get lost

You decide to ignore the small voice and scratch yourself.

As you start, the razor sharp hook that has apparently been installed where you had, until now, assumed your left hand resided, digs startlingly deep into your back and you fall to the ground in shock. Now that you are still, you become acutely aware of a ticking, what sounds like an egg timer, muffled but undeniable, originating in your abdomen.

You weigh the pros and cons of letting some cry of enlightenment slip your lips. An elongated "Ooooooooh, I get it," has an innocence and naivety that may bring you more pity from the owner of the scratchy voice*... though, given your recent seedy pursuits, you doubt people will look past your obvious guilt, caked heavily into the creases around your eyes. A more self-conscious, sarcastic mumble of "Eureka..." would have been smirkingly, if not gahuffingly, acknowledged as comic by the trust-fund deviled eggs you once referred to as your friends, and indeed there is a certain appeal to having your last utterance be something so ridiculous. After kicking around several more options, you decide your time is perhaps best spent selecting a religion and becoming a devout follower, which had been on your to-do list for some time, but was supplanted daily by the more pressing action item, "Take some time and do something nice for yourself."

As you slip into unconsciousness, you coin a term, and flip it (for lack of a penny), attempting to protect yourself from the responsibility of making the final decision between the Church of the Heavenly Wooden Sub-Subgenius, or Holistic Ramen Noodle Catholicism. It lands tails, but you forget which that corresponded to.

You hear a sharp belltone. "DING."

what do you do?

1. die

* license plate LT1 6V9, whose voice is double-parked and about to be towed

laura reimer