FIC: "A Spark."
Hope y'all had a good Halloween, I'm in awe of the treats.
Title: A Spark
Author: Me, hazey_jane_i
Rating: R/15. Swearing and addiction.
Word Count: 4,147
Disclaimer: None of this is to be associated with the real people bearing these names.
Feedback is like fairy dust. Sparkly and joyful.
They say drunkenness is temporary suicide. Where’d he heard that one before?
Greg blinks and pulls out his wallet, down to quarters, counting them out across the bar, each silver coin leaving a trail of sticky alcohol behind it across the dark, stained wood. He’s half impressed he can count up that well. The other half is displeased, as he pushes the pile of coins towards the barman wordlessly. Senses still too sensitive for his taste.
Try to wash away the pain.
Greg slumps on the bar stool, eyes bloodshot and head full of vodka induced mist.
“Think it’s time you call it a night Proops” the barman comments, shaking his head. This one was a regular. Yes, regular train wreck if he ever saw one. “Reckon you got about one more shot and you’ll be out completely.”
“Give it then…” Greg slurs, lifting his head.
“You gonna pay for it sunshine?” But before Greg can reply with an elongated, inarticulate no he falls forwards, head smacking the bar square on, the sound resonating through the half empty joint. The barman sighs, moping around Greg’s head, clearly unaffected by Greg’s lack on consciousness, carrying on with his job.
Nobody stirs. No matter if you live, no matter if you die.
He whimpers softly as the sunlight persists at cracking through his eyelids, searing his fettered brain. Greg winces in pain; his lips dry as he parts them. Gingerly, he inches into a seating position, and opens his dark chocolate eyes a fraction, pupils blown and bloodshot. Each minute movement sends a spike of pain though his skull until he ceases the action, the burn fading only to be replaced by a rhythmic pounding. Thud, thud, thud…Like the invert of his broken heart.
Oh yeah, the bar. Solid wood, no wonder it hurts like fuck.
Greg takes long, drawn out breaths, in and out, marveling at the capabilities of his lungs, still in order it seems. He blinks rapidly before remembering he needs glasses, easing the thick lenses and heavy black frames into place on the bridge of his nose and tentatively surveying his location.
Home. That’s fucking exceptional, considering…Well, just... considering. Greg spares himself the ugly details and harsh truths. Just for a little while longer, he could pretend for just a little while. How did it come to this? Being amazed when you wake up in your own bed the next day; being amazed that you wake up at all.
It hadn’t always been like this, he’d had friends, a succession of relationships. Hell, he even loved a few of them, or at least, liked to think he did. The Greg of yesteryear was full of hope and dreams, in his final year of college; clarity shining through that stand up was his destiny.
Greg’s sorrowful train of thoughts is crudely interrupted by the phone ringing, harsh peals like a new wave of weaponry to his cranium. He answers it to stop the noise drilling into his hangover headache.
“’Lo?” he mumbles, mouth dry, voice cracking hoarsely.
“Proops, it‘s Reed, checkin’ y’all ain’t done yourself in entirely” He breathes a sigh of relief, briefly, before his brain alerts him that he has to come up with a reply.
“No, not dead Rahlman.” he replies quietly, each decibel out to intensify the headache further.
“Listen Greg…you uh…you missed a Faultline yesterday, where were ya?” Reed Rahlman asks, trying to keep the worry at bay.
“Got...held up…” Greg mutters.
“Well, McShane and I were, y’know, just wondering. We’ve got one tonight, remember? 7.30 at the Civic-”
“I know Reed, I know, I’ll be there.” Greg hangs up quickly, the pressure of forming a conversation overwhelming.
Well, I’m sick and all done in.
Time to get up, it would seem. Shuffling to his feet Greg treads the path slowly to the bathroom. Shower, brush teeth, dress; his morning mantra. He recites it over in his head, whether for something to do or for actual mandatory function he doesn’t know any more, but would bet on the latter, too worried about the outcome to actually test his theory. Derailment is contrary to progress.
He lights a cigarette, sinking down at his desk in a pensive state, trying to think of something, anything at all. He gazes around, the end of the cigarette burning quickly but not being smoked, a line of ash building as the orange flame dulls and weakens.
It is so small now, that little flicker of “Perhaps today will be different” numbed and doused with each drink.
And yet, there is still somehow a fragment left. Sometimes the embers just have to be relit. A single flick of the wrist and everything can be reignited, old flames brought to life again.
Greg jerks as the ash spills onto the desk, too heavy for the burnt out cigarette to handle.
“Fuck.” He groans as the dust covers his notes in a layer of smudges and shadows, scraping the grey off of his precious scrawled notes, trying preserve them as best he can. Giving up he sinks back into the murky depths of his mind.
***
So lonely, and I ain’t even high.
Greg sighs as he watches her pack her bags, unsure what to do now the fact has been established; she’s leaving, and not coming back.
“I can’t.” She mutters over and over, for her own confirmation as much as Greg’s. She’d tried to walk out on him before, but this time is different, more significant. Final.
“But…” he didn’t really know where he was going with it, so was grateful she interrupted him so quickly.
“I. Can’t.” she hisses, catlike, tossing her blonde hair back, green eyes bloodshot and glistening with tears. “You’re way too intense Greg. You’re so fucking bitter and sarcastic, it poisons me.” She gushes quickly. Talk about ripping the band aid off fast. Greg stares silently, muted and rooted by her words as she continues. “You’re so desperate to be a comedian; it’s all you think about night and day. But comedians don’t think about being comedians, they think about life, about other people. Then make funny things out of it. You’re missing out on everything! On me!”
Off balance and out of depth he tosses out the only life ring he has left,
“I love you...” It sinks to the floor with a heavy thud, lifeless.
“Well I don’t love you. I thought maybe I could, but it’s just not possible Greg.”
She drops a pile of books to the floor, burying any hopes Greg once had under the slap of his baseball encyclopedia, and his tattered and battered copies of his old favourites he’d leant her. “Don’t even like baseball” she murmurs, half to herself, as she locks her case and grabs her carrier bags of things, Greg merely observes, almost third party to the end of his relationship. He always was a third wheel.
Rejection is never easy. He watches in slow motion as she heads out the door.
“You’ll never be a comedian Greg. The sooner you get that, the sooner you can be a human being.”
The clock ticks in the corner, counting out seconds, minutes, hours. Time is beyond mechanic measure. And so he blinks. Once, twice, three times. She doesn’t reappear. In that moment Greg’s flame died, the light went out.
I’m so damn lonely, and I feel like I’m gonna die.
*
“C’mon Greg buddy, it’s time you got up.”
My heart is ripped,
it’s torn and smashed.
“Yeah, man up bitch!”
It’s shattered like glass,
spider web cracks spindling
it’s entire surface.
“Forrest!”
“Sorry Mike.”
Greg keeps his eyes resolutely shut. Perhaps then, they’ll leave me alone.
“Greg…please…It’s been two weeks. Why don’t you get up?”
“I can’t. My heart is broken.” Oh, shit, said that one aloud. He sighs, cracking open an eye and immediately regretting it.
“He’s alive!” The blurry outline of Forrest Brakeman claps gleefully, and Greg scans around the out of focus room to spot the unmistakable silhouette of Mike McShane standing by his head.
“How did you guys get into my apartment?” He asks, confused, his head running on empty for a considerable time now.
“Door was unlocked” replies mike casually.
“Best remember to lock it next time…keep people out…” Greg growls flatly, tugging the throw rug tighter around him on the sofa, fully intending to return back to sleep, back to the safety of the darkness.
“It’s been two weeks…” Mike says gently, worry in his eyes, not that Greg could see it that well. But he sure could hear it. “Why don’t you get up and have a shower, come out with us to Cobbs. Warren is playing tonight, he wants to see you after, he’s worried too. Come on buddy, please?”
No.
“Fine…”
“Maybe next step would be cleaning?” Forrest jokes, grinning goofily at his best friend as he rises. Greg merely blinks and turns, heading slowly to the bathroom. Mike slaps Forrest over the back of the head.
“Tact, Brakeman, such tact.”
Greg steps slowly out of the turmoil of his apartment, the sea breeze from the bay catching his eyes, making them burn. Or at least, that’s what he tells the guys, he can’t own up to tears, not yet. He breathes slowly, composing himself, turning to Mike and Forrest.
“Ok…” he mutters, giving them permission to start chattering, laughing and relaxing, knowing both of them had been holding their breath as they left the safety of Greg’s abode. As they walk Greg gazes around the streets of San Francisco, the colours, sights and sounds of other people living their lives. He sighs, his own life in grayscale by comparison, the radiant colours of the sunset over the bay now weak and faded, like the dying embers of a once bright flame. I feel like Charlie Chaplin’s trap, just not as loveable, he decides, chewing his lip. Greg watches as everyone around him is lifted higher to an emotion he can’t quite reach, chained down by the lead of his heart. On either side of him Mike and Forrest joke, sparring with each other over some unimportant matter, trying every so often to include him.
“That’s right, ain’t it Greg?” Forrest prompts on cue, nudging his best friend, goofy expression hiding the concern for him. The effort is wasted on Greg, who shrugs and slinks off ahead. He stops suddenly, aware he can’t remember where they are going. Mike sweeps him up in a wave, leading him to Cobbs.
The club is dark and dim, a natural hiding place for Greg to blend into, no effort required on his part. He shrugs off his chaperones and heads to the bar, falling into a stool heavily, gazing enviously at the stage, once his true home, but not any more. She made sure of that.
“Vodka lemonade please…” he mutters to the barman, not actually thirsty, just knowing that it’s what one does at the bar. In order to fade into the scene surrounding him, to remain inconspicuous, he sips at the clear drink absent mindedly, each mouthful making the throbbing pain ease for a moment. He drinks slowly but constantly, for something to do; to occupy the space where the hurt is; to avoid, for the briefest moments at a time, having to feel. Greg closes his eyes as the warm feeling of the clear liquid slips through his veins with ease. Gradually he relaxes, his smile returning, eyes bright, laugh loud. Eyes a little too bright, laugh a little too loud as the soothing vodka fills him up from the inside out.
Mayday, mayday…
***
Greg stumbles back to the present with a jolt, his headache returning in full force. He groans, resting his head against the cool wood of the desk, knowing what he will ultimately do, the day already mapped out by his addiction.
Greg sighs, mind rifling through all the months of memories, nearly all blurred images of drinks. He shakes his head, digging his nails into the battered and scratched wood of his old desk.
“No. I don’t want to. Not again.” He moans softly to himself “I don’t want to be this person, this freak who wakes up every morning not sure what he did the night before…I want to know where I’ve been, who I’ve seen…I want to keep a promise…” he garbles quietly, a reflex inside him believing if he keeps talking the fight will be won. “Won’t go, won’t go, won’t go…” he mutters, quickly lighting another cigarette as he glances at his clock, He’d held on three hours today, he could stick another three before he meets the Faultline gang, right? They’ll keep him safe then. He grits his teeth, wedging his cigarette firmly between his lips, picking up his pen and starting to write ferociously with intense concentration.
He’d gone home that first night laughing and singing, mind buzzing with new ideas, the cobwebs blown from his brain and the hurt white washed over as if it were never there. Greg had written nearly twenty minutes of material that night, twenty minutes worth keeping he discovered that Friday at Cobbs. He received a storm of laughs and cheers, and a balloon of warmth had risen in his chest that he had not felt in months.
“Hey, maybe a shot or two ain’t so bad for performance after all!” he jokes to his friends afterwards, an odd pang in his stomach, a quiet lift of his heart as his fingers gripped the cool neck of the vodka bottle in the heated nightclub. And so he fell into a pattern, a dangerous one. Get drunk, perform, and drink to come back down. And the hangovers became more intense, as the material began to dry. He had to drink more for the same buzz.
“It’s just not good value any more” he remembers Forrest remark once, only half joking as he anxiously watched Greg consume the crystal liquid. Steadily he found himself visiting liquor stores, bars, clubs, anywhere that would have him. It happened so quietly, working away at him in the background, by the time he had noticed he’d swam out of his depth it was too late, the riptide tore him away completely.
He lost control before he even realized it had happened.
Greg glances up at the clock, almost ready to scream. Forty fucking minutes, is that all? He snatches up his papers, rereading them, breathing heavy. All trash. All of it. He stands up reluctantly, just going to get some fresh air he reminds himself as he heads out the front door. He pauses at the liquor store, teetering on the brink. Just one won’t hurt…a little pick me up before the show tonight…
Cannot get a grip on me, can’t even try.
“Greg….buddy…I think you should talk about this with someone” Mike’s voice echoes in his head as he places one foot in front of the other down the street, all control vanished, the addiction running everything now. He’d stepped away from the liquor store as he’d passed, chewing his lips and his head ducked low, but there is no escape as his feet carried him along of their own accord towards the bar.
“No, I’m fine, just got too drunk one time too many” Greg had hiccoughed in reply, barking out a laugh. “Two and two makes four…” he snorted, amusement in his unfocussed eyes before frowning, the pain of events past crossing his mind again “Not drunk enough though…” Mike was hardly convinced of this, but there was little he could do. If Greg wanted to drink, then he would and not even his best friend had any say in the matter.
Greg trudges through the misty afternoon to the bar, troubled mind running over every conversation he can remember of late, almost all of them being in hushed concerned tones and including some reference to alcohol and his consumption thereof. He frowns, memories floating to the surface of his mind.
Mike sighed as he gazed at the slumped over figure of his best friend. He gently shook Greg’s shoulder, trying to rouse his friend.
“Come on buddy…”
“Ugh?” Greg turned, and Mike can see the clear outline of a slap across his cheek. Another rejection clearly, nobody wants to be with a drunk.
“It’s time to go home Greg, you can’t stay here.” He nods obediently, sliding off the stool and straight to the floor. Dutifully Mike scoops his slack friend off the floor, heading home.
Routine isn’t always good, especially when you break it down.
“You know what…” Greg blinked up from his bottle, slumped on the sofa an hour later.
“Wha?” He’d mumbled, gazing across at his pensive friend, the worry etched in every action, every blink of his eye. “You need to find someone, someone to fix you. It sure as hell ain’t me Greg, I’m just holding down the fort until they get here.” Greg had stared at him for a moment of clarity, as Mike rubs his eyes behind his glasses in frustration and exhaustion. Greg retorts with a grunt,
“Who the fuck would want me…?” he mutters, before slipping into unconsciousness, eyes closing and fingers going slack on the clear glass neck of the bottle. Mike sighs
“Whoever they are, they better turn up soon…”
Then they come in a rush, every single drunken rescue, every screaming match, every awkward questioning of where he was and why he’d missed the show the night before. The disappointed expressions on his friends and family’s faces, which changed to worried, frustrated and finally to angry as his addiction consumed him, the hushed tones of concern in their voices growing ever more urgent. The resentment in their eyes and the shake of their heads as they find him once more, hammered and helpless, at the mercy of his vice. It is all there, and every last inch of him burns with self hatred for what he has become; a wash out and a drunk.
Shot down over a stormy sea; feel like I’m drifting away.
Greg jerks as he stops outside the bar; the same one Forrest and Mike have collected him from almost every night. He stares up at the once happy place, rocking on his heels, surprised at his sudden clear recollection of the past few weeks, and the pain and guilt shed along with it.
“I hope they come too Mike” he whispers “or I’m gonna die here.” He takes a deep breath, reluctantly stepping over the threshold and into the pit of hell, dragging his feet, all grip gone once again as the liquor beats him down.
Drugs or overeating or alcohol or sex, it was all just another way to find peace. To escape what we know. Our education. Our bite of the apple.
He’d tried to get better before, on his own. He’d looked up books on being an “alcoholic” (although at the time Greg was adamant it was just to see what it was like). He’d read the self help books, dismissing them as nonsense… “The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.” He smirks and shakes his head as the quote drifts into his brain,
“Bullshit,” he mutters, sipping on his vodka, delving deeper into his memories of the self help universe.
Greg flopped on his sofa, book number eight on his lap. Apparently eight is lucky. At least Greg hoped it would be. “The first step to recovery is reading this book…” He was already done by this point, but he kept on reading, hoping somewhere along the line it would pick up, become useful in some way or another. “You must first learn the source of your addiction, think back and identify reasons for drinking, and address these properly…”
“Patronizing piece of shit!” he shouted, chasing away his hurt with more vodka. The book had touched a nerve, a nerve he liked to keep buried away under leagues of alcohol. He’d burned that book to cinders; one night simply set it alight and watched it curl in on itself, drowning in the flames.
“See how you like it” he’d hissed as the words dissolved on the charred pages…
He jumps and blinks up as the barman stands over him. Greg glances at his watch - oh wait he never put one on. How long had he been here? He’s not even finished his drink, golly well that’s sure to be a first. Greg frowns, gradually becoming aware of the fact he is lying on the floor.
“Huh…?” He quips, that Proopsian lightning wit there.
“Good, you aren’t dead. But I’m kicking you out now anyway.” Greg’s frown deepens,
“W-why?” He stammers, slowly sitting himself up from the sticky floor, back groaning in protest from the fall, head instantly screaming its dislike of movement.
“You should get yourself checked sunshine. You ain’t well, so I’m tossing you out.” With ease the barman hoists Greg off the dirty bar floor and frogmarches him to the door.
Standing in the rain, and I feel like I’m gonna cry.
Greg scrubs at his glasses with his handkerchief in frustration, but no matter how he tries he cannot seem to erase the sudden crystal clear memories from his head. Crystal like the glass of vodka he should (not) be drinking. Sliding his glasses back onto the bridge of his nose Greg sighs, the rain immediately clouding them over, his vision lost entirely, starting to walk down the street, hoping against hope that he will find something to block out the memories crowding his head. He whimpers softly to himself, tugging on his curls. Holding out his hands Greg blinks, realising his fingertips are shaking uncontrollably. How he feels on the inside finally comes shining through.
“Fuck…” he mumbles, shaking his head, sinking down against the wall, hearing the rough brick tear at his jacket like fingernails. He closes his eyes, head to his knees, huddling up small. “Please go away…” he whispers, silent salty tears dripping from under his closed eyelids. “I can’t…I just can’t…”
He knows he is late for the Civic show, he knows there will be questions, he knows now that everything he once had, all of it is gone. All that remains is his addiction, nothing more. No volume of vodka can wash away the pain inside.
Standing in the rain, and I feel like I’m gonna die.
It’s all to much, the roaring pain in his head, the rushing of withdrawal, the constant reminders of his failure stabbing at him, torturing him. The panic rises in his chest, air constricting, he can’t breathe, can’t see, can’t do anything but scream.
“I DON’T WANT IT.” He roars suddenly, the torrential downpour crashing on his head, yet he makes no effort to seek shelter. “I don’t want ANY of it. I don’t want to be here any more. I can’t!” He slumps down further on the wall, soaked to the bone and trembling. “They aren’t coming Mike, you were wrong, I’m going to die here…”
I’m so damn lonely…
Suddenly the hairs on the back of his neck prickle, and he feels he is being watched. He frowns through his tear filled eyes, scraping at his lenses with his jacket sleeves. Shoes appear out of the gloom. Little shoes, black patent high heels, with dainty feet in them, slender ankles. Not the cops then. He breathes out slowly, daring to look up, taking in the young woman an inch at a time, clothes soaked through and moulded to her tiny frame, darkened by the heavy rainwater, before he meets her face. Her delicate features are surrounded by a cloud of hair, waving across her face by the whipping wind.
What he notices though, is her eyes. No judgement, only empathy.
“I’m fucking insane…” He mutters to himself, the figure clearly a figment of his broken and fevered mind.
“No…just lost…” she replies softly. “But you’ll find your way eventually.”
“No chance.” He mutters.
“I’m Jennifer.” Great, he’s not only crazy, but creating named characters. Greg hangs his head once more, falling silent as a calm settles over them both, a calm Jennifer oozes into the air, settling Greg’s wild cravings and stilling his shakes.
He waits a while to see if the pretty feet fade, waits to see if he really has flipped and this fragment of his imagination, this ghostlike creature, will disappear and take the last of his hopes with it - her. He frowns, sniffing suddenly, looking up as the woman - Jennifer - lights a cigarette, the amber end glowing bright.
A spark through the darkness…
You stand there bleeding, people pass you by. But not her.
Title: A Spark
Author: Me, hazey_jane_i
Rating: R/15. Swearing and addiction.
Word Count: 4,147
Disclaimer: None of this is to be associated with the real people bearing these names.
Feedback is like fairy dust. Sparkly and joyful.
They say drunkenness is temporary suicide. Where’d he heard that one before?
Greg blinks and pulls out his wallet, down to quarters, counting them out across the bar, each silver coin leaving a trail of sticky alcohol behind it across the dark, stained wood. He’s half impressed he can count up that well. The other half is displeased, as he pushes the pile of coins towards the barman wordlessly. Senses still too sensitive for his taste.
Try to wash away the pain.
Greg slumps on the bar stool, eyes bloodshot and head full of vodka induced mist.
“Think it’s time you call it a night Proops” the barman comments, shaking his head. This one was a regular. Yes, regular train wreck if he ever saw one. “Reckon you got about one more shot and you’ll be out completely.”
“Give it then…” Greg slurs, lifting his head.
“You gonna pay for it sunshine?” But before Greg can reply with an elongated, inarticulate no he falls forwards, head smacking the bar square on, the sound resonating through the half empty joint. The barman sighs, moping around Greg’s head, clearly unaffected by Greg’s lack on consciousness, carrying on with his job.
Nobody stirs. No matter if you live, no matter if you die.
He whimpers softly as the sunlight persists at cracking through his eyelids, searing his fettered brain. Greg winces in pain; his lips dry as he parts them. Gingerly, he inches into a seating position, and opens his dark chocolate eyes a fraction, pupils blown and bloodshot. Each minute movement sends a spike of pain though his skull until he ceases the action, the burn fading only to be replaced by a rhythmic pounding. Thud, thud, thud…Like the invert of his broken heart.
Oh yeah, the bar. Solid wood, no wonder it hurts like fuck.
Greg takes long, drawn out breaths, in and out, marveling at the capabilities of his lungs, still in order it seems. He blinks rapidly before remembering he needs glasses, easing the thick lenses and heavy black frames into place on the bridge of his nose and tentatively surveying his location.
Home. That’s fucking exceptional, considering…Well, just... considering. Greg spares himself the ugly details and harsh truths. Just for a little while longer, he could pretend for just a little while. How did it come to this? Being amazed when you wake up in your own bed the next day; being amazed that you wake up at all.
It hadn’t always been like this, he’d had friends, a succession of relationships. Hell, he even loved a few of them, or at least, liked to think he did. The Greg of yesteryear was full of hope and dreams, in his final year of college; clarity shining through that stand up was his destiny.
Greg’s sorrowful train of thoughts is crudely interrupted by the phone ringing, harsh peals like a new wave of weaponry to his cranium. He answers it to stop the noise drilling into his hangover headache.
“’Lo?” he mumbles, mouth dry, voice cracking hoarsely.
“Proops, it‘s Reed, checkin’ y’all ain’t done yourself in entirely” He breathes a sigh of relief, briefly, before his brain alerts him that he has to come up with a reply.
“No, not dead Rahlman.” he replies quietly, each decibel out to intensify the headache further.
“Listen Greg…you uh…you missed a Faultline yesterday, where were ya?” Reed Rahlman asks, trying to keep the worry at bay.
“Got...held up…” Greg mutters.
“Well, McShane and I were, y’know, just wondering. We’ve got one tonight, remember? 7.30 at the Civic-”
“I know Reed, I know, I’ll be there.” Greg hangs up quickly, the pressure of forming a conversation overwhelming.
Well, I’m sick and all done in.
Time to get up, it would seem. Shuffling to his feet Greg treads the path slowly to the bathroom. Shower, brush teeth, dress; his morning mantra. He recites it over in his head, whether for something to do or for actual mandatory function he doesn’t know any more, but would bet on the latter, too worried about the outcome to actually test his theory. Derailment is contrary to progress.
He lights a cigarette, sinking down at his desk in a pensive state, trying to think of something, anything at all. He gazes around, the end of the cigarette burning quickly but not being smoked, a line of ash building as the orange flame dulls and weakens.
It is so small now, that little flicker of “Perhaps today will be different” numbed and doused with each drink.
And yet, there is still somehow a fragment left. Sometimes the embers just have to be relit. A single flick of the wrist and everything can be reignited, old flames brought to life again.
Greg jerks as the ash spills onto the desk, too heavy for the burnt out cigarette to handle.
“Fuck.” He groans as the dust covers his notes in a layer of smudges and shadows, scraping the grey off of his precious scrawled notes, trying preserve them as best he can. Giving up he sinks back into the murky depths of his mind.
***
So lonely, and I ain’t even high.
Greg sighs as he watches her pack her bags, unsure what to do now the fact has been established; she’s leaving, and not coming back.
“I can’t.” She mutters over and over, for her own confirmation as much as Greg’s. She’d tried to walk out on him before, but this time is different, more significant. Final.
“But…” he didn’t really know where he was going with it, so was grateful she interrupted him so quickly.
“I. Can’t.” she hisses, catlike, tossing her blonde hair back, green eyes bloodshot and glistening with tears. “You’re way too intense Greg. You’re so fucking bitter and sarcastic, it poisons me.” She gushes quickly. Talk about ripping the band aid off fast. Greg stares silently, muted and rooted by her words as she continues. “You’re so desperate to be a comedian; it’s all you think about night and day. But comedians don’t think about being comedians, they think about life, about other people. Then make funny things out of it. You’re missing out on everything! On me!”
Off balance and out of depth he tosses out the only life ring he has left,
“I love you...” It sinks to the floor with a heavy thud, lifeless.
“Well I don’t love you. I thought maybe I could, but it’s just not possible Greg.”
She drops a pile of books to the floor, burying any hopes Greg once had under the slap of his baseball encyclopedia, and his tattered and battered copies of his old favourites he’d leant her. “Don’t even like baseball” she murmurs, half to herself, as she locks her case and grabs her carrier bags of things, Greg merely observes, almost third party to the end of his relationship. He always was a third wheel.
Rejection is never easy. He watches in slow motion as she heads out the door.
“You’ll never be a comedian Greg. The sooner you get that, the sooner you can be a human being.”
The clock ticks in the corner, counting out seconds, minutes, hours. Time is beyond mechanic measure. And so he blinks. Once, twice, three times. She doesn’t reappear. In that moment Greg’s flame died, the light went out.
I’m so damn lonely, and I feel like I’m gonna die.
*
“C’mon Greg buddy, it’s time you got up.”
My heart is ripped,
it’s torn and smashed.
“Yeah, man up bitch!”
It’s shattered like glass,
spider web cracks spindling
it’s entire surface.
“Forrest!”
“Sorry Mike.”
Greg keeps his eyes resolutely shut. Perhaps then, they’ll leave me alone.
“Greg…please…It’s been two weeks. Why don’t you get up?”
“I can’t. My heart is broken.” Oh, shit, said that one aloud. He sighs, cracking open an eye and immediately regretting it.
“He’s alive!” The blurry outline of Forrest Brakeman claps gleefully, and Greg scans around the out of focus room to spot the unmistakable silhouette of Mike McShane standing by his head.
“How did you guys get into my apartment?” He asks, confused, his head running on empty for a considerable time now.
“Door was unlocked” replies mike casually.
“Best remember to lock it next time…keep people out…” Greg growls flatly, tugging the throw rug tighter around him on the sofa, fully intending to return back to sleep, back to the safety of the darkness.
“It’s been two weeks…” Mike says gently, worry in his eyes, not that Greg could see it that well. But he sure could hear it. “Why don’t you get up and have a shower, come out with us to Cobbs. Warren is playing tonight, he wants to see you after, he’s worried too. Come on buddy, please?”
No.
“Fine…”
“Maybe next step would be cleaning?” Forrest jokes, grinning goofily at his best friend as he rises. Greg merely blinks and turns, heading slowly to the bathroom. Mike slaps Forrest over the back of the head.
“Tact, Brakeman, such tact.”
Greg steps slowly out of the turmoil of his apartment, the sea breeze from the bay catching his eyes, making them burn. Or at least, that’s what he tells the guys, he can’t own up to tears, not yet. He breathes slowly, composing himself, turning to Mike and Forrest.
“Ok…” he mutters, giving them permission to start chattering, laughing and relaxing, knowing both of them had been holding their breath as they left the safety of Greg’s abode. As they walk Greg gazes around the streets of San Francisco, the colours, sights and sounds of other people living their lives. He sighs, his own life in grayscale by comparison, the radiant colours of the sunset over the bay now weak and faded, like the dying embers of a once bright flame. I feel like Charlie Chaplin’s trap, just not as loveable, he decides, chewing his lip. Greg watches as everyone around him is lifted higher to an emotion he can’t quite reach, chained down by the lead of his heart. On either side of him Mike and Forrest joke, sparring with each other over some unimportant matter, trying every so often to include him.
“That’s right, ain’t it Greg?” Forrest prompts on cue, nudging his best friend, goofy expression hiding the concern for him. The effort is wasted on Greg, who shrugs and slinks off ahead. He stops suddenly, aware he can’t remember where they are going. Mike sweeps him up in a wave, leading him to Cobbs.
The club is dark and dim, a natural hiding place for Greg to blend into, no effort required on his part. He shrugs off his chaperones and heads to the bar, falling into a stool heavily, gazing enviously at the stage, once his true home, but not any more. She made sure of that.
“Vodka lemonade please…” he mutters to the barman, not actually thirsty, just knowing that it’s what one does at the bar. In order to fade into the scene surrounding him, to remain inconspicuous, he sips at the clear drink absent mindedly, each mouthful making the throbbing pain ease for a moment. He drinks slowly but constantly, for something to do; to occupy the space where the hurt is; to avoid, for the briefest moments at a time, having to feel. Greg closes his eyes as the warm feeling of the clear liquid slips through his veins with ease. Gradually he relaxes, his smile returning, eyes bright, laugh loud. Eyes a little too bright, laugh a little too loud as the soothing vodka fills him up from the inside out.
Mayday, mayday…
***
Greg stumbles back to the present with a jolt, his headache returning in full force. He groans, resting his head against the cool wood of the desk, knowing what he will ultimately do, the day already mapped out by his addiction.
Greg sighs, mind rifling through all the months of memories, nearly all blurred images of drinks. He shakes his head, digging his nails into the battered and scratched wood of his old desk.
“No. I don’t want to. Not again.” He moans softly to himself “I don’t want to be this person, this freak who wakes up every morning not sure what he did the night before…I want to know where I’ve been, who I’ve seen…I want to keep a promise…” he garbles quietly, a reflex inside him believing if he keeps talking the fight will be won. “Won’t go, won’t go, won’t go…” he mutters, quickly lighting another cigarette as he glances at his clock, He’d held on three hours today, he could stick another three before he meets the Faultline gang, right? They’ll keep him safe then. He grits his teeth, wedging his cigarette firmly between his lips, picking up his pen and starting to write ferociously with intense concentration.
He’d gone home that first night laughing and singing, mind buzzing with new ideas, the cobwebs blown from his brain and the hurt white washed over as if it were never there. Greg had written nearly twenty minutes of material that night, twenty minutes worth keeping he discovered that Friday at Cobbs. He received a storm of laughs and cheers, and a balloon of warmth had risen in his chest that he had not felt in months.
“Hey, maybe a shot or two ain’t so bad for performance after all!” he jokes to his friends afterwards, an odd pang in his stomach, a quiet lift of his heart as his fingers gripped the cool neck of the vodka bottle in the heated nightclub. And so he fell into a pattern, a dangerous one. Get drunk, perform, and drink to come back down. And the hangovers became more intense, as the material began to dry. He had to drink more for the same buzz.
“It’s just not good value any more” he remembers Forrest remark once, only half joking as he anxiously watched Greg consume the crystal liquid. Steadily he found himself visiting liquor stores, bars, clubs, anywhere that would have him. It happened so quietly, working away at him in the background, by the time he had noticed he’d swam out of his depth it was too late, the riptide tore him away completely.
He lost control before he even realized it had happened.
Greg glances up at the clock, almost ready to scream. Forty fucking minutes, is that all? He snatches up his papers, rereading them, breathing heavy. All trash. All of it. He stands up reluctantly, just going to get some fresh air he reminds himself as he heads out the front door. He pauses at the liquor store, teetering on the brink. Just one won’t hurt…a little pick me up before the show tonight…
Cannot get a grip on me, can’t even try.
“Greg….buddy…I think you should talk about this with someone” Mike’s voice echoes in his head as he places one foot in front of the other down the street, all control vanished, the addiction running everything now. He’d stepped away from the liquor store as he’d passed, chewing his lips and his head ducked low, but there is no escape as his feet carried him along of their own accord towards the bar.
“No, I’m fine, just got too drunk one time too many” Greg had hiccoughed in reply, barking out a laugh. “Two and two makes four…” he snorted, amusement in his unfocussed eyes before frowning, the pain of events past crossing his mind again “Not drunk enough though…” Mike was hardly convinced of this, but there was little he could do. If Greg wanted to drink, then he would and not even his best friend had any say in the matter.
Greg trudges through the misty afternoon to the bar, troubled mind running over every conversation he can remember of late, almost all of them being in hushed concerned tones and including some reference to alcohol and his consumption thereof. He frowns, memories floating to the surface of his mind.
Mike sighed as he gazed at the slumped over figure of his best friend. He gently shook Greg’s shoulder, trying to rouse his friend.
“Come on buddy…”
“Ugh?” Greg turned, and Mike can see the clear outline of a slap across his cheek. Another rejection clearly, nobody wants to be with a drunk.
“It’s time to go home Greg, you can’t stay here.” He nods obediently, sliding off the stool and straight to the floor. Dutifully Mike scoops his slack friend off the floor, heading home.
Routine isn’t always good, especially when you break it down.
“You know what…” Greg blinked up from his bottle, slumped on the sofa an hour later.
“Wha?” He’d mumbled, gazing across at his pensive friend, the worry etched in every action, every blink of his eye. “You need to find someone, someone to fix you. It sure as hell ain’t me Greg, I’m just holding down the fort until they get here.” Greg had stared at him for a moment of clarity, as Mike rubs his eyes behind his glasses in frustration and exhaustion. Greg retorts with a grunt,
“Who the fuck would want me…?” he mutters, before slipping into unconsciousness, eyes closing and fingers going slack on the clear glass neck of the bottle. Mike sighs
“Whoever they are, they better turn up soon…”
Then they come in a rush, every single drunken rescue, every screaming match, every awkward questioning of where he was and why he’d missed the show the night before. The disappointed expressions on his friends and family’s faces, which changed to worried, frustrated and finally to angry as his addiction consumed him, the hushed tones of concern in their voices growing ever more urgent. The resentment in their eyes and the shake of their heads as they find him once more, hammered and helpless, at the mercy of his vice. It is all there, and every last inch of him burns with self hatred for what he has become; a wash out and a drunk.
Shot down over a stormy sea; feel like I’m drifting away.
Greg jerks as he stops outside the bar; the same one Forrest and Mike have collected him from almost every night. He stares up at the once happy place, rocking on his heels, surprised at his sudden clear recollection of the past few weeks, and the pain and guilt shed along with it.
“I hope they come too Mike” he whispers “or I’m gonna die here.” He takes a deep breath, reluctantly stepping over the threshold and into the pit of hell, dragging his feet, all grip gone once again as the liquor beats him down.
Drugs or overeating or alcohol or sex, it was all just another way to find peace. To escape what we know. Our education. Our bite of the apple.
He’d tried to get better before, on his own. He’d looked up books on being an “alcoholic” (although at the time Greg was adamant it was just to see what it was like). He’d read the self help books, dismissing them as nonsense… “The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.” He smirks and shakes his head as the quote drifts into his brain,
“Bullshit,” he mutters, sipping on his vodka, delving deeper into his memories of the self help universe.
Greg flopped on his sofa, book number eight on his lap. Apparently eight is lucky. At least Greg hoped it would be. “The first step to recovery is reading this book…” He was already done by this point, but he kept on reading, hoping somewhere along the line it would pick up, become useful in some way or another. “You must first learn the source of your addiction, think back and identify reasons for drinking, and address these properly…”
“Patronizing piece of shit!” he shouted, chasing away his hurt with more vodka. The book had touched a nerve, a nerve he liked to keep buried away under leagues of alcohol. He’d burned that book to cinders; one night simply set it alight and watched it curl in on itself, drowning in the flames.
“See how you like it” he’d hissed as the words dissolved on the charred pages…
He jumps and blinks up as the barman stands over him. Greg glances at his watch - oh wait he never put one on. How long had he been here? He’s not even finished his drink, golly well that’s sure to be a first. Greg frowns, gradually becoming aware of the fact he is lying on the floor.
“Huh…?” He quips, that Proopsian lightning wit there.
“Good, you aren’t dead. But I’m kicking you out now anyway.” Greg’s frown deepens,
“W-why?” He stammers, slowly sitting himself up from the sticky floor, back groaning in protest from the fall, head instantly screaming its dislike of movement.
“You should get yourself checked sunshine. You ain’t well, so I’m tossing you out.” With ease the barman hoists Greg off the dirty bar floor and frogmarches him to the door.
Standing in the rain, and I feel like I’m gonna cry.
Greg scrubs at his glasses with his handkerchief in frustration, but no matter how he tries he cannot seem to erase the sudden crystal clear memories from his head. Crystal like the glass of vodka he should (not) be drinking. Sliding his glasses back onto the bridge of his nose Greg sighs, the rain immediately clouding them over, his vision lost entirely, starting to walk down the street, hoping against hope that he will find something to block out the memories crowding his head. He whimpers softly to himself, tugging on his curls. Holding out his hands Greg blinks, realising his fingertips are shaking uncontrollably. How he feels on the inside finally comes shining through.
“Fuck…” he mumbles, shaking his head, sinking down against the wall, hearing the rough brick tear at his jacket like fingernails. He closes his eyes, head to his knees, huddling up small. “Please go away…” he whispers, silent salty tears dripping from under his closed eyelids. “I can’t…I just can’t…”
He knows he is late for the Civic show, he knows there will be questions, he knows now that everything he once had, all of it is gone. All that remains is his addiction, nothing more. No volume of vodka can wash away the pain inside.
Standing in the rain, and I feel like I’m gonna die.
It’s all to much, the roaring pain in his head, the rushing of withdrawal, the constant reminders of his failure stabbing at him, torturing him. The panic rises in his chest, air constricting, he can’t breathe, can’t see, can’t do anything but scream.
“I DON’T WANT IT.” He roars suddenly, the torrential downpour crashing on his head, yet he makes no effort to seek shelter. “I don’t want ANY of it. I don’t want to be here any more. I can’t!” He slumps down further on the wall, soaked to the bone and trembling. “They aren’t coming Mike, you were wrong, I’m going to die here…”
I’m so damn lonely…
Suddenly the hairs on the back of his neck prickle, and he feels he is being watched. He frowns through his tear filled eyes, scraping at his lenses with his jacket sleeves. Shoes appear out of the gloom. Little shoes, black patent high heels, with dainty feet in them, slender ankles. Not the cops then. He breathes out slowly, daring to look up, taking in the young woman an inch at a time, clothes soaked through and moulded to her tiny frame, darkened by the heavy rainwater, before he meets her face. Her delicate features are surrounded by a cloud of hair, waving across her face by the whipping wind.
What he notices though, is her eyes. No judgement, only empathy.
“I’m fucking insane…” He mutters to himself, the figure clearly a figment of his broken and fevered mind.
“No…just lost…” she replies softly. “But you’ll find your way eventually.”
“No chance.” He mutters.
“I’m Jennifer.” Great, he’s not only crazy, but creating named characters. Greg hangs his head once more, falling silent as a calm settles over them both, a calm Jennifer oozes into the air, settling Greg’s wild cravings and stilling his shakes.
He waits a while to see if the pretty feet fade, waits to see if he really has flipped and this fragment of his imagination, this ghostlike creature, will disappear and take the last of his hopes with it - her. He frowns, sniffing suddenly, looking up as the woman - Jennifer - lights a cigarette, the amber end glowing bright.
A spark through the darkness…
You stand there bleeding, people pass you by. But not her.