TMB (XII): From One Joint To The Next

Were a couple of drinks we eventually downed. But what could you do – we just got carried away. Sometimes I wondered how a bunch of happy drunks could run an organisation like ours and yet succeed in doing so. Only, of course, until I remembered that most of the guys had an iron frame, fist and constitution right underneath that happy-drunk-appearance. And literally so.

I wasn't one of the iron-fisted. I was on board for my brains, or so I told myself. Could also have been the sheer luck I sported from time to time. If so, luck had deserted me recently.

When I left the office, the stars had already come out. They shone across the sky with a dignified standoffishness. Even scared the moon off. Well, perhaps he'd show his face later. Perhaps not. I had different things on my mind, I decided.

It was too late to believably get a taxi to the industrial area, so I walked for two miles to the rim of the suburbs and then called a cab from my mobile. I could have asked one of the guys to take me that far in one of their cars, but it hadn't appeared to me. Just like it hadn't appeared to me to ask Judy another time for the fucking telephone number. I was just about to dial her up when the taxi arrived. So I skipped the call for the time being and stepped in and stated my address. On second thoughts, I shouldn't have done so. Should have stated my usual next-block-street. Just to be on the safe side. But I was tired. It had been a long night, and it had been a long day. I was as tired as some bear, awakened from hibernation three months ahead of the schedule. That's what I felt like: as if I was trapped in the wrong existence, some other life, some other time, feeling perfectly like my own, but feazing already at the seams. At second thoughts, I cancelled my destination and directed the taxi to one of my favourite bars. It was a small, cosy, customary place, nothing special, nothing extraordinary, but clean, cheerful and understated, just as I liked it. Sure, I'd already had my fill, but these were special circumstances. The taxi driver just nodded, changed gears and course and delivered me within fifteen minutes. Smooth going, if I'd ever seen one. I paid my fare and stepped out into a light drizzle – no more stars, and no moon either, just a by and by slightly overcast sky. The driver took the tip, nodded again and off he went. Never would have thought I'd see the guy again, and under such circumstances. You never knew.

Next to the bar, there was your typical neighbourhood tobacco corner shop. I entered there first and bought my first pack of cigarettes in five years. I only returned twenty seconds later to buy a lighter.