For Whom

Chapter 1

I've made it. To Rome. To the actual city of Rome, Italy. I've only a duffel bag filled with my only clothes, my fold up easel, my paintbrushes, some cash, and my phone, to my name. All I have left from leaving Oregon. I don't know what I've come for, I just know I came for myself and no one else. And as I stand here, on this terrace, this emptied, old, falling apart terrace, with emptied houses all around me, the sun slowly rising before me over the tops of these rooftops, I feel the warmth of that orange glow hitting my skin. I feel like as it crawls over the baby hairs of my arms and the peach fuzz of my neck and face. The soft, yet sharp, heat of its rays hitting my dull brown eyes, turning them to amber. this terrace will be where I come for my morning runs it will be my destination as i run towards the release I promised myself since the time i thought up this insane plan. to leave everything and everyone behind so i could come here, by myself. i let myself drop my bag, roughly, with "attitude" as my parents would say. I step forward until my body touches the stone barricade of its railings, so as not to let anyone fall down. I press myself to it, until I've left nothing untouched, and i suck in the air I've so desperately needed since my departure. I hold it, until it burns, until i hear my own blood rushing in my ears, until the sharp familiar twinge of asthma hits me, and let it out, in one horrible, angry, lonely, painful sound of my own voice that I've held back for years, rips from my throat in the most guttural and animalistic shriek. And I hold it, and make it louder as I run out of the breath I held for so long. Until nothing is left, but the heaving sound of my lungs sucking up the air I forced from me.

And then i wake up. I'm on the couch in front of the TV. The shrieks are from the baby next door. I look to the clock and it reads, 4:37 am. I guess I'm getting up an hour earlier. 

I rise from the old antique cushions and walk to the restroom, where i start the freezing cold shower i need to fully gain consciousness. As i undress myself from an old Pink Floyd t shirt, and my thong, i step into the arctic water. I feel myself stiffen even though i don't want to, but soon, force myself under the spray directly, and stand rigid until i can think. Scrubbing the night sweat from my pores and washing my hair, i finish quickly. The air outside the shower curtains is muggy. Italy is hot even at its coldest hour.

Not bothering to cover up, i walk bare to the living room where i slept, and scrub the towel through my hair. Its grown out really long in the past two years. i haven't cut it once since junior year. its to my shoulders now. long enough and shaggy enough to tie up. I stand before the window leading to the balcony for a minute. the dark, thick drapes keeping the light out. grabbing my sunglasses off the coffee table and the bottle of gin, and the glass next to it, i yank open the drapes, towel now draped across my neck.

I open the doors to the window, and climb through the window to stand on the metal fire escape. i set the bottle and cup on the railing, grimacing at the beginnings of the sun. Setting the glasses on my nose, i go back inside to grab my phone and the speakers. Setting them up once more outside, i release the slow steady bass of The Strokes and The Arctic Monkeys. Tying my damp hair up in a messy knot at the top of my head, i set my joint in between my lips, pouring some gin into my glass, and replace the blunt with a sip of the burning drink. Taking the matches out from underneath the railing where i taped them, i light one up then hold it to the end of my Maryjane cigarette.

Taking a hit off of it i playing with the still lit match and then toss it over the railing. Taking another swig off the gin, chasing down the huff of intoxicated air. Holding it in, then slowly letting it out, i start to relax from the dream. It wasn't a nightmare, but it was a great dream, though i don't get those anyways. As the morning passes i finish off the joint and the rest of the gin, my neighbors start to rise, and son wear down from their night shifts. As the time passes from dawn to morning, i sit here with my weed and alcohol, a happy drug and a depressant, drawing away, from landscapes to the surreal images passing through my mind like the blink of an eye. Soon, i feel the eyes of an unfamiliar guest on me. raking down my nakedness, as i lounge on this lawn chair I've snuck out onto this cheap balcony. i don't raise my eyes. but soon, curiosity gets the better of me. i still my hand over the drawing of a twisted blurred face, and raise my eyes to look up straight across from me, but don't lift my head. but soon, i see a face that is familiar and unfamiliar and unwelcome to me.