Jim Gore

25 October 20XX

Convenience Store

FUNCTIONAL FANTASY

This place is surreal. It’s like a dream eating at me, secreting weakness, distraction, and a dulling, limitless patience. But then a customer walks up to me. And then I notice her appendages.

“Alright, that’ll be $14.97,” I say to her.

“Thank-you-thank-you!” she says. Notice her overgrown nails and stained skin. Look at it.

Gross, right? But still, I hand her the bag. I watch her walk outside, into the concrete abyss—the sprawling, suburban pit—and then she disappears. The sun has set. I already forgot her face.

We wait all night for nothing. Days are diseases and the sky rots until there’s maggots in its carcass. The music here is thin, nostalgic and disorienting. It destroys a perception of time and induces my simulated happiness, useful only to force a crude expression of politeness. Take it away, and the effect follows.

Look outside. Remove the fake grass, malnourished trees and bushes, and it’s all concrete. It’ll all be some day, and there will be no moon left to illuminate the world’s decomposition. Almost everywhere’s like this.

I bet they’re having fun. I missed club to reflect on a dead earth. I missed that cheap, scuzzy thing that’s the most I really care about. My patient disease keeps me waiting for an arbitrary end, and I just keep on saying nothing until we’re there. Silence feeds itself. Witness my contribution.

The meeting started two hours ago; I punched in about two hours ago. I imagined mobility would make for more exciting things than going to work or a Japanese club. But what more excitement is there to find here? There’s not even sidewalks outside. You are trapped; I am trapped; no one wants you going anywhere. Domestic slaves prevent your escape out of fear of being alone.

The moon is watching. I spit in her liquified eye.