Several chapters of Elephant Graveyard by Andy Crawford

This section of my book spans across several chapters. I think it sums up the mood of the story pretty well. Any feedback would be appreciated.

Brother.

It is a quarter past three, on a bright but breezy Thursday afternoon. I am sitting in the Queens Head public house opposite a stranger. We sit at a sticky wooden table tentatively sipping at pints of strong French lager. My glass is almost empty, his is almost full. No one has spoken for the last couple of minutes and it’s getting awkward.

The stranger looks like me ten years ago except a cleaner, more athletic version. Short, well groomed hair, a clean, informal shirt and naïve eyes. This is me before I realised that the world was out to get me. A bubble-wrapped doppelganger sitting opposite looking just as awkward as I feel. It seems like there has been some sort of time warp.

 

I watch the bubbles rising in my glass. They appear at the bottom, inflate, and rise to the top to meet their end, like insects with only a day to live, surging to the surface and fizzling out into oblivion. Pointless and irrelevant. My eyes want to look anywhere except at the stranger who sits opposite me.

I pick at the skin around my fingernails and bite sections of it off, another part of me dead forever. My curiosity gets the better of me and I lift my head and our eyes meet in a moment of awkward clarity.

 

My brother has ostensibly aged by twenty years since I last saw him. From a fifteen year-old boy to a man aged eighteen going on thirty. He is far more mature than I am despite our nine-year age gap.

 

I wonder what he is thinking. Does he look down on his older f**k-up of a brother who has done pretty much nothing since he left college eight years ago? Is that just me being paranoid? Sometimes I am envious of his situation. He will end up in a well-paid job, house, wife and two-point-five children. Probably before he reaches the age I am now, twenty-seven. And stupid f**k-up big brother will still be fantasising about travelling the world as a rock star, getting older with not a penny to his name. A fantastic role model.

 

It hasn’t always been like this. I remember when we were younger and I first started learning the guitar at thirteen. I would stand in the living room at home and prance about pretending to be whichever Rock Star I was into at the time, playing whichever two chords I could play and making up stupid songs. My brother would be my audience and would sit on the sofa jumping and clapping as if I was the only thing in his world. When I’d finish a ‘song’ he would cheer and shout “again, again” and I’d play another made up tune ‘til I got bored of it.

 

I skip back to the present with a jolt, and right now he can barely make eye contact with me.

 

I drain the remnants of my drink greedily.

 

“Another?” I say

 

“No thanks” says younger me, pointing to his half-finished beer to show me that he still has a drink. How sensible, I reflect.

 

I go to the bar and return, fresh drink in hand.

 

“So, how’s Uni?” I blurt out, with the grace of a tank.

 

“Yea, pretty good thanks,” replies my brother.

 

“How’s the band?”

 

“Not bad” I reply, lying, my nose growing by an inch or two.

 

Conversation doesn’t get much better for the next half an hour. It appears that in the three years since I last saw him we have lost everything we ever had in common. I am tempted to finish my drink and make my excuses but then I realise something. This is the first time I have ever sat in a pub and had a pint with my brother. I tell him that and he smiles and says “oh, yeah. Fancy a game of pool?”

 

We play pool and start to enjoy being tipsy in a pub on a Thursday afternoon. The amazing influence of alcohol has its usual effect of turning ordinary people into conversational dynamos. Wow, look at me conversing like a real adult. I ask him more about how University is and he tells me about his Psychology course and about a man he read about who had a fantasy involving scooping his eyeballs out with a spoon. I tell him about my miraculous escape from hospital and about the crazy characters I had to share a ward with. We laugh, and slowly but surely he starts to feel like my little brother again, and for the first time in ages I am enjoying the company of another human being.

 

By six o’clock the alcohol has created a warm fuzz in my belly and turned the early autumn sun into a mellow glow, like someone has turned the dimmer switch down. I am at the peak of happy drunkenness and don’t yet realise that I am about to go over the peak and into the deep trough that can so easily appear beneath you under the influence of alcohol.

 

We leave the pub behind us and fall out onto the wind-beaten concrete of the street. The temperature outside has dropped since earlier but I can’t feel it due to the beer coat I have constructed. I have a dull throb in the back of my heart for my brother to stay with me for the rest of the day but know that soon he will be gone. Back to his perfect life with his girlfriend and his college mates and his football team and he can leave thoughts of his shattered family far behind him. I try to keep up the conversation in order to distract his imminent departure. We walk but we have no idea where we are going.

 

“Fancy something to eat?” I ask, realising I am starving, food-wise and confidence-wise.

 

“Don’t think I’m going to have time bruv, sorry. My train back to Uni is at eight and I still haven’t gone to visit mom yet.

 

The inevitability doesn’t dull the pang of rejection that sits in my gut like a lead bullet. Suddenly I crave another drink to dampen the fire and numb my senses even more.

 

“Oh, okay. That’s a shame, it’s been great catching up.”

 

“Listen, why don’t you come to moms with me? She’d love it if we both turn up at her door. I know you two don’t exactly see eye to eye but we really should make an effort.”

 

I start to think of things that I would rather do than go and see my mother right now. Chew my own legs off. Drink a bottle of shampoo. Scoop my eyes out with a spoon.

 

“Nah, I can’t tonight” I lie. “I have some band stuff to sort out.”

 

“Oh, okay. Well I’ll tell her you said hi and I’ll let you know next time I’m back up here.”

 

“Yea, cool. See you soon.”

 

I want to tell him everything and hug him and not let him go back yet but instead I build up a wall and decide to concentrate on getting even more wasted instead. He looks at me like he wants to say something but instead he reaches out his hand and we shake awkwardly, like two lampposts stuck in the pavement afraid of getting too close, and he is gone. And I can’t look back. I walk off as quickly as I can in the opposite direction; walking so fast I almost stumble off the curb in a drunken stupor.

 

I walk along shop fronts and alleyways and grass verges and iron railings. Past bus stops and churches and restaurants and lampposts oblivious to it all. It is all just unimportant backdrop. My mind is ticking. Overflowing. I need another drink so bad I would kill a homeless guy for his bottle of whisky in a paper bag. I sit at a bus stop to think for a minute and steady myself. I want to get fucked-up. I want to get so drunk that I don’t remember this day and how I feel right now. Wipe the blackboard clean. Erase the hard-drive. Right-click. Delete.

 

I check my pocket and find that I have one pound twenty four. S**t. I don’t have my debit card on me so I’m pretty stuffed. I know at home I could probably steal some vodka out of my housemates cupboard, or….

 

An idea springs in my head. Well-done brain, you’re doing a great job. I know I don’t call on you very often but when I do you never let me down.

-----------------------------------------------------

Sid.

Sid is an old school friend who I rarely see any more. We used to be really close but we eventually went our separate ways. Having said that, each time I do see him it’s as if we’d never been separated. Years could pass and he wouldn’t even notice, stuck in a perpetual relationship hamster wheel. I kind of liked that, even though I could never trust him to be there when I needed him, but sometimes he came in handy.

 

He is the kind of guy who flits from one thing to next like a humming bird moving from flower to flower. His lifestyle seems to dramatically alternate depending on the girl he’s going out with at the time. When we were in high school he was with a rock chic and he had long hair and wore leather jackets and jeans all the time. He played guitar and drank in all the dirtiest dives in the city, even at the age of fifteen.

 

By the time that relationship ended, we were both at Art College and he had met another girl who was an amateur athlete. He got a fashionable haircut, ditched the biker clothes and started dressing like a more acceptable member of society, visiting the gym three times a week. He also stopped hanging around with us rocker types.

 

After adopting many other characters over the next few years he has now settled on playing the role of a trendy, sharply-dressed high-flyer. He has a trophy blonde with fake tits, wears expensive suits, works as a manager in a bar in a well-known department store and shoves as much coke up his trendy nose as he can get.

 

The last time I saw him was about two months ago. I was wondering through the city centre minding my own business when I bumped into a good-looking, clean-cut, smooth character I assumed was trying to sell me something. I automatically try to avoid eye contact with anyone who looks like this normally, so I was staring at the ground as I walked by. It had been a couple of years since our last meeting and it was only when he started talking to me that I realised it was Mr chameleon himself, in the guise of a business man.

 

He invited me into his bar for a drink and I sat there for the rest of the day enjoying free drinks, free cigarettes and even a free cheeseburger. When it was time for him to close up we went our separate ways and promised to stay in touch.

 

And right now I intend to honour that vow and get in touch. I sprint the couple of blocks to the department store, my face freezing over in the cold wind, hoping that he is working today. I navigate the large glass doors and into the women’s clothing department of the store.

 

I am racing through the aisles, motivated by the idea of free drinks. I run up an escalator, almost knocking over a middle-aged lady with a hairstyle that looks like an auburn motorbike helmet. At the top of the escalator I turn left and walk, with as much calm nonchalance as I can muster, towards the entrance to the bar, pretending to be “just passing”.

 

I immediately see Sid behind the bar and feel relieved. He spots me straight away and gestures to me with one hand that he’ll be with me in a minute. I take a seat at the bar and feel a little self-conscious. This place is all fitted out in a minimalist fashion, with mirrors and white décor. It is obviously the kind of place that the upper-middle class go for a glass of Chardonnay to escape the rigors of credit card waving. And here I am. Wearing dirty converse trainers, tatty jeans and a pixies T-shirt under my oversize Parka. I feel out of place. I feel exposed in the harsh plastic light surrounding me. They’re looking at me. I’m on a pedestal being interrogated. I can feel the colour of my face changing from chalky white to blister red.

 

Just when I think I’m going to scream or kill somebody, Sid greets me and asks if I want a drink. I bite his proverbial hand off and ask for a Jack Daniel’s and coke. “Double?” he asks, “Please” I reply almost salivating.

 

“So you recovered then?” asks Sid, feigning concern.

 

“Recovered from what?”

 

“I bumped into your guitarist the other day, he said you nearly died or something”

 

“Oh right, that. I didn’t nearly die but at times I wished I had.” I reply, half joking.

 

“Now, now mate, it can’t be that bad. Tell uncle Sid all about it”

 

I tell him all about my jaunt in hospital, taking regular breaks to slurp on a seemingly never-ending supply of JD and coke, whilst he intermittently serves the odd customer or two. We talk about music, and he tells me all about his new city-centre apartment he shares with his girlfriend, and about his job.

 

From what I can see he can pretty much get away with standing around smoking and drinking all day. And he has respect. I can see it in the eyes of the rest of the bar staff. They ask him something, and he replies, all wise and wonderful. I feel a sense of bitterness. I went to school with Sid and he never put any effort into his studies at all.

 

He was the class joker. He left school with nothing. Despite this he worked in a supermarket, and in the past seven years has climbed the ladder of retail wonderment to become bar manager.

 

“You got any plans for tonight?” asks Sid.

 

“Well, I thought I’d visit the ballet and maybe take the Porsche for a spin” I reply with a hint of sarcasm, and the breathy overtones of bourbon.

 

Twenty minutes later the department store is closed and we are heading down streets and alleyways towards a pub, where Sid has arranged to meet some friends. I am more than a little tipsy and am struggling to walk in a straight line, my feet tripping on the cobbles of the street. Every time I open my mouth to speak it feels like I’ve been drinking a gluey syrup and my mouth is moving in slow motion.

 

Day has turned into night and the breeze has turned into a harsh wind that freezes my ears. Sid knows I have no money but told me not to worry about it, as he’s just been paid. Who am I to argue? We walk swiftly now, in silence, aiming to reach the warmth of our destination before we freeze over and shatter into icy fragments.

 

Finally, we reach The Windsor Public House and negotiate two fatheaded bouncers, eyeing me suspiciously but letting us pass. The inviting glow of the pub thaws my skin and we head towards the bar. The place is pretty busy and Sid buys us a pint each. He scans the room and can’t seem to see his friends.

 

I look around the room myself and see that there is a mixture of people in here. Men dressed like Sid, in designer shirts and polished shoes. Groups of office workers having a drink after work, and probably a fair share of students, dressed not too dissimilarly to me. I am comfortable, possibly a lot to do with the fact that I am well on my way to being smashed. I have never been in this pub before and I am wondering why. It seems like a decent enough place, and I must’ve walked past it hundreds of times on my regular trips through town.

 

“You’ll like this bunch, I think.” says Sid, sipping on his pint.

 

“They’re a good laugh. They all work in the store in different departments. It’s great, we are all in here after work most nights getting pissed.”

 

I am a little nervous about meeting so many people all at once; I’m bad enough when I have to talk to strangers in a shop or something. I always think they are pre-judging me. I don’t know why, maybe they are? I’m not very good at making conversation at the best of times, and always think that I come across as being stupid. It’s not quite as bad when I’ve had a few drinks like I have now.

 

Am I just being paranoid or do I really sound like an idiot? I would love to be able to step out of my body and have a conversation with myself just to see how others perceive me. I suppose that wouldn’t work though because I would know myself too well. Maybe I should just ask someone what they think of me? But obviously they wouldn’t tell me the truth. You don’t tell a stranger that you think that they are a bit dull or that their breath stinks would you?

 

Maybe I should ask one of Sid’s friends? Its not like I’ve got anything to lose. I would probably never see them again and at least then I could put my mind at rest. I could tell them to be brutally honest and tell me what they think. That would be an interesting conversational: ‘So, Sid’s friend, I know I’ve just met you but what do you honestly think of me? Don’t hold back; give me what you’ve got. By the way, I find you dull and you’re breath stinks.’

 

I decide to test the water a bit first and if I get stuck for conversation, I’ll hit them with that. It might be fun. Meanwhile, the heat in this pub is making me a bit tired and I am suddenly starting to feel the effects of the alcohol I’ve been consuming all day on an empty stomach. I never did get that free meal. I am only being held up by a beeping, flashing fruit machine that I am leaning on, and just when I begin to wonder if I should just head off home, in walk two of Sid’s friends.

 

Both men are probably a bit younger than me, smartly dressed with designer haircuts and anonymous faces. I forget both of their names instantly. In one ear and out the other. I am standing watching them talk to Sid. I can’t hear their words over the din of the busy pub and to be honest I don’t really care. I can always tell when I’m included in the conversation when the people talking regularly make eye contact with me, but I may as well not be standing here as far as this one’s going. Years of being in a band have affected my hearing. I’m ok most of the time but in a busy room I can’t hear a thing anyone’s saying.

 

The thing is, I suppose most people would adopt a system where they just keep nodding and smiling. My social skills haven’t figured that one out yet though so I just stand and stare into middle distance or distract myself by sipping my pint. I hate small talk. Ninety-nine percent of the time it is pointless. Unless it’s with a girl you want to f**k. Then, there is a point to it all because you are trying to sound interesting in order to get something out of it. Occasionally I’ll nod begrudgingly, but only if the person makes eye contact with me. And that has more to do with me feeling awkward than good manners.

 

So, I’m standing here still watching Sid blah blah blahing to his friends, occasionally stopping to offer me a cigarette, which I take thankfully to distract myself from the awkward situation. I blow puffs of smoke into the air, watching them swirl, shift pace and eventually evaporate. I snap out of my dream-state to realise that Sid is talking to me

 

“What?” I say, confused

 

“I was just asking if you want another drink.”

 

Do I want another drink? Good question. I think about it for a second. I am quite hammered already but I am on the last sip of my drink. Should I keep exploiting Sid’s generosity like this? Don’t suppose I should, really. He’s been giving me free drinks and f**s for a few hours now. I wonder whether he thinks I’m exploiting him? Lets face it, I’m either going to have another drink or go home. There’s no way I’m going to stand here all night without a drink, looking like a complete loser.

 

“Errm okay, cheers.”

 

“Get them in then.”

 

He passes me a tenner and I turn to walk towards the bar. I suddenly realise that this place is now rammed and I am considerably drunk. I somehow manage to get through the mass of people and find a spot at the bar. I am glad of the distraction. I was starting to feel really awkward standing there not being able to hear Sid and his friends’ conversation.

 

After a bit of shoving and standing on my toes to be seen better, I finally get served and head back to Sid, drinks in hand. In the short time I took to get to the bar and back he has been joined by several more, smart looking friends, none of whom I have ever seen before.

 

I hand Sid his drink and his change and decide that it’s time for me to go. I’ll drink my pint as quickly as possible and make my excuses and leave. I take one big gulp and a third of my pint disappears down my throat, nestling in my bloated belly. I wait a few seconds and drink another third. That is where my memory starts to fail me and a hazy mist descends like my windows are all steamed up.

 

A curvy, cute girl is talking to me but I can only make out bits of what she’s saying. She has long hair and her fantastic breasts jut out, trying to reach me. She is obviously very enthusiastic about what she is telling me as she is using hand-gestures and keeps widening her eyes. How did I end up talking to her? She looks quite attractive at the moment, but I wonder if that is just the alcohol. I consider this for a second. No, I think she’s sexy and she definitely likes me. Right, sober up so you can chat-up this girl. I start to focus on what she is saying. Like tuning in a crackly radio so you can hear it better.

 

“…So when I came back from Uni I really started to get into the Pixies and when I heard they were reforming for a tour I knew it was something I didn’t want to miss so me and my friend Claire bought some tickets for eighty pounds each off Ebay but it was well worth it because it was the best gig I’ve ever seen it was just a shame that Claire threw up on somebody and we had to leave early.”

 

Wow, attractive and a good taste in music. Okay, she talks a bit too much but that’s not a huge problem. She is looking at me waiting for a reply and I try to look cool whilst thinking of something to say. Come on mouth, don’t let me down now. I try to think how we ended up on this topic of conversation, which wasn’t easy as I don’t remember being introduced to this girl or ever saying anything to her. Then I remember, I’m wearing a Pixies T-shirt. Ah, that’s how this started. One plus one is two, well done.

 

“You are dull and you’re breath stinks.” I say in a slurred gluey voice, trying not to look at her tits. I think this joke was funny, but luckily she doesn’t hear me.

 

A while later we are walking along the streets again. The redheaded girl is clinging like a limpet to my left arm, and the cold concrete air has sobered me slightly. I have no idea where we are heading and don’t particularly care. My confidence has returned and I am looking forward to wherever the night takes us. All thoughts of my brother have been washed away in a river of booze.

 

We travel in a group of about ten people, yet the only person I know the name of is my adaptable friend, Sid, including the girl on my arm. She looks like she has fallen asleep, her head rested against my arm, but that’s impossible as her legs are moving. I decide that I really should make an effort with her, as it has been a while since I have had any real contact with women.

 

I usually find I can pick up a girl without much effort, especially at one of my bands shows. The very fact that I sing in a band makes me apparently more exciting to young women. From the manic blur onstage you can usually pick out one or two female faces, watching a little more intently than the others. Then, it’s a case of waiting for someone to approach you after the gig, and starting things from there.

 

I’m not fussy by any means, and usually if a girl has the confidence to approach me, they are automatically too attractive to turn away. As I say anyway, I’m not fussy. Lately, I have been too self absorbed to even contemplate pursuing relationships of any kind, no matter how short-lived they may be. Tonight though, I return to the land of the living, and fully intend to make the most of the situation.

 

As we walk the girl reaches into her bag, pulls out an almost empty pack of cigarettes and offers me one. Her eyes meet mine for the first time since leaving the pub, and in the dim lamppost light of the street she still looks reasonably attractive and sweet.

 

“Thanks” I say, reaching across and taking a smoke from the packet.

 

We are by now slightly behind the group, where Sid seems to be the pied piper leading us rats through the streets. It has become more and more obvious to me how popular Sid is among his work friends. I suppose it’s obvious really that Mr Chameleon is bound to be so popular. His ability to change his fashion sense and general lifestyle to suit his current situation is pretty admirable. I’m no expert but I would consider Sid a good-looking guy, who is a genuine laugh to be around. He is definitely a character and seems to attract people like a magnet. Men want to be him; women want to be with him, that old cliché. Even in his former, grungier guise he was always very high up the social pecking order.

 

Should I try to be more adaptable like him? Would that make me happier? It would certainly make life more enjoyable. Unfortunately I don’t think I have the capacity to ever be like Sid. For one, I think too much about everything. To be like him you would have to be a pretty shallow kind of person, who takes life as it comes and never worries about everything. I envy his lack of worry. But would I be content to constantly have to change in order to be popular? Maybe not. Maybe I was born to be a depressed cynic, constantly questioning everything that is put in front of me. Either way, tonight I am going to cast away my shackles and enjoy myself.

 

After a seemingly endless array of streets we stumble, wordless, into the chasm of darkness and strobe lighting of a nightclub. I feel like I have sobered up too much and am relieved when the girl immediately drags me towards the relatively quiet bar and puts a drink in my hand a minute or so later. She must sense my sobriety too, and fears losing the opportunity to take advantage of me. I ravenously gulp down half the glass, and she looks up at me for a moment, amused and sexy. At that moment I wonder how old she is. I would guess she is about nineteen.

 

The throb of music makes my lungs bounce inside my rib cage and my head dances in time. I turn to see Sid who is trying to get my attention from the bar, holding up another drink for me. I finish my pint and lean towards Sid, to reach for the black glass of Bourbon and Coke. I grab at the drink and shout out an inaudible “Cheers!” All of this is done in one movement, and the girl has obviously made herself a part of me. Sid looks at me, then the girl, and winks at me, cheekily. I look down at the girls’ cleavage, heaving and inviting. I lift my head to look back at Sid, and he laughs.

 

The moment freezes in a cacophony of sound and faces. Why can’t you be around more often? I ask him, silently. This is what friendship is all about, experiencing a crazy night of randomness together. Having stories to tell. Going wherever the night takes us, why can’t we do this all the time, Sid? Why do you have to disappear? Do you have another cocoon to enter? Another metamorphosis to undertake?

 

Here today, gone tomorrow. Adapting to your surroundings, a ghost, shape-shifting into a new environment. Are you a mirage in my desert? Are you an angel sent down to make sure I have a good night when I need one the most? No, I’m pretty sure you exist, but it doesn’t have to be like this Sid, we could be great friends. An all-drinking late night machine of debauchery. I could live a thousand nights like this one and not get bored.

 

I look over to Sid once more, but he has started to walk towards the dance-floor, Barbie-doll girlfriend in hand. I still have no idea what her name is. Sid doesn’t talk about her, as if she is just another fashion accessory that compliments his look. She is fashionably good-looking but is much too high maintenance for me. All blonde hair, too much make-up and too cool for school. In this light she almost looks evil. Her eyes are dark pits that Sid gets lost inside.

 

I neck my drink in one go and look down at the girl at my side. She looks up tentatively, and we kiss. Not a sweet movie style kiss, but a rasping, aggressive kiss that sucks my face off. She tastes of vodka and cigarettes. We separate, and she pulls my hand towards the dance-floor. I am certainly in no mood to dance, but that is not her intention. We walk past the sweating crowd and into the depths of the club. She leads us to a dark corner. I slump down onto the sticky, thinly carpeted floor and she sits, straddling on top of me.

 

We kiss some more and I make for those breasts, with no objection from her. She is voracious, a relentless onslaught of skin and saliva. Her breasts are supple and more than a handful, over her T-shirt and tightly packed bra. My hands slide down towards her skirt and I feel her hands scanning my jeans for an erection, which she finds. Just before I reach the star prize she stops kissing, grabs my hands firmly and whispers “Later”.

 

She jumps up, helps me up and with no care for being discrete, I correct myself. This girl is cool. She leads me puppy-like towards the toilets and disappears into the ladies. For a second I consider following her but instead I stumble into the garish bright lights and urine smell of the gent’s toilet.

 

The sudden light makes me realise how drunk I am and I begin to feel queasy. The bathroom is empty, a fact of which I am glad. I take a piss, head resting on the white tiles in front of me.  As I turn towards the door, the room spins and I almost slip onto the urine-soaked floor. Saved by the sink, I rinse my hands in cold water and dampen my face, my eyes avoiding the judgemental gaze of the mirror. I turn to see Sid and a nameless friend walk into the room. They give out a loud “Wahey!” when they see me.

 

They playfully grab me and bundle me into a cubicle. Sid whips out a small plastic bag of white powder, licks his finger and dabs it into the bag. He sucks the powder off his finger and gestures for me to do the same. I take a big dose onto my finger and suck it down like a sherbet dip. It tastes like aspirin and steals the moisture from my mouth, a fiendish pickpocket in powder form. Minutes later I am exiting the toilets, and back into the thumping cacophony of the club. In the darkness I feel comfortable again and I can feel the effects of the chemicals sobering me and lifting my spirits, an injection of energy and confidence that I do not have.

 

The red-head is waiting for me, and she says something that I make out to be “I thought you’d gone” and she smiles and she grabs my hand and we are on the dance floor pogoing higher and higher knocking into people but not caring, looking at each other and laughing at the comedy of us dancing and jumping and almost falling over and bouncing with the beat.

 

The music is inside us, using us like puppets on strings as we bob and prance and dance and sweat and laugh. The strobes cut sections of us out and throw them up into the air, randomly re-appearing and shattering into multi-coloured shards.

 

Time stops, and I am there, caught in a rare moment of bliss. The eye of the hurricane. Living, Breathing. Alive, resurrected. I am holding onto it, grasping it like a Polaroid that brings back happy memories. A snapshot of what life should be like. Sharing a bond with someone just because they are there at the moment you temporarily enjoyed life. Feeling like they are the only person in the world who knows how it felt. At that moment, At this moment I love this girl more than anyone I have ever know, yet I don’t even know her name. Names are an unimportant irrelevance that would shatter this illusion and bring reality to my conscious. So I look at her, bouncing and smiling and being there with me, and I want to hold onto her forever and freeze the look of pure exhilaration on her face.

 

In my mind, hours pass, and I blink and find myself once again sitting on the floor, in a dark corner of the nightclub. Red is sitting next to me, looking as drained as I feel. Another drink has found its way into one hand, and a cigarette in the other. I suck a deep gust of smoke into my lungs and exhale into the humid, sweat-drenched air. The drink tastes stale and sticks to my throat, not wanting to go down. My bloodshot eyes can just make out the girls face; she looks like she’s asleep, head resting on my shoulder.

 

A pair of men’s legs tower in front of me, with black trousers and smart, shiny shoes. I tilt my head upwards and see Sid’s welcome face. He crouches down.

 

“Alright lad?” he enquires in a mock northern voice, barely audible over the persistent thud of dance music.

 

Before I have chance to answer he helps me up, and in turn I help the girl to stand up.

 

Next thing I know I am in the white, minimalist surroundings of Sid’s Living room. I look around the room. We are scattered around a barely furnished but messy modern apartment with magazines and bottles littering the wooden floor. I am sitting on a brown leather sofa with a redheaded girl next to me who I do not know, smiling wearily. To my left is another leather sofa at a right angle to ours, on which Sid is sitting, having an in-depth conversation with a man I recognise from earlier. I can’t make out what they are talking about until I tune in my brain to concentrate. It appears that the guy talking to Sid is a work colleague, as they are talking about how someone called Kev keeps calling in sick and messing up the bar rota.

 

I am tired and feeling sober, and am starting to get a little self-conscious about the redhead, who keeps looking at me expectantly. I notice another body, lying prone on the floor, possibly dead next to the plasma TV. A man who I vaguely recognise from earlier, a Sid doppelganger in identical smart attire.

 

The unmistakeable click of a lighter sends thick grey smoke past my face and a sickly sweet familiar smell enters my nostril. Red offers me the joint and I take a drag without hesitation, thinking this was exactly what I need to take the edge off the harsh neon light of a modern apartment. The dimmer switch behind my pupils turns down, and my vision suddenly has a protective tint that comforts me from the plastic surroundings.

 

A guitar is playing and we are all sitting on the floor, singing Beatles songs, dazed by contentment. I once had a girl, or should I say she once had me? We sing loudly, from some voices the words are wrong but it doesn’t take the gloss off the warmth in the air. Smiles and faces spinning round whilst smoke rises up and up and up and disintegrates into the ceiling.

 

I watch as swirls exit my mouth and twist around and outwards, reaching for the centre of the abstract circle in which we sit. The unfamiliar faces are now familiar.  I know them, they know me, we share an experience together. We sing songs together. A wooden floor and white walls with our silhouettes cast upon the white plaster. She showed me her room, isn’t it good, Norwegian wood.

 

The night is stuck in slow motion. Voices tumble around the room, but sound muted, as if I can hear them faintly through a wall. The TV is a blur of colour, bright and incoherent, bouncing off the screen. A kaleidoscope of shapes and faces, speaking in tongues. Bright red numbers etch 06:06 onto my irises, fading and re-appearing in my vision in an attempt to force a sense of normality on the moment.

 

The lights are off and this seems to magnify the plasma light pouring from the silent TV. Voices fade to nothing so slowly that I could swear that the volume in my head is gradually being turned down. Minutes turn to hours, hours turn to days and time stops, and sits on my lap. I feel its soft lips touching mine, wet and smoky. Tongues searching my mouth, forging deeper and deeper as if searching for my soul.

 

The early morning sun breaks through the curtains and snaps me into a pseudo reality. Time is an alien concept that limits us and confines our imagination to numbers on a wall but I rinse it away in a blur of pale skin, red hair and flesh that washes over my eyes and overloads my senses. I am lost in a blur of motion and vigour. Limbs entwine, breath warms my cheeks, and eyes search for the real me hidden under a shroud of chemicals. An amazing rush of energy grabs my body and jolts it into one final burst of life. My eyes close and bodies sink entangled like a ball of elastic bands with too many limbs, and I sleep, finally and deeply.

---------------------------------------

First night.

An excerpt from ‘The Journal of ghosts’

 

I was drunk on my own saliva when you entered my enclosure, dazed by the headlights of loneliness. You expressed the silent notion that you longed for a lighthouse to guide you through stormy seas. I took your words, covered them in question marks and devoured them like a rare steak. We collided, stationary and unfocused, as I tried to disintegrate the hostage situation I found myself in.  You uncovered a mouth full of hand grenades so I stepped aside and deleted them one by one. You asked me to buy you a conscience that worked as well as your ovaries. You were searching for a ghostly voice in howling winds and I threw you to be eaten by the wolves ravenous. After all, I was the devil incarnate and you were a pawn taken in the first move of the game.

----------------------------------------------------

Morning.

I wake as a body cast away on a beach. My eyes flicker to focus on the bright white above, like heaven has opened above me and calls me into its gates. I lie for a while, my limbs motionless in the silence of the moment. I can hear my eyelids close and open again, like a camera shutter clicking. Blink blink.

 

My arms are deadwood sitting on a pile of seaweed and my head lies motionless, a rock embedded into the dry sand. I squint at the white nothingness, trying to focus. Dryness in my throat makes me cough, deeply and harshly, cutting my oesophagus to shreds. Blink, blink.

 

My vision becomes clearer slowly but surely, and the dazzling brightness of a sun-drenched sky gradually becomes a white ceiling. Blink, blink.

 

I lift my head with bleary eyes and scan my surroundings. I see a minimalist mess, like a modern art instillation. A white room smelling of smoke and bad breath. Sid’s apartment. Memories of last night and earlier this morning start to re-appear in the picture-house in my head.

 

An arm is draped across my chest. Not mine, but whose? I tilt my head sharply to my right and see a bundle of skin and red hair. I gently pick up the arm and place it back with its torso. I sit up and realise that the hangover is yet to begin, so I can’t have been asleep for long.

 

I want to get out of here without waking anyone. People are too much for me to deal with right now, let alone people I don’t know. Questions I don’t want to answer. Details, details, details. And consequence.

 

I peer over to the redheaded girls face, and am relieved to see a pretty face containing closed eyes and an open mouth, gently breathing rhythmically. Last nights makeup still applied heavily onto her features, looking out of place in the bright natural light of the morning.

 

I stand, slowly and unsteadily, put my feet into my converse, and turn towards the door. A body still lies on the floor near the plasma TV, and the room has a completely different ambience to last night. Everything is too harsh and plastic, and I feel uncomfortably self-conscious. I need to get out of here.

 

I walk towards the door, turn the handle and seconds later I am running down a hallway that looks like a hospital, not looking back, stomach churning with every step. I scurry down three flights of stairs and out through the front door, and I have escaped into the glorious sunshine. My lungs grasp at the fresh air with such enthusiasm that I cough again and can almost feel my insides travel up my throat.

 

Twenty-five minutes later I am sitting in an almost empty train carriage with no ticket concluding that last night was fun, and that I should do it more often.