Counting The Fish

I remember late nights that bled into very early mornings: days and days without sleep or moments to rest. Working ten-hour shifts that weren’t anything compared to the hours indulged in liquor and cocaine; practically anything you could sip, snort or smoke, multi-tasking between the three. Shooting darts with one eye because a blunt hung from your lips and the smoke rose just right, a cigarette in the other hand and someone laying out a line on the counter and someone else patting your shoulder and lifting a shot glass at your face and you’re like, ‘can’t you see I’m shooting a game of cricket’? You toss the dart and nail the wall where there are constellations of other drunken failed attempts and then you take the shot and bump a line and say, ‘f**k it! Let’s play some cee-lo'. There’s like thirteen of you there all stoned out but it’s not a party yet it’s just the regular group of friends, the crew, all slowly getting off from work and gathering. Climbing up the steps and slamming the door and there you are again; home; where else?

            The counters and tables, the floor, all filth and sticky from spilled whiskey weeks ago, nights ago, just now. Cocaine dust, molly dust, dusts of all shades and colors and resin black as coal, brown as a coconut and we’re all just standing there together, in a circle around the counter, betting ones and sipping warm beer and nothing is strange about this. Pay no mind to how red the eyes are, how pale the face, needlepointed the pupils. The heart is beating a mile a minute but the hands shake only if you are the one rattling the dice. The dog s***s in its kennel, acts strange, whimpers, goes wild and passes out stoned and Ricky notices he’s missing a slice off of the table. He says, ‘anyone seen my eighth? I swear I had an eighth right here’.

            I remember being wide awake at four-in-the-morning on the fire escape drinking tequila with a fly in the glass watching the fish jump in the river below. It’s always fun to watch the fish jump on a clear morning after a storm. There’s a rhythm to them. It’s hard to explain if you haven’t seen it. Anyway, I’d found a pack of cigarettes somewhere; they’re still jumping by the time I’ve smoked them all. Slowly then, the traffic sounds. The empty streets regain their company. The world awakens. All the while you’ve just been there, watching it happen, counting the fish. Somewhere the clock strikes six or seven or sometime in-between and the cars sip back and forth the bridges and up and down the hills, through the streets in their little exchange like some uninstructed game. You see the first person walking and you toss your final smoke and head back into the apartment because the world is taken care of now. There’s no more emptiness to fill.

            T.K. is already up rolling a blunt or packing a bong and the smoke drifts thick and floats like the ghost of some long dead genie and then disperses and lingers in the air and he leans over with the paraphernalia in his hand at the end of an extended arm and without exhaling says, ‘would you like to hit this?’ of course you take a hit and hold it in and blow it out and pass it back and you ask, ‘hey, you got any cigarettes?’

Reviews

[S. K. Burke]

Yes, "flip book" is a perfect word for this imagery. Very captivating. I also love your description of hitting the wall with "constellations of other drunken failed attempts", I think it really speaks to the chaos of the whole narrative. Just a constellation of dart holes, of images, of paths and of lives. Great work.

[Cris Roley]

Thanks Ms.S.K. Burke!

[roarke]

great flip-book images, like seeing everything in detail from a wide angle lens. Not only does your narration have flow, it's got it's own rhythm and that's always entertaining to read. Good stuff.

[Cris Roley]

Thank you Roarke! Your review is much appreciated.