deadline - although there were many. A dusk through dawn spent not
fighting to stay awake but simply forgetting to sleep.
The house awakens around him, moves slowly for a while and leaves.
Still stationary. Same place, same task. It's 4 hours before he
decides it's time to eat, the decision to head out for food made
easily after a quick inspection of the microwave meals icing over in
the back of the refrigerator. Meal X. The same he'd had every day for
weeks.
An old woman necking a can of cheap beer, a youth in sportswear on a
bicycle far too small for him. A group of 8 year olds waiting outside
a police station. Everyone he passed on his way to the high street
confirmed his suspicion that he simply stood out. Unremarkable other
than for being completely different somehow. Perhaps it was in his
bone structure or his swagger. Though far more likely - his skinny
jeans and boots.
The High Street frustrates him. to him everyone is idiotic. Tattooed
men with beer bellies standing alongside young girls pushing prams
filled with their illegitimate offspring. The shops filled with old
people who through years of this environment do not return smiles but
instead grimace, looking every bit their decayed suffering.
Big strides, weaving in and out of aisles. Retrieve food, pay in self
checkout - Always free, just like the credit card ticket machines at
the train station. He'd been unable to work out why for some time -
was the affluence here so bad that people simply didn't own credit
cards or were people just apprehensive to make use of new technology
whereby they may in some way experience failure?
The smell of meat plagued the way home. Meat and eyeballs of people
around him. Was this feeling he felt paranoia, a mere sensitivity to
the observation of others - the same he gave unto them. Or was every
bone in the mans body, his very instinct correct - He needs to move
the fuck out of this death hole.
And right now, he needs to sleep.
