when the music's over

Jackson Pollock - Source: https://fineartamerica.com/featured/2-jackson-pollock-street-art.html

The artifice of relationships comes apart at the dawn of reality which includes food riots in Peru, Sri Lanka, and Shanghai, China. And I’ve just had a shot of tequila while listening to Bob Marley on a Friday night alone.

I could recount the last week, yeah. Sure. While belching or something. Like catching the vibes of the setting sun when a girl you’ve been seeing is on the beach with her gay friend. And you are the intruder.

Then coming back to my spot to drink. And waiting.

I’m going to break the rules — they’re back at my apartment now too. Ophelia and I drink shots. We leave, walking up the street, as a trio.

Catch a cab. Split it. Yeah. She’s wearing a tight-fighting green dress. And I’ve got on a mild-toned leopard shirt.

In Montanita, getting dropped off … there’s a large crowd that makes up a bright area of people looking to party, drink, dance, and eat. And we move south toward a gay bar on the beach.

There we sit, the three of us.

“It’s nice to finally meet you,” he says, “she’s told me so much about you.”

Yeah, and these private conversations with Ophelia’s eyes glowing a brownish hue into hazel and sunlight, her own.

We make our way back to the bars, then we get into a club. He leaves, then it’s just Ophelia and I getting drunk on tequila, one, two big shots. She hands me hers. We drink. Leave. Decide to sit adjacent to a curb rider, what?

She sells us two weed brownies. We leave.

“Wait,” I say, eating one, whole, “there ain’t no weed in this…”

I give her an earful and toss one to the ground and stomp on it, then the girl throws a punch that lands directly on my dome. OW!

Ophelia pulls me away. “Just let it go!”

I say, okay. Yes. Anything for you.

Then I go back there and cause a scene and dart off for a cop or security guard to translate that I am mad, this girl sold me fake weed! Crazy!

The guy laughs.

I get back to the scene, the girl’s gone. So’s Ophelia.

She sees me and comes over. She’s mad. I’ve made a mistake.

We get into a cab, not saying much, drunk, angry. Crazed. We get to the corner of my street, and I get out and slam the door and walk up the street and get into my place and open a beer that I won’t remember in the morning…

Good. Now that’s outta the way.

A bad, bad hangover in the morning. With a dead roach next to the sink in the bathroom … I settle for the cavern of bleak, black darkness. Just let me get over myself on a Sunday alone.

***

Can I continue writing in a dead world where lions go extinct? I know the Phillies just began their new season, and I am not read by anybody dangling from Mount Zion. I don’t care.

There are plenty of things to care about, I guess. Like bad breath, fingernails, toenails, beer in the fridge, food, yeah, and good music. Which guides us all through the madness. Sentences without a subject, all that shit.

So I ordered a pizza on Sunday night and ate a few slices that tasted like god was in the pizza dough.

And the next day once I pushed through another day of endlessly working, I went out to Montanita by myself and got some ceviche without a beer, and then I went to the TIA grocery store. There I got a bunch of cleaning supplies.

I came back to my apartment and cleaned the floors, and the bathrooms. Sweeping, mopping. And then, all sweaty. I went to the beach or maybe I didn’t. I dug my toes into the sand and said good luck to my future self.

Then the next day came. Ophelia decided that I was okay enough to see her again, and I took her out to a nice dinner in Olon. Just the sound of her voice in her car made me shake inside, rattling with an accent so sexy. I couldn’t help it.

We restored our romance over veal, tuna, salmon ravioli, seafood lasagna, and a bottle of Pino Grigio. We talked about anything and everything, which was a talent of hers that I found so sexy.

And we had a sexy night back at my clean apartment.

“It smells so good in here!”

And in the morning too, which tends to tire you out if you’re not too careful. And that made it, what? Another week, yeah. I worked in digital marketing, then wrote an 800-word article on coding an online casino for a client. It was nice to drink orange juice, eat fruit, and then have a day to recoup. I also sent a pitch for a story later in the week on TRAVEL to a very popular magazine. A feature there would pay $4,000-$6,000.

I worked and went back to a normal life.

Ophelia in bed said she wanted to do something nice for me. I couldn’t think of anything. I had everything I needed. Even when the power went out one morning due to maintenance.

I went to the beach for a swim after we’d made passionate love, yeah. The whole building shook too when we did the same again on a Thursday night.

“I don’t care if they hear us!” we both screamed.

It was good.

And I kept hidden the comb stuck in my hair that read: I soon won’t know what to do without you around.

I told her that maybe it’d be good to see each other one night and then the next night we’d have to ourselves.

Yeah, I revealed that to her at the beach. After she’d been messaging me asking when I’d be done work.

“Just need to write,” I’d said.

And I wrote a poem about New Jersey and a short story too. Then when I got to the beach she was waiting there on a hippie towel in a sexy bikini. Her long brown hair dangling, eyes grinning, wild, free.

“I smoked some weed,” she told me.

Then we briefly spoke about social media. Stupid! Yeah. She said she’d been struggling to get it going for her production company. Making movies. I said that getting past yourself was important for any artist. She didn’t understand at first. Then I got to the gist of not giving a shit what anybody thought about you, and then you got to be YOURSELF. She understood.

We went back to my place — after she leaned down to my knees when we didn’t know what to do for dinner — I came up with the plan to cook at my apartment. She said she’d leave for an hour. She dropped me off at the grocery store.

They made secret jokes in Spanish when I paid, and there were Russians in there too, not hurting anybody. I left, walking along the road, ignoring somebody who stopped and asked if I needed a ride.

I cooked her some chorizo, and pasta, and offered some pineapple glaze from a plastic container. Then we rocked the walls in the bedroom and shook the earth.

Sleeping peacefully eventually all naked and ah free in the sweet darkness of not giving a fuck.

When she got here that night, her forgiveness, her sanctity of body and soul, nipples peeking through her blue blouse, I went to grab them. She’d laughed.

I’d answered the door in my underwear.

“It was so funny last night,” she said in the morning, giggling.

“What, babe?” I hugged her close.

“When you bent down and went like this…” she mimicked my actions.

“Why’s that funny?”

“I dunno,” she turned to face me, kissing.

“Then I ran at you and tickled you, and it was just funny.”

“Yeah,” I said.

We kissed at 7 AM. Hippies in a world gone mad.

Above us, a pregnant girl bustled as her guy thought aloud, “Hey, our downstairs neighbors are awfully quiet this morning…”

And they kissed too as the loneliest wept and wondered where they went wrong…