Slender Bones

Saturday, October 10th, 1992

After a fitful night, I opened my eyes and rolled over, looking at the clock. Seven-thirty.

"Ugh," I groaned, frustrated. I had the weekends off, usually, and it was Saturday. All I wanted to do was sleep in, once, like I used to. Was that so hard to do?

After my many attempts to go back to sleep failed, I kicked the coverlet away from my body and swung my legs over the side. I rubbed the sleep away from my eyes.

As I trudged into the kitchen, my cat, Polly, weaved in between my legs. She always knew when feeding time was, yet she couldn't remember to finish shitting before jumping out of the litter box. I scooped out her food and set it on the kitchen floor.

I had trouble falling asleep last night. After I picked up that tape, I spent the rest of the evening listening to it, side to side. The lyrics were almost captivating. The singer was crying, he was crying out for something. Attention, inattention, I couldn't tell.

I grabbed a jug of milk from my small fridge and uncapped it, pouring a fresh glass while reaching for the phone. I dialed Kathy's home number. She would probably be up by now.

"Hello?" Yeah, she was up. Her voice was groggy, though. I hoped I didn't wake her. I didn't care.

"Hey, it's Esther."

"What's up?"

I yawned into the phone before answering her.

"You said that Mr. Cobain is in Nirvana?"

"Yes. He's the frontman."

Question answered.

"Thanks, Kathy. See you Monday," I said, not waiting for her reply before I put the phone back down on it's receiver. My hunch was confirmed; that crying singer was Mr. Cobain. Good. I could start picking his brain before I even got to know him and his wife.

Now, what about his wife? Kathy had said that she made the appointment for her husband, and that it was urgent. Perhaps he refused to seek help on his own? Maybe she felt that there was something he was doing that was keeping them from moving forward in their relationship? I gulped down the last of my milk and took out a spiral notebook, jotting down my thoughts as I brainstormed.

Courtney Love was a name that rang some distant bell. Maybe she was a model or a producer? She was obviously famous because she didn't take Mr. Cobain's surname for her public image. She had a reputation to keep, and that reputation was not associated with Nirvana. At least, I didn't think it was. I couldn't jump to such hasty conclusions.

I jumped up from my seat at my desk and dug around in my bag for the Nevermind cassette. Found it. The tape was still in my car, but the sleeve was there. I pulled it out of the plastic and unfolded it. There was that picture of the swimming baby, the list of songs, and two pictures of the band. In one of them, a blonde man flipped off the camera. He was in the front in the other picture, too. I hated making assumptions in my research, but I had to assume that he was Cobain.

He, like his lyrics, appeared very combative yet elusive. His haphazard appearance denoted indifference, or the wish to be indifferent. I turned it over and found the names of his bandmates, but they made no difference to me. I was focused on him, for now.

After a few hours of brainstorming (with intervals of Looney Tunes), I had a pretty complete list of ideas that I could take with me to the library tomorrow. It wouldn't hurt to dig up what I could on the Cobains.

I went back to my car to retrieve the cassette from the stereo.