City Escape.

I'm sitting on my bed, chain smoking out the only window in my tiny New York City apartment into the solid black night - the only lights that shine are those of the Manhattan skyline off in the distant west. I live in Brooklyn. I live in the only four-story building on my block that is not a brownstone across from Walt Whitman's old house. The floors sit on an angle so none of the furniture I have placed against the wall actually touches it and there is a radiator in the middle of the floor that I've awkwardly squeezed between my full-size bed and portable closet.

I'm waiting for the boy of my dreams to come over. It's 9PM and I have a cold and I'm drinking coffee... wishing the time would go faster so I could pop this expensive bottle of red wine I bought for us. I've already drank two Hot Toddys today and I'm wondering whether or not my alcoholism will catch up with me again. I spent a dry eleven months which began in Sarasota, Florida and ended in my living room in Brooklyn listening to old records with the aformentioned boy. He was there when I hit rock bottom and there when I decided to get sober. It's only fair that he should be there when I decide to relapse. I suppose it's only a relapse if you decide to get sober again. AA is not for me. Not for me, right now.

I've only had one embarrassingly bad night since I've began drinking again, where I got on-stage at a high-profile play reading at the Players Club in Gramercy Park to read the numbers on a raffle ticket. I snickered through the whole boring ordeal until intermission where I blasted out of the joint into a blackout, leaving my scarf and sunglasses behind, like some misshapen Hollywood starlet. I came to in a taxi-cab where I was yelling at the driver for ripping me off. All around me horns blew as we waiting to go over the Brooklyn Bridge. I do know that he tried to keep two dollars which he probably deserved for putting up with my bratty attitude, but other than that, I don't know if he purposely put us in traffic or not. Either way, this is New York. I found another cab after fifteen minutes of teetering in my heels on the street and got home swiftly and safely.

I should mention that I was wearing a ridiculously low-cut one-piece bathing suit underneath a long, flowing black skirt with a light sweater that evening, and that is probably why I caught a cold in the first place. I've been out of work for four days and I'm considering just never going back. If only it were that easy. If only I had rich parents who would support my dream that changes every other day.

I suppose I should start at the beginning. I suppose I should start with the rape and how that cataclysmic event sent my life into an entirely different direction and ended me here, sitting at my window, sniffling snot into the night sky, listening to Everclear, and wondering if I should try and eat something substantial before the evening really begins.

I haven't written a thing in well over a year. So. Here it goes.