11/27

It's quiet Thanksgiving morning.  I don't think I'll be seeing anyone today.  No family.  No friends, though it is debatable whether I actually have any left.  Not a soul.

Of course, it is daybreak and for the past few years of my life I've displayed that I really am a poor judge of future events.  Of using present conditions to hypothesis a later outcome.  Not so good at it.

That's why I'm squatting in this empty apartment with a cat.  Why I don't have a change of clothes.  Or a clue as to where I'll be tonight, though I seriously believe we don't need to dispute that.  Why I've lost all hobbies and aspirations.  Friends and foes.  A sense of identity.

And where the hell did all my cigarettes and whiskey go?

Every living moment is a chance to turn it all around.  Yes.  Absolutely.  But this hardwood floor seems to be getting softer.  And these clothes seem to be losing their smell.  My hunger is waning the more and more I don't appease it, and sleep is becoming a welcome nourishment.  Maybe happiness has come to me.  Maybe this is it.  I just had to wait it out.  Patience.

Then the cat slurps as he chews at a knot or an itch on his rear leg.  The neighbor above runs her vacuum across the hardwood flooring.  Back and forth through my ceiling.  Back and forth.

And I see Insanity staring at me.  He's seated by the window in a black brimmed hat.  Legs crossed.  Arms resting on the chair.  Behind him, shadows slide down sides of the houses across the street.

And I have to bite the meat of my hand before speaking.  Just to make sure.  Teeth marks.  They're there.  I'm here.  Then I turn to him.

"Is today the day?" I ask.

He says nothing.  Air rushes from his nose.

"Is today the day you're going to take me?" I'm leaning forward now.  Wondering if I'm talking out loud.

But he just lights a cigarette.  Glances at a bird landing on the telephone pole outside.  Smoke splays out on the glass before him, then dissipates into the room.

"Are you going to stay for Thanksgiving?" I ask.

Then he stands.  The chair disappears.  Still facing the window, he lowers his head.  Sighs.  

The whine of the vacuum ceases.  I look at the cat, who's now curled in a ball on the sleeping bag, then back at the window.  He's gone, but his cigarette lays burning on the window sill.  A trail of smoke crawling up through the blinds.  

I rise and walk over.  The sun rests behind the clouds creating a bluish-grey hue to the morning.  Roads are vacant, besides the slosh from yesterday's snow.

I grab the cigarette.  Bring it to my lips.  Breathe in so slow and deliberately.  So I can feel the irritation in my throat as the smoke glides down, the dryness in my mouth as it sits in my lungs, and the rush to my head once the nicotine's done its work.

Then I exhale.

Thanksgiving.  

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