Almost done here


10:00, Sunday. Oh dear. Last night brought two realizations. One: with friends, there is no other place to be, than this city. Here, everything is the best that it will ever be.

Drinks at Chelsea, quiet meetings at dim tables. Robert’s friends arrive. Liberal Arts majors at Marymount, a dancer and two actors. In just a few ideas, we all ease into a comfort zone.

A cab ride over to Mulberry and Grand. Wonderful Italian meal. Osso bucco. Eggplant. Fazool. Tiramisu and cannoli. Chianti. Perfect conversation. Overlapping and segued. Political and personal. Comics come up and it crystalizes. Something that will last forever. 

A walk beside Morgan and she talks of biochemistry. Neurotransmitters. Sodium ion channels. She’s devastatingly bright and all over the place. I buy her flowers to little effect. Megan “wants to put me in her pocket.” 

Into the subway and things get strange. An improved tiff that lasts for blocks. More fun than anything I’ve done in a long time. Then some shotgun bar. Pool and 80’s music. Prince and a-ha and GNR. Megan and I team up, win, and the smile hurts it’s so wide. 

Then suddenly its over. They are gone and I make realization two: being alone here is more terrible than anywhere else. Surrounded by people and speaking to no-one. Catching little bits of conversations on cell phones as you pass on the sidewalk. 

"It’s my birthday.” 

“What she doesn’t realize is...” 

“When he says that to me I feel...”

“I love you, too." 

The depression is well settled in my brain by the time I wake Monday, from a dream of watching a couple make out in Mid-town Comics. I’m straight-jacketed. Near and inside of the things I desire most, and unable to touch any of it. 

Oh fuck me, it’s time to go back home.