the lonely hangover

Eevery morning, the hangover awoke, feeling itself pulled into being from the gluey abyss of its creator’s brain. Every morning, just about the time its creator got up to take a shower, it would feel itself emerging from the very heavy, black matter that existed in the back of the subconscious, just behind the trash can and the mysterious puddle of oil. Every morning it felt the same way.

“I am miserable,” the hangover said. “My life is a completely desperate affair.”

You see the hangover had recently gone through a rather devastating break-up, with another hangover.

This had been about a month ago, but the pain was still fresh. The hangover simply didn’t know how on earth it was going to continue living. It only knew that it must do this, because it could not die.

“If only my existence were not under the control of another living thing.” the hangover often moaned, “I would gladly take my own life.”

The fact that this was not a life, as such, was pointed out to the hangover by its therapist.

“You mustn’t take Stephen for granted,” said the therapist. “Stephen is the only reason you’re here.”

“I know,” the hangover said—for Stephen was the man to whom the hangover belonged.

“Now I know what you’re doing. You’re thinking bad things about Stephen. You’re thinking that if it wasn’t for him, you wouldn’t have to emerge each morning and go through this agony. You could have a nice, long sleep. But I’m going to stop you right there.”

“Right where?” said the hangover.

It was really no use. The hangover wanted to kill Stephen. It knew this was the wrong impulse, but nothing mattered anymore. Since being dumped, all the hangover could possibly think about was putting an end to its creator’s life.

“Perhaps,” the hangover thought, “I’ll strike when he’s in the shower. Yes, I’ll do my worst to him when he’s just woken up, all weak and sleepy. I’ll pound at him and make his stomach lurch and the pain will be so bad that he’ll just have to commit to never, ever drinking again.”

But this plan, despite being well thought-out, never seemed to work on Stephen. Either Stephen was very resilient, or he just didn’t give a shit. Each morning the hangover felt itself hurled once more into the terrible reality of life, and each morning it knew that it must finish its natural course on this earth, bound to Stephen’s whims and weaknesses. This was always a grave disappointment, as the hangover realized it might never have been born at all.

All hangovers come into being for different reasons. Most, belonging to carefree owners of a certain age, live a brief, exquisite life, and fade away in time. With maturity comes the hangover’s gradual obsolescence, until it is suddenly and all at once gone, with barely a trace to distinguish it from the memory of a past headache or flu. but some hangovers— such as Stephen’s—last a lifetime. Each day they are dragged away from the precious womb of sleep, beaten into existence, forced to perform their terrible tasks, pricked by anger into making their creator’s lives a mist of pain and regret.

Now Stephen’s hangover wasn’t usually given over to such extremes. It considered itself a rather reasonable hangover and thought that perhaps this was the reason that Stephen had allowed his own habits to go on for so long. Stephen’s hangover was mostly gentle and kind to him, nudging him awake with a gentle thump, and then a nausea, quickly soothed by the shower, and then a lurching dizziness, and a hunger, and a pang, and then it was done. Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing too elaborate. Stephen’s hangover made sure not to be too grating or obscene, out of respect for Stephen. But lately, in the thrall of this new, deep depression, the hangover felt that its term of kindness was at an end.

“I must do something,” it said to itself one late afternoon, in its final flicker of consciousness.

The hangover awoke with Stephen the next morning like clockwork. Stephen got dressed, and the hangover made sure to make its effect on Stephen’s body especially severe, so that when Stephen undressed, he would see the sad paunch of his stomach, growing rounder and more shapeless by the day, with repulsive pockets of cellulite around his lower belly. He would be sure to see the deep, cave-like hollows of his under-eye region, which once lent to his face a distinguished Vincent Gallo look, but now made him look like he had risen from the dead. The hangover made certain that Stephen would take note of all this, and more. It created a dizziness intended to floor him, a nausea to rival that of early pregnancy, a repulsion at the thought of food so severe that it would lead him not to touch a morsel for the entire day.

Of course, this ended up backfiring, since Stephen’s response was to drink heavily on an empty stomach, mumbling, “hair of the dog!” with each shot, and lo and behold, the next day the hangover reemerged, and its Sisyphean dance was resumed.

The next day, the hangover’s therapist advised a different route.

“You’re making this all about Stephen,” it said. “This is about you.”

Yes, the hangover thought. It is about me.

The hangover spent the rest of the day thinking of all the many ways that this was true. It thought about the past six months of its life that had passed by in a dizzy whirl—first meeting its mate, then falling in love, then losing them, then trying to understand, then accepting that it was alone now, possibly forever. All of it had been too much to take in properly. and Stephen, meanwhile, that idiot, had been completely unaware of all of it, just going about his business as usual, drinking each evening and blacking out each night.

“If only I could black out,” the hangover thought.

And then the hangover had a brilliant idea.

In the back of Stephen’s mind was the rather filthy gutter of gray matter from which the hangover was pulled each morning. It was usually in a state of disrepair. Near the trash can and the mysterious oil puddle, there could usually be found a small collection of nips, left over by some bum who had been there the night before. The hangover collected these and drank what little amount was left in each of them to create inside of itself a tiny but incredibly potent mystery cocktail. and it did the trick.

When the hangover woke the next morning, it had a hangover of its own. And this hangover, far from being thrilled at the task of tormenting one of its own, one who should have known better, threw itself into action with a fury unparalleled among hangovers.

You see this hangover was currently in therapy for anger management.

“This is the last straw!” it screamed in its therapy session the next day. “The last fucking goddamn straw!” and it chucked a full vase across the room, where it broke into several wet pieces.

And its therapist sighed and said under his breath, “God help us all.”

the yam that was loved

Ever since she was a child, she had wanted her own pet. Everyone said it was too much responsibility.