Moving Shapes

There was some confusion in the room as I adjusted to this new piece of information. Inside I was still, but now the world was spinning. If I had been sober...were they all laughing at me? I felt a rising in me. I wasn't going to hurl, but I wasn't okay either. My eyes found Sarah. Her smile pulled her cheeks up towards her eyes, making her face look opalescent. She had always reminded me of the Disney version of Alice from Alice in Wonderland, but now her upturned cheeks (For a second I imagined crescents cradling water. Then I glanced around, behind the laughing faces, and saw that the oceanic walls had turned red. The bubbles were probably still bubbles, but to me they looked like blood cells, shaking with laughter as they glided towards the ceiling. The color flooded my vision, painted everything red.) reminded me of the frantic card men or the queen herself. For a second, I thought I saw a white rabbit, anthropomorphic and red.

I shook my head. No one else seemed startled. They were merely amused. I was still holding Dawn's hand. Sarah took my other hand and sat me down. I wanted to blame the alcohol on putting me in such a daze. Don was Dawn, so what? Sarah was saying something, which I lost in the music. Dawn had sat down on the other side of her. I fixated on her hand on Sarah's bare leg. Looking up, I found Sarah's eyes locked on mine. Her lips stopped moving. Then Dawn took Sarah's head in her hands and kissed her. I couldn't hear anything and my mouth was open as if I were trying to pop my ears. It felt like I had breathed in the frantic light and everything inside me had turned red. Nothing needed oxygen anymore and my organs died and my fingers and my brain too. I felt like I was floating and sinking at the same time.

Sarah turned to look at me again. I tried to kiss her, but she shook her head, took me by the hand, led me out of the club. As the three of us walked through the various chambers, clung to the translucent walls, and pushed past the one or two wallflowers, I ran my fingers along the cool surface. A strange thing happened. Strange things happen everyday. As I was trailing my fingers, I saw the wall turn blue behind me. It was as if a curtain was lifting. The dancers looked ghostly, transformed into mere moving parts of a writhing red or blue mass. I touched my fingers to my lips, and they were wet. I was glad to feel the night air as we emerged.

It wasn't quite night anymore. In maybe an hour, the city birds would start shrieking in the branches. Sarah was still looking at me as if she expected something. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to be reacting to. I looked at them for a moment and, when they didn't say anything, I started to shuffle off in the direction of our apartment.

"I'm going home."
"Dub, wait! Don't you think we should talk about this?"
"Talk about what? About...hmm? It's Saturday morning and I'm sleepy. What do you want to talk about? Quickly? I want to spread my dream wings-" I paused to laugh at myself, "before the birds spread theirs. I mean real ones."

I woke up in Moira's bed. Moira was next to me, which made the morning feel naked. Her bare arm was smooth and cool. Her apartment was incredibly white. I was surpised I hadn't noticed that before. I had an impulse to paint on the walls, perhaps something really small, moving shapes within a rectangular outline.