I did not expect to have written this much by now. Or anytime, really, but whatever. And yeah, this bit gets pretty serious towards the end, I guess.
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(Continued from last entry.)
'I think you're an idiot.'
'No, think about it,' said Alex. 'What else are we doing with our lives? You wake up at two in the afternoon and lounge around until it's time to work or watch Back to the Future again, then when you get home you lounge around and watch television until you fall asleep. I mean, it's not much of a life. You're not living, you're . . . SURVIVING. And all three of the rest of us are unemployed and living on welfare. Dave and Josh get through somehow, but me . . . if it weren't for the lesbians bailing me out I'd probably be living with my parents.'
The lesbians were a group of 20 or so straight women that lived in the same apartment block as Alex that she liked to call lesbians. They had big parties every weekend; the whole herd of them would flock periodically from apartment to apartment, drinking and making a quiet, focused kind of hubbub that was probably more annoying than would be a louder hubbub. Occasionally they invited Alex, or me, or a temporary boyfriend who had nice hair and a nice body and was ultimately discarded within a week. They were so straight that they were entering lesbianism from the other side.
They'd collectively paid her rent for her two months or so, a year back. Everytime she came to them with money to pay them back, they refused to take it, and eventually got so annoyed with her attempting to give them money and threatened that if she tried to give them money again, they just might take it. She'd never tried it ever since.
'Scissors, paper, rock,' I said. 'I win, we don't go, you win, we do your stupid road-trip.'
'What, all four of us in one game?'
'All four of us in one game,' I said.
'Alright,' said Dave. 'I like it. There's no truer democracy than Scissors, Paper, Rock, after all.'
'Scissors, paper, rock,' we all chanted, pumping our fists like retarded five year-olds. I put down a rock; every single one of the other three put down a paper.
'Best out of three,' I said.
'Alright,' said Dave, and we went again. I put down a rock. Everyone else put down paper.
'I think we win,' said Josh.
'You only won because you outplayed me,' I said. 'It's not like you're better than me or something.'
'Whatever, Mike,' said Josh. 'When are we going on your wack-ass roadtrip, Dave?'
'Four sounds like a good idea,' said Dave.
Alex looked at her pocketwatch. 'It's already a quarter to four.'
'Four in the morning, then. That's when you get off work, right, Mike?'
'Yeah . . .' I said uncertainly. 'Are you sure that's a good idea, though? I mean . . . four in the morning?'
'Okay, okay,' said Dave. 'We'll do Scissors, Paper, Rock. If I win, we go at four in the morning. If you win, we go whenever you wanna.'
'Fair enough,' I said, and we played again. I picked rock. Dave picked paper.
'Four in the morning it is, then,' he said. 'You'll be fine with that, right, Alex?'
'Yeah, sure,' said Alex.
'We'll pick you up after we pick up Mike from work, then. Cool?'
'Cool.'
'Cool.'
April 13, 2010 - Early Morning
'It's all cool,' assured the man pointing a gun at me and wearing a beanie over his face. 'It's all cool.'
'It's all cool?' I asked. I had my hands up, but it was possible that I could twitch my knee up and press the alarm without looking like I had epilepsy.
Possible.
The alarm itself was just a button that sent a message to the police station that the place was being robbed. The police station was halfway across town, so in order to even stop the man robbing the place, I'd have to engage him in a tea party or something.
'It's all cool,' assured the man once again. 'It's all cool.' Just hand over all the money from the cash register and we'll be cool.'
'There is no money in the cash register,' I said.
'What do you mean there is no money in the cash register?' the masked man demanded. He waved the gun threateningly, but there wasn't really any heart in; after all, there's nothing much more threatening than a gun.
'I mean there's no money in the cash register,' I said.
'Don't get smart with me,' he said.
'Sorry,' I said. 'It's just there's no money in the cash register.'
'Open the cash register,' he said. I opened the cash register. There was no money in it.
'There's no money in that cash register!' said the man in surprise.
'Yes,' I said. 'Yes, that's true.'
'Why is there no money in the cash register?' demanded the man.
'Every night, my boss comes and collects the money before my shift. And no-one's tried to sign in all night. Or morning, for that matter,' I said.
The man aimed his gun directly at my face and said, 'Give me your shoes.'
'What?'
'I said give me your shoes!' said the man. 'Give me your shoes or I'll shoot you in your stupid shoe-wearing face!'
I unlaced my shoes and handed them over. They were pretty shit shoes, to be honest. He looked at them scornfully. 'These are shit shoes!'
'Hey,' I said, 'at least I'm not stealing a pair of shoes.'
'If there was any money in the cash register, I wouldn't have to steal your stupid shoes,' he said.
'There is no money in the cash register,' I said.
'I know there's no money in the cash register, you bald-footed son of a bitch,' said the man. He aimed the gun at me again. 'Take off your shirt.'
I took off my shirt. It was my work shirt; an old, slightly faded black shirt with a small crown for Crown Hotel on the lapel. I couldn't see why he would want it. He stuffed the shirt in his pocket and held my shoes in his left hand as he brandished his gun at me.
'Take off your vest,' he said.
'I'm not wearing a vest,' I said.
'Yes you are.' He pointed to my undershirt.
'That's an undershirt,' I said.
'Well give me your damn undershirt, then.'
I took off my undershirt, leaving my chest bare to the slightly chilly night. It was just getting into Autumn, so it was cold, but not too cold. Quite nice, really.
I half expected the man to aim his gun at me again and tell me to give him my chest, but he didn't. He said, 'Take off your pants.'
'But they're my pants,' I said. 'I can't take off my pants.'
'Take off your pants or I'll shoot you.'
I took off my pants because if I didn't, he would shoot me. They were earthy-coloured, and drab, like the rest of the uniform. The whole thing didn't really fit the whole crown motif.
And now I was naked to the world apart from my underpants. He aimed the gun at me once more and said, 'Give me your underpants.'
'You've already got the rest of my clothes,' I said. 'Why do you need my underpants? I think I need my underpants more than you need my underpants.'
He shook around my clothes and shoes. 'You think this is gonna sell well? No way! But underpants? Whoo-ee!'
'Who the hell buys used underpants?' I asked.
'You'll be surprised who buys used underpants,' he said. 'You know bums?'
'Never met him.'
'Bums, moron! Homeless people! You'll be surprised the amount of money a bum will pay for used underpants.'
'What kind of bum has enough money to pay for used underpants?'
'The kind of bums that wants used underpants,' explained the man. 'That kind of bum.' He shook the gun around threateningly. 'Now give me your damn underpants.'
'What if I don't want to give you my damn underpants?' I asked.
'Then I'll shoot you,' he said. He shook the gun around to demonstrate that he knew how a gun worked, or he knew how to shoot, or something. Maybe he just liked shaking the damn thing.
He was so busy shaking the gun threateningly that he had forgotten he was only a metre or so away from me, and only came back into focus when I stole the gun from his hands. I aimed it directly at his face. He blanched.
'Give me your shoes,' I said. He tried to hand me back my shoes, but I waved them away. 'I want your shoes. My shoes are shit.'
He unlaced his shoes and gave them to me. They were marginally less shitty than mine.
And the whole bizarre thing began again. He handed over his shoes, then his shirt then his undershirt and finally his pants. I dressed quietly and quickly and soon had all his clothes on. He was down to his underpants, but he just put my shitty shoes and faded uniform on. We looked at each other for a moment, and I could see his eyes blinking through the holes he had cut in the beanie.
'Your undershirt's kind of itchy,' he said.
'I know,' I said. 'Your undershirt's nice.'
'Technically it's a vest,' he said.
'Oh, right. That must have been why you said "vest" when referring to my "undershirt".'
'Yeah,' he said. 'Yeah, that's why.'
There was a beep outside, then a figure came running through the doors. It was Dave, dressed in a wooly jumper and slack pants. He looked from me to the beanie-wearing to the gun, then shook his head.
'Come on, Mike,' he said. 'It's already past four. We've been waiting outside for five minutes.'
'That's true,' said Beanie. 'When I came in to rob the place, they were outside.'
'That was at the least seven minutes ago,' I said.
'Then we've been waiting outside for seven minutes!' cried Dave. 'Come on, Mike, hurry up.'
'Sorry,' I said. 'I'd been talking to this guy. Ok, I'll - hey! If you were outside when this guy came to rob the place, why didn't you stop him?'
'We just thought he was very excited about the prospect of staying at the hotel, or something,' said Dave.
'That's not true,' pointed out Beanie. 'When I came inside to rob the place, I waved the gun at them and said, "Don't fuck with me when I'm robbing the place".'
Dave hung his head. 'Sorry, Mike.'
'It's alright, just don't do it again,' I said. Stuffing the gun in my pocket, Dave and I began to walk out, leaving Beanie in the reception area, looking around aimlessly. I turned back for a moment. 'You can probably sit down and pretend you're me. The guy who's replacing me will be here in a few minutes, and honestly he probably won't notice. Just arrive here tomorrow at six o'clock at night and take my shift.'
'Okay,' said Beanie. 'I've never really had a job before, though. What do I do?'
I thought over my nightly tasks as receptionist. '. . . Nothing.'
'I can manage that, I think.'
'Just don't let any scum-suckers rob the place.'
'I won't let any scum-suckers rob the place,' promised Beanie.
'The cash register's empty, anyway, there'll be nothing to steal but your clothes. And what kind of scum-sucker steals a man's clothes?'
'The lowest kind of scum-sucker steals a man's clothes,' said Beanie.
'That's right.'
'Come on Mike, Josh is waiting,' said Dave.
We left. The Polonez was waiting outside, looking like an accident on wheels. I slid into the back seat, while Dave hopped in the driver's seat next to Josh.
'You picked up my luggage, right?' I said.
'We picked up your luggage, yeah,' said Josh. 'Why'd you bring so many condoms?'
Fuck. 'Because fuck you, Josh.'
'Thanks, but no thanks,' said Josh. Dave started up the car, and with a suspicious clunk we pulled out on to the dark street.
*
Scrawled across the front wall of Alex's apartment block was the word bitch in big red letters. The streetlights were still on and they conveniently illuminated the diatribe with gloomy, weak light as we pulled up in the old FSO Polonez. Dave had put on an obscure Finnish heavy metal band called Iso Anukselle - I didn't know what it meant in English; in all likeliness, it was probably something about dancing - a few minutes back, and now we were listening to a Finn girl singing, again, something probably about dancing.
'Someone's a bitch,' said Josh.
'I didn't know your mother lived here, man,' said Dave.
'Yeah, she moved out a few weeks ago,' said Josh. 'She's not feeling the place, though. She's thinking of moving again.'
'Oh?' I asked innocently. 'Where to?'
'Oh,' said Josh, 'just to a little place called up yours Dave.'
We high-fived.
The three of us got out of the car and walked down the smooth concrete pathway. Alex's apartment building was a tall, square, hideous thing that had square balconies and sharp corners and a flat roof. It had been designed by one of the top architects in the country, and it was one of the ugliest buildings in town.
As we got closer, I realised that it wasn't simply "bitch" but written above it was "Macy Flake is a giant". "Macy Flake is a giant bitch," with bitch in giant letters. Clever.
'Who's Macy Flake?' asked Josh.
'Some bitch.'
The whole apartment block had bizarre, intersecting staircases that seemed to be trying to make up for the monotony on the outside of the building by being the most complicated thing in the universe. The architect had got it all the wrong way around: monotony on the inside, interesting twists and turns on the outside. No one wants to walk into a big block of concrete and suddenly be in Wonderland. I guess no one wants to walk into a big block of concrete at all, really, but you get my point.
Scrawled on the walls inside was "Macy Flake is a giant bitch" again. More than twenty times. Macy Flake and her giant bitchiness confronted us in its full glory; the flickering hallway light illuminated the sentences running across the walls and up onto the ceiling, big streams of red paint dripping from the letters. Someone fucking hated Macy Flake.
'What kind of name is "Macy Flake," anyway?' I said.
'Sounds like a bitch name to me,' said Dave.
'Yeah,' agreed Josh. 'A giant one.'
'Just because it's written on the walls doesn't mean it's true,' I said.
'Why not?'
'Well let's say I wrote that Macy Flake was a real good person on the walls right now. Does that make Macy Flake a real good person?'
'No. Macy Flake is a giant bitch, not a real good person,' pointed out Josh. We continued on up through the staircase designed by M.S Escher. At one point we got stuck on some stairs going down and found ourself arriving back at ground floor, where the message of truth was still painted across the walls. We went up again, once again took the same staircase back down again, went up again, this time took a different one and arrived at number 7.
'Alex is at number five,' I said, 'so she should be right next to . . . this one . . .' Number five wasn't right next to number seven. Instead the number 12 was painted across the next door. Not in red paint or anything, like the message downstairs. It looked pretty official, with serifed black lettering edged by gold. Number 12 was definitely next to number seven.
'Number 12 is next to number seven,' pointed out Dave.
'That's retarded and I hate this stupid hotel,' said Josh.
I didn't remember this the last time I had been here. Number seven had definitely been next to number five, with number six on the other side of the hall. That was how hotels worked, right? 'I was here two days ago,' I said. 'Number seven was definitely next to number five, then.'
'Maybe they changed the numbers since then.'
'What, changed it so it went 5, 6, 12?'
'Maybe it's like . . . Arabic,' said Josh.
'No, I don't think that's it.' We walked down the hallway and up it again. Every number apart from number five was 12.
'We seem to have encountered a problem.'
Just then, there was a thump at the 12 in front of us. Like someone was knocking at the door. Like someone was knocking . . . on the inside of their door. Dave and Josh both nodded at me to answer it.
'Come on,' said Dave.
'We're on the outside of the door,' I pointed out.
'And? Don't be impolite. Answer the door, dude!'
I opened the door cautiously. A head slumped out and banged lightly on the floor.
It was Alex.
Shit, I thought, then realised I'd said that out loud. I kneeled down. She was completely unconscious, and when I opened her eyes they were bloodshot and red, like she'd been drinking. She was limp, and there was a quickly developing bruise on her forehead. Down her arms, there was long scratches that were bleeding, just a bit. But any bleeding is blood. I checked her fingernails out. Under them was a bit of blood. She'd . . . scratched her own arms? What?
Music was playing, I realised lastly. It was Paranoid Android, by Radiohead. I didn't know she listened to Radiohead.
'Shit,' said Dave.
'Shit,' said Josh.
'Help me pick her up,' I said. I picked up under her arms and they picked up her legs and we carried her into the room and on to her couch. Her room was messy. Messier than usual, that is. The chair and the coffee table were knocked over and the magazines spilled across the floor. Women's Day, and shit like that. It hadn't been this woman's day. There was a big crack across the east wall, too, and below it, her baseball bat. I knew it was her baseball bat because every time I came over she jokingly told me to get out of her apartment and threatened me with it. The whole joke didn't seem so funny anymore. There was a foul stench that wafted through the place, too, like shit. Exactly like shit, really. I followed the smell to the bathroom, where the toilet had overflowed and thick, brown water spread across the bathroom floor.
Well, that would probably explain the shit smell.
So . . . signs of a struggle, toilet overflowing, Alex knocked out and scratched . . . by herself. Someone had crawled up through her toilet, she'd fought him off, then . . . what? Decided to scratch herself?
I felt tired, and stupid. This whole thing was a retarded idea. I went out to tell Dave and Josh. They were sitting on the couch next to Alex, staring at nothing. I looked up at the clock on the wall. 4:40 AM. It was too damn late, and not one of us looked like we could drive.
'I think we should stay here for the night,' I said. 'We'll take shifts watching her. Obviously something's happened here.'
'Maybe it was Macy Flake,' said Dave, and we all laughed, not because it was particularly funny, but because it was something we could laugh at.
'I like that idea,' said Josh. 'We'll stay here for the night.'
'Yeah,' said Dave. 'That's a nice idea.'
And I couldn't fail but notice that neither of them had mentioned the road trip at all. Maybe we weren't going on the stupid thing after all. Personally, I couldn't care less either way. Work graveyard shift at a hotel, take a road trip to the centre of Australia: it was all the same in the end.
Well, kind of.
We had enough energy to drag out a few mattresses and sheets and lie down on them. It was terribly haphazard. 'I'll take first shift watching her,' I suggested. 'After all, I am the one with the retarded sleeping schedule. I'm used to being up around now.'
'I'll take second,' said Josh and Dave at the same time. They Scissor, Paper, Rock-ed it. Dave won, and decided to take the third shift, the one he hadn't wanted to take in the first place.
'I'll wake you up when my shift's over,' I said to Josh. Both of them rolled over on their mattresses and pulled their sheets over them.
When I was sure they were asleep, I locked the door with every lock it had, closed the windows and locked them, and drew the curtains shut, so it was just the four of us, safe in a little world outside of the big, scary one. I grabbed the baseball bat and held it limp in my hands, and slumped on the couch next to Alex. I felt like a knight guarding over a sleeping princess, except the princess was a girl covered with scratches with slight body image issues, and the knight was a guy who didn't have armour, didn't have a sword but did have a baseball bat, was 5"10 and skinny and was scared out of his mind. So not really like a knight at all, I guess.
I tried to ponder over the question of the 12s, and the Macy Flake shit, and the whole thing, but that didn't work, so I tried going over each one individually, and managed to be confused and bewildered about each one individually. At some point I realised we hadn't organised when the shifts would start and end, and soon after it was 6:40 and the sun was rising. I watched it out the window, lighting up the world, making it seem a little bit safer. My shift was probably over, so I shook Josh awake and collapsed into my own mattress. The last thing I remembered seeing before falling asleep was the crack running across the wall where Alex had beaten the wall with a baseball bat for unfathomable reasons.
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