The World Is Ugly (But You're Uglier) - FRERARD

Chapter Two-Muholland Drive

As soon as Frank opened his eyes, he regretted it. He laid flat on his back in his bed. The warmth of the covers seemed like it was trying to make up for the lack of warmth in Frank's heart. He took a deep breath in, thought of Jamia, and exhaled, exasperated and hurt over what had happened the night before. "Oh, why'd I chase her away?" Frank groaned to the ceiling. The ceiling just stared back at him. He sighed and climbed out of his bed and sluggishly made his way to the kitchen to brew some coffee. Frank didn't even like coffee, but he needed something to give him energy to get through the day, despite sleeping for over ten hours. Do I even want to have energy? Do I even care anymore? Why do I care? Frank thought to himself. Without Jamia, nothing is worth it.

Yes, it is true that Frank was an all or nothing guy, meaning that his highs could scrape heaven and his lows could sink past hell. He knew he was probably being too extreme with his thoughts, thinking solely in an emotional mindset, but he had just lost the love of his life, and he didn't really care about being rational. Frank's coffee finished brewing, he took the cup and chugged as much as he could, despite it scalding his mouth and throat. He took his mug, sat on the couch, and stared at the blank TV.  He knew he ought to turn it on to distract himself, but something inside him told him not to. Frank felt so hopeless, like stones of despair were clogging his chest and legs and heart, as if he was nothing but an empty pond, the water and life drained out of him.

He clicked his phone which had been in his pajama pants pocket. It was 12:15 PM, Saturday. Frank had nothing to do and all the time in the world. His heart sank for no apparent reason. What does one do while sad and alone? Frank wondered. Though embarrassed he would do something so pathetic, it came to him; Frank would do what most would call 'sadsterbating'. He slid his rather generously sized junk out of his underwear and pants, flipped on to a random 'adult' channel, and got busy. In the long run, it didn't make Frank feel that much better.

When Frank was done with his business, He decided to shower. After cleaning up his, er, manmess, he walked to the bathroom, stripped off his clothes, turned on a sad music playlist, and got in the shower. As the warm water rained down on his torso, an Adele song came on. Frank tried not to cry, but as he lathered soap on his body and listened to the music, he felt his eyes well up with tears. Without permission, the tears fell down his cheeks and mixed in with the shower water. Oh come on man! You're seriously crying in the shower over your ex girlfriend to an Adele song!? What a baby I am, thought Frank to himself. But in that moment, he was already vulnerable physically, naked and wet, so he allowed himself to be vulnerable emotionally too.

Now that he thought about it, Frank was just vulnerable in all ways. Spiritually, he didn't know what he believed in, though he was raised catholic and therefore felt partial to the religion. Physically and emotionally has already been thought about. Mentally, he was letting grief take control of his actions and therefore wasn't being vigilant to his surroundings. And Frank didn't know of any other ways to be vulnerable, so he stopped thinking of it there.

As he began to massage the shampoo into his hair, his left eye started to burn, only slightly at first, but soon it felt as if it were on fire. With his hands, attempted to rub the discomfort out of his eye, which would have worked if he hadn't had an abundance of shampoo on his fingers. The pain in his eye matched the great pain in his heart. "Agh, FUCK!" Frank yelled.

After spending a full 15 minutes in the shower washing out the gallon of soap from his eye (okay, maybe not a gallon, but it felt like that), Frank dried himself off and walked over to the bathroom mirror. He wiped the steam off the mirror to reveal his reflection, and in his reflection he saw his eye, a bright red where the white should have been. He looked absolutely stoned with his eye like that. Feeling defeated by both his girlfriend AND shampoo, he opened the door and walked into his bedroom to get changed.

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Later that evening

"The shooter was described as a 5'7 caucasian male with stringy black hair, police weren't able to get a good look at the man and therefore have no lead onto who the suspect may be. Police officials say they almost pinpointed the grocery store shooter but he escaped and ran towards Mulholland Drive..." Piped the television.

Frank sighed, trying to ignore the depressing news channel that had been on for the whole day. Speaking of the whole day, Frank had spent it vegging on the couch, crying on and off and eating junkfood. He felt like crap. Sprawled out on the couch, Frank shut his eyes and sighed. He felt pathetic and like the worlds biggest loser. As soon as he thought those words, he thought back a handful of years to his second to last year of high school. The year had been stressful and rough, and to top it off, he had been voted "Most likely to fail/biggest loser" in the yearbook. Frank sighed, believing that maybe his old classmates were right. At the rate things were going now, he agreed with them.

Frank's phone buzzed. He had gotten a message from his friend Robert Bryar, or more well known as simply "Bob."
"Hey Frankie, there's a music festival that's starting in half an hour, this really good band called Electric Century is headlining, come with me?" The text said. It had been a while since Frank had seen Bob, and he figured he could use someone to distract him from his pain despite the fact that he didn't feel like going because of his melancholy mood. Sighing, Frank took out his phone and replied.

"Sure, see you soon."