Friday, November 24, 2000 02:27 a.m. PST
three: the 4-way (conversation). [read previous chapters first!]

Wednesday, November 22, 2000 08:48 p.m. PST
two: the couple. (read previous chapters first!)

Tuesday, November 21, 2000 05:11 p.m. PST
one: the voice. in retrospect, it wasn't nearly so improbable as it initially seemed. I mean, once I got over the initial shock, the entire sequence of events made a lot more sense. the perspective I gained from speaking to friends and family about it helped me realize what a perfectly normal, everyday, non-deviant incident it was. still, for reasons which I hope will soon become obvious, I wished then and still wish now that it had never happened.

enjoying an uncharacteristic respite from the bitter rain and cold of the northern cali winter one friday morning, was what I was doing. if we need get specific about things, I was strolling down lomita drive back to my home, one of the reduced-rate apartment-style housing facilities adjacent to campus. the weather was gorgeous; it felt about 75° with wispy white cirrus high in the sky. basically, it was the kind of day I came to this part of the country to enjoy in the first place. I'd just picked up some various sundries necessary for independent living from a local convenience store, and to do my part as a card-carrying member of CALPIRG, I had decided to walk instead of drive. at the time I was looking at the palm trees thinking: 'goddammit, robert better not have eaten my portion of the leftover pizza. sonovabitch knows it's mine, but I bet he's gonna do it anyway. if he has, I'm gonna break my foot off in his mexican ass when I get home--' but wait, you don't know who robert is.

robert, a short mexican student with shoulder-length hair and a perennially tired facial expression, is my roommate. I met him last year in the dorm where we both lived, and at the end of the year we jointly decided to ditch dorm life and strike out on our own. usually he's a pretty reliable guy, with the following faults: 1) he's excessively negative, indiscriminately (or so it appears) dissing everything from his TAs to the government to 99% of TV programming. which brings me to my second point, 2): he has terrible taste in music. his tastes go all over the place, but remain concentrated in early- to mid-90s grunge and alt-rock. the complaint he most often levies against my music is that the production is thin (ok, granted. . .), the song structures aren't standard (well excuuuse me if I enjoy innovation!), and that it simply sucks (thank you lester bangs!). the last thing is 3) he always mumbles. people almost never understand what he says the first time, not even me. and he wonders why women preemptively shoot down his attempts to hit on them. but besides all that, he's a fairly tolerable specimen.

--so. mentally dissing robert for imagined slights: 'he's paying for dinner this weekend. I paid last weekend, but he'll probably deny it like always. bastard needs to get a job, and a haircut, and a fucking life, and--'

"deen!"

the walking continued. I learned two things when I was very young: one, that "deen" is a very rare name; and its corollary two, whenever I hear someone calling a name that sounds like deen outside my home, they're probably really saying "gene" or "nadine" or "teen" or something.

'and a woman. and a goddamn car, or that motorcycle he's always going on about--'

"hey, deen!"

I wasn't quite convinced at this point, so I kept walking, expecting that whoever was yelling out the long /e/ sound was probably addressing one of the other people in the immediate vicinity.

'that couldn't be who I think it is. no frickin' way. but just in case. . .'

I had to suppress the urge to pick up the pace of my stride; fortunately, the ambient noise from the construction crews, cars and people talking made plausible the possibility that I hadn't heard the person, who was from the sound of her voice, female. fortunately, I was closing in on my destination.

'ahhh, just a few more feet and I won't have to worry about--'

"deeeen!"

as soon as the door swung closed behind me, I bolted up two flights of stairs to my third-floor door, frantically scrambled for my keys, got the door open and locked it shut behind me. robert emerged from his room, looking even more frazzled and disarrayed than usual, and said, "dude, what's the matter with you? y'woke me up." he paused, no doubt scutinizing my visibly agitated demeanor. "what the hell happened to you?"

"I think a figure from my dark past may be following me." so I have a flair for the dramatic. sue me.

"god yer so. . . paranoid! you really need to calm the fuck down. what did you call that kind of weird psych thing, when you think everything in the world applies specifically to you?"

"delusion of reference," I said, calming down slightly, placing the bag of sundries on the coffeetable and easing onto the living room couch. "but that's not what this was. I swear, someone was calling my name out there. . ."

"yeah right. more likely they were saying, I dunno, 'thomasine' or something like that."

"well, whatever the fuck they were saying, it was weird, and I'm glad it's over. you didn't eat my pizza, did you? cuz if you did, I'll be so pissed I might--"

five quick raps at the door stopped my accusation cold.

"holysssshit."

"goddammit. here, I'll show you, it's prolly just a mormon or the landlord or. . . someone regular." robert started toward the door.

I jumped up to block his path. "no! just wait. they'll probably go away soon, and I bet it's no one important, I mean, you're not expecting anyone, are you?"

five more knocks.

"jeezus man, fine. no wonder you've never had a girlfriend." he walked into the kitchen, opened the fridge and pulled out the milk, turned around and spat out, "and you better pray that's not christine."

"now who's having delusions? you're worse than me."

"I'll kill you, you sonovabitch. after I finish breakfast." he began eating his frosted flakes.

"yeah, c'mon and try it. I'll hang you by your own hair, punkass." good. the belligerent yet harmless banter was calming me down. overhearers always think we're at each other's throats, but that's just how we relate. "yeah, maybe I was being a little ridiculous there," I said after a moment.

"yeh-ya think?"

"here, I'll just open the door and prove it to myself. yep, I'll just get up off this couch," and I did, "and see if whoever is still out there." by then it had been about 2 minutes since the first knocks, and I'd regained my head somewhat. I opened the door and looked to my left down the hall.

so much for ignoring my instincts.