Half a Cup's Worth.

I got gas, and slipped back onto the interstate. I was feeling good. I had the job and there was no worry left (well, besides the starting-a-new-job worry). Steering with my knee, I sent Marie a text.

"Got the job. Have to take a drug test now."

I went back to the road. I rolled the windows down, pulled the tie out of my hair, and turned the stereo up. David Bowie was young, I was successful in my task, and the sun was high. The wind smashed itself against me, and I smiled. Life was okay right now. I could already feel the strain and anxiety of the past few years melting away from me, little by little. My phone vibrated. It was a return text from Marie.

"Good job baby! I knew you would! Drink lots of water."

I replied; "Will do. Have to go home and get changed first. I feel like a fucking moron."

I set the phone into the center console, and resumed my glory drive. The exits seemed much closer together now. The heat, almost bearable. Goddamn, Ziggy is truly a brilliant album. Tapping my fingers against the wheel, careening and flowing between the lanes and down the interstate, I let the sun roll over me, let myself feel good.

My drug test was only a block away from Michael's new apartment. I dug out my phone and sent him a text.

"Have to take a drug test near your house. What are you up to today?"

My house was a few exits north of Piss Lab and Michael's. I drove past his exit, and kept going. My phone came to life again.

Michael: "Nothing. Want to get a drink?"

Me: "Yes."

Another vibrate. Marie: "So, what are you doing after the drug test?"

Me: "Don't know. Hanging out with Michael. Possibly getting a drink."

Michael: "Okay. Call me when you get to town."

Marie: "Okay. Do it for free. We're broke."

Me (to Marie): "Okay."

Me (to Michael): "Okay."

I set the phone down, and let my knee relax after all of that steering. How have I not been pulled over for this yet? I wondered.

I smiled. "Starman" has the most ridiculous lyrics. My exit came up, and I pulled off, back into the seizure inducing mess of roadwork orange and dust everywhere. I turned right and hoped I wouldn't end up in a ditch. A half hour passed before I got to the end of it, and now I was drenched in sweat and the euphoria had worn off, leaving me in a state of drained hostility. I pulled into my driveway, bounded up my stairs, unlocked my door and headed into the one air conditioned room in my house, my bedroom. I collapsed onto the bed, and wriggled my way out of my clothes, letting the cold air cover me and slowly dry the wet parts. Few things feel as good as the breeze from an A.C. on a swampy no man's land.

After a few minutes, I got up, dug around for what has apparently become my one pair of pants and a tee shirt. I got dressed, found my messenger bag, and filled it with all the things a clear evening may call for. Bathing suit, sunscreen, voice recorder, Hemingway, and an empty water bottle (we'll get to this part later).

I checked my phone. Nothing. I put it in my pocket, checked over my hair, put on my sunglasses and left. The windows of the car had been left rolled down, so as to make it less like an oven and more like a sauna. I threw my bag in the back, and headed out on my way, my brakes and rotors squealing pleads to my entire neighborhood to have them fixed. Fuck you brakes and rotors. This is our business. Comfortably dressed, I drove out, and back toward the road work.

I didn't have to piss at all, and I should have drank water or something at the house, but I didn't. I hoped that the place could test piss dust, because that was about all that I was prepared to offer. Piss rebel.

Back through the roadwork, back into the heat. Back to the interstate. I couldn't have looked forward to that drink more.

After a little while, I took the exit into Springer (the town all of this was to occur), and slowly worked my way through the traffic. Now away from the screaming breeze of interstate travel, I rolled my windows back up and let the A.C. attempt to do something. Sitting at a red light outside the hospital, and only a few blocks from Piss Lab, two girls in short skirts walked by and distracted me from the searing heat for a little while. I am very much a leg man. Well, I suppose I am also a breast man. Also, an ass man. And a face man. Point is, it isn't difficult for me to find something worthwhile.

I watched the backs of thighs and the bell curves of bodies walk off around a corner, and realized the light had turned green at some point. I drove on.

Piss Lab was just over a bridge spanning nothing but a dust ditch (which was always disappointing), and down a hill, in a medical complex. All brick buildings with large single digits adorning each doorway. I drove around the cul de sac searching for "6".

It sat in the center of the complex. I parked in the lot adjacent to it, looked at my hair in the mirror (terrible, fuck it), and turned the car off. As soon as the A.C. ceased, sweat pored over me as I became smothered by heat. I burst open my door and found no relief. The air was a million arms, holding me back, pushing me away from wherever I was going. I tucked my hair behind my ears, wiped sweat from my face, and crawled toward the 6. The Man in Black fled across the desert, and I followed.

Days had passed, or so it seemed, by the time I got inside the building. A great sterile hall, capable of being a lobby to some old theater, all painted in serene shades of blue and white. Glass and chrome everywhere. A sign in front of me pointed to Piss Lab. I followed it, went through to large double doors, and came to a much more modest waiting room. The bottoms of the walls were made of something that they were trying to pass off as wood. The tops, the same calming light blue as the Great Lobby. Four or five people were situated almost strategically around it. Offering varying levels of comfort to whatever seat I chose to wait in.

I walked up to the counter, where a woman with a nest of curled blonde hair typed angrily into a decade old computer. I stood there for a few minutes before she noticed me, or acknowledged me.

"Yes?" She asked.

"Hi. My name is James Martin. I have to take a drug test."

"For?"

"Drugs?"

"No," she said, "Court? Work?"

"Oh, work. I just left an interview. Trying to get a job."

"Pre-employment. Did they give you a sheet?"

Fuck. "Yeah, they did, but I lost it." I think it may have been back at the house. I couldn't remember.

She looked terribly annoyed with me. "You lost it?"

"Yes ma'am. The wind. Went over a bridge."

She glared at me. Her hair looking more reptilian than before, I was sure.

"Okay," she finally said. "For where?"

I told her and she went back to her computer. I felt like an asshole. A childish, irresponsible asshole. She typed something, then picked up her phone and dialed. She glared at me again.

"Yes," she said into her phone. "My name is Lorraine. I'm calling from Lab Solutions. I have James Martin here, he says he needs to get a pre-employment drug screening, but he has lost his information sheet. Okay. Yes. I just need your company code and contact please?" She tapped her pen against the desk, and looked at me again.

"Sorry," I mouthed silently at her.

She gave me a half-frown and looked away. I felt better when she wasn't looking at me. She wrote something down. "Okay, thank you," She said. "You too." She looked back up at me. "You can have a seat Mr. Martin. Someone will be right with you."

"Thank you." I took the seat by the door closest to the actual labs, furthest from the reception area. An old Asian man was looking at me and smiled. I smiled back and put my eyes to the floor. I tapped my feet to the beat of some song that I wasn't sure I had heard, or if I wanted to write, and waited. The waiting room was so cold, I almost wanted to be outside, in the sun, the light, the warmth. I am impossible.

Ten minutes later, the door opened. "Mr. Martin?"

I looked up. A large black woman stood there, smiling at me. I suddenly realized that in my black skinny jeans, my v-neck tight tee shirt, my wild hair, and my cool-guy shades, I totally looked like someone who takes drugs.

I stood up. "That's me."

"Follow me." She disappeared back through the door, and I went after her.

She stood in front of a terminal about three feet from the door and I almost walked directly into her.

"Take a cup from the drawer and remove the bag from inside," she said without looking up. She thought I was on drugs. I could feel it.

"What?" I asked.

"That drawer there," she said, pointing to a drawer right next to her. "Take a cup from it."

I opened the drawer, and took a cup out.

"Now take the bag out from inside of it."

I did.

"Now set it down."

"Okay." I did.

"Now, empty your pockets, remove everything. Place it all on the counter."

"Okay." Briefly I imagined that she didn't work her and this was all an elaborate plan to steal my fucking wallet, but then I thought that that might be racist and decided against it. Thinking the thought that is. Fucking white guilt.

I took out my wallet and set it down. Then my lighter, guitar pick, a quarter, a Chinese fortune ("Keep your secrets secret for now"), and Marie's credit card. I set them all on the counter. "You aren't going to steal them, are you?" I asked.

"No," she said, not looking at me, only typing. "Go around the corner and wash your hands."

I looked around the corner and there was a sink with automatic accessories. I wasn't sure what that meant. Did people sneak others piss dust in on their skin to pass off as there own? Was there a way to fake a drug test with filthy hands? Probably. Probably something obvious, but I am an idiot.

I washed my hands, dried them, and came back around the corner.

"Now take the cup, go in the bathroom, and fill it halfway." She pointed to the halfway mark on the cup. "You have five minutes."

I didn't have to piss even a little. I went into the bathroom, which was next to the sink, and closed the door. I put the cup on the back of the toilet. There was a sign above the toilet that read: "DO NOT FLUSH THE TOILET" and then directly below that, something scribbled in Japanese (?).

I undid my pants and pulled out my piss-less partner. Well, I thought at it, let's go sir.

We looked at the cup, and at each other. I tried coaching it. I tried scowling. Nothing was working. Finally, I put him directly into the cup. Go, you bastard.

A drip.

My hopes rose.

Another drip.

Another. Stream! Nope. Just a few drips in close proximity.

I moved the cup away. I had filled it just below the quarter line.

There was nothing that was going to be coming out of me anytime soon. Did it have to be halfway? Would I fail if it wasn't? Would the woman be pissed at me? Hit me with a cup of piss? She had given me an order, I had not delivered. I was a piss failure. I decided to take whatever punishment was coming my way, zipped up, closed up the cup and went out of the room.

"Yeah, halfway just isn't going to happen. If you want, I can wait a while. Maybe drink some water?"

I handed her the cup. She looked it over, carefully.

"No, we got a temperature. This will have to do." She began to write thing on a pad of paper.

"Can I was my hands?"

She looked up and stared at me. "No." She went back to filling out paperwork.

I couldn't tell if she was fucking with me, but I was too scared to ask again. Keep this up, and I could fill forty of these cups lady.

A few minutes of her doodling on shit later, and she tells me I can wash my hands. I had been keeping them held out in the air, not because I worried about having pissed on them, I didn't, but because if she was going to make me feel like an idiot, I may as well look like one. I went over to the sink and washed my hands. When I came back, she handed me a sheet of paper.

"That's yours. Go ahead and collect your things. You're all set." Then she turned around and left.

I felt a little used, but I gathered up my things, looked around for her, waiting to pop out and scream at me. Holding out a little cup to catch my fear and test it, but she was gone. I left the lab, the waiting room, the Great Lobby, and headed to the car.

I sent Marie a text. "I'm a piss failure."

I sent Michael a text. "I'm on my way."

Michael: "I'll meet you outside."

Marie: "You failed!?!?!"

Me (to Marie): "No, I just didn't have to. They got dribbles."

Me (to Michael): "I think we should get a bottle of wine and head to the park."

Marie: "Oh. Okay."

Michael: "Oh. Okay."