“Shit, I know,” you say. “I know it.”
She says, “A big plate of dicks, twirling them around a fork like spaghetti.”
She checks her board and the remaining rows, pinching her crotch piercing.
She smells her fingers, thinking.
Thinking with a secret hate.
Trying to win.
This means something to her.
She’s trying hard to win because she hates you.
She wants to degrade you.
She wants to be able to go around and tell everyone how terrible you are at this game.
Shit, did you hear how bad he is at Guess Who.
Oh I heard he’s absolutely shitty.
You watch her think.
Will she guess who you are and win, or will she keep failing.
You look at the person on your card.
Here he is.
“Jeffrey.”
Jeffrey looks really upset.
Like, he looks totally pathetic and helpless.
And this is the moment you and him realize you know nothing about each other, and have nothing to contribute, only take — which doesn’t happen, because there’s nothing to contribute.
Ha fucking ha.
Sorry Jeffrey — you think. I can’t help you.
Your girlfriend puts her hands together and puts both forefingers up to her bottom lip.
She says, “Does your person, have—” points her folded hands at you, “—sideburns.”
You look at Jeffrey.
Jeffrey has sideburns.
He has beautiful, light-brown sideburns.
Don’t tell her about my sideburns, says Jeffrey. You can lie, he says. Lie about it. Say your person doesn’t have sideburns.
Jeffrey, I can’t — you think. No, because then I’d have to win before she finds out I cheated. I’d have to guess who her person is before she realizes I’d made it impossible to guess mine. And right now I’m not confident enough. I’m not good enough to do it. No. I’m going to just tell the truth, Jeffrey. Jeffrey.
Jeffrey is silent.
“Yeah, he has sideburns,” you say, looking down at your smelly and wrinkled dick.
Your girlfriend puts down a few more of the plastic holders, making a fist with her other hand and elbowing downward against the air, her big green tit-vein shaking.
You look at the big green tit-vein shaking.
It’s beautiful.
Hey it’s the big green tit-vein — you think. Hey you. Thank you for this.
And for some reason this transitions into you thinking about a reality where everyone’s death is just a spreading apart into invisibility — and each death is voluntary and self-inflicted — accomplished by detachment from all objects, people and experiences — where death is an accomplishment — where death is people slowly guessing everything out about you, figuring you out.
And then that somehow transitions into thinking about holding your lips open and exposing your teeth for someone to throw darts at (why not).
You’re careful not to make a face so she doesn’t ask you what you’re thinking.
Outside there are a few loud booms, then squealing tires.
Your girlfriend looks at you.
“Were those gunshots,” she says, holding a plastic holder halfway down.
“Yeah, I think so,” you say.
She slowly flips down more holders.
You yawn and say, “Hey did you eat the rest of the peanut butter I bought.”
She flips down more holders. “Uh huh.”
“So it’s not on the counter anymore. I just don’t want to be surprised in the morning.”
“No, it’s gone,” she says. “It’s all gone.” Then she yells, “It’s all gone.”
Someone pounds on the ceiling.
“All gone,” you say, looking at the board and scratching your chesthair.
It’s your turn.
It’s your turn to crush her with a casually-stated question that completely characterizes the reality of her person, putting you one guess (not even a guess) away from finishing her forever.
Think hard, says Jeffrey. You can do this.
Rows of little cartoon faces look back at you.
Your head feels swollen, stretching slowly in different directions without any direction.
Tomorrow when you move out, you’ll continue to stretch in different directions.
You see yourself in a field with your hands on your head, eyes-closed, spinning around, saying, “I’m finished! I’m finished!”
Your girlfriend is looking at her board.
You decide to lie next time she asks something.
Because you want to win.
Want to make her feel bad.
Want to win and piss on her spirit.
Yes.
You can do this.
Believe in yourself.
There’s nothing left to lose.
Your peanut butter is gone.
“Does your person have — a weird head,” you say. “No like, a falcon-head.”
She looks at the board for a little bit.
“I don’t know,” she says. “They all have weird heads. They’re drawings.” She grabs one of her breasts and says, “Hell-oh” shaking the breast to the syllables.
She is very pale and her nipples are orange/pink.
You keep playing the game.
Neither of you tries to win.
Because when someone wins, it’s over.
Outside a plane passes.
Nearing to land.
You imagine the sound of the plane nearing to land as the falling of a bomb.
Just, a huge bomb of no-fun.
You’re standing in an empty field and a bomb that has “No-fun” painted on it lands on your head, detonating.
It happens to the sound of the plane nearing to land.
And it feels good to admit it.
Always feels good to admit it.
No close relationships of any kind.
And no satisfying goals.
Good to admit it.
Like it all makes sense.
Like everything always makes sense in some way, and you either see it or you don’t.
Right now someone is guessing who you are, and you are the one who has guessed.
And it makes sense no matter how you think about it.
“It’s still your turn,” she says. Then she raises both her arms and says, “We playing or what.”
You let the bomb of no-fun detonate over you.
Asking questions that have already been asked.
Asking unanswerable questions.
“Is your person diabetic.”
“Does your person look suicidal.”
“Does your person wish he or she had a fucking dartboard.”
“Does your person maybe have a falcon-head.”
She adjusts her tepee, checking her person. “No, my person looks more like a Croatian hockey player with lung cancer.”
“Ok, what about a shaved asshole, does your person have a shaved asshole,” you say.
No one wins.
Both boards go back in her purse.
You start the shower.
You stand naked in the bedroom waiting for the shower water to warm up.
You lightly pinch her nipple and say, “Beep-beep.”
She lightly pinches your dick and says, “Honk-honk.”
She gets into the shower, then you do.
Taking turns standing beneath the warm water.
You think about how showering with someone else is another thing that’s no-fun.
The bomb is falling on you.
You think about how maybe you just need to get a dog.
You see yourself hunched over the dog, to protect it from the bomb of no-fun.
You exit the shower before her.
In your room you dress in your work clothes.
Because that’s all you have there still.
And because it’s better to eventually fall asleep in your work clothes so you can wake up later the next day.
Sitting in the bedroom, you feel acutely dispirited and tired.
Listening to her shower.