.45 Caliber Headspace

It’s been a few days, but I’ve been wallowing in self-destruction.

I came to after New Year’s Eve after already having dreamt I came to after New Year’s Eve blind and chained to a fence in Reno. Luckily, in the dream, Owen Wilson came by with some bolt cutters and a six-pack of Red Bull that sent me tilt-a-whirl. Once it peaked and my vision cleared, I mugged some vacationing Mormons for bus fare, which I quickly spent on ointment, and hitched a ride with an Irish, one-armed, lesbian trucker named Pepé.

Pepé had me wear a wig and some lipstick, which would have been fine, except the wig smelled like fear and the lipstick clashed with my thong. I kept trying to tune the radio to NPR, but Pepé would jab me in the ribs with her metal claw attachment, taunting a pain I’ve had since a previous blackout in November, so I was stuck in the hell of “Bootylicious” on endless track repeat. I secretly wished she had any other CD and/or an adorably soft, stuffed tiger attachment, but beggars can’t be choosers.

When we finally reached the city I call “The Place I’m Stuck” and my ointment had run out, I waved good riddance to Pepé and rubbed the scar on my side, feeling warmly reminiscent of the kidney I lost in Guatemala this time last year. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder, the skin grow paler, and the blood grow thicker; especially when on a self-imposed regimen of painkillers. I decided, then, to skip my planned visit to the trannies on Polk Street and head straight home where I could crawl onto my bathroom floor and snuggle up with a nice shotgun.

When I did, really, come to from this dream, I was alarmed, at first, that the shotgun wasn’t loaded. Then a rush of complacency washed over me when I realized my lipstick did match and the scar on my side was actually from when I got shanked while making license plates in the prison of my own mind.