My eyes blink open, slowly adjusting to the hazy neon lights. I'm vaguely aware of the fact that there are people all around me. Bustling about their buisness, drinks in hand. Drinks that are just a little bit too old for their actual age, but they're ignoring that fact. The young men are busy trying to obtain the numbers of women twice their age and the women twice their age are busy deciding whether or not their IDs are fake. If you have to ask, it's probably a no. I check my pocket for my own ID, vaguely wondering where I am. Yes, the card is safely in place.
And the map? Where has that gone to? I check my pockets, frantically searching for it, but to no avail. I jump to my feet, though the pain seems to be splitting my skull cleanly in half. I try to remember how I got here, where here is, what my name is, what happened at all.
"You're up," an unfamiliar voice greets me.
I look up to the blurred face of a young man. Blinking rapidly at him, I try to regain my focus, "what's going on?"
"I found you passed out in the alley," he says calmly, "I brought you inside. Are you alright? You don't look well."
"I'm okay," I say vaguely.
"What's your name?" he asks, "I checked your ID, but I'm guessing it's fake, like everyone else here. You are very young, I imagine? What's your name? We'll call your parents and get you home."
"No, it's okay, I can make it home myself," I pause, hesitant about my next course of inquiry, "did you happen to notice... was there a paper or anything near me? A note, of sorts?"
He pulls a paper out of his pocket, I still can't see very well what it is, but I instantly know that its what I've been searching for, "Thank you," I snatch it from his hands.
"Where did you get it?" he asks quietly, leaning closer to me.
"From someone," I say vaguely, questioningly, "why do you ask?"
"I recognize the handwriting, that's all."
"Really?" I squeeze my eyes shut, my interest perked, and try to refocus on the young man's face, "whose is it?"
"I imagine you should know, since it's yours, after all."
"I do not know," I pause, "it is a long story... what is his name? Please tell me."
"No one really knows his name," he says softly.
"Do you?"
"Yes."
"You know him well?"
"Very well. Better than anyone else, I imagine."
"How?"
"I am him."
“No, you are not,” I reply without hesitating.
“How would you know? You cannot even see me.”
“Oh trust me, I know.”
“Far be it from me to argue that, for I imagine I must have known you rather well to have given you that,” he nods toward my hand, “but I do wonder how you’ve come upon it, and under what circumstances we may have met. I again beg of you your name.”
I wish desperately that I was not so drunk or high or whatever I am right now, and could see his face a little bit more clearly. I wish I could recognize his voice. I would not have forgotten the voice of HIM, but his voice was far from its natural state when we had first met, it was screaming and parched and desperate, and perhaps this man’s voice may sound like that if driven to that point, but I was currently not hearing it. And it just was not helping at all that his face was a blur.
“You are obviously not in your right mind at the moment,” he says gently, “my god, I can but wonder and imagine what has driven you to this point, and yet I know. I do understand, perhaps more than you do.”
“What are you talking about?” I rub my eyes, hoping to no avail that the world around me would suddenly become less oof a hazy, neon fog.
“Ah, now, you are far too drunk to understand much of anything at the moment. You also reek of marijuana. You know, you should probably set some limits for yourself, you’re going to die at a young age if you keep up like this. I would not be surprised if you are into some harder stuff, as well. Are you doing cocaine?”
“No,” I state emphatically, “no, I am not. And even if I were, I do not see how that is of any importance to you.”
“Because,” he says, “I know this will not make any sense at all, but you are wasted enough that it will not bother you at all in the morning, at some point, I imagine I care about you quite a lot.”
“Whatever.”
“So what was it that you said your name was?” He repeats, slowly drawling on a cigarette.
"Anna," I respond, still somewhat hesitant, "I do not need your help, though. I can make it home on my own."
"I highly doubt that," he says.
"No, really, I will be fine."
"The city is not the safest place for a young lady after dark."
"Said by a strange man that I have never met before in my life."
"Ah, but we have met before, and you would know that if you could see straight right now. As it is, though, you cannot see straight, and you are a young lady out and about by yourself at around three 'o clock in the morning, and you are very drunk, and very high, and I do not believe that you can make it home by yourself, so I will be taking you there."
"Who are you, anyways?"
"I'm the bartender," he says, as though that explains everything in the world. Perhaps it does.
"Fine. Take me home."
"Ah, we went from strange man to take me home?" he chuckles. A deep, somewhat cynical sound that I don't know how to feel about, "I think this relationship is moving a little bit fast for me. I usually wait until the second date for that."
"Okay, then don't if you're going to be all sick about it."
"I am sorry," he pauses, motioning around the room, "this place gets to you after awhile. It tends to get in your brain, you know, all the boys trying to take home women either twice or half their age. No one ever goes for the right range." he pauses, "but all that aside, I promise to be a gentleman and respect your dignity or whatnot, though it does not seem you have got much to lose at this point-"
I scowl at him, and he stops.
"Where is home?"
I tell him my address and he leads me out back of the bar. I look around an unfamiliar part of town. I wonder how I had gotten this far out? I do mjake it a point not to know this city to well, but I am still quite familiar with my surroundings. I would have to be pretty far away to be this uncertain of where I am.
"You're pretty far away from home," he states, as if reading my own thoughts, "want to talk?"
"No. And most certainly not to you. I don't even know you."
“Ah, but as we have already established. You do. Or did. Or will. One of those.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I imagine your guess is as good as mine is.”
“I sincerely doubt that. You seem to know quite a bit more than I do. And I still am not entirely sure whether or not I believe you. This has been the weirdest trip ever,” I lean my forehead on the dashboard, “I am half convinced I am not here right now, that pretty soon I will wake up again. Whatever I did, I am never going to do that again. It was way too hardcore for me. I feel awful. I am half convinced that I am just dead and went to some crazy purgatory.”
“I am pretty convinced that you are very much alive,” he assures me.
"Thanks, that is so reassuring," I respond sarcastically.
"I mean, I suppise that I could be an illusion... or some part of whatever kind of purgatory you think that you are in... really? Purgatory? Can't we be at least a little bit more creative?"
"Well, I am pretty sure that this is not Hell, unless Hell is just plain weird and annoying. But no, this is not nearly bad enough to be Hell. And I am pretty bsure that this is not Heaven. Even if I were the sort of person who would end up in Heaven, I do not think that this is what it would be like."
"We all end up inb places that we don't expect."
"Arre you sayuing that I am dead?"
"Not at all," he says, "but I am saying that perhaps what you think is cetrtain is not certain at all. And just because you do not think that you desrve something does not mean that it won't happen. I find that most things happen to the unlikelist of people."
"You sounbd like you know alot about life."
"I like to think that I do."
"What the crap are you? Some arrogant kind of bastard? Really, how old could you possibly be? 25? 30 at the very oldest, I imgine."
"I'm 23," he consents, "but I have seen far more than most my age."
"Right. I forgot. You're a bartender."
"That isn't what I meant at all."
"What did you mean, then?"
"Everything and nthing," he replies cryptically, and turns up the volume on the radio. Some awful pop song is playing. I do not know who it is or the mnam,e of the song, but it sounds vaguely familiar.
"Tell me, if you're so wise, or whatever, why do yo listen to this crap?"
He shrugs, "I find it interesting from a cultural viewpoint."
"Why do I feel like you think you're a lot better than you actually are?"
"You are sadly mistaken, I actually am just as great as I think I am. Better, maybe." he pauses, and neither of us speak for what seems like an inredibly lkong time, though I imahine it wrere actually just a few minutes, "I am not certain you will remember me tomorrow."
"Neither am I."
"I feel that you should," he says.
"Why?"
"Because you have that note, and it is from me, and so we must know each other, as I said... or, you know, we must have known each other at some point or will know each other in the future."
I snort, "yeah, okay, whatever."
"I am far from joking," he says.
“I know,” I reply. Strangely, I do know that he is being very real and serious about this. I am not certain why, exactly. But I do know that it is the truth. And a small part of me is beginning to believe that I am not,m perhaps, wquite as high as I would like to believe that I am, and that this night has really just been this weird.
“What can I do to help you remember me?”
“Write me a note. Tell me where I can find you again.”
"Do you have any paper?" he asks, "for I haven't, and I have found that it is awfully hard to write without a lack of paper. I suppose I ought to start carrying that sort of a thing around with me, but I already carry so many things as to make me feel entirely homeless, I try not to add too much to my cllection."
I laugh, somewhat sincerely and at the same time unamused, "I do not carry paper around with me either. Are you, then?"
"Am I what?"
"Homeless."
"In a sense, I suppose," he pauses, "I am staying at a place for now. No, homeless is the wrong term, I suppose. I am a bit of a nomad, I tend not to stay in the same place for too lkong a time. Not letting things get boring and all of that jazz, you know how it goes." he turns his attention awayy from the road to momentarily focus on me, "I suppose you would not want to a;lways stay in this city? You don't seem like the type. You have that thing about you."
"I won't stay here," I agree.
"How old are you, then, that you have not yet left? You must be very yyoung."
"I'm seventeen," I confess.
"Seventeen years of age and out alone in the middle of the night," he glances at me again, "something must be terribly wrong at home, or you are more than a bit of an adventurer."
I do not say anything.
"Perhaps a litttle bit of both?"
"Perhaps."
"So what were you doing out on a night like this? You must not have been there for long when I found you, you were still decently coherent, and your hands werre warm. From where did you come, and where were you headed?"
"I am really not sure," I confess, "I remember walking, no, running, and the note, the one you claim to have written. It slipped from my hand. It was windy, it blew away," I pause, straining my mind, pressing to remember, "no, it did not go with the winfd. It went the other way, away from the wind."
"I am not surprised."
I glance up from the dashboard, but a little too quickly for my inebriated head to accept, and groan.
“Woah, take it easy,” his face is becoming a bit clearer. Perhaps my mind is clearing up, perhaps it is being away from the neon lights and haze of cigarette smoke. He smiles at me. It’s a nice smile, so far as I can tell.
“Hey,” I say, a smile creeping onto my face. I’m not certain why it’s a smile that decides to take up residence there, because, perhaps, I should be more frightened than I am happy, but my lips curl nonetheless, twisting from a smile into a grin.
“Hey what?”
“Your eyes are blue.”
“Yes.” He says, seemingly not grasping the significance of this. Maybe he really does not.
“His eyes were blue, too.”
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