4/23 █ ████ ██ ██ ███ ████ ██████ ███ ███ ███ ██████ ██████ ██ ████ ██████ ██████ ██ ███ ███ ████ ██ █████ 

████ █████ █████ █ ████ ██ ███████ ████████ █ ████ █████ █ ████ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ████ 

██ ████ ████ ██████ ███████ ██ ████ ████ ███████ ███ ██ ███ ████████ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ██ █████ █████ ███████ ██ ███ ███████████ ██ █████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ███ ████ ███ ██ ████████ ████ ███ ████ ██ ██ █ ██████ I was asleep and therefore left out of this sort of moral qualm; gladly. 


██████  ██ ████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ████ Part of me wants to fight it or question it but I am too tired, ██ █ ██████ ████ ████ ████ Falling asleep.

I’m tired of fighting everything. And it just feels nice, so I will let it feel nice. I don’t have it in me to  fight, nor do I have the tenacity. 

Any tenacity I have is born from solipsism. 

  ----

My solipsism has been rewarded satisfyingly: my career is now. I can’t think of any other way to say it. It is almost like I paid her to say exactly what I had dreamt of. 



4/21 The 50 hour fast proved to be worth something. I woke up feeling clean. Like a baby who had been baptised and slept through the entire thing.

It makes it easier to not eat for 50 hours when you're irreconcilably stressed; the effect that has on one's appetite is grating. I lost 5 pounds. Surely just water weight. But it's nice to have a tangible difference compared to all of the innocuous problems that have planted themselves so firmly despite their corporeal nature. 

I feel healthier than I have all month, which is saying next to nothing. But better is better. 

When at work yesterday, hunched over my desk; I thought I was going to die. And it felt very real. In a new way than any all of the other times I thought I was going to die.

I started praying which is something I only do when I really need something or I’m very scared. My hands shook as I tried to type on my computer, as I raised my glass of water to my lips. I really thought I was going to die and that was it. 

“Are you okay?” █████ asked me. I hadn't even noticed him next to me.

I nodded dutifully as if to assure him I was completing something. I was.

██ ███████ ████████████ ██ █████ ████ ██ █████ █ ███████ ███ ███ █████ ███████████ ███████ ██ ███ ███ ██ █████ ██████ ██████████ █████ ███ ██████ ████████ ████ ██████ █ ████ █████ ██████ ██ ████ ██████ █ ████ █████ ███████ █ ██████ ███ ██████ ███ █ █████ █████ ████ ████ █████ ███████ ██ ███████ ████ 

██ █████ █████ ██████████ █ ███████ ██████ █████ ██ █████ ████ ██ █ ███████ █████ ████████ ███ ██████ ████ ████████ ████ ███ ███████ ████████ █ █████████ █ █████ ████ ███ ██ ██████ ██ ██ ██ ██████████

████ █ ███ ██████ █████ █ ██████ ███ ██ █████ █████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ████ █████████ █████ █ ███ ██ ███████ █ ███ █ █████████ ██████ ██ ██ ███ ████████ █████ ██████ █ ██████ ████ ████ █ ██████ █ █████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ██ ████ █████ ███ ████ ██ █████ ███████ ███ ████ ████ █ ██ ███████ █████ ██████ ████ █████ 


-----

“Can we go to my bed?” I grab button, my pale yellow stuffed animal  duck  from the couch and without waiting for an answer start towards my bedroom. 

4/20 Objectively, that is bad. Neutrally, this is the only thing that brings me a semblance of normalcy. A sense of control. A knowing. It sucks when you find yourself aligning with the words on google under a list of symptoms:

• Being very tired and weak.
• Dizziness 
• Not able to stand the cold, or feeling cold when others feel fine.
• Swelling of the arms or legs.
• Stomachaches.
• Never feeling hungry or feeling hungry and getting full right away after eating a very small portion
• .Having a hard time concentrating or focusing.
• Low mood.
• Increased anxiety.
• Stress fractures or reduced bone mass.
  
  

I do always surprise myself under circumstances of immense pressure or hardship. I don’t know why. I think it enacts some feeling of self reliance which feels very safe to me now. Relying on only myself has rewarded me. I have proffered much of my own life. Not to discount my friends, family, those who love me and support me. But I don’t know. 


In times of desperate need and genuine unwellness I have found, for whatever reason, that the world does not offer much grace. This has been confirmed in an array of ways. Naturally, I stopped asking for it. I just took care of what I needed to take care of. 

“Can you help me open this?”  I ask my coworker. He rolls his eyes jokingly. The truth is that I am so physically weak that I cannot open it myself. Which is highly embarrassing. But I should probably drink water. 


——


█ ████████ ██ ███ ███ ████ █████ █ ████ ██████ ████ ███ ████ ██████ ████ ████████ ████ █████████ ██ ████ ████ █████ █████ ████ ██ █ ██████████ ██████ ██████████ ████ ██ ██ █████████████ ██████ 

███ ██████ ██ ██ ███ ████ ████ ████████ █ ███ ██ █████ ████████ █████████ █████ ███ ████

██████ ███ ████ ████ ████ ██ █████ I want to believe her. I want to believe this is true. 

It would make this all make sense. All of the hardship and confusion. ███ ████ ██████ █ █████ ███ ███ ███████ this past year won’t just be something I now can no longer relate to and find increasingly difficult to write; it’ll be an epitaph. The ultimate goodbye letter. One I didn’t even know I was writing


I would like to believe this is true.


—-


“The dodgers end they games today. Or no they come back Friday.” My grandfather says through the phone.


“Nice” I say back unsure of what else I could possibly say to that. 


“How is work?” He asks obviously picking up on my monotonous tone. 


“Busy.” I say. 


“You’re relaxing?” He asks as I turn off of the freeway, right onto La Brea.


I nearly stop my car, and my hand reaches to switch gears to park. My ears can’t be hearing right.


My grandfather; who while he loves me despite seeing the absolute worst of me, is in his own unique way asking if I am okay.  My boomer grandfather who has raised me as a bratty child, into a bratty teen, and maladjusted bratty adult, is asking this. The same one who makes fun of me if I complain about emptying lint in the dryer, the one who swears up and down, left and right, that my “generation” are a bunch of lazy sacks of shit that can’t buy houses not because of the actual turmoil his generation placed the economy in, no, it is because we are lazy. Maladjusted. Selfish. He is asking me if I am okay, insinuating I am pushing myself too hard. This makes me ponder the thought; am I? 


“I am trying to relax. Yes. I don’t have much time” I am telling the truth. I am not looking for sympathy from him; which I have unfruitfully searched for from him my whole,  only until recently. 


“You have to relax.” He says starkly. “It’s important”


“I know I just-“ I sigh. I wonder if I command F search this entire blog for the word ‘sigh’ how many times it’d appear. At least over 100. Maybe 300. “I don’t have time” 


Again, telling the truth. 


He must have heard through my mother about my recent health scare. Which is just a reality now. One that I have swallowed. Not due to some sort of emotional acceptance. But more so due to timing. I didn’t have time to sulk. Take it on the chin, bite it, turn the other cheek, move on. These are things I say to myself in my head often. Things that I say that are supposed to help and feel good for me. They work sometimes; not all of the time.


“well find the time”  and like that, we are off the phone. 


I had called initially to hear his voice; which was coarse and made me scared. The idea of him aging pains me too much to ever think of it fully. It’s something I try to ignore, but it’s clear at this point avoidance cannot be my full-time job. At least not anymore. 


It can be a hobby, like knitting, or something, something I divulge in alone and away. But I have no choice but to be an active participant in my life now. The past week has made it abundantly clear that the world insists upon making me suddenly important. However much I may deny it, it is forcing itself on me. 


Take it on the chin, bite it, turn the other cheek, move on. 


Except it, it being the world, will not let me. Every attempt I have made this past month; to be quieter, to fade. To disassociate myself from myself, my chassis has proven to be unavailing. 


My worst fear has always been to be important. 



4/16 i thought so many times of what it’d be like to see jack again. In the flesh. Occasionally, as anybody does, i will sometimes look at his instagram. This is soley to ensure he is alive, i don’t know why he wouldnt be, but sometimes its very easy to feel like somebodh is dead when you haven’t heard their vocie in years and there’s a high chance you might not ever hear it again.


I typically ensure his alive-ness and turn my phone off; feeling very stupid. Of course he is alive, why wouldnt he be?. Occasionally I will read the poem he has about me up which makes me wonder why he hasn’t untagged it. It’s a good poem. I can’t reconcile it’s about me or the fact we were ever in love, practically lived together, so on. It’s weird how I can’t reconcile that but I can remember exactly how he takes his coffee. The sputtering sound he made when I would force him to try my cup, which I just take black. 


I don’t remember what it feels like to kiss him. Or what kind of hand holding position we naturally assumed. Time will do this. Sometimes this relieves me, othertimes upsets me. I guess just the idea that even if you want something to be special, sometimes it just cant be. You cannot assign or feign emotionally potent feelings. 


There was still this part of me that worried so intently and neurotically that upon seeing him again, I’d somehow remember all of these things. I’d have a big sweep of human emotion. One so all encompassing I’d have to leave to go write about it, or put my wet palm to the back of my neck in the bathroom of a party in a sad attempt to ground myself. One that would make me feel human. 


It was all so unceremonious. 


Trinity was rattling off her lyrics in an attempt to memorize the song she was recording with Greg. I would mumble she sounded great and pat her in an attempt to ease her nerves to no avail. This helped nobody but we repeated it a couple of times amongst the house party, in a corner we claimed as ours. 


In the midst of it I looked up and thought to myself “wow that really looks like jack” and when I looked down at the sweater he was wearing I realized it was him.


We locked eyes and he seemed to have the same realization. I am wearing the same sweater I always wear. And always have worn.


I saw his eyes dart away. I felt absolutely nothing. 


I have this deep fear I am suppressing all of my emotions to the point of detriment. To decay. And that this is something i myself am oblivious to, until one day I will realize it and explode into a million pieces.


I think I am doing that, but the reality of this never springs upon me the way I expect it to. I expect it to hit me in moments like this; palpable, human, fucking expected. It never arrives in these moments, only edges itself by my own volition as a sad attempt at feeling normal which has never been fruitful. 


I only feel the weight of whatever I am suppressing in the bathtub. I think because this is the only place I ever had any privacy as a child. My best sobbing has been done there. All of my pleading has been in waded shallow water with bare thighs against porcelain.


I did not have that feeling of the world stopping, ceasing, the music playing in the background suddenly becoming mute. His face despite knowing it so well, it’s etches and contours, didn’t act as an anchor amongst the crowd of people I knew nothing of. I felt like it should have, but it didn’t.


I felt absolutely nothing. I don’t think I smiled. I don’t think I cried. I think I just looked at him and felt puzzled by myself. I know how I am supposed to feel about seeing a person I spent so much of my life with, only I can’t feel that. I can’t even force myself to or play into the drama of it. It’s over and done. It has been over and done.

The most startling part of our breakup to me was the idea that it didn’t matter how much you loved somebody sometimes things cease to work. This upset me deeply, freaked me out. The idea that “work” and “love” had something to do with each other seemed insidious. In hindsight it’s incredibly juvinelle. I don’t know. I didnt even believe that when I was with him. But something about not being with him. Made it worse to stomach a truth I had always known but then had to accept.

Seeing him across this backyard, under these string lights, made me feel like a character. Like his ex girlfriend. I am dealing with what every early twenty something deals with; it isn’t special or unique. It’s by no means earth-shattering. To be a 25 year old woman with a bob haircut seeing her guitarist ex boyfriend at a house show for an up and coming neo-twang artist is hardly revolutionary 

----

My car windows are down. Trinity is still at the house party. I think. It feels empty on the 101 which is optimal because I’ve decided the only way I can stomach Los Angeles lately is if it is completely barren. Which is a big ask. 

4/17 “aren’t you worried about ██████████?” ████ asks me.


“I don’t know. Should I be?” I ask. Completely unenthusiasized by the conversation of choice. 


The last thing I would like to hear upon enter this swanky, bordering on gauche party would be to hear about ██████ ███ █████████ ████ ██ as of late. Frankly, it makes me sad. Frankly, I am worried. I have learned this ceases to matter in any real way. If anything; that any sort of effort to worry, a semblance of care, or will not be warmly received. It won’t be received at all.

“I don’t know. I think I am worried. I haven’t heard from him in weeks.” ████ fucks with the collar of his shirt. He is holding a beer. I’m completely sober.


“Oh. That doesn’t seem good.” I don’t know what to say. I think I’m being prompted to say something, reveal something. But I frankly don’t want to talk about this. Especially not at a party. 


“Yeah. I mean have you seen him? Talked to him?” He asks sipping from his beer as if we were talking about something as benign as the weather. 


No, I have not.


“I honestly haven’t talked to anybody the last month or so” I offer, answering this intangible, unsaid prompt.


It’s the truth, I haven’t. Though, it’s not something I necessarily derive any sort of pleasurable feeling from speaking about.


“What? Why?” He asks, befuddled. 


I shrug. How could he possibly expect me to answer that? Here? I can't. I don't want to. 


 “They dont like.. I dont know. ███ █ ████ █ ███████ ███ “ I am trying to keep it vague but he cuts me off. 


“What? The way you ████ ██ awesome” again, he says, befuddled. 


Im not looking for validation. I'm not looking for somebody to tell me, I'm actually exceptionally fine as a human being, so to avoid this palpable awkwardness, I thank him only mildly and try to switch the conversation .

People inadvertently shoulder check us as we try to have this serious conversation, in the least serious of places; a random plaza on sunset across from the Silver Lake La Pergoletta, which has been decked out to have an elite party for a sunglasses company. Everybody is here, virtually everybody. 

I have no idea why I am here.

“█████ ███████ ███████ █████ ███████ █ ██ ███ ███ █ ████ █████ ██ █████ ███████ ██ ████ █████.” I ask. 


He nods.


“█ ████ ██ ██████ █████ ███ ███ █ ████ ████ ██ ██ █████████ ███████ ████ █████████ ██ █████ █████.”


“Yeah, maybe.” 


“She told me you two got into a fight” ███ finishes his beer, tossing it into a trash can next to the bar. 


“Of course she did” I mutter under my breath.


“What? I couldnt hear you” His voice raised. 


“Nothing” I stammer. “Im going to go thank Nick for putting me on the list.”


He gives me a nod as if to say ‘okay’ while adding to meet everybody at the Thirsty Crow later. That will not be happening. 


I spot Nick through the sea of people. I think he saw me as well. Chobi is trying to say hello to me, but as of 5 minutes ago, in the most reprehensible conversation possible, I had decided that I won't stay. 


“do you want to do ketamine and go get food?” █████ grabs my shoulder, turning me towards him. I hate how much this scared me; how I reflexively jumped. 


I go to answer but Im cut off before I can ██████ cuts me off. 


“Knowing Ash” Im pointed to “I cant think of two things she would rather do less than eat or do ketamine. Both together especially.”

Something about being spoken for has always irritated me; usually because its usually off kilter. then I feel like nobody knows me. That nobody understands me. And then I feel bad about myself because those two thoughts are so incredibly juvenile. 


“I’d actually love to do some ketamine.” I havent done it in months and it always mellows me out which would be useful right now, maybe even responsible because I am frankly so high strung these days  that I might kill somebody if not myself. Hyperbole. But the stress is eating me alive. I could do with doing a tiny bit of ketamine. I could probably stand to eat too; but that is less simple. 


█████smiles, “Lets go to Bacari. We’ll do ketamine on the tables”


“A) I cant afford Bacari, B) I have work tomorrow” I laugh. The idea of doing ketamine on the tables at Bacari is simultaneously incredibly predictable yet completely inappropriate. Living here has taught me that those two words, predictable and inappropriate, appear parallel to each other often. 


“Whyyyyyy? Just a little. You’re being a buzzkill.” █████jokingly whines. 


“Trust me I want to.”


“Im going swimming tomorrow.” He adds.


“Nice. what pool?” Im trying to keep up, I think hes already high.


“At an apartment. So are we going to Bacari or not?” He is high. 


“You guys can,  Im not” My eyes are darting around. I feel on guard. Like i have been verbally assaulted on the utmost menial level since arriving. 


—-------


The 101 is barren. Like a womb waiting to be filled with the sperm of tomorrow’s morning commute traffic. 


I replay the conversation I had with ███ in my head, and am filled with latent worry. Ultimately, I know I can do nothing. I know I am not the right person to maybe verbalize any of this to ██████. I cant; i’d be seen as aggressive and confrontational. 


I will sit back. I know how to now. The same Sparklehorse song loops over and over this really acute feeling of worthlessness.



4/15 Jason calls me. I reject the call


“Hey. Im at work, I cant talk” I type and text him. I feel really thrown off by seeing his first and last name loop itself over my phone screen. 


“All good. I wanted to check on you”


I turn my phone screen down and get back to work. I dont know if I have anything to say; not really. I did. Or I thought I did. I tried to say it but it seems like I am not the most verbose this past month. Nearly everything I have said for the past month has been misinterpreted; whether willingly or unwillingly misinterpreted. It feels exhausting to even try at this point. I dont even have a point I care to make. Exhaustion will do that I guess. 


Jason calling me ignites a sort of retarded fear I have that the world is mocking me, only having it to where my efforts are rewarded once I decide I dont care about things. He isnt meaning to do this, I know that. But like I said I dont know that I have anything to say anymore. It has been proven that it doesn’t really matter.


—-


“Come in” my boss says, we both crowd into the back office, the one with the large iMac. 


We exchanged small niceties and catch up; I haw been gone sick again. And then back. And then gone again. I catch her up and assure her, according to the doctors, I will supposedly be fine now. Or fine in comparison to before. I would really like to believe this.


She catches me up on what they’ve been up to since we have habitually missed each other at every turn since Monday.


“Wait aren’t you going to Coachella this weekend?” She asks, her nails typing against her phone. I have always liked that sound.


“No” I laugh awkwardly. This question is one I have had to answer an absurd number of times the past 2 and a half weeks.


She shoots me a curious glance; “why not?” 


I shrug. And smile so it isn’t awkward. 


We both laugh.


In all honesty, I am very happy to be in Los Angeles.

I don’t mind the thought of  being in my own bed this weekend. H█████ ████ ██ ██ ███ ████ ████████ ███████ █ █████ ████ ████ █████ █ ██████ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ████ ██████ ████ ████ █████ █████████ █████ ████ █ ████████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ███████████ █████ ████ ███ █████████ ██ ████████ ███ █ ████ ██ ████ █████ ████ ██████ ████ ██ █████ ████████ █████ I haven’t updated the blog, or if I have it has been in an incredibly veiled and elusive in tone, one leaving out the complications. Obviously done intentionally. 


It doesn’t matter. Not really. Just more of a nuisance if anything.

----

It’s stupid when the world forces you to become somebody of importance 


—---


“Do you have a literary agent?” ████ asks me, standing next to me at the bar of some nightclub (?) on Fairfax.


“No.” I laugh, a bit too much. This seems like such a ridiculous question, given how much turmoil my writing has caused in the past month. Any literary agent who would possibly want to sign me would have to be utterly stupid. 


“Seriously?” He asks gobsmacked and is really looking at me as if I said something insane. Maybe the word ‘no’ is insane for a lot of reasons. 


“Uh yeah. I dont think I will ever have a literary agent.” I am still laughing at this question as if it were some absurdist joke. I am realizing now, as I squeeze my lime into my vodka soda, he's being serious. 


“Why?” His arm reaches over me to grab a napkin. 


“My writing has caused nothing but trouble.. Lately” I sigh and laugh. I didnt even know you could do that all at once. 


“But youre a great writer. A really great writer-” 


I hold my hand up as if to insinuate for him to stop feeding me compliments


“I mean it. I'm not trying to fuck you. Or.. I'm just saying you’re a great writer. I mean that. I really do. I want to help you get a literary agent”


I hold my hand up higher practically pleading for him to stop. For so many reasons. 


“I swear.You should have a literary agent ash. I want you to talk to people that I know. I think they can help you.. Im not trying to fuck you. ”


I set my drink down and turn to him to level with him. I still cant tell if hes being serious. I cant tell if im being serious. 


“You know people that can help me?” I ask rhetorically. 


“Yeah, I think so. Listen, lets get coffee. None of this” He moves his hand back and forth to reference the party and its ambiance “So you can see that Im serious. I mean it you’re a great writer. You should fucking have a literay agent. The fact you dont have one now is fucking retarded” 


“Okay.” I comply. 


“██ ██ ████ ████ ████ ███████████ ██ ████ ████ ████ █████████?” He probes. 


“No.” 



4/14 my tax return was deposited into my account this morning and without thinking I opened my laptop and searched flights to New York. They’re not terribly expensive.


Late May should be a fine time. Really, I don’t think there would be much of a difference. 

—-


8 hours at desk with nothing but sun kil moon in your headphones should be illegal.


A startling realization has rattled me at my desk; everything has changed and everything is different. I can go to the fucking farmers market all I want, I can walk for miles aimlessly, I can shower a million times, I can call my mother and try, again. Everything is different now. It doesn’t matter how you cut it. There’s a before, there’s an after. 


I’m decidedly self aware and deeply ashamed by how I still haven’t accepted I am not young anymore. I am not nineteen. I can’t write this off as some funny thing that happened. This is not a great excuse for a blog update. This is not some deep secret I keep that will make me appear serious or deep. This just sucks and thats it. 




4/13 woman offers to sell me a rosary at the mechanic


“No thank you” 


If this were three weeks ago I would have said yes and gifted it to ██████. Ceases to matter in any way now.


It’s a very conflicting thing to have a specific aspect of your personality be marveled and disdained. It makes you feel like a you have a mistake of a personality. This is an affliction I thought would be rectified after leaving my teenage years. I think it is fully rectified. I don’t know. I saw a good email subject line recently “your life is not a crime” 


Sometimes a sentence is so perfect, you can tell it has never been said, but there has been an attempt by many people to say it for years, it’s succinctness via language a challenge to many, and when somebody truly aces it, it feels like an orgasm or great release. It makes the world feel a bit lighter than before you read the sentence, the verbalization of an affliction or beauty. 


“Your life is not a crime” relieved me from this detrimental but subconscious feeling I’ve been acutely afflicted by from seemingly birth; that I am constantly in trouble or about to be.


That whatever I am doing is “wrong” that my little act will be figured out soon. I’ve operated with this secular and self-imposed paranoia for really no reason. I don’t know. It probably has to do with something. But it was nice to read that sentence, it made me feel like I had figured something out; either about myself or the world at large.


——


I had tried to be happy earlier this morning. My motive was to deal with light manners such as laundry, dishes, a quick shower, and maybe an oil change. Monotonous, worthless chores to distract. Happy music to soundtrack all of this. Maybe music I would even listen to at the beach would soundtrack this; because then I would be happier.


 This was not a reality and only made it worse when I realized I am being forced to operate with a sense of heaviness I frankly don’t know if I can afford. My doctor asks me if I plan to have children. 


“I don’t know. Maybe” I say into my iPhone.


It feels inappropriate to make these kinds of decisions or even ponder them through my iPhone, at this age. I have to. I don’t have a choice. 


She tells me how to go about that with my circumstances. 


She tells me I will ultimately be fine if I want to have children, that the children will be fine with curly blonde hair and big blue eyes and that my life will be normal as anybody else’s. She tells me that the pills I have to take every day for the rest of my life are not too pernicious in the sense that I can take them at any time, morning or night. Even in the afternoon. She also adds that I don’t have to take them with meals which is good.


She sends an 11-month refill to the pharmacy on 3rd street and I tell her I will pick it up. She keeps saying things so gently which only makes me feel worse.


Doctors are the worst because they're certifiably good at something. 



4/12 I run a bath, as quietly as I can as to not wake June. I sit in the bath in complete silence and lukewarm water. Thinking of nothing. 


Well I guess i am always thinking of some modest mouse song. 


I take one of the pills, which arent too big, with a glass of lukewarm water. 


I put my knees under the faucet to catch all the lukewarm water. 

—---

Feel so worthless when all I can do is lay in bed. Is there anything more to say about that? Not really. 

My mother calls me to try to check on me. The answer is still: bad. I feel bad. In every way i feel not good.

4/11 I tried to have a normal morning despite completely abnormal circumstances. I wore an outfit that made me look put together. I drank a large glass of water. I did the dishes while looking out of the window. I had a mug of coffee. 


I did pretty good at this for around an hour or so. I stopped by the gimagaus pop up, and the girls that worked there, who were all so pretty and nice, told me i was so pretty and nice. I tried a pretty dress on that I cant afford. 


When I got home, and attempted to bring in the groceries I had just bought; I found myself so physically weak. every joint in my body was ignited in pain. I imagined a set of christmas lights, strung through out me, pulsing on and off. I dropped the bag and one of my containers of yogurt dropped out of the brown paper bag without breaking. 


I practically crawled to the bathtub, and ran my neck under coldwater, unaware of what to do. 

—-

The grotesque nature of life is not even a plight at this point. I think I just accept it. I have forfeited the idea of empathy, understanding, grace, and whatever some weeks ago (though this was realistically probably months ago, Im just too dumb to have noticed)


Becuse of my attunement I tell June I will watch the Texas Chainsaw Massacare with him. He tries to assure me of its gore knowing I am typically sensitive to seeing humans, well, massacared. 


“Its fine” 

My laptop acts as a temple as we slip in and out of my sheets. He kisses my forehead when I wince either in my own pain, or the accounted for pain of the teenagers who are getting hung on meat hooks meant for cattle on the screen. He feeds me chips when I am doing better. 

“These are very good.” I eat a chip. “This is very good. Scary” I point to the screen. 


4/10 unrelated to the pot; but I am urgent care again. I’m nervous to admit that for some reason. 

I was only at the office for maybe 4 hours, █ ████████ ████ ████████

 It reminds me of being sick at school when you are young; how your mother will stop and get you McDonald’s. I am not getting McDonald’s but the thought is nice enough. 

I am so poor that they offered me some sort of coverage for my bill which relieves me but also makes me feel pathetic. 

It’s cold in here. The waiting room is painted a ridiculous shade of green. They have accented it with plaque signs thhag map out the building in an abrasive shade of orange. A Gordon Ramsay show, one of many; is playing. It seems insane to play a cooking show at an urgent care. 

I’m hunched over in a fake leather chair that sticks to my thighs; my kidneys hurt really bad. It’s a weird kind of hurt where my chest feels empty yet filled with some sort of grease.

Had to take western ave to get here, which I used to take home to my first apartment in Los Angles. I can see the Hollywood sign. It isn’t charming at all. I feel haggard and really tired.

—-

“Do you mind needles?”

“No.” I shake my head and offer a light smile as if to convince the nurse that I dont mind needles, as if she didnt believe me. 

“I’m going to have you clench your arm-“

“Three times” I cut her off. Ok. She probably thinks Im a fucking junkie now. Great. 

Its just from the mysterious stomach illness I had in high school that I am used to these things; general hospital milieu, and its procedures. I am very good at them. And i know how they work. I know how to make them work in my favor too. 

She might not think that I am a junkie,, but She thinks that I am stupid, I am sure of that due to these factors: A) my vitals speak for themself. They are ridiculous. They always have been. But they are bad now. B) My answers to every question she asks read as if i do not care about my life at all:

“Do you smoke cigarettes? Vape?” She asked, tapping her pencil against the clipboard. 

“Yeah.” 

“To which?” She looked up. 

“Uh both” I swung my legs off the hospital bed. She looked down and wrote something. 


“Do you drink alcohol? Do drugs?” 

“Probably not any more or less than somebody my age who lives in a metropolitan city. Like-” I started but then realized I sounded quite stupid and was practically leaking out self-importance. 

“I drink maybe every other weekend. I guess.”

She wrote something down. Since this interaction, around 5 minutes ago, theres a palpability between her and i. Its obvious I am nervous. I am not sure who this is obvious to, or why, if it is me, that is so difficult to admit. 

Just then I realize I havent had any time to eat today. Perfect. This is my doing, I understand that, but I am somehow angry with myself regardless.

“Are you okay? Lightheaded?” She isnt an idiot and she can see my eyes practically rolling to the back of my head, accompanied by the brisk inhale after the initial insertion of the needle. 

“A bit” I say trying to sound tough, like a cowboy or my grandfather. 


——-

The doctor sits across from me and waits for me to say something but I'm very distracted by the tile in this room, and just how low to the floor all of the chairs in this room. The tile has that fake grading that is just so ugly. 


“Oh. Okay.” Is all I can think to say. 


“ it’s something you’ll have to take medication for, for the rest of your life” she says, implying I don’t know the scope of things. 


“Oh okay.” I say. The tile has a slight crack in it 8 squares down from the door. 


“Do you have any questions for me?” She says. She filled in her eyebrows, I can tell just by looking at her. She is nice. She is doing a good job at a really bad part of her job; giving bad news in a good way. If theres a good way. 


“No.” I grab my bag off of the floor. “At least not yet” 


That was a normal sentence for me to say. I think. 

She and I are both distinctly aware at the fact that she just gave me life-changing news. However big or small. It’s a moment where there’s a before and after. I fucking hate these moments. Like losing your virginity, or your grandmother dying. At the risk of sounding self important, I really hate these moemnts. I hate having to note or distinct something. 

“I will call you soon when you’re more.. ready.” she stands up from her chair so quietly that you would think she thought I was dying. 

“You’re going to be in pain for the next couple of days. But after the initial 10 days you will feel much better and then we can discuss ongoing treatment.” 

“Okay.” I cant even remember how many times a day I am supposed to take the initial pills. 

The tile is still there and intact. When I try to stand up and change out of the hospital gown I lose my balance, putting my hand on the counter. Ew, the counter. Where sick people touch. I guess I am sick. 

The nurse comes back in as I am grabbing my bag, full of my fucking things, all of my stupid fucking things, and coyly hands me a bag of pills. Based off of her body language I think she thought that I would be crying when she walked in. 

I was very brave and didnt cry until after. 

—---

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An earnest plead. In many ways, this was stupid of me, I should have known better. ██ ████ █████ ███ █████ █████ █████ ██ ██ █████ ███ ██ ██ ███████████ ████ ███ ████ ██ ███ ███ ██████ ████████ ███ █ ████ █████ ███ ██ █ ███████ █ ████ ███████ ████ ███████ ██ ███ ██ ███ ██ ██████ ██ █████ ███████ ████ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ██ ███████ ████ █ ███ ██ █████ █ ████ ██████ ██ ████ ████ █ ████ █████ █ █████ ████ ████ ██████████ ███████ ███ ████████ ███████ ███████ ██ ██ █████ ████████ █████ ████ ████ ████████ █ █████ ████ █████ ██████ █ █████ ████ █████ ███ ████ ███ ████ █████ █████████ 

 ██ ██ ████  ███ ██████ ███ ████████ █████ ███ ███ █ ██████████ ███ █████████ ███ █████████ ███ █████████ ███ ███████ ███ ██████████ ██ ████ █████ █████ █████ ██ ██ █████ I dont think I realized how tired I have truly been until I collapsed onto my bed an hour ago. I know this will only probably be received as a guilt trip, that Im looking for sympathy. I should have known better than to say anything. I shouldnt have. 


I am not acting like myself. Im fucking agitated. Im paranoid. I cant fucking do anything without being in severe phyical pain ,which only adds to my agitation and paranoia.I dont think anybody believes this, but I would like to be good. I would like to be a good, polite, subservient person. I want to be tantamount to cordial, tantamount to good. 

But frankly, I am not doing well. And the thing about not doing well; is that you’re not doing well

I am not 
I am not doing well. That one modest mouse song. 


█ ████ ███ ███████ I would like a friend. 


I choose to ignore the obviously devastating subtext. 


4/9 My bed just doesn’t feel the same or something. It doesn’t even feel good in a foreign way; like being in a hotel. It just feels wrong.

“Come over” June texts me. I asked him earlier if I could come over and then I told him that I did not want to come over but now I kind of want to go over.

 What is that one Geese lyric? Not to be gauche. Actually theres no way to quote a Geese lyric on your blog in 2026 without it being gauche. 
——-

Junes apartment is dimly lit and he says it’s messy despite it never being messy. █ ████ ████ ███ ███████████ █ █████ █ ██ ████ ████ ████ █ █████ █████ █ ███ 

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 He is rolling a “spliff” which is just a cigarette and marijuana. I don’t respond well to marijuana. I never have.

I shake my head. 

“Milkshake?” 

I think he’s trying to cheer me up.

“Probably soda.” I sigh.

“No sighing.” 

“Kay.” I sigh again. 

——
En route to get soda he plays just the right song, well I requested just the right song, some song about sunshine by Sparklehorse, which made it so where I was easy going enough to actually smoke the pot. 

I hold the joint intuitively which makes me laugh because I haven’t done this since high school. It makes me a tweaker and get really weird. The thought of once being a baby really terrifies me when high. Really, everything scares me while high. 


In the 10 minutes (which might as well been an hour) that passed since hitting the joint; I went mute. I looked around inquisitively at the In N out line we were in. A blonde girl who’s roots are out is sitting at an outside table, she looks like she smokes weed. 


“How long have we been here?” I ask. My eyebrows pulled together in deep concentration. 


“Like 5 minutes.” June says rubbing my chin. wow. He is really pretty. Like a very pretty person, or something.


“Okay.” I say. I roll down the window, and then roll it back up. Oh no. That seems scary. Like something somebody who has high would do. High off of weed. I am high on weed? I never smoke weed.


It kind of feels like ketamine. But not. Whatever.


I remain mute. My eyebrows stay furrowed; as if I were too focus hard enough I might reverse myself out of this high. It’s fine enough I guess. I can just become quite scary.  I think of my schizophrenic uncle who always drank Capri-Suns; this always made me cry as as child.


“Hey.” June says pulling my eyes away from the vanity license plate in front of us which I am trying to decipher. I would have deciphered this in no time had I not been high. I think it’s a play on ‘sticky baby’ but I’m not sure. I’m not sure why anybody would want this to be their license plate. 


“Hey.” He says again. “Who is your favorite superhero besides Batman?” 


I think he thinks I am scared. I am almost scared, but not scared. 


I think hard. My brows remain furrowed. I do like Batman a lot. The old comics are great, especially the ones where Bruce is randomly a cowboy. I like all of the villains, and have fond memories of watching it with my brother as a child on a huge box TV that acted as a makeshift heater if you ran your palm over its body.


“Probably Curious George.” I say. 


“What?” He laughs. And looks shocked.


“What?” The tone of my voice goes up a pitch. “Was that the wrong answer?” 


“No baby. It’s just-” he holds his chest from laughing “is he a super hero? I thought he was a little monkey?”


“He like solves cases and stuff.” I cross my arms. 


“I guess so. He is kind of like a detective then, huh?” He runs his hand over my thigh, I can tell he is trying to distract me and pull me out of my thoughts which I appreciate. It’s working. In some way.


“Well yes. I can’t think of any other monkeys who can solve cases.” My arms remain crossed. 


“Do you need anything baby? Literally anything. It can sound weird. I don’t care. Water. Whatever? When we get home?” He hands me the vanilla milkshake I ordered. Why did I order that? I don’t want that. Smoking weed has always weirdly killed my appitette weirdly. 


“I want to watch Girls by Lena Dunham.” 


4/8 A little less blood today. Mersh and I get into my car. I am surprised by how laxx he is about it; just sitting in my lap as if he were not in a thing 500 times his size. I suppose he doesnt know. I suppose mersh doesnt know about a lot. 

I stop by the donut shop on Melrose to get Kelly a birthday-donut; Im still trying to be cheerful. It works sometimes; othertimes it doesnt. Jacarandas pool at my ankles in this parking lot, tickling my bare toes seeing as I decided to wear flip flops to the office today. It feels like a sick joke. I cannot understand how little time has passed. I cannot understand how much more will pass. I cannot believe its April. 

—--
Again; feeling paranoid. I hate it. Around 11 am, I gave up on having a decent day. The only redeeming factor is that Mersh is here with me at the office. But not for much longer, a lady from another office offered to take him to the vet and care for him better than I can. Theres always this appeal about having something to take care of, but I have proven time and time again I am incapable of it. I dont understand the sentiment of giving a suicidal person an animal to take care of. Its never made sense to me. I dont know if I am suicidal person, I dont think it really matters. I think of it sometimes, and i would never do it, but if somebody offered to kill me, or reallly really wanted to (which according to the internet is plenty) I wouldnt fight that hard, if at all. This maybe the only hypothetical in which I become a person who believes in matters of “destiny” or “fate”. If I am meant to die at a specific time I dont see the point in trying to evade that so vigorously. 

I am sent a link; which in hindsight I really wish I had not opened. 

A potent “whatever” fills my chest, and then leaves pretty shortly after; leaves nothing. 


Sometimes I wonder if I have been writing an epitaph this whole time. 
—--


While today cant amount to good, it can amount to nothing. Which is better than bad. 


4/7 Waking up I felt less sick. My body felt slightly warm, but not in a feverish way. In a- theres a 6 foot something thing asleep next to me with its arms draped over me, unaware of its strength kind of way.


Kisses off to work which always help

—--

“What is this?” I hold the small kitten in the air, as if he were God’s greatest gift. He might be. 

He arrived to the office in a small clear container, atop a plush white blanket, occasionally screaming as if to ask why he were in a small clear container atop a plush white blanket. I imagine that’d be very confusing. 

Occasionally, stray cats will pop up at the office, but this one, who I choose to call Mersh, is far too foible to fend for himself amongst the rivaling cat gangs and harsh elements of the world. He is as big as something very very small. He is at that age where he needs to be held all of the time, so we all switch off between holding him all of the time. 

—-

Mersh sits on my lap as we drive home on the 110 for our sleepover. He sleeps peacefully, only waking when I hit the brakes a bit harsh. He listens to the radio on my lap and dreams about things. Probably like playing, or kibble, or the beautiful women in the office who all hold him and say things like “awwwww” or “you’re just so small!”

—---

The little thing screams if I leave him alone for any longer than two minutes. It made me feel compelled to skip dinner entirely, which if I am honest, (which arent I always? Isnt this the biggest deficit of mine? It has kind of ruined a lot) would not have taken much convincing anyway. Mersh runs over, often falling over, back into my chest. We read more of that Chris Kraus essay, I do so aloud because it works my stutter out, and it puts the little baby mersh to bed. Because babies like when you read them stories, or sing. 

I hear him crying from my room as I brush my teeth, which are again filled with an unprecedented amount of blood. I cannot even taste it anymore. 


4/6 Ample rest. Brushed my teeth and was met with my blood. I think it is stemming from my throat, but at this point curiosity serves nothing. 


See your very own blood in a white porcelain sink can evoke such a feeling of detriment. 

—--

Red House Painters at work is not helping. Im half awake, which confuses me given the ample rest. I cant stop sniffling which makes me feel pathetic. 

—-

June meets me at the apartment after work and makes sure I take strange liquid medicine for my cold. How many pseudo flus can one person get? Im good at it. Im good at this. 

I wish it counted to be good at bad things cause im so good at a lot of that stuff. 


4/5 My thighs are sweating on the leather passenger seats. I noticed too, before June merged onto the 101, that the jaccarandas are in season again. This seems unfathomable. I cannot reconcile the idea that the last time I wrote about them was a year ago. I would believe a century had passed.

—-

I raise myself, jumping, and lowering myself to land on seaweed pearls. They pop underneath my feet, and every time I make a shocked expression. 


“What did you think was going to happen?” June asks. 


I dont know. 


We lazed on the sand for a couple of hours, switching sides on the towel  so one of us obtained shade while the other baked in the sun. We posited ourselves under the dock of a seemingly empty mansion. I flipped through my Chris Kraus book on video art in the 90s while he arranged flowers he picked for me. I found myself mostly silent. This beach, which I dont know the actual name of, only that its close to Coral Canyon; always provokes me. 


Sometimes I am burdened by grotesque sentimentality to the point of nausea, othertimes it is hard to remember it even exists, let alone that I myself, surely at one have had to have felt it. 


He let me be silent which I appreciated. 


But every so often I would get up to play, running to the sea like a child, my limbs flailing around. The great white foam would crash against my lower belly and I would feel this aliveness that I thought would relieve me but only terrified me. 


My complaints lately have been as follows; Im so busy, B) theres no time to swim. I have been in the office everyday Los Angeles has presented its prepubsecent summer. Ive looked at my legs under the desk, feeling their heaviness, only to imagine the subsequent lightness one feels in the water. Its simple science, buoyancy and all, but it feels marvelous; like theres no more fighting. The air in your lungs; so crisp and salty. No more fighting.


June swam out, about up to his top rib and called for me. I stood in the water up to my thighs.


I felt this reluctance to meet him there. To swim. I wanted nothing more, I thought, than to be in the ocean. Yet, I found myself constantly looking back at the sand, down where the beach club once was. It's nothing now. They moved all the chaise lounge chairs. They reclused the yellow and white striped umbrellas. I had the taste of plums in my mouth. I imagined this wetness on my face, as the juice from the plum swam down my cheeks and onto my bikini top. I thought about the sensation of getting a tiny bit of sand into the sandwich my mother packed into a brown bag. How it felt to be pinched by a crab in Laguna at 9 years old in the tide pools, how it felt to have nobody believe me about that. 


I just kept looking at the sand, feeling really sick. It felt like if I swam out, I don't know, like I would be leaving something. Everything. 


There's the sentimentality. But in the least emotive way, this felt terrorizing. Like a legitimate ceasing of something. I could imagine it all; right there on the sand. And I didnt want to turn my back for some reason.  


4/4 I sustain a moment of separation that feels liberating instead of threatening. 

I’m wondering if autonomy matters at all. It seems like it will at some point; but not now.

----
I laze around on Melrose in the heat with no purpose or goal in mind. 


I wondered into Agent Provocateur just to try on lingerie aimlessly. The lady, in and out of my fitting room stood behind me, adjusting the clasps on the back of the (my?) lace balconette. She asks if it feels supportive and I say sure. 


The heat is getting to me. I feel happy but completely abject from my own life. 


For the rest of my afternoon I find myself  doing things my mom and I would do when I was 15 and we were trying. We would sit at cafes across from each other, I’d wear black clothing and gigantic white t-shirts refusing food after four hefty spoonfuls, usually of soup or salad (which was our preferred cuisine) 


She’d ask if I thought I was going to hell. I’d roll my eyes and ask her if she thought I was going to hell. She’d ask me again if I thought I’d go to hell. I’d get pissy and release my fork from my hand so it’d fall on my plate, create a noise, a little/big sound to signify my defiance but also to create some sort of tangibility of whatever stupid tension was between us.


I’d sigh after my noise from the fork landed, furthering the tangibility of these ridiculously hypothetical situations, ones I could only choose to believe she made up to be mad. It seemed preemptive to be mad at your sixteen year old daughter for hypothetically going to hell. It made no sense. I remember thinking “I haven’t even lived yet” 


She’d insist upon these hypotheticals, these abstracts. It made me annoyed. 


Today I find myself creating hypotheticals at the cafe table, all on my own. I get it. 

——

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I want to rectify my mood. I should rectify my mood. We are going to a party in Beachwood in which all of our friends will be at. I’d like to be stomachable by then. Mostly for him but a little for myself. 


——


The house is an old storybook with an exceptional view of the Hollywood sign. I had noticed it an hour into the party, remarking that because it was so close it borderline looked completely two dimensional; like something you can break, something you could crack in half.


I wonder in and out of rooms looking for alcohol. I had bought a bottle of Japanese vodka from Whole Foods but I left it on top of the porcelain tiles in the kitchen; next to some tecate beer, a pot of fresh French pressed coffee somebody made, and lime rinds stripped of their pulps. The glass bottle couldn’t have been alone for more than five minutes, but by the time it was back, it was empty.


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I rest my hip against the kitchen doorframe, raising and lowering my hands; engrossed in a passionate conversation with this guy about Lou Reeds review of Yeezus. They’re playing Kanye in the den just below, girls are dancing alongside Noel who is acting as their sort of jester for the night. Something about this makes me jealous. I don’t know. I feel all of these sort of horrible feelings about everything to the point that they mean nothing. 


“What kind of music do you listen to?” This guy asks me.


I spot June walking over, obviously confused by why I am perched against the doorframe, talking to another guy. He snakes his arm around my waist


“This is June.”


He smiles because he’s polite. 


I dont have horrible feelings with him. 

—-


Everyone is touching me tonight. It does not feel that different from every other night. 


In my search for the bathroom/ ongoing quest to recoup alcohol, I bump into a guy. I think he liked my friend. And then liked me. I don’t know. He is holding my shoulder as he talks to me, so it’s hard to tell. 


“Where are you from?”


I say where I am from.


“I feel like everybody from there is so smart.” 


This is so fucking stupid. I can accept a compliment but a veiled one, or an uncreative or debased one will always agitate me. 

I find it difficult to take men seriously. Theyre so self indulgent with their dramas. They have no tact or poise when it comes to their emotions or desires. 

—--

“Ow.” I have a splinter of cheap wood lodged in my palm; which feels so fatty. Unlike the hollywood sign, which i mentioned; is two dimensional. I am saying my goodbyes to it, being escorted up the tiered stairs of canyon home in which I apparently debauched too hard at (June is holding me for balance)

A barricade of black cars are lined up in a very useless way. Supining themselves in this dead end; as if a fossil of the hills. 


4/3 my boss and I joke about getting a fish for the office. I think we are joking but I am kind of serious too. I really would like a fish here.


I would like a fish almost anywhere. I think anywhere. 

——

“Ash” intuitively, I turn my head around


“Yeah?” I ask before the car even rolls the window down. It’s a Mercedes, which makes me raise an eyebrow. 


I’m so used to my name being called here that I just answer immediately. To my surprise, it isn’t anybody who works for the company, it’s a guy who scouted me for a shoot. 


“Oh hey. What are you doing here?” I ask, peeking my head into his very nice car. He is with one of my higher ups.


“Oh you know.” He says. I don’t know. 


“Right” I draw my wrist back after realizing I am letting my cigarette trail smoke into his very nice car.


“Are you going to the Kanye show?” I ask, seeing as this might be the reason he is here.


“No. I went on Wednesday.”


“Oh. Nice.” 


“Listen, what are you doing?” He asks.


“You’re holding up traffic” I say. 


“Okay. Stay here. I’ll be back.”


I watch the nice car drive west toward the end of the block. I’m leaving. 


———


On my way to Junes, I stop for a pack of gum because I think he might try to kiss me later. 


I also grab a Coke and I’m in such a decent mood I get an automatic carwash; the ones where you have to drive thru a makeshift tunnel. It is alright. Sometimes, these car washes have bubbles that align themselves in a pastel rainbow across your dashboard. Sometimes the bubbles smell like nice things like cotton candy or gum.


My grandmother used to get her car washed all of the time simply to amuse me with this. She says now it was to get me to go fall a sleep, that the only way I would fall asleep as a child was if I were to be in a moving vehicle. 


That hasn’t been the case since the only real car accident I have ever gotten in. I remember it well. My friend, who I had a crush on, 16 years old and bleeding from the face. I felt like an adult. I just remember thinking there shouldn’t be blood on his young pretty face.


I had a concussion and went to sleep immediately upon arriving home. Probably not good.


I pull out my car, my very own car, and think to myself, in this ridiculously good mood (given the circumstances at least) how miraculous it is that I even have a car. I was fifteen when that happened and it curbed any sort of normal teenage appetite one might have of wanting to learn how to drive. 


I turn left onto Beverly. I idle at the red light in front of Erewhon and Andante. I think also a small sandwich shop and a Jewish school. I’m starting again. 


Before I even can, a car hits mine I feel it, my car moving, and then the noise. It’s funny you always hear the noise after somehow. Which makes absolutely no sense.


The car is being driven by a man not much older than I am. He looks back confused and panicked. He waits for me to pull over too, but I am not doing this right now. I keep just waving my hand and telling him to go. 


“Go” I whimper to myself, alone, in my very own car. 

——

I’m late to dinner from that fake and useless car crash (if you could even call it that) so I apologize mercifully. 


He pretends to not forgive me but grabs my lower back, and the top of my head, pulling my body into his, which is sat on the edge of his bed.


He is hugging me, I am reciprocating but I am also staring at his wall. 


“Don’t you want to go to dinner?” I ask, my eyes glued to nothing. He actually has many things hanging in his room, a plethora of things to look at really,  but this particular wall is blank.


“Mhm.” He says into my chest. “Wait” 


I wait. He turns me around and pushes me onto the bed so I am now sitting. Oh.


He pulls out a bouquet of flowers. The most precious arrangement of; white, thinly bridled calla lilies, on top of a bed of a flower similar to white babys breath, and cradled by some white limenoums.


I find myself genuinely shocked. I don’t know why. In all honestly, part of adult life that has been quite surprisingly pleasing is the amount of flowers I’ve received. Men are typically good at getting women flowers. I assume they probably got bitched at by their high school girlfriends enough for not purchasing them, that they now know to just get them. But also when people die, or people very close to you try to kill themself you typically get flowers. 


I’m shocked because they’re stunning. They’re so neatly arranged. I’ve been so happy to receive any sort of bouquet that I never even considered their arrangement might matter. Everything is balanced and in tune with each other; there’s contrast and contours while still being soft. 


 I smile, holding them, turning them in a 360 angle in my stumbling hands, wanting to admire them from every angle. 




4/2 “I know a young man who has a crush on you” ███ says. His assistant, or some woman, is next to him, smiling at me. 


“Oh. You do?” I smile. This has to be a joke. 


“Yes. He just saw you and he came up to me going ‘there she is! There she is!’” He mimics the excitement of a child. Its hard to believe ███ is as old as as he is because he reads quite young. 


“And? Are you going to tell me who it is?” I cross my legs and position my hand on my chin, fully amusing him now. 


He shakes his head no.


“You cant just tell me that and not tell me who,” I whine jokingly. “Pleaseeeeeeee”


He shakes his head again, and zips an imaginary zipper across his lips.


I playfully roll my eyes, and say something about how Im trying to work. In all honesty, it is nice to hear. I havent felt necessarily good about myself due to, I guess, various circumstances. Its hard to remember I am a girl that boys could even see, want to take on a date, kiss, etc. I dont know. Being sick and losing this weight, the consequence of that in my face, which twitter user 200004859938th let me know “ages” me and makes me look “sick”. Its aggravating because I know its true. This should be enough to make me stop what I am doing. It wont be enough. I know myself and the circumstance well enough to know this. 

Regardless, this hasnt done the best on my self-esteem. What bullshit, the concept of self-esteem. Its so bloated. Grotesquely self-important in such an uninteresting Westernized way. But ultimately, everybody has one. 

I wish I did not. I wish I didn't have anything. Let alone myself to deal with. And then all of the things that belong to me. Or things I have to tend to because of me.  That is kind of the point of what is wrong. 

“Well you’ll tell me one day?” I look up from my computer, back to ███. 

He nods and gives me a mischievous smile. At least there is still some level of playfulness happening right now. 

I feel depressed and then I dont. 

That has always bothered; my unrelenting, cheap effort at hope.
—--

Maybe I just am better now. Right? Maybe. Smiley face.


I forgot that I have the best job ever. I am just playing dress up, and sorting through an array of vintage clothes. It is nice. It is mellow. 

Theres a nice buzz around the office because everybody is talking about the Kanye show. Some of us went to the one last night, others will be going tomorrow. I think I want to ask ███ for a ticket. But I dont know if he will give me one. The worst he could say is no I suppose. 

He will randomly offer me things;  so its worth trying i guess. 


SKIP: Depressing Arthur Russell song about not being around anymore.


PLAY: A nice song from Free Kitten. 


Oh, right. I feel immune to that worry right now though. Hope this is a permanent liberation. 




4/1 I slept easy in June’s bed. I didnt want to cause problems how I did the other night. Besides there is no oxycodone left to take. I took 12 mg of melatonin and it worked well enough. 


“You smell like an Irish baby” I say into his wet chest. He let me sleep while he showered this morning. 


He gives me a look but ultimately smiles. He takes a beat and cups my face with his hand “oh my god” he says exasperated, shaking my face gently as if to ask how I am real. He is very good at making me feel pretty. 

It was easy enough when we were making out in his car last night, the rain creating small pattering sounds that mimicked how gentle we were being. 
—-----

Work by all accounts is fine. It’s relieving now, when things are fine. I theorize, and will forever; that I am a terrorist in my sleep. Everyone is aware of this; it escapes me entirely. 
My desk, which is a clinical shade of white, reaffirms a scary notion. I am tired. 

I am tired of trying. I am tired of trying to understand why. It does not make sense; it never will. And even if it does, that in some way is a cope. Right? 


I am asking myself, but ultimately I know. I have known. I will know. And then I will forget. And then I will know again. 

-----
I’m 90% sure I killed somebody, or committed some great big terrorist attack that I am unaware of. This sucks. 

I thought I’d spout down; I didn’t. 

I still don’t want to try. In fact, now I think I am heading towards even refusing to try. Even if I did want to try, I cant. Im beyond busy. Im still bleeding too. Now coughing. The drama!



3/31 Its miraculous how fast it can all happen. Modest Mouse song stuck in my head. 

I feel paranoid. And vaguely religious. Not in a good way. 

Im doing that thing you do when you’re a teenager; when you hypothesize whether God can be real or not, not from an existential curiosity, but from a place of “there must be some guy out there making all these things go wrong and terrible because thats the only way I can stomach such unpredictablibity and seemingly onset pointed personal tragedy” Its selfish. Its immature. I still cant help but to do it.

Its a really juvenile trait of mine. One I wish I would shed, once and for all. Because the hard truth of the matter is that I know these things just occur without rhyme or reason. Things get bad randomly. And all at once. There isnt some divine reason; suffering is not divination, it's just suffering. You don't get a medal. 


My grandfather has seemingly picked up the skill of understanding when not to poke at me. 

“How is work?”

“Busy.” I sigh into my iPhone receiver. 

“Good busy or bad busy?” He asks, but very gently. 

“Busy.”

We talk about medical insurance, and all of this stuff. Im just so happy to talk to somebody; I dont mind. 

He doesnt make me say it which I appreciate it. 

—------

Packing my bag. It reminds me of when the fires broke out in Los Angeles. Its a really hard thing to decide what you might need incase everything gets set ablaze. I believe, at the time, I packed my birth certificate because it felt like the responsible thing one would do, my iMac because I cried when my family gifted me it at 11 years old, and I think my guitar. I dont know why I packed my guitar because I havent played guitar in nearly five years. I remember holding it by its mahogany neck, trying to reckon with the fact that I used to care about it. A long time ago, but yes, I did care about it. 

I dont feel sentimental about anything today. Maybe not in a long time. 

I carelessly throw pairs of underwear into my large duffle bag, alongside some jeans, and variations of white t-shirts. I should probably pack some books. Susan Sontag essay collection, Portnoys Complaint, any others. It does not even matter. 

I think it might be raining. 

I flip the fridge open, and grab a cup of pre-made cold brew. Its awesome because I dont have to make it. My eyes tour the the fridge; a couple of heads of broccoli, goats cheese, capers, tomatoes, yoghurt, blackberries etc. I bought all of this on Friday when I still had the need for it. 

I usually wouldnt buy so much food. I even bought miniature ice cream cones with some quirky name from Trader Joe’s. I think I felt happy. 

I grab a bottle of Nyquil off the counter, this reminds me to grab the sleeping pills from my vanity. 

—--


My grandfather and I sit in the living room. He tells me everything about myself, which is good because I know nothing about anything, let alone myself. 


“The dodgers begin the playoffs this weekend” Its tuesday I think. 


“Gotta pee. Can I take a shower here?” I wanted to earlier but I felt distinctly uncomfortable. 


He shrugs. I think thats a yes.



The idea of showering in my childhood home offers me a facsimile of comfort. I think. I take off my boots one by one, taking the time to unzip them even, slipping my jeans off, and then my white t shirt. I am in nothing but my black bra, a black pair of cotton underwear, and a pair of white socks. I look in the mirror. I think I look kind of better today. “Better” only by standards of this past week.


My eyes arent that dark anymore. My skin has somewhat returned to normal. My mouth is still bleeding though. Leaning over the bathroom sink, I fuck around with my gums by running cheap floss through it. I am gushing blood, but I dont notice this all too much because I can make out my iliac crests. They hover idly over the waistband of my underwear. I touch them. 


“Oh” I say between the bleeding. 


Without thinking I move off of the counter. My white socks look like fake stuffed bunny rabbits against the stone flooring of the bathroom. Its green. An actually soothing shade of green  this time. When I was younger I spent a lot of time in here, I’d sit in the bath fully clothed sometimes, just to obtain a semblance of privacy. I’d lay on the stone floor when I was anxious; it’d provide a cooling sensation on my back. 


My white feet are now on the scale. This was my first ever scale, and something about that feels sentimental which is fucked up. 


I cant help it. 



I have lost seven pounds within the past two weeks. 



—-


Actual tranquility is achieved when I walk down the pier of the coastal city I grew up in. It smells of fish and bait; I am surrounded by these burly men. Men who are back from the oil rigs, they docked a medium sized boat named the ‘S.S Isabel’ on the base of the pier, the men walked up this aluminum ramp and headed onto main street to i suppose grab food or became regular denizens of life after 6 months of shucking for oil. 


“I didnt even know you could do that” I said, my boots, heavier than ever dragging across the concrete of the pier making sure to miss the bait and guts. The oil riggers do not seem phased as they pass us, the rubber soles of their shoes crushing the bait and guts. 


“Ask to go on the boat” Max auctions. 


“No” I laugh. No.


I roll my eyes and sit on a bench. On the south side of the pier; a view of a jetty. On the north; the city's pathetic skyline. It has always looked like a miniature, weaker Los Angeles. While it is nice being back, for some reason, I could never imagine living here again. At least not willingly. 


The smell of fish and seaweed makes me feel comforted for the first time in days. 


—---


June watches for my reaction as Anthony Hopkins tears off his facsimile of a face. 



3/30 reading Portnoys compliant in June's bed. June is asleep next to me. 

I drove him insane last night, I’m afraid. Unable to sleep at all I’d rock back and forth, moving his arm over my left rib so it wasn’t sitting on top of it, I’d moan every once in a while to communicate my lack of sleep. 

There was the palpable tension between the fact he desperately wanted to sleep and that I couldn’t at all. 

While he rested away, I crawled over his larger-than-mine body and opened up the small container he brought back for me; in it a bottom tooth the extracted during his emergency wisdom tooth removal, and an oxycodone. The tooth was deep from his gums. The oxycodone, Colorado. 


I emptied the pill onto my palm and hurried to the bathroom. I just then realized I don’t know where keeps his cups or dishes. The water from the faucet is cold and washed the pill down fine enough. 

In light of the unforgiving morning; I can’t say the oxycodone did much. I took it, sure. I fell asleep fine. This was the only reason to even take it. 

I was arrested in a war between my brain and physical body where I woke up every twenty minutes. I’d have an intense, bizarre dream, and wake up, happy at first, because the sensation the oxycodone provides. It is like you are sinking, melting into yourself. You feel warm; everywhere. Your veins arent a thing anymore. You cease to be the owner of tendons, bones, any sort of organ that keeps you alive; those are distant memories of the past. 

God, I fucking love downers.

I would be happy due to these sensations, or more so lack of. I think I have always liked downers because they are the closest you can get to not existing, to being intangible. You are warm, you are nothing. You are a warm nothing. 

I would then be sad when I realized that I was awake, and therefore alive. Probably not good. 

I’d fade back into some nonsensical dream. Faces I’d prefer were absent were in fact present. Pools of neon water in a high school grade pool made sense; I did not question them despite the absurdist borderline ludicrous sentiment. I swam in them. I smelt sunscreen, and rubbed my crunchy chlorine-soiled hair in between my fingertips; it felt so real. An animal that was a mix of two real ones decidedly became a pet. My eighth-grade teacher was there. You were not there.

I woke up and realized nobody was there.

I woke up and I realized June was there.

—---

“Hey, can i tell you a secret?” I am piled onto June's lap in one of his t-shirts, and my underwear. We are in his bed. We have been in his bed for basically the last twenty-four hours.

He nods, close to my face. 

I crawl up closer to him, cupping my hand to his ear, only to mutter gibberish into it. 

“No!” He gasps and covers his mouth in a feigned manner of shock. 

I nod, smiling. 

“Really?” He grabs me by the shoulders, playing into my stupid joke. 

“Mhm… and!” I mutter more gibberish into his ear. He laughs. And pulls me into him. 

“You cant tell anyone, okay?” I soberly beg. 

“Of course not. Thank you for telling me and trusting me” He pulls me into him again, harder, and closer. 

This is the first time I have laughed in 72 hours, I think. This is the first time I have been made to feel redeemable, maybe even acceptable, in the last 48 hours. 

—-----

Santa Monica Boulevard is sparse in all ways tonight. My window is down for my cigarette, but no noise bellows in. There is no sign of life in the city except for this pathetic ember on the end of my cigarette. 


I did the math, realizing I have smoked a pack in two days. 

Mark Kozeleck is playing. Some Mark Kozeleck project. They all bleed together in my head. I think it is that song I really love about San Francisco in the rain, despite it being summer. It just makes me so sad, so I try not to listen to it often. 

Things are all falling apart. I dont see why I cant listen to this song. 

I can only really make sense of ██████ █ ███ ██ ████████ ██████ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ███ ████ ██ ███ ██████ ████ ███ █ █████ █████ ████ ██████ 



3/29 despite this being my first day off in six days, I still woke up around 7:30 am. 


I think I am excited for June to come home. And my brain just intuitively knows. 


I woke up happy because I dreamt he was home earlier,  then I dreamt ████ ███ ███ ████ ████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ████ ███ The sadness occurred probably 3 minutes after waking up when I realized this was not real and might not ever be real. 


The aftermath of last night is still settling within me. I wish the birds would stop chirping so I could just go back to sleep. I wish I could just sleep.


█ ████ █ █████ ███ ██ █████ ███ ████████ █ █████ █████ ██ ██████ ████████ ██ ███ ████ ████ █████ █ ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ███ █████ ██ ███ ██ ████ ██ ███ ██ ███ ████ ██████████ █████ ███ █████████ ████ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████████ ██████ ██████ 

It feels worthless to be lucky in regards you don’t even aspire to have luck in.

██████ ██████ ██ ██████████ █████ ██████ █ ██ ███ ███ ███ █████████ ████ █ ████ ██████ █ ██ ███ ███ ███ ███████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ █████████ ███ ███ ███ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ██ ██ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ██████ 

These do seem like the right things to do.


I just have very little faith in myself to bridge the gap. Especially after reading notes about my teenage self from my old psychiatrist; “mother reports patient isolated herself in her room still despite claiming to feel ‘better’” 


I am good at three things: ████████ ███████ █████ ██████ and having sex. 

-----

I have been better. I have attended work regularly and diligently. I have wanted good for myself and others. I have tried to take as good of care of myself that I can muster. I have gotten myself up to a normal and healthy weight for an adult woman my age. I have gone on dates despite having no sexual appetite or urges, I have worked through that because I know it isn’t good for me to not desire, I guess feeling desired, or desiring.


I have forced myself to go outside and see my friends after a less than desirable work day; because that is good for you. It is good for people. I have said no to cocaine because that is bad for you. I have said no to just about every drug. I have had vegetables, salads, murky green juices while hungover instead of my preferred either a) nothing b) greasy diner breakfast meal because that is supposed to be good for me. 


I made new friends because that is good. I said yes to photo shoots despite not liking them, or even the way I look in them, because that seemed good. I have cried in front of people, people I really care about, I’ve been forthcoming with them, because that is good and not doing that when you feel negative emotions is bad. 


I have done all of these things. I’ve tried. I have really given it a good old college try. 


And it has worked. I’ve been happy. I have been happy for the first time in my adult life. I sing in the car on my way to work. I allow myself to enjoy dinner with my friends. I go to parties and partake in small talk, even if I know it doesn’t matter, because I finally found the charm in it. I go for walks around my neighborhood and admire the miniature villas with their Spanish architecture. I make plans to visit friends on the east coast. 


I want good. I want to be good. I thought I was good. Or was something very close.




3/28 My coffee isn’t too strong, my cigarettes taste the way they did when I first started smoking a decade ago. The weather is temperate. Traffic is mellow to nonexistent. I feel much better. 

I don’t even mind having to work on a Saturday; in fact, I am in such a good mood I say good morning to everybody upon entering the office. I even packed a lunch. Which I think is a good sign; it seems like this would be a good sign for somebody. 
—-

I have no appetite because I believe a fake-intervention is going to be held for me, invariably at some point today. I say fake, not to discredit it. But usually, interventions are for drug addicts, gamblers, etc. 

I think I’m █████████ I don’t even know at this point.


I’m an anxious wreck at work, dropping things, varying between crying and deep breathing, so on. The whole row. 

I got a concerning text, which then turned into about 15 concerning texts, and will inevitably turn into a concerning phone call. I had been waiting for the phone call for an hour, and then eventually just started to cry. I don’t know why exactly. The whole situation is bad,it seems bad. I seem bad. This seems bad. I kept trying to collect myself, but to no avail. 

I’m now in the bathroom with a tissue to my face. Whole row. Cold water on the back of the neck. Breathing like you’re two years old. ’m trying to brace going back outside and I’m attempting to gauge the risk of somebody, anybody seeing me cry. It just doesn’t seem nice. It doesn’t seem like something that would happen on a Saturday. Let alone something that would happen at the office, my place of employment. 

I count myself down like a toddler, 3, 2, 1, 

When I open the door I am immediately met with my boss. 

“Are you okay?” She asks in a gentle tone.

“Yeah.” I’m crying as i say this. I realize how pathetic it is to say yes while crying so I offer a shrug. “Just … stuff” shrug again.

“Yeah. I understand.” She says. She stops what she’s doing and turns her body towards me. “Do you want a hug?” 

I nod, surprised by my own answer. 

How lucky am I to have such a circumstance for work? 

—-
I decided I really needed a cigarette so I took an early lunch. I looked at my lunch that I packed in the fridge: a small bowl of yogurt with berries and honey. I don’t have an appetite. How ironic that the literal one time I pack a lunch I don’t have an appetite. 

It’s hard to eat when you’re out of breath from crying. I guess so. 

Upon going outside and fucking around with my bag looking for my lighter, trying to hide my swollen and red face; I  see ████, ███ sees me. He looks me up and down, and once again, up and down, and says hi.


I smile. Genuinely. “Hi”

It probably wouldn’t make sense to anybody, sometimes not even me. But this all offers me comfort. I can always count on him to do that. Wars will be waged, famines will ravage,████ is going to look me up and down. And then again.

I can always count on coming here and being engrossed, ripped away from whatever might be happening to or because of me. I can help make the best t-shirt in the world. 

And that’s the biggest worry I have to have. 

A couple of work friends surround me as I smoke a cigarette on my lunch. It’s nice to have work friends. I didn’t have any before. This was due to personal flaws I think.

They don’t seem put off so it might be that the swelling in my face actually went down, and my eyes are no longer red.
——

June and I somewhat fight on the phone. In a fake way. Or maybe real. I can’t tell. I think I’m just being temperamental due to circumstances. 


“It’s too loud I’ll call you later” I sigh.


“I’m in a packed elevator” he says, which I can barely make out. 


“Right… I’ll call you later”

There is a sudden moment of complete clarity. I can hear his voice again, sans the chaos from the now deceased crowd “I’m sorry baby it was packed in the elevator”

God. I’m the fucking worst. 

“Okay. I’m sorry” I should have added a pet name or something to that apology. I don’t know. 

 —-

I tried to eat dinner after everything. It was really difficult to get out of bed. ‘Just so cold’ I kept repeating to myself in my head. 


Count myself down like a toddler, 3,2,1 

Instead of making it to the kitchen, I make it into the bath. I didn’t even wait for it to fill. I just got in and positioned myself under the faucet, the warm water running between my elbows, pooling between my breasts and arms. 


I let my arms give and the warm water spills all over me, my stomach, my thighs, my knees which helps slightly with the ‘just so cold’ of it all. 

—-
I feel acutely “wrong with”. 


3/27 An issue with my health insurance, well the lack of health insurance has me running in between buildings at work today. 


They wanted me to check if I had health insurance. I held my tongue. I think I would fucking know. 


“Can you just check?”


Yes.


I do not have it. 


“I do not have it” I emailed.


Great. 


I am now sat at my desk with every medical record from age 15 onward. I can read any notes any of my doctors, which were plenty, at my convenience. 


----MENTAL STATUS EXAM----



   LETHALITY---

     SUICIDAL IDEATION:  denies suicidal ideation, plan, and intent

     HOMICIDAL IDEATION   denies homicidal ideation, plan, and intent

    APPEARANCE & BEHAVIOR---

     APPARENT AGE:  as stated

     ATTIRE:  appropriate

     GROOMING:  good

     HYGIENE:  good

     EYE CONTACT:  appropriate

     GAIT AND POSTURE:  normal gait,normal posture

     BEHAVIOR / MANNER:  normal, normal,cooperative

     MOTOR ACTIVITY:  normal



   MOOD & AFFECT---

     MOOD:  anxious, depressed

     AFFECT: mood congruent

     SPEECH:  normal



   COGNITIVE---

     THOUGHT PROCESSES:  coherent,relevant,logical

     THOUGHT CONTENT:  no psychotic or inappropriate thought content

     SENSORY & COGNITIVE:  alert,clear

     INSIGHT:  average

     JUDGMENT:  average

—


ASSESSMENT:



 AXIS I:   Major Depression

██████ █████ ██████████ Prob

R/O Panic Dis, R/O Anxiety Dis.

Axis II: deferred

GAF:  Current:  59


It is weird to read about myself in the third person. To look at, read, digest the consonants, literally spelling out this elaborate but also simple narrative. I was good. And then I was bad. 


Its maybe not the best for me to have access to it. To view myself through these files, the worst years of my life condensed down to affect, motor, speech.


Its maybe not the best to not have health insurance for the last two years. Its maybe not best to get a boyfriend who lives six hours away. Its maybe not the best the break up with somebody a day before New Year's. Its maybe not the best to wait until 7 pm to have dinner because “there's no healthy foods” around. 

Since when do I know about what is best?


3/26 in between directing the model, I hear a voices, intuitively my back arches and I whip my head around; 


███ ████ is back from ███ ████.


He immediately locks eyes with me, and walks up to me. I am in a pleated skirt, down to my ankles, and a vintage Smashing Pumpkins t-shirt. He is going to hate this.


“I know you”


“Yes .” I say. I can’t say much else; because then I will have to answer for as to where I was during the fall. 


“I know you” he repeats, grabbing my hand. Firmly shaking it, looking me up and down. 


█ ███ ████ ███ ██████████ ██ ████ ███ █████ █ █████ █████ █ ████ █████ ██████ █████ █████ ████ ██████████ 


“This is Kelly” I point to her, he then shakes her hand.


Thank God I didn’t get pneumonia. If I was busy before, they will have to create a new word for whatever it is I will be now. 



——

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█ ███████ █ █████ ███ █ ███████ █ █████ █████ ███████ ██████ ███ ███ █████ █████ 



3/24 I am falling asleep on the pink couch in the office in front of everybody; I don’t care anymore. 


June must’ve picked up that I am off, or at least more off, because realistically I have been off since Sunday night. I am fatigued to the point of seemingly no return. He texted and asked if I was okay, if I wanted him to order me food to the office. I said “no thank you” (I added a pet name so as to not read as a clinical bitch) I said something about how my period really disturbs my appetite; which is the truth. 

I am on my lunch break trying to read Philip Roth out of this really ugly pink book cover. I had two large cups of coffee. Nothing will aid the fatigue. 

I’m doing admin work today too, opposed to standard shooting, editing, so on. It’s not helping. I’m practically falling asleep at the desk. 
████, last night, emphasized a text she sent earlier I had never responded to; asking when we should fly home from New York. 


“June 5th” I texted back. This seems like a fine day to fly back to Los Angeles for no particular reason other than the fact that it sounds fine. 

I have not responded to anybody else’s text messages or returned their phone calls. I missed Brandon’s birthday dinner at Nobu on Sunday; which I self-admittedly forgot. 

I think I just slept through it. I’m imagining the salmon nigiri, the sake, all of these things I don’t necessarily care about aligned in a beautiful rich way. 


I guess, I ███ ████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███████ ██████ ██ ██ ███ ████ █ █████ ████ ████ ████ ███ ██ ███ █ ████ ██████████ ██ █████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ █████ █████ █ ███ ██████ ███ ██ ███ ███████ 


I responded to everything in a monotone and bleak way. I accepted apologies without a hint of softness in my voice. I said he should remember things are important outside of work; do I hear myself? 

Not really. 

I’m going to try to sleep with Roth on my lap. I’m going to try to drive home later and eat a relatively okay dinner. 


I have been eating terribly, sleeping terribly. Which is not good. ████ scared me on Sunday, she heard my coarse voice along with its complaints of how busy I am until we leave to the desert in two weeks. 

She said to be careful, if I push myself too hard, I can get pneumonia. I thought this was something that only happened to old people, like my grandfather. Who has habitually gotten pneumonia without fail every couple of years since I was born.




3/22 ████ is home from New York, so I am half awake and warm on her couch. Kismet comes to cuddle with me every once in a while. His small brigade of organs, raising and lowering themselves, apparent through his small furred chest, is the only reminder that I am actually here.

I was just on the phone with June. I miss him a lot. 

Hes in a lot of pain, and it feels kind of ridiculous of me to tell him how bad of shape I am in. Like that one MJ Lenderman song. Still not going to listen to that song, it always upsets me. 

████tells me about New York and what it was like. I cant even remember what New York is like at this point. I say I am excited to go back with her in May. I think I am. Its hard to think that far ahead. 

“What are you wearing to Coachella?” I ask her. 

She answers, I look at my calendar and realize it's in two weeks. Its hard to think that far ahead. 

Its hard to even think about tomorrow. 

Zoe arrives and this is my signal that I should probably head back home to prep for tomorrow which is loaded. I run to the bathroom really quick to blow my nose, but when I do this I end up just bleeding from my mouth. Which probably isnt good. 

“How are you feeling?” June asked when we were on the phone, however many hours ago.

“Im okay. Do I sound bad?” I know i sound bad. 

“Kind of”

Yeah I know. 

—--

At home, a spider richochets itself between my curtains and the window. Despite feeling completely foible, i get a small cup to trap him under with the hopes of setting him free outside. 

I have never been able to kill bugs. Its just too sad. 

I am so weak it takes a lot to trap him, and then eventually move him to his home which is just;  vaguely outside. 

I lose him at points, wondering if he is still under the cup. Whenever I check, he is doing worse. His stamina is flagging, his legs are moving slower and slower, his tenacity is practically leaking. I think the cup might have hurt him, I dont know how, but I think I might have hurt him. 

I open the back door, and go to let him out, as if he were my dog, but when I remove the cup he isnt moving. His flaccid body piles down the back first stair. 

I think I hurt him. 

This is ridiculous, I think. Im almost crying on the kitchen floor now. I did not mean to kill him. The whole point of the cup, and trapping him, was so that i wouldnt have to hurt him. This means nothing seeing as he is little and dead now. Dead and little. 


3/21 I slept the entire day which really made me feel weird. I didnt get home until 4 which I just cant take anymore. 


I woke up half heartdly around 9 am, coughed up blood, and went back to sleep because I didnt want to deal with that. 

████ and I are in our eternal poses, Im strung across the couch, hes painting on the floor. We talk to each other without ever making eye contact. This makes talking about hard things feel easier. Our air conditioner being the only annoyance, its quite loud so you have to scream whatever it is that youre trying to say. 


I dont know what I am even trying to say. I think Im asking him to come to this magazine launch, making the point its only walking distance away. Making the point I have an ad for my blog in it. Maybe in my own pathetic way I am asking ████ to support me. 


He cant. He has his friends show. I dont even know the person by name.

He keeps apologizing without ever actually saying the word ‘sorry’ because I didnt express actual disappointment. Life is just something that happens. 

Im not actually upset. I also dont even have the energy to be upset, not in a real way. I have enough energy to mildly and vaguely complain though. 

—---


I gave up on the prospect of going to the last ever Milly show around an hour ago. Its 9:28 now and theyre set to play at 10. Theres no way I am making it to pasadena within that time frame. I dont want to. 


I think if I even try to do that I’ll die. 


Im barely here, on Beverly bouelvard outside of this bar. I ordered a water, which totaled to 8 dollars. Sure. 


This guy is talking to me. About movies I think. 


Hes wearing a suit. Im wearing a t-shirt meant for little boys who play baseball, a pair of black shorts from work, and last nights eyeliner. I tried scrubbing it off, really hard, to the point that it burnt my eyes but to no avail. Its pocketting itself in my waterline. 


Which I thought made me look bad but apparently not bad enough because this guy wants to take me to dinner. 


I genuinely cannot figure out why. 

I have done nothing. I’ve said virtually nothing. I am virtually nothing right now.


Ive offered no sort of hint at any sort of redeeming character traits. At all. 


I figured maybe this would get him to see I am in no place to be taken to dinner. I think this is only wanting to make him try harder. 


I feel like I am going to die. At the risk of sounding dramatic. When I was talking to Jameison earlier I felt like I made no sense. I coudlnt even figure out what I was trying to say. I felt like everybody was wondering why I was there, and what the fuck was wrong with me. 


I feel half awake, but still warm. This is overall an incredibly unpleasant feeling. 



3/20 Last night of the Julia gallery tonight, I think I am very sad. I think I am sad because people are going to Berlin. France, Wherever. I just know it isnt los angeles. 

Its weird to think after tonight I will never go back to the gallery. I dont know how it became such a third space in my life, or really what my friends and I did to deserve such a luxurious playhouse. But I will miss it. Bad.

Lots of things are ending; Milly’s last show ever tomorrow is at Sid the Cat. I think ████ ████, ████and I are going to go. Feels full circle. I’ve been to probably like 20 Milly shows. They just kind of have always been around. It used to be a Friday night thing, go to a Milly show at El Cid, then back to their house in South Pasadena (yellow house is what everyone called it), the boys would drink beer, talk about their producers, music industry things I guess. 

Its really sad that wont be happening anymore. Ever.With things ending I have just kind of been forced to think about the fall. 

I still cant listen to Ee which really pisses me off. But i think that proves what is wrong with me; my stark and frankly scary ability to adapt. I can be happy, more so convince myself that I am happy under nearly any circumstance. I can be good, I can be mild. I can be tantamount to whatever is expected of me in almost any situation. 

But then there are these rips, rips of reality which threaten to tear that all apart. I think if somebody forced me to listen to that one Ee song I’d start to cry, or something worse. Is there anything worse? I’d do whatever is worse than crying. 

Theres this fear rising within me █████ ██████ ███ ████ ██████ █ █████ █ ██ █████ ██ ██ ██████ ██████ 
Thats something I dont want to account for, something I dont want to figure out “what it means”

I know that it means nothing; I will let it mean nothing. It cant mean anything. Not right now. 

-----

here is this communal drunkness from all the champagne. This guy, Tim, is trying to buy Zoë and I drinks. He’s the worst kind of guy who is hitting you on despite the fact it’s benevolently clear you have absolutely no interest in him; he habitually interrupts you as much as he harasses you. 


“That’s okay, really” Zoë tried to say.


We kind of don’t need him to buy us drinks because we are on a covered tab here.

-----
“I just think its about–” Theyre talking about writing in front of me, which I dont mind. I can hardly think though. Its loud here, everybody is hot seeing as the gallery is in an old theater from the 30s. Maybe the 40s. 


Everybody’s skin is sticking to each other. 


I have taken to going on my iPhone instead of trying. I think this is fine, or at least better. I dont care about my essay on Baudrillard or Krauss right now. Im pretty champagne drunk, and it seems like this will be my last drunk night sponsored by the kindess of German millionaires. I am trying to enjoy it; it isnt working. 

I cant figure out why. I keep going to say things, talk about things I know I care about. I can only find myself saying the same thing when everybody asks me how I am “just so busy with work”

Im stil sick in a really worthless way. I cant breathe on top of the capacity issue the gallery is facing. I gave up on trying to breathe around an hour ago, when we first initially got here. It was puzzling to see it so packed. It felt wrong. 

I have spent so much time here borderline alone. Or with Zoe and ████ who I am so close to it might as well register in my brain as still being alone because I am that comfortable with them. 

Alone. I realize I havent been alone all day. I went from being at the office for ten hours, to dinner with a coworker, to getting ready in ten minutes (while I could hear zoe and dillon laughing fron the living room), to on the concrete being hovered over by people that I supposedly know. I know them. I think I know them.

Im just really tired and out of it. I probably shouldnt be drinking when I feel so physically weak. But I dont know when my debauchery will be sponsored again; if it ever will. 


I am going to go downstairs and get another drink 


“I am going to go downstairs and get another drink”


No one really understands this as “I am going to go downstairs and get a drink to be alone” because I didnt say that part. So now we are all going downstairs to get another drink. 


I eventually piss, which I only half had to do so I could obtain a semblance of alone-ness. 

Got my period. Great. 

I wash my hands, taking my sweet time doing so. My hands turn prunish under the lukewarm water because I am taking so long. I am completely distracted my reflection in the mirror. I look like hell. I am covered in an array of bruises I dont remember obtaining, my skin is practically melting off of me, my pathetic attempt at 10 minute makeup only looks sad. Im completely null and void. Theres not really a trace of life there at all. 

—-

German house music rapes my eardrums. What a good verb. Thats exactly what it is doing; raping my eardrums. 

Everyone is here. Probably too many people I know. 

I have no control over this; I dont care either way. 

It feels like life is just something that happens



3/19 Air conditioner is broken in the office today, which is cradled by my remaining menial fever. 


I walked in weary. I think I will always be scared to go back to work after being out for a duration of time. I am worried everybody is mad at me all the time, generally in life, or upset with me. I dont know if worried is the right word. 


Because i ultimately am not afraid of the supposed anger towards me, the preconceived “upsetnesss” thrown my way. It just kind of weighs on me in a worthless way that makes me really hard on myself. 


Its a fake pressure I apply to myself. 


Im self aware of all of this; yet it doesnt help in any sort of way. If anything it makes it worse. 


Much to my disbelief, I enter a meeting with my bosses aand everybody is very happy I am back. I almost turn my chair around to see if there is somebody else behind me. Me? Really? Okay, I guess.


I’ll take it. 
—

The meeting goes exceptionally well. I feel really happy. And supported. 
hese are two great words. 

I feel as a basal pressure. But its hard to know if thats real or something I am making up for myself. 

3/18 I did not intend to do so; but I am drinking champagne at the Julia gallery again. 


Something has happened, it is packed tonight. Our pseudo clubhouse feels blown out. I recognize instagram models, granted the more artsy ones, but they’re here. They’re boys, I guess men, my age here. 


They keep looking at me.


I am starting to believe I might be beautiful. 


I can’t figure out why people think this matters. Or shows any sort of skill or tact on my end. 


“Obviously you’re fucking beautiful, and you’re smart” Alex, the bartender, holds my hands, literally ignoring the willing and patient customers. He seemed to have miss me during my bout of mystery illness.


It felt nice to come here and have everybody ask where I was, and if I was okay. I said I was okay. I was. 


I feel inclined to ask “so what?” 


But I just drink the champagne. 


Being called beautiful, at least as a woman, has always only ever felt like the twist of a knife. I’m perpetually aware that by the time I’m 35 nobody will pay attention to me. 


Unless I get real smart.


But the grocery store, will just be a grocery store.


These comments instill some sort of notion within me; that I have to act quick and fast while people still care. I have to take advantage of this thing I have no control over; because I really will eventually have no control over it 



3/17 I am the worst illness have-r ever. It is impossible to sit still.


Yesterday: I spent most of the day lazing on the couch while ████ painted. He even let me paint a small section. He said I have “very good technique” that I was “actually pretty good at it” 

Charity. He says the same thing when I round off on his drums. Its like when you tell a child they are good at ‘playing’.

I sat under the air conditioner in a tiny babydoll dress feeling pretty fucking useless. I went on my phone and saw things that upset me, only mildly, but they still upset me. This only made me feel even more useless.


I thought of what I wanted, because when you’re sick you have this insight to your deepest desires, an almost prenatal truth to what you absolutely need in that moment, what do i need?  I dont think anybody would like my answer to that question; I dont like my answer to that question. 


Selfish. 


I tend to get pretty angsty when Im ill. And sentimental. Like a baby. Its the one time I’ll let the front, if thats what you want to call it, down. And even then, it isnt fully down. I still have agreed to the Jaded London photoshoot under the guise it will take no longer than 30 minutes. I text Asher from sex magazine back that I am in infact available for a call today. 


I dont know how to stop, which isnt even a sentiment I am concerned with. I dont want to. 


I dont know when I figured this out, but I very much enjoy to be busy. I need to be busy. If i am not, I will kill myself. This is a simple sentence, one very easy to digest, and makes a lot of sense to me. It is generally easy enough to subscribe to. It is a beneficial sentence to subscribe to. 


████████ ████ ██ ██ ██ █████ ███ ██ ███ ██ ██ ██████ █████ ███ ███ █████ █████ █████ █████ ███ ██ ██ █████ █ ████ █████ █ ███ █ ████ ██ ██ █ ███ ██ ███ ██████ ████ █████ ████ ██████ █████ ███ ██████ ██████ ████ ███ ██████ ████ ███ █ ███████ ████ ██ ████ █████ ██ ██ █████ ███ █ █████ ████ ████ ███ █████ ███ █ ████ ████ ████ █ ███ ███████ that became a full-time job in it of itself. It became a career. A conviction. 

█ ███ ██████ ███████ ████ ██ ██ ████ █ ███ ████████ █ ████ ██ ██████ ███ █████ ████ ███████ █████ ██ ███ ███████ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ████████ ███████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ██ ██ █████ ████████ ██ ████ ██ █████ ██████ █████ ███ ███ ████ █████ ████ ███ ███████ █ ██████████ ██████ ███ ████ ██ ████ ██ ████ ███████ █████ ██ ███ █████


I never understood why my tact was seen as concerning  ███████ ██ ████████ ██ ██ █████ ████ ██ ████ ████ █ █████████ ██ ██████ ████████ █ ████████████ ████ ███ ██████████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ████████ ████ ██ ████████ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ ████ █████ █████ ██ █████ ████ ██ █████ █████ ████ 
It made sense then. It still kind of makes sense now.