3:19 a.m. - March 06, 2002
Cue!
Some nights I imagine myself with a gun knocking and when he opens the door I shoot into his face and forensic detectives will report Bullet Dislodged Cranium. Other nights I imagne myself with the same weapon knocking on the door, forcing myself in, and torturing him slowly with deliberate cruelty and deriving much pleasure from the helpless sounds and defeated look his eyes will surely display. I would hurt him slowly and laugh at him to show I am the one with the power at last and I would make him cry as if tears could give me my missed sleep and all the days I lived my life as a shadow on the periphery of some great city too busy to see me in the dark.
My thoughts and fantasies scare me because each variable required for success is easily within grasp. Wait five days for the gun and drive to the address in Fresno and knock on the door and give birth to vengeance. C'est fini.
Does he realize what he did? I wonder what kind of man he is, if he's married and has children of his own or what kind of life he's had and how many Superbowl parties he's hosted over the years. I think sometimes perhaps he's forgotten the kid who lived next door and would be surprised when he saw me standing there. Othertimes I think he's a filthy pervert with shifty eyes and thief-hands with trench coat hidden in the closet who would remember my eyes because they haven't changed and he wouldn't cringe but instead the light would catch on his teeth and they would glisten with his saliva.
Why does he have such power over me and why can't I be successful and triumph? Why am I the weak one who carries the past around like a watermelon stomach tumor or a tapeworm that consumes in a zealous rage anything it contacts? Why me and why not somebody else, yes, I do wish it on another in my place and when I think that I become angry at myself for the weakness of passing the victim-buck instead of sucking it up and curing the tumor through sheer will. It's like a black hole growing in power and it's eaten my insides and now seeks to devour all of me and I don't know what to do to stop it. Ignoring it doesn't work any longer and there's no place left to run and he will prevail and I can only fantasize about a gun and his door and his face.
I'm tired of all this, the dreams at night the fantasies by day the incapacity to move on the dread chill weight slowing me down keeping me from running like some nightmare where you run in slow motion but fall back and the scythe rakes your body and you wish Just let it be over just let it be over but it's not and the alarm clock buzzes and you think Jesus just let it be over but you have to go to work and be productive and be healthy and have friends over and laugh and enjoy what you have but the joke is on you because you never sleep and you never live and you're so tired you can do nothing at all.
So this is inside but outside I'm happy and thinking I'm in love with Spec and there is a place for me in this world and I am confident of my oyster-shucking skills and all is well because it is but just below the boiling point the water in the pot threatens to spill and cause a mess and I think What first, the paper towels, the asbestos mitts, or shut off the electricity?
How can I be like this when I'm also happy?
I'm tired and I can't write and I can't be interesting and engaging or effective or thorough but everybody else can so better reading elsewhere.
