On my last day of work I said to work, Today is my last day. The boss just laughed and said, It’s best to get off a sinking ship. I immediately took on the unemployment and cashed the checks the credit card sent. I went home and took some headache pills. I laid in the bed for a good long while.

I endured opening and closing of drawers, frequent sucking of teeth, stomping of feet, sighing and so on. This woman stood in the doorway waiting for me to stir, except I had no way to say I just wanted to lay still for awhile until I felt better. I thought it might go without saying. Could I not go on forever, this thing ignorant to hearts, without saying? I could not and eventually a quiet closing of the front door.

It was only a few short laps around the apartment when I stirred. I was a hinge swinging out of one empty space into another. I’d have a chair in my hand and set it against an opposite wall. I’d pick up the empty chair and then set it back against the wall where I first removed it. This behavior advanced. I began moving all of a room’s furniture clockwise until in four moves the furniture ended up against the wall where it began. Soon the entire apartment moved in circles. Each room became the next room and then the next room until I became this thing moving furniture clockwise through rooms turning clockwise in the apartment. If for no other reason than to sweep up this woman’s black hair after the moving or furniture and rooms.

It became difficult to tell if it was evening at all. Sometimes it was just morning being dark. There was a radiator hiss or spit in every room of this apartment. The radiator in the living room missing a steam release valve when not present let steam and water shoot across the room. The radiator in the kitchen that did not work but only panged. The radiator in the bathroom without a steam release valve and shot water out but also panged. The radiator in the office with all working parts but dripped continuously into a bread pan. The radiator in the bedroom that worked too well but made a percolating sound on top of the hissing and spitting and banging and knocking. Why this was allowed to go on or why these radiators continued to act this way I do not know. I did not bother the landlord. The landlord had said, and I believed, You’re an ideal tenant.

Who also heard the landlord say, You’re an ideal tenant, was the super in the building.

He was an old man always coughing and hacking. He smoked cigarettes on the fire escape or in the front yard sitting in a folding chair I watched him pull from the garbage. He always made remarks regarding the weather: warm today, dang hot today, supposed to be dang hot tomorrow, supposed to cool down they say, might rain, they say it’s gonna rain. There was nothing other to the super than the weather. This old coughing barometer that smoked and watched passers by.

I lived on the third floor. The name sometimes called out to a barking German Shepherd was, Rocky. I kept a lantern burning in the room adjacent to the office. Not having any windows it was the darkest room. Reluctant to call it the dining room, it was without dining room furniture. What else was sometimes I stayed on my back too long and endured indigestion. Mostly it was difficult work keeping the German Shepherd quiet.

My condition improved. Shadows of leaves whipped in the window glass. The window shades rocked out and back against the sill. A rectangular piece of glass went missing from the stained-glass window above the bed, and the stack of books over the missing glass in a did little to block out the sounds of pigeons or salt trucks rumbling past to put down their medicine.

I made short trips in the car. I drove to the grocery store across the street. I drove to the bank around the block. I drove to the park. The park wasn’t as close as the grocer or the bank, but it was not far. Or it may have been just as far in a different direction. A different part of town. What I liked to do in the park was park next to the baseball field and put a leg out of the car window. I’d roll my pant leg up. There was never a game going.

I met most of the tenants in my building. The hairdresser who cut hair in the city and brought me egg rolls from a deep freezer in the back of her shop. Another tenant who owned the barking German Shepherd and repaired dog tag machines at pet stores around the city. Another a lady who cut off the stamps from controversial letters of historical value and believed the stamps to be worth some money. Another a lady who had a bird that shit all over everything in the house and on her shoulders and in her hair and had a dog she often dyed purple to match the color of her favorite sweaters. Another a lady downstairs who was never home and had the same last name on her mailbox as a famous car dealer in the city. Another a young lady who woke up early sometimes screaming for everyone to wake up. Another a young boy who screamed over and over that he didn’t want to watch a movie. Another a man that threw dynamite off his balcony. Another a lady with two small dogs that shit in the front and back yard. Another a lady who worked at the museum and had two ferocious dogs she regretted having according to a certain look she gave when they went to barking. Another a man with one ferocious dog that always said he couldn’t wait to get out of the city. Another the super who often told me about the horrible accidents in the intersection in front of the apartment building when not describing the weather.

In the evenings there was a tavern across the street where patrons screamed like dying when their team was either winning or losing on the TV. The men seemed to me the kind that come out of sleep at times entirely beaten in cities that sound like Tuscaloosa or Decatur. The women all seemed to me the kind that painted rooms before ever having lived in them. I often thought to attend. I imagined stepping out long enough to wake up in the morning to two piles of clothes. I imagined sitting at the end or the bar, after having slept with all the willing women, saying to myself, I could have been something.

The hairdresser would sometimes leave for me her hair dryer.

At the end of summer I took a phone call from the credit cards. I asked the credit card lady, Are you from Alabama? and she said, No Pennsylvania. She didn’t sound it, or she may have been funning, but she sounded like this woman. I immediately took some headache pills for a nap. I took more pills in order to nap. This is all I could think to do for three days, and after three days of this carrying on I passed away.

I woke up to the the sound of jackhammers.

Two young boys jackhammering away at the fire escapes and balconies behind the apartment building. They had crow bars and iron poles. They pried and struck the concrete and twisted the steel frame of the escape. I watched them kick out the concrete using the heels of their boots or with broken pieces of other concrete. Is what you are about to do safe, I said. Too late, he said and showed me his arm. It was scraped up good and his shirt sleeve had a rip at the hem. Already fell, he said.

The boys never returned with their jackhammer, and I’ve considered the boy with the scraped up arm and I are not so wildly different. Except the older I am the worse it is and feels, and nobody ever promises you your life is going to be important. You’ll never be as good as anyone expects. You may be strong, but you aren’t that strong. I should have bent their ears. Let them have it. Let me tell you something. I have observed so much pattern of movement over time.

There are people in the office responsible for blood. Takers. Testers. Cleaners. They man a phone line 37HELP. They take calls and say, “Everything is fine. Everything is okay.” They take calls and notes and run out with a sulfate slurry. Blood on floor. Blood-borne blood. Toilets plumb full of blood. Pathogens.

Devices ticking together and in opposite time.

One of us is always fielding calls from the media and saying into the telephone, “I can’t answer that.” He has said to me, in confidence, “Wake up in a hotel room with your finger pointed at Escort Services. Boys that’s rock bottom.” He has asked a few times if I know anyone looking to get married. Says it is the reason he has a hard time standing too long. Says he’s suing his friend but the Oxycontin helps the pain. Says the thing about his left leg is you could take a need and run it straight through and he wouldn’t know no difference. The older he gets the worse it is and feels.

Some say how bad would that be and can you believe that.

A considerable amount of time can be spent anticipating devices ticking together.Blood in the office is often referred to as bio.

A man in the office friend to the man always fielding calls from the media says, “You can’t make somebody love you if they don’t want to.” Says he moved from Miami for the seasons. Good time Texas. Good time Arkansas. Would not be caught dead in Texas. Says, “Oh no the coffee isn’t ready. Story of my life.” Puts back the empty pot and says, “Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on darling.”

Note left behind from a blood-taker having run out after taking a call: Tuesday AM vomit. Normal stool. Appetite. Tuesday PM no appetite. No BM. Blood in vomit. Hospital. Wednesday AM appetite. Bloody loose stool. 8:00 AM Metronidazole. Half food. 10:00 AM Sucralfate. 6:00 PM Sucralfate slurry. Half food. No bowel. 8:00 PM Metronidazole. Sleep in bed. 6:00 AM Metronidazole. Soft stool. Dark red mass. 6:00 Metronidazole. Half food. No stool. 8:00 Sucralfate slurry. Half food.

No. Believe me. There is a body inside me.

They say if you want to be happy you have to be honest.

I say if you want to be happy you have to be honest, too.

I have failed to qualify for hardship status.

I have been dismissed from jury duty having never bathed a child.

I had sex with a woman in the office with four children refers to the eighties as a lost decade.

I had sex with a woman in the office deaf in her right hear so I stayed to her left.

I had sex with a woman in the office used to be a sharp shooter in the military. This woman kept on her nightstand a pair of needle-nose pliers, juror badge, perfume, coin jar, makeup, dollar bill bound in fishing wire, sinkers. Said her ideal man would have a job to protect the President. Said her sister worked at the Allegheny General Hospital. Said she grew up around animals the better part of her life.

I tear half the office apart. I put my boot in the wall. I shoot holes in the ceiling. Punch through the paneling. I sit in the dark of the kitchen and do not turn on lights. The office watches from the doorway. We advance into night. The coffee maker glowing off its orange light. All of the office dark. All these teeth marks on these forks. No one is coming for me.

A man in the office says it gets hot like this and the black boys like to take off they shirts.

A woman in the office cannot believe there are two fried options in the cafeteria today.

This is a story about people in an office setting responsible for blood. Takers. Testers. Cleaners. They answer telephone calls mostly. They say everything is fine, everything is okay, and can you believe that. They take notes and notes and run out. Dialogue… “I grew up around animals the better part of my life [man].” “You can’t make someone love you if they don’t want to [man].” “Oh no the coffee isn’t ready. Story of my life [also man].” “I cannot believe there are two fried options in the cafeteria today. No. Believe me [woman].” Blood in the office is often referred to as bio.

Blood on floor. Blood-borne blood. Toilets plumb full of blood. Pathogens.

My best friend is a religious man. He doesn’t live here. I stay at the Alamanda, and he stays at the Birdsong. I can see his window from mine.

We take the bus to work in the mornings and sit with Mexican ladies who watch us from the corners of their eyes. My friend is not much for conversation, though he’s set on making good with one of them. They dress in maid uniforms. They wear pantyhose with open-toed shoes and sleep when they are not watching us.

We move stumps for a thin-lipped tyrant with property out of town. An electrician. She keeps chords and fuse box casings in the back of her truck. We can hear that racket going on when she’s miles down the road. We always know when she’s close. She has said to us more than once, “You boys are money in the bank.” She does it with a belly laugh and almost always seems to separate her jaw. I’ve had bosses tell me before, “Shape up or ship out.” I am not certain which is more productive.

I’ve been trying my luck at the OTB. My best friend, the religious man, does not gamble. He keeps his money in his shoe. I have no problem pushing my money through the window. Usually it’s no luck though, just heavy waits. When the numbers come in my friend almost always says, “We really learned something.”

He is concerned for my moral map. He says I haven’t one. He says, “You are completely without a moral map.” I want to hit it big. If I could win a little every now and then I’d have a haircut, shave my face, and pay one of those Mexican ladies to fold brown paper sacks and stuff them under my kitchen sink with other paper sacks though this is not what I’d pay her for.

When it rains we do not work. We have a disagreement in regards to the Earth. I argue mud is for easy digging. He argues the digging is slow. But on rainy days, the thin-lipped tyrant is always hungover and doesn’t want to see our faces. She gives us a ride into town. She drops us off underneath the bank clock and says that thing she says and I say, “Thus always to tyrants,” as she pulls away.

I almost always take my money to the OTB. My friend almost always goes to the doctor. When he comes out of there he seems happy enough. Once when I asked him what for he said it was personal. Just then my numbers came in and I said, “Saints alive.”

He said, “Jesus wept.”

I think he has a disease. I’m almost certain he has a disease.

He has only ever told me two stories. One, he was married before. He and his wife gutted a utility van and made room for a couch and a stove. They were going to drive to Alaska and sell cooked meals out of the back. She was going to sing organizing songs. The other story, as I remember, involved his children. During thunderstorms they would sit on the porch and sing what they knew. He’d tell them if it thundered then God didn’t like what they were singing.

We can both agree the Earth is unforgiving.

There are nights I fall asleep on the couch and make a pistol at my friend through the window. He is always moving furniture around. He is a hinge, swinging out of one empty space and into another. And he might have a disease, counting to himself the money in his shoe and I in mind wonder if I have something else to be hopeless for more than hope.