Chapter 7
It wasn’t that weird that this Morgen A. needed a ride.
Although, our interactions in private messages did make me wonder if I was talking to a computer programmed with auto responses. A bot.
The driver double-checked to make sure the address I put in was really where I wanted to go.
Why does it always feel set-up whenever someone agrees to hang out with me?
Chapter 6
Spending so much personal time with Evy-B has dulled some of his shine. I’m starting to realize the billionaire barista does not exist, at least not full time. And I can’t lie, my reverence may be dwindling.
What’s impressive is he doesn’t start making excuses of why he has a day job. It’s purely strategic, he needs it to fund his art career. Any stupid shame about jobs considered “beneath” is self-generated—as is all shame.
Chapter 5
The DMV is a Visual Cult Object to me.
When stepping from outside into the glass antechamber, one feels they are in a limbo space.
The second set of doors swing open to the waiting area, the catechumen.
Chapter 4
On my first day at Van Gogh’s Vase he appears.
Either there’s some funky stuff in my gum or this is a dream come true.
I keep looking at the shaved hair around his left ear, his perfectly groomed short beard (likely a Size 1 clipper guard), and try to truly believe, the creator of DPZ, Everhet Byzantine, is my boss now.
Chapter 3
I arrive twenty minutes early to my interview.
As I wait for the manager to come interview me I make sure to not look like some insecure basketball-short-wearing douche who puts their ankles on their knees to make an obtuse triangle, like they’re stretching their hamstring. Those types don’t come to fancy coffee shops like Van Gogh’s Vase.
Chapter 2
Mom lit her cigarette on the red coils of the stove. The tobacco burned slow. And you could smell maple syrup. One side of the neck would glow orange and start to smoke. Then she’d roll it along the edge.
“Girl fell asleep at her station again.” Mom rattles, “And I haven’t said nothing about the times I came over and checked on her, woke her up, made sure she was alright. I never told anyone. I didn’t report her to the super or nobody. Then the one time I have to cover they say ‘Keep an eye on her, if she falls asleep and gets hurt you’ll get in trouble’ and she was literally asleep standing up over the workstation when they were telling me that.”
Chapter 1
During the commercial break before returning to the featured presentation of James Whale’s Frankenstein the television tells me to stay tuned for a live news update at six using the same stock footage from a year ago.
People holding signs over their heads that say: UPDATES COMING SOON? and FREE FOR WHO?