“Don’t make fun of me. I’m unwell. I’m not hysterical or overly hyper. Where is the fucking Valium? There is a tea bag in there—there is a tea bag growing!”
Even a fucked clock gives the right time twice a day. But not for my old pal, Herod. The poor bastard will see the eviction notice soon enough. Not now, though. No. That kind of reality is no place for a man who’s been up three days straight and is just about to come down from a weekend pill session. His name isn’t really Herod, obviously, but the sonofabitch deserves anonymity (Gordon is a horrid name for even a hamster).
I often wonder why (why God, why!?) men reach their peak when they hit a vile age. Still able to get it up (some), still some hair (some), and made a little bit of cash (some), men are doomed to age right at the point where their desire is at its height. Their experience, lust, and rage to sort out the madhouse we call the world ripen when things inevitably start to go downhill, in a physical sense in many cases. Women, on the other hand, have the planet’s balls in their hands until the age of 40. Then they go mad, gravity kicks them in their memory of a long-lost hymen, Botox does its best, and that’s that. I’m talking shit again. I must consult Herod on how we acclimatise in the age of the unwell.
“Maybe they should stop watering down the drinks!” you bastard, Herod yells (as if it’s my fault), still clasping onto the idea that there’s a growth in the kitchen or money-grabbing charlatans in our local. Ok, no, it’s best to ignore this clown lest he make me as anxious as himself. I have a history, you see, and in this case, it’s always best to ignore your friends. “Herod, eat some of my Propranolol in bread and have a sleep.” I was always full of great ideas. “I know you have Valium, you creep, give it here!” I’ve once heard the phrase that you can turn your back on a person, but never turn your back on a drug. Regardless, the cunt wasn’t getting near my Valium. That was for special occasions, and tonight I was going to have a prosperous sleep for a change. I had hidden the pills under my dog’s bed. The swine would never find them. I feared that little Ronin might snuff them out first, so I had to be quick. Imagine finding a dead Bichon Frise on all fours from a Valium overdose? Oh dear God, let me rest. These thoughts plagued my dreams often (under his bed was a commonplace for my stash), but all was in hand. I’d take the lot to my garden, pop two, and maybe slip the little guy a half to deal with all this hideousness. The dog, that is.
I opened a Bukowski book of short stories. It was one about him and some woman going to a bar (how surprising), and once they commence talking, she brings out two small people from her jacket pocket. Not small as in midgets, small as in small enough to fit in your coat. She brings these little strangers out, and soon as you like, they start to viciously fight and then furiously screw right there on the bar. Known for his fighting, fucking, and excessive drinking, Bukowski certainly wasn’t one for exercises in surrealism such as this tale. And it got me pondering. “The age of 40 comes at you like two little random fictitious screwballs getting it on in public.” How tragic. How could a master such as Bukowski write such a terrifying tale? If you happen to be fat and ugly like Charles, then you better have a good imagination.
Herod killed himself the next day. Without embarrassment, I contextualised the whole charade that was his life, my life, and our alleged friendship in a matter of minutes. “Have you had any medication to help you cope?” – “Yeah, I got a long drop and a short rope.” – I could hear him talking to himself, as he always did, right before the end. It made me laugh hysterically, as is usually the case these days. None more so than when I visited the doctors the next day and had to have two large man fingers up.. you get the picture. It’s an age thing, I told myself. “It has to be done,” as my dear old grandfather used to say. “It had to be done.” Herod would always say similar things in moments of crisis or nervousness. And I loved him for that, at least. But he was gone now, and what was left? Except my own neurosis and having to deal with the cock-sucking funeral and my delicate hole. Sadly, I’m fine.
I always remember Herod’s mum’s funeral. He lost her, as they say, when he was barely 20 and she was still a young woman. Cancer, obviously. How the bastard managed to keep things together, get up on that podium and give her a speech-send-off, I’ll never know. “Stronger man than I,” I always thought. And then the stupid bastard goes and does this when he wasn’t even that badly ill. He had an enormous cock, was banging some 23-year-old, and generally growing into what I’d mentioned before, in decent shape as well. I thought he had things together. Imbecile. Herod’s send-off wasn’t without its plus points. At least he wasn’t Catholic. There would be no hour-long mass, no open coffin crap, no priest talking shit, and nothing to make the day less than pleasurable—apart from his passing. And apart from the daft bastard’s father showing up, still obnoxious as hell and still asking about a girl I’d split up with 20 years previously. Herod’s grandfather, now aged 88, made a silent appearance, still looking like he’d play Death at chess and savage the fucker for another 20 years. I suppose it wasn’t as successful as I’d thought.
I think about Emile Cioran every day. Herod used to annoy me about my fixation with him. “When my baby dies, I shall follow promptly,” I would half-joke, always keeping the idea right in the back of my mind for when the time comes.
Time always comes for you and everything you love the most, sadly.
“Emile Cioran never bothered with such bullshit. That swine didn’t even have the guts to top himself even without a dog to love!” Herod was usually right in calling out contradictions. But fuck him. He took the way out people like you and I and the others can only dream of. As long as dogs exist, as long as pussy exists, as long as Herod exists in my memory, I’ll be here. My Valium did not get taken by my dear little Ronin, the only man in my life. Thank Christ. A man in my disposition and mental state couldn’t handle losing a dear friend and a dog I worship to death in the space of a few days. I must be ill. Ronin knew, he knew everything. I popped two and left onwards to a bliss I cannot describe. There will be a tomorrow.
“What do you do from morning to night?”
“I endure myself.”
Words by Henry Jacobson.
