Friday, May 9, 2008

My good safe friend,

This morning around 3, I fell asleep, halfway through a conversation on the right side of a nice guy’s chest. In his bed, in his dorm, in my clothes, which I later took off because it’s true, it’s not comfortable. Nothing happened (we didn’t have sex).

Which is why my sleep is depraved and deplorable, inexcusably strange. Without sex I lacked the cathartic excuse, which permits exhaustion as natural. Between a stranger’s bed and your sleep, sex stands as the simplest, fastest, and most fragile barrier. It is, ironically, easier and less bothersome than explaining what I’m doing there otherwise. Couldn’t we just fall asleep together?

“just”, right?

I’ve had that offer once, or a bit more, maybe. First was Helen, my first real city, and friend, she spoiled me rotten.

“Just fall asleep with me,” she’d say.

That line might haunt me, always, my whole life.

The next time was a boy, already…I’m not certain. Did I ask to fall asleep? Did he? All I remember was the Colonopin, he took out beforehand. “Because I’m a drug addict,” he said, “Because I’m a drug addict, and I need to fall asleep, that’s why”. He crushed it up, and I took a bit, a small line and the last of the sort. It’s a pharmaceutical, a bunch of salt and junk in there, and one shouldn’t snort it. I could feel the powder hit my brain, stick in the crevices, making me a tiny bit dumber. Well, maybe- a new meaning to “all in my head”, right?

That was his excuse for everything, the drug addict bit, I mean. Why he was disingenuous, unloved, posing, competitive, tired, serial, cerebral and serene. Why he felt, or craved, forgot, lied and didn’t. I never believed it, nor used it myself. Blame the drugs, blame exhaustion, blame your mother. shame that I'm defenseless, I can’t use that plea.

Seven hours ago, I closed my eyes and limped my body, didn’t twitch or respond. The kid next to me was quiet for a bit, breathing, then he kind of removed my hand (on his shoulder). “I’m going to brush my teeth,” he whispered, checking. I lightly groaned an ‘ok’, and when he came back I played dead. Signaled, trusted, and lied.

I ‘woke up’ a few minutes later, groggy. “Hey…I didn’t just fall asleep, did I?”

I meant that. Did I dream pretending? Was it intentional, or did I fake it, or start, how can I know? What, I beg, is the difference between motivation and action, are they extractable, can you pull them apart? My wanting to makes it so, in a way, more real than staying up for propriety, or crashing from exhaustion. Would I be genuine, if, per say, I asked? What can or should people do, at 3 AM, tired, in bed, defensive?

How can something be so staged, so replicable, and yet so genuine?

I always fell asleep like that. “I passed out,” I’d say, in the morning, “I don’t sleep much”.

“Bad dreams?”

“Nightmares, yeah”

“I get those, you know”

Really?” (I know this: I can feel you twitch.)

How often will I do this? In two years, five, in a lifetime- a hundred? In polar opposites, in sensitive, the same situation.

Kiss me and find me amiably drunk.

Was it fake, love? I can’t say, I honestly can’t.

Helen taught me that trick. If scared, fall asleep. Except you couldn’t wake her, at all, she was good, it was real.

I let Daren fall asleep, sometimes, with permission. I started it, though I wanted him, awake, we needed sleep, and trust, more. So I hugged a pillow and closed my eyes- and I could feel him, shocked, happy, safe, off the hook, unnecessary. But I didn’t really mean it; I was curious, and needy, I just wanted him asleep besides me more.

What’s blurred between reality and what’s been prepared for, scripted, blocked out? If, anything.

I just wrote about six people, rated G, themed and clothed and oddly sexless. I could continue the introductions; this topic so tense in fluidity.

Yet I still feel a slight guilt, betrayal- arousal, even.

Exposing them so, that simple, tender intimacy.

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