1. Consider the truffles and crinkles you ate that night. Inspect the specks of confectioner's sugar you failed to wash off with water, or the runoff from your facial wash. Unusually, you're not in control of yourself that night. You were never like that. Repeat the names, Nene, Althea,and Juno in your child-molester voice you've named Tito Jerry until you fall asleep.
2. Take a train to Shaw, bring a set of clothes for a could-be sleepover. When you get off, turn in all directions and search for geographical clues. If there's none, recall that time you accompanied your sister to Megamall to meet her friend, Shalu. She's getting married, and your sister's the bridesmaid. They'll be participating in a practice that was once used to expand and conquer uncivilized lands. Say a discreet good bye and thank you, and leave. Walk a few meters to Galleria. Thank the Christians.
3. Pretend that the two of you are lovers. Hug and kiss. Look each other in the eye like in the late-night teleseryes your mother stays up for. Look in his eyes and try to acknowledge a warm, cozy feeling. If there is, tell him he's beautiful. If there isn't, stare and force it to come. Repeat until your tongues are knotted like a french girl's braids. He sleeps on your arm, repressing the flow of blood into your swollen arm. Your thumb pulsates, a signal fire.
4. You know two facts about cockroaches. One, is that they're heterotrophs, like almost all organisms, and that they're in a mutual interaction with gregarina, an organism that aids the cockroach's digestion. In return, the cockroach serves as a home to the gregarina. You've learned that in seventh grade, and it stayed in your head ever since. Two, is that they have thirteen heart chambers twisting throughout its body. You don't exactly remember why. You've learned that in your second year in college, and it didn't stay quite clear in your head.
5. Recall how many times you've said you like hospitals. One particular night, you walked in the emergency room, quite casually. The security guard stared, probably wondering what life-threatening case this young man in a pair of brown eastboroughs from Payless has to whine about. Discreetly support your swollen arm with your left hand for him to see. In his mind your arm said, yeah fuck off I can pay, you know. Inside were lots of kids ages four to six, wrapped in their blankets and parents, sniffing and coughing. The nurse asked, do you smoke? You reply with .....yes? The nurse, your mom, even the kids who heard your reply stared in disbelief, and in that moment you realized how Pacman must have felt every time he lost a match. They directed you to a peculiar looking chair labelled ASTHMA CHAIR.
6. Take in as much hospital air as you may. Besides the fact that they smell purely sterilized, you think they may heal your damaged organs. A different nurse tears up a package of fresh syringe. He ties your arm with a rubber strip and tapped the back of your hand, magically raising your green veins. Observe how they differ in circumference. The nurse chose the thickest, juiciest vein in the middle and inserted an intravenous catheter. Keep your eyes on the needle at all times. Watch as the nurse injected clear, water-like drugs into the IV. Vaguely you remember one is a type of steroid, the other a remedy for a side effect of the steroid (or was it the antihistamine?), and the other, antihistamine. You wait as the latter took you to sleep, steering you away from your happy place. The smell of antiseptics, and the slurred sounds of the hospital fades out.
Buttons & Zips - Elbow
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