Conversation · Bathtub

This is not the cleanest bathtub in the world, but it's cleaner than you are right now.

Ah, that soap scum smell. It smells like life. At least compared to you.

Run yourself a bath.

The bathtub slowly fills with water. The water beckons.

Undress, close your eyes, and submerge.

The water doesn't feel particularly clean. A few beer cans are bobbing up and down along your flanks like sad duckies. You pause to think before letting your head go under.

Hold it right there! Keep your head above water, or you'll lose all those pheromones Morell sprayed on you.

I don't care. I just want to be engulfed.

The lukewarm water is comforting, like amniotic fluid.

You feel nice and lonely. And so, so tired.

Leave the beer cans in.

The cans continue to bob, as do your thoughts, aimlessly splashing up against the sides of the tub.

They're not even really thoughts. Just assorted sensations, none of them acute enough to focus on.

Get out. (Conclude.)

The water line recedes as you stand. You are cold now. Your clothes stick to your still moist skin.

Linger in the tub a little.

Your fingers grow pale and are covered with tiny whorls as the water cools.

What are you doing? You're not some fat fish in a fucking aquarium. Time to get moving.

Imagine something.

You see the corpse. You can still smell the cadaver on you. It's going to take more than one bath to get rid of that stench.

Then -- houses along a narrow street. A video rental. Darkness on the planet's curvature.

Take the beer cans out.

Now you are alone with your thoughts in the tub. But it's easier than being alone with your thoughts outside the tub.

Keep your head above water, just in case.

The water is only lukewarm, but still comforting, like amniotic fluid. A few beer cans are bobbing up and down along your flanks like sad duckies.

I want to live forever with the corpse smell. Memento mori and stuff. [Leave.]