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I wake up to find myself hanging over a rail. With a sudden rush, the sensation of vomiting overtakes my whole body. I heave & heave, and up comes yellow foam with black chunks. What the hell did I drink last night?

I wipe a half-frozen claw across my mug, using futile gestures to comfort myself belatedly. Goddamn, I hate November.

Raising my head toward a flicker of movement in a window ahead takes more effort than it should. My commitment to curiosity rewards me with a glimpse of an old broad peering out from a trailer's lace curtain across the way. It's then that I have enough clarity to remember where I am: my drug dealer's house. Trailer, rather. We're in a trailer court. A very classy one, at that. I wave casually to the little biddy behind the window, and promptly return to my heaving. When I have a moment to look again, the snowy-haired marm has wandered back to her doings. I am alone again, and this borrowed housecoat does nothing to stave off the chill of the November breeze.

I swivel to the porch's door unsteadily, tenderly testing my capabilities. My hand reaches out for the knob, like a last drowning grope at a pool floaty. When at last I grasp said knob, I twist, to no avail. Apparently, I've been locked out, which leads me to wonder how long I've been out here for. I hammer at the door with an open palm, fighting another wave of nausea. I lose, and a wet, warm splatter of up-chuck lands on my bare feet. Well, at least they're warm now.

"Let me in, damnit!" I try to shout; somehow it comes out more like, "Shlemme innnnn, dammet..."

I bop the window with my cold-tight knuckles, a few times. For good measure, I kick the door with a goopy foot, but only just barely. My lame attempt at a kick seems to get someone's attention inside. I coukd see in the tinted window, a shadow weaving its way toward me. If I had a particular deity I was talking to that week, I would be praying to it now. Possibly thanking it, for this supreme gift of luck. Seeing as I don't, and this doesn't look like Jimmy answering the door, I feel a shred of dread. I should, because it's Jimmy's latest cut of trim. She stares at a way that conveys murderous intents.

"What the hell are you doing here, Joe? I kicked you out at 3, this morning," she greets me, peevishly.

I can't muster anything witty, relevant or useful to say, so instead I shrug half-heartedly.

"Give me my housecoat, you useless lump." I comply, only because I know if I don't, she'll leave me out here to die. I can only imagine the look on the crone next door when she spots my chilled corpse all by its lonesome. Or, hell. Maybe she could be a witness to the boys picking me up to ditch me behind some seedy bar or another.

Sheila, the trim, takes the coat and inspects the stains I've made for her, with my after-binge ralphing. Her face twists in annoyed disgust, but she still moves aside to let me in; she never looking up from a particularly garish spit-up spot on the lapel. My one half-socked foot drags across the tiled floor pitifully. The door clicks shut behind me, so I proceed on, deeper, on to the living room. Blankets and laundry clothe the furniture here. The smell of stale pot reaches my nose, reminding my stummy of some unfinished business. I clutch at my torso with both hands, my useless fingers cradling my undone belt. Before I can release my liquid assault on the throw-rug, Sheila runs up with a wash bucket, strategically placing it in the way of my offending ambush. I release on target, thus saving me from another sabbatical outdoors. By the time I finish this round, I'm kneeling on the floor, face shoved in the bucket, just inches from my hurled flotsam.Sweat & tears run down my face, mutually joining the ex-contents of my wretched stomach.

I'm pretty sure that at some point, Sheila went from standing over me to sitting down in one of the cloth-buried easy chairs. Whether or not she stood by me at all is questionable, but it seems oddly like something she'd do, for a little while, at least. For trim, she was unreasonably intolerable of her man's ways. Not to mention, his customers'. I would say 'friends', but Jimmy never gets past the dealer/customer phase of his tenuous relationships. It's probably better that way.