'Hey can't wait, I'll see you in 45 minutes, okay' Gerald looked at the glowing light that was his phone. He squinted at the light, and something that vaguely resembled '8:23am' was staring back at him. That couldn't be right he thought. That was two hours and thirty-seven minutes before clocks even existed.
He thought possibly something important was about to happen, which he would boldly face after five more minutes of sleep.
The next time he was conscious he glanced at where he thought his phone was. Nothing was there. He looked over at his computer monitor, and saw a clock there. '11:37am' is what it said. Gerald felt around for his phone. Swept his arm without looking over the right side of his bed, like he was confused about how to make snow angels, but wasn't going to let that stop him from trying. He snow angel'd under his pillow, then the same thing on the other side of his bed. He nearly fell off, but recovered just in time by grabbing onto his end table. Then thanked his incredible strength and exercise routine, for his ability to, slightly more slowly than gravity wanted, hit the floor.
"Ugh." Gerald eloquently stated. He went to look at his phone, and stared at his empty palm for about 30 seconds before realizing that his phone was not there. Through some feat of balance and panache, he got up onto his hands and knees, and then when his right hand got distracted by something under his bed and gave up supporting him he smashed his nose into the bottom of the bed frame.
"Shuftfuf." He said.
He sat back and thought for a minute.
He woke up when he hit the back of his head on the end table again.
This time there was someone standing in his doorway.
Gerald was up with a jolt. "Sorry, so sorry." He started falling about his room and closet throwing clothes in some rough resemblance of 'on'. "I'll be three minutes. Less. I'll be less than three minutes."
Haley had a look that seemed to say, 'I'm sad, but I expected this of you'. Well, she had a face, and since she said "It's okay, I expected this, honestly." Gerald made the logical leap that her face was having related sentiments.
"What? I'm ready. I'm done, let's go." Gerald started moving towards the door.
"Gerry." Haley said. "It's okay. I'm going to get my things, and I'm going to go, okay?"
Gerald meant to say, 'No, it's not okay. I'm tired of fucking up, I need you, fuck me, I'm sorry.' But what he said, and really it was the same thing anyways, was 'I'll uh. Bye then.'
After she got her things and left, Gerald somehow found the strength to go to the kitchen, though he wasn't sure what for. He saw his phone sitting on the counter. Looking at his screen he saw a message, 'Maybe after we sign our new lease, we can get lunch?'
He wrote a response, 'It's funny, in the way where no one laughs, like me doing stand-up, that two hours ago the person who sent me that message existed, and was real. But now, not long later, she stopped existing, and someone I don't know took her place.' He didn't send the message. But he kept writing variations on that and not sending them. He felt strongly like taking a nap.
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