chapter-3-nostalgia-goggles

I wake up.

Jesus, I think to myself, what a fucked up dream that was. Psychics and crabs and shambling monsters? What the hell was I on last night? In fact, where exactly was I last night? Where am I now? This is definitely not my apartment. This is not my bed. I don’t even have a bed! I sleep on a damn futon! I never sleep in the nude either, yet here I am, like a newborn wrapped in a white sheet. I’ve either been kidnapped or I got laid. This is the thought process a paranoid individual goes through after a one-night stand.

Aside from me, the bed is empty. Whoever I was with has long since left. I find my clothes in a heap on the floor next to me. After I get dressed in my disheveled, beer-scented street wear, I take a look around the place. The events of the previous night a blur, I begin piecing events together as best I can, as though I were the World’s Most Pathetic Detective, hoping I can find out just where I am. Her dresser mirror has all the answers I need. Next to my stubbled, red-eyed reflection, is a photo. A young woman with straight black hair, puffy cheeks (like a chipmunk), thick-rimmed eyeglasses and the most infectious smile I’ve ever seen stares at me.

Then it all clicks.

I remember a phone call. My mother’s hysterical screaming. My father is dead, I was told. I felt cold upon hearing the news. I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t angry. I was a blank slate of a human being. I didn’t really know how to feel in that situation. Then I woke up here. I can only assume that the two of us, my friend and I, ended up back here and slept together. Again. Along the way, we must have taken something: alcohol, hallucinogens, uppers, downers, inbetweeners, something. Something that’s wiped my mind clean up until this point right now. Mystery solved, roll the credits.

Now that I have time to take it all in, I’m still not upset. The last time my father and I spoke, I just barely escaped an aggravated assault charge at a local mom and pop diner. The story goes, as I’ve repeated time and time again: a couple of friends and I had gone out for lunch. We have a good time, the three of us, scarfing down cold cuts and making fun of the daytime t.v talk shows. Then in comes Dear Ol’ Dad, stumbling drunk. He takes a seat next to us and begins making a scene. My parents split up when I was a kid, and he wasn’t a major part of my life. The reason was simple enough: he was a worthless fucking addict who made sure I was miserable anytime we were together. He begins by raising arms as if he were Moses parting the Red Sea and raising his voice to the point that everyone in the restaurant can hear him.

“Well, take a look at my son, the faggot! You’ve made me proud, you little shit! Giving yourself that dopey haircut and putting all that metal shit in your face so that nobody thinks we’re related. Take those fucking glasses off! Everyone in your family can see perfectly, you don’t need that bullshit!” He smacks me across the face, knocking my glasses off onto the floor, and continues. “Look at this! Your cunt mother brainwashes you and turns you into some fucking sissy queer! Nobody in MY family takes it up the ass, but I guess in that nuthouse they raised you in, it’s totally okay because we should all love each other, right?” He motions towards my two friends. “I guess that’s why you’re here with your fag hag and your nigger, right? Hands across America and all that shit?”

My friend takes exception to the slur directed at him and stands up, the two of them separated only by his own self-control. I’ve done nothing but take his abuse, and I feel like a weak, pathetic shell of a man because of it.

“Hey pal! You need to get out here, right now!” One of the owners of the place, a short, round Brooklyn-ite, tries throwing him out.

“Fuck you! I’m an American, I have rights, asshole!”

The momentary distraction was all I needed. Without thinking, I grabbed a glass bottle of Heinz ketchup, lunged directly at my own father, and CRASH, a satisfying sound of shattering glass and the sickening pitter-patter of ketchup and blood dripping onto the ground. A sea of hands restrains me from continuing my assault. I had every intention of stabbing him with whatever was left of the glass in my hand. After a lifetime of dealing with him and his crap, I was ready to end it all, consequences be damned. Luckily, everyone was on my side, and told the arriving police officers that I was acting in self-defense. I got off easy. He spent the next couple of days in the drunk tank.

After that, he tried to call me to apologize. I told him to drop dead. It seems he did just that. The coroner is still trying to determine the cause of death. It could be anything: health problems, suicide, foul play. I didn’t care. Cold as that sounds, I just didn’t. I felt free. Once and for all, I felt free. As though the Doors of Life have finally opened and will allow me passage to all of the wonderful things life offers. I could smile. I could have a good time without the use of some narcotic (okay, maybe not that one). I could finally love someone, and not just use them and throw them away like a kleenex. I could start a family. I could write my novel. I could do anything.

But right now I feel like watching this girl’s television.

I’m watching Spongebob Squarepants, the best show to watch with a hangover, or anytime, really. I’ve seen this episode enough times to recite all of the characters’ dialogue along with the show. “Argh, Spongebob! You’re spendin’ all my money! What have I tol-”

I’m cut off by the sound of the doorknob tumbler clicking and turning. I assumed that my “date” had come back home. I should’ve left the moment I woke up, as the law of one-night stands dictates. But enough weird shit happened last night that justified my staying there. I needed to sit her down and ask what happened last night. Instead…

“Who the hell are you!?”

A man I don’t recognize is in the doorway, staring at me uncertainly. Am I a friend? A burglar? Some stalker coming to rape the woman who lives here? He doesn’t ask questions. He moves, quickly, towards me, hands up in a fighting stace.

Things are certainly getting hairy. I hope for my sake that there’s a bottle of Heinz around here somewhere.