Too many words are whirling around my head for me to grab onto one. The words I want to say, the words blaring, raping me, from the nearby television. The words from my mother. I try to listen. I try to listen as I try to write and I try to reassure my mother as my trigger finger shakes on the keyboard and spawns yet another typo. My head's trying to process the events of the day as my mom tries to process last night's dream as the television tries to process my brain into a gelatinous blob of insatiable consumer appetite. I dance back and forth between images of kissing my lover goodbye, Michael's Carpet World on 401 Old Country Rd, an apparition of my brother with twelve fingers, my hands slamming on my steering wheel, my mom flying over a city while trying to hold onto the baby version of myself, a scrolling marquee with a severe thunderstorm warning in the next county. Peeling out of his driveway, tears streaming down my face as I desperately maneuver my way to the interstate, a blender and a dicer, bad guys with big guns, his face, the way his eyes didn't quite meet mine. Mesothelioma, Bacardi, a two-headed dog, his bed, that song, Viagra, Hershey's, ITT Tech, lasers shooting, his hair, Oxyclean, his smell, Martha Stewart, his nails, Toyota, his teeth, Subway, his sweat. It's just all too much.
Still I know I should be getting myself and the house cleaned up. The dishes and my laundry are screaming at me in competition with the tv. The clutter on the table behind me is poking my shoulder, aching for my attention. The trip to Target yet to be made. The trip to the grocery store yet to be made. The looming deadline of friends coming over for the basketball game. I need to tweeze my eyebrows. I want to dye my hair. I'm well past due for a wax. Nothing about me is good enough.
Suddenly it's quiet. My mom, she's still lying on the couch, the television is muted, and she pauses in conversation, reflecting. The blood pouring from my ears subsides and I find myself thinking, He treated me better when he was cheating on his girlfriend.
