the lonely walk home from the bar, the drunken stagger, the sudden recalculate & regroup as one foot bismehaves, slips right as if drawn to a sullen, clandestine magnet just behind that streetlight, that trashcan. tongue heavy in the cave of the mouth like a hibernating bear. eyes like fish in a foggy bowl. somewhere, deep in the recesses of the brain, there is a headache blooming like a bruised flower.
it is on the corner of Lux and Scorro that they meet. red light, imperious DO NOT WALK blazoning from across the asphalt, yet no cars. she comes up behind him, tilting slightly, waifish, giggling to her intertwined fingers held just before her mouth. he turns his bleary eyes over his shoulder and she lifts her gaze. she wears a hat just slightly askew on her head, a dress she's made herself, all patchwork & crazed sew. "d'you got a cigarette?" he asks - or thinks he does, she is fishing in her little clutch, withdrawing a battered pack of parliaments.
"i don't smoke," she says. the light has turned green and a single car whizzes by, too fast. "i don't know what these came from." she tilts her head like a dog listening for a distant, tinny sound. "where. they came from. here." she proffers the pack.
he accepts them even though he smokes camel filters. "thanks." returns his attention to the car-less boulevard. "guess we could go."
"no cars," she lists back and forth a little, whether on purpose or not he can't tell.
"are you drunk?" he demands to know, somewhat imperiously. the timbre of his voice spirals upwards like a minaret.
"no." she narrows her eyes at him. "are you?"
"no, i'm jeremy."
the silence acquires a patina of frost, which abruptly thaws with the sound of her laugh, a brittle thing that seems to spider out of her before growing louder and ceasing, altogether too abruptly. "i'm corie." she extends her hand, palm down, and he takes it in his. his palm is callused just above the mount of saturn, and encountering this with her forefinger she frowns and withdraws.
he scrutinizes her face. just under her right eye is a quick pale scar that seems to flicker beneath the skin like a minnow in the shallows, wriggles when she winks or smiles. she averts her gaze.
the light's gone red, the admonishment of DON'T WALK has turned to the beneficent white man's outline. they begin to walk, steadied by each other's presence. "do you live in the west?"
"depends on where we are now," she retorts with a crooked smile.
"almost west."
she nods, and they proceed. towering over them to the right is a hospital: every window is dim save for one, stained with the silhouette of some lonely patient looking east, waiting for the sun to rise. the driveway in is stippled white & red lambent by the neon proclaiming EMERGENCY. somewhere around the corner, a dog's collar & tags are jingling. "you didn't answer me," he says.
"yes," she pauses. he is a head taller than she. something about the fringe of his brown hair sweeping across his brow she doesn't trust. that and his hand. "on purpose."
"well, aren't you just the..." he trails off. "i got nothin."
she laughs despite herself and they continue until they part at the corner of Oyll and Vinniger. neither note the irony.
