The Lost Chapters of....

He wakes up with his eyelashes clumped together forming a prison cell over his eyes. The sun blasting through the window penetrates the bars of mascara that have incarcerated his eyes for the five short hours of toss-and-turn sleep he assumes he just had.

As soon as the gates open his eyes start itching and burning. He is squinting and rubbing his eyes like a newborn. The taste in his mouth is a combination of tinfoil, cardboard, and excrement. Equal parts of each. The room is intensely dry but cozily warm, with just enough breeze from a cracked window to keep anyone under the down.

He looks at the digital clock with it's ruby red numbers and reads 9:45
He thinks, "Already!" and "It's Only?" at the same time.

He turns to the other side of the bed. There's no one there even though no one's left.
He himself is no one.
Only glitter traces both his and the other pillow.
He retraces his steps.
Unfortunately, he can't remember anything that follows his impromptu number at 2:00 a.m.ish.

His desire for coffee is strong enough to evoke the muscles in his arms and legs to conjure up some semblance of bodily movement.

He stops at a mirror in the hall.
The blood in his eye's hit's him like a shot.
Before he can self deprecate the sweet saliva begins to form in the back of his throat and the intense, rapid swallowing increases.
He makes it to the bathroom in time, because he is a pro.

With two drops of Visine and a spoonful of Listerine, he's standing upright with his shoulders back and proud. At least outwardly.

No one is still there in the bed.
No one knows and no one cares.
It's back to the neighborhood of make believe.
Where he doesn't appear to have a life that could be a chapter in an Augusten Burroughs Memoir.