fade to gray (frank ocean)

pilot jones.

       12 something this morning, still at work. i was beyond ready to sleep, in all honesty. this was the sleepy hour in the diner; carpets had been vacuumed, tables cleaned repetitively, the windows so clean from both sides that you could see the neon red 'open' sign miles away. everybody was either by themselves doing an array of activities, mainly sleeping/trying not to, listening to music, or they were chatting amongst themselves. i of course fell into the lonesome category, but as it was, my flip phone was too ancient to really put music on and i was too tired to sleep. insomnia plagued me for years, so not being able to sleep was nothing new. it was from a mix of being a side effect of coke, and depression. 

"ay, jas, you alright?" butterscotch asked. "daydreaming again?"

"uh, no. too tired to sleep... wait, that's not something to tell my manager, is it?" i asked with a sly smirk.

"don't think so... but as your friend, i can say that i agree. i almost fell asleep myself."

"ah." i hadn't had conversation with anyone in a looong time, so i really had no clue what to say to her. 

"your hair looks nice, all twisted like that." she said at last.

"gracias, i could do yours sometime. i wouldn't charge."

       "hmm.... i'll take you up on that sometime." she smiled at me, then her phone rang. "just a second, mami. ay, emilio, que te gusta?" there was more rapid spanish that i didn't catch so i could tell you, but butterscotch didn't seem too happy with him. then, the look on her face gradually slid from steely and prideful to shocked with hateful brown ojos. "ay, no, not mi niño! no tocarlo, pinche monstruo. haz lo que quieras conmigo, pero no toca mi hijo." only spanish i knew was hola, taco, burrito and margarita but i knew she was begging this person not to do something about her little boy. "ok, fine. fuck you. goodbye." she hung up, then stormed off.

       i thought of running after her, but how she left gave off that 'i'm gone but i need someone to talk to when i get back' vibe so i let her be. something i picked up from Him was detecting vibes, really. He was an expert, and it seemed like He had the ability to read me like a book instantly after we'd been on the phone together for a month.

       "...your body's bangin', baby, your face is beautiful, and your vibe...ah, man." a low chuckle slithered from his plump, succulent lips, over to my ear through the reciever and made me involuntarily shiver, like he'd laughed directly in my ear and not that he was 18 minutes, 47 seconds away from me.

"why do you seem to love it so much, but other people are repelled by it?"

"why do some people need glasses and some people don't?"

       i had my answer, and my cheeks heated up. a smile made its way across my face. "never mind, baby." while i was thinking of something deep and cute to say back, janelle busted in my room without knocking. "hold on a second, lonny." my mood went from sunshine and rainbows to the ugliest, green-gray skies that you see before a storm, when the air is still and nothing is moving, just dead silence. "what." i spat this as more of a statement than a question, so i don't think that deserved a question mark.

       "oh, how cute, someone from the state of california is willing to talk to you, even after that stunt you pulled at the party a few months ago! since y'all are talking, i guess he can't be deaf," she gave me a tight-lipped, curt but sweet smile as she tore me down with nothing but candy coated cyanide in her tone, "is he blind? or...or..." she smirked, "can't get a man so you a lezbo now?"

       i knew better than to obey my hand, which was itching to slap the hell out of her, since the last time i did i'd gotten thrown out into the streets for about a month, left to the mercy of the homeless who'd been out here, roughing it longer than i'd been alive. i was thankful that they let me share their block, and they'd treated me better than this 'family' of mine ever had. i wish they'd taught me how to control how i felt naturally, but everybody was on the bottle, the needle, the bud, the powder, and sad to say, i was one of them, so my hormones were out of wack from trying to bounce back to normal. "no, he's not deaf, blind, or mentally ill. he ain't nothing that your little mind can comprehend, he too beautiful of a soul to be described."