#a concept!!!

he hasn’t slept in two days.    each time pendulum weights tug at the tendons behind his eyes,   try to drag heavy lids closed,   he chases another pill with a shot of something that sears his stomach like battery acid.    muscles burn,   pupils dilate,   heart pounding an erratic rhythm.    lullaby for a bloodstream coursing pure chemicals.    he’s awake,   or  half - dead  ;  lacks the capacity to make that distinction.    it’s okay as long as he keeps moving and doesn’t think.

everywhere they go starts looking the same.    everywhere they go is a writhing mass of bodies and stifling heat,   too - loud music,   blotter sheets and pills and little bags of powder and dozens of drinks changing hands.    they’d lost track of his brother hours earlier and it fucking rattles him,   it does,   except it  can’t  because he’s a thousand miles away on some alternate plane where he can rot in peace.

every face he’s seen starts looking the same,   too,   until a flash of gold makes him sway in its direction and ken’s stepping so close he almost trips.    it’s the press of the crowd,   he thinks  ;  then has to remind himself  not  to think,   that’s the whole miserable point.     

‘     where th’ fuck’s   –––––––     ’     jamie,   he wants to ask,   struck at once by the absence  :  where’s jamie.

kenneth probably can’t hear him,   or doesn’t care to listen.    the crowd and the walls and the strobes blend together,   the monochromatic blur of a ruined watercolour,   rippling like ocean waves   —   undertow and all.    a hot,   clumsy clash of mouths sends him reeling back to earth with a sloppy reciprocation and the shock of impact.

a second impact  :  palms shoving hard against the boy’s chest and grappling for enough leverage to stumble,   nearly losing his balance for the umpteenth time,   steadied gracelessly against ken’s shoulder.

‘     tosser.     ’

a rasp,   the scrape of grit in his throat,   he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and casts a line into the ether to reel in a better closing statement.    he needs another drink.

‘     ‘elp us look f’ me brotha’,   ye fuckin’ lemon’ead twat.     ’