That Cool Guitar-Whine Isaac Brock Does in Dramamine

Payte walks around his small Arizona town at night. He has his vape, a pack of cigarettes, and a lighter on him. In the pocket of his shirt is a fifth of Popov vodka that he sips on. He gave a homeless man twenty bucks for it, and bought him breakfast with that money. His earbuds, well, they’re playing some sad emo shit.

He enters Villa Park, and walks through the arch of water, shooting from the sprinklers. A drop of water lands on the cigarette in his mouth, and soaks into the paper. Smoke puffs out from the tip. The paper is now soggy.

Across the sidewalk and grass, lay a bench with a dim light hanging above it. At the table, a silhouette sits. He walks over and waves. The guy turns around and gives a weird smile.

Sitting down at the table, Payte pulls another cigarette out and offers it to the guy. As he grabs the cigarette, the man’s hand quivers.

“So, what are you doing here?” Payte asks.

The man shrugs. “This is where I sleep.”

Payte raises an eyebrow. “Sleep? Like, in the wet grass?”

The man chuckles, and says, “No. I just throw a tarp on the side-walk, and a sleeping-bag.”

Payte’s eyes wander over to the big hiking pack and he realizes that that is what holds all of the man’s belongings. The man is essentially a shadow, wandering from place to place, never really being seen. Meanwhile, Payte is that which is not there. In a way, this man is a direct reflection of Payte, just more concrete. Maybe, everyone that has lived or will live, is Payte. It’s like the same organism, just living out all these lives and then fucking every single one of them. A never-ending orgy of sex and drugs and money. Hell?

“So, are you one of those guys that just goes from town to town?” Payte asks. “Just wandering?”

The man takes a puff of the cigarette and nods. “Yeah, pretty much. Name a city somewhere West, I’ve been there.”

“You ever think of heading East?”
The man kind of tilts his head and shrugs. “Maybe once this cold weather’s over I’ll check out the mid-west.”

“Dude, you ever drive around there? There’s practically nothing, but I guess you could get work on some farms.”

The man nods. “Yeah, I suppose so.”

And thus continues Payte’s midnight adventure. He smokes more cigarettes, and drinks more vodka. He has become a non-human, something abstract. He no longer sees the world in just black and white. It’s more of some big, heaping, mass of shades of gray. Nothing exists, and yet everything does. Circles.

He ends up walking towards his local Turnway, and decides to check it out. Jonas, one of the cashier’s, is standing outside smoking a cigarette. Payte decides to join him, and sparks up a cigarette himself.

“How’s tonight goin’, man?” Payte asks.

Jonas shrugs and exhales smoke. He has a wrinkled face, and dark-black hair. He must be in his late twenties. “Same shit different day, man.”

Payte takes out his bottle of Popov vodka and takes a swig. “You want some?” He says, gesturing the bottle towards Matthew.

Jonas shrugs and takes the bottle. “Eh, fuck it. Why not?” Matthew brings the bottle to his lips and tilts his head all the way back. He brings the bottle down and passes it back to Payte. “Has a smooth taste.”

“That’s what vodka should taste like, you know?”
“Yeah man, I get ya’.”

Payte notices a semi-truck in the parking-lot. A man dressed in jeans, and a black company T-shirt unloads pallets from it. “Shit dude.” Payte says. “You get trucks at this time of night?”
JOnaas nods. “We get em’ every night, and it sucks.”

“Well, would you ever wanna be a truck driver?”

He shrugs. “Eh, maybe if I was younger. But now? Too much shit to deal with.”

They fall into a quiet pause, and Jonas finishes his smoke. He drops it on the ground and squishes it. “You know what they say, either get going, or get leaving.” And with that, he walks back inside the mini-mart.

This night has been an eventful night. Birds swoop down, charming the insincere. The full-moon rises, and the small Arizona town Payte one called home dances around bon-fires, talking and drinking. Nothing is well. Nothing is good. In the end, everything must die.

Deep inside the desert, insects crawl around the dirt, carving their souls into grain and forever commemorating their life. Meanwhile, Payte goes for a drive. The car stereo plays depressing rock as the windows are rolled down. Wind blows in his face.

He is now miles away from any civilization. The ground is flat, and there are no trees. There is only dead cactus and sand. The road buckles on top of the earth, bending and twisting the car. Payte slowly leans his foot, harder and harder on the gas pedal. The night sky meshes into a blur, and the stars coagulate. The wind grows fierce. The moon is now just a speck. He is flying, flying high.

And then, he reaches Marsh Road. He turns and stops the car in a circle of dirt. Payte steps outside and lights a cigarette, staring up at the stars.

“Hey there.” A coyote says. It’s standing on it’s hind legs and has one eye missing. Nasty and twisted scars cover it’s stomach. “Can I bum a cig’ off you?”

Payte nods and retrieves a cigarette from the pack. He hands it to the coyote and lights it for him. The coyote takes small puffs. “You wanna know what it’s like in the desert?” The coyote asks.

Payte gives him a subtle look and nods. “Sure.”

“It’s fucked. Completely fucked. The only way I could feed myself tonight was from a rotten deer corpse.”
“Must’ve had a gamey taste.”
“Oh yeah, totally. But I can’t find anything now, so I dunno what the fuck I’m gonna do. Like, am I gonna starve?”

Payte looks at him and exhales smoke, then smiles. “Listen man, I’ll drop off some food here for you. Does hamburger sound good?”

The coyote pauses for a moment and takes a drag. “What about sausage? I love that stuff.”
“Got it, I’ll get some for you.”

The coyote nods and they fall into a sweet silence. However, it’s not awkward. It’s like a silence between long-time friends, comfortable with each other.

A shooting star passes the sky, and lands over the mountain. The moon begins to sink ever so slowly, dimming the desert even more. Cold air begins to seep about, sending chills down their spines. It’s calm, and quiet.

“You know what we call you?”

Payte raises an eyebrow. “We?”

“The desert, us.”

“What?”
“Es Tranquilo. Or, he is peaceful. You don’t judge, you don’t really care. You just listen and do what your heart says. We, the sand, respect that about you.”

Payte takes one last drag of his cigarette and throws it on the ground. He stomps it out and says, “I’m a fucking narcissist.”