Nobody

Overheating

When I woke up I laid in bed for a long time, crying to myself, holding tightly onto the pillow. I could almost smell Pru's perfume, feel her body against mine, and I missed her so bad it made my chest hurt deep inside. I rolled over, staring at the ceiling, wiping my eyes. I lit a cigarette and laid in bed, the light from the dawn slowly getting brighter in the bedroom as I smoked the cigarette.

The smell of the smoke pushed away the lingering phantom scent of Pru's perfume.

More than once I went to get up, then just flopped back and laid in bed, staring at the ceiling. There was really no reason to get up. Nobody to talk to, nothing that really needed doing. The house wouldn't collapse if I spent one day not dusting, vacuuming, and doing other household chores.

But I knew that if I let myself start down that road, it might be days or weeks before I could come back from where that led.

I forced myself up, walking naked from the bedroom to the bathroom and taking a cool shower. Nothing too cold, just enough to wake me up and get my heart pumping. I dried off quickly, standing in front of the mirror and looking at myself.

My appearance now was enough to banish the dreams where I had been only twenty.

I dressed, taking my time to put on a bolero string tie and then my cowboy hat. I stared in the mirror at the man staring back at me. I stripped down again and redressed. Button down shirt and slacks. I shook my head and stripped down before dressing in just jeans and boots. When I looked in the mirror I just stared.

God, I looked like Hell warmed over.

I made myself breakfast, well, another slice of Miss Mary-Beth's casserole to be honest. I just cut it from the whole and thew it on a plate, not bothering to heat it up. I plopped the plate down on the table, sat down, and dug in. When I was done I got up and stared at the table. Did I want another slice?

No. I couldn't remember how what I had eaten tasted anyway.

My limbs still felt heavy, my body weird feeling. Like I'd been exposed to anesthetic or something.

Something was wrong with me, but I didn't know what.

I thought about calling the shrink, thought about calling Doc Rutheford, but pushed the thought away. I was just having the effect of dreaming of Pru all night, dreaming of watching our son play in the school playground on his first day of school. Pru had been worried, afraid for him, and to calm her I'd parked the truck outside the playground and we just sat and watched.

The cop that showed up, probably summoned by the fact a man and a woman were sitting in a truck for over an hour watching the kids play, understood completely and had chatted with us about how he and his wife had been nervous during each of his children's first day of school.

I pushed the memory away, almost savagely, by biting the muscle in between my thumb and pointer finger, then concentrated on eating.

Afterwards I went through the house, checking the locks and door knobs.

My breakfast done I went and sat in front of the computer and staring at it.

I fired up the game, playing, losing myself in the digital world to run away from the memory of Pru and the dreams I'd had all night. I knew when night fell, using the little pop-up clock mod someone had suggested I install to keep track of the time.

I met up with some people and started talking in the chat, listening to the advice they were willing to give someone new to the game and eventually taking them up on the offer of running a couple dungeons to get the hang of it and to gear/level up. They walked me through getting on a voicechat in order to be able to talk to one another. There was some teasing about my voice, a little more about my accent, but it was just shit-talking.