gaffer on the chin

I had gaffer tape on my chin. The whole five minutes. The Northern line bit, the callback I'd workshopped, the polite laugh I'd been hoping for — all delivered with a grey strip of adhesive from a flyer I'd torn off a lamppost that morning and forgotten about. Found out at the bus stop. Shelter glass. My own stupid face staring back, receipt still on it. Sandra saw it. Sandra definitely saw it. The look she gave me at the bar — mate, that was rough, she mouths with her eyes — wasn't about the bomb, I'm sure of it, it was about the tape, and I can't prove it and I'll think about it forever.

The man in the back. Beanie. Half a lager. He shouted the panic attack one! like he was ordering off a menu he knew by heart. He knew the catalogue. People know the catalogue. I keep telling it like it's a craft choice and it's not — it's just the only thing I know how to talk about, and now it's the bit they come for, like a dog doing its trick without being asked. Dev put his hand on my shoulder at the bar and I almost bit him for it. Almost. ~~Pity hand.~~

Moleskine open to September. Wrote one line about the gaffer tape — could be the whole set rebuilt around it — and crossed it out. I will not turn tonight into content. Mum driving me to Manchester. Edinburgh. I keep trying to start that bit and I can't. Phone brighter than the kitchen. Dev's text on the lockscreen. ~~I'll answer tomorrow.~~ I won't answer it. Tomorrow's Leicester Square and I'll walk on clean and I won't check my face first. I'll check. I'll check three times.