Book 1 Story 4 – Dana is determined to make it through an entire day without fucking up
Genre: Comedy
The shrill beep of the alarm clock ripped Dana from her sleep, letting her know in its abrasive way that it was
8 am.
No, wait. What sort of maniac wakes up that early when there’s another graveyard shift ahead?
8 PM.
She jolted upright and screamed “I WILL NOT FUCK UP TODAY!!!!” satisfied that the ear-splitting loudness of her own voice was enough to convince even her.
She threw her legs over the side of the bed and repeated it for good measure. “I will not fuck up, I will not fuck up, I WILL NOT FUCK UP!!”
Her mantra continued as she went through her ‘morning’ routine. Today was the day. The day not a word from her mouth would blubber forth unchecked. Not one situation was to be misinterpreted and not a single one of her actions would lead to disaster. For a maladjusted, poorly socialized misfit such as herself, it was a lot to ask.
Humming a mangled tune, she carefully wrapped her hair in plastic to give the red dye time to take hold. She’d almost selected a purple as the shop had ran out of pillarbox red, but then laughed at her own absurdity. Why mess with success?
Well, maybe success was a bit of a stretch. The bright hue hadn’t caught her a man, nor much more than the occasional glance, but it was definitively her – since as long ago as her first paycheck. If the usual place didn’t have it, another surely would, and in fact, did.
“I AM CONFIDENT, POWERFUL AND STRONG!” she roared into the indifferent mirror.
Unconvinced, she repeated it again even louder. The words were supposed to instill confidence, but it wasn’t working. She felt stupid.
“I AM FINE THE WAY I AM AND FUCK THOSE WHO DON’T THINK SO!”
A bit better, but still not enough.
“FUCK YOU ALL YOU COCKSUCKING FUCKING FUCKHEADS!!!”
That should do it. So long as she left those words here. Wouldn’t want to say that to an actual person, would she? That would be a fuckup indeed.
Still dressed in the oversized t-shirt and threadbare shorts she had slept in, Dana hoisted the ripening garbage over her shoulder, aiming to banish it to the curb. It wasn’t garbage day but so what. It couldn’t stay in the house. She’d had her fun and learned a lot from dissecting all those fish, but it was time for them and their guts to go.
Hold on though. Letting it sit by the road for two days would be considered a fuckup, as it would surely enrage her finicky neighbour. The two were at constant odds as it was. He took offense at the slightest of things, like the thousands of dandelions that made up her lawn, or her occasional psychotropic indulges that only sometimes led to her dancing naked in the yard. Why all the obscenities that came from his mouth? It wasn’t like she did that all the time.
She nearly went back inside, thinking she could fit the garbage in the freezer instead, when something caught her eye. Someone, and she knew who, had snuck in during the night and slashed one of her tires. She couldn’t actually see the offending hole, but the bottom rim was now touching the dirt driveway. A menacing growl rose from her depths. So, the coward wanted a war, did he? He probably did it to get back at her for painting a gigantic bloody eye on the side of her house, which also happened to look right into his bedroom. Or maybe it was in response to her getting into his mailbox, writing ‘deceased’ on all his letters before sending them back to where they’d came from?
It never occurred to her the flat could have happened on its own. The aging Datsun was more rust than car. There was a hole in the floor she could watch the road go by in, and another above to view the sun. The dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree and the exhaust came out in vile belches. And while Dana didn’t know a whole lot about cars, she was pretty certain the engine shouldn’t sound like an angry cat with a jackhammer.
She looked over to the grimacing grill, cringing. It was a face for the failing body that always begged her to ‘kill me please’. She just hadn’t had the heart to do it.
She tore a hole in the trash bag, preparing to chuck it over the fence. If the man was going to be that way, so was she. Say hello to her disembowelled playthings that were about to serve a greater purpose. She froze though, realizing the error she was about to make; it was only
9 pm
and she’d nearly blown her perfect day. This definitely counted as an action that could lead to disaster. Who knew what the man next door would do in retaliation? It was doubtful he’d be pleased by the sight or the smell of ocean innards all over the grass.
She regretfully set the bag down. A backyard burial it would have to do. She already had a hole in mind. She’d been digging a lot of them lately, for the fun of it, just to see what lay beneath. Also, if she could fit into them.
She could get her revenge tomorrow. She could fuck up all she wanted to then.
When the job was done, she thought to herself, ‘a good day means a good lunch!’ No corner store soggy sandwich for her today. If she was quick about it, she might just have time to make something proper. Something that said, ‘respectable colleague who puts care and time into creating a masterpiece of nutrition’.
Two pans, a small pot and an armful of kitchen tools later the finishing touches on her beautiful bento were complete. It featured a cute little kitty cat head made from sushi rice, on a bed of fresh salad greens. Its maw was enormous, with pointed little teeth, vomiting copious amounts of star and heart shaped vegetables. Happy little meatballs nestled within, smiling their approval. A little touch of hot sauce here and there and the regurgitation now looked horrifyingly bloody as well. If she ate things in the right order, she could pretend the meatball’s hiding places were slowly being revealed, rendering them helpless against the devouring feline.
“YOU’RE DOOMED MOTHERFUCKERS!” she cried at the clueless soon-to-be-victims, drawing a paring knife across her throat in an obvious threat. She couldn’t wait until lunch!
Her energy now qualifying as manic, she bounced around in place wondering what to do next when she spotted the time. There was no way in hell it was already
10:45 pm!
She bolted from the kitchen, leaving the mound of dishes for another time, tearing the plastic off her hair so she could rinse and then dry it. It was a good thing it didn’t need fancy styling. She could pop her head in the oven for a few minutes or sit outside in the cold and POOF! it would stick out all over just the same. It represented her perfectly, refusing to follow the norm, plus, coming across as insane.
It would only take a minute to jump into clothes more suitable for work and she could be out at the bus stop by
11:00 pm.
Just in time to flag the driver down and hop on board. She grabbed the pole, caught her breath then lifted her head with a great toothy smile. Her eyes sparkling with optimistic cheer, wondering what new friends she could make en route to the coroner’s office tonight.
To her dismay, there was no one in the seats. She briefly entertained the idea of chatting up the driver, but his face gave her pause. Were eyes supposed to twitch like that?
“Oh, I remember you!” she exclaimed, giving him a hearty thumbs up. “You don’t like me, do you?” Was he the one who had kicked her off three times already?
She wisely scurried to the back when she noticed a newly pulsating vein on his forehead.
Dragging her feet in disappointment, she sunk into a seat in the back, reflecting on the driver’s hostility. Such a reaction wasn’t that uncommon. Maybe it would best if tonight’s shift was a quiet one. If there was no one to interact with, there’d be no one to say the wrong things to. No one to scare away or piss off, like Mr Bus Driver here.
People died, though, and rarely at convenient times. If they died horribly or mysteriously enough, they wound up in her ‘in’ tray. That meant porters to bring them in, people she had no choice but to interact with. Probably at some stupid time like
2:32 am.
“She looks all right to me. The hair’s a bit weird though.”
“Just give it a chance” the other hissed, shoving the gurney up the ramp.
Dana greeted them with an unnaturally stretched smile, as if the sides of her mouth had been cranked to their limit and then stapled to her ears.
“Good morning, gentleman, how can I help you?” she somehow said, her lips barely moving. She either looked like a ventriloquist still learning the art, or the dummy’s mouth he’d forgotten to unhinge.
She’d gotten through two and half hours without single human contact and was determined to get through this one fuckup free. She’d even come prepared to ensure it didn’t happen.
“Alfred Domas, 62,” the younger one said, handing her a file. It was only his third day on the job, and his first delivery here.
She fixated on him immediately, it couldn’t be helped. The guy was exactly her type; young and male, with no ring. He also had luscious brown eyes she could stare deeply into, which she naturally already was. His brown hair was thick and curled up at the edges, perfect for running fingers through when they eventually kissed. From the look of him he played some sort of sport. Those broad shoulders hadn’t been created by watching TV.
She wanted dearly to ask for his name, his phone number and the size of his manhood but that could lead to another reprimand. She had to shut herself up before the words came tumbling out.
“YeeAAAAH!!” she suddenly screeched, her eyes bulging to the size of the wheels on the gurney. Then, just like that, her eerie smile reappeared. Her eyebrows raised coolly as if nothing had happened.
“Are you alright?” Mr. Gorgeous replied, looking somewhat concerned.
She nodded her head cheerfully, biting back the pain. A binder clip to the thigh had seemed like a good idea in theory, but she sorely underestimated how much it was going to hurt. There wasn’t much point in trying to distract herself from fucking up if the solution made her look even more insane.
Still, she was determined. She reached for another clip from the counter and discretely made it disappear, ready for the next round of aversion therapy, should she need it.
“Why don’t you bring him over to the scale, hm?” she squeaked, fighting the tears forming at the corner of her eyes.
“Aren’t you going to come check the weight?” the more experienced of the two porters asked, looking at her with narrowed eyes. She never passed up a chance to get near him or any other. Either they’d caught her with a vibrator up her nether regions or she’d finally snapped and was going to kill them all with explosive charges beneath the scale.
“No, it’s alright. Just tell me what it is!”
The pair wheeled the gurney over as the older one whispered, “I dare you to hit on her!”
“What? Are you kidding?”
“Just do it! It’ll be hilarious!” He then barked out the numbers to the painfully smiling redhead.
“Mmhm, yes, Ok. We’ll put him in number two,” she yelped, trying to look less deranged by placing her elbow on the counter and resting her chin in a thoughtful hand. At least her tactic was working, just about. She could hardly speak at all from the pain.
It did dawn on her though that she had to direct the two to the right compartment tray for poor Mr Domas. It meant emerging from her station and them noticing the clip sticking out of her side. She removed it with regret and placed it in her pocket with the other she’d gathered, praying she could get through the next few minutes without one.
She led them to the other room at a pace that seemed wholly unnecessary, but perhaps suited to the 100-yard dash at a track meet. Once at the refrigerated cabinet she gave her instructions in mime. She’d decided it was best to not say a word. Better that than to open her mouth and ruin her so far perfect day.
The two looked on with increasing confusion as she gestured and silently mouthed her way through her commands. They understood what she was trying to say but were stumped as to how this had become a game of charades.
Once they transferred the body, she swiped the gurney right from under them, and weighed it herself so she could calculate the difference. Elated that they were nearly through, she turned and spread out her arms with a great beaming smile that together said, ‘Have a wonderful rest of the night!’
The first porter elbowed his partner hard in the side to goad him on. He looked horrified and made a point of letting his colleague know it. “You do it!” he said as they were in the process of leaving.
He rolled his eyes, but not for long. This was too good a chance to get a laugh. “Hey Dana. What do you say we go for a drink after this?” He’d chosen his words with great caution. There was neither a bar that was still open, nor an end to her shift any time soon.
She froze mid-step, still an arm’s reach from the counter’s safety. That and the chance to reattach the clips that could keep her mouth shut. Sweat rushed to her flushed face and heated brow.
I will not fuck up I will not fuck up I will not fuck up.
Wait. Was this a fuckup if he initiated it?
She turned her head so fast he thought she was going to keep going and keel right over. “Me?”
“Yeah, you’re still single, aren’t you?”
She might have said and done a few things in response that put her plans for a flawless night to ruin.
The two barely escaped with their clothes intact, laughing hysterically when they were well out of range.
“Is she always like that!?”
“Oh, you haven’t seen the half of it. She gets even weirder!”
“She was so desperate! I almost feel bad for baiting her!”
“You’ll get over it when she smells your pity and shows up at your doorstep!”
“Oh, God, I can’t even imagine!”
The instigator of the whole incident grinned in the bizarre way she’d done when they first entered. “Gdd mrnng endlmN! Hm cn ai hlp ru?”
It took some time for the two to run out of reasons to mock.
The rest of the night was mercifully peaceful. It was like nobody else had decided to die tonight. Well, not in a way that resulted in them ending up here.
Dana wanted to crawl under a rock. One that was already submerged in a lake of filth. It was where she belonged after that. Had it been necessary to grab at his shirt like that? To get on her knees and plead when the joke was revealed? One day, one consecutive twenty-four hours of normality was all she had asked for. She’d managed 11 hours and 50 minutes. It might actually be a record for her, but that didn’t give her much solace. She knew she was being laughed at, she could hear them howling, but she chose to disregard it. It really wasn’t that uncommon.
Things started looking up again when Professor Dockett appeared.
“Good morning, Dana,” he said with a smile. The aging pathologist always had one of those for her. He’d given her the job in the first place, when she had nothing, not even an education. He was the only person in her life to see the brain behind her difficulties. He’d taken her under his wing, encouraging and supporting her. In return he got to see that part that others didn’t see. A woman who was bright, curious and had more potential than even she was able to recognize.
“Have you got plans for about 8:30?”
Dana bristled with excitable energy, knowing exactly what he had in store. The chance to watch an autopsy was so good, it could cancel out her previous indiscretion. Maybe this day wasn’t a loss after all.
“Ooh! Whatcha got?”
“Life’s better with a little mystery, don’t you think?”
“I could look on the system you know.”
“You could, but you won’t.”
“Do I at least get a hint as to what to study?”
“Not this time. This’ll be a test of what you know.”
For nearly as long as she’d been working there, the senior pathologist liked to slip her textbooks with pages marked for her to read. It was the agreed upon cost for allowing her to observe what he was doing now and then, so long as she didn’t do anything that could taint the forensic findings. In other words, hands off. She never saw it as a burden. It was genuinely interesting, and she was voracious for more. She’d commit what she could to memory, arrive ready as sharp as a tack for his questioning and spur of the moment quizzes. It paid off in the end. She was brighter than most others gave her credit for. When it came to certain cases, she even did better than some of his students.
She was off at eight, but what was half an hour more? Had he said nine, or ten, her answer would have been the same. For an hour or two she would be treated as having value – like she was wanted and appreciated. Screw those porters! Even thirty minutes with the professor would completely negate their cruel jokes. She had something better than them ahead of her.
She made herself a coffee and waited for
8:43 am.
“Booooorrrriiiiinnng.”
The aging pathologist peered at the rolling eyes of the redhead through the upper lens of his bifocals, frowning. “This poor soul is in two dozen pieces. What could you possibly find boring about that?”
“Well, the cause of death is rather obvious, don’t you think?”
“My dear Dana. The subway that hit him isn’t necessarily what caused his demise.”
“No, but the stab wound to the right of his left scapula probably hastened it,” she said with a self-congratulatory smirk.
Her beloved mentor glanced down at the part of the torso she was referring to, lifting it carefully to examine the back. There, just as she said, was the offending gash. It was a fair sized one at that. Something she shouldn’t have known about yet. He’d only just opened the bag.
“You were peeking again before I came in, weren’t you? You know you aren’t supposed to touch the cadavers.”
She knew the rules. She’d been shadowing him for years and hadn’t broken any of them. She was just an attendant, not a doctor or even a student. An attendant with insatiable curiosity.
She lifted a finger, careful to keep her distance, and pointed at a small hole in the chest. “That’s the exit wound. It’s tiny, with everted edges.”
He examined it closely, checking its characteristics and the angle. She’d picked up on the truth pretty quick. The entrance wound confirmed her deduction. “You are correct, but if anything, that makes this more interesting.”
“Stab wounds are boring! I’ve seen dozens of them!”
“Well then. If you need more of a challenge, how about you name every internal structure visible at the edges of these pieces!”
Dana’s smile quickly faded as she regarded the collection before her. The pathologist liked to test her, and she didn’t want to disappoint, but that was a lot of blood vessels, organs and bones to be named.
“All of them?” she squeaked.
He placed a hand down on the table and gave her an expectant smile.
She took a deep breath and started with the section closest to her.
“Dana, you never cease to amaze me,” he said as she put away the newly sterilized equipment. “I’m not sure if my students could have recognized a few of those. They weren’t easy to make out.”
She beamed with the irrepressible light the man always drew out of her.
“Dana, you have your high school diploma now. I implore you to reconsider applying for medical school.”
Her smile quickly faded as darkness began creeping in. “I can’t,” she said quietly and with evident discomfort. They’d been through this so many times. Her reasoning never changed. “There’s too many people.”
“You could sit at the back, take notes, and study on your own.”
“I’d have to work with others at some point.”
“But not right away. You’ve come so far already! When you started working here you couldn’t look at me at all. You were so withdrawn. Your social anxieties have improved, immensely. They’ll continue to get better.”
“That’s because it’s you! You always treat me like I’m worth talking to. I’m not the same around other people.”
“Yes, I’ve heard the stories. I got another complaint about you, by the way.”
“What did I do this time?”
“You were apparently dancing around with your headphones on the other night, screaming out some rather offensive lyrics.”
“Oh yeeeaahh…. 4 am is pretty dull around here.”
“You also lined your counter with pornographic origami.”
“Do you have any idea how hard it is to fold a paper vulva?” she grinned but the humor fizzled and blinked out. Professor Dockett wasn’t amused. She shrunk into herself and apologized.
“Sorry,” she said, before wincing as if in pain. “Am I in trouble?”
He chuckled in response as she relaxed her tensed shoulders with relief. “I told those two porters that your ADHD medication was causing terrible side effects and they should be more understanding while you switch to another.”
“HEY!” If there was one thing that set Dana off it was the suggestion that there was something wrong with her, no matter how progressively society viewed the diagnosis.
“Would you rather be reprimanded?”
She clapped her mouth shut before cautiously opening it to say, “ADHD is a legitimate hypothesis.”
“How much do you think you can get away with until your ‘new medication’ starts kicking in?” he said with a sparkle in his eyes.
Dana let out an explosive cry of glee. “I’ve always wanted to sit on the counter instead of behind it!”
“I’m surprised you haven’t done so already!” he chuckled. “Just keep in mind this is a respectable workplace. No more pornography please, even if it is just paper.”
“So… no sitting on the counter…” she began before adding with a cheeky grin “…unless there’s no one around.”
“Go forth my dear and explore the heights!”
****
A cheerful goodbye and a bus trip later, it was
10:25 am.
It was most of the way through her day, but her biggest challenge still lay ahead. The market quarter. Rows of tables and booths, teeming with everything edible, surrounded by streets that sold everything else. A banquet of delicacies, wafting enticing scents and hand-crafted items you couldn’t find at the local mall. Unfortunately for her, it was crawling with people. It was therefore a minefield of potential fuckups. She rarely made it through without making some sort of scene, but not today. Today was going to be different. She was going to hold her head high and breathe in pure confidence and calm. She’d even practiced her lines the day before, determined that they would come out right. She took a step forward and waded into the circus.
10:32 am
“Eeny-meeny-miny-mo, pick a cheese for your Bordeaux! If it stinks it’s good to go! Eeny-meeny-miny-mo! GOUDA!!!”
The cheesemonger breathed a sigh of relief, who was never sure what this frequenting weirdo was going to do next. At least today’s peculiarity was brief. Unfortunately, she wasn’t quite done with her selection.
“My mother told me to pick the best one and YOU. ARE. IT!!!”
Her finger landed on a nice little wedge of Wensleydale.
“Oh. I don’t like that one. Let me start again.”
10:40 am
“Oh, I’m not actually crazy, though the doctors and the nurses and the therapists seem to think so. Kept stuffing pills down my throat like I’m some psycho but I SHOWED THEM! Told them to shove it up their asses and threw the whole lot in a box under my bed! Can you believe it? They can’t make me take them. I’m not some criminal! I have a JOB and a HOUSE and it’s actually mine! So, what if I like to pretend that watermelons are THEIR HEADS and SMASH them into pieces or drop them off my roof! You know what sound it makes? KKSSPLURSGH!! Ahahaha! Sometimes I draw the faces of people I don’t like with a marker and then BASH THE WATERMELONS INTO PIECES WITH A SLEDGEHAMMER!’ If you put enough red dye in it first with a syringe it looks just like mashed up organs, and I should know! I see mashed up human organs all the time!”
“Tell you what,” the ashen faced vendor suggested, “you seem like a nice person, how about you have that melon for free, on me.”
She blushed wildly, biting her lip. “Nah. I wouldn’t want to put you out. Here,” she said, handing over some change. “You wouldn’t happen to be single, would you?”
10:52 am
“A beautiful bunch of ripe BANANA! Daylight come and me wanna go ho-OME! Hide the deadly black TARANTULA!”
The fruit seller had never seen that one before. The crazed fingers in the air after the last line was a nice touch as she shook her purchase around with mock terror.
11:01 am
So far so good. Everyone had been really nice to her, and she hadn’t said or done anything wrong at all!
There was still Vinnie though. The greasy haired, smirks-a-lot with the best vegetables in the square. One of these days she was going to go somewhere else, but his specialty was tomatoes, and she had a pasta sauce to prepare.
She hated everything about him and his stand, except for the produce, of course. It was always swarming with people, and there was rarely much left by this time. She should have gone to him first, but had been procrastinating, as usual. Somewhere in the back of her mind she always hoped he’d have nothing left, giving her the excuse that she needed to try someone new. If only his wares weren’t so dammed good. She needed those juicy red fruits like a teenager needs validation.
If only she didn’t have to deal with him. He looked like a rat on its hind legs, sniffing the air for suckers to fleece. His yellowing front teeth hung past his lips, gnashing together now and then when he found a target, which there were plenty of about. He had a reputation for having the best and he damn well knew it. He had no shortage of customers and made more than enough money with what he had, but still used every trick in the book to get those few extra coins. His prices were extortionate. He wasn’t averse to placing a sneaky finger on the scales and he could talk just about anyone into purchases they hadn’t planned, making tubers or greens disappear into bags before customers had a chance to say no.
Those who knew him were wise to his ways and were adept at navigating his little tricks. Dana wasn’t one of those people.
“Little girl, what can I get you today?”
She hated when he called her that, and the weasel knew it.
“TOMATOES!” she hissed from behind clenched teeth, readjusting the melon in her hands, cursing herself for not buying it last. It was going to end up breaking her toes if she had to hold it much longer.
“And how many would you like?” his grin turning wicked. She was his favorite sadistic game and knew that a bit of fun could be had if he dragged things out.
“EIGHT! No TEN!”
“You have to buy the whole vine my dear little girl, you can’t just pluck off how many you want.”
“Just give me at least ten!”
“Big ones or smaller ones?”
“Uh, a mixture of each!”
“How many of each would you like?”
“Just grab some already!”
“Now, now little girl, there’s no reason to be short with me,” he sneered, making a point of selecting the clusters that would give her the greatest number. He took his time in weighing them, stopping frequently to greet those who were waiting. By the time he was done, Dana was in trouble indeed, feeling the weighty fruit slipping.
“Eight dollars and thirty-six cents, my dear little girl.”
It was at this point she froze. She couldn’t possibly get at her wallet and there was nowhere to put down her heavy burden.
“I uh…”
“Well, get on with it, little girl!” he snapped. “I have other customers you know!”
“STOP CALLING ME THAT!” she shouted and heaved the watermelon as hard as she could in his direction. He didn’t bother to move or even flinch. It only travelled a few inches, mostly up, before slamming down on his precious stand, squashing a salad’s worth of variety in the process.
“Shit.”
Ten people deep into the crowd, she could hear his voice screaming for compensation as she ran. It looked like she was going to have to find another vendor to buy from after all. That, or another market entirely.
She shook her head to clear her thoughts, but they were muddled and screaming back at her, “ONE DAY! JUST ONE SINGLE FUCKING DAY! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU? YOU’RE NEVER GOING TO BE MISTAKEN FOR A PERSON!”
“SHUT UP!” she cried out to the ears of those she passed.
“ALL YOU HAD TO DO WAS BUY A FEW FUCKING THINGS! IT’S A MEASLY MUNDANE FUCKING TASK, HOW THE FUCK ARE YOU SO USELESS AT IT?”
Her escape came to a sudden halt as she slammed into an elderly man she hadn’t seen. He was thankfully more robust than he looked and didn’t go down, but that didn’t mean he was grateful.
“WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING YOU FUCKING CUNT!” he yelled, leaving her paralyzed. He was just a doddering old man, how horrible a person was she to bring forth such language from him? It was just a mistake!
Her mind in the meantime had latched onto the insult as validation of what it had already been telling her, “PATHETIC LITTLE RUNT! CAN’T EVEN GO A FEW PACES WITHOUT PISSING SOMEONE OFF!”
“SHUT THE FUCK UP!!” she screamed in the man’s face, leaving him redder with fury.
Not daring to stick around to see what he would do, she bolted in another direction, toppling two stacks of fruit, sending a busker’s coins flying and wrapping her leg around one unfortunate browser, knocking the both of them down.
There may have been others she’d affected in a mad dash towards solitude, but she’d shut out her ears to their angry cries. The only thing she could hear now was her own mind tormenting her. She refused to give in to its cries of ‘SHAME!’ and mounted a nearby statue, desperately clinging to one abstracted arm. It wasn’t her that was the problem, it was them!
“FUCK YOU!!!! FUCK YOU ALL!!! FUCK YOU, AND YOU AND EVERYONE OF YOU!!!”
“SUCK MY DICK YOU FUCKING WHORE!”
Spotting the face that had provided the jeering voice, she lifted her shirt to reveal the braless chest underneath. “EAT THIS BUDDY!”
Coursing now with bitter hatred, she continued belting out her frustrations. “YOU’RE ALL MINDLESS DRONES WITH BORING LIVES!! AT LEAST I’M INTERESTING!! I’M FUN!! AND DIFFERENT!! AND I’M BETTER THAN YOU!!!
“YOU TELL HIM SISTER!!”
Misreading the fist-pumping fan’s comment as a mockery, Dana turned her damning fingers towards her, screeching her reprimand. “FUCK YOU!!!!”
It was then that she noticed the two officers at the edge of the crowd, looking at her with what most certainly was not bemusement.
“SHIT!” She didn’t recognize either of them, but they’d likely heard of her. She’d been fined enough times and spent enough hours in a holding cell to have made a name for herself.
She leaped off of the statue and made a break for the entrance to the nearby park. There was a lot less cover, but she was quick on her feet and was banking on being faster than they were.
She’d nearly made it when she spotted a familiar face in the crowd.
“Darren!” she cried, grinding to a halt. “Hey! You never called!” The two had met at a club towards the end of the night when standards weren’t quite as high. They’d ended up at his place for more than just fooling around. It was a night she remembered quite fondly, though his curled lip and horrified eyes suggested he remembered it differently. She didn’t think he was happy to see her but couldn’t imagine why.
“I missed you,” she said, with a shy twirl of the hips and a naughty finger to her lips.
“On no! You get away from me you loonie!”
“What?” she said, genuinely confused. “I thought we had fun?”
“FUN? You fucking BIT me and tore my favorite shirt!”
“You didn’t complain at the time,” she said with hopeful reasoning.
“Yeah, because I was going to get laid! If I’d known what would happen next, I would have kicked you out the door!”
“I made you breakfast!”
“You made yourself at home and refused to leave! You stole my spare key and I caught you doing it!”
“I gave it back,” she said, cringing. “It was just a stupid mistake.”
“SO WERE YOU!”
“So come to my place next time, you can leave whenever you want.”
“You don’t get it, do you? I DON’T WANT TO SEE YOU AGAIN! You were just a fucking lay! An easy mark so desperate, you would have fucked the guy lying outside in a pool of his own vomit!’
“But I liked you, I thought we shared something?” she pleaded, reaching for his arm.
“Get off of me, you nutcase!” he shouted, pushing her backwards. Unprepared for the response, she fell long before she thought to brace herself, landing hard on the pavement.
She blinked, watching him go, feeling tears start to form at the corner of her eyes. What the hell had she done? Things had gone so well. Eight months of not even a bite and he’d come along, so eager to have her. She thought she meant something to him.
“Are you alright ma’am?”
She snapped her head upwards at the question to find the two officers she’d been running from earlier. She didn’t think they were there out of concern.
She scrambled to her feet and bolted once again. If she could make it to the bus, she could get home, the one place where angry eyes and quaking fists couldn’t touch her.
She made it just as the driver was starting to close the door. He’d seen her coming and didn’t want her onboard, but she didn’t know that. She was just grateful to have gotten there in time. She stuffed some number of bills in the slot, much more than was necessary and stood awkward and ashamed, unable to find a seat. In an hour or two this day would come to an end, no better or worse than any other day of her life.
At long last it was
2:03 pm.
24 hours ago, she had fallen asleep, but it eluded her now. She picked at her meagre acquisitions but was no hungrier than she’d been twenty minutes ago. Nor an hour before.
The watermelon was long gone and what remained had been rendered inedible. She’d had a few farm-fresh eggs, but they were broken now, their contents seeping into the rest of her purchases. The cheese was saturated, the bananas crushed and bruised. A book she’d been looking forward to reading was mostly soggy pages, some already disintegrated into mush.
All she had wanted was one day without any screw ups and all she had to show for it was a collection of reminders that such a day was impossible.
She tried to wash off the Gouda she’d bought after all and cut off the contaminated edges. It didn’t leave her with much, just a mouthful or two.
Maybe she wasn’t meant to ever succeed. Maybe she was the way she was for a reason.
It would have been easy to succumb to the darkness that crawled inside her head, but that wasn’t her either. A part of her, the biggest part, saw the fun and the joy in the world, even if it was in her own way.
She had optimism. Her refusal to give in always burning bright inside, giving her hope that the next day would be better.
Right now, though, it wasn’t there.
“You’re never going to be like them, you’re too damaged,” she muttered to herself then drew her legs in onto the chair, bringing her knees to her chest.
A blazing spark ignited in her eyes.
“Why would I want to be like them?” she countered, fierce and defiant.
She planted her feet back down on the floor and rose from her seat. “FUCK THEM! FUCK THEM ALL! FUCK THE LOT OF THEM!”
She swept her ruined purchases off the table and climbed up upon it, letting out a scream worthy of her rage. “FUCK!!! YOU!!!”
Maybe tomorrow would be better.
Flickering Lights 
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