Straining to see amidst the bouncing lights, I make out that it’s a man wearing gold chains around his neck. He’s looking straight at me, but something’s wrong with his arms. I squint, studying the man. His arms are misshapen, his shirt dangling in wisps from his shoulders. And that’s when I realize…this man has no arms. He falls to the floor. Amidst the strobe lights I see he only has stubs for legs, too. I step back, into Elliot, who’s by my side once again. He laughs and hugs me.

Time speeds up, and then it slows down, but all I hear is ringing. Low and dull. The man, that thing with the gold chains, comes towards me. He’s only half a person. No one else seems to notice that he’s here, crawling among us.

The lights illuminate the man. He opens his garish mouth. A section of his torso is missing, as if he’s been ripped apart. Glistening blue intestines hang from his side like tangled rope.

I’m drunk. That’s all. This isn’t real. But then why do his beady eyes look so desperate? They fixate on me as he struggles to come closer, his face wrenched in agony.

I scream, pushing back again, this time spilling my drink on a Bro with this devastatingly strong cologne. The Bro whirls around. “Hey, what’s your problem?”

The Bro sneers, but I’m still looking behind me, checking people’s feet for the thing coming towards me. All around us people grope and thump and pulse and pound. But the man with the gold chains is gone.

Bro Cologne looks at me like I’ve flown the coop, and hell, maybe I have. Deep pressure erupts from my chest. I hiccup. “Nice perfume,” I say. “What is that? Eau de fuck you?”

Bro Cologne narrows his eyes. He looks behind me, to Elliot. “Why don’t you control your girl?” he says. As my face reddens, Elliot stands there, his mouth open as if he’s not processing what Bro Cologne said.

“Excuse me?” I say. “Excuse me?” I get in Bro Cologne’s face. His breath reeks of vodka. Elliot steps beside me, placing a sweaty hand on my shoulder.

“You heard me. Crazy,” Bro Cologne says, and it’s that word, the word Jackson and my father call my mother, and the way he says it, so dismissively, as if that sums up my entire existence.

I don’t mean to do it. I don’t even think. I hack up a wad of spit and catapult it into his face. Elliot steps in, grabbing my arm lightly. “I…Ange. Hey, come on.”

I expect Bro Cologne to charge, but he just stares me down. Maybe he really does see the crazy in my eyes.