Walking Off Heaven's Shore

Turning Point

8:15. Forty-five minutes to Friday morning.

At the kitchen table, I stared into black coffee. Lasers exploded in my head. The deadly morning sun ricocheted off the white kitchen walls and zinged through my skull. The more I woke up, the worse it was.

Not a hangover. I hadn’t drunk anything.

Too stupid to go to bed, I’d channel-surfed old movies. She starred in every one, on every channel.

I drank more coffee, dark and hot, like her eyes. The smell of it *reminded me of her too, rich, bittersweet. The ache in my heart eased the rage in my head, but only for a second.

I rolled my head—my neck grated like a Harley on a gravel road. No release. If I could just twist my head up and to the left another 3/16s of an inch…I’d probably just break my neck.

With my luck, it wouldn’t kill me. Wet from my shower, my ponytail soaked my shirt.

Cold sweat.

A whole week. Her answering machine wasn’t taking any more messages. Maybe it had been coming for a long time. But today she might relent.

If I went back to bed now, maybe I could face her later. But if I didn’t go to work, I knew I’d be at her place, on my knees, waiting for her to come home.

Did she think of me as a puppy she couldn’t paper train?

I covered one eye, my thumb against my temple pressure point. My brain created its own flares and jabbed back. I ate a handful of aspirin and washed them down with caffeine—any stronger, and it would slap me. No sugar. I’d changed my ways. She wanted me to be healthy.

8: 25. I could call in sick. For the first time in my life, I had a real job with sick days. Hadn’t missed a day in over a year.

Responsible, that’s me.

I peered at the morning’s headlines. Suicide bombers. The idea of being blown up was appealing. Did terrorists get migraines? Were they drunk when they strapped on the backpack and climbed on the bus?

I could have been talked into that when I was a kid…if I was drunk.

I didn’t drink in the mornings anymore. Hair of the dog was worse if t*****e could be quantified.

I’d quit smoking too. I didn’t miss smoking all that much except when the network went down at work, or when she went off on one of her rages. I wanted a cigarette now.

If she were here, she would try to rub my neck and that wouldn’t help.

A b*****b wouldn’t help.

I cradled my head in my hand, stretching my neck against my shoulders like a dog pulling against his chain.

I’d made changes, for myself, I thought, not for her. I took a deep breath and pulled my legs under me in a lotus.

I centered myself, relaxed as much as possible to withdraw from the pain, to observe it without attachment.

My hippie days were too far behind me. I tried to breathe through the pain, but the oxygen fed the fire in my third eye.

8: 30. No point in calling in on Friday. If I could get the bike started, that would help. The bike always helped, even if for only the six minutes it took to get to work.

The bike had been as cranky as she was. I made a mental note to check the clutch cable again. I wanted to be in control the next time the front wheel popped erect with me behind it.

That’s what pissed her off. She thought I was showing off.

Again.

Maybe I could ride this afternoon, blow my head away with an 80-mile-an-hour wind in my face, just me and the road.

Alone.

Time to go to work.