rdking.net

I have been a favored sleeper by nature and not by choice as some would suspect—who on occasion feel it necessary to verbally ascertain. I am elect in a prizeless manner; it is temper and not an accumulation of habit. Mostly a working project to a facet of my personality acting as a process of sorts, internal keypunch:   a response. I admit that few disruptions alarm me; it is easy to say so. Other than grisly dreams or errant clocks only the W. Hollywood sun can rouse me, the building whiteness in my room; a woman.

Yet these are not an administration of my wants. Feeling that it often finds me caught without reasons, without plausible needs, without the quick tongue of excusing grace, it makes great play for conflicts—and accusations begging silence or defense.

So it is a subjective remark to say that Mrs. Logan never learned the needs of men. It seems always subjective to remark. I feel it so. And is such with her except that she would not submit to something in that way. Our quarrels are in the syntax of events, never concerning objects. Which is just as well, and part of the charm to her house.

...for that reason, four is the oddest hour to me. It is rare to feel so close to stillness, so close to a city in a city of this size. To be able to see it and notice that it is only a stabilization of lack. One gets wary, or goes back to bed.

I spent four or five clauseless minutes wondering why I had awakened, marveling, making out the outlines of windows, furniture, figurines before my attention gathered on Mrs. Logan.

She was crying not weeping. Then sobbing to Santos who was trying to calm her down with his deep voice. Her breathing was short, audible in that way which normally continues for some time. I pulled on my pants to go down.

Bottnick had been drunk again. He was not a usual drunk, but extraordinary in versatility and surprise—a tram conductor who resided in moderate attacks of melancholy, of ensuing combustible demeanor.

He had come and gone—for the night lock we all have a key—but not before snapping the hands and feet off of Mr. Service. She heard Bottnick dancing on his way out and Service trying to get off the linoleum, his warning lights strobing the kitchen—Bottnick using the parts for castanets.

We sensed she would not quiet until his return, until she played it out; it was apparent there was little to do. Santos had to work in the morning but knew she would want him to lock Bottnick's things in her room. I realized he would agree, and that there would be no more figs on the breakfast menu. Other routines would change, the shower schedule too.

Turning, I could see his upper torso down the hall in his room. Service on the bed he never slept on. I wanted to know what went on in his machine head and his machine gut. What color the eyes saw now. What circuits felt malfunction in an insistent way.

Back upstairs I had a smoke in bed. Leaving the light on I spread a newspaper on my lap but the print felt dirty against my skin. I started thinking about this city of people, the nine million bedrooms with radio waves flush to the walls. I assumed some of them sleeping and some not asleep.