Part 18 (1/2)

Have I ever, you know, had s.e.x with her?

”Christ!”

Well?

”Well?” she says.

Have we ever had s.e.x?

”You are such a piece of s.h.i.+t.”

Have we had s.e.x?

”I could kill you!”

Is that a yes or a no?

”I knew this would happen,” Marla says. ”You're such a flake. You love me. You ignore me. You save my life, then you cook my mother into soap.”

I pinch myself.

I ask Marla how me met.

”In that t.e.s.t.i.c.l.e cancer thing,” Marla says. ”Then you saved my life.”

I saved her life?

”You saved my life.”

Tyler saved her life.

”You saved my life.”

I stick my finger through the hole in my cheek and wiggle the finger around. This should be good for enough major league pain to wake me up.

Marla says, ”You saved my life. The Regent Hotel. I'd accidentally attempted suicide. Remember?”

Oh.

”That night,” Marla says, ”I said I wanted to have your abortion.”

We've just lost cabin pressure.

I ask Marla what my name is.

We're all going to die.

Marla says, ”Tyler Durden. Your name is Tyler b.u.t.t-Wipe-for-Brains Durden. You live at 5123 NE Paper Street which is currently teeming with your little disciples shaving their heads and burning their skin off with lye.”

I've got to get some sleep.

”You've got to get your a.s.s back here,” Marla yells over the phone, ”before those little trolls make soap out of me.”

I've got to find Tyler.

The scar on her hand, I ask Marla, how did she get it?

”You,” Marla says. ”You kissed my hand.”

I've got to find Tyler.

I've got to get some sleep.

I've got to sleep.

I've got to go to sleep.

I tell Marla goodnight, and Marla's screaming is smaller, smaller, smaller, gone as I reach over and hang up the phone.

22.

ALL NIGHT LONG, your thoughts are on the air.

Am I sleeping? Have I slept at all? This is the insomnia.

Try to relax a little more with every breath out, but your heart's still racing and your thoughts tornado in your head.

Nothing works. Not guided meditation.

You're in Ireland.

Not counting sheep.

You count up the days, hours, minutes since you can remember falling asleep. Your doctor laughed. n.o.body ever died from lack of sleep. The old bruised fruit way your face looks, you'd think you were dead.

After three o'clock in the morning in a motel bed in Seattle, it's too late for you to find a cancer support group. Too late to find some little blue Amytal Sodium capsules or lipstick-red Seconals, the whole Valley of the Dolls playset. After three in the morning, you can't get into a fight club.

You've got to find Tyler.

You've got to get some sleep.

Then you're awake, and Tyler's standing in the dark next to the bed.

You wake up.

The moment you were falling asleep, Tyler was standing there saying, ”Wake up. Wake up, we solved the problem with the police here in Seattle. Wake up.”