DUMBACHE

‘YOU NEED TO figure out food for next week’ Margaret said to me early in the morning. I wanted a cigarette, some coffee, and to think about whatever it is that I think about. It’s not usually about food. I’m a coeliac and my relationship with food is odd. I’ve never eaten much, or well; because food has always seemed like a punishment to me. I hate walking to the store, hearing the awful music, standing in lines, and having to bear fluorescent lighting - then having to pay for food that will make me feel ill and walk it all home, and even then spend hours cooking it. I’d rather just draw a picture of Spider-Man and throw it in the bin than eat food sometimes. I live on sticks and twigs, pebbles and pieces of glass I find on the pavement.

“Ok” I replied.

“So, there’s two options, we order a delivery of food or I make a fish pie and a gluten free quiche over the course of the weekend and we split it up into containers and you can freeze it”.

“Sounds good”

“So, which one?”

“Um, I prefer your cooking” I replied.

“Ok, but I also wanted to make a beef ragou and I have to also make my own meals for the week.”

“Ok, let’s order the delivery then.”

“But…” said Margaret

“Well, why don’t we take option three and do the delivery and make the quiches too.”

“But you have no money.”

“Don’t manage my money” I said, “I’ll have some next Friday, and I’ll give it to you.”

“Ok” She replied and pulled the covers up.

I walked outside and had a cigarette in my mouth, a needle and some orange cotton in my other hand while I carried a dirty blanket I'd found that morning on my walk to the shops to buy cigarette filters. The lighter didn’t work. I walked back in and reached for a second lighter on the bedside chest of drawers and realised I already had a second working lighter in my pocket.

“Of all the lighters here, I picked up the one that doesn’t work; and when I came back in I realised I already have one in my pocket” I said to Margaret.

“Ok, so, what stuff do you want delivered?”

“Um, six of those pre-made meals and three that I’ll make myself”.

“Baby, that’s going to cost over $100.00”.

“Ok.” I replied.

“Baby, you don’t have any money.”

“Ok, let’s make the fish pie and quiche and beef ragou.”

“But baby, the ragou costs a lot to make too...”

“Um, ok.”

“Baby, you need food.”

“Yes, I suppose I do.”

Margret crossed her arms and exhaustion covered her otherwise fresh early morning face. We’d been laughing and smiling just minutes before.

“So, what do we do?”

“I don’t understand, haven’t we already solved this problem three times?”

“Well…” She said.

“Ok, I began "let’s just leave it to me; I can sort myself out. You have to go to work and I don’t think you have the capacity to think about yourself and me at the same time, and I don’t think you ought to either.”

Margaret’s face sunk even further and she shifted in the bed and once again pulled the covers around her. Her hair was red in the dim light and frizz had appeared where she had slept on it.

“Don’t do that baby”

“What?” She replied.

“That passive aggressive thing”

Margaret turned her back to me.

“Look, I’m going to have this cigarette, I don’t need you to worry about this for me; I’ll sort it out”

“No you won’t!” she said.

“But it’s my problem baby”

I walked out and started puffing and looking at the blanket. I thought about how stupid nihilism is and how happy I am. I don’t necessarily think nihilism is stupid, but I do not think highly of people who describe themselves proudly as nihilists. I looked at the needle in my left hand and the orange cotton in my right. Smoke from my cigarette got in my eyes.

I heard the door close and Margaret walked around the corner.

“I’m going to go home baby”

“But, it’s only 7:40am, I thought you’d stay till 8.”

“I have to do some exercise and get ready for work”

“Please, let’s not leave it on this note”

“I have to go baby”

I watched her walk to her car and drive off. I puffed my cigarette and sipped my coffee and looked at the blanket.

"I love that woman." I thought to myself.

Later I sent her a message:

“Baby, I’ve never been happier in my life than right now and it’s because of us. Thank you for thinking of my dumb stomach); I love you and I realise I have to figure out some food. I hope your day is great!

I was sitting at my desk by this point and my stomach did start to ache. It does every morning until I eat something. Dumb stomach. Dumbache.

*

The thing is, Margaret had given me my life back at one point. She figured out I’m a coeliac. I can’t eat wheat, apparently. I think it’s the chemicals and pesticides put on the wheat but what do I know.

When I first met Margaret I had told her about how I was one of those people who walked up and down the street aimlessly. I wore the same clothes everyday. I went out once and some guy came up to me, a barber, and said “hey, you’re that guy that walks past the shop at the same time every day wearing the same clothes; and you’re still wearing them right now!” I felt embarrassed. “Don’t worry mate, you’re not the only one doing that, there’s plenty of ‘em out there; we see ‘em all”.

But Margaret never seemed to care, and she's a biologist, a doctor of biology actually. Maybe I was her patient.

I messaged Margaret “you know, there’s a lot of food in those brown paper bags you leave in the fridge, tonight I’m having meatloaf “Lawson Style”. She messaged back “Hahaha”.

"I love that woman," I thought again, and took long a sip of my wine. I’d filled it to the brim so it was in arms reach and I wouldn’t have to do anything but think. Or try not to. Maybe I was trying to block it all out. A person in the city needs to create their own nature and wine is a good way to block out the sounds of accelerators and general displeasantness in the streets.

My phone buzzed four more times at that point but I didn’t want to look at it and admit to Margaret I was drunk. She might want to come over and I didn’t want her to see me like this. I wanted to always give her the good version of me; not this one.

The phone had actually only vibrated once. I hate phones.

I looked at the message; all fine. And took another sip of wine. It was giving me a headache. Damn shitty wine full of no wine but probably full of anti-freeze instead - a heinous crime. Five bucks.

Stop writing I thought. So I picked up the needle and the piece of orange thread, again; and kept trying to get it through the eye of the needle like I was on the morning she walked off and it kept untwining and splitting in two and frustrating me to hell. I gave up and used the length of cotton to dislodge something in my tooth. I flossed it out and noticed the cotton was wet. Do I really need to write down what happened next? Look, I will; once the cotton was wet it was easy to thread through the eye of the needle. It was like water then following the path of least resistance. I wish I was water.

Anyways, you might figure it out but my dumb stomach still ached when I woke up the morning after that. Pain. Food. Poison foods. Dumbache. I slept in the blanket though. It was nice and warm. I'd fixed it with needle and orange thread.