Pieces of the Night: Alex (part 2)

Escaping a situation is one thing. Trying to escape a lifestyle is another. The unwanted way haunts its victim, relentlessly pulling at the soul until the futile struggle to evade is snuffed like an expired cigarette. Alex knew this. He knew his strengths, and more importantly, he knew his weaknesses. The few strengths he possessed were always upstaged by the darker side of his existence. But for some reason, he couldn't let go. The sex, drugs and lying was much more enticing than the mundane respectability he longed for. He felt as if his own self was so contradicting, so ruthlessly manipulating, not only did he lose himself every weekend and enjoy it, he hated himself every morning.

These thoughts whirred through his sloppy mind one Friday night, crouched over a dirty toilet in his friend Jon's house. The only thing he could see was his darkened reflection mocking him to the rhythm of his body seizing and vomiting. One question played a harrowing role…Why? If it feels good, do it, right? This didn't feel good anymore. This hurt. And yet he still subjected himself to degradation- both mentally and physically- for what? A few cheap laughs? An occasional one night stand? Great. Open the door to further disease. He clenched his knuckles as the last of the vodka escaped his stomach.

With a great weight lifted from his tired body, he felt cool…the sweat he'd worked up over that toilet mixed with the breeze of the bathroom fan eased him up to flush away his mess. He staggered over to the sink, missing the faucet handle as he caught himself in the mirror. At first he could not distinguish his pupils…they resembled dried cranberries...small, shriveled spots of reddened dark on an orange surface. Cold water splashed against his face, dripping from his eyelashes and into the sink. The droplets saddened him for a moment. He remembered in his childhood he'd have the hardest time picking out any kind of grocery when shopping with his parents. He always was victim to a fertile imagination, however much narcissistic , and the products he'd select were lucky. The roll of toilet paper he picked above the others should be privileged to be wiping his ass. Alex always felt depressed when he had to leave things behind, like he'd somehow hurt the inanimate objects feelings. But now, the droplets of refreshment were leaving him. With good reason. He was nothing but a goddamn drunken addict. Still, they helped. He dismissed the idiotic childhood notions and wiped his face on the beige towel hanging crookedly on the wall next to him. He turned and walked towards the bathroom door, surprised at how straight he could perform the task. Fumbling for the light switch, he rejoined the festivities outside.

"Hey! There he is!" Jon bellowed, smacking his giant hand on Alex's back. Alex tried to make eye contact with his annoyance of a friend as if to signal "leave me the hell alone" but both pairs of eyes were in a drunken wander, it was impossible.

"Dude, back off…I just hacked for like the past twenty minutes." Alex glanced around at the crowd of people before him. Angry people, primarily. Kids really. All pissed off at their dads or their life or whatever…trying to escape something, trying to be someone else. Backwards hats, dirty tattered pants and awkward piercings were signature to these people. "Fuck" was a staple vocabulary word. "I need a cigarette." Jon extorted his face into a sort of forced hearty laugh. Disturbing. Everything about that guy was weird. Not only was he 6'6" tall, but the dude dyed his eyebrows AND his soul patch black to match his hair. He still had blue tinted skin around his face in spots. Alex knew Jon was the type of nut that would be standing over him as he slept, wielding a 6 inch fillet knife and a nasty grudge if he ever found out Alex had said anything bad about him to any female. He was simply starved for good attention.

"It was that good, huh? Ha ha ha!" He looked around desperately for some kind of response, and eventually due to the lack thereof, faded into the background noise and tried to make conversation with a girl who had no intention of returning the act. Alex, used to this behavior, grabbed his bag from within a circle of potheads and slipped out to the front porch.

June always proved to be a pleasant time in Boise- especially in the evening past eight o'clock. The wind died down, the harsh desert sun was giving up its assault for the day, and everything was usually pretty mellow. Alex fished his lighter from his camera bag and struck up a Number 27 from Marlboro. Now he was 2 degrees shy of sober. All he had to do was keep moving, not let his mind or his body rest for a couple hours and he'd be fine, possibly without so much as a headache the next morning. He was still in no position to drive though. He knew this, and despite the annoyance he was experiencing, getting in his old car and driving around after having all the booze he did was suicide. A walk would be just fine for now.

The North end of the town was, to describe it simply, quaint. Most of the residents of the old turn-of-the-century houses were college aged and had the same motives for fun as he did. With an emphasis on effort, Alex walked as straight as he could, cigarette draping from his mouth, down the historic sidewalks. Bits and pieces of conversations accompanied his stroll through the darkness, and he found himself becoming lost in the lives of strangers with each step he took. To anyone else, the candid nature of the dialogue would prove to be refreshing. But to Alex, the topics were all the same. Who had slept with who, how messed up someone had become the night before and what they did to embarrass themselves, who kicked whose ass. It was quite simply terrifying- the depth of the hopelessness he felt was being further explored with each block. It wasn't just Jon's house...he could have been at any one of these places and been in the same mindset as he was now. Even more disheartening was the realization that no matter how far he walked, the atmosphere would never changed. He was trapped.

He pondered this with much dismay as he took a drag from his cigarette, and his walking ceased as he beheld the image before him.

Alone and sitting on the sidewalk in the orange puddle of light, her body was supporting itself on its knees. It seemed as if she was crying. The house behind her was obviously a party, and a much more livelier one than that which he left. Yet she was the only person outside.

"Hey," he said, casually approaching her. She was startled, and hurriedly wiped her face.

"Hello," she muttered as he passed. "Hey!" Alex stopped, turning to face the woman. "Do you have a cigarette?" The orange of the street lamp reflected from her dampened cheeks giving an eerie, etheric glow.

"Absolutely," he replied. Alex fumbled about his jacket, trying to remember which pocket he'd placed them in. "Eh..I'm a bit drunk, may take me a minute!" He caught a glimpse of a smile on the woman's face, but it quickly waned to a haunting expression accentuated by the forlorn colorlessness the street lamp provided. Finally, the 27's.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"I'm Alex." he answered, handing her a cigarette. "You?"

"Mara."