The messiest fever dream I’ve ever had just pulled me out of an afternoon’s nap to take myself out to the kitchen and open the fridge to reach for one of the water bottles I keep full in there against needing to take drugs without running the faucet and waking up the neighbors with clanking shuddering pipes or the sound of me choking in the pre-dawn.

Not that it’s necessary in broad daylight like this but old habits die hard.  Sometimes they even outlive you.

See, it’s possible that one day a subsequent occupant of this apartment might also have an afternoon fever dream and stumble into the kitchen to spot an ordinary-looking…thing…like a brown dry oak leaf clinging to their bare foot. They’ll try like hell to shake it off but it won’t budge. Panic will ensue and they’ll assume it’s some kind of flashback or the bad fish they ate for dinner last night.  They’ll medicate it away and pass out.  

It will happen a few more times. They will mention it to the landlord who will say, yeah, the guy before you mentioned that would happen now and then and we never figured out where it came from.  I’ll look for an exterminator who knows about these things. In the meantime stay hydrated. Try not to scream in the night if it happens. Try to hold on.  Let me know if it happens again. If it keeps happening.  If it happens more often.  If it never ends.