Ticking Time Bomb
Jeremy was experiencing internal conflict, he just couldn’t control his emotions anymore. One minute he was crying his eyes out listening to the “Sound of Silence” on his shattered iPhone wailing in his truck in the driveway and the next he would be threatening the cashier at McDonald’s for forgetting to give him a straw. He changed his clothes about once a week and always smelled like Blue Spirits, which he chain-smoked in the pick-up lane at his daughter’s high school. He and his wife hadn’t had a civil conversation in years, and he had no urge to spend time with her. He didn’t want to be loved by his wife or worshiped by his children anymore. Jeremy only wanted two things. To be alone and for his head to stop hurting.
Over time, he had fallen into this routine. He spent the nights awake creeping around the house. The sixty-year-old single story had only hardwood floors and the creek of the floorboards and the ringing of the bell on the chow’s collar was the background noise in the children’s nightmares. Jeremy walked through the house examining it as if it was a museum displaying his consequences. He would leave the second living room full of the furniture used for decoration and slide the wooden door to enter the hallway leading to the children’s rooms. He walked by his son Leo’s room and stared at the white wooden door leaning against the wall. He thought about fixing the hinges but decided it was best to just replace the damn thing. Jeremy didn’t peek inside because he knew his son wasn’t home. Sneaking down the hallway that led to his daughter’s room, he smelt the aroma of weed and lemon-scented Lysol, noticing her light was still on. Walking towards the door, he tripped over a rug and heard a gasp. The lights went out, and he heard the click of the door as it locked. As he was leaving, he swore he heard counting, as if she was counting how many steps he took before he was gone.
Later in the night, he would go to the kitchen and pour mounds of sugar into a plastic Little Mermaid bowl and eat it over the sink, listening to the howls of coyotes out in the fields. Jeremy had no appetite during the day and after years together with his wife, her recipes he used to fantasize about during the long work days now had no flavor. After about three or four bowls, he made his way and plopped on the genuine brown leather couch he bought with his disability back pay. Turning on the TV, he changed the channel to CNN and began yelling at the reporters. His yells echoed through the house, but no one dared to approach the beast while enraged. If he took one or two of the blue ovals, this would go on for several hours until he was worked up, he’d begin to tire himself out. His snores were so loud, but to his family, this meant he was down for the count, and they would be able to eat a quick breakfast before he would wake up and wreak havoc.
He usually started the morning walking the property with his dog. Originally, this was a gift for the family, but he told himself the dog was his emotional support. The problem was Jeremy had no urge to take care of anything and found the repetitive tasks of taking the dog out to pee and changing the food bowl annoying. He told his family that the dog would help calm him down and that he would have fewer “outbursts.” But, the dog pissed him off with the whining and panting, and it turned out to be another thing Jeremy thought he wanted but ended up disappointing him. The only reason he spent so much time with his dog was because he liked to talk to himself and somehow talking to a dog looked less concerning. Jeremy would ramble about everything on his mind and try to remember his story because in his head the pages were now blank. He’d ramble about his days in the service and how it built character. This was usually followed by a PTSD moment, and he would scream about bombs falling down on him.
Sometimes he ranted about his children and sometimes they heard him. His daughter’s room had a sliding glass door that led out to the pool, and she could sometimes hear him go off.
“Well, I guess you’re more like me than you thought!” he yelled, examining the roaches in the ashtray on the patio. There was no response.
After walking the dog, he’d usually take the pickup down the road to the local donut shop where he’d get a black coffee and talk the ear off the cashier who spoke very little English but always nodded politely. Jeremy would sit with his coffee on the bench outside and smoke two Blue Spirits reading his Yahoo news. Usually, after that, he’d drive to the filling station to work on his truck. After he totaled two trucks, his doctors told him he shouldn’t be driving, but he felt his truck was all he had. He vacuumed the felt red seats at least once a week and spent hours scrubbing the exterior and adding modifications. He’d always had manual labor jobs and enjoyed working with his hands. However, the nerve damage was bad, and he often burned himself and wouldn’t feel it, causing even more damage. Usually, after a few hours, he would admit defeat and make his way back home.
The rest of the day was spent getting increasingly more and more high. If his family was home he’d stick to the devil’s lettuce, but if he had a few hours to himself, he’d go in the closet and grab the pink shoebox, move the tissue paper, and pull out an orange bottle with the blue ovals. Jeremy wasn’t good at making new friends, but he was great at finding a dealer. After living in California for a little over a year, he met this guy, Ted, at the vape store cleverly named WESELLVAPES. Ted was a single dad and stereotypical surfer dude with sandy blonde ringlets and badly done tattoos from the ‘90s. Ted also was the best dealer in the area and after his doctor stopped prescribing the blue ovals to him, Ted was more than happy to play doctor. They weren’t friends, but they were friendly.
“Jeremy my dude! This new stuff I just got will blow your mind! I took it before surfing the other day and had an out-of-body experience, man.” Ted always had a sales pitch.
Jeremy hated how “California” Ted was. Jeremy hated everything about California and repeatedly told his wife how much he resented her for moving them back to her home state. He hated the “radicals” ruining the country with their backwards politics. He hated the crowded beaches and the hot sand sticking to the sweat on the skin. But most of all, he hated how expensive it was. His family was living off his social security check and, even though they didn’t pay rent, the money in the account at the beginning of the month only lasted a few days after paying the bills and setting some aside for the substances he’d purchase each week. Jeremy justified hiding some of the money from his family by telling himself his addiction made him “tolerable.” If he was sober, the pain in his head would worsen and the voices would get louder. So he made sure he was hardly ever sober. Jeremy would be stuck in the clouds all morning and crash in the sun around noon. His family never woke him, and it was honestly the only time they were able to leave the property without getting questioned or screamed at. His naps would last a few hours, and he’d wake up in a cold sweat with blurred vision. He often had nightmares and wrote them down in a note app on his phone.
Nightmares this week:
Running through the desert. Shirtless with a gun in hand. I’m dizzy and overheated. I fall to my knees, and I’m approached by a face so uncanny…it’s Dad. I shoot. I miss.
Laughing with my buddies in the Army. Our base is attacked. Gunshots went off for several hours.
My bike is stuck on the tracks again. This time it didn’t start. I only see bright light and hear the shriek of the wheels.
In the evening, sometimes he chose to have dinner with his family. His children hardly ever joined them, but his wife, Marilyn, always made sure food was made each night, even if it wasn’t eaten. He found this pathetic. Cooking him meals he no longer found appetizing, waiting for her “good girl,” acting like the chow. If he sat and ate it was never for very long and his wife usually said something to piss him off. But, the fighting meant he didn’t have to stay. He sometimes started arguments for the sake of being able to leave. Jeremy knew this made his wife anxious, but it kept her submissive. Even after being verbally abused for years, she still got up each morning to do his laundry and clean his house. And if Jeremy was forced into having a long conversation with his wife, he learned over the years how to drown her out. Jeremy thought about leaving her but knew it would be inconvenient. He was now decaying and disabled. No woman would want him, so he had to keep the one who was still obedient. That and he liked the idea of having children but wasn’t going to take care of them or give them the attention his wife did. Leaving wasn’t an option. He was stuck in this hell he created for himself. He resented everyone, including himself. Jeremy lived the same day over and over. Impatiently waiting for the time bomb in his head to explode.