CHAPTER FIVE
With the sweat hardening into their alcohol skin Susan and Mathew both lay facing the wardrobe. The window was closed, blocking off every possible hole to the outside world. It created a hot sweaty bubble. With Susan still asleep after last night Mathew’s eyes broke open exposing themselves to the pink tinted room. The curtain’s collaboration with the sun was the cause for this welcoming hue. It was a memorable highlight of Susan’s mornings. He wiggled his body an inch at a time. Rolling his fingers through his destroyed hair, he casted his gaze over to Susan. Her long black hair hung over the pillow as if in a coma. Her right arm was attached to her front with the tattoo peering out from under the quilts.
With his clothes lazily fitted around himself, he moved into the kitchen. Morning silence possessed the flat allowing all of the tiny characteristics of Susan to stand out. He walked around causing as little noise as possible. Moving as if he was in an art exhibition, he analysed every sculpture of Susan’s home life. A smile couldn’t help but cut through his mouth. There was a bedroom pillow carefully placed on the sitting room chair acting as the beds younger cousin. Food was placed in little castle shaped piles in the fridge. A family of small plants roamed the ledge of the kitchen window, with the smallest one shrivelled, a piece of paper representing its grave stone placed beneath it. Mathew soaked it all in, he ate it without restraints, every single dirty angled pose.
Memories of the night previous flushed into her head, pushing through phases of alcoholic thought. First was the known regret phase, born by her mountain of drinks. Second was the analysis stage, this took a considerable amount of time as she lay in bed looking at the details of the room. Half way through she flung the blankets from herself and positioned her arms until they were in the shape of a cross. This wasn’t an angelic or religious metaphor, Susan simply enjoyed the feeling of fresh air in her armpits.
The third stage usually comes later in the day, or even a few days later, but for Susan it crawled up her back with fingers tied in soft cloth. With each tap of the linen fingers they left an area of warmth on her skin, removing any doubtful thoughts previously. The orange memories of regret now coloured themselves into a kind shade of baby blue. She loved it all, hugging her legs until they almost touched her chest. It was good to get out of the house she said to herself. And with that bookend of a thought, she got up and put on a loose t-shirt.
With the window open and the soundtrack of the city resumed, she shifted into the kitchen to grab some food. Every time she left her bedroom in the morning, a part of her hoped that the furniture and apparatus would rise up and pick a new spot around the flat. She hated how they were always in the same position as the night previous, yet she was simply too lazy to move them herself.
The fridge doors exploded open with her hung-over hunger. She took out a few slices of plastic packed ham and Emmental cheese. Slapped them together with almost burnt slices of toast and rested her elbows on the counter of the kitchen staring into the sitting room. The crumbs of the “sandwich” created some form of waterfall onto the counter, she looked at it and told herself she’d clean it later.
Right at that moment her eye caught something on the edge of the counter. It was a tiny piece of paper, with its edges torn roughly from something. Abrupt writing painted the picture for Susan, she knew instantly who it was from. She was just slightly surprised he would leave anything behind. Picking up the paper she rested her body on her left hip creating a sort of sassy look of expectation. Only a few words plagued the paper. His name first of all, Mathew scrawled quickly into the top. Beneath wasn’t a number or some form of contact, but an address. A few letters of the address were dug into the page, trying to make it as clear as possible. It reflected how important he wanted her to be able to read it and how much he wanted her to show up. There wasn’t any specific time either, just a time of day; afternoon. Bizarrely uncomfortable as the heroine, she wasn’t used to it, but the thought of meeting Mathew again aroused her cute little happy receptors. Cute.
Her time was planned with an incessant tick. And no, she wasn’t going directly to Mathews, she felt the need to make him wait a bit, let him sizzle like the renowned rasher that he was. Taking the free time in her hands she decided to pay her father a visit. Sure why not. When you don’t have a job or daily purpose, entertainment slowly becomes the substitute.
With cheap food filling her stomach she showered herself creating a layer of skin for the day’s load of events to pile up on. Afterwards she laid out an assortment of fresh clothes from the pile next to her bed, pulling her new pair of jeans to her waist. She picked her boots up by their leathery necks. Another long day ahead they said to themselves.
She paused in the hallway outside of her flat and froze when she thought about where she had left her car. A few steps to calm herself down and she started to walk to where it was parked. It was absolutely empty of anything important, which gave her confidence that no hooligans would dare molest it. Those darn hooligans lollygagging with fluorescent lights.
Having walked the sunny distance to where she remembered she parked it she found it sitting silently in the same location. No fecked scratches and no one bothered enough to waste their time stealing it. She knew she was lucky, but she didn’t ponder on the “ifs” and “buts” extensively. It required too much effort to visualize the naïve consequences she might have had to have faced.
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