I woke up early feeling as if rancid maple syrup was covering my whole body. Stickiness filled my pores. The smelled of sun rotted onions creamed over me and the companion headache made my eyes tear up. But something new happened. My nose was sore and a reservoir of blood dried on my pillow. An odd revulsion compelled me to exile the offending pillow from my sight with a toss across the room and I pushed my sheets away. Rolling up to a sitting position, my skull chimed; a bell rung. The day was tolling.
My feet hit the worn carpet and I stabilized myself and the fluid in my eyeballs sloshed around. Dizzy, I put my hands on my knees just above the cuffs of my heart boxers.
Blood flowed.
My nose bleeds fixed themselves in the past so I scooped a sock up off the floor with my toes and tilted head up. I applied even pressure. The blood stopped. I dropped the stained sock in the laundry pile.
I found a warm soda on the desk behind the computer and ate some two-day-old pizza concealed in the small box beside the stack of books under the window. The dizziness went away but the headache was a stowaway that told the crew the ship was in trouble.
The room was cool as dawn. I left the lights off and the blinds down so the light freckled through. There in the cubbyhole Less Than Zero, still unread, sat. My eyes fixated on the cover but the edges of my eyes grabbed don to a strange message. On the note board hanging from my door the word Kill scrolled across the face.
In a mound, I sat down as the headache pinged and pounded inside my skull. Something had to be done, so I crawled across the dirty floor to my open closet and dug out a first aid kit behind a few unpacked boxes. Eureka, a full bottle of ibuprofen, just what was needed to stop the tire screeches in my frontal lobe. The pills dove into my hand. I choked them down. I crawled back, rose up like a leper begging for alms and swigged the soda.
I managed to climb back into bed. Weighted lashes held my eyes closed. My body pulsed into sleep. My leg kicked. I was paralyzed. Sleep couldn’t be denied.
In a purple room, a transparent cube outlined by a metallic rim hovered in a small smoky cyclone. The whirlwind spit out eggs at the wall. They splattered and slide down while transforming into bronze crabs that scurried to my feet. Then dog barked from inside the cube. The cyclone burst into flames and the cube exploded.
I woke up drenched in sweat, beer sweat. The siren’s song held me all day long. Needed to clean up.
Treading down my hall, towel around my waist, with a shampoo bottle in hand, I made it to the monstrous row of showers behind the wall where the toilet stalls sat in echoing with gas. A plastic chair under the towel rack gave me an idea. I would have a sit down shower.
I chose the shower stall with the gentlest spray so I could sit until my skin pruned because two of the showers could blind you if you were not careful. I sat with my head down and let the water run down my face and into the drain. Bogged down, I watched the drain empty the soapy suds for minutes on end as the water rotated clockwise until I got dizzy.
Tight and barely able to move, I shuffled to the towel rack consumed with the desire to blaze up a smoke. I pat dry and drudged back to my room leaving slick footprints behind. A horrible discovery was made, no smokes.
I went to George’s room though the chances of getting a cigarette at Tim’s room were better but it was session time and I didn’t want to smoke pot. George never hit the herb during the day. White knuckles tapped on the cracked door and then I pushed. George was sitting back holding his acoustic guitar and the watching television he suspended form the ceiling.
“What is up George? Would you happen to have a cigarette? I will get you back later.”
“Yeah, sure,” he said, pulled a pack from his green and blue flannel button down shirt pocket and flicked it.
With shaky cupped hands, I caught it and slid lighter out of my pocket. The smoke tasted minty and stale. An old menthol clung between my lips but you never pass up a free smoke when a nic-fit comes calling.
Motioning to sit on his couch, he nodded okay and I let gravity pull me in. My leg slipped between the cushions. Truck racing was on TV but he was rather involved with his guitar and he was not a bad for someone who had only been playing for a year. I waited for a graceful pause to ask him if I could change the station.
“George, are you really watching this or could I possibly turn the channel?” I asked and he nodded again while finger picking a G-Major open chord.
I found “The Breakfast Club” playing but all of the good scenes were edited and the overdubbed dialogue was mismatched. I waited for George to finish playing and put his guitar away. He didn’t stop until “Don’t You Forget About Me” played.
“Man, last night was rough. Puked four times, still taste the bile. I went to the Kaf earlier but couldn’t put any food away. Now I’m starving,” he said, arched his back and then sank in his seat
“I ate some old pizza and had a soda but I just woke up and you have probably been up since eleven,” I said.
He sighed and replied, “I was up before that and here it’s the middle of the afternoon. I don’t want to go back to the Kaf and definitely not going out tonight even if there is some rager. If you were smart, you’d stay in too.”
“You are right,” I said.
“Yes I am. Dude, why do you talk like that?” he asked.
“What?”
“Slow like you’re stoned and you don’t say don’t.”
“Really, I had not noticed.”
“There you go again. Never mind. I’m going to play some computer golf. You’re welcomed to join me,” he said.
I shook my head no.
After dinner some guys went to play Ultimate Frisbee in the twilight and others went to do work. I went to read in bed. If I could get five chapters done and skim my notes I would be able to go out. The deadline came in two blinks and I didn’t finish. Tim barreled though my door came to my door and I dropped my book on the floor, the pages fan out.
“Better get ready dude the train leaves the station in fifteen minutes,” he said and left to warn the others of the impending departure.
I told myself I had done enough and could make it up tomorrow.
As the group walked by George’s room, he saw me. We made brief eye contact. He looked away back into his text book.
The party was almost non-existent only thirty people or so lounging around broke down house they called Home Plate. There was beer; we drank it; we all got drunk. Sight blurred. The world rocked and rolled. I stepped into a black out, a dark room with no escape, and would have to pay the next day. George warned me too.