There are now three flyers on the fridge at my office: Bad Movie Night, My Sucky Valentine, and The Ten Commandments. They won't make a difference, but I put them there anyway.

5:01pm

Before I got on the train Wednesday morning I could tell from the outside that it was mostly empty, yet when I got on there was someone blocking the door. That's never a good sign, and in this case it was one of three dererlicts. The net result was that they were very much aware of my presence, especially as I walked through them to my usual seat. As soon as I settled in, one of them sat down in the seat next to me. I made a show of taking off my headphones, which I like to think are a sign that I don't want to talk. Never works, though.

The fellow resembled the title character from Metallica's "Enter Sandman" video, and had that wonderful eight-in-the-morning-booze smell about him. He said he really liked my hair. I nodded and smiled in thanks. Not good enough: he asked where I had it done. What the fuck? What, he's going to get a squid of his own? I told him that I got it done in Oakland. He then asked my name, and I told him that I didn't want to talk anymore. Direct signs like that usually work better, and did in this case as well. Thankfully, he went away.

Though I had my headphones on, I listened to them talk, just to be on the safe side. They didn't say anything more about me, though ten minutes or so later I heard the Sandman telling "woman who turns out to really be a man!" story. As near as I can tell, it had nothing to do with me, nor had it been inspired by me at all. Yay for passing at the right times.

Not that it isn't a pain in the ass sometimes, and I never thought that life as female would be easy—I just knew it was what I needed to do, period. And being parsed as female means being treated as female.

Like later that same evening after work. Phoebe's tire was going flat again, and I hobbled her to the gas station at Noriega and 44th to reinflate it before heading into the Mission for rehearsal. As I was filling the tire, a man in a car pulled up behind me, waiting to use the air pump. Fine, that's what it's there for, no problem. He got out of his car and stood a couple feet away, watching, with a little smile on his face. I looked up at him and he said: just waiting for you to be done. I replied: just wondering why you were hovering there. Which was my passive-aggressive (or possibly just passive) way of telling him to stand the hell back. Realizing that not only was there a woman attempting to do a man's job but that she's was slowing things up for him as well, he crouched down and pretty much took over. Of course, he had the same problem I did: it wouldn't fill past twenty-nine whatzits, and the recommended pressure was fourty-four whatzits. He told me it had something to do with the rubber not reaching the rim, or something. It was then that I realized that he knew as much about it as I did, but he was the man fulfilling his manly duty. I thanked him and drove off to the Kragen at Taraval and 32nd.

There, I got some of the magical spare-tire-in-a-can goo. The fellow behind the counter was very helpful and told me everything I needed to know. I put the goo into the tire and drove to the Dark Room. Seemed to be doing okay. Whew.

Due to extreme underattendance, rehearsal was cancelled. Since Meliza was there and I've gotten into the habit of giving her rides home anyway, I gave Meliza ride home. (We talked for a while outside her place, as is the other habit. It's so weird, the things that have gone down in the loops I'm out of. My own fall from grace is looking increasingly minor.) I headed back to the Dark Room to join in the Scrabble game, yet another habit, this one being what we do when rehearsal is cancelled. As I was turning the corner from 18th onto Mission, I heard a noise that sounded like an open toolbox falling off my roof. There hadn't been an open toolbox on my roof, nor have I actually heard that precise sound, but it's what I imagine it would sound like. I parked a few doors down from the Dark Room, and as I was getting out Phoebe a passing hipster told me that my back rear tire looked flat. Ah. That would explain the sound, and I was very glad that I was able to drive relatively slowly and not hunt far for a spot.

One of the few other castmembers in attendance, Andy, offered to put on the spare tire. It's something I can do, but didn't particularly want to, and his tone was one of just being a friendly sort. So I took him up on the offer. Certainly went a lot faster than had I tried to do it. The problem also became glaringly obvious: a screw.

This morning I drove back to the Kragen on Taraval to get one of the repair kits I'd seen the night before, specifically for this sort of thing. According to the package of the most likely one, there were different methods depending on the size of the puncture. I had no way of telling how big the puncture was inchwise, so I decided to be proactive and bring the tire in.

The fellow who'd helped me the night before was there, as was a different guy, a short, rat-faced man with a mustache and glasses. The latter was clearly the Kragen Alpha, and as I approached the counter, he laughed and pointed at me, saying: look, she brought the tire in! It went downhill from there. His tone the entire time was one of extreme condescension. He never directly answered my questions, often trailing off while talking, instead staring at me and shake his head. After a few more minutes of him blowing the chance of a sale, I left, seriously considering joining Yelp just so I could rant about the guy, instead settling for Twittering about it. That'll learn him!

I drove to my usual tire place in Daly City, where I was in and out in half an hour. The guy there was unfazed by any aspect of my gender presentation, instead just seeing me as another customer. Which is how it should be.

At the Sea Biscuit now. No rehearsal or Bad Movie Night or other kind of giggery or Ennui, which means writing. I'm quite happy with the balance.

6:45pm

It's been exactly a month since I've seen Vash. It's very weird, knowing that this is the post-Vash epoch, something I didn't think would ever happen. But even if she wanted to (and I have no idea at this point if she does or doesn't), I'm not ready to have contact with her again. I need time to heal, and so does she. We hurt each other in the ways that only people deeply in love can.

sometime after midnight

maybe you still love me, maybe you don't
either you will, or won't
maybe you just need some time alone

i will try to understand
everything has its plan
but either way
i'm going to stay right for you

maybe the sun will shine today...

sherilyn r. connelly, please report to the front desk.

Ugh. The "R" is remnant of my old middle name, when I had middle name, the one I was born with and thus not consulted about. I don't have a middle name now, and it seems that when they finally got around to removing my old name from the voter rolls, they decided to migrate the "R" over to my real name. Fuckers. Besides, if I were to have a middle initial, it would be J. I don't like that it's my old first initial (as well as the first initial of my father and all of my siblings—what a coincidence, huh?), but it is the classic cartoon middle initial, dating back to Rocket J. Squirrel. Which is why it's Ezri's middle initial initial, of course.

Anyway, I went to the front desk, expecting them to tell me that there'd been a terrible mistake and I shouldn't have been summoned for jury duty in the first place. Well, "expecting" is a strong verb. Regardless, what they did say was: they're waiting for you in room 502.

Oh. Heh. Whoops. That's what I get for not doublechecking that they hadn't already read my name, alphabetical order or not. So not only was I a flake who missed hearing my name, they were waiting for me. I was personally jamming up the cogs of justice. Irony!

There's few experiences quite like entering a courtroom with all eyes on you, knowing that they know that you're why this miserable day is taking forever to get started, let alone end. On the plus side, I reckoned, I was not one of the first two people in the room to be called into the actual. Then again, was it really a plus? Maybe it would ahve been quicker otherwise. Get eliminated, get it over with.

I remained in what the very chipper judge referred to as "the audience" for the rest of the day, save for the frequent breaks and generous lunch period. I was actually rather interested in the case, as it involved Studio Z. Dunno if it would have worked, but I had a perfect and very honest reason why I couldn't be impartial in the case, since one of the questions they asked of prospective jurors was if they were familiar with the venue: i have a very strong emotional connection to studio z. it was where i first asked my recent ex-girlfriend if she's like to go out sometime, and the following week we made out there for several hours before going back to my place and consummating our relationship. Plus, of course, the fact that I don't trust cops. And there was something else I realized that day: I don't like lawyers. I completely respect what they do, and I hope that there'll someday be one for me when I need one (same goes for cops—at least I'm honest about my hypocrisy), but my exposure to them during the jury selection process has left an awful taste in my mouth. Ick. Again, yay for representation and all, it's a very good thing and I the philosophy of the system, but, like everything else, the presence of humies fucks it up.

It was a beautiful day, though. It was kinda wasted by being inside a fracking courtroom, but at least it was pretty when we got to go outside.

We got to escape at half past four. Not having been there since Sunday morning, I drove home to get blankets and clean undies and give Perdita some love (plus fresh food and water and all that), then turned around and picked up Ennui from in front of Cassandra, her apartment. We parked near Ritual, got foil-wrapped food from the taqueria across from 12 Galaxies, and waited for Chicken John's bus.

It was one of the less cohesive Drive-Out Theaters thus far, more of a birthday party, and KrOB pretty much abandoned the movie aspect halfway through. That was okay, though. The main stop was at the Chabot Space and Science Center, unaware beforehand that the observatory was only open Fridays and Saturdays. Even as Ennui walked up the hill from the bus to the telescopes past the sign that said "Open Fridays and Saturdays," we somehow managed to not to figure out that it would be closed. Made us feel very smart.

For the final few hours most everyone was toward the font, Ennui and I had the majority of the back of back of the bus to ourselves. There was plenty of space to spread out on the very comfy mattresses, roughly the equivalent of a queen-sized bed. I spent much of it curled up with my head in her lap, Ennui petting my hair. I didn't sleep much, even though it was very comfortable, much more than you would expect for a bus going up and down hill. The few other people back there with us were sleeping, in fact. But I didn't especially want to sleep. We'd do enough of that that later when we went to bed. For now I wanted to be aware of being there with Ennui, of her energy and her physicality, of her hands on my head and my head on her body. I don't think she's going anywhere in the foreseeable future, and I know I'm not, but I still try to savor the time. This is all we're gonna get.

We got back to Ritual around a quarter past midnight, as usual. As we walked around the corner to Phoebe, we ran into Jarboe, who had just finished a CineWhores show at the Artists' Television Access. Jarboe had a moment where she couldn't quite remember what was Ennui's regular name, and what the name was she used for sex work, let alone which one Jarboe should use now. The Whore's Dilemma.

As we started to drive off, a guy who had been on the bus flagged us over: my right front tire was flat. Fortunately we were close to the service station at 23rd and Valencia, so Phoebe hobbled over, and we checked and inflated the tires. They're fine now, but I shudder to think of how much damage could have been done if he hadn't noticed that and said something.

Jack had long since crashed by the time we returned to Cassandra, so Ennui and I slept on the bed in the living room whe Jack usually sleeps. She's right, you can really tell the difference between flannel and non-flannel sheets. I think I'm officially acclimated.

10:35pm

We worked on blocking and lighting and stuff at Ten Commandments rehearsal tonight. I even remembered most of my lines. I'm pretty sure I'm not sucking, but it's so hard to tell.

Last night's Bad Movie Night feature was as horrid and interminable as I expected it to be, but the event itself was fun. Ennui and I were in the front row (her first time up there in a spot which was important to some and meaningless to others) and for most of the show I was on what we call "The Darnowsky Mic," which means I was just shouting without amplification. For reasons I never fully understood, by the last half hour of the movie I was put on a real mic. I certainly didn't mind, though I suspected it destroyed Ennui's hopes that we might be able to split early. It's not that she doesn't like Bad Movie night—she's a regular, and it was a catalyst for us to start dating—but everyone has their limits.

9:02am

Good lord, they're showing us a "Why It's Cool to be a Juror" video. People are paying about as much attention to it as they do the safety instructions before a plane takes off.

9:40am

They just did one of the Elimination Rounds where they read off the names of the lucky bastards who get to leave. I was not one of them, but I did get to move to a table with a power outlet, and I've accessed their (surprisingly free) wi-fi. Plus I have a mocha. Suck it, bitches!

It had been raining all evening long, and though I circled the Power Exhange, I decided not to go in. The first problem would have been finding parking, of course, and there's construction on that block of Otis, thus eliminating half of the usual spots. The streets were also starting to flood, and I knew that before I left the average driver would be even more drunk than they already were. Yeah, no thanks, especially considering that I would most likely leave disappointed. So, I just went home.

Went to the Sea Biscuit this morning to hand-edit what I wrote yesterday for Breaking Up is Harder to Do, and as I'd figured I might, I wound up throwing out the first half. That's the process for ya. Swung by my office to pick up my mp3 player, which will be a lifesaver while I'm in the jury waiting room tomorrow (bleh, jury dut, bleh). Since I had about an hour and and the office to myself, I took the opportunity to clean my workspace. For no good reason, I don't like doing that sort of thing when other people around. Especially, you know, my archnemesis.

At Ten Commandments rehearsal this afternoon, Jim gave me a few more lines, which I can only conclude means I'm not sucking as much as it feels like. It's an extraordinarily talented cast, a group of people with a lot more acting experience than me, and I feel like I'm sticking out like the sore, untalented thumb that I am. (If I do say so myself, as actors go I'm a hell of a writer.) But, again, Jim probably wouldn't give me more to do if I was dragging his play down. We also did a readthrough with a keyboardist improvising along with us, which was fantastic. In spite of my presence, it's going to be a fun play.

At a coffeehouse (a-ha!) in Ennui's neighborhood. We're going to dinner soon, someplace with the pupusas she's been craving, and then we're to Bad Movie Night. I'm not hosting tonight, and I made a point of not scheduling the feature Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End for one of my nights, but it's an excuse for a date with Ennui, and that's enough.

Fortunately, I remembered today—rather than, say, Tuesday—that I have jury duty on Monday morning. Bleh, I say. Bleh. Must start practicing my mantra: sorry, i can't serve because i don't trust cops...sorry, i can't serve because i don't trust cops...sorry, i...

3:12pm

Free entertainment or not, after rehearsal (Jim let me go early since they weren't going to be working on any more of my scenes) I headed straight back to the Sea Biscuit. My car was in a non-metered spot and would have been fine where it was for the next few days, and I could have possibly gone to Mission Creek or Ritual to work until the shows started tonight at the Dark Room, but no. This the only place where I feel like I'll be comfortable and not restless. I don't think I would have really been able to enjoy myself if I'd stayed in the Mission, amongst life and people. (There's usually life and people here as well, of course. Just not as much.) For reasons I don't fully understand I'm feeling emotionally raw, and this is the safe place, where I can channel it into something productive.

Scrawled in what I think was lipstick onto a picture taped to the wall at Wonderland: i am my own muse. the work is my mistress. If truer words have been written about the creative process, I sure haven't read 'em. A true artist at heart, my love was.

6:15pm

In the neighborhood to drop off my contributor's copy of the lastest issue of Other Magazine, Charlie Anders happened upon the Sea Biscuit. She was looking for a place to sit and work anyway, so she stayed for a few hours.

Meanwhile, I've passed three thousand words on "Three-Twenty-Seven-Ought-Five," my piece for Breaking Up is Harder to Do. Considering that the limit is three thousand words and I've barely made a dent in my original notes, I guess this one's going to be all about the editing.

7:40pm

Considering that pounded out most of those three thousand words today, I think maybe I will head to the Dark Room. It's the final showing of "Sweetie" Tanya: The Demon Barista of Valencia Street, which is supposed to be a hoot. Perhaps I'll go to the Power Exchange after that. Been a while, maybe something will happen, all the usual hopeful hoohaa.

sometime after midnight

Do I take the art down from the walls? Does that have to happen eventually?

Ilene and I had dinner at Ananda Fuara last night, both because it's within walking distance of her apartment and because I've been craving their Neatloaf Sammich. Afterward, we returned to the aforementioned apartment, got stoned, drank some absinth-like substance whose name escapes me at the moment, then watched Sunset Blvd. I've seen it dozens of times, but Jim keeps referencing Gloria Swanson in that movie when discussing my Ten Commandments character (Bithia, who finds baby Moses in the river and names him), so I figured a refresher was in order. Plus Ilene had never seen it, and I'm always happy to expose that movie to the unsuspecting. We then watched Dreyer's Day of Wrath as we dozed off. We did talk a little about our recent gnarly breakups (so, who was vash?), but for the most part kept away from the heavy stuff. No point, really. We both have a pretty good idea of where the other's been.

My car was parked at a meter which started at seven—as opposed to the meters in Ennui's neighborhood, which are kind enough to not start until nine—so I got up at a quarter til, put on my boots (I slept in my clothes, which was quite a timesaver), and exited into the rainy dawn while Ilene was still asleep.

Since I had time and it was on the way to my office, I stopped at the Soma Inn Cafe for breakfast. I've been there a handful of times over the past few years, and I've come to the conclusion that I don't like it. Now I know for sure.

It's been raining all day long, as it has for the last couple days and will probably continue to in the forseeable future. That's okay. I'm looking forward to that first clear day. Not because of the lack of rain, but just because that first clear day after a storm is always so crisp and beautiful, like getting a new prescription for your glasses when you hadn't even realized the old one was out of date. Makes the inconvenience feel worth the trouble.

It struck me today that the Transgender San Francisco Cotillion is probably this weekend, if it hasn't already happened. Turns out it was a few weeks ago, on a day that I was sick. Even if I'd been booked for the show, I probably would have had to cancel, since I'd barely had the energy to leave the Black Light District, let alone go. I'm not suprised that I wasn't asked to participate, though. I was never anyone's favorite part of the show, I'd had to actively lobby for it, and quite frankly, it just wasn't a priority this time around. And by "not a priority" I mean "it slipped my mind."

sometime after midnight

After the high comes the crash, after the bliss comes the reality of the drive home in the rain. It's just how things work.

Ten Commandments rehearsal was last night. Sort of. The three main actors didn't show up, so the rest of us who were there played Scrabble instead. Meanwhile, Jim keeps giving my character more lines, which is cool but scary. Still, it means he likes my performance, and that feels good.

Going to swing by Jim's birthday party after work, and then I'm hooking up with Ilene. We're going to have dinner and watch a movie. I don't know what will happen beyond that.

She's also sanguine about my as-yet-unwritten essay for Breaking Up is Harder to Do. She understands that it won't be a hatchet piece, and while she may not always come across in the best light, neither will I, and it's not really about us as such. I always find the ripple more interesting than the actual event, and lordy, there were ripples. It also felt good to talk to her about my personal life since then, especially about what went wrong with Vash, without fear of feeling judged or being reminded of how I'd hurt Maddy in the past. It was like the last scene of Annie Hall, where all relationships should wind up, and it's place which I dearly hope Vash I reach someday. Maybe it'll take nearly three years, like it did with Maddy. I don't know. It'll take however long it takes.

I was still at Unimatrix Zero when Ennui called to say she was done with band practice. I went to her apartment, ate, and got ready for the party at Edie's. The theme of the party was patterns, so I acquired new stripeys that afternoon in the Haight, did my eye makeup in a quasi-paisely pattern similar to what I used to do in '04, and kept on the stripey fingerless gloves I've been regularly wearing. Otherwise, I was in solids (read: black) and nowhere close to the glorious mash of patterns sported by Ennui and Jack.

After a trip to their local supermarket to acquire White Russian supplies, we got into Phoebe and headed east.

We arrived at Edie's around a quarter to ten as the party was picking up. Ennui's bandmates were already there. I'd met one of them at Zeitgeist last week, and she'd told me quite a bit about the others. It was nice to get to know them, especially since I'll be seeing a lot more of them in the future, being the drummer's girl and all. i'm with the band! I've always wanted to say that.

I talked about Bad Movie Night a lot at the party, but not by choice. I mean, I didn't bring it up. It was a little embarrassing sometimes, as I was afraid I looked like I was trying to guide the conversation back to me, which really wasn't the case at all. I can be plenty social and gregarious and can hold my own in most situations, but I'm not one to dominate proceedings with talk of how bitchin' I am, either. (Because I'm not, for starters.) At one point later in the evening, someone told me that at least three people had "bragged" about seeing me at Bad Movie Night. Bragged? Puh-leeze.

An unforgivably rockstar thing I did do was picking up a copy of Good Advice for Trendy Young People of All Age I saw on Edie's bookshelf. The garish blue-and-orange design is easy enough to spot on the spine, and for some reason the was displayed prominently with the cover facing out. Couldn't miss it. Feeling like a shmuck but unable to stop myself—even in the most microscopic of doses, fame is addictive—I showed Edie my picture and essay, the latter of which I don't even like. It was just so weird to see a book I'm in on the bookshelf of someone who doesn't know I'm in it it. I also see Rent Girl on a lot of shelves, but that's not the same, since I didn't contribute to it. I was little more than an extra, the assistant to the gravedigger who meets the prince.

I had a White Russian which Ennui mixed for me, and a super-spicy drink which someone else made, though I didn't take a hit off any of the joints being passed around. GHB was also present, but I'd been drinking alcohol, and slipping myself a roofie sounded like a spectacularly bad idea.

Sounding like a much better idea was Ecstasy. It was available at a reasonable price, so I bought two hits. As I put them in my bag, Ennui asked: stockpiling them for later? I blinked. It hadn't even occurred to me that I could take one, like, now. And why not? I confirmed that her and Jack were fine with staying at the party for however long it took for me to be up for driving again. She said they'd already figured it would be an allnighter, and they could crash at Edie's if need be. Though she decided not to partake, Ennui encouraged me to help myself.

I took at hit a quarter past midnight. As I waited to come on I saw people ingesting it in other forms, especially snorting, like we'd done at the rave on New Year's Eve. This time they properly bit more equipped, using a rolled-up dollar bill of a clear glass plate. Classic. There was also nitrous, which I haven't done in a long time. I still have a box of Whip-Its which Maddy and I bought before she moved out, but I've done approximately one since then. I just forget that I have them at all, and it's not as much fun alone. Plus, you know, I don't exactly have an excess of brain cells, so I have to be careful how many of them I wantonly annihilate. Nitrous kisses with Ennui, however, were more than worth it. (To again reference Annie Hall, in a different context: as balzac said, "there goes another novel.")

For a while I was afraid the E wasn't going to work at all—in my experience the efficacy of drugs tends to be a crapshoot, and I've done both E and acid which has turned out to be paper—but when it did there was no question. It kicked in an after an hour, while, Ennui and I were leaning against the wall in Edie's bedroom. I'm always cuddly with whoever I'm dating if they'll let me, and Ennui is always indulgent and reciprocative, but the need to do so now was strong and intense. I could feel my heart beating, and it felt like it was extending to my personal space, what the hippies would call my aura, pulsating and needing contact. God, how could anyone do this alone? It was something Jezebel had suggested as a way of getting my head together, taking E by myself or perhaps with Sadie nearby as a guide (cuddling with whom would be not unlike getting intimate with my sister, if I had a sister), but right now the thought of feeling this way withou somebody nearby to embrace and hold and touch sounded like the worst thing ever.

So I held Ennui tight, tighter, feeling her warmth through the dress which otherwise revealed very little skin—that was okay, the fabric was nice, and it made the accessible flesh all the more precious and special—nuzzling and cuddling, a cat marking her with the scent glands I didn't have.

Ennui just laughed and smiled, not at me but with me. I knew she wasn't in same brainspace as me, she wasn't on what she only half-jokingly referred to as truth serum, and Christ knew I'd experienced some major betrayals lately—I felt like I was only just becoming able to acknowledge them as such—but I also knew I had to trust her. We'd gone this far, she was open to me in this, she had guided me here (though I had free will, made my own decisions and took responsibility for my actions), that I had to trust that I could open up. Not that being closed was an option.

And open I did, reaching into my chest and pulling out my still-beating heart, bleeding and dripping and turning the white stripes of my gloves pink, holding it up to her: yeah, this is me, pretty much. I let out all my fears and gratitudes, I asked for forgiveness for everything I'd already done wrong already and would do wrong in the future (lines extending to the horizon in either direction), I told her how happy I was that she'd been patient when I disappeared for most of October and all of November, that I really really liked her and was veering dangerously close to thinking of her in terms of the g-word, how grateful I felt that she'd given me shelter from the storm this past month (inside a Dylan song as I'd been so often before but never this one).

She observed, not unkindly, that I was exhibiting textbook E behavior. Well, good. That was the point. When I do a drug I want it to work, I want it to make me feel the way its supposed to. And I understood why Vash didn't want us to do it together. It was for all the reasons I had wanted us to. I wanted to feel this way towards her, but...

I sometimes laughed at myself for the thoughts that came to mind, but I said them anyway because they needed to be said. I told Ennui she could read the manuscript after Jessie was done if she wanted, and I invited her to come hear me read at My Sucky Valentine on February 14. That was something I'd been afraid to ask, since I figured I was third in line after Jack and Jessie to bogart her on Valentine's Day, and I wanted to be respectful of my place in the hierarchy, at least as I understood it. She said that she'd love to be at the show, schedule permitting—of course, she didn't exactly have her datebook handy at the moment, so there was a good chance that she was already booked for that night, but that was enough for me.

Ennui was on my right, and to my left was a blonde girl in a plaid schoolgirl dress which I accurately guessed as being of Hot Topic vintage. (I said: that's from hot topic, right? She said: it is! how'd you now? She was quite high, her pupils tiny but determined, cackling and happy. Artificially or otherwise, then you're inside it, the distinction is meaningless. I sometimes put my arm around her, and she laughed and returned the gesture, and I wanted to kiss her, and I knew that if I asked if I could kiss her she'd say yes, but I was somehow unable to work up the courage, not even so much because of Ennui's presence but just because I still run into the same damn barriers in my brain no matter how much my serotonin is flooding.

I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Ennui would have been fine with it, because in my coredumping I found I had to say the single most obvious and self-evident thing imaginable: that I hoped it was okay with her that I was going to see other people. She laughed when I said that, and why not? It was silly of me and I knew it, it's not as though Ennui hadn't gone home with Jessie the week before and half the time I spend the night at Ennui's her boyfriend was in the other room with his boyfriend (whom I've known for nearly six years, since well before I met Ennui or Jack), but I was in a place of saying what needed to be said even if it didn't need to be said, so I would know that it had been said and covered and not miscommunicated. Ever indulgent of the squidheaded, emotionally melty tranny hanging onto her, Ennui assured me that not only was it perfectly all right for me to see other people, she wanted me to tell her all about it (tres Crash), and if she could watch, so much the better. Which is why it would have been more than fine if I had in fact kissed the girl. (I did make out with Edie a while later on the bed, as did Ennui, as did most everyone else. It was Edie's thing, and not a bad thing at that.) So long as we communicated and kept the other present, it would be okay. And I think she knew I wasn't going anywhere, that she didn't have to worry about losing me. (Sometimes I tell myself that if Vash and I had been exclusive, things wouldn't have disintegrated. The truth is that we would have fallen apart that much faster.)

While we were on the bed, Ennui and I got many compliments on our sheer cuteness. I had to be told this, since I was aware of the other people in the room but not paying attention to them, instead tunnelvisioning on Ennui or Edie, mostly Ennui.

There was only one dark moment. Around three, Ennui asked if I was coming down yet. I didn't think I was, but for a moment it was as though the question alone had made me sober, and I hated the feeling. I didn't want to come down. I was rolling so nicely and blissfully. I didn't want to go back, I wanted to stay in this place where she made me feel warm and loved.

The sad, scared feeling only lasted a few moments. When I came down for real later that hour, I felt fine, as I always do when I'm coming down from a drug. It helps that I like reality. Reality is where all the cool stuff happens, where my fairly awesome life is. Even sober I was still with Ennui, I'd be doing Bad Movie Night in about sixteen hours (even though I'd have to watch Transformers), Ennui and I were going on KrOB's Drive-Out Theater on Monday, I had my writing and stories left to tell (which when you come down to it is my passion, storytelling, and since I lack imagination I tell true strories even though it's pissed off a lot of people over the years and will continue to for years to come) and Perdita and a terrific day job and I was in rehearsals for a play and I felt like I was emerging from a dark personal time and I could at long last lick my thin skin and move on.

I was more than capable of driving by half past four. There's no visual distortions or hallucintions on E so I probably could have driven anyway, but I sure wouldn't want to, especially not from Oakland to San Francisco. Though I was tired on Sunday afternoon and decided to nap rather than write, the depression-crash never hit. I was fine on Monday, too. Yay for a hearty brain.