fresh excerpt: Orange

We entered a café/head shop. All I could see was orange. It was like being inside a cheetoh, or a carrot. Orange. I looked at my hands. Suddenly they were orange too. Shit! Shit! I was turning orange! I went to the bathroom. It was also orange. There was no escape from the orange. I peed and washed my hands. Shit, I had to throw up. Did I have anything in my stomach to throw up? No, I hadn’t eaten at all except for the mushrooms. Would throwing up make me feel better? Maybe? I didn’t know. I went to try.

I strangled a scream of terror while bent over the toilet. It would be no good to have somebody rushing in here wondering what the fuck I was screaming about. What was I screaming about? I looked in the toilet. My puke was orange! The orange had invaded my body! It was in my veins, in my lungs, even my stomach! There was no escaping it. I washed my hands again and took a drink from the sink, then looked in the mirror.

“Conscious choice? Fuck that, Steve.” I muttered, and traced my reflection’s outline. I painted my self-portrait in trails of water as somebody else came into the bathroom. They spoke to me, in English, I thought, but I couldn’t answer. All brain functions had ceased. I was an orange zombie. I exited the bathroom, wondering how long I had been there, and found my friends at a table. I looked at Antony. “I gotta go.”

“Where?"

"Um... um... I don't know. But it's... it's too orange. It's everywhere. All over me! And I can't get it off!" I could hear the panic summoned from the depths of my stomach.

“All right, let’s get you some fresh air.” Antony took my hand and led me outside. “D’you need a cigarette?”

“Yeah.” Cigarettes were oddly familiar – I loved them, but had no idea why. And it took ages to smoke one. We smoked and talked a little. He reassured me.

“Forgive me if I’m forward, sweetheart, but I think you’re really quite frightened. And tripping balls in the middle of a city you don’t know.” I looked at him. “Are you listening?” I nodded. “Good. I’m a good guy. So are James and Antony, we’re all good guys – we’re not going to leave you. I’m going to take care of you.”

I smiled and felt a little better. The air was nice. The cigarette smoke was blue. I could feel it swirling down in my lungs and going through my bloodstream, rinsing it of all the orange. It wrapped itself around each singular cell, choked the color out of it, made it blue and red again. I watched as the orange leeched off my skin and crept wickedly back inside.