Now I’m going to tell you about the week leading up to that photoshoot.
Fast forward to that Monday. I woke up, took my handful of pills and supplements large enough to choke an elephant (or perhaps a small whale), and checked my phone. There was an unread text from X. It read:
“What do you want me to wear to the shoot?”
“Whatever cool clothes you have!” I replied.
“Such as?”
“Dude, I dunno. Ripped up jeans and a goth t-shirt?” I texted as I left for work.
I will not bore you with details of my work, so we’re going to cut right back to my house, as I returned home FROM work – if only skipping over the workday were so easy.
Sigh.
Anyway, the first thing I notice upon entering my house, is that it smells FUCKING GREAT. Now, my house USUALLY smells nice, thank you very much, but this day in particular, it was uniquely aromatic. It quickly became apparent as to why: the cupboard where I store my candles had been ransacked. Whatever, no biggie. Small price to pay for such good smelliness.
As I walked down the hallway that lead to both my bedroom and my office, the true insidious nature of the candles was revealed. Very quickly, the smell went from remarkable, to utterly overpowering, and I knocked on my office door. Christian didn’t answer, so I texted him:
“Hey. How many of my candles did you light, man?!”
He responded back :”i took 1-2. y?”
“No reason. Just asking because I don’t think you’re supposed to be able to actually TASTE the candles in the air.”
He replied again but I didn’t look. I cracked open all the windows in the house, took a shower, and by the time I got out, the air seemed slightly less toxic. Entering the kitchen, I noticed that the garbage needed to go out.
Relevance? Just wait.
I take the bag of garbage outside, and toss it into the bin. As I do so, however, something catches my eye. I pull the bag back out and see 5 of my candles in there, completely burned out.
Explanation? I don’t have one.
Christian was out all night doing whatever it is Christian does, so I had my house to myself again, which was kind of nice, as I still needed one more line for Here’s To Eternity.
Now, as metaphorical as they often get, I like to add an element of my own life into my lyrics. Typically, I write them shortly after something occurs to me or happens, but that night, I had full on writer’s block, and writing “You scare my cat and you burn all my fucking candles” just wasn’t working for me, I’m afraid.
Then, my phone dinged. It’s a text from X. This is what he sent me.
He wrote a single “?” and below it, sent a selfie of him standing in front of a mirror wearing a blue t shirt with the word “goth” printed on it in white.
“Hah. You’re, er, you’re kidding, right?” I asked.
“No.” he replied a few minutes later.
I started and erased several attempts to reply before I just finally set my phone down, and put my head in my hands. Finding inspiration in my despair, I grabbed my pen, and wrote:
“--and we all set sail on a pitiful trip to nowhere.”
