I stare blank faced across the break room table at Kurt and Chloe. I haven’t slept a minute, and I don’t know how I have managed not to lose my shit yet. They are just looking at me nervously, exchanging little conversation, giving me almost constant jittery looks as I stare at them without blinking. I know that if I blink, it’s all over. If those eyes close once, I’m asleep. I haven’t said a word to them yet today. I came to work, just pantomiming their motions as they set up, worked, went to break. I’ve been a machine on the calls, one after another, tearing into crazy person after crazy person like a human threshing machine. I’ve laid low so many monsters today that it isn’t even funny.
Having not stopped drinking until 11am, I was still very loaded when I arrived. Now, that is all gone, and it’s everything I can do not to collapse right here on the table. I have no idea how Chloe managed to be so alive. I know I’ll have to do it again too. I can’t not go out on a Friday night. I feel so strongly about this that I’m willing to use double negatives, even if I do have to be in a church the next morning for my ex-girlfriend’s wedding. I can’t go home early tonight; Friday night is my night to shine. I already know I’m not coming in Sunday. That, of course, is if I don’t get fired today. They like to do their dirty work on Friday evening. Of course, they also like to do it before your day off, which would mean they may not be planning to axe me until Monday night. I almost wish they would do it right now and get it over with so I could go home and go to bed.
“I feel bad for you guys,” Chloe says slowly, looking nervously at me still. “It’s going to be a rough weekend.”
“Probably,” Kurt agrees, not taking his eyes off me.
I’m torn as to whether or not I want to submit to this calculated attempt to get me to speak. Why do they want me to talk so bad? Who wants to hear my voice? Has Chloe’s hair always been that shade of red or is it something new? It must be something new, I would have noticed that before. It really stands out. Should I ask her about it? What if it isn’t new and I just haven’t noticed it before? Then I’m just a bad friend. She says she doesn’t even know what color her real hair is because she has been dyeing it since she was twelve. This all leaves me wondering what color the rest of my friends’ hair is. Kurt’s is brown, I mean, I can see it in front of me. Dr. Filth has dirty blonde hair. Tommy Guilt’s hair is almost the same color as Kurt’s.
They are still looking at me, and I’ve forgotten why. My body and mind are so exhausted from everything that this one drunken night with no sleep has put me over the edge, and I honestly feel like I’m tripping.
Now that’s something I haven’t done in a long time. The last time I tripped was when I still lived in Ithaca. Kurt Vance came over with it and we decided to just go nuts. He brought the Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine” and we watched the movie three times. We also hiked in the gorges, which was even more amazingly beautiful than usual, and believe me, Ithaca is already a beautiful town to begin with. All was going well until we found a dead Sasquatch, and then realized that the whole town was populated by trolls and punk rock werewolves, so we had to barricade ourselves in my bedroom. We tried to hide under my bed but it was too small. The problem arose when we realized we had no water, so we had to brave the downstairs, and I couldn’t figure out how to use the Britta, so I just drank from the pitcher, which pissed off my roommate, but I knew from a previous experience that he was the Devil, so I didn’t care.
Why are they watching me still? I venture an unsure, “Yeah,” and look expectantly between them to make sure neither is taking notes. I keep saying I need to get a copy of my FBI file. Why haven’t I done that yet? What have they monitored along the way? I’ve spent time with some deviant fellows. What if I made my way into their attention? My friends in California believed they had their phone tapped–what if it really was? Is my phone tapped now too? I have talked about drugs over the phone; is that bad? Is anyone here watching me beside them? I don’t see anyone, but a good agent would know how not to be seen. Any of these people could be keeping tabs. Chloe and Kurt would be the best candidates, because they are the closest to me, and I would expect them the least. At lunch, it may help to slip poison into their food when they aren’t looking. That is, unless they can prove their loyalty in some way...
“Well, it’s time to go back to work,” Kurt says, looking over my head at the clock on the wall. Is he looking at the clock? Is there someone behind me giving him instructions? Is my customary trip to the urinal before returning to work going to be my undoing? Is there going to be an agent in there with a garrotte, ready to slip it around my neck when I unsheathe my Johnson so that I will die with my flaccid cock gripped tightly in my rigored hand?
I nod stupidly while I consider these possibilities.
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