Boy's Night Out

A story about going insane. Or not. Like so many things in life, it's just a matter of perspective.

 

   “I’m going insane.”

 

   I’m messed up in the head. I’m on drugs and I don’t know it. I’m completely fucked. There has to be some explanation for what I’m seeing now. It feels real, yeah; the damp concrete I’m sitting on, the smell of the smoking cigarette, the goose bumps on my arm from sitting out on a chilly night. It feels real, but I know there is no way it could be.

   “Oh quit being so melodramatic, will you? We just want to talk.”

   I hear the voice, but I don’t want to. To accept that I’m hearing it just means accepting that I’m really coo-coo for coco-puffs. Someone must have slipped me some drugs. I’m hallucinating and my head is starting to throb.

   “No, your head hurts cause your eyes are so damn tight you’re giving yourself a headache, stupid. It looks like you’re trying to s**t your pants or something.”

   Oh. I open my eyes reluctantly, and look to my right, and then my left.

   “S**t . . .”

   That was me. They’re still there, sitting on either side of me on the curb. I sigh, hoping that it’s drugs, knowing that I’m probably just crazy. To my left sits, well, me. He (I?) is dressed darkly, black shirt, black jeans, long dark coat. The hair is longer then mine now, but I remember having it that way, always falling into my eyes. I always thought I looked pretty cool like that, and now seeing it on me, sitting next to me, I know I was right. He’s me, but different. More . . . rugged? His features are mine, but it’s like they’ve been cast in a different light, reflected off a different mirror.

   “You’re not on drugs. No one slipped anything into your drink tonight and you didn’t fall on your head. Everything is as it should be.”

That, I feel, is strictly a matter of opinion. His voice is different from mine too. A little bit deeper, a little more commanding. Truth be told, he kinnda scares me, which is really weird to think about. He looks how I imagine I would look if I was a character in a John Woo movie or something.

   “Everything thing is as it should be, right . . . except that your sitting here, talking to yourselves. Some might be incline to say you’ve gone nuts! They’d be wrong, though.”

   The one to my right looks more similar to me. He’s got an odd, pseudo-punk thing going on, with ripped jeans, and a Red Hot Chili Pepper shirt over some fishnets. His hair is cut close to his head with a spike stripe of red running down the middle. He’s more handsome then I thought myself to be, in a dashing rouge-ish sort of way. His grin never leaves his face, like he just heard a juicy secret or like the cat that swallowed the canary. He takes a puff from the cigarette in his hand, and then blows out a perfect smoke ring. His grin says he knows more then me, and probably always will. It’s hard to look at them, I mean, how often do you get a chance to look at yourself, really look? Like how other people see you.   It’s much different then the biased reflection you see every time you pass a mirror. Then you’re seeing yourself as how you think you look, your own opinions and mindset going into it. But these two . . . it’s just a bit unsettling.

   “Okay, what the hell is going on? Why is this happing to me?”

   The one on my left takes a drink from a bottle I didn’t realize he was holding. It’s dark; probably some kind of ale. The label looks like it’s in Japanese.

   “You needed help, so we came.”

   I’m sitting here, talking to not one, but two different versions of myself. Damn right I need help. The type that comes in small plastic bottles labeled “prescription”.

   “How . . .?”

   “Well, for a start, you watch too many goddamn movies.”

   What the hell is that suppose to mean? I can feel the confusion all over my face.

   “All right, look. If you were religious, we’d be angels. If you were paranoid, we’d be, little gray aliens or something. But you saw some movie about a delusional guy talking to himself, and you latched onto it, hard. Some part of you was able to recognize the . . . the same madness, same mindset, the same splintering of self. Call it a defensive mechanism, call it insanity, but here we are.   I’m the id, you’re the ego, and he’s the superego, or however that goes; I’m not too sure; you never really studied Freud. Me and the Crow over here are parts of your unconscious, the part of you lying below the surface. I’m your happy-go-lucky, free-spirited, party all night side. I’m your sense of humor, your fun, your desire. He’s your serious, dark as night, bad mood side. He’s your sense of honor, your morals, your fighting spirit. Put the two of us together, add a generous portion of self-doubt, let simmer, and thirty minutes later we have you!    We’re different parts of the same whole. Extensions, extremes, whatever you want to call them.   Light,” he motions to himself, “and dark,” he motions to the other. “Basically, I am you. I am the clown.”  He’s grinning a little bit wider now.

   “And I am you, the Stoic.”

   “I am the jester,”

   “And I am the fighter.”

   “I am the lover . . .”

   “And I am the killer.”

   A shiver runs down my spine. I am desperately wishing I had a smoke. The one on my right pulls a cigarette out of no where, handing it to me. He leans in close as I reach for it, and our hands touch in an intimate way. His voiced is hush, like he’s telling me a great secret, and says:

   “We are your secret names, Alec. The names you give yourself, and never give away. The ones that are just so right, though you never knew why.”

   I know what he’s going to say before he speaks it (which makes sense, seeing as I is he, we is me). And he’s right. It all comes together with the names. Now I recognize them as part of me, of who I am, of what I am made of.

   “Fool.”

   The one on my right, Fool, mockingly bows, his face alight with a grin, his grin full of mischief.   He’s the me I always wanted to be to other people; charming, witty, fun . . . intoxicating. Always on time with a quick line, always with something funny to say. He speaks in silk tongues, and the ladies flock to him. He talks with clever insight, and the men admire him.

   “Hunter.”

   The one to my left nods solemnly. His features shadowed, the light from the streetlamp above some how misses his face. Only his eyes catch the poor illumination, shine out as if on fire. Him I know less about, but he’s there the same. Like a ronin, he has that look of honor and toughness etched into the every line of his face. He’s mysterious, that cool side I felt whenever I reached the peak of a fiery righteous anger. I always wondered that about myself, if this side truly existed in me or if I just wanted it to, and how strong it would be. Though he mirrors my physicality, there is something written into his posture, his presence, that says it is strong enough. Despite an odd sense of doubling, I feel proud. Does that make me vain, being proud of myself?

   “Vain or not, we are what we are. And now we are here.”

Master of the obvious, this one.

   “Okay, I get it, even though it’s completely insane. You’re here. Why?”

   Fool rapped me sharply on my head with his knuckles.

   “Hello? McFly? You zoning out? Tall, dark, and ugly over there already told you. You needed help, and like a sexy genie I appear. Just don’t be rubbin’ on me.”

   “Help? Help?? I’m sitting here talking to myself . . . my selves. Before you guys showed up, I was fine!

   The grin on Fool’s face gets even wider.

   “You think?”

   As he says it, he motions down with a single finger, like they do in the cartoons when one guy has run off the cliff, but doesn’t realize it yet, so he’s standing in mid-air. The sentiment was appropriate. I look down and suck in my breath, surprised. My feet are dangling out into the cool night air. I look around and realize I’m sitting on the edge of the old hand bridge. About sixty feet below me, I can hear the waters moving swiftly as they flow. I do not remember getting here.

   “Still believe everything’s kosher?”

 

. . .

 

   We’ve been sitting up here for the past few minutes in silence. Hunter sits contently, sipping his drink. The Fool has pulled a video game out of nowhere, quietly cursing the machine every time he dies. I’ve been staring down into the blackness underneath my feet. My cigarette is smoking on the concrete next to me, forgotten. Well, to me at least. I can see The Fool; he keeps glancing from his game to the cigarette, silently burning away. As the ash grows, his looks become more forceful until finally, the cigarette goes cold. He makes a disgusted ‘tch’ sound as he tosses the butt away, and says something about wasting expensive smokes. He pulls another out and lights it, handing it to me. I take a drag, the filter still warm from his lips, and then put it on the concrete next to me. The Fool gives a great exasperated sigh, then goes back to his game. But I can’t help it. For the past few minutes I’ve been trying to wrap my head around how I got here. I was at Eddie’s party, trying to have a good time. The people were louder then I like, and the atmosphere was heavy with the sickly sweet stench of weed. My head started to hurt, so I stepped outside to get a breath of fresh air. I started to walk down the street, planning on buying a pack of smokes, and . . . and then I was talking to them. The two. Five miles away from where I remember being. The time between seemed as empty as the space below me. Just darkness.

   “The fall isn’t really anything to worry about, I hear”

   I jump. The Fool had leaned over and was speaking in my ear, his hands empty. I look at him for a second, not knowing if he’s being serious, then down again at the blackness.

   “Nothing to worry about, huh?”

   “Nah.  Hell, the fall is the easy part. It’s the sudden stop at the end ya gotta worry about!”

   The Hunter chuckles at this, and I turn to glare at him. There’s nothing like feeling stupid, especially when I’m really doing it to myself.

   “Pay no attention to it, Alec, or him.”

   I can feel, feel, the Fool sticking his tongue out.

   “Right now, I need you to answer a question. It’s a simple one, easy as time. Who are you?”

   I try to imagine the scene: me, sitting by myself on the bridge, my a*s half hanging off, smoking a pretend cigarette, talking to myself. I barely manage to stifle a giggle.

   “Man, if you’re asking me that, then you got some problems. Hold on, I’ll show you who I am. Let me get a mirror.”

   This time the giggle gets out.

   “Stop it. Stop being The Fool. Do you not see that you life may depend on the answer? Have you allowed yourself to become so f*****g blind?”

   His tone never raises, there is never a hint of anger creeping in, but I feel rebuked anyway. I can’t look him in he eye, so I turn my gaze back down below.

   “Who am I? You should know. I mean, I’m me, what else? I’m Alec Hubris.”

   The Fool lets out a titter of his own.

   “In other words, you have no idea. Or you’re just playing dumb.”

   “Hey, screw off man! What the f**k kind of question is that anyway?”

   “It’s a relevant one, Alec. You have become lost.”

   I look at him, confused. Sure, maybe I don’t know how I ended up on the bridge, but I’m not lost. That makes no sense, no sense at all. Except . . .

   “Except you know it does. You’ve felt it, deep in you. Time has become a blur, too similar to make any distinction from one day to the next. You go through the motions when you wake each morning, but you’re simply not going anywhere. And you can’t. You don’t know where you should be going. This is to be lost. To be drowning on dry land, to be suffocating with each gasp of air, till all sense of you is dead inside. Everything that made you important and special withered on the vine, dying before it has the chance to blossom. That’s why you ended up on this bridge tonight. Neither The Fool nor I guided your steps. You got here all by yourself. And I will tell you something else: you were ready to walk off the edge. That’s what being lost is, dying, and never knowing why. Out of a sense of preservation, we decided it was time to try and talk to you, see if we could wake you from the haze in which you’ve been living, and almost dying. But if you can’t answer my one simple question, then we say aye, go and jump off. End it tonight. Finish it, because we cannot stand dying this slow death of apathy.”

   I want to be angry at him, at his little monologue. I want to tell him to sit and spin, that he doesn’t what the hell he’s talking about. He’s just a f*****g figment of my imagination anyway. A little piece of flotsam floating around in my head, caused by stress, or bad Chinese food. Hell, he could be a f*****g tumor, my synapses firing the wrong way till my brain goes ka-put, then it’s adios see ya latter. What right does he have to sound so damn self-important? I created him. Hell, I am him. I am him . . . and I know what he knows. And, with a touch of reluctance and embarrassment, I know he’s right. It’s been a long time since I really tried to do something, or be something. I barely made it out of high school, just getting by on the least effort I could. And ever since then, I’ve been humping the same dead end job, sleep walking from nine to five. I know that this isn’t all there is to life. I know this isn’t what I’m supposed to be doing, but for the life of me, I don’t know what the hell I’m suppose to do.

   “That’s the eternal question, ain’t it? How does one blossom into one’s full potential and therefore escaping the soul crushing sense of conformity and disparity that society otf times forces upon one?”

   “I thought the eternal question was what is the meaning of life?”

   “Pfft, that one’s easy,” he leans forward to face X, sharing with him one of his secret smiles. “We know.” I look at X, who, to my amazement smiles to himself.

   “The secret . . . “ he lowers his voice to a whisper, and leans in closer to me. “The meaning, the purpose of life . . . is to live.”

   I give him a wry look.

   “The secret is there is no secret. There is no one thing that would give your life meaning; anymore then it already has inherently. Jack London once said the proper function of man is to live, not just exist. That should strike close to heart, Alec.”

  “Alright, alright! I get it! I’m a f**k up!” I stand and start to yell at the two of them. Again, what I would give to see how someone else would see this. “You both tell me you’re here to help, but so far you’ve given me f**k all. I knew I’m in a s****y place right now. Of course I did. What I don’t know is what to do about it! And for all your fancy tricks and your philosophical pandering, I have yet to hear any suggestions. So here we go guys! We all know the f*****g problem; now what the hell do we do about it? You say that you’re just aspects of me . . . well I didn’t realize that I was about as useful as condom to the Virgin Mary!” 

   My rant ends and I sit back down hard on my a*s, shoulders heaving. They look at me for a moment, and then X passes me his bottle. I look at it for a second and snatch it out of his hands, nearly spilling it. I take a breath to calm myself, then down the rest of it in three long pulls. The beer is cool and bitter down my throat, and I feel better almost immediately. 

   We sit in silence. The two are watching me, and I’m staring at the bottle in my hands, trying to remember the name for future reference, not sure what to say next.  I feel embarrassed for blowing up like that, for yelling. Yelling at myself. I’m angry at myselves. Angry at myselves. Angry . . .

   Then it kinnda hits me, not all at once but in a slow wave. I’m angry at myself. All this time, I’ve known of my own wasted potential, but just haven’t bothered enough to care. There are a million ways that I could get out of this rut, but I play stupid cause it’s easier to whine about not knowing how then to actually do it. I never thought of myself as lazy, just . . . too damn comfortable with where I happened to be at that moment in my life. And even when I did stop to recognize what I was doing to myself, I would just sit and wallow in my own self-pity. Bottom line, I was – am – scared. Scared of what it’s going to take to change the way I am. Scared, maybe even, of what I might become afterwards. The Fool puts a hand on my shoulder, gently.

   “So, we come to the root of it. The problem lies exposed for all to see. Now that we know the shape of it, would you like some advice?”

   I look up at him. In this moment, he’s not charming, or dashing, but almost real. I nod.

   “Even if it means facing your fears and doing battle with them head-on?” I nod again.

   “Well, here’s a surprise for you . . . you already know what to do. Of course you do, because we know. You have to believe in yourself, it’s as simple as that. And, I hate to be trite, but you have to let your heart be your guide. Right now, that’s us. So, do you trust us, Alec? Do you trust yourself?”

   What a question, so loaded. “I . . .yes. I trust you. I believe in me.”

   “Stand up then.”

   I get up, and so do they. We take a moment and look down at the cool blackness spread out around us. Far below, the water is singing softly.

   “Alex, you need to jump.”

   I turn sharply to him. “Wha . . . ?”

   “That’s it, buddy. You’ve got to be willing to let it all go, and just jump. Cast off your fear and self-doubts, everything that’s been holding you down. It’s kinnda like life, man. It’s the sudden stop at the end that takes the piss. All you’ve can do is make sure you enjoy yourself on the way down, make sure it all means something.”

   I look at him, the Fool, trying to read some hint of smile on his face. None. He’s serious about this. I turn to the Hunter, and he nods, encouraging me. All this sounds crazy, but then again, so does holding a conversation with yourself on the edge of a bridge at 1 o’clock in the morning. The night is all around me, trying to engulf me in its stillness, and I know I must decide what I’m going to do. I notice the bottle the Hunter handed me is still in my hand, empty. With a grunt, I throw it as far as I can into the pitch, and am rewarded with the small musical sound of glass breaking as it comes to its own sudden stop.

   “F**k it.”

   Without looking to either of them, I close my eyes and fall. The feeling is exhilarating and it makes me feel alive. The wind is whipping past me, whistling in my ears, and even knowing how this is going to end, I am happy. I’m free.

 

. . .

 

   I open my eyes. I’m still on the bridge, feet firmly planted on the concrete. The Fool slaps me on the back, his voice welling with pride.

   “It’s a leap of faith, man. Congratulations, I think you’re going to make it.”

   I smile, but when I turn to face him, he’s gone. The Hunter too. I’m stand standing by myself next to an empty bottle of ale and dead cigarette butts. For a second, I’m ready to question it all, think it was just a dream, but I can’t. Because it’s different now. I’m different. I trusted in them, I trusted in myself. I guess that was the only way for me to be alive again, not just existing. 

Satisfied, I make my way over the guardrail. Starting my walk back, I reach to put my hands in my coat pocket, and feel something there. I pull out a pack of cigs, the same type the Fool was smoking, and a receipt from the store down the street. I smile as I light one up. I think I can almost hear them as I head back to the party.

   “You think the kids’ gonna be okay?”

   “Of course . . . he has us, doesn’t he?”

Author's Note

The different fonts are designating different voices. I did this to try and avoid confusion. If it helps, I could change it to different colors, but I thought that might get annoying to look at.

Reviews

[Montilee Stormer]

Fantastic.

The different fonts were perfect. Different colors would be distracting. Took me a minute to figure them out but once I had, I was golden. The bold for Hunter is a good choice. Speaking of Hunter, in the last third of the story, you call him X - I'm guessing that's a holdover from a draft.

I've got no quibbles with this at all. It flowed well, and the further adventures of Alec, Fool, and Hunter is definitely something to look forward to. It would be my wish that they become a metaphorical but indescriminate team of killers, but that's just my own Dark Passenger wanting someone to play with.

Great job.

I liked this. The different fonts worked well. It was not at all confusing and the descriptions of Hunter and Fool seemed so real. Great story!