pixelated.me

somewhere just south of nowhere
near the park and a fountain and a pile of garbage waiting for its ride to the city dumps.

In there, some where, The hard floor was a shiny white something which made him think of a hospital waiting room.
It was the floor he'd wake up to in his shinny new but old apt.

The ceiling looked like the pockmarked face of a teenage Bukowski, "popcorned" was the term they so charmingly referred to it as.

It was a home, but not quite home. It lacked the little bits of memories that had filled his small avocado green living room on east 35th st or his unearned highrise apartment overlooking central park.

There'd been no great loves in this room.
No breathless "oh god's" to mask an "i love you" that's bashing to get out.
No snowy days spent in doors watching movies.
Just sex, good sex, fun sex, but..

...There'd been no arguments filled with bile and love
no promises,
no broken promises
no betrayals or reconciliations.
no hard hitting, core diving, conversations on a living room couch, no truths, no beautiful girls that would break his heart, on a beige living room couch, in fact
there was no couch here, just an old futon on the floor that didn't belong to him and didn't belong to the person that'd lent it to him.
Just an old futon that smelled of sex, and uneasy sleep, and strangers dreams.

His books and movies stood like soldiers against the wall, a cardboard box and a plastic shelf from his fridge were the extent of his coffee table,
He doesn't spend much time in this makeshift living room.
He wakes in the mornings and imagines a large wooden table that would welcome coffee stains and tea rings and nights of writing on its dark wood surface,

He wakes in the mornings and takes to the familiar confines of his music library and the people on his buddy list. To the list of movies or albums torrents he's left downloading overnight,
to the comfortable surroundings of the websites he reads, the blank "page" of a word document, the porn he knows is tucked away on his computer, that he'll rarely ever bother looking at.

To the half watched documentary on Bukowski that sits patiently paused for the last few days.

And his feet feel the cold shiny surface of that white floor in his bedroom,
and his feet walk to the living room, the slumped futon looking very much like an overnight guest asleep after a very heavy night of drinking, he opens the doors to the balcony, the tiny balcony that smells of dog piss when it rains heavily,
that overlooks the treetops and fountain and pile of trash,
He does this and thinks...this is home.
he does this and thinks...this is home?