Upon my arrival to my condo, I walk through every inch of it with my gun drawn and senses alert uncertain what I might find in the shadows. I'm still damned unnerved that my sanctuary has been invaded. To have a home broken into is bad enough, but to have someone mulling around in your residence with you still in it is scary as all hell. Anything might have happened. Anything might still happen, for the thought occurred to me that whoever broke in might return.
I must be ready.
I can't relax until I hide my police weapon in my living room where I can reach it quickly. I also make it a point to slip my personal in the bedside drawer. Can't help but love my Smith and Wesson.357 Colt Python. It's a sweet revolver and packs a hell of a punch. If I had to take someone down with this baby, it would hit so hard that person's mother would feel the passion.
Feeling safe, I take down my hair and slip into a white tank and red pajama bottoms, intending to unwind before bed. I throw some Bob Marley on my laptop, then slip into my kitchen to pour a glass of sweet tea when I hear a light knocking at my door. I glance at my microwave clock and cock a brow. It's late. Like real fucking late, and I'm not a social fucking butterfly. I don't have friends lining up down the road waiting for me to get off work.
Save one…
Realization dawns and I suddenly grin like a fool. Even after surviving such a rotten goddamn day, I'm still able to let out a girlie giggle of raw excitement. I dart for the door and swing it wide open, coming face to face with my upstairs neighbor.
The beautiful bitch!
Lisa Song resembles a petite stoned grape. She dons a dark oversized purple night shirt and massive purple fuzzy slippers and between two slender fingers, dangles a baggie filled partway up with some bodacious green.
Now to all you who can run out and buy weed without thought, I'm not allowed, considering my job and all. But damn, a joint does a stressed body good, and after this day, I deserve some 'me' time.
And I have been out for days, waiting for Lisa to find time to hook me up, bless her little stoner heart.
"Make way for the bag lady," she says in a jovial tone, referring to one of my nicknames for her. I laugh and step aside.
"I'm changing your name. You're a bad-ass neighbor, so I'll call you State Farm."
With a chuckle, she skims past me and plops down on my couch, getting right to work on rolling us a fat yummy. If there is someone I might call 'friend', it'd be Lisa. She is similar to me in the aspect she keeps odd hours and enjoys her personal space. She runs a spa somewhere in Knob Hill, but because I never visit spas, I can't say exactly where.
Her family lives in Sacramento, and she moved to New Mexico for college, and here she remains years after finishing her degrees. She's an herbalist and a masseuse which she seems to enjoy doing. Her parents, on the other hand, want their daughter to be something resembling a doctor, but she ignores their lectures and does her own thing.
The one fixation we have in common is we both enjoy good weed. Yes, ladies and dicks, I partake. Rarely but there are times, like now, I truly need a release. Some fuck to relax, some meditate. I toke. And don't you dare judge me. Have you noticed how high-strung I am? It's either this or hardcore medication and since I hate pills, that leaves this.
It is my favorite vice.
My condo is its usual mess, but she's accustomed to the clutter. I used to be quite a homemaker, but that was long ago. Once my daughter died and marriage ended, I handed over my Donna Reed card and lived life a little more willy-nilly. I admit I'm a damn slob. I try to make plans to clean up, but I never find the time. It just so happens I planned on coming home and picking up before going to bed, but come on. There are priorities.
I move all of my paperwork, books, and clothes onto an overstuffed chair to my right so I can sit next to her on the couch as she rolls us a fatty. Bob Marley's music is hauntingly rhythmic in the background to keep it real. Shaking her short dark hair from her eyes, she levels her gaze on me, taking in my pale face and tense expression.
"Long day in cop-land, Brooklyn," she asks before licking it to stick and grabbing a lighter off of the cluttered oak coffee table.
"You have no idea."
I lean back against my plushy couch, relaxing as much as I can considering who I am. She hands me the joint then grins, still holding in her smoke, as she witnesses me moan ecstatically as I take a long hit.
"Same here," she says in a wobbly voice, trying to clear her throat from the strong pull she took with a few deep coughs. "I'm so behind on paperwork that I stayed home and let Gayle run the spa today. I know everything will be a complete disaster tomorrow, but I had a lot to get done."
A thought occurs to me as I let the high relax my body, my muscles going from rock hard to limp, my mind a little less overheated. I want to question her on a few things, but need to do it in a way that won't alarm her. I like Lisa, but I don't confide in her. Not because she isn't trustworthy. For Christ's sakes, she buys my herb.
It just ain't who I am.
We discuss absolutely nothing, which is awesome. I want to discuss nothing and feel nothing and reflect nothing. The steely cocoon I've been wrapped up in all day is un-clenching from around me and I feel rejuvenated.
I exhale my smoke and for the first time in hours, I can breathe again.
Once we finish the blunt and she rises with the obvious intention of leaving, and I take that as a sign that now is the time to throw in a little questioning.
"So were you home all day," I ask, standing as well, meeting her red-rimmed, dark eyes with stoner eyes of my own. She nods, tossing the baggie of sweet herb on my coffee table, and giving me a quick wink.
"Did you notice a weird smell earlier, around noon? Any noises seem strange to you coming from my condo? A powerful thank you, by the way," I state with a smile while snatching up the bag and putting it in a vase which sits on a nearby shelf.
She furrows her brows and pauses at the front door, her small hand resting on the knob. "Nada. Why do you ask?"
Waving her question away like an annoying fly, I plop back down on the couch and rest y arms above my head. I long to bask in the surrealism I'm experiencing and brush away any other sources of stress.
She chuckles at my lax condition and while humming the State Farm jingle she softly closes the door behind her as she leaves me.
It's unbelievable she didn't experience some of the high jinks from my apartment. How could those things be confined to just my place? Every time Lisa even attempted to sing in her condo, not a good experience by the way, I hear it clear as day through the paper-thin walls and floors. When she smokes weed or burns her microwaveable dinners, I smell it down here. How can she not have heard that fucked up screaming?
Groaning, I pushed myself to my feet and slipped out onto my terrace through the patio doors in my bedroom to have a cigarette. I've never liked the smell of cigarette smoke in my condo and always take one on my back porch.
I find myself dwelling on the millions of questions looming in my mind and no matter how long I consider everything I remain without answers. The dark annoyance is causing me to lose my high and get me worked up again.
In frustration at my lack of ability to shut it all off, I bitterly crush my cigarette in the brass ash tray I keep on my small patio table and get to my feet. Slamming the patio doors shut behind me, I do one more walk through before switching off the lights and the low blue glow of my night lights scattered throughout my home take over, lighting my way back to my room. Fuck the damn world, I'm going to bed. All of this thinking is kicking my ass.