My Whole Expanse I Cannot See…

You are not perfect, you are not pure.

You are full of cracks, cracks too deep to fill with all the liquor, all the morphine in the world.

You are damaged, and fucked up, and worn down.

You’re just pretending to be alive, pretending until you can stop.

So, just after the saying of Grace, with people sitting around a table of lit candles, poured wine glasses, a turkey bigger than any infant child, and all the foods that would accompany such a turkey, he left the table. It seemed a little odd, perhaps, to leave just after the prayer, and just before the meal, to leave without a word, but stranger things have happened. He’s a writer, he’s eccentric. Besides, he’d be back, right? Where could he possibly go? Then, they heard the front door, the open and the close. The starting of a car, headlights dancing around the living-room, tires screeching down the driveway, he was gone. He was so absolutely fucking gone.

Right now, in the car, stereo blasting angry songs, and sad songs, sung by sad, dead people, he’s driving. He’s driving nowhere in particular, he’s just driving. He’s driving to think, and not think, the cold night air hitting his face through open windows. The cold air feels so good, it burns his skin, wakes him up. He’s really not sure where he’s going, but he’s not going back there, back to his lifeless life. He’s not going to change his mind, slam on the brakes, turn the car around. He’d rather pull a gun and put a bullet in his mouth, it’d be better than what’s behind him. Back there’s another sort of death. People can die of boredom, and tedium, and frustration, and loneliness. They’re just as sure to kill as a bullet, but they’re slower, more quiet-like. They kill by inches and years, not with a click and a bang, and pieces of your face scattered around the room. Who needs that sort mess anyhow? He’d feel bad for the poor fuck who’d have to clean him off the ceiling. No, he’s not going back. He just doesn’t fit, never has. Back there, he’s alone in a crowd. He always feels like he ought to be somewhere else. He’s thinking about wheres just now, driving through the cold dark.

He thinks about God as he’s sitting at a red light across from some church. He could stop by, see if anyone’s home, see if God’s home. God probably wouldn’t answer the door though, God never answers anything. We’re all just solicitors trying to sell Him something, trying to get Him to buy our prayers. Keep me safe. Make me happy. I’ll be good, really, I promise. He’s heard it all before, He’s not interested. The light turns green, gas pedal hits the floor, the car doesn’t stop, not here.

He could go to some bar, get shit-faced with all the cash in his wallet, sleep it off back at the car, but he’s done that before. Liquor’s a Goddamn fucking blast, until it isn’t. Until you wake up enough mornings feeling like you got dragged under a truck, genuinely wishing that truck had finished you off. Bars are just somewheres that usually lead to nowheres. At least, that’s been his experience. He needs something different, something he’s never found in a shot glass, or a church, or behind the door he left before he got in his car and sped away.

He could leave it all, the whole fuckin’ city, the entire fuckin’ state. He could get on a bus, drive cross-country. He’s always thought about chucking it all, going somewhere quiet, somewhere where no one would think to find him. Maybe he’d write postcards a year or two later, “Hi, I’m not dead. I’m just in Casper, Wyoming.” He’d find a little house to rent, maybe a small apartment. He’d do odd jobs around town, shoveling snow, serving coffee in some diner, anything that pays anything. He’d read at night, listen to music as he falls asleep in a place that’s his own. He’d be alone, but not entirely lonely. He’d have a blank canvas, he could create a different reality. He’d have blank pages on which to write the story of him. He thinks about ditching his car at the bus station, a gesture that says, “Well, I’m out, it’s been real.” He looks up at the stars, wonders what those stars look like in Casper.

There’s a girl though, there’s a girl. At another red light, another stop, he thinks about her. He loves her, she’s always in his head somewhere. She’s really where he’s wanted to be all night, not driving around. He’s just afraid, afraid that it’s too much to hope for, being with her. Still, he could drive across town, he could go to her. He could tell her about the dinner, and the door closing behind him. He could tell her he loves her completely, how much she feels like home to him. He could hold her close, tell her she’s beautiful. She is beautiful, he can’t look up at the night sky and find a single star as beautiful as her. He could tell her he wants to fall asleep with her in his arms, that he wants to wake up in the morning and see her soft brown eyes smiling at him. He could kiss her in the moonlight, tell her he just wants to stay with her awhile, how ever long awhile might be. He could go to her and see what happens.

The light goes green, tires spin against pavement. He thinks to himself, “Well, fuck it, Casper isn’t going anywhere.”

You remember before her, before her warm brown eyes, her curly brown hair.

You remember before her touch, and before her kiss, before you ever held her close, told her you love her.

You remember the grey, and the empty, and the weight of lonely.

But when you’re with her, her hand in yours, her lips against yours, you forget the befores. The grey has color, the empty’s all filled up. The lonely isn’t heavy on your chest, doesn’t drag you down.

All those befores, they scare you though, they absolutely fucking scare you. They’re places you don’t miss, don’t care to go again. These places are like ghosts, they haunt you when it’s quiet. They stop by and say hi when you’re alone in the dark.

She keeps it all away, the places you don’t miss, the ghosts that haunt, so you want her to stay. She might not, and you know it. The might nots make you uneasy sometimes, they keep sleep away when you let them in, but they’re worth the risk of happening. Without that risk, all those befores would be so right now.

She could be gone tomorrow, or the next tomorrow, or the next, but maybe she won’t. You want to tell her things with a voice you can’t find. You want to kiss her slow, and be with her as long as tiny gears turning tiny hands allow.

She might go one day, but you don’t want it to be today, not today.

You’re sitting in this bar, this sad, smokey place where fuck ups go to forget that they’re fuck ups, at least for a few hours. You’re sitting at the bar proper, front and center. The lights above you are blue, making all the the liquor bottles shelved in front of you look soft and peaceful. You wonder if you look soft and peaceful, you doubt it.

You order another vodka shot, slam it back. It burns going down, it warms your face. You feel a little numb, you like the numb. Numb, the off-brand version of contentment. Numb, of course, leads to drunk, the off-brand version of happy. This shot makes seven dead shots, lined across the bar. Seven not so deadly sins.

There are maybe ten people in the whole place. It’s 1 AM on a Monday, odds are nobody has a job to go to in the morning. People are mostly sitting in the booths behind you, forest green leather, brown wood. There’s a candle on every table, neon signs on the walls, picking up the slack for the candles, telling people what poison to drink. A couple in the corner next to the door is making out like there’s no tomorrow. They’re all heat, and close, and immediacy. She’s got the guy up against the wall, holding his arms back, shoving him hard against the wall, her shoulder-length brown hair thrashing this way and that. She’s fucking the guy without actually fucking him. It’s kind of surreal, maybe they know something you don’t know. Maybe tomorrow isn’t coming, you just didn’t get the memo, or the e-mail, or the flyer. Or maybe you’re just lonely and somber-like. You wonder if you’ll ever feel anything like that again, that sort of intensity with another person.

You had this idea of what your life would be like by right now, and this sure as shit wasn’t it. Sitting here, alone in a crowd, getting shit-faced, this was not the plan. Getting shit-facd as often as you do was not part of the plan. Drunk is just so much easier anymore. Alcohol kills feelings, which is the idea, because everything you feel is dark, empty, lonely. You’ll sleep alone tonight, and you know it. Tonight, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, for you don’t know how long. No one will hold you close, no one will kiss you slow.

Drunk as you are, so drunk you can hardly feel your face, in that place between drunk and oblivion, you still feel time flying through you. You always feel it. Time is like this surprise amount of cash in your wallet. You can’t know how much you have to spend, you just know when it runs out. The wallet goes empty, and that’s it. This terrifies you.

You’re afraid you’re going to end so far away from everything you ever wanted. You’re afraid that the time you spend getting where you want to go is wasted time. You’re afraid that everywhere you go will keep feeling empty, empty even when you get to the last place. You drown yourself in liquor hoping to make time leave you be awhile, to make you forget your wants that feel so far away, but it never works. Not really.

You should get up, go for the door. You should breathe in the cool night air, get so far away from fixes that don’t fix. You order another shot, maybe this one is the one that will make it better, but it’s not. Of course it’s not.

I want to let you in, to hand you the key to me.

I want you to see all my locked rooms, the lonely places people never see. They’re all dark, dusty, full of hidden things. I want to show you the rooms that keep my secrets, my fears, the dreams too stupid to show anyone else.

I’ve locked so many rooms, guided people away from the things I don’t trust to anyone. The things I didn’t trust to anyone, until you showed up one day.

I want you to see everything, to know everything and maybe stay awhile. I want you to stay, though I want most people to go.

I want to let you in, to hand you the key to me. It’s scary wanting something so much, scary to feel so much trust. You might not take the key, you might not like what you find inside. You might say, “Goodbye, nice try.” So much I don’t know, but I want to let you in.

He lays down, cold and alone, a thousand thoughts in his head, and nothing to say. How he got there doesn’t matter. He can’t stay awake. He closes his eyes, and hopes to wake somewhere nice.

You have your masks, you wear them everyday. Masks cover your walls, you take them down to cover you, so you can be who you need to be. Happy masks, funny masks, masks to cover the sad and the suicide. Masks to cover the empty and the lonely. The masks are heavy, they make you tired. You hate that you need them, or maybe you hate everything they hide. Maybe it’s both, you’re too frayed to know. So many masks you can’t think straight, so many masks you don’t want to wear.

So many Goddamn fucking masks, killing you without killing you.

So, I saw it there on the bar, scribbled in pencil on a scrap of paper, stuck under a dead shot glass. The place was dark, filled with smoke and people, people having a better time than me. I’m not really sure how I noticed it, or why I bothered to pick up that glass to read what I read. It was just there, someone’s thought, someone’s prayer, stuck under a dead shot glass, written on a dying scrap of paper. Just two lines, just a nothing of a prayer.

I want to be next to you right now, you so close, my hand touching your face. I want to kiss you slow, I want to tell you I love you with the voice in my head.

I put it back, left it there. I wonder if it ever ended up where it was supposed to go.

Drugs, and liquor, and loneliness, and ghosts.They’ll hold you close and kiss you slow. They’re forever friends, eager lovers.

They’ll hold your hand, they’ll walk you home. Drugs, and liquor, and loneliness, and ghosts. They’ll fling you toward oblivion, and you’ll welcome the push.

Stay with me awhile, your head on my shoulder.

Stay with me awhile, looking at me the way you do.

Stay with me awhile, the two of us in the dark.

Stay in case the zombies come, stay in case tomorrow doesn’t.

Stay because I love you, and because I’m why you look at me the way you do.

Stay with me awhile, let me kiss you slow.

Let me hold you close, let me stay awhile.