I’m writing this entry in my mind while driving for efficient time management. But there should be no problem transcribing this tonight back at the hotel because I have an excellent memory. Or at least used to. Been forgetting things lately, like at The Last Resort Bar and Dodgertown. Is my mind slipping? Here I am again, tooling down my beloved Florida on another fabulous morning, exactly what I love to do most in the world, watching scenery go by: palmettos, petticoat palms, some guy living in a wheelless Airstream, roadwork ahead, another town, another sign at the city limits telling me the Kiwanis and Moose Lodge are glad I’m here, old billboards, fresh-squeezed orange juice, pecan logs, Jesus knows what’s ailin’ me, that cop pulling over a speeder with a pair of checkered flags flapping from the windows of his sports car. Ain’t life wacky? So why aren’t I happy? Look at Coleman over there, blissfully content. Maybe J should do drugs. And how do I explain that nagging feeling I’ve been having lately that won’t go away? What if Mahoney’s right? Or what if it’s all a trick? Of course! He’s trying to rattle me into a fatal mistake by getting inside my head. Well, good luck Mahoney! But how do I explain the sleepwalking? I’ve never done that before. And I’m not even taking those new medications from the TV commercials that CNN says have side effects of people sleepwalking to the fridge at night or waking up behind the wheel of a car going seventy. What’s happening to our republic? We used to be tougher than that. But today the pharmaceutical companies encourage us to whine like babies and take a bunch of pills that aren’t supposed to be handled by women who are pregnant or may become pregnant: My bad cholesterol’s too high, my good cholesterol’s too low, sometimes I’m sad, I pee a lot, I can’t nod off, my legs are restless, my acid refluxes, diarrhea interrupts my active lifestyle, uninvited relatives show up right after I’ve taken a pill to bang my wife, which is why we’re sitting in separate bathtubs on a bluff overlooking a cornfield. But they never consult me. The problem’s obvious; everyone’s too tired to fuck from lugging bathtubs. I know what you’re thinking: Coleman and I have sat in our share of hilltop tubs, but that’s something else. I just see things on TV and want to participate in my times. Like right now I’m applying something directly to my forehead. Had to buy a new stick of that stuff because I wasn’t about to put it back on my forehead after catching Coleman rubbing it on his dick. I said, ‘Coleman, why are you rubbing that on your dick?’ He said, ‘What have I got to lose?’ What indeed. Here’s another city line, Elks and Optimists thrilled to see me. But it all comes back to Mahoney and sleepwalking. One minute I’m closing my eyes on the pillow, the next I’m standing over Coleman. With a gun no less! That’s what really scares me. What could I have been thinking? Hope it wasn’t a murder-suicide. I don’t feel suicidal, but who knows what’s going on in my subconscious? I mean, yeah, I’ve given a lot of thought to suicide. Who hasn’t? But it’s within the normal psychological range where everyone else thinks about it on a daily basis, like, remember to pick up some milk at the store and take the trash down to the curb and don’t forget not to blow your brains out. It would be totally against my nature-unless Mahoney’s onto something. What if he and my subconscious know something I don’t? Maybe my pre-amphibian brain sees fate just around the corner, and it would be better to end it myself instead of what they have in mind. Then it would only be logical to take Coleman out first. Because if I’m gone, who would handle his care and feeding? At that point, it would be an airtight mercy killing. Actually, it would be at any time. But I’m not one to play God. I have from time to time, but only when God’s running late. I don’t schedule the killing urge. Society does, like when I buy a new DVD that won’t let me skip through the ads for other DVDs. It’s not even a rental; I own the goddamn thing, and then I have to sit through a fucking Interpol warning until I’m ready to grab the next European I see and shove a bumbershoot up his ass. Hmmm, maybe I should warn Coleman. He could be in great danger. Tell him before he goes to sleep to surround his bed with peanut shells or bubble wrap. No, he sleeps too soundly to hear me. What about mousetraps? No, that would hurt too much. Dang, missed an exit. Isn’t it odd how you can hear your own voice inside your head? My mouth will be completely shut, like now, and I’m hearing these words perfectly pronounced. I can even turn up the VOLUME FOR EMPHASIS. Or yell: AHHHH! AHHH! Yet, outside my head, perfectly quiet. Or like when you’re reading a book and hear the character talking inside your noggin with a voice you give him. Hey, I just thought of something: If it’s internal dialogue in the book, is it doubled for the reader? You know: a character talking inside his brain, who’s also talking inside your brain. Is that why I usually get an echo, echo, echo} What about you, you, you} Missed another exit. Then there are the other voices in my head: Mahoney, regretfully, and God, who’s mainly silent, and the devil, who sounds like Henry Kissinger: “Serge, do it, do it, do it. You won’t get caught. Do it. And while you’re at it, kill Coleman.” I sure hope I’m not planning a murder-suicide … Uh-oh, Coleman’s staring at me …
