Flaming Sambuca’s, tattoos beneath pert breasts, and bar jobs serving housing estates whose residents never think of anything beyond the end of their coked-up noses. Shall we watch Shaun of the Dead while eating pizza and chocolate gateau? Shall we make love soon after and then stroll hand in hand through the falling snow while the animals circle our cold and soggy feet? Yeah, I think so. In the morning, I awoke with a headache after dreaming of squirming body bags that wriggled like maggots beneath trees adorned with dead and dangling leaves. They reminded me of those in your mother’s garden, and those that bordered my old junior school- the one I was suspended from for biting my girlfriend’s arm and then looking up girl’s skirts while stood beneath the flight of stairs outside the assembly hall. I used to write back then, too. Nothing as damaged as the stuff I come out with now, mind. It was mainly ghosts and blood and stuff like that. Every weekend I stay in bed not moving or thinking. I pretend it’s because I’m lazy, but really, it’s that I suffer from a crippling form of nausea that just won’t shift. It’s not very impressive for a grown man to admit, but I was told that liars burn, so the truth will always out, much like how I once masturbated on the London Underground on the way back from a day of browsing through art galleries, and how this one time around a mate’s house I ate Artic Roll with his girlfriend while sharing the same spoon as he slept upstairs. Not exactly hardcore, but every time we swallowed each other’s saliva the smile on our lips was enough to make us itch. Sometimes, when I’m drunk, I play piano in the style of Elton John. Think Rocket Man but not as good. Or Tiny Dancer played by a neurotic loner with a thirst for energy drinks and Drambuie. Maybe, if you want, we can play Resident Evil 2 and forget about everything else. With you in my arms and a controller in my palms, there would be no better way to die. Just promise me you won’t go peacefully. Promise you won’t leave without a fight.
Author S. K. Nicholas 
Leave a reply to Harlon Cancel reply