Acrid Accountability

A 1967 Smith Corona Classic 12 typewriter makes a very unique sound. Solitary. Individual. Every type bar seems to create its own specific statement on the page. Of course this is literally what it does but there’s more to the experience than just imparting ink to paper via a slamming metal slug. It’s difficult to explain.

Here’s something not nearly as difficult to explain: the doors on a 2004 Chevrolet Cavalier coupe also make a distinct sound. Solid. Heavy. Definite. This is especially true when your girlfriend - the mother of you child - drives said car to her place of employment, exits, slams the door (THUD!), and hops in the passenger seat of her coworker’s car. The coworker is also known as the man she’s seeing behind your back. You’re not supposed to know but the sound of slamming metal gives her game away. The car may be a few miles down the road but you can still hear it; you can still feel it. Even if you can no longer feel much else.

Never mind all that for the time being. You needn’t worry about the entire situation not coming back to you in vivid color - mostly mean red and jealous green. It’ll be back. In fact it won’t actually go anywhere. It’s not like the twelve pack of Miller Lite is going to solve the problem. But, hey. It’s worth a shot. Or a chug. Or whatever.

It shouldn’t feel like this. You know it damn well. Hell, you’re not exactly pure and innocent either. The truth hurts but at least it’s an equal opportunity abuser. Where were you last night? Not at home. You went to work like you said but then after? Exactly. In a just world you would simply both acknowledge the situation, perhaps laugh at the irony, and part ways peacefully. But the world isn’t just and dammit you need a scapegoat. You also need to work on your gaslighting so this seems to be a great chance to do so. So crack that first beer and get to sulking.

Alright. Hold up. You came here expecting me to talk in the first person. Obviously this is all about me. It’s my memory and my hurt and my shame and my shortcomings. I best fess up to that. So here we go: the last time I knew it was the last time.

Everything so far is exactly correct. I have nothing but 4K, hi def, Technicolor recollections of everything. Well, everything until I was five bottles deep into that twelve pack. At that point things get a bit…cloudy. Memories become dull. Certainty is tossed out the window. I guess that’s as good a place as any to pick up the action.

Here’s the scene: a very low-rent one bedroom apartment that is home to two adults, two toddlers, and a baby. The toddlers were with their grandma. The baby was with her aunt. You already know where mom was. And me? I was slouched, as deflated as a 90s anti-pot commercial actor, on a futon covered in stains of baby formula and red wine. My legs were going numb from the weight of the typewriter on my lap. It had earlier been firmly planted on a tray table but that was now laying in shards on the living room floor. Did it buckle from the weight of the machine? Did I destroy it in a fit of ill-conceived and misplaced anger? Did I trip over it last time I tried to make it to the bathroom? No clue. I also didn’t care. I had booze and typing paper within reach so I would get along just fine.

I glanced down. The paper was already imprinted with text. The letters were only just beginning to blur. Experience taught me I still had a good 48 more ounces before haze gave way to blackout. I only had 36 more ounces in front of me. Good for the writing, bad for my mind. I was able to make out one line that had something to do with a roaring tiger and Beefeater gin. (Sadly this page is lost to time, which is a hell of a shame because who wouldn’t want to read about a tiger wasted on dry martinis?) I shook my head and continued typing.

Another empty bottle appeared at the side of my typewriter. It looked so noble. Empty but still solid on the outside. I thought about working that into the prose but my drunk brain never told my fingers. Instead it sent a message to my eyes. Look at the clock. I did. The second hand stuttered forward. Each tick wasn’t really a tick, but rather more of a scoff. The clock knew everything. It was there for all the fights, all the lies. It was witness to drunken sex and drug-hazed conversations. And it was there when she left, fresh from the shower, dabbed with the perfume I bought her for our anniversary days before. It was all so cliche. The clock knew where she was going. And now it was staring at me with a face somehow both blank and guilty and accusing.

Me too, clock. Me. Fucking. Too.

Silently another bottle joined his comrade to the left of the Classic 12. Caught by surprise I could only stare in confusion. As I moved my fingers from the keys I realized my fingers hadn’t been on the keys at all. At least not since the line about the intoxicated wildlife. Judging by the small tangle of paper in front of the bottles my hands had been busy tearing the labels. I never recalled doing this prior though I have always been known to find novel ways to distract myself from feeling actual feelings. I could only nod and concede that tearing labels is a far better reaction to stress than popping the pills from the prescription bottle that most certainly did not have my name on it.

My phone buzzed. Much like my emotional stability, texting was in its infancy. but also much like my emotional stability she took advantage of it to use for her own ends. This time it was gibberish; a bunch of unrelated characters that, to my mind at least, amounted to an admission of guilt on her part. After blinking hard enough to overlap my eyelids I saw that it actually said that she had accidentally fallen asleep at a “friend’s house”. Meh. Same difference really.

I threw the phone somewhere over my shoulder.

It landed with a thud somewhere over my shoulder.

Then.

A key slid into the lock somewhere over my shoulder.

The sun was rising somewhere over my other shoulder.

(I have a lot of shoulders when I drink.)

The knob turned.

And now I’ll address YOU directly. There are some things you need to know.

I smelled the cologne before I saw you. It commingled with the remnants of weed smoked not too long before to present me with what, to this day, I still refer to as “acrid accountability”.

You moved with such intent and purpose that the bathroom door was open and closed before the front door latched. Honestly I would have been impressed if I didn’t know full well what a bee line for the bathroom after a night out meant.

The shower started. You got in. You washed the scent of him and sex off you.

But he still hung heavy in the air.

At this point I know I typed something. It I just dissociated for a while. Really, either is possible though the latter is more probable. Not that it matters since the sound of typewriter keys smacking paper was replaced in my ears by the rattling of my heart. It was more than just a beat. It was almost ragged. Tracking the rhythm was pointless anyway. My attention was inexplicably focused on the thought of how many individual droplets were hitting your skin. How many would it take to wash away your sin? Did you even consider it a sin? Did you not believe in God because doing do would mean having to own up to your indiscretion?

Or maybe I was just overthinking it. And maybe I still am.

The water ceased. Your repeated fumbling and muted swear words escaped under the bathroom door and out through the vents, letting your poorly hidden truth take up residence alongside us in the tiny apartment.

You opened the door.

You dashed to the bedroom.

You locked the door.

I pounded another two bottles of MGD.

At some point the morning came and along with it an unforgiving amount of sunbeams stabbing at my eyes and aggressively jabbing at the base of my skull.

And there you were sitting in the chair across from me, a mug of steaming coffee in your hand.

“Good morning, sleepy head.”

You smile.

I blink.

You smile even bigger as you raise your eyebrows.

Did I simply dream it all?

But then I smell it, just barely, mixed with the scent of Folgers: weed. With just a hint of residual Axe Body Spray.

You smile.

I collapse back into the couch. It seems much easier than staring reality in her bright blue eyes.