Immersion
Obsession
2 Days is 48 hours.
48 hours is 2,880 minutes.
And 2,880 minutes, well that's just too fucking long.
To calculate precisely how many seconds pass in two days is really just pointless, considering that it was going to be such a big number that the shock factor would just decrease, and maybe, maybe, that partly scared me to know that that much time actually passed.
Call me crazy.
Call me a rambler.
I'm both, and I can accept that.
I think I also wanted to go the 'Ignorance Is Bliss' route because not only were those days spent trying to pass the time, but they were spent trying to pass the time alone. Every time Oli knocked on my bedroom door asking me if I wanted to 'hang', or whatever the fuck that meant, I had turned him down. He didn't seem too broken up about it, for he had Jenni, and for any one guy I was positive that that was enough. They would either stay in the house or take off to probably a party.
Only over the course of two days, and I'm explaining it as though it were for the month, but that's how long this weekend felt.
I stayed isolated, only to get out for food before I could pass out or to take a piss before it was too late. My bed had become permanently sunken in from being a modern sloth and watching TV in a drowsy daze. I didn't even like cable, but there I was waiting for Room Raiders on at 5.
Rock Of Love at 7. Even infomercials were processed through my optic nerves, through my cones and bars, and then to my brain.
I was a fucking zombie.
The curtains were closed, so I couldn't even tell you if the weather was nice or not. I didn't hear any rain, and that's the only aspect that was even worth caring about.
I stayed in the same boxers and t-shirt, which half of the world found rancid, while the rest of the bums and I called it home. My room that had been clean during the week, was piled with garbage in the course of two days.
Boredom is a beast.
Homework: consider it lost.
Paper plates still crusted with food, scattered.
It was a dense jungle, only the trees were cut down to wads of paper. The only thing keeping my sanity on a string tied around my wrist was my album. I had some new additions that I had been needing to put in place since Monday, but was too busy to do so. I didn't want to be taking breaks between algebraic problems and history reading to hastily push in Polaroids in the plastic linings of my books. Bullshit my way through it and only be left with a half-assed job.
If it was worth doing, it was worth doing right.
To go all out would mean asking Oli to take me to get my other rolls of film developed so I would have it all in front of me. I contemplated this, and got up from my bed for the first time in eight hours since I took a leak. My feet felt strange against the carpet, like they were sleepwalking.
Figuring that pajamas would be prohibited, I changed into jeans and a t-shirt. The same I wore on Friday. I grabbed the knob and pushed the door outward towards the hall.
There was not a sound, not a single voice.
The living room was empty.
No television, and no people.
I winced at the sheer brightness of the space and even thought about just turning right back around into my cave to catch Rocko's Modern Life at 3:30, slowly stepping foot by foot on the obesity path with the majority of America's spawn.
"Hey, you're up!" Oli said brightly.
If only, if only.
Somehow, he had appeared at my left, holding a red heart-shaped lollipop in his right, and the grin to go along with it. I looked at it oddly.
"What's up with that?" I asked, motioning to the sugary, scarlet confection.
Oli glanced down at himself, as though it was a surprise to him also, and formed his mouth into a perfect oval, like 'oh'.
"It's jus' candy."
"I know, but why do y- never mind."
The entire conversation was pointless. If I had gotten to the point of concerning myself with the food Oli decided to put in his mouth, then those TV rays had gotten to my head. Infiltrated my conscience.
He gave me a confused stare, and I rolled my eyes in distaste of myself. I began walking towards the kitchen with my brother smacking me with questions.
"Woah, wait Tom,"
My feet had touched the tile for the first time in five hours.
"What's up mate? I haven't seen you all weekend."
I trudged over to the fridge.
"You don't look too hot."
I opened the fridge.
"What happened to you?"
I spotted an apple towards the back, hidden like a nutritious treasure.
"Is everything alright?"
I grabbed it loosely and let the door shut with a CLICK.
"Jesus Tom, talk to me."
I turned to look at him with a bulk of the apple between my teeth as I was about to make it bleed. I brought it away from my lips and sighed,
"Can you take me to the photo shop?"
His face was a mix between confusion and surprise. The look when someone says something atrocious, and the other person's eyes bulge out of their skull like they can't believe they just said that. Not that I said anything atrocious anyway.
"Photo shop?" He clarified.
I nodded.
"Yeah, I gotta develop some film."
The skin of the fruit was pressed against my lips, and I took a bite. His eyebrow was up to his forehead, and I knew that another question was in order.
"What are you always taking pictures of?"
That's right, I never told him. Confiding in Oli about my 'problem' -at least that's what he would see it as- any deeper than I already had would not be a good thing. He doesn't need to know the aspects of it, for it's not something that I feel needs to be shared. In fact, it was the complete opposite. This is all mine, and no one has to fucking know.
So, I just smirked, and with chunks of apple in my mouth I mumbled, "You're nosy today."
Now I gotta find a new hiding place for my albums.
We stared at each other, me because I was waiting for him to drop it, and him wanting me to tell him. He eventually looked away, and walked past me towards the wall where all our keys hung.
"Alright, I'll take you. but Jenni ain't gonna like it."
I think I'll take my chances.
...[&&&]...
The porch steps were a safe distance from the explosion.
Children were screaming down my street as their mothers scurried behind them, and leaving the elderly and/or handicapped to fend for themselves. It was bad enough that I was the one to ignite the fuse.
Now everyone had to stay out of 'nuclear Jenni's way.
I had my head down in humiliation, afraid of catching the neighborhood's attention, for her screams were really that loud. Oli was trying to console her with his touches and tone. I knew it as the 'Jenni-tone', or whatever his girlfriend's name was at the time I used the term: Only used to soothe and persuade his girl. It wasn't working however, because she was jerking her shoulder back when he tried to lay his palm on her.
"But you promised!"
"I know, but it's only for half an hour."
She began yelling at him again and I cringed. Such a dynamic personality, and surely, that was too much for Oli to handle. Surely.
"Come on baby, he's my brother and he hasn't been out since school. You can come with us."
No no no.
I took my hands out of my hair and looked at Oli with wide eyes; shaking my head frantically. Taking Jenni with us is something I definitely don't want to experience again.
Rule #1: AVOID THIS AT ALL COSTS.
True Story: The three of us went to an outdoor store to buy Oli swim trunks one time, and as we're there, so was his psycho (ironic?) ex, Casey, begging for my brother to take her back. Jenni grabbed a nearby baseball bat and threatened her with it saying, "You come near us and I'll hit a fuckin' home run with your head."
Rule #2: NEVER EVER LEAVE A BLUNT OBJECT LYING AROUND BY JENNI.
So like I said, Jenni tagging along to the photo shop is definitely not a good idea. She looked up at Oli, her eyes once burning now like twinkling stars.
"Really?" She asked.
This made him smile, and he nodded while relaxing a bit.
I barely heard him say, "Yeah, and I'll buy you some chocolate chip ice-cream too."
She grinned ecstatically as he slinked his arms around her waist and pulled her close. I sneered in disgust, quickly realizing that they were no longer arguing or negotiating, but this now became a 'Oli-groping-his-girlfriend's-ass-in-the-front-yard' situation.
I got up from the concrete and marched my way to the car, on the way hearing Oli say "You know I love ya, right?", and Jenni giggling. I made sure to slam the door to signal our departure, and she pulled away. She walked to the passenger side, and he glared and gave me the finger.
"I'm sorry Tom." Jenni said politely.
I smiled in return.
There goes her mood swings again. Oli jogged around to the other side and got in. As he swung his self inside, he pecked Jenni on the cheek.
Oh god, let's go already.
He jabbed the key into the ignition and the engine bellowed to life.
We all put our seat belts on, and Oli drove out of the driveway sloppily.
"Learn to fucking drive, Sykes." Jenni mumbled.
Oli glanced over at her, and that glance turned into a stare, and that stare turned into fascination. Even after she was his to claim, and vice versa, she never seemed to be affected by intimacy. Never letting him off easy just because they were together. From the moment I met her to now, she never changed due to circumstance.
"Come on Oli, we have to hurry before it closes." I interrupted.
He looked back at me, and then, we were on our way.
I checked the time on the radio, and it was 3:07. The store closed at 5:00, and it took an hour for the film to be processed and birth my photos. So maybe I was being a little impatient, but it wasn't all my fault. Blame it on my obsession.
We drove for what felt like hours, but really, it was only half of one. Oli's so-called singing just dragged out the minutes. It was when we were at the intersection, the one right across from the shop, that I was speechless, inside and out.
I know that 1984 red slug bug anywhere.
48 hours is 2,880 minutes.
And 2,880 minutes, well that's just too fucking long.
To calculate precisely how many seconds pass in two days is really just pointless, considering that it was going to be such a big number that the shock factor would just decrease, and maybe, maybe, that partly scared me to know that that much time actually passed.
Call me crazy.
Call me a rambler.
I'm both, and I can accept that.
I think I also wanted to go the 'Ignorance Is Bliss' route because not only were those days spent trying to pass the time, but they were spent trying to pass the time alone. Every time Oli knocked on my bedroom door asking me if I wanted to 'hang', or whatever the fuck that meant, I had turned him down. He didn't seem too broken up about it, for he had Jenni, and for any one guy I was positive that that was enough. They would either stay in the house or take off to probably a party.
Only over the course of two days, and I'm explaining it as though it were for the month, but that's how long this weekend felt.
I stayed isolated, only to get out for food before I could pass out or to take a piss before it was too late. My bed had become permanently sunken in from being a modern sloth and watching TV in a drowsy daze. I didn't even like cable, but there I was waiting for Room Raiders on at 5.
Rock Of Love at 7. Even infomercials were processed through my optic nerves, through my cones and bars, and then to my brain.
I was a fucking zombie.
The curtains were closed, so I couldn't even tell you if the weather was nice or not. I didn't hear any rain, and that's the only aspect that was even worth caring about.
I stayed in the same boxers and t-shirt, which half of the world found rancid, while the rest of the bums and I called it home. My room that had been clean during the week, was piled with garbage in the course of two days.
Boredom is a beast.
Homework: consider it lost.
Paper plates still crusted with food, scattered.
It was a dense jungle, only the trees were cut down to wads of paper. The only thing keeping my sanity on a string tied around my wrist was my album. I had some new additions that I had been needing to put in place since Monday, but was too busy to do so. I didn't want to be taking breaks between algebraic problems and history reading to hastily push in Polaroids in the plastic linings of my books. Bullshit my way through it and only be left with a half-assed job.
If it was worth doing, it was worth doing right.
To go all out would mean asking Oli to take me to get my other rolls of film developed so I would have it all in front of me. I contemplated this, and got up from my bed for the first time in eight hours since I took a leak. My feet felt strange against the carpet, like they were sleepwalking.
Figuring that pajamas would be prohibited, I changed into jeans and a t-shirt. The same I wore on Friday. I grabbed the knob and pushed the door outward towards the hall.
There was not a sound, not a single voice.
The living room was empty.
No television, and no people.
I winced at the sheer brightness of the space and even thought about just turning right back around into my cave to catch Rocko's Modern Life at 3:30, slowly stepping foot by foot on the obesity path with the majority of America's spawn.
"Hey, you're up!" Oli said brightly.
If only, if only.
Somehow, he had appeared at my left, holding a red heart-shaped lollipop in his right, and the grin to go along with it. I looked at it oddly.
"What's up with that?" I asked, motioning to the sugary, scarlet confection.
Oli glanced down at himself, as though it was a surprise to him also, and formed his mouth into a perfect oval, like 'oh'.
"It's jus' candy."
"I know, but why do y- never mind."
The entire conversation was pointless. If I had gotten to the point of concerning myself with the food Oli decided to put in his mouth, then those TV rays had gotten to my head. Infiltrated my conscience.
He gave me a confused stare, and I rolled my eyes in distaste of myself. I began walking towards the kitchen with my brother smacking me with questions.
"Woah, wait Tom,"
My feet had touched the tile for the first time in five hours.
"What's up mate? I haven't seen you all weekend."
I trudged over to the fridge.
"You don't look too hot."
I opened the fridge.
"What happened to you?"
I spotted an apple towards the back, hidden like a nutritious treasure.
"Is everything alright?"
I grabbed it loosely and let the door shut with a CLICK.
"Jesus Tom, talk to me."
I turned to look at him with a bulk of the apple between my teeth as I was about to make it bleed. I brought it away from my lips and sighed,
"Can you take me to the photo shop?"
His face was a mix between confusion and surprise. The look when someone says something atrocious, and the other person's eyes bulge out of their skull like they can't believe they just said that. Not that I said anything atrocious anyway.
"Photo shop?" He clarified.
I nodded.
"Yeah, I gotta develop some film."
The skin of the fruit was pressed against my lips, and I took a bite. His eyebrow was up to his forehead, and I knew that another question was in order.
"What are you always taking pictures of?"
That's right, I never told him. Confiding in Oli about my 'problem' -at least that's what he would see it as- any deeper than I already had would not be a good thing. He doesn't need to know the aspects of it, for it's not something that I feel needs to be shared. In fact, it was the complete opposite. This is all mine, and no one has to fucking know.
So, I just smirked, and with chunks of apple in my mouth I mumbled, "You're nosy today."
Now I gotta find a new hiding place for my albums.
We stared at each other, me because I was waiting for him to drop it, and him wanting me to tell him. He eventually looked away, and walked past me towards the wall where all our keys hung.
"Alright, I'll take you. but Jenni ain't gonna like it."
I think I'll take my chances.
...[&&&]...
The porch steps were a safe distance from the explosion.
Children were screaming down my street as their mothers scurried behind them, and leaving the elderly and/or handicapped to fend for themselves. It was bad enough that I was the one to ignite the fuse.
Now everyone had to stay out of 'nuclear Jenni's way.
I had my head down in humiliation, afraid of catching the neighborhood's attention, for her screams were really that loud. Oli was trying to console her with his touches and tone. I knew it as the 'Jenni-tone', or whatever his girlfriend's name was at the time I used the term: Only used to soothe and persuade his girl. It wasn't working however, because she was jerking her shoulder back when he tried to lay his palm on her.
"But you promised!"
"I know, but it's only for half an hour."
She began yelling at him again and I cringed. Such a dynamic personality, and surely, that was too much for Oli to handle. Surely.
"Come on baby, he's my brother and he hasn't been out since school. You can come with us."
No no no.
I took my hands out of my hair and looked at Oli with wide eyes; shaking my head frantically. Taking Jenni with us is something I definitely don't want to experience again.
Rule #1: AVOID THIS AT ALL COSTS.
True Story: The three of us went to an outdoor store to buy Oli swim trunks one time, and as we're there, so was his psycho (ironic?) ex, Casey, begging for my brother to take her back. Jenni grabbed a nearby baseball bat and threatened her with it saying, "You come near us and I'll hit a fuckin' home run with your head."
Rule #2: NEVER EVER LEAVE A BLUNT OBJECT LYING AROUND BY JENNI.
So like I said, Jenni tagging along to the photo shop is definitely not a good idea. She looked up at Oli, her eyes once burning now like twinkling stars.
"Really?" She asked.
This made him smile, and he nodded while relaxing a bit.
I barely heard him say, "Yeah, and I'll buy you some chocolate chip ice-cream too."
She grinned ecstatically as he slinked his arms around her waist and pulled her close. I sneered in disgust, quickly realizing that they were no longer arguing or negotiating, but this now became a 'Oli-groping-his-girlfriend's-ass-in-the-front-yard' situation.
I got up from the concrete and marched my way to the car, on the way hearing Oli say "You know I love ya, right?", and Jenni giggling. I made sure to slam the door to signal our departure, and she pulled away. She walked to the passenger side, and he glared and gave me the finger.
"I'm sorry Tom." Jenni said politely.
I smiled in return.
There goes her mood swings again. Oli jogged around to the other side and got in. As he swung his self inside, he pecked Jenni on the cheek.
Oh god, let's go already.
He jabbed the key into the ignition and the engine bellowed to life.
We all put our seat belts on, and Oli drove out of the driveway sloppily.
"Learn to fucking drive, Sykes." Jenni mumbled.
Oli glanced over at her, and that glance turned into a stare, and that stare turned into fascination. Even after she was his to claim, and vice versa, she never seemed to be affected by intimacy. Never letting him off easy just because they were together. From the moment I met her to now, she never changed due to circumstance.
"Come on Oli, we have to hurry before it closes." I interrupted.
He looked back at me, and then, we were on our way.
I checked the time on the radio, and it was 3:07. The store closed at 5:00, and it took an hour for the film to be processed and birth my photos. So maybe I was being a little impatient, but it wasn't all my fault. Blame it on my obsession.
We drove for what felt like hours, but really, it was only half of one. Oli's so-called singing just dragged out the minutes. It was when we were at the intersection, the one right across from the shop, that I was speechless, inside and out.
I know that 1984 red slug bug anywhere.