need some coffee?
Something made this morning beautiful. Maybe it was the dense, warm fog drawing me outside Garth’s kitchen where my friends were still sleeping; my day began with the soft relief I felt when I stepped outside into the twilight-gray dawn and felt the gently humid breeze on my face. My day never actually ended, there was more of a two-hour nap to break apart Friday night and Saturday morning. The days have been blurring together these past few weeks (I only noticed it was over the past few weeks because I looked at my calendar and realized “a couple of days ago” happened at the end of last month). I was surprised at how easily I woke up. The last thing I remember before I conked out at four was mumbling “I only had one drink…just a bit…” as I tried not to throw up, and the feeling of horror and stupidity that punched me in the gut when Garth whispered that I had, in fact, drank over half a bottle of wine in about twenty minutes. Plus a hit of weed. For a night that ended with such a heavy emotional berating, the morning was very gentle.
Garth shook me awake at exactly six like I half-tearfully begged him to do, and passed me my cold shirt and bra before I climbed in front of the window right below the loft bed. I don’t remember if we had conversation, just looking up at his sleep-bloated face from the floor, and then drunkenly climbing back up to plop my head down on his chest. God, I love him. I grabbed Kita’s leg to wake her up, although I was afraid to poke B.M awake as well. It was the third night in a row I saw him when I woke up, but this time I felt a bit wierd at how intimate it is to see someone zombie-wake in midmorning piled under a comforter. I managed to brush my teeth and call a car, and we were off to the subway. During the day, there is an assumption that everyone else on the subway has somewhere reasonable to go. But we were in a different crowd this time, a crowd of early-Saturday baristas and busboys and maybe even a few partyers who overdid it at Union Square. Kita got off first to get ready for work while I stayed on. My eyes dried out from staring at nothing in a stupor so deep that I realized I was intently listening to the blood rushing through my ears. A hobo in a wheelchair asked for change and I gave him a dollar and change, although I felt fearfully disgusted to make any contact with his hand. He was polite, and I wondered how this man with sunken eyes and no shoes had such a pleasingly deep voice and humble tone in his speech. He was just a guy who needed to buy food, but he gave off a stench of rotting flesh that stayed solid and sedentary in the car long after he moved to the next one. This was a person who really needed that cash, and everyone knew it, dolefully casting glances at his one bare foot. The skin behind the toes was in the process of completely peeling off, leaving a wet patch of white like a thin tissue on his black skin. People who pretend to need change don’t smell like that, and they don’t eye pennies like a saving grace dropping into their palm.
I suddenly felt suffocated, so I got off thirty blocks from my apartment and got a warm, sweet-smelling bran muffin and a cup of cold milk to keep my head from spinning. I was alone on an empty avenue on a dim New York morning, watching the few morning travelers make their way under the blooming cherry blossom trees (they’re so short-lived, but make cold April so bearable). There were signs of life everywhere, and I felt grateful to be up with a sleepy spring day ahead of me. How could I not feel well-being in every inch of my body? I am living with someone I can call my friend in Manhattan. It’s not going to last, and I love that too. I feel my friendships getting stronger every day- I’m settling into a family that will last me through years of experiences and midninight adventures through thunderstorms in search of liquor. I feel strong and beatiful even though my eyes are puffy and my skin is dry. I’m in love. I’m in LOVE. I’M IN FUCKING LOVE with someone who loves and trusts me back in the most fluid way. I get to wake up from a two-hour night to my apartment and treat myself to a fresh crusty muffin, and chew slowly to feel the grainy softness calming my stomach. I am so, so, so grateful.
