A Book Report Influenced by the Absurdity of Life

I don’t remember how long I had him before the first time I saw him, evidently, standing post.  So there’s the living room, the hallway on one side of which is the galley kitchen and on the other the bathroom and at its end the bedroom.  That’s it, ladies and gentlemen.  

    One morning, before sunrise, I remember, yes, I remember because my long term memory is working; it’s the short term shit that I forget so I write everything down on a dry erase board (pay this bill, this bill paid, mail this check, this check mailed . . . ) and this happened years ago, rabbit’s old, so I remember, yes, I remember I woke up thirsty, wanted a swallow of water and saw him sitting away from me and the threshold of where the living room meets the hallway.  Sitting there.  Just sitting there.  Zero reaction to my emergence from the bedroom.  I mean zero zilch nada.  To him I might as well have been still passed out in bed.  That’s what I do.  I don’t know how to fall asleep.  Just pass out.  

    He was there.  At the threshold.  Either unaware of or ignoring me.  There.  Illuminated by the dull red shadow of the boa’s nighttime heat lamp.  It was summer, I remember, yes, I remember that the fans were running and the cicadas were romancing and I was naked.  Full frontal.  One of the perks of living in Florida.  But when I saw him there, just sitting there, threshold hallway red heated illumination, just sitting there my instinct I remember, yes, I remember, was to go back to the bedroom and put on the jeans I’d worn that day because I didn’t want to be naked in a potential confrontation because why?  why I don’t remember, no, I don’t remember but I remember, yes, I remember putting on the jeans and retrieving my Glock semi-auto from my underwear drawer, yep, you read that right, slapping in a magazine and chambering a round because what the hell or who the hell was keeping him at the threshold staring and not affirming me?  

    Hand on bedroom doorknob then, nope, retrieved the Ruger, shotgun, understand?  Loaded and chambered it and returned to the living room to confront who the hell knew what?  I scooped him up out of the nighttime heat redness and closed him into the bedroom.  Glock in one hand and Ruger slung on my shoulder I looked out the peep hole of the front door and saw nothing and had the craziest thought, Denim doesn’t feel good against the crotch, yes, I remember I thought that, yes, I remember and he started protesting against the bedroom door so I let him out and sat on the couch and protested the feel of denim against my crotch and sat up for a couple of hours before I was satisfied that there was no danger.

    But that satisfaction did not satisfy the wonder of why he was sitting there, illuminated by red heat, on the threshold, ignoring me.  Then I decided that I wasn’t satisfied, I remember that I decided that, yes, I remember and I kept the jeans on and went outside clearing the corners, yes, I cleared the corners of the property, yes, I remember, cleared the corners of the entire perimeter and it was summer yes and wore nothing but jeans yes and I remember yes and I cleared the corners wearing nothing but jeans in the early morning before the rising of the sun yes and returned inside and unchambered the Glock and the Ruger and remembered that I was thirsty yes I remember that I remembered that I unchambered and remembered that I was thirsty and had a couple swallows of tap water and returned to bed yes returned to soft protection of a single thin cotton sheet over my nakedness in the summer in the morning before sun rise and the artificial breeze produced by a bedside fan yes and -

    passed out again so I don’t remember no I don’t remember what happened between the return to nakedness to the breeze but I remember yes I remember waking up before the alarm and seeing him under the coffee table.  Loafed.  And now, these days, whenever I see him sitting there illuminated softly in heat lamp redness at the threshold, not facing me and facing away and not regarding me and determined to just stay I just give his cookie jar a shake and he snaps out of whatever keeps him sitting illuminated and focused and I still have the Glock and the Ruger and an AR because I can and I have never again worn jeans without underwear, circumstances be damned.  Alright, buddy, you’re fireguard until 0400 H I say, yes, I always remember to say before I go to the bedroom to pass out.  No stripping these nights, too brass balls cold.  

I remember because he was like that this morning.  Sitting and focusing and unacknowledging yes I remember to get his attention acknowledgement with shaking the cookie jar as if I’m shaking dice in my palm about to toss on a momentous bet.  I remember.  Yes.  And lest I forget to remember I keep that dry erase board scrawled upon with left-handed writing.  I remember and feel sometimes and sometimes more than most times that any morning now before the sun rises and while he’s redly illuminated in heat lamp baskination at the threshold at the end of the hallway that I’m going to be the modern day Joseph K and I won’t remember no I won’t remember when the trial comes my way.