The big guy in the corner is still looking over at me occasionally. Not just in my general direction, but right at me. Full eye contact. Then he turns away. He speaks to the man beside him but I can't tell what they are saying because the music in here is too loud and anyway he' s about twenty feet away from me. His friend doesn't look over at me. So they may or may not be talking about me.
Beside me, two girls who have been paying no one else any attention are locking in conversation. The taller of the two girls is wearing a fake US military combat jacket with stencilled words on the back and sleeves. On the back it says CAN THE MAN? ARRIVAL CAME AROUND AND NO ONE NOTICE! which makes no sense to me at all, other than it giving a cool effect of having English lettering on faux Western clothing. She has a tattoo on her right wrist, which looks like wire or a pair of wavy lines.
And the voices are gone. I have drifted out of the conversation in my immediate vicinity, aside from the time when Jojo bumped my arm and asked me to repeat a funny story which I bumbled through to the restricted amusement of the others. I have lost interest in the beer and the chatter and the laughter and the noise and the music. All I want to do is retreat somewhere dark and lose all of this around me. But to leave would be pointed, so I remain.
The music plays on. A song comes on that has already been on tonight but no one else seems to notice. It's the weekend. I assume no one thinks about that sort of thing any more. Maybe it's a sign: staff are signalling that they are struggling and only have time to flip the tape over or something, instead of choosing something different.
The big guy looks over again. What does it mean?
The girl with the tattoo crosses her legs without losing the stroke of the conversation. What that a sign for something?
The crowd over by the door start singing along to the song on repeat. Are they sympathising with the staff? Or is there something else? Does it have any meaning at all? Am I overthinking all of this?
Jojo exclaims 'and so there it was...and no one came!' to the great amusement of the others. I am fading out.
I am fading out, being watched by the big guy in the corner who cannot understand why I am diminishing. Somehow I feel a jag of liberation. Emboldened by this new invisibility I stand up and walk out the doors and into the night where the darkness consumes me. I realise that I am now a tilted shape in an oblique world of parallels, just a slightly different angle and a slightly different hue.
A playlist for the album can be found here.
Titles conceived, composed, arranged and performed by Mike Dickson
(c) 2026, Black Cat Music Factory