Wendell 2 – Wednesday March 9, 2011 (Part 1/1)

Guess it didn’t take long to brush off the idea of daily journals, what with my birthday indulgences completely engrossing me until about five hours ago. It only takes that long for me to miss having a pen in my hand anyway, but my yearly traditions tend to distract me like that. Even Paisley’s infuriating manipulations from Sunday were forgotten for a while.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still pissed about having to appear at a convention hall packed with drooling crowds of comic book retards and their obnoxious obsessions with all things ridiculous. I hate being asked questions about my career methods almost as much as I hate recounting the monotony of it all, and fans never seem to be satisfied with the answers I give because they keep fucking asking. For the life of me I can’t understand why they’re interested. How my books became so popular escapes me to this day, though my ever-beaming agent takes plenty of credit. I’m even more pissed off that whatever hostess Paisley took home from the sushi place didn’t cut him to pieces like I had fantasized (I’d have gotten a phone call had that actually happened, I’m sure.) The only good thing about conventions is that I always get sex from at least one “die-hard” fan, and at the very least fans are cheaper than pros.

I can thank alcohol once again for taking my mind off the hell I’ll be experiencing come the first weekend of April, and for giving me another delightful birthday stupor.

I barely remember what I’ve been up to since Sunday, but I’m used to blacking out for hours at a time. Drinking myself into a forgotten oblivion has been my birthday tradition since I turned eighteen, when my well-meaning and entirely liberal parents decided to welcome me into legal adulthood with an entire bathtub of assorted alcohols. They had decided that if I was old enough to get drafted for my country then I was old enough to drink. To them, dying in a military squad and slurping spirits were just different forms of the same thing: getting wasted.

Really, I never stopped drinking. Never had to. I had no friends, did well enough in school, and was discovered for my artistic and story-telling talents before I had to consider college. Paisley buys me the programs and the tools, and I teach myself the magic tricks. The cunning bastard even turned my lack of an artistic degree into a decent advertising technique. Telling the world how amazing it was that I developed these skills all by my lonesome was an effective way to get my name out into the open.  My twenty-first birthday arrived and I discovered I could afford all the booze I wanted.

Mom and Dad are so proud, though they wish I would call more.

So I don’t know how many celebratory shots I knocked back or how many birthday bottles I’ve downed this year, but it was enough to keep me totally inebriated for three days. A wonderful feeling, worth all the hard work it takes to keep intoxication going that long. There are shitloads of factors and consequences to be considered. You have to think about personal levels of tolerance, the amount of alcohol in every drink, how to prevent hangovers, retain nutrients… And let’s not forget just how much alcohol costs. Living off booze for three days is an insanely expensive and unhealthy tradition. That’s why I only do it once a year.

I don’t refer to myself as an alcoholic because I know I don’t deal with an addiction. I honestly never need the stuff. Every drink is a choice. I just happen to want it quite often, though in small amounts. Very rarely do I drink enough to send my memories down the proverbial drain, so it’s official that turning twenty-two will always hold a special place in my cocktail-pumping heart. This was the first year I transcended drunkenness and lived in a blissful trance, falling in and out of conscious thought for hours on end.

It’s a shame I have only vague memories of the last three days, though. Apparently I did something exciting.

See, my neighbor is furious with me. I was too far gone to focus when the pitiful woman confronted me, and I was more concerned with holding in my vomit than with hearing what she had to say.

Something to do with killing her cat? I don’t know, I’m still hard-pressed to care.


OOO OOO


His breakfast of imported palinka had blurred and watered his vision, and Wendell had to lean into the door jamb just to keep his legs steady as the colors of morning swirled bright and dizzying. The glittering green of fresh dew on the grassy field of his front yard, the blues and white of a cotton-sprinkled sky, the casual hues of faraway homes on the hillside combined with the crisp scents of cold, clean air. A crippling sense of nausea cinched his stomach as the dayspring assaulted Wendell’s already dulled senses. He let out a bubbling gasp of a burp as the tiny woman standing on his porch scowled at him with her own pair of swollen red eyes, enflamed by hours of weeping.

Wendell knew the bare minimum about Helena Nowles; only as much as everyone else in the upscale neighborhood knew, which happened to be quite a lot because of how she allowed her cat to prowl around. Everyone wanted to complain about the barbaric way her precious pet left bird carcasses on their sidewalks and howled like a beast through the night, but they knew better than to bother the poor widow. After all, who wanted to be the bad guy and complain about the only love left in the life of the forty-something year old lady whose husband passed from chronic liver failure only a year ago? Wendell had never gone to her to complain about the tiger-striped nuisance that yowled and pissed at his door; when that cat angered him, he did something about it. Usually something violent. And Mrs. Nowles came complaining to him about the poor treatment of the practically feral animal every time. Wendell caught himself wondering whether other distant neighbors sometimes secretly cheered him on before remembering that he didn’t care if all his neighbors were blown to hell. He was a shut in who wouldn't be bothered with the welfare of the neighborhood (and that was all well and good, because the people who lived around him were generally displeased by the existence of a famous macabre comic book writer in their own little Pleasantville), and he was fine with everything as long as no one else disturbed him. But Mrs. Nowles’ disturbed him, as did her cat, so when he felt particularly annoyed Wendell would do anything and everything in his power to return the favor.

But this Wednesday morning Wendell couldn’t recall doing anything to Mrs. Nowles or her cat that would warrant an early and tearful confrontation.

Mrs. Nowles’ light hair hung dingy and unkempt around her shoulders, her horn-rimmed glasses slightly crooked on her sharp nose. She was wringing her hands as though struggling to collect the strength to get her accusations off her chest. She had the appearance of one who normally tried very hard to hide her wrinkles, but depression had taken a firm hold of her and aged her ten years overnight. Wendell tried to ignore the way her thin lips pursed at his insobriety. Not my fault my liver’s still healthy, he thought with a tiny hiccup, remembering how much her husband’s passing had torn her apart. She'd obviously never had any fun in her life and was simply jealous that he could drink guilt free. It occurred to him that it might be funny to offer her a martini, and he grinned stupidly, but before he could invite her inside Mrs. Nowles spoke.

“Freya is dead, Mr. Haydn.”

Wendell squinted his eyes at her, confused. “What?”

“My cat, Mr. Haydn, had to be put down this morning. Freya was suffering from blunt force trauma and acute organ failure and had to be put down.”

She looked at him imploringly, searching for a reaction, but Wendell had none to offer.

“So?” he asked as he scratched the three-day old stubble that now adorned his cheeks. He shrugged at Mrs. Nowles’ dumbstruck stare and added, slurring, “I mean, good riddance to the fleabag, but why the fuck would you bug me about this?”

“Because, Mr. Haydn, I saw the way you treated her.” Mrs. Nowles fought to keep her voice steady, redness filling her already withered features. “You would hit her and kick out at her and throw things at her when she had done nothing wrong! And I’m certain that Freya’s trauma came from an injury you inflicted!”

Again she paused just long enough to get a reaction and again Wendell disappointed her.

“Got any proof?”

Her mouth fell open and she stuttered, “E-Excuse me?”

“If you don’t have any proof then you need to get the fuck off my porch.”

Mrs. Nowles gaped at him. “I saw you kick her! Her ribs were broken and she had internal bleeding! You attacked my cat and you will suffer the consequences!”

“Lady…” Wendell sighed and closed his eyes, unable to ignore his nausea. This conversation needed to end, now, before he hurled on himself. He pressed on as quickly as he could, his rapid-fire words stunning Mrs. Nowles into appalled silence. “If you don’t have any proof then all I have to do is deny your claims and my life goes on while you continue to look like a lonely old bitch. Now I’d offer you a drink to take your mind off your fucking cat but I’m afraid it’d be a waste of perfectly good booze. You’d still have a stick up your ass, still bother me with your bullshit, and I bet it’d be an insult to, to… What was the guy’s name? Henry? Harry?"

“Hector.” Mrs. Nowles' voice shook with fury.

“Yeah, him. Shame he never taught you how to party. He drank himself to death right?”

“Hector died because of his severe hepatitis you – ”

“Anyway he’s dead, like your cat, and you should get over it before you completely kill my buzz.”

Wendell thought this was enough. That draining speech of slow and garbled insults certainly felt like enough; his addled brain pounded and his stomach clenched with every deep breath he sucked in. He waited for Mrs. Nowles to turn on her heel and march her sagging ass off his property, but the widow simply gaped, aghast. He fidgeted and gasped as his throat suddenly dried, readying itself for the upheaval of his gut. He could not stop himself, and she could not step back in time. Suddenly he curled forward, seized his belly, and vomited all over Mrs. Nowles, who yelped and cringed. Wendell gagged and coughed, acidic peach and apricot flavor of his palinka spewing forth, and she let out a little whimper as he straightened and wiped his chin clean of phlegmy spittle. He cleared his throat while Mrs. Nowles glared, horrified, with her hands in the air as though afraid to touch herself.

Wendell groaned. “God damn, Lady…You are a waste of booze. Do you have any idea how expensive imported palinka can be?” He coughed again and turned to retreat into his home as Mrs. Nowles’ eyes welled with tears. “Get the fuck off my porch.”

He slammed the door and stumbled down the hallway, ignoring Mrs. Nowles' sobs.


OOO OOO


What bothers me is that if I really did do something to her cat, I can’t remember it. If I can’t remember doing it, how can I prove that the little shit deserved it? I know myself, and I know I wouldn’t have lifted a finger if the cat didn’t already have it coming.

In any case, I can’t stand interruptions to my alcoholic endeavors. I’m a private sort of person, I know, and how much I drink is going to make this sound even more ridiculous. But after today’s events I feel I have to make a confession here.

I already mentioned that I’m enough of a lightweight to keep my memories after binges. Whenever I take the time to sober up, I look back on my behavior and actions, and I discover something new about myself. But more often than not, I discover something I don’t like. When drunk, I’m capable of becoming a total idiot, no better than any other addicted moron. I can deal with the nastiness; I have no problem with being mean to others (similar with the cat situation, I snap at people when they deserve it). But alcohol numbs something in me, dulls a kind of light I take pride in. Alcohol makes me feel almost empty, and after the effects of my drinks wear off I’m forced to wonder why I submit myself to that kind of hollow misery every week.

I don’t like myself when I’m drunk because I know I’m capable of…something. I can feel it lingering inside me, and I need to know what it is. And why, when I want to know so badly, do I continue to drink and suppress it? Even now, as I write this, I have to acknowledge just how little I must know about myself.

This has disturbed me since the beginning of my career, when I became Felix Haydn. I’ve thought countless times about whether or not I’d been robbed of myself by using that pseudonym, by being known only as that pseudonym. Felix is loved. Wendell is nobody. Which is the real me? Is the real me what’s hiding in the shadowed wings of my subconscious, waiting for the drunken haze to clear the stage? What will I see, then, when the spotlight hits them?

I really have no idea right now. I’m still a bit drunk. But it may be worth investigating.