back and forth

a slice of pizza and an email send me down the subway steps. a black wool coat can't conceal my royal blue '80s tube dress. my toes scrape against knives. the train skips quickly to my stop. I climb out from the underground. I pass model collectors and blond psychics from LA. Bongo drums over French house emanate out from a second floor venue and I see the psytrance club where the euporhia wears off quicker than the e. fragmented memories rain down Tenth Avenue and lure me into a deafening, velvet-walled club. i quickly negotiate the line and step inside.

keep your cigarettes says the coat checker tells me with a wink. i sip a glass of white wine then quickly switch to jack daniels. this reminds me of my tiny flask and I escape to the bathroom to quickly dump it in my drink while bleary-eyed city babies kiss mirrors and girls from New Jersey tug at their miniskirts and crowd up against each other in line.

the dancefloor swells as the minutes crawl past midnight. i press up close to the stage to try to align my pulse with the bass that drives each song, drowning in vinyl. I soak up the rush of feeling alone while surrounded by a million bodies moving to one beat. felix takes the stage and time stops. I breathe in the robotic strobe light, delerious, alive as he mixes electricity into magic. confetti floats on a dense, artificial fog and I feel like a Care Bear on a cloud or an ethereal princess who will disappear at the first sign of morning light.

The music keeps me prisoner until the very last beat drops and then the city envelops me in a shimmering predawn mist. Trampled flyers litter the sidewalks, enthusiastically imploring partygoers to attend an event that has now just ended. Celine Dion’s Titanic theme echoes out from an all-night deli and a glowing Chinese McDonald’s sign lights the frozen sidewalk dotted with sparkling, nameless stars. with a tiny bleep of a button I capture leafless trees in black and white and stare into pixels representing eyes. I stop at the Gramercy to take in a giant Basquiat hanging above the empty bar and then backtrack to watch the sun rise over Fourteenth Street.

In Union Square I finger a folded bill in my coat pocket and glance quickly at the many empty taxis before slipping my Metrocard through a silver turnstile. Underground a trash train sits abandoned across the platform, bright, serene and dirty. Shiny garbage bags piled high ooze excrement and decay, glinting in the static station light.

how to escape from the mental hospital

For six thousand dollars and relatively few superficial wounds, you too can gain autonomy by escaping the instution known as NPI. Note: this has not been tried out on A-South, also known as the Mariah Cary ward. Note to Note: The Mariah Carey technique of flashing the security does not work, especially if you are not Mariah Carey, but also even if you are. Anyway here are the steps:

First, go to the nurses’ station and tell them you are definitely not suicidal nor would you hurt anyone. Insurance won’t pay for you to stay if you explain those two points to be incorrect -it saves them money. Open your eyes wide and speak clearly. Make sure no open wounds are visibile but also try to avoid long sleeves. They arouse too much suspiscion. Wear jeans and a clean t shirt and shoes to show you are eager and serious. Whatever you do don’t cry. Crying practically mandates another 72 hour hold in some of these places. Be sure pick a time when your doctor is unavailable even by pager. This way they will have to track down the resident on call to decide your case and he probably won’t have gotten any sleep so he won’t really be thinking too much about all the other times he saw you screaming obscentites and tearing your hair out, even if it's in your file.

Next, repeat your statements to the resident and add that you are done hurting yourself. Even if you never hurt yourself to begin with, this can really convince them that you’ve had an epiphany while locked in their dim little ward, which is everybody’s wet dream over there.

Third, and most importantly, subtly and knowingly remind the resident that you are over eighteen and can therefore leave any time you’d like. Arch your eyebrow like you are sharing confidential information between two colleagues. Indicate that you have the six thousand dollars or so for the gap between insurance coverage and actual hospital costs, regardless of whether this is true.

Finally tell the nurse your family has not come to get you, rather, your boyfriend is waiting downstairs and he can’t be bothered to park. He hates hospitals even more than you do. Gather your things and demand all the confiscated cigarettes back from the nursing station. Do this while the resident debates your case, to build momentum. Once he signs off, you are free. Oh, lastly, don’t forget to wiggle out of that green hospital bracelet before you get on the bus or walk down the street. It’s a dead giveaway.

ok, but what about ne-yo?

the queen of the used, clothing, persons, star of the show caught crying in the interval

lets make a fucking deal, keep 'em guessing. i'm ready to give it up, are you ready to come clean?

and they say LA is fake but its new york that can't stop defending itself
its all the same

show me the real emotion and ill uncloak my own heart
until then its icy cold