Yes

“Sorry Miss, you are just not the actress we are looking for but we will let you know if we have any future roles that might fit to your person.”

My eyes twitched as the blonde’s words sunk in. Rejected… Again.

I tried to smile at her, I really did, but right now all I wanted was to smack her hard in the face.

With a baseball bat.

Of steel.

Okay, maybe I was a bit dramatic but shit! I couldn’t get any job at all! Maybe it was wrong of me to take it out on her but I really needed to blow off some steam. So she got it right there; I threw a minor tantrum.

“Look bitch, why don’t you take your shiny little pencil and shove it up your perfect Botox ass!? You really think you’re that much better than me, huh? Cunt!”

As I was escorted out of the giant building with the beautiful glass façade, I started to calm down again. And then the embarrassment washed over my face as I realized I had just been kicked out of a building, leaving the passing New Yorkers free to stare at me like I was some freak…

But then again, I sure had acted like it.

I finally made it home to my shitty apartment and I immediately went for the small closet under the sink. I grabbed my painting gear, pencils, sponges and paint, and started working on my wall. My place was pretty small but I had made sure that the eastern wall was clear from furniture, so that I could use it for situations like this; painting out my emotions and blowing off steam (and not on innocent strangers like the blonde earlier this day).

Right now the wall was filled with dark and grey colors. I took a sponge, soaked it and worked out a weird formation of dark blue across what seemed to be a skyline. I wasn’t even sure what it was, I just knew it worked for me. More colors spread on the wall. Blue, black, green and a little bit of yellow.

After several hours I sighed loudly. It didn’t really work on me as it usually did; the colors seemed all wrong and my hand kept twitching to the side without me intending to do so. I threw the pencils in the big porcelain sink that was stationed on my right side and cleaned them up.

I needed something else, something I usually did to calm down back in Denmark: I needed a beer.

I quickly searched my mind for a suitable place to go. It had to be close to my place; I didn’t want to end up getting myself into another situation like the one with the two Hispanic guys the other night. It also had to be small; I couldn’t take another of those fancy New York clubs that I would probably have liked if my life didn’t look like it did right now.

After I moved here, I’d become rather pessimistic. It seemed like I was the only one living here in this big city of millions and millions of people who didn’t have a place to be all of the time. It was like that every day. I got up and searched for work a couple of hours, then I would sit down and have a cup of coffee at some random café, walk around Central Park a bit, buy some groceries, head home to cook and eat it and then paint a bit.

And all while doing that, I would see hundreds of faces; different lives walking around with different masks of fake emotion. No light behind their eyes; no passion. Kind of like zombies... But they would all look like they were in a hurry all of the time. Every woman you saw: bam! Tight ponytail, dressed to the nines, coffee cup in the right hand and an iPad in the left, working her stilettoes up and down the streets.

I sighed as I stepped out of the shower. Why even bother shower? I would go down to the first bar I thought nice, get shit-faced drunk and then go home and sleep it off. But I guess all girls have to do something to keep their spirit up. Whether it’s chocolate and crisps or – as in my case – putting on some nice clothes and getting drunk.

I checked myself out in the large mirror hanging in my hallway before I headed out. My hair was, as usual, uncontrollable and big; sending blonde locks in every direction. My eyes were framed with black eyeliner and my lips looking good in earthy colors. I wore a long black chemise over a pair of washed jeans and black pumps. No jewelry.

No sir, this’ll do…

....................................................

I found my way through the dim streets of the city, not knowing which direction was the best for finding a quiet and non-stacked bar. I took a left and immediately came to an abrupt stop. Again I found myself in an alley.

What is it with me and alleys?

I was just about to head out on the bigger street again as I bumped into a guy, forcing all of the air out of me.

“What the…” I heard him stumble out as he caught me by the arm, preventing me from falling.

My lungs hurt from the sudden loss of air and a stinging sensation started prickling in my eyes. I finally managed to gulp down some oxygen while making a strange croaking noise.

“Thanks…”

A scent of leather and cigarettes soon filled my nose as I watched the man before me. He was kind of good-looking; a bit short, blonde hair and dark green eyes and a smoke hanging from the corner of his mouth.

“Where are you going?” he smiled.

Pretty nice teeth as well.

“Um…”

Where am I going? I thought to myself as I searched in my purse for a lighter.

“Here”.

He lit it with a type of zippo lighters that you never really come across anymore. I smiled at him as I blew smoke out in the warm and summer air.

“I’m trying to find a nice bar. I’m not from here, you see. You know any?”

I tried flashing an innocent smile. I was really bad at talking to complete strangers and not go totally shy. The guy looked back to the bigger street behind him and pointed at a red door with a sign over it that read: “The Politian”.

“That’s a pretty cool place, kinda small and never really crowded. Want me to keep you company?”

He was kind of cute… But not really my type. If I even had a type, I wasn’t sure. I don’t really believe in types; some men look good and others don’t. Whether you find a tall dark mysterious kind of guy or a blonde, lean and down-to-earth one doesn’t matter to me. As long as you find them nice and attractive, you know? A hand waved across my face.

“Where’d you go?”

I shook my head and laughed.

Hey brain, you’re actually in a conversation with someone.

“Sorry, my mind just wandered… Sure, we can go there.”

He sent me a confident smile and put made a gesture for me to follow him. Soon we were sitting at a bar disk with cold beers in our hands. The bar was indeed small; it almost looked like one of those pubs you always see in movies. The lighting was cozy and the walls filled with different kinds of art; all from pictures of famous people from the seventies to modern paintings of the twenty-first century.

I liked it here.

The music was a bit loud and you could hear laughter and drunken conversations from the back of the room. I smiled at the guy next to me.

“So, what’s your name?” I asked as I realized we hadn’t even gone through the whole nice-to-meet-you thing yet.

“Alec. And you?”

I took another zip at my beer before answering. We shook hands and started talking about ourselves.

But after a good hour of this, I was getting kind of impatient. I hadn’t come here to meet guys or talk to strangers – or both. I really just needed to get drunk and then go home. And this guy Alec was starting to get on my nerves. He was going on about himself and some fancy career of his. I can’t even remember what it was. And when the conversation hit the topic of my work, he really pushed my buttons.

The wrong ones.

“So you moved to New York to become an actress but you’ve only gotten one job? Hm, maybe you should apply for roles some more; I mean, like, really go for it.”

Okay, so, that was it. I told him to fuck off.

I should probably just finish this beer and then hit home, I thought to myself.

That Alec-guy hadn’t really helped my mood and the alcohol in my blood only seemed to make it even worse. I looked to the many shelves filled with brown liquor at the back of the bar.

Maybe one of those as well and then: home…

The burning sensation from the whiskey and the thick dullness of smoke felt good in my throat. I was pleased to learn that you could smoke inside here; there weren’t really that many places in NY where you could do that – at least not any I knew of. I could feel a twirling sensation in my legs as I poured down another shot of bad tasting whiskey.

It was disgusting but it always worked.

I hummed along to the song that was now playing.

Wow, I’m actually sitting here by myself and singing. Go home!

I smiled as I lit another cigarette and took a big zip of my almost empty beer. Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder.

“Sorry babe, but can I borrow your lighter?” I turned my head to see where the rough male voice came from and almost choked on the beer that I hadn’t swallowed down yet.

What the fuck, what’s Daryl Dixon doing standing right next to me?!