even though she has a pinched nerve in her back or a slipped disc or a slipt disco

chris called me and told me that she was picking me up after work so we could do laundry and sure enough there she was right as the guy pulled the birds tail and before fred flinstone could slide down his dinosaur’s tail i was rounding the corner and i saw my baby sitting on a step exhaling a camel light.

she has blonde hair now. dark roots on purpose. a frayed green denim levis jacket, powder blue sweat pants and a wrinkle on her forehead because the generic pain killers her fuct up doct prescribed her weren’t worth the ten dollar copay and how do you tell someone, listen, i know a few things about meds and this shit isn’t working, i might look young enough to get carded, but im an adult and my shits fucked so give me the damn vicodin for this is why the good Lord made it.

but shes so sweet she just hangs up the phone and yells fuck into her pillow. fuck! and breaks down and sobs cuz it really hurts and it would be one thing if the doctor was unsure but this shits coming from the nurse practioner not even the doc but from some bitch who can only prescribe advil. and by the way, what fucking loser needs a prescription for advil.

meanwhile in america everybody has the hookup. this one, that one. look at her over there. yep, even him. dosed, drugged, done. and this is a girl who wont have a beer with her meal after the laundromat because the label clearly said no alcohol on the bottle of pills that don’t do shit.

and im all, don’t you remember even one day in isla vista?

she smiles and i take her hand. we’re in a booth in silverlake. the crest. its dark. theyre playing slow jams from the eighties. pointer sisters at the moment. it doesn’t sound cheesy. it sounds of all things, classic, for lack of a better word.

thank you for all the love you give me i tell her and she smiles and says my name.

its like groundwater. its vital. to not have to wait for the flood or the downpour, all you have to do is open your eyes and theres this super strong foundation that hasn’t wavered a smidge since it began.

which isn’t to say there weren’t disagreements. or fights. or nights where one party would huff to the guest room and put a blanket over his fro and try to go to sleep on the futon. there were disagreements.

and tears, and loud moments, and angry lipsticked messages on the mirror.

there were no angry lipsticked messages on the mirror.

but there were some loud moments.

and those moments usually ended up with the one in the soft comfy bed creeping over to the guest room after about twenty minutes and crawling into the futon with the tearful one and whispering all the right things as they both fell asleep among unopened boxes and books.

is it good for a man to want a lot of love in his life i asked her as we waited for liver and bacon and a thick burger with an onion ring and mashed potatoes and homemade chips.

and she said yes. its good.

she said i pretend that i don’t want it too, but i do.

and later she said that my hair didn’t look so bad

that in fact it looked good.

and the liver came and they gave me a mini pitcher of coke

and we both talked about how much sleep we were going to get as soon as we got home.

lago + mental spigot + joh3n

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