My Year of Rest and Relaxation

The LIRR wasn’t exactly celestial, but I wondered if I might be lucid dreaming.

Hallucinating is completely harmless. And it happens mostly to Asians. What, may I ask, is your ethnic background?”
“English, French, Swedish, German.”
“You’ll be fine.”

“Are you awake?” I pretended I wasn’t. I heard her get up and put her shoes back on, ticktock to the bathroom, blow her nose. She left without saying good-bye. I was relieved to be alone again.

I reheated my half-drunk second cup of coffee in the microwave.

the forgotten Klondike bar melting in my pocket.

CHRISTMAS DAY, around nightfall, I woke up <…> went out to get my fix of coffee.
<…>
The sidewalks were piled high with snow. A foot-wide pathway had been shoveled from the entrance of my building to the bodega.
<…>The Egyptian on duty gave me my coffees for free that night because the ATM had run out of cash.

“Do you even like me?”

“I’ll come for a while,” he agreed. “But there are other parties I’m already committed to. I’ll stay at yours for an hour and then I’ll have to leave,

I could picture my selfhood, my past, my psyche like a dump truck filled with trash.

I watched a lot of Indiana Jones. But I was still anxious. Trevor Trevor Trevor.