After work

“When I first moved here, I promised myself I’d write every day and be disciplined about it. I’ve written twice.” He said, passing me the still-lit pipe. “It’s just…so much has happened I a short time, and it’s too much to process all at once. I have to just step back and just, take it all in.”

“Yeah,” I say. That sounds familiar. I exhale pot smoke and shift into fourth. We are driving east on Colfax Avenue, in _____’s Isuzu Trooper, toward his house. I must, too, stop, step back, take everything in, and try not to leave anything out. Out of place. Every step, every acquaintance, every action; its all very important to remember now.

It’s January of 1998, in Denver, Colorado. I have begun to equate my progressive emotional states with physical localities in which they have occurred. Key West equals devastating excess coupled with crippling manic depression and mental imbalance. Saint Louis equals isolation and ultimately, a greater sense of self and self worth. Hopefully, Denver will allow me the opportunity to grow, write, and progress.

Scott is a writer, too. We wait tables at the same restaurant, yet another in a growing list of restaurants of my employ. We talk and agree on a variety of subjects. We are both having internal discipline problems. He is handsome, and lets almost no one know that he is intelligent, not to mention a writer.