13th post, Very Short Story: Two Weddings

Ok so it’s late and i haven’t posted in a day and i’ll be damned if i miss two in a row.

I’m going to call the following a short story but that may be reaching. Nontheless, and in less than half an hour i give you:

Two Weddings

“You don’t like facebook? So what, you use google plus instead?” asked the guy with the huge fucking mole on his chin.

I tried to explain: “NO. FUCK FACEBOOK. I don’t like facebook, or google plus or any of that social networking shit. Social networking. Fucking stupid term. People have been socializing since the beginning of time. So now it’s networking too? Like a network of machines? Like we need a fucking prefix, a fucking social networking, to differeniate between that and local area networks and wide area networks?”

“Wow you are shit faced.” Said the guy with the huge mole.

“YES but that doesn’t mean what i’m saying doesn’t make sense. Look. Ok. Look. Listen. Facebook is just our tribal fucking outlet. Way back in the day, before computers or even castles, we all lived in nomadic fucking tribes. It’s been barely hundred thousand years since then, way too early for our brains to have changed or anything, so we have the same needs. Now we’re all fucked up though, we’re all separated and we want that tight community. They call it a fucking wall, a post on your wall for a reason. Because that’s what we used man, fucking paintings on fucking walls with only a couple of dozen people and all of us saying look at me look at me look at me, and we’re so fucked up now we need this shit. Well fuck all of that.”

The guy with the mole was nowhere in sight anymore. Goddamit it all to hell. I stumble out of the club. Nirvana follows me out shouting “here we are now, entertain us.” in a chorus of drunken voices, voices imbued with a desperate excitement. I feel like i can hear them shouting for something more, like the song taps into some need, some primal fuck you. But who knows, i’m shitfaced, the guy with the huge mole had that much right.

I know i should go home. Or to be more accurate, a part of me knows i should go home right now. Some tiny, rational voice underneathe all the emotions. Some tiny, rational pretender. Because guess what rational-me, i know you’re just afraid. Not that you shouldn’t be, i have some photo editing to do for my boss and i’ve got to do it tomorrow and shit, i guess i should go home.

“HEY!” I practically shout at two young folks, one a girl, wearing some ridiculous hat, and another, a guy, also wearing some kind of hat. “Can i bum a cigarette?” They hesitate. I think i scared them. I don’t know what to do, so i stick out my hand, palm up like a beggar, hoping my expectant stance forces them to comply.

Fortunately the girl with the hat is speaking the same slurring language and is all “YEAHHHHHHHHH” And before i know it i have a lit cigarette and i’m tasting the menthol and i’m wondering what i’m going to do next. The taxis beckon like bored chapperones on the opposite side the street, closed restaurants backgrounding the convoy quietly. On this side of the street a boy throws up, noisily, and everyone ignores him. My buddy got married today so we started celebrating till i got separated. Now i’m here, smoking alone, waiting for the existential crisis to kick in.

On a whim i enter the club again, just in time for the full force of the too loud music to punch me in the face drawning out the sound of my own thoughts. I yell: “I HATE YOU ALL!” whilst everyone else yells “WELL FUCK YOU!” And together we Wooah OOOH OOOOOH, Wooah OOOH OOOOOH in time with the terrible cover of an Offspring song from a decade before those goddamn buildings fell down.

Now i’m saying something cheesy to a girl of ambiguous description, and now i’m heaving over a toilet, nothing coming except for some thin string of saliva that hangs like a bungee cord. I feel better nonetheless and i check my personality i mean phone, for messages. Too many messages, most of which are phrased as questions inquiring as to my current location.

“In time or space?” I reply and already i know i’m going to find that embarrassing tomorrow.
Now i’m dancing, incredibly, with some fine, fine girl, and she’s saying something and i’m yelling back “WE ALL GET DRUNK SO NO ONE CAN TELL HOW FUCKED WE ARE!” And she’s responding, and fuck knows what she’s saying. She could be saying “Like camoflage?” For all i know- attempting real, honest to goodness conversation, or she could be saying “I LOVE JURASSIC FIVE!”, or anything really. It doesn’t matter until the song changes and i stumble a little knocking into some guy with a huge drink and arms, and then i thread my way all the way out.
The quiet line of taxis seems awfully compelling.

I scan my side of the DMZ for some kind of smoker, so i can bum another. The place is deserted though- a temporary lull in the tides of degenerates, ‘cept for little old me. Fuck. I bend over heaving again, still empty, as empty as anyone really.

The taxi’s wait like some kind of deliverance.

That night i sleep and dream some fucked up dream where i’m waiting my turn in a line but i forget what for. A clock on the wall isn’t working and halfway through i realize i’m dreaming and i want to wake up but the guy in front of me keeps trying to convince me this isn’t a dream and i say fuck you to him but he still maintains his story. I think if i punch him in the face the dream will end but i’m a coward inside my own head so instead i doubt and wait till the light rips through the curtains, pokes me in the eye, and suddenly i’m awake and my head is a fucking nightmare.

Goddammit alcohol is a terrible drug.

I spend the morning trying to seal the light out, twisting, bending, straightening my curtain in a light sensitive daze to no avail. I self medicate with water till my stomach aches. If i were a medical student i’d be able to set up my own drip. This bitter delusion follows me all the way back to a half-dream, and i lay half asleep between 9 am and noon.

In the dream i’m in an opera hall, and the man on stage looks like an older version of me. I ask the man next to me what he’s singing and the man next to me says he’s singing me truths i should learn, lessons from an older me. But i don’t understand opera man, it just sounds like yelling in Italian or something and then he’s shushing me and saying just listen. Suddenly i say “Look can’t i just fly a little?”

Then the dreams rips like some old tangible photograph you hate and suddenly i am fucking flying, in the clouds and all, except it feels like i’m on an escalator. Dull and routine. What a rip off. Not even remotely exciting.

Then i burst awake when my door flies open and it’s that goddamn crazy room mate, it’s Eddy and “WHAT EDDY WHAT?”

“NOTHING JUST M-M-MORNINGGGG!” He yells before flying back out of my room leaving my door open. What a fucking asshole. He’s a fucking troll Eddy is. The guy proudly described how he anonymous fucks with people on the internet, and the prick does the same to me. Seriously all the time, he’ll do annoying pranks and shit like this.

I slap my bed with two hands in annoyance. It’s past noon according to my wrist watch which lies at an angle on the floor.

Then it’s afternoon and i’m editing photos of another wedding. If anyone looks unhappy i instantly move on, till all i have is a prime selection equating to maybe a few sporadic seconds separated by entire hours over the course of an entire day. I have a good couple dozen and i start making everyone look more beautiful.

“WOW” yells Eddy from right behind me and i say

“FUCK!” And jump because he scared the shit out of me but he just laughs. The asshole.

“Looks like a fucking party man.” he says, before proceeding to literally dance out of my room.

I feel forgiveness for him on account of his dance, so i let it pass, plug my earphones back in, and this time lock my door. My boss needs this shit by this evening. It was the only condition. I could party with my friends on their entirely separate, coincidental wedding but only if i did all the editing by the end of today. A bridesmaid’s drink is caught in mid air, defying gravity, and so i crop her glass out, leaving a pleasant looking bunch of assholes. I’m constructing memories here. I remind myself that maybe, just maybe this guy’s grandkids might see all this, might look at it like it’s some kind of historical record of some unrecoverable moment. The idiots.

Ignoring the editing with memory and alcohol and a professional photo program. I’m fixing their past, making it palatable. My headache rings and i answer with water, cursing when the glass empties.

I go into the kitchen to pour some more medicine.

By night i’ve finished, and already i’m starting to convince myself that i also had fun last night.

I even believe it by next week, till i go out again.