Controlled Scribbling

Nicole


2. The following day

The bright midday glare shot through the blinds into my room and onto my face. My head felt as if someone had recently filled it with wet cement and my body was screaming at me to get it something to drink. I reluctantly joined my body in consciousness and slowly rose to my feet. I welcomed the glaring day with a stream of muttered profanities and headed downstairs.

My eyes pulled through a thick, tired blur and focused haphazardly as I stared into the fridge. I stood half-bent and hung on the open door for support the way my mother always told me not to. I felt my body complain about the way I had doused it with whiskey. I continued to stare into the open fridge. I stared at all the colors and shapes almost hypnotically. Time slipped by and I would have heard about it if my mother was around. I anticipated her sharp voice, "standing there with that door wide open. . ." but no voice came and I continued to stare. The cool air that lapped up at my face felt good, nothing else did. I had the perfect clinical example of an Olympic-size hangover. A small, sarcastic voice chirped from a dark corner of my mind, 'had a couple o' drinks last night - eh Denny?'

"Smart ass son o' . . ." I was muttering under my breath when another voice chimed in. This voice wasn't coming from inside my head but I didn't have to look up to see who it belonged to. It was my sister Lisa; she came bouncing into the kitchen, pushed her way into the fridge and grabbed the carton of grapefruit juice I was there to get. I let the door glide shut as I straightened and turned towards her.

"Have a good time last night?" she asked out of a smile that sent my brain spinning. The kind of smile that toned the words in a subtle way to make them say "a little embarrassed?" I hadn't gotten around to thinking of 'last night' yet. I was concerned first with getting some fluids back into my dehydrated body. I extended my hand for the carton of juice and drank heavily from it once it was placed in my hand. While I gulped at the juice I wondered where my mother was; she certainly would have a lot to say about my etiquette today. Some juice found its way around my mouth and splashed wildly down my front.

Lisa started to laugh at me. I thought she left after she handed me the juice. Her laugh ended almost as quickly as it started and I realized her question wasn't completely rhetorical. I let out a deep, rough, morning sigh and asked her what exactly she meant.

She said something as I groped at my memory; I met a girl, that was clear enough in my memory. We hit it off terribly well, that stuck good too. She left and then I rejoined my original group and continued to drink. "Nothing to be embarrassed about there - dear old sister," a little voice stirring in the corner of my mind said to itself in a bad Irish accent.

She smiled a different smile and began to chatter something about how she thought I must have known 'that girl' and how 'that girl's' friend thought it was all a little out of hand.

My thoughts drifted and I started to let out another deep, rough, morning sigh when my eyes caught the clock. It was just passing two in the afternoon so I let out a deep, rough, afternoon sigh. My head pounded and I drank the carton of grapefruit juice dry. Lisa finished what she set out to say or noticed my attention span was that of a pigeon; either way she left the room and I believe she then left the house.

I climbed back upstairs and looked through my jacket to see if 'that girl' gave me her number or if that was just my imagination.

"Nicole is my name" the matchbook read in the glare of Sunday's afternoon sun. An address was written below it without a phone number. "Seattle, Washington, that's way west," I thought and an Aramis ad floated across the backdrop of my thoughts: "The East is the East but the West is something completely different." I pieced together more of the night and was happy with the overall picture it was making.

The wet cement in my head throbbed into a thundering fog and I decided to take a nap until dinner.


3. Later that evening