He takes one long haul and examines the plastic pharmacy bottle in his hand. There's still a single codeine inside, so the eminent bottle half full of Tennessee sour mash swirls the ground in a concentric circle. Some serpent slips past his mind's eye like a single frame flash edited from a single thought film. The valley of the spirit clouds their eyes. The whiskey has kept thе inner codeine out, and again hе drinks. Feels the burning in his belly. He keeps the sole parking meter that marks the passing of the time he spends in anyone's face. He has a lot of unpaid tickets framed on his wall. An occasional cough like the chiming of a grandfather clock or an old branch breaking in the high wind. Old friend codeine can only do so much.

He hears that strangled laughter, not like the belly laughs that the kids bring, going by in their irreverent youth. His brain doesn't remember what his body and spirit do. Another swig, and the container is tossed to the tabernacle trash can. He takes out his copy of Patti Smith's "Babel." He'd tear out a page and eat it, but he's not that goddamn cool. He reads one line instead, Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock. Fuck the clock.