I’m in your bedroom.
I met you, and now I’m standing in your room, the memories spliced together with the connecting events nowhere to be found. I met you, was abducted by aliens or brainwashed by the CIA, and now I’m standing in your room. That missing stretch of time is in a syringe or on microfilm, trapped in a bell jar within an underground vault guarded by motion sensors and electric fences, but it’s not in my head.
My reflection meets my fingertip with his own, Michelangelo’s God and Adam. The mirror bows like a sheet of taut plastic. I trace figure eights and random glyphs in the glass and my finger leaves a warped trail in its wake, like I’m six years old and playing with a puddle of pancake syrup. The miniature Red Sea converges, each new stickman,teepee or rocket ship fills in and fades in slow succession. We press palms, my reflection and I distorting each other from opposite sides of the liquid mirror. I’m flying on something, more acid of my own design. I’ve become better and bolder during that hole of haze I’ve leapfrogged between doses from the Glass Stripper.
My reflection says, “She still out there?” I hadn’t seen his lips move in the twisting of the mirror, so I can’t be certain.
“I need to lay low in here.” My reflection didn’t say anything, but Otto did. Blond, wearing jeans, a rugby shirt and glasses as thick as aquarium glass, he sat on a pillow in the corner. He’s staring at his fingers and moving his hands slowly in front of his face, but once he starts talking, he doesn’t stop.
“Chick’s scary,” he says. “The short-haired brunette friend of Desiree’s out there. Hooked up with her and she got space freaky. Cuffed me with these chains held together with a chunk of ice. I’m thinking, ‘Cool, I’ll go with this,’ and everything’s great until she jams a finger up my ass, which I’m absolutely not cool with but I can’t do shit. I want to stop her but, let me tell you, Finnish street names make terrible safe words. Pills she gave me, I couldn’t feel my lips, much less form consonants. And she’s been matching me two for one, so she drops out cold and I’m stuck for two and a half hours waiting for the ice to melt so I can get loose. Finally, I’m rolling her wheezing, naked body off my jeans and looking for my wallet, I see she’s broken a goddamned nail off her examination finger. I’m freaked, like I want to run but don’t want to slice myself up on the inside. Three days of yogurt, prunes and death threats screamed onto my answering machine. We haven’t been properly introduced. I’m Otto.”
“I know who you are.”
“And you’re Eric.” He stands and offers his hand. I think he’s reaching through the glass. I’m startled at first, but he’s standing to one side of themirror, beside my reflection. We shake hands, his flesh and bone.
He smacked the mirror with his middle finger. The surface quivered like a rubber sheet, our reflections bursting into moonlit confetti.
“Watch this.” Otto pounded his fist against the wall. Concentric ripples spread across the pictures, window frame and the other walls. They undulated like the surface of a water bed, lapping at the corners.
“Eric?” The walls righted themselves, snapshot frozen, the instant you opened the door. “What was that?”
You’re a silhouette in the doorway, but I can see your eyes in spite of the light flooding mine.
“Just talking to Otto,” I said.
“Come outside, you should meet everyone.”
“One second.”
You blew me a kiss, then closed the door.
My heart beats faster at the sight of you, my blood sings at the sound of your voice and I don’t want to move from this bed. I don’t want to disturb your phantom skin against mine.
“This stuff is beautiful,” Otto said. “Only God could have done better. Is there something I should know about you?”
“You know too much.”
“Relax. I’ve known Desiree since I was a pup. She’s been my
I met you, and now I’m standing in your room, the memories spliced together with the connecting events nowhere to be found. I met you, was abducted by aliens or brainwashed by the CIA, and now I’m standing in your room. That missing stretch of time is in a syringe or on microfilm, trapped in a bell jar within an underground vault guarded by motion sensors and electric fences, but it’s not in my head.
My reflection meets my fingertip with his own, Michelangelo’s God and Adam. The mirror bows like a sheet of taut plastic. I trace figure eights and random glyphs in the glass and my finger leaves a warped trail in its wake, like I’m six years old and playing with a puddle of pancake syrup. The miniature Red Sea converges, each new stickman,teepee or rocket ship fills in and fades in slow succession. We press palms, my reflection and I distorting each other from opposite sides of the liquid mirror. I’m flying on something, more acid of my own design. I’ve become better and bolder during that hole of haze I’ve leapfrogged between doses from the Glass Stripper.
My reflection says, “She still out there?” I hadn’t seen his lips move in the twisting of the mirror, so I can’t be certain.
“I need to lay low in here.” My reflection didn’t say anything, but Otto did. Blond, wearing jeans, a rugby shirt and glasses as thick as aquarium glass, he sat on a pillow in the corner. He’s staring at his fingers and moving his hands slowly in front of his face, but once he starts talking, he doesn’t stop.
“Chick’s scary,” he says. “The short-haired brunette friend of Desiree’s out there. Hooked up with her and she got space freaky. Cuffed me with these chains held together with a chunk of ice. I’m thinking, ‘Cool, I’ll go with this,’ and everything’s great until she jams a finger up my ass, which I’m absolutely not cool with but I can’t do shit. I want to stop her but, let me tell you, Finnish street names make terrible safe words. Pills she gave me, I couldn’t feel my lips, much less form consonants. And she’s been matching me two for one, so she drops out cold and I’m stuck for two and a half hours waiting for the ice to melt so I can get loose. Finally, I’m rolling her wheezing, naked body off my jeans and looking for my wallet, I see she’s broken a goddamned nail off her examination finger. I’m freaked, like I want to run but don’t want to slice myself up on the inside. Three days of yogurt, prunes and death threats screamed onto my answering machine. We haven’t been properly introduced. I’m Otto.”
“I know who you are.”
“And you’re Eric.” He stands and offers his hand. I think he’s reaching through the glass. I’m startled at first, but he’s standing to one side of themirror, beside my reflection. We shake hands, his flesh and bone.
He smacked the mirror with his middle finger. The surface quivered like a rubber sheet, our reflections bursting into moonlit confetti.
“Watch this.” Otto pounded his fist against the wall. Concentric ripples spread across the pictures, window frame and the other walls. They undulated like the surface of a water bed, lapping at the corners.
“Eric?” The walls righted themselves, snapshot frozen, the instant you opened the door. “What was that?”
You’re a silhouette in the doorway, but I can see your eyes in spite of the light flooding mine.
“Just talking to Otto,” I said.
“Come outside, you should meet everyone.”
“One second.”
You blew me a kiss, then closed the door.
My heart beats faster at the sight of you, my blood sings at the sound of your voice and I don’t want to move from this bed. I don’t want to disturb your phantom skin against mine.
“This stuff is beautiful,” Otto said. “Only God could have done better. Is there something I should know about you?”
“You know too much.”
“Relax. I’ve known Desiree since I was a pup. She’s been my
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