Some of Life

There is nothing unusual about how we go at it. I’m up first. My morning cigarette. Up and turn the heater on. I hate the cold throughout the night. I hate sleeping in long sleeved shirts and trousers, but we cannot afford to run the machine for too long. I can stand winters here, though. They’re short. Quite. Then I’m back in bed, body cold from the air outside on the balcony. We don’t have an alarm. I just wake up. Sometimes she’s up in the middle of the night. Sometimes I am. A few times. Neither one of us can sleep properly. She’ll go read in the other room. I’ll just lay there on my back running conversations with deceased friends or family. Talking in fragments. Writing in fragments.
Like:
–Joyce Carol Oates will give Balzac a run for his money.
–What?
–She is the most prodigious writer out there.
–Prolific maybe.
Or looking for succubi sliding down the ceiling fan. And then I’ll think: a grilled cheese sandwich. That’d be grand. A goddamned grilled cheese sandwich at three in the morning. With ketchup on the side. A huge dollop. I leave my watch on. When I sleep. Or even when I climb into the bath. She hates that. I hate it too but if I don’t, I’ll forget it. Everything is a routine. Even our drinking. Some mornings I sneak a mouthful of gin on my way out. When there is gin. I love leaving her in bed, knowing there is nothing she needs to do. But still. Neither of us sleeps. Nights come and they grind us down more than the days. And so there is nothing to ameliorate anything. Patches. Cheese. Rent. Wine. Melancholy.
–Leave the door open.
From the other room there is movement. Floor creaking. I’ll sit and watch the sun come up. Most days. The light, more like. I never see the sun actually come up. We face north. And so it’s like a dimmer being turned slowly. There is nothing unusual, really. There is the struggle. No answers. Rowing against the current. Just people dying in an upper unit of a large, apartment complex. Not making any noise. Nullifying. No one will know we ever existed. And that’s good.
–Wake me up at six.
–Why?
–I want to talk with you.
The dimmer: on and off and on and off and on.
And off.

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