I made my way to Atlantic City via speed racer style and got there before it started getting light out. Picking the right casino would be easy, whichever one had a parking space in front of it. Checked my wallet to see if I had everything I needed and jogged into the place. Lights, humming of slot machines, old ladies with long cigarettes dangling from their lipstick, men from "families". I got to the black jack table and put my bet down. nine hundred dollars. First card, ace of hearts, second card ten of hearts. Dealer? Bust.

My wallet was filled with twenty dollar bills, and hundred dollar bills. I have no idea how much money I had won. I just collected it and got back into my car. I wanted to go back to the party. "They would still be there" I thought. I made it back to Boston in four hours. Nine o'clock in the morning on a Sunday. The party was obviously over. Not for me though. I climbed the small stair case and opened the door to her apartment. It was always unlocked. I would yell and scream at her when she would leave it open. My only excuse was "you have shit you borrowed from me, lock your fucking doors". She barely paid attention to me. I barely paid attention to her. I went into her kitchen, there was some young guy sleeping across three chairs. I tapped him on the head, "get out"...he looked up at me with glazed eyes, obviously very hungover, he must have gone to sleep an hour previous. "I said get the fuck up, and get out of here before I throw you on to the pavement". He got up and scrambled around looking for his things and left.

I went into her bedroom. There she was sleeping. I always loved watching her sleep. Not many people are interesting when they sleep. She had this look though. Sure you couldn't see her amazing green eyes, but she was beautiful like that. I wondered what the guy sleeping next to her thought of her when she slept. I decided to wake him up now also. Slapping him on the back of the head fairly hard "hey buddy, how great does my girlfriend look sleeping?" They both woke up kind of groggy rubbing the sleep from their eyes. I had seen this guy around, she had probably introduced me to him at one point. I never liked her friends though. A bunch of slackers and drug addicts. No real people. They were young, no stories to tell yet. This was the guy with the Nine Inch Nails t-shirt. There was a fucking guy with a Nine Inch Nails t-shirt sleeping in my girlfriends bed right now. "Hey, it's no like that man I swear" he replied. "I'm going to make some breakfast while you two sleep or do whatever it is you do during daylight, could you at least have the decency to take the can of beer off of my copy of The Neon Wilderness?" I lent her that book months ago, I don't think the words entered anyones head in that apartment. It was now a drink coaster. A once important reminder of how interested in her I was. How I wanted to show her all these things and do all these things with her. I grew tired of that. I was now tired of her and her bullshit. It had been two years of good times, and then six months of me trying to jump out of her window. Frustration. Her lips and body were the only thing still communicating with me at this point.

I started some toast in the toaster when it hit me. "I need to go back to Atlantic City" I would find something there. I would find someone as useless as her there to entertain me for a couple weeks before heading out west. I went back into her room "Hey man, where are your cigarettes?" I asked the kid. "Oh, over there next to my wallet and keys" "Right next to this pill and condom wrapper you mean?" I took the pill, his cigarettes, and his wallet and left the apartment. I dropped the pill down the sewer on my way to my car. Opening his wallet when I got to the car. Not much money, about forty-three bucks. Jason Martin. What a boring fucking name. Horrible license picture as well. A ticket stub to a Nine Inch Nails concert, oh wait, two ticket stubs to Nine Inch Nails concerts. I tossed the wallet from my car on the highway and lit one of his Camel Lights.

"I am so glad to be alive right now" I told myself

before & after