“Dis-ease”

“It’s going to force me to deal with that. For five, six years, I was hiding that, I was pushing that away, and then I just dealt with that.” -Tomer Peretz

This journal entry is inspired by true events. Some of the characters, names, businesses, incidents, and certain locations and events have been fictionalized for dramatic purposes. Any similarity to the name, character or history of any person is entirely coincidental and unintentional.

“Dis-ease,” Green eyes had told you on the balcony overlooking your penthouse studio. “It’s a state of uneasiness. Constant uneasiness.”

You half believed him half-heartedly. You were a biology teacher. The disease is actually a virus or bacteria that infects the body and manifests when your immune system is down. He was a quirky Irishman. Dressed in black, he looked like a vigilante detective, smoking his cigarette while you drank your red wine. Over the balcony were a few swimmers silhouetted by the glistening teal color of the waters in the pool of the summer evening in Los Angeles.

He came over on this particular evening because he said it was an emergency. He said he needed to see you. Life and death matter.

“I have a dis-ease. It’s alcohol, it’s sex, it’s any ism I can get my hands out. Coke, crank, crunk, anything,” he confessed.

“What are you running away from?”

“Myself.”

He looked at you with eyes intense as the fire that sparked their initial intrigue. He had sent you a picture of the Arclight Theatre Hollywood sign a few weeks back to remind you where you two first met. He had called you suddenly in the middle of the night to come over to wherever you were. It didn’t matter, he needed to see you. He said he wanted to kill himself that very evening, so you invited him to your new home, the top floor of a luxury condominium. Your boyfriend was currently in Massachusetts directing a horror film. 

Guess the psychic’s love spell did work, you thought to yourself. He comes to you saying that you are the angel that will save him. He didn’t specify what type of angel.

He was twirling his Sobriety Chip in between his fingers as he continued, “I’ve sold my soul to the devil.”

You were taken back by this statement, yet you were not surprised. You knew he had a charm that felt more like a spell than it did genuine ease into understanding one another. It was obsession-compulsion.

You compelled him to love you when you paid $2,000 for the psychic to create a clearing for you so that you will be open to receiving the blessings that the spiritual angels have for you. Magda, the psychic in Burbank who had a Jesus sign on her wall, had told you that Green Eyes was your twin flame, and you paid her the money to create a path for the two of you. 

Be careful what you pay a psychic for.

Your fire burns for this man. He could have been the devil himself, and you would have melted in his arms just for that high of having this kind of intimate connection. 

“You can get your soul back. I’m sure there’s a way to break soul-ties and soul contracts,” you tell him, “And don’t forget about your heavenly angels who are still there to help you fight your battles.”

You don’t know why you’re even saying all this. If it were not for the twilight hours of magic and mystery, if this man in black didn’t charm you with his voice you would have told yourself that you sounded downright absurd.

The idea of the supernatural wasn’t present until he had brought it up. You did not believe in half of what he said. Perhaps he is delirious and depressed. You reasoned. You went with it anyway because you just wanted him to trust you and love you. Whatever he said, it was all good, because you wanted to prove to him that you were the one for him.

You were his savior.

You were the underground man.