36 Missed Calls

The morning did not greet Chris well. Groaning softly, he turned away from Michele, leaving her warmth behind. He scrunched into a ball, mind and jaw clenching with bitter realisation. The calm, now torn on the sharp edges of dawning self-doubt. Michele, sexy and intelligent, sleeping beside him, gave no respite to his frayed ego. The urge to hold her tight, to melt into her and offer up his hideous pseudo reality - belayed by a horror of questions. 1

He needed to escape. 2

Chris crept out of bed, careful not to wake Michele. Quietly, slowly, he pulled his pants on and gathered up his shirt and boots. Casting a glance at Michele, he found her quietly watching him.3

‘What are you up to?’ She asked sleepily.4

‘I feel like shit.’ He pulled his shirt over his head and sat on the end of the bed. ‘I’m going to go home.’5

Michele sat up, the quilt sliding away revealing her nakedness. She reached her arms to him. He didn’t go to her, instead pulled his boots on. 6

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked.7

‘I just feel shit.’8

‘Don’t lie to me.’ The quilt rustled as she moved to him, her arms wrapping around his waist, her chin resting on his shoulder. ‘I know something is wrong. You’re a crap liar.’9

Chris pulled away, stood. Distracted eyes on her face, her eyes, nowhere in particular. ‘I have to go.’10

‘No you don’t. Talk to me, Chris.’ 11

‘I have to go.’ Turning his back, he opened the bedroom door, barely repressing an urge to recoil like a scalded vampire. The early morning brightness of the living room was overwhelming after the peaceful dark of the bedroom. He was across the immaculately ordered room, at the door when Michele called to him.12

‘Talk to me.’13

Hesitating, he could not bear to look at her but could not bear to dismiss her. 14

‘What’s wrong? I don’t get it.’15

‘I need time to get my head together.’16

‘I want to help.’ 17

There were a thousand things he could have blurted out in that moment. There were things he wanted to say. Perhaps, if he were honest with himself, he would brake down and weep. These were the in-articulated processes of an anxious mind; Michele recognised this. He was afraid and frantic and she just wanted to help him. 18

‘Chris, stay. I want you to talk to me about whatever is on your mind.’19

The door clicked as Chris turned the knob. He slipped out of the apartment. Angry and confused, there was nothing Michele could do but let him go. 20

Caffeine, nicotine, solitude: these were the things Chris craved. The cold, empty, metal elevator welcomed him; he took it down to the car park. His dented, faded, piece of shit car, next to the shinny current models, stood out like a bogan at a black tie party. The boom of his door slamming echoed loudly within the sunken concrete structure. A minute he allowed himself to linger as he dug a crushed packet of cigarettes from the glove box. Hands trembling slightly. He put a cigarette to his lips. Lit it. Inhaled deeply… Yes, cigarettes were bad, but they were good too. An expanding blue grey cloud exited his lungs, filling the car. Chris turned the key in the ignition switch, the car started first go.21

*** *** ***22

Spilling into his apartment, sitting on the op-shop junk table was a notebook, the first thing to take his notice. Beside the book was a pen, he took this up and scrawled in long, deep overlapping groves. ’I HATE YOU ALL,’ the line read. Tearing the page free, he pinned it to the wall. Just sitting there in his apartment, on his black leather couch, was comforting. The walls chipped and marked, the carpet threadbare and stained, the windows were speckled with who-knew-what and mouldy at the edges. The all pervasive sparkle and sheen of Michele’s place was like a sterile laboratory in comparison.23

Chris scrawled another note in the same angry angular manner. ‘I HATE MYSELF’. This note was pinned over the last. He went to the kitchen and came back with a wooden handled vegetable knife, surprisingly, still sharp. He laughed as he wrote another note. ‘I’M GOING TO KILL MYSELF’. The joke was; he already knew he would not. He stabbed the blade into the table, decided it felt good, did it repeatedly until gouges and splintered fragments covered the tabletop.24

COFFEE! He made one, then another, both strong and without milk or sugar. He drank these while smoking cigarettes. MUSIC! The CD player narrowly avoided destruction, as Chris jammed his favourite album into the tray, slamming it closed and sending the unit rocking precariously. The album was a symphony of jumbled beats, sinister samples, disturbing synthesisers and tortured vocals. As the music built and decayed, an ecstatic euphoria of stimulants, music, and self-loathing overcame the person who had been Chris. The transformed lunatic would alternate between attacking his notebook with vigorous pen strokes, and physically assaulting his furniture and electrical appliances. He swore at himself and cursed people from his distant past (the present too). Cursed them for being witness to his life. More coffee and CIG-A-RET-TIES! 25

Sleeping little, barely eating, not cleaning, a constant stream of stimulants: this went on for days. He didn’t answer the phone, didn’t go to work, didn‘t go outside or open the curtains. The whole time was spent writing disjointed notes and narratives, composing pieces on his synthesiser, and constructing sculptures from broken household implements and furniture. At one point, possibly during the second day, Michele came to the door. The lunatic turned the music off. In the same instance, he wanted both, to see her and to tell her to go away. He could do neither as he stood there, frozen, leaning towards the door, one heal up, one foot firmly on the floor. She had stood out there for twenty minutes trying to get him to open the door.26

‘Why won’t you speak to me you stupid bugger? Don’t you know I really care about you?’27

Unable to stand it any longer, the lunatic wrote a note. ‘I can’t.’ He slipped it under the door. 28

There was a scraping sound and the ruffling of paper. ‘What does this mean, Chris?’ 29

Eventually she left and eventually the urge to go to her subsided. 30

The projects continued: thousands of words written; hours of music and poetry recorded and bizarre sculptures constructed. On the fourth day the crash came. The whole day, and half of the next was a string of disjointed surreal dreams.31

Upon awakening, Chris’ head felt too small for his brain and his tongue was like sandpaper. Uncomfortably dozing - it was hours before he managed to get out of bed. An unexpected clarity of mind and a calmness dawned. Literally starving, having eaten almost nothing for six days, Chris feasted on most of what was left in his cupboards (which was never much), tuna, pasta, a one kilo bag of frozen dim sims and a bottle of sweet chilly sauce. 32

There were 36 missed calls on his answering machine. He expected there would be a lot of bad news in there, something about consequences for actions, but that could all wait. He picked up the phone and dialled Michele’s number. To apologise, if nothing else, would be a good start to a new beginning. What then?33