night standing still

06/25/2008

suddenly i feel as if i have been in this hotel forever.

i am working a night shift that will never end.

the only thing i hear is the constant murmur of the lobby fountain. it echoes through the open expanse and resonates within my being.

whenever i went other places, i always wondered how businesses looked to employees rather than customers. what did the clerk see when they rang me up, or when they walked through through the door to the "employees only" area? what company secrets were they privy to? i always felt a sort of curious jealousy.

now the tables have turned. oh, what i would give to be on the other side of this desk! to be a traveler in a strange town- perhaps for a job, or passing through on my way to somewhere significant, or maybe even visiting family. how wonderful that would be.

how wonderful that would be, to have a life in motion.

i know only stagnance.

years of night behind this desk have passed without event.

the memories of days gone by are as dreams: distant and intangible. in fact, i begin to doubt that anyone else exists at all. all but mr. spruce, that is. he is the wal-mart truck driver that stays here weekly without fail. he seems as lonely as i am. he says i remind him of his daughter, whom i know he sees rarely (though he has never said so). maybe there was some relationship that fell to pieces, or perhaps he is just always on the road. whatever the case, there is a distance in his cold grey eyes whenever we speak, indicating he sees someone else where i stand.

i am his only connection to home.

he is my only connection to reality.

i thirst for our conversations much as one wandering the desert longs for water.

everyone else i have ever known now seems to have only existed in my subconscious.
or perhaps they do live, somewhere in a dimension wholly inaccessible to me. who knows? maybe you are floating around out there somewhere, unaware of my entity altogether. ignorant of our compatibility, of the love we could share, of all the intricate ways we could fall apart. or possibly i reside in your dreams as you do in mine, but my actuality is lost to you.

i think i once remembered how you smell.

now i have trouble picturing your eyes.

i can't stand here any longer. i take a walk around the lobby. there are precisely four things in motion: myself, the water in the fountain, a ceiling fan in the cafe, and a humongous spider scurrying across the floor near the opposite wall. it is a large area; my ability to see the spider in itself signifies its size. a grass spider, i'm sure. those grow as large as their enviroment allows, and this hotel is located in a field on the edge of a rural oklahoma town. though harmless, they can reach unsettling proportions.

it disappears under a crack in the floor board. once again, i am the only living thing around. i continue my tour.

the pool appears to be made of glass. i can't imagine the water being stirred, so i bend down and stick my finger in. the ripples are startling, as though i really expected a solid surface. all at once i feel as if i have disturbed some necessary peace.

the entire incident is depressing as hell.

i escape outside to find absolute stillness.

the air is suffocating, from the absence of sound and motion to the atmosphere itself. goddamn the humidity.

i flee back inside, back to the maddening serenity of the fountain. it is my only indication of the passage of time.

my thoughts drift back to you.

i spend less time dwelling on memories than i used to. the imagined future feels just as real now, and the ending is always better.

"hey honey, how was your day?"

"oh, you know. better now that i'm home."

you always say that, right after you kiss me on the cheek.

from here it always goes differently. we may order chinese food, or go out for dinner and a movie, or even a walk in the park. or maybe just a quiet night at home. however the evening goes, it always ends the same. we fall asleep in each other's arms, peacefully.

of course, it is only an imagined future. i am certain our paths will never cross again. the single point in time and space where your life was tangent to mine was a phenomenon never meant to repeat itself.

at least, i think it happened once.

then again, maybe i've been in this hotel forever.

you are steadily fading, no matter how desperately i cling to the vision. exactly as a dream would.

what am i to think about when you are gone?

the night continues, but i doubt its acceleration through time.

i don't think the sun will ever rise.