The following can also be found in the book Chicago Stories 1997. Click here to learn more, and to download a free electronic copy.

So I'm hanging out in her apartment
with this dog.
This crazy fuckin' dog
who can't go thirty seconds
without getting petted
and stroked
and told
"Oh you want some loving, don't you, yes you DO, you want some loving!"

An entirely appropriate metaphor.

I look around and I notice things
that I haven't before
which is easy with her
because her house is like one of those puzzles
from the old "Highlights" magazines
where there's a dozen things
hidden
in the picture of the farmhouse

I notice
that she's the only person besides me
that I've ever met
who owns a hardback copy of "Vox"

I notice
that she has a restaurant check
sitting on her computer
that says
"No shots
No cigarettes
Not tonite"

and I've spent the night
throwing up in her bathroom
and there are many things I want to tell her

like I wouldnt've thrown up
if it wasn't for the fact
that I haven't eaten in 24 hours
and I wouldnt've thrown up
if it wasn't for the fact
that I had a 40 of St. Ives last night
and then a something and cranberry
and then a bourbon and coke

and that
if I had gone home last night
I don't know what would have happened to me

But I can't tell her these things.

The dog whines at the door
when I sit in her den
and type on her computer
try to get online
but realize that I need a password

Realize that I need a password
and what is the password?
love
trust
vomit
friend
pickmeup

I've been searching for the password
for months now
and well, jeez, I just
can't
seem
to
find
it

She admits to me last night
in our drunken berlin stupor
that when she's interested in a man
she sits around and observes them
for a bit
before making her move

"How long?" I ask

"Oh, about four or five months."

"But,"
I say,
"If you wait four or five months
you can pretty much convince yourself
out of dating anyone"

"I know,"
she says,
and laughs

This dog demands that I love it
even when it's eleven in the morning
and I am still drunk
and still depressed
and still sick
and the light from the windows
hurts
and the nicotine
worming its way to my lungs
hurts

On her shelves
Bukowski sits next to
Sabine's notebook

of course

She's asleep
in the other room
and I have just read
her poem about me
which I've heard before
but not in the form
that's in her book
which is so much more personal
more intimate
more sad
more powerful
than what she's let me see before

and she's named her book
after the poem
that's about me.

And if I knew what was good for me
I'd walk right into her room
and sneak in under the covers
demand that she pet me
stroke me under my chin
rub her long fingers over my belly
and tell me what a good boy I am

And I would whine
and grovel
and thank her for letting me stay here last night
for giving a damn
and yes I know
that I'm always seeming to vomit
in your company
but I don't mean anything by it
it's just those goddamn free drinks is all
and that whole not eating thing
but I don't mean to say anything bad
about you

Thank her
for giving a damn
and doing the only thing
she knows how to do
when confronted at night
with a life full of baggage
unexpectedly

If I knew what was good for me
I'd sneak into her bed right now
and act like the dog that I am

But I know what's good for me
which is why I sit in her den
and type away on her computer
and sequester myself from the dog
and look through her Highlights puzzle
and desperately seek out aspirin

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