A Muse with a Bottle In Hand: You Drink, I Reminisce

Frank walks into the dark room, a sad smile adorning his face; this is not what he’s bargained for. The room reeks of alcohol, stale cigarettes and him, but so does Frank, more so the cigarettes than anything else. Cigarettes and burned out dreams, he sighs to himself and shuffles closer to the center of the room, trying to be as quiet as he can while he feels for the scratchy, old blanket he had given him earlier.


Is this okay, Frank?
Yes.
Are you sure you don’t want mine?
Yes.
We can share if you want? I really don’t mind. You can sleep with me by the way. My bed’s big enough for two, y’know? He laughed his soft laugh, the one Frank adores so much, the one that he knows brings color to his cheeks.
Seriously, I’m fine here. Don’t worry about it. Don’t tempt me. Please.


Frank wraps the blanket tightly around himself and brings his hands up to his mouth, blowing on his icy fingertips, trying to chase away the cold tiptoeing its way into his heart, but it’s too late. He’s too late just like every time. Always too late, too early, too much or too little; never fucking right.
Fuck. Fuck me. Fuck this, he thinks and reaches for the almost empty bottle of scotch, the amber liquid glistening when the moonlight seeping into his room through the cracked window hits it. There’s about three maybe four shots left, he can tell, but, fuck, that’s not enough. It never is, not when he’s around. Nothing is ever fucking enough. Maybe Frank is needy, greedy even. He likes to think he’s not but, God, some days and most nights, especially the ones he spends sprawled out on his couch, drinking his scotch while he sleeps so fucking calmly only a few feet away from Frank and his treacherous thoughts, he wishes it were true. Frank wishes he were as confident as he pretends he is. Maybe then he wouldn’t be sitting here, mourning over his sorrows and bad fucking luck, wishing he had the balls to walk a few more steps, slide into his bed, slip under the warmth of his covers, breathe in his scent..

Breathe, Frank, breathe. Fucking in and out, you asshole. Jesus Christ, look at you. Fucking pathetic.

Frank clenches and unclenches his fists, taking in a deep breath.

You’re okay, he silently assures himself, trying to kid himself into thinking, yes, this is okay. This is enough.

But he knows it isn’t, he knows it will never be. His chest still feels cold, icy and hollow. Even after he’d shakily lifted the damned bottle to his lips and downed the rest of the fucking scotch in one go, the liquid burning its way down his throat, scorching his insides. What was that, a chemical burn? A fucking cold burn?

You’re okay. It’s okay, he keeps repeating to himself over and over again. But it fucking isn’t. He isn’t okay.

Just an hour ago, he’d been listening to him spouting all kinds of bullshit, something about the difference between stormtroopers and clone troopers and how there were people out there who thought, they’re the same fucking thing, Frank.


Fuck. Stormtroopers and clone troopers. I- I was looking for this still, from that scene, y’know which one I’m talking about, the one where that guy- no, three guys, y’know, three stormtroopers come out? Yeah, yeah that one. So anyway, I’m searching it up and fuck, I get all of these fucking stills of clone troopers, and you’d think they’re there because it’s a Star Wars blog, right? But no, oh my God, no. This- this guy- or girl, or, fuck, person, ‘cause y’know, everyone likes Star Wars, man. Fuck what they’ve got between their legs, y’know? It doesn’t matter; it’s fucking Star Wars. Anyway, this person- this motherfucking person’s got these clone troopers listed under, guess what? Yeah, you fuckin’ guessed it, motherfuckin’ ‘Stormtroopers’. Fucking hell. Like, put the fact that, y’know, they’re a whole fucking other- what do you call them, species? Robots? I don’t fuckin’ know, man, but they’re not the same. Like, these stupid Stormtroopers, they don’t care, man, they don’t care about who they are, they just wanna fuck things up but- but the clone troopers, yeah, they care, they wanna be like, recognized for their- for the shit they do. They take pride in it, but Stormtroopers don’t. Plus, they can’t aim for fuckin’ shit. Oh no, they fucking can’t, and people still confuse them, Frank, how can they? Fuck, even what’s his name, Obi, that motherfucker. He said and this shit’s like word for fuckin’ word, okay? He said, ‘only Imperial Stormtroopers are precise,’ yeah? And that’s cool, like, sure, whatever. It’s cool, but then you spend the rest of the fuckin’ movies watching all these dumb fucks shoot and fuckin’ miss. Like, I could stand right in front of one of those motherfucker, make him fucking aim at me and he’d still miss, Frank. He’d still fuckin’ miss, Frankie. Jesus, shit. Obi-Wan Kenobi, the Jedi fuckin’ Master my ass. No fuckin’ wonder he got exiled, y’know. Fucking Obi-Wan Kenobi. Y’know what he shoulda been called? Obi-fucking-Wank Enobi, ‘cause he’s full of shit. Fuckin’ full of it. Motherfucking Star Wars, dude. That shit fucks with me, y’know? It fucks with me bad’.



The corners of Frank’s mouth curl up slightly. Yeah, he knows. Sure, he doesn’t see whatever it is he thought was so fucking obvious, but he knows what it’s like. He knows what it’s like to fucking know, to fucking see something when nobody else did.


Hey, Frank. You gotta remember this, okay? ‘Cause I’m only like, gonna say it once. I think- I think I discovered the fucking secrets to the universe, man. Just one, though. Fuck the rest of ‘em, they don’t mean jackshit to me, ‘cept this one. And look, it ain’t fuckin’ 42, fuck that hitchhiker’s shit, man, this is for serious. I totally fucking got it, y’know, and you have to promise you won’t tell. Like, I trust you, Frankie, I do. You’re my best fucking friend and I dunno, I’d probably die for you, and I know you don’t want me to, but look, hypothetically. Hypothetically, I totally would. You’re so fuckin’ cool, that’s why we’re friends, yeah? Oh, yeah, the secret! Oh, man, promise me first. Promise you won’t tell, okay? Not even Mikey, not even your mom, dude. This shit- it’s big. You won’t- fuck, I don’t even know where to start, dude. So, you know how everyone talks about that fuckin’ light at the end of the tunnel, the one you like, see when you die? Yeah, yeah, so, I was thinkin’, just thinkin’ about it, and then it fuckin’ occurred to me, man. It’s not fucking heaven, no, it’s light, like light, light. Sunlight, artificial light, fuck, I don’t know, but it’s light. Like, reincarnation, yeah? It makes sense, Frankie. It makes so much sense now and even the people who don’t see it, man, even they get to like, live again, ‘cause kids, babies, they’re born like ever fucking second or something, at night too. No, no, wait, I looked it up, I looked it up, man. I think- I think it was like 3 or 4- oh! Yeah, 4 kids a second! Shit, that’s a lot. But anyway, no, I’m not done yet- no, there’s more, okay? So, I was looking it up, yeah, how many babies are born every second and I found it and right fuckin’ next to the- fuck, the number, they had like, what do you call it, rate of death? I think that was it. So the rate of death is like 2 people a second, so I started thinking. Twice as many kids pop out for every person who, y’know, kicks the bucket, and it don’t make sense. Where are these two extra kids comin’ from, Frank? It doesn’t make sense but then it fuckin’ hit me, dude. It fuckin’ hit me so hard, man, I thought my fuckin’ brain was gonna explode or some shit- fuck. So y’know how these kids come in pairs, for every person who dies, so my theory- no, my- not mine, so the secret, yeah, the fuckin’ secret is your soul, dude. It fuckin’ splits in two, one for each body. Like, you die, okay and then, your soul just gets fuckin’ cut in two, one for every baby and it keeps on splitting every time you die. And the other half, your other half, dude, it’s your soulmate. That’s why everyone keeps going on and on about how you gotta find your other half, fuck them, by the way, making people feel fucking incomplete and shit, but yeah. That’s it, that’s your soulmate, man, that’s how we fucking multiply, we just keep fuckin’ branchin’ out? Yeah, like those worms you can cut in two and they grow and multiply, y’know? Shit, we spend our entire lives just lookin’ for ourselves- it’s so fuckin’ sad, Frankie, y’know? Makes me feel so shitty, so sad. You think I’m gonna find him, Frank? You think I’m gonna find my soulmate, myself? I’m so scared I won’t. What if I die before I do? What if I die before I can complete myself, what if I fuck it up for all the future me’s? Fuck, I don’t want that. I really don’t, Frankie.


Frank isn’t even aware of the burning hot tears streaming down his face nor is he conscious of the choked up sob he lets out until he sees him steering, turning onto his side and slowly blinking his eyes open.
Even in the dark, he can still make out his distinct features, the curve of his nose, the pink of his lips and the way his eyebrows are knitted together, no doubt in concern for his ‘best friend’.


“Frankie?”
Yes.
“Are you okay?”
Yes. No. I don’t know. I don’t fucking know.
“Yeah, Gee. Go back to sleep.”
Please.
“M’okay, come sleep with me? S’cold.”
I know it is.
“Sure.”


Frank wipes the tears off his face with the back of his sleeves, taking a deep breath.
It’s okay. You’re okay. This is okay. He keeps the scratchy blanket wrapped tightly around himself, slowly walking over to his bed. Frank carefully slides into his bed, slips under the warmth of his covers and breathes in his scent. He smells like alcohol and stale cigarettes, just like Frank, but he also smells like home. And maybe Frank smells like that to him as well. Maybe this time, it will be enough. Maybe this time, he will be enough. Maybe, just maybe, it will be okay.

“Goodnight, Frankie.”

“’Night, Gee.”

Yeah, it was enough. This was okay. Frank was okay.

Notes

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