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The cacophony of pattering water from the shower was, to many, nothing more than man’s feeble attempt at orchestrating Earth’s natural craft. Such conservative principles were favourably abandoned with the planet they came from, thankfully, as the interstellar ship drifted along the gravitational current of the unexplored cosmos. Not even the rhythmic propulsion of the engine jets was satisfactory to the experimental musician. The sound was drowned out by the syncopation of each droplet hitting the floor. Some escaped the drain immediately. Others travelled along their own course as they trickled along the lanky body of the shower’s occupant. And still, not even the uniqueness of each droplet was enough to subvert it from its simplistic fate – to fall, and disappear forever.
From the other side of the automatic sliding door, the faint sound of classic blues blended in a balance with the perpetual stream of water. The sound quality was reminiscent of that of an old vinyl player, outdated technology, scratchy and slightly muted; a dusty disk was the only possible culprit. Or, perhaps, it could be chalked up to the vapour flooding the cramped room, swamping all senses besides scent with the warm smell of excess moisture. Everything balanced out on the inside, nonetheless. All possible elements existed in harmony. All except the solitary man, who stood stoically in the water pooling at his feet.
With a pop of the handle, the water ceased to run. An arm reached out from behind the dull shower curtain, blindly aiming for a scraggly white towel which hung from a low-placed bar parallel to the prismatic container. With a quick snag, the hand, along with the towel, disappeared behind the covering. Audible exhales, as if a strenuous activity was taking place, folded almost invisible ripples along the curtain, not yet strong enough to create a new patterned wave. Minuscule changes were irrelevant. Metal rings scratched against the high bar supporting the curtain. Pushed to the left, the revelation allowed for the man to emerge from the shower with two calculated strides.
He stared into the distance, eyes directed towards the ancient radio, with the impression that he could telepathically control the signals. Water dripped from his afro. Several drops were caught by the towel, which was wrapped around his slim waist to prevent him from looking down in shame at his nude figure. He loathed showering. It wasn’t the purely hygienic practice everyone swore it to be. Instead, it felt like indecent exposure, revealing things he wished to keep hidden not only from others, but himself as well. There was no sense in supposedly cleaning oneself through such a dirty act. Ultimately, he had avoided this irrefutable reality for so long that he became a putrid individual, both inside and out.
Sounds contorted. The slow swing beat of the music grew arrhythmic, to the point where it was no longer discernible among the insanity born from the repetitive splats of water against the dirty floor rag. All this time – at least a minute – the man never once blinked, never once reset his position. A living corpse. With a deadpan expression, he staggered towards the radio, sitting atop a wooden cabinet directly across from him, tucked into the left corner. His eyes remained fixed on the small red button – just maybe, he’d gain some form of celestial power to gain control of the little things, to make life just a tad more bearable. That wasn’t the case. He realised it would never be. Driven to insanity, the insipid man had become more rational than ever.
The melancholic tune faded with the draft of warm air wafting in the room. Only a prolonged sigh commemorated its disappearance. Colours miraculously sprang to in light of an auditory death; he could see the nauseating cream-yellow walls from his peripheral view, the blue embellishments of the nearby mechanized door, and the paleness of his usually tan knuckles as they tensed from his tight grip on the cabinet’s edge. Lost in apparent nothingness, he hadn’t noticed the minute shift in his stance. There was much he never paid mind to. There were equally many things he deliberately avoided confronting, because he knew that he’d exert more energy towards the pointless action than his maximum mental threshold. He had accepted that there was nothing he could do. Everything was far beyond his control. Merely a hair too far, just enough for it to miss the far-extending reach of his slender arm. Experience had made him more conscious of this reality, and yet the longer he lived – the more he experienced – the greater the derealization became.
Neither eye of his could observe the present. One had previously witnessed the morbid peace of death, never having moved on from that moment; the other forecasted a miserable future, something dark and unlivable. Either the prediction of his false eye held no depth, or it was mistaken not in prophecy, but in time. Possibly, this was already the present. The galaxy held more despair than beauty. He couldn’t step outside to admire the landscape as he could with a boundless garden on any planet he frequented, unless he wished for the cold to burn him until he grew numb to all physical sensation. That wasn’t the way he wished to go out. Not that painstakingly slow, at least. Frankly, there wasn’t much prediction when every night, the world was reset and he’d constantly relive the same day in a slightly different way. He was entirely convinced some days that the world had already ended, that he was finally dead, but was eternally cursed to be sent back to his final day, with no potential to reform its course, as a way of atoning for his inability to get over past qualms. Death could never be his sweet release. He’d inevitably find himself killed, slowly and painfully, by a memory’s chokehold, one of a long-lost lover.
His right hand slipped from the radio, pausing midair between the space of his torso and the cabinet’s edge, before he hesitantly let it take its place on his left side, just above the ribs. He prodded the spot meticulously, feeling the non-geometric contour send ripples of pain towards his back. Each prod let his fingers move like spiders, inching rhythmically as they crawled over the protrusions of his jutting ribs. Looking down to face the unsettling feeling head-on, whether he truly desired it or not, the size of his hand and its way of contorting obscured his general view of the area. He didn’t understand what brought him to conduct a physical analysis of his perimeter. It had been a while since he had eaten anything with more nutrients than excessive carbs and sodium, since he had caught a bounty generous enough for him to afford something appetizing. Or else, save enough money for his desired cause, knowing that his comrades were equally gluttonous. Despite this thought usually being enough to force a chuckle out of him, the man remained just as stone-faced as he was before. The water drying along his skin dried the remaining life force from his sickly body.
There was no possibility for him to continue with the examination. A pang of nausea washed over him. He would’ve run to the opposite side of the room, where the toilet was set, if not for the mirror hanging above the sink right nearby; if he were to catch sight of his reflection, he’d rather disappear with it the moment he’d blink. The man in the mirror would never be him. They’d share the same physique, the same characteristics, expressions, unnatural movements. But still, they’d be nothing alike. While he’d be riddled with ineffable emotions, the other wouldn’t. The other couldn’t. If anything, the thing was more akin to the shed skin of a venomous reptile that nobody dared to approach. Such was pardonable – he hadn’t the courage to approach himself either. He was scared of who he was. Not the man he had become, but the one he had always been.
Instead, he stayed put on the spot. While his legs couldn’t move, everything else could. He slowly reclined backwards until he felt his back hit something hard. Friction. It was something he experienced interpersonally, a numbing sensation he grew accustomed to over time. And yet, none of his prior experiences could prepare him for the harsh feeling of his back sliding jerkily along the cold bathroom walls. Physical friction felt disgusting in comparison to anything emotional, with no possibility of advance preparation to each unique prolonged touch. The peculiarity of the wall’s goosebumps-like texture gave him a moment to breathe, to think about something other than himself. What selfish thoughts he remained fixated upon. Self-centred fantasies of suicide and discreet disappearances, for his sole idea of comfort was the aftermath of perishing for good.
He was met with a gentle thud as the floor prevented him from sinking any lower. His legs were raised, knees bent, as if begging to be cradled in his arms and pressed close to his chest. One arm rested on the ground to support him – he felt as though he’d topple over without the anchorage, he was exhausted – while the other trailed towards his face. His eyes squeezed shut before his hand could get any closer, until his thumb and index fingers pressed against his eyelids to apply pressure to his nose bridge. Green specks were blotched among the black backdrop of his blindness. He winced from irritation, biting down on the inner flesh of his lower lip to prevent him from making any other noise. Men couldn’t cry. Vulnerability was prohibited. Furthermore, a suave man like himself couldn’t possibly allow himself to give way to the complicated, albeit stupid, nature of emotions.
Heaving a heavy sigh which made his whole chest tremble, he took pity on his eyes, letting his fingers outline the contour of his nose. He gave his sinuses a slight pinch along the way down. The action temporarily blocked out any odd mist which pooled at his eyes, not that there was anything at this moment, and cleared up most of the tension attacking his forehead. His fingers then met at the tip of his nose, halting his breath momentarily as they pinched his nostrils, wiping away the fluids collected from stress. His left eye closed in tandem, only reopening gingerly once his arm drew away from his face to wipe the nasal contents onto the towel’s coarse fibres. Another deep sigh interrupted the steady up-and-down motion of his stomach, upon which his hands were freshly placed. It was moments like these when he desperately craved a cigarette, something to smoke and keep his mouth occupied. Nothing prevented him from pretending, at least. His mouth formed a rough circle with his next puff, while his mind envisioned the thick cloud of tobacco-scented smoke escaping his lips.
The repeated inhales and exhales calmed the smoker’s nerves. Bad habit or not, it was his go-to method of guaranteed relaxation. His mind would drift with the smoke, travelling along gravitational currents until it would return with fresh ideas. None happened to be positive, though. His thoughts were no less rotten than his lungs, perhaps even the rest of his innards, and no matter how hard he’d try to seek closure in mental purification, nothing ever did the trick. Some invasive pest bothered him, belittled him, brought him to his wit’s end as it interrupted each of his internal monologues. Even now, his brain, merely a puppet to the specimen, was urged to shoot a glance towards the tub to his right; he should take another shower to clean himself. He was filthy. It would take at least two more washes to cleanse his exterior, and if he were to dunk his head into the sacrificial waters for a minute and take a deep breath of the liquid, his mind would be put at ease too. But if he kept it in longer…
Enough. He would lose his mind before he’d commit to any of those thoughts. Holding on by a shrivelled thread, worn thin from over-exposure to repulsive ideas, all he could do was yawn. It wasn’t late into the day according to the clocks, but it surely must have been over an hour since he settled within the lavatory. It was strange that nobody had beckoned him out of there; there had been occasions on which he had occupied the room for extended periods, normally when he’d be perched atop the toilet lost in thought or suffering from a brutal hangover. The action of recollecting made him even more tired. The chaos overwhelmed him. He used to attribute it to the music which consumed his senses – he had deliberately turned it off so he wouldn’t have to think – but he realised in his moments of paranoia that he couldn’t live without some background noise. It didn’t put his mind at ease, per se, but it allowed his mind to wander through bittersweet daydreams, the same few scenes he was able to envision. There was a certain element of romanticism to the journeying spirit.
There wasn’t any greater reason for him to stay in the bathroom, unless he hoped to confront his warped reflection. He could take care of grooming himself later, when his mental state was a bit more stable. Realistically, he could crash on the sofa and take a cat-nap for several hours, or however his heart desired, as long as he’d put on a few garments to make himself presentable in front of his peers. The lower drawer of the cabinet held the laundry basket, wherein he’d find some old clothes, maybe slightly wrinkled or with a small streak of toothpaste somewhere on the stomach area. To him, though, as long as the clothes didn’t smell, they were safe to wear, especially for home-lounging purposes.
He scooted himself towards the wall upon which the cabinet was lined, too lazy to pick himself up and squat down again. As the door opened, he saw the basket labelled with his name, a paper etched with the jagged print of an orange crayon. “Spike,” it read; the writing style was oddly symbolic of his name. Something about the minute remark helped ground him back in reality. Had he utterly lost himself in the midst of his tumultuous breakdown? His eyes flickered to and fro as he pouted, an expression looking more like an upside-down smile.
His knees supported him as he knelt, hovering over the basket while rummaging through his clothes. Most looked relatively clean, and none emitted any particular stench – he certainly wasn’t nose blind, as he could still smell the lingering odour of his semi-sweet shampoo throughout the room, most strongly concentrated in his thick hair. Among the pile of clothes in the monotone basket – and he made sure not to let the contents spill over the curved edges – he found the grey shirt he was searching for. If he had the guts to admit it, that shirt would’ve been his favourite of his casual attire. He tossed it behind him before going back for a second search, this time for the black shorts completing his outfit. It didn’t take long for him to find them, dragging them out of the mess with a half-disgusted pinch. He gave the shorts a shake, nothing came out. It was customary of him to give his bottoms a gentle shake to determine their wearing potential. To ignore the ritual was a way of welcoming omens of misfortune. He couldn’t afford any more of that.
Shorts in his lap, covered by the towel, he reached behind for the shirt he had cast away, putting it on quickly without any additional struggle. Even though it was thin, it sent a wave of warmth along his body; he didn’t realise how desperately he needed such a feeling at that moment. He rubbed his biceps to warm himself some more. A tingle ran down the man’s spine, causing him to shrug and throw his head back. An embarrassing habit of his, no doubt. After resetting his position, he rocked onto the balls of his feet so he balanced right on his toes, grabbing the shorts with a swift motion and holding them tightly in his grip. He wouldn’t need his hands for balance any longer – the movement he was about to make was an act he had performed many times, potentially nearing an infinite amount. His feet acted as a springboard, propelling him upwards in an energetic hop. Landing right on his feet, he felt the wrapped towel loosening around his waist from the motion, though he had deliberately kept a spare hand to keep the ends fastened.
He had minimal shame. From his tossed collection of prior attire, the clothes he had worn before showering, he snagged the pair of grey briefs, putting them on quickly as he let the towel drop to the floor. His single hand was quite dexterous; the other one wasn’t able to partake much in its additional task. From there, it took another two steps to slide into the pair of wrinkled shorts. While he’d usually wear a pair of socks, he appreciated the feeling of cold feet against the tiled floor, and the sound of him walking barefoot on the various floor textures. It also gave him the chance to kick the fallen towel for him to grab midair during its toss, as he scooped the remainder of his outfit and transferred the contents to one hand, so he could carry the bulk over his shoulder like a heavy piece of lumber.
With a nonchalant attitude, he sauntered towards the exit, instantly welcomed to the rest of the world he had long since been estranged from. He was a man of many mysteries, many skills. And still, he was a simple man. There wasn’t much to be said about him, his life, or experiences. He wasn’t secretive, just a little uninteresting. All the more reason not to disclose anything that had happened. Here or there. Then or now. In the end, nobody would care. As dismal as it was, it was no doubt also a great relief.
That alone put a smile on his face.