Some Phantom Called Whitney in Houston August 24, 2010
Someone was screaming to me in my sleep. A woman from the empty side of my bed. She was there in a veil of my own fear. She confronted my thoughts. She asked if I was the one with blood on my feet. I told her there was a plan. She pressed on the blood, but I’m clean and she knew it.
Fresh air, I said. Yea, that’ll fix it. Even stale air. So I went outside and realized my car was not there. Then, before I could figure it out, Abbie drunk drove my car into my driveway. “But you’re supposed to be in Houston…why do you have my car?” Hiccup, she seemed to say and stumbled out into the dark yard, green streaks highlighted her hair from 2 seasons too late festive lights. Beep Beep, as she remotely locked the doors to my foreign automobile. Eh Eh Eh Ehrrrrrrmmmm, it started again, but with no driver, nor passengers. The car began rolling down the street, lightless and lifeless. I sleepily looked at Abbie’s drunken, limp body barely standing there and instantly became drunk myself.
After some rousing, we instinctively chased after my car, trying to open the locked doors to stop the villain/vagueity. To our advantage, it did seem to be rolling very slowly down on my street, like a hurricane. Luckily, it’s path mapped a vacant home as the destination, assuming it’s course would not shimmy.
While we were banging like banshees on my car windows, I saw a white guy moving in the bushes. I called out his lack of aid, in a rather insulting O’Hara-like fashion. “WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU, WHAT KIND OF ASSHOLE, WHY WOULD YOU STAND THERE AND WATCH US STRUGGLE.” I grabbed a cinder block and attempted to smash a window, but it bounced back and hit me in the face. By the light of his smart phone, I could see he was naked. He simply replied, “I’m going back inside. So should you.” His words were voodoo because in the next moment, I thought to myself “Why is Abbie IN the backseat?” And then, “Why am I in the passengers seat of my own car?”
The sobering thought: We were no longer in my city. We were in the South. The oily, wealthy, bitchy part of the South. Someone or something was driving my car. It took me a few red lights ran to realize it was a someone and something in cahoots performing this scary operation. It was something from within Abbie. Once realized, I urged her to crash this demon vehicle Now. She said she tried and she could not. She cried to me and I could feel the uncontrolled terror in her voice, then in mine. I said CRASH AND BURN THIS BITCH. Abbie disappeared. I was alone, then suddenly in the drivers seat with zero control of my mind and motor functions. I could feel one strand of courage to end the nightmare: crashing, burning, and walking away- killing this daunting, hunting thing that sang so loud and annoyingly. But something called my bluff. The smokers voice from before. The loud, clearly feminine & forceful voice that rose me from my sleep initially. She said I could not and would not do it. So I did. and I died. My eulogy began, “I wanna dance with somebody…”