CISION

Hear me—

I want a cigarette, so I grab a tootsie pop.

‘I want to write—’

“You’ve been on that all night.” I hear a voice, ahead, from the driver’s seat.

‘Who are you?’

I feel the car hit a speed bump, and a bulge works up through my throat. I gulp it down. Then, we stop.

‘You want one?’

“Cherry.”

My tongue flings the sweet core around, plunging it against my cheeks. I hear it grind against my braces.

‘Who are you?’

I hear a chuckle, and my back stiffens. A name. A crack of laughter. Something about a party. The tires’ groans. A cackle. An insult. A wheeze—a headache, then nausea.

The car accelerates, and my world blurs out of focus. I lean my head on a window and whimper.

‘I want to write.’

“… Have you been writing anything lately?”

‘I’ve been trying.’

A yellow beam zips by. Its engine, I heard, growled at me, deafened me.

“Damn, must be a supercar or something. You caught that?”

My back slouches back again. A familiar sore resumes its climb up this spine of mine.

‘2012 Ferrari 458 Italia Base. Tuned…. (maybe).’

Another chuckle.

“You got your car-smarts straight. I’ll give you that.”

Then silence.

“You know how much i—”

‘No.’

A chuckle, “Fair enough,” then silence.

I recognize a neon smudge creep across the window slate (familiar, but they all look the same). The sweet core breaks between my crooked teeth, its debris scraping my tongue. With it, the nausea crawls away. Only a sharp migraine remains, latched onto my skull. My surroundings regain definition, and I feel the rough asphalt below me make my car shiver.

I open my eyes wider and stare into the driver’s seat. A black leather jacket. A washed-down baseball cap. I see their reflection on the windshield too, but I meet no face. I see black leather gloves. I smell dead cigarettes.

“Almost there.”

I stare outside at the procession of yellow streetlights. I look up, looking for the limelight, or moon. I give up as the car screeches to a halt.

A strange face turns towards me from the driver’s seat. I can’t see its eyes in the shade of its cap, but I hear it mutter “out.” I spot a pair of lips shiver, a white stick protruding from between them.

‘It’s cold.’

“Get out.”

I stare back with my lips clasped, teeth grinding, and my back stiffens up again.

“Go home.”

‘…’

“Out.”

I comply, but I look back at the car door before it clacks shuts. There’s a scent of familiarity to it.

I see a window slide down. From it, pops out that shaded face.

“You really live here?”

I still can’t see its eyes.

‘I think so.’

A sigh. I see it vaporize. The window slides back up, and the car crawls away. Along with it, the familiar silhouette of my car.

Two hands crash into my pockets—empty. I feel a shiver crawl up my spine, but a pang cuts it off—an aged headache, then nausea.

This head droops down, and my eyes meet a dry, dark sidewalk. I turn my back against the asphalt as I pull the head back up, and we confront a familiar building.

This mouth is dry, and I feel the braces’ wires tear apart our softer cheeks.

‘I want a cigarette,’ but I’ve run out of tootsie pops, and the taste of iron coats our tongue and throat.

These legs walk towards the building and the head leans on its door. Fists bang on it twice, then squeeze out a voice:

A name, a familiar one

—as I collapse, once more.