Approximately two weeks ago.
Oh to be tucked snug, safe and sound, in my own bed…
Wishful thinking.
Not only am I still awake at four o’clock in the morning, far beyond the reasonable time period to be awake on a Sunday night, or should I say Monday morning if I want to get all technical and such, but I don’t even get to enjoy that quality time alone with my ceiling and several thousand sheep. Counting them of course, no self-ridiculing using cliché jokes about nationality here. The ability to laugh at oneself, or to a more extreme level, downright mock oneself, is often used to make you seem more appealing to other people, and get them to like you. That sort of thing would be uncharacteristic of me, to say the least. Pfft… like I really need to search for the approval of others. Especially when I’m just thinking shit to myself right now, while I stand all alone in this elevator. It’s common knowledge that on the small list of people I actually give a crap about, my own name appears at least three times.
Wait… what was I thinking about?
Hey! I love this song!
“Load up on guns and bring your friends
I begin to hum the Nirvana classic “Smell’s Like Teen Spirit”, as it plays along over the elevator music. I stopped singing it for two reasons. The first, and probably most important, is that I’m a little, uh… inebriated right now, so as could be imagined, the whole mouth-brain connection isn’t working at maximum capacity right now. Should I continue, then no doubt words would be slurred and I would succeed in ruining a great song. Sure, I’m going to be the only one who hears it, but when coupled with my second reason, that of me being way to freaking tired to willingly exert myself in any way shape or form, I conclude that it is a perfectly valid reason to prevent any would-be listeners the pleasure of hearing me stammer over the words. Take that society!
Gah. I lost my train of thought again! This elevator ride is taking remarkably long. Or maybe I’m just thinking at a faster rate than usual. Holy shit! What if I’ve been transported to some fictional dimension where I’m about to become the next bearer of The Flash legacy? Wait… my hands are still black, and they’ve already done a black Green Lantern so there’s really no need for them to try to reach out to that minority through me. If I were Asian though, I could be onto something! Why am I looking for an explanation anyway? Drink in every moment of solitude you get, Leroy! Remember, if you were back in that warm, soft, marvelously comfortable bed of yours, you wouldn’t be alone, and people, like those two fine young lasses would want you to… do stuff. God I hate doing stuff. Not that stuff, I love that stuff, I just mean stuff in general. As far as that stuff goes, there’s probably only two things that I enjoy more. One such example is getting OTP (that’s ‘On the Piss’ a.k.a. getting absolutely plastered). I thoroughly enjoy the wacky, philosophically semi-important thoughts that I concoct in a state such as the one I am in now. The second example is when I act all heroic and shit.
Hands are still black – still not The Flash. Note to self though, possible ideas for future ring attire: red spandex with yellow lightning bolts. Shiny red spandex!
I guess my love for all things heroic is one of the reasons I’m such the fucking man in the wrestling ring. I’d be the worst superhero, because I’m way too self-absorbed, and get way too annoyed with pretty much everyone on this planet, but that doesn’t mean I can’t do good things like smacking some sense into buffoons like R.W. Randolph – I still need to cross that off, now that I think about it. Heroism is the entire reason I’m in this elevator right now. I’m off to save the day for the youngest name on the list with me of people I give a shit about, Kelly Webber. I can’t do much when I’m stuck in an elevator though. Ooh, chorus time!
“With the lights out, it’s less dangerous!
“Uh… Mr. Stone?”
I open my eyes, after closing them while singing, because in personal experience it makes you sound way better when you do that, to see the elevator doors wide open, and a few people looking at me rather strangely. Directly in front of me is Cameron, which I think is his last name. Anyway, he’s the guy who sorts shit out down at the ground level of The World’s Greatest Tower. He’s like the fat kid who used to get used as the middle block on the bottom of human pyramids in gym class, except he’s not fat. Nor a kid. Nor does he have two knees driving into his back. The analogy stands, nonetheless!
“Are you okay?” He asks me, crouching down so his head is at my level. Hang on a sec… I’m supposed to be taller than him! I look left. I look right. And then I ask the question that passes through the lips of everyone who has ever had a few too many brewskies.
“How did I wind up on the floor?” I struggle to my feet, which thankfully, he helps with. I catch a glimpse of the bottle of whiskey that I took with me into the elevator. It’s empty now. It wasn’t before. And there are no spills on the floor.
“You were sitting there in the corner of the elevator when the doors opened”, he informs he, as he helps me walk out into the lobby. There aren’t that many people about right now, which I guess is a good thing. The ones that are, look down their nose at me. Fuck them! This is my building, damn it!
“How long were the doors open for?” I ask, delayed too long to fit into normal conversation, which causes him to take a little bit longer to answer.
“Huh… um, a couple of minutes”, he responds. “You were just sitting there, like you were lost in your own head or something. Then you started singing. Badly”.
“Thanks”, I chuckle, appreciative of the fact that he’s not going to suck up to me like a lot of other schmucks would. I’m also appreciative of the fact that he’s not using my current state as an excuse to get how he really thinks of me off his chest, thinking that I wouldn’t remember. First of all, I would. Secondly, he can tell me when I’m sober. We’re not exactly friends, but I’ve come to rely on him quite heavily for this company of mine to run smoothly.
He escorts me out of the main lobby, away form the prying eyes of the few members of the public still there, and down a corridor to a bathroom. He props me up against the wall next to a toilet bowl.
“I’m not going to throw up”, I tell him, as another staff member busts through the door carrying a very large mug of water.
“Just shut up and drink this”. He pushes the mug towards me, and gingerly I grasp at it. Slowly I bring it my lips, and in my utter idiocy, I take an Everest-sized gulp.
I gag.
I vomit.
And I keep vomiting.
Eventually, after God knows how long, I stop, and shudder at the taste in my mouth. I snatch up the water once more. I gargle the first mouthful, before spitting it out into the orange and yellow stained toilet. Yum, pasta. I then chug back as much water as possible, spilling some on my chin. That only furthers my cause though, as the temperature on my skin brings me back to a semi-coherent state. You see, to me, the words I’ve managed to say have been perfectly clear. As I down this elixir-of-life though, it’s becoming more and more apparent that what I had originally thought, may not be entirely true.
“Fuck…” is all I can manage to utter after the mug finds itself emptied. I spit out into the toilet once more, and flush it, before crawling away from the bowl itself.
“Did that help?” he asks. I look up at his smug grin and roll my eyes. I get to my feet once more, entirely on my own this time. I give him a ‘does that answer your question’ look.
“Got any gum?” Thankfully, he does. He hands a piece over to me, and I chew it frantically in an attempt to rid my mouth of the taste of vomit. It works, to some extent.
“What are you doing down here, Mr. Stone?” he inquires, confused. “Don’t you have a couple of visitors up in your loft?”
I raise my index finger at him, telling to be quiet, and then I walk towards the toilet once more. I take the gum out of my mouth, and spit into the bowl again. The gum goes back in and I turn around to face Mr. Cameron again.
“Kelly was here”, I tell him. “Did you see her?”
“Young Ms. Webber?” he asks. I nod.
“Yeah, Randy’s kid”, I confirm.
“I haven’t seen her in at least a few days”, he informs me. This is displeasing. I storm past him, and out of the bathroom. He follows just a step behind. “What’s going on?”
“Kelly was just here!” I snap back at him. “She just called me, that’s why I was in the elevator. She said she was in the lobby, and she wanted to come up”.
“She was here? At this time of night?”
“I just fucking said that, didn’t I?” I bark, turning around only briefly towards him, before I continue on my way, heading towards the door to the street.
“What did she want?” he asks. God, he’s being fucking useless now.
“I fucking told you already!” I yell again. “She wanted to come up! I told her no, because of the Self-Esteem Twins up there! I then told her to go see you so that she could get a ride home, but apparently you didn’t even fucking see her!”
“What are you going to do?” he asks further. Cameron’s full of questions tonight, but the cocksucker has no answers for me.
“Find her!” I say as I, perhaps irrationally, charge out onto the street.
“But you don’t know where she went!” He yells back, from the safety of the warm light inside.
It’s fun to lose and to pretend”.
Here we are now, entertain us!
I feel stupid, and contagious!
Here we are now, entertain us!”