These are not stories.

Pull off the filter. Let everything soak right through. You are not who you think you are. This is not the train you’re supposed to board. So don’t fucking get on cos you’ll end up going the wrong way. And which way is right? It’s always gonna be the way you choose not to go. You’re on the wrong side of the track, Tony. Wake up, Tony. The kids are screaming. The bass is thumping. Wake the fuck up, Tony!

And Tony wakes up covered in newspapers, lying on a bench in Madison Square Park. One minute he was eating McNuggets, sipping Jameson from a shitty plastic flask, and the next minute he’s waking up shivering on a bench at two in the morning. It’s not even a cold night out. There were thunderstorms earlier. But it was hot and muggy all night for many months, for what felt like years. The bench was burning grill marks into Tony’s back. How long had he been sleeping here?

I remember the taste of her skin. It was yesterday. We slept on the futon and thought about what we were going to do ten years from now.

You’re silly, I told her. She didn’t see the humor in my comment and she got very quiet. I didn’t realize it so I just kept talking about how I wanted to die alone when I was old and how my father told me I would amount to nothing when I grew up. And here I was.

Tony didn’t know what he wanted to be when he grew up. He knew he didn’t want to sit around and blindly listen to young kids babble on about how their mothers didn’t want them to be fitted for clothing by other children who had no concept of money or adult responsibilities. It didn’t matter all that much to Tony. He just wanted a good fucking night’s rest. Sometimes you gotta sleep outside to get the best sleep. In your own filth. In your neighbor’s filth. Does he have the patience to deal with the noise? He’s not sure, but he pretends that he does. What else can he do? He’s tried to pay attention to the world but the world has forgotten about him and the things he needs to get through his life. Why is he any worse off than the motherfucker who almost punched him in the face while he was walking down the street minding his own fucking business?

The McNuggets were delicious. He wiped the sleep from his eyes and the drool from his lips. He wanted more McNuggets. But he had no money left.

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