Hungry

You're awakened from your nap by someone asking, “Are you hungry?” You fell asleep somewhere else entirely.

           “Are you hungry?” I got me a headache. I's tries to get up, but I falls me down. Damn, my head hurts, motherfucker. “Or maybe you'd like some water, coffee, or perhaps some aspirin?” I's try to speak, but this bitch don't understand drunkage. “Let's try this again, are you hungry?” I feels my stomach. Feels like I's goin' puke, so I shake my head. “Would you like water?” I think about that. Maybes water'll clear me fucked up head. So, I nod yes. Where the fucked I wind up this time? Look around and all I's see is fuzzy white. Fuzz is from drinking. I'm hungover, but my girlfriend'd be yelling at me and telling me to get the fuck up, not offering me water and shit. Wait, feels like I'm in a bed. Weird. Who would put me in a bed? Not Nancy, my girlfriend. Then, the woman puts a small table on my bed, like breakfast in bed, and gives me water. I gotta do the five senses thing like what can I smell and shit. Ammonia. Smells like ammonia. Why would anyone clean our shithole house? Wait, I must not be home. Home, you dumbbass. Of course you ain't home. Is this the pscho ward again, then? Where are the other looneys, drunks, and people high on drugs. Damn my head hurts. Woman comes back with the water and asks if I want aspirin again. My heads killing me so I nod and she puts on gloves and fetches aspirin. Am I in a hospital? Cirrhosis? Stomach pump? Narcan? What the fuck's going on? 

           So, after drinking water and taking two white pills, I ask, Who is you? And the woman says, “I'm Barbara and I'm a nurse.” So, I ask Nurse. Where is I? She smiles and answers, “You're at Northwest Hospital on Walnut Street.” She then tells me the date, time, city, all the usual shit my drunk ass can't remember.  I then ask her Is this the nut house? She smiles tells me this ain't the psychiatric ward, but a long term care facility for people with my problem. Problem? What problem? “Alcohol abuse”. Then, this be a half way house? “Not exactly. It's a long-term care facility, so if anything breaks, we fix it and you don't have to. Where's Nancy? I ask. The nurse tells me Nancy has requested some time away from me. Bitch.

           Then, the SOBER thing starts happening. You know, Son-of-a-bitch, everything's real. My liver starts paining again, but the headache starts to go away. It still smells of ammonia. I wonder if I's be the only one in this long care place. Shit. So, I ask and, what's her name tells me there are other people in this here place, but they've found we's fight if we's put in same room, which ain't good. But, I listen and I just hear meep. Meep, meep, meep, meep, in 3/8 time. Damn. Startin' to sober up sucks. So, I ask, what's her name, “Hey, what's your name. . . “ She takes a deep breath and reminds me her name is Barbara. Think Barbara Streisand, maybe that'll keep it in my fucked up head. What's that meep meep sound? 

           “That's your heart. We're monitoring your organs to make sure you stay healthy and sober.” So, then I starts to think about it. None of this makes any goddamn sense. Maybe these be aliens that came and abducted me when I was drinking and they're performing experiments on me so they can find out how to do bioterrorism against my family. Or, maybe everything on Earth. Or maybe the Chinese took over America and their doing bioengineering to spread communism everywhere. Fuck 'nam. Fuck China. What's her name doesn't look Chinese. 

           Or maybe motherfucking Uncle Sam is collecting my DNA and putting one of those things they put under dog skin to make it so people can find their lost dogs or cats. Maybe this ain't no hospital at all, but a secret laboratory. I look around. There's white walls, white sheet covers, white lights. Everything's white. Wait, if everything's white, maybe this be Heaven. Me? In Heaven? Don't make no sense. I'd be burnin' up in Hell if I died. That's just where I'd be's. 

           She came back with fresh underswear. Did I shit myself? I still smell ammonia. So, I's tries asking her all this shit in me's head at once: You be Chinese, alien, abduct me, communist, Heaven? And the woman paused, confused, and said, “I'm Barbara”. So, I say, You be Chinese Communist, Barbara?. And she breathes deep and says, “No, I'm American.” 

           So, see, I caught her. She's wrong and I's tell her, See, you no Barbara, you American. She sighs and says, “I'm Barbara and I'm an American”. Maybe she got Multi-personality disorder or something. 

           Then, I tell her about the monkeys in the room. They're crawling on the wall and monkey's eat bananas, humans, and human's bananas. So, I start screaming, curl into a ball under the covers because maybe if I'm under the covers, the monkeys will ignore me. 

           “What's wrong?” what's her name asks.

           And I tell her about the monkeys on the wall that want to eat me. She says she doesn't see any monkeys and this be the start of DT. Maybe that's the name of the head monkey, DT? Wbat's DT going to do to me? I ask. She pauses and says some shit about hallucinations and asks if I be taken other things like LSD. Hell, I ain't remember nothing about no LSD, but I be passed out and maybe somebody be slipping me a mickey. Like the monkeys. Maybe the monkeys but a mickey in my drink so they could rape me. So I tell the nurse, “Monkey be mickey” and what's her name pauses. Why for she pause and look stupid after all the shit I say. Then she she says, “No, Mickey is a mouse from Walt Disney”. 

           She don't understand shit. So, I try again, No, monkey put mickey in drink. No mouse. MDMA E. Monkey. She asks if I've been taking ecstacy and I tells her the monkeys be putting MDMA in my drinks. She smiles and agrees me like mommy says, whatever, world is flat. Who gives a fuck? Then, I think why person put E in drink and I tell her monkeys be rapping me. I need rape kit. What if I be pregnant. She smiles and says, “Men can't get pregnant. You're not pregnant. You're hung over”. Then, monkeys metamorphasis into aardvarks and thinks me made of ants. And nurse becomes mammagram machine. Motherfucker.