A Dream Deferred

Not Ideal

"What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore—

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over—

like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?"

— Harlem by Langston Hughes

*   *   *

The subway rattles and clangs as it speeds down the rail. The sickly fluorescent lighting hurts my already tired eyes, but I continue looking down at my phone anyway as my music plays in my earbuds.

It wasn't exactly ideal given that my head hurt as though somebody had hit me with a sledgehammer, but what are you gonna do? You make do. At 5 AM, I was on my way home from yet another late shift at the Old Tar Bar where I worked as a bartender. Another situation that wasn't ideal. I had no idea why the place was called "Old Tar" and quite honestly, I didn't care to find out. It was only a necessary evil. Bartending at night gave me the freedom during the day to work on my life's work. Like many of my fellow delusional creatives, when I had money, I packed up my stuff and moved across the country, leaving the comfort, or I guess lack thereof, of my home in Colorado for the bright lights and dirty streets of New York in hopes of making a name for myself as a writer.

Listen, I wasn't entirely delusional. I wasn't expecting to become an instant success or anything. I know better. But did I want to strike it big like Stephen King and write something so good that it was made into movies or a tv show? Of course. Did I think I would become famous and rich beyond my wildest dreams? Probably not but you can bet your ass I would try. 

Like the others, when I first arrived in New York, I found the cheapest studio apartment I could find. It wasn't easy and, if I'm quite honest, I'm not even sure how I found the antique building tucked away behind some Russian deli place that always reeked of salami. It wasn't the most glamorous place but I knew that this was the way to do it; Pay my dues and all that shit. Apparently, this place was practically a right of passage for new transients looking to make it big as each apartment was filled with some other young, and some not-so-young, hopefuls.

Each floor has about twelve inhabitants, with six on either side of the ancient stairwell separating them, and a bathroom on either side, with each side sharing one bathroom. Each floor, I found, contains different types of hopefuls. On my floor, there are two musicians, three actors, one makeup artist, and another writer. My side of the floor consists only of an annoying actor by the name of Pete and the makeup artist, Yuri. Yuri isn't too bad. Like the rest of us, she holds down a daytime job while honing her craft after work, and taking up random gigs on her weekends to gain experience. She works at some big-name makeup store, giving makeovers to tweens and Karens, but I can't remember which one. 

Shortly after I had moved in, we ran into each other in the cramped mailroom on the ground floor at the entrance. I was struggling to open my mailbox with the shitty key the landlord had left in a stained envelope tucked under my apartment door. She came over and showed me the stupid little key jiggle I had to do to get the key to cooperate. Long story short, we got to talking and she invited me over for coffee.

Our other neighbor, Pete, was a bit more of a nuisance with his frequent visitors occupying our only bathroom every morning, usually hungover. It was usually this time I would be impatiently waiting outside the bathroom door with my toiletries, anxiously glancing at the time on my phone while he would saunter out of his apartment, hair askew and wearing nothing but some worn plaid boxers and a lazily tied bathrobe, as he went to check the mail. He'd return as his guest exited the bathroom, clutching her various items to her chest as she muttered an apology before scuttling past me. They never returned to his apartment, as he would head back inside and shut the door behind him with little regard for anybody else. When Pete wasn't out auditioning for various minor roles or out prowling the night clubs for new "talent" (as he so charmingly referred to them), he was a waiter. He wasn't a good one, however. By the time I moved into the building, he had already been fired six times from various restaurants across the city. How he kept getting hired was beyond me.

The rocking of the subway makes my eyelids feel heavy, but I try my best to remain awake. Though I am the only one in the car, I have learned early on that it is always wise to stay awake, especially when traveling alone. You never know when somebody else might suddenly appear and catch you unawares. That has happened once, but I don't care to talk about it, and we'll leave it at that – just don't.

Luckily, we slow as we reach my stop. With a sigh, I rise from my seat and wait as the doors slide open before making my way back up to the surface. I am lucky, I guess. The subway station is a block away from my building, which is good since my legs are killing me, as they always do when I stand around for hours on end, listening to the drunken mumbles and stories of regrets and lost loves that frequently come with a couple of drinks in a dimly lit bar. 

The door to the building, a thick, antique-looking thing, creaks loudly as the old hinges protest. During my short walk from the subway, I think about checking my mail, but my body seems to be on autopilot as I trudge past the wall of mailboxes and up the stairs. Like the others on my floor, my apartment is very modest with a large, single room. As it's just me, I don't have any issues with it. In fact, I think it's easier since everything is close by. My full-sized bed, which I got from a Facebook marketplace ad for a cheap twenty dollars, sits against one wall, opposite my small kitchenette. In between the kitchen and what I guess you could call my "bedroom" is a threadbare sofa that I found on the curb the day I moved in. It served as my bed for the first month, but after waking up sore and feeling bruised every day, I paid the twenty and got some sheets and blankets from a nearby secondhand shop. It's not much, but it's home.

I once read that "inconsistency is a writer's greatest enemy". They explained to me that, like for athletes, the brain was a muscle, and like with any muscle, it needed to be worked otherwise it would atrophy. Because of this, every night, no matter how tired I was when I got home, I brewed some coffee, sat on my couch, and wrote as much as I could before I was no longer able to keep my eyes open. With money being tight, I couldn't afford a TV. At least, not if I wanted to be able to eat. I tried to tell myself that it would only be a distraction anyways.

When I left Colorado, I had been living with my mother recently. She had a habit of disappearing for days, sometimes weeks or months, leaving me to my own devices. Most of the time she'd be out with one of her poor choices of men, but she somehow convinced them to pay for our streaming services even though she was never home to watch them. I guess she figured that if she was going to be absent, I should at least have something to entertain me. She didn't count on not paying her electric bill and rendering the service basically useless. Once the electricity was shut off, I gathered the little money I had saved from my old part-time job after school and occasional babysitting gigs, then I quickly left. Now, I have only my writing and streaming platform on my phone to entertain me.

As I climb the stairs, I'm so exhausted that I don't even notice the light above flickering as it usually does. It's that type of tiredness where nothing seems real and time seems to stand still. This time, as I trudge through the door to my half-empty apartment, I don't even bother taking my earbuds out of my ears before flopping face down onto my bed, and I pass out immediately. So much for exercising my brain.