Free When Everything Feels like the Movies by Raziel Reid Page A

sat on the edge of my bed, listening to the floorboards creak as Ray walked to the bathroom. If I had really strained myself, I probably could’ve heard him scratching his balls. Then, more creaking as he walked back to the living room, rocking the floor as he sat down on the couch. He turned the volume on the TV so high that I could hear all the bad jokes on SNL .
    I ignored Stoned Hairspray, who was trying to get me to pet her, grabbed Breakfast at Tiffany’s off my bookshelf, and opened it to the back page where I kept a razor blade tucked behind the dust jacket. Angela gave it to me; she carried razors in her clutch like they were cherry ChapSticks. I never went too deep—I was too vain. I just dragged the blade down my forearm, pulling the tiny blonde hairs, then across my wrist, digging for blood diamonds.
    I fell asleep on Stoned, who was used to being my pillow. I think she knew how much I needed her. She was the only one who didn’t sell stories about me, and even if it was just because she couldn’t talk, I loved her for it. She let me cry into her fur, and when I woke up, she was still wet, as if I had kept crying in my sleep.
    I picked a glob of blood out of my nose. My face was swollen, and it was kind of hard to breathe, but I didn’t miss my sense of smell because I generally had to throw bottles of perfume against the cement walls just to get rid of the basement’s musty odour, and because I liked to pretend the walls were my personal assistants.
    I tried to cover the bruising on my nose with makeup, but it was still obvious. I kept staring at my face in the mirror. There was something about black and blue that made me feel like, well, such a man. It was a whole new role for me to play.
    I didn’t want to face everyone upstairs. I could smell the French toast my mom was making. Every once in a while, she decided to be domestic, but it never worked out; she always burned something or gave someone food poisoning. The thing with my family was that we always seemed the most abnormal when we were doing the normal things.
    I put on my biggest pair of Jackie O sunglasses and escaped through the window, texting Angela to meet me at the Day-n-Nite. When I got there, I sat in the back booth waiting for her. I kept my glasses on. I was so famous I had to go incognito.
    Brooke came over, but I didn’t order anything, I didn’t have any money. She brought me a cup of coffee anyway. Brooke could be good like that sometimes. I always wondered about her name. She just didn’t look like a Brooke. You never think a Brooke is going to be some fatty whose neck folds remind you of a vagina. You don’t think of a fifty-year-old waitress who looks like she’s never been to the dentist. You think of a Brooke as some blonde bitch in L.A. with perky tits and a phony personality, someone with a white dog named Snowball and a husband who buys her jewellery every time he cheats on her. Someone living the dream life.
    Angela was late again, so I looked out of the window at the smoke billowing over the mine. I caught a trucker staring at me through the reflection. He sat at the counter, and I turned to look at him. He smiled, chewing a burger with his mouth open. He wore a hat and a long-sleeved flannel shirt that looked like it had never been washed. Typical Day-n-Nite trucker. He stared at me, and I let him. I don’t know if he thought I was a boy or a girl or if he even cared. I slowly took off my sunglasses and stared back into his beady eyes, looking him up and down, licking my lips. His smile got so big that I could see his cavities. He was practically panting. I started thinking about some porno my mom caught me jerking off to once, one with a perverted truck driver and some dazed and confused hitchhiker. My pants got tighter, and I felt so disgusted with myself that you’d think I’d eaten my mom’s French toast. The trucker’s smile got even bigger as he poked his tongue in his cheek, and his hands disappeared