Archilochus Cloot

I wake and find another piece of paper tucked between my fingers. The same thick paper fragment folded neatly between my middle and pointer finger

Unfolding the paper I discover a drawing of a gun. There is some text but It is hard to make any sense of it.

It says:

…when I go to bed…

…pretend I’m a lone (some other word)…

…when I look through my small hole in my cave…

…can see a wide dusty…

…but no one can see me…

not even with clever…

…seeking goggles

…shoot people with my…

which keeps getting b…

…shoots all sorts of…

…mostly needles…

…that explode like…

…or drive the…

…mad with drugs

They never know what

…the needles are small…

think that the val(ley?)

..is cursed

which it is

Isn’t it?

As I pore over the word fragments, I become aware of one of the watching holes in the ceiling. All the watchers normally have blue eyes but this one is green. The eyes don’t blink much. I turn back to the paper.

I think about the words and the green eye and an image comes to me. I think it is a sleep image. I see a soldier chewing gum. He is wearing broken sunglasses revealing one of his eyes. His breathing is asthmatic and wheezy. I can taste dust. Then I smell roasting meat and hear the clinking of ceramic plates. The Soldier says the words “besides you…” and turns to look at someone in the corner of a small room. I cant see them.

I place the paper under my pillow. The green watcher eye has gone and is now a blue eye again.

I have a pain in my stomach. My stomach has been complaining over the last two hours.

The words ‘bedside soldier’ pop into my mind. From where, I do not know? What is a ‘bedside soldier?’

I do something that I don’t usually do. I roll onto my back and say the word ‘bedside soldier’ out loud. My voice is thin and cracked. I haven’t used it for a while. The eye in the ceiling blinks. My stomach groans.

I think I might have smiled if it hadn’t been for my grumbling stomach.