guiltiest pleasure, saving it for when she could trust me not to betray her artsnob candy coating. I agreed, and I asked her to marry me; she said yes.
Whoa. Wait, shit, am I still sleeping? I may've dozed off as when I look up I see credits rolling. I missed the shootout at the hospital, when Chow Yun Fat leaps out the window with the baby in his arms as the entire wing explodes. I guess I've seen this movie enough times. I eject it, my legs feeling a bit wobbly, I stumble a wee bit.
I pop in the next movie without really looking and ease myself into the chair again. The old familiar green cushion holding me, comforting me, telling me its going to be alright. But it won't be. Not anytime soon. Things have been bad for ages, comfortable pains that it was easy to live with.
I'm only 25, I shouldn't hurt this bad after a show. Granted, I don't drink much anymore, but I think it was the dancing that did me in. Whipping my body about with reckless abandon, swinging my arms about, trying to keep to the rhythm; I open my eyes for a moment and she hits me.
Someone fell back against me with a bloody nose, the moshers all threw their arms wide, holding back the crowd, opening up the pit. A pint-sized, ponytailed terrorist, a wifebeater bearing boxer of a girl, thin jeans and with checkered vans on her tiny feet. Eyes closed, fists clenched, she thrashed about with pure abandonment.
I loved her instantly. I don't know what it was. Her joy? Utter lack of concern for others? A composite of all the female traits I loved, black hair, tattoos, and piercings. A baby face that's seen more than I will ever know. Her eyes popped open as I stood before her, dazed as I marveled at all that she was, all I imagined her to be.
She cocked back her arm and the smallest fist, on thin arms that smelled of cocoa butter, cracked across my jaw. My head shot to the side, rolling with the blow, which didn't seem to hurt as much as shock me. When I looked back, I returned to those eyes, that gaze that changed my life.
Fuck man, don't think about that shit. It'll just depress you. Regrets are regretful, it is true, but that's where it ends. You're living with too many alternate realities in your head. Every what if and what could be, you have to let them go. You're only capable of what you're capable of. And for some reason, this is it.
Through tears, I lifted my eyes towards the screen. I watched as a man took a drill and pressed it into his temple. Years of staring into the sun, following the spiral of fractals, the processing of formulas and calculations had driven him mad. The unknown factor drives men to madness.
Forget her.
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