9:30

9:30 9:30 9:30 9:30 9:30. It took several tries to figure out what time it was. My glasses were not within reach and after re-arranging the furniture the previous day, the clock was further away then before.

Sprawled out in the middle of the floor was not how I normally chose to sleep, and I couldn’t recall why this was, and what had led me away from the recliner in which I had been sitting, watching a film.

The carpet was filthy and several bugs scurried about. The exterminators had been in the basement apartment a week ago, but these beasts were immune to the ancient chemicals these men deployed. Generations of cockroaches have survived, chewing through wires, starting wars with other species, crawling in and out of tiny cracks in the exposed brick walls.

Until recently, I used an air mattress that I had stolen from work as my bed until I could afford the 50-100 dollars it would likely cost to purchase a futon. The new kitten had likely put a hole into it. A few months had passed and many bills, a spread out security deposit, and a severe substance abuse problem left me with almost no money for extras such as food, bedding, or cleaning products. I maintained a bare minimum level of personal responsibility for my health and that had created a paranoid and stressful state of mind for me over the course of the past three months.

There was a time a few years ago, when I had slept on a giant blanket spread out on the floor in my bedroom. The small bit of padding in the comforter at least made the rest tolerable. Today, all I had were two pillows, a very thin, knitted blanket, and a thin sheet. I tried wadding them up in several different ways, but there was no comfort to be found at all. A terrible pain was working its way down my back, and my right elbow was sore, because I had been lying with it tucked underneath me. The pad just below the carpet was no help at all, and I slept on what was nothing more than covered concrete.