November 10, 2005

In grey cubicles, young men talk softly into phones. Problems. Everyone has them. And I go home late at night and sleep late into the day, drained of energy and words. Sleep. I sleep on couches and divans, naked and exhaused.

Later. We sat in the doctor’s office waiting for her cunt to stop bleeding. Drip. Drip. One painful drop at the time. The television above us told how to clean our heroin syringes: draw in hot water; shake; draw bleach; shake; find a vein. We sat and watched, my arm around her waist. “It will be OK,” I said. “What makes you so sure?” she asked. “I’m sure it’s not a baby,” I said, I who saw the moment of my birth and the way babies are made of sorrow and vomit.

She trembled and her hair was wet, not knowing what was going on between her legs. Cunts are funny like that — they need constant care, affection, lube, just like veins require iron, heroin.