To The Undertow

Part 1

Small, squiggly lines -the outlines of objects- were moving at a rate increasingly noticeable. I straightened my shirt collar and drank some grain over ice and lime wedges. Harsh, but tasteful. It was most fitting to the environment. People were cheaply overdressed and smelled of citrus. Do you ever nod your head to nothing? As if to seem casual, you move to a song in your mind? After...shit..after that...after I moved around for awhile, noticing traces of either cookie crumbs or ashes in my limey grain drink. To be careful, I grab a fresh one.

I’d been waiting on Colin to show his face for nearly half an hour. He hadn’t. Work parties can be cheesy for sure, but this was arranged quite differently than your average theme-party. A nice establishment -this year, the trendy sKull Lounge over the usual masonry lodge- definitely helps the atmosphere. How should I frame this issue to Colin? If I come off as arrogant, I lose my chance at a raise...blah, blah, blah. Honestly, the concerns floated by me, barely registering as worthwhile. Hell, he could even fire me.

Maybe I shouldn’t even bring up the issues? Let him find out on his own. I don’t even recall those past ethical concerns, or the major snags that would inevitably swallow the project. I flow along with the chemicals in my head, and sip my icy limey grain.

The music changed, drastically. Scottish tunes perforated through the sound levels in the room, sharply cutting my ears. The older ladies’ thick, oily perfumes filled my nostrils. Then I glanced Colin, behind the bar, oddly. His suit stained with rum as he kept trying to blend new liquors. Blue Curaçao and Dark Rum with chipped ice and orange or pineapple juice, I can’t tell. Hell, it could even be grapefruit. It was probably grapefruit. I slowly make my way over to the bar, slinking behind my officemates. It’s pointless, though. My teal unisex blazer with pastel-peach lining is very loud, and Colin nods and does his best Cruise in Cocktails impression. The bottle of blue breaks.

Colin is tall, fit, and witty. He’s some sort of cocky artist in love with his body, wearing putrid cologne I’m sure has someone’s signature on it. His stupid, insipid, and I’ve oft-assumed fake accent definitely has Scottish notes, but I’ve heard the Georgia southern-boy come out, rife with malapropisms. As the bagpipes fade to a lull, hiding yet another coming crescendo, I begin to care less about turning mountains of terrible ideas into white gold. I don’t have the energy for alchemy at the moment. So, we just talk. Not about work. Music. Writers. Film. Then, I leave, stumbling and stoned, in a cab, thinking new things. Then there’s the therapy.

“I would have nightmares where I was driving, and the sun would blind me, causing me to crash. Or it would be drowsiness, fatigue, or something. Intoxication, perhaps. Or maybe there’s a fastening failure or an axle fracture, causing wheel separation. Then I’d careen into a culvert, flipping the car and decapitating myself. I always die in these dreams, I experience it. Then comes the panic and the anxiety. It feels as if it’s a premonition. It’s like, what lingering trauma is hanging in the clouds, waiting on my incorrect step. I think it goes back to my father...”

My therapist listened intently while intently staring at her legal pad. It was ten in the morning. I finished my overnight bartending shift, grabbed some sort of taquito, and headed to Dr. Ronan’s office. 10AM was her only opening, and I needed the assistance. The day job would have to wait.

“Blah, blah, blah. Your father is the cause. Blah. Blah. The withdrawing is making it worse. Narcissism. Blah, blah. Some other shit, some DSM-5 shit, diagnosis or something like it. Maybe derealization. Blah,” my therapist said.

Sixty-five facetious minutes later, I’m standing at the reception desk. The payment is about ten percent higher than usual. And I’m cheap. So we begin to debate.

“Sir, the payment increase is due to reduced funds from the university. It was a necessary move.”

“Look, I’ve been coming here for six months. Nothing’s improved. I still can’t...look, I work two jobs. I’m headed to my regular gig at the fuckin-”

“Please don’t curse in here, sir.”

“I said ‘fuck’ once.”

“Please don’t curse, sir.”

“Jesus Henry Christ.”

As I walked down the teal hallway, I noticed the lack of soul in the building. That’s not a knock on therapy, or psychology as a whole. Just this place. Just this quack. She was a fake personality; a bad actor wearing the costume of a caring individual. She wanted to care, but she didn’t. Really, though, I understand. All doctors will see people fade away, one way or another. It’s all part of the job. Oncologists, for example. How can she be worried for me when the real schizo comes in at noon? I’m just practice. I’m a child complaining of a splinter. I’m a broken finger.

I pull into the office parking lot around 1pm. The lunch hour has passed already and people are heading back to their desks for part two. I notice Colin at my desk.

I do customer analytics for a security systems company in rural Kansas. The city’s about ten miles and our oversized offices take up an entire mini-mall space. The only space locally that could fit us due to our rapid growth. I don’t enjoy my job but I enjoy people. Not emotionally, mind you. People are still a giant annoyance that I’m working to understand. No, I enjoy the study of people. Sociology, anthropology, psychology. Whatever you want to call it, I’m nothing more than a peeping tom. I study your behavior and it excites me, all while I struggle to relate to you. My job is to use that not only to advertise, but to build a more personable product. I’m the middle man between your secret, painful needs and the companies selling you solutions. People are the ultimate fetish. Getting to know them, crawling inside their brain, and having a few fleeting seconds of connectivity. Being human.

Colin wore dark burnt khakis, with a crisp sky-blue Oxford, purple skinny tie and a Gant light blue wool blazer. I was more thrift-store chic with tight olive jeans, Doc Martin’s, muted orange dress shirt and a used H&M twill peacoat. No tie. Goddamn, I admire his style. Colin founded this company four years ago. An old college buddy, he recruited me from the depths of online market research. He’d always seen my potential even as manic depression and addiction reared its beautiful head from time to time.

“Colin, how are we this morning?” I ask.

“Doing great, Keith. How was the session?”

“I’m now enlightened,” I joked. “But, I am overpaying.”

He laughs and says “We pay it all at some point.” That’s dark, Colin.

He continues with the niceties for a second then gets managerial.

“Look, I know you’ve been busy with recovery and your sessions with Mara. That’s great! But, I need those reports on rural risk factors.”

“I’m already 80% done.” That’s a lie. I forgot about it.

As I sat in my decently sized cubicle, I found it disgusting. My stomach couldn’t handle these “folks” talking about their parties and judging their enjoyment thereof on the crowd size. I work on rural risk factor analysis for homes outside city limits. Oh, and listen to AM radio.

From The Coast To The Undertow with Syril Sawbell is my favorite radio show in history. It’s filled with weirdoes and mountain-people calling in with tales of sasquatch or alien abduction. Every once in awhile some legitimate pseudo-philosophy will be spoken and my ears just ring in delight. Listening at my desk, waiting on the bupropion to activate, I pretend to work. The voice lingered.

“What a strange time it was. I remember the populace decorated and parading in a panicked jubilee. Oh, and I’ve heard it echoed. They say, ‘I don’t believe in beliefs’ and pay their taxes. Now, as our batteries die and we scrape feelings, we seek relief. Make no mistake, sensation and stimulus are the herpes of the soul. We seek relief from the fire and itching. I watched as massive hurricanes, gusts of water, were drowning my comrades. The reporters holding on to guardrails as news of Special Counsel distracted from aid. Relief.

“I’ve been everything. A cog in the freak kingdom. I’ve been chemically enlightened and physically exalted. I’ve set fires and taken identities. I’ve been blunt to the powerful and doubtful of the assured. I am what you are. A king. A goddess. Yet, you don’t see the true boundaries of your aura. You don’t feel the limitless reality you occupy. You bring limits when you sit at our table. We should all bring our fears when we meet, and tear down anything that doesn’t bring catharsis. Nothing else is real, at all.”

And then, mid-interest, the pills kick in. Maybe it wasn’t the pills. Maybe it was temporary dysfunction. But, I swear, on my mother’s grave, Syrill Sawbell called out to me.

“Keith...it’s me. The buzz in your ear and blood in your heartbreak. Why do you listen to these thinkers? These capitalists. Rise above. Raise a fist. Murder your boss.”

I protest. “I can’t murder Colin. Colin is kind.”

He protests. “Kindness isn’t bulletproof. You are Colin, you are me, you are your fears and secrets. We are the same, so no one is special.”

“This isn’t real,” I remember uttering nearly silent.

“Nothing is real. We are decaying matter. Kill Colin. Do it,” Mr. Sawbell called out on AM 1320, directly to me.” If his pain is your pain and is my pain and our parent’s pain, then we are the same, one. And if we are all the same, none can be special. Kill your boss, Keith.”

I turned the program off and raced home in this strange, sudden thunderstorm. I recall thinking that some mixture of the meds and my own recreation had caused this. I fathered this situation and later arrived home to it. My front door was littered in flyers advertising To The Undertow. The From The Coast portion was covered in brown paint or oils. “To the undertow. Ha. Maybe I should kill Colin,” I thought effortlessly.

Inside my overpriced, first-floor, city-scape, studio apartment, I heard cars pass while blaring their radio. It would taunt me. “Keith!” “Kill him.”

I was a good damn fan of Syril Sawbell but now I was wishing I was capable of self-decapitation with these limited resources. How is he in those cars? I’d hear him my head, just humming. He shouldn’t be using his radio resources to incite murder, though.

The weatherman was Syril. The newslady was Syril. “It’s Syril Killyourboss and it looks like we’re in for a cool blast and icicles jammed in foreheads. Or maybe there is no snow. You should go ask Colin about forehead injuries..Murder him, Keith.”

Oh, what a soothing, violent voice for my id. It was really easy to find poison. It was really easy to find a gun. It was really easy to imagine jealous frustration leading me to strangle the life from Colin’s face. The car is an instrument. I take the long way to Colin’s and turn on the radio. And there’s my sermon.

“You deserve better, Keith.”

“Thank you, From The Coast To The Undertow.”

My new god continues. “Kill him. Kill that person. Maybe you should try to eat a little.” Then, I’m at Colin’s before I know it, adding some scent and making sure to adjust my peacoat in his driveway. The bastard.

To be continued...