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[MY HEAD...]

Leo: Chase, did something happen to you?

Chase: What do you mean?

My head is pounding.

Leo: Please... just, reassure me. Tell me that you... being here... doesn't mean you're... dead.

Chase: Leo.

Chase: I promise, me being here doesn't mean I'm dead.

Chase: For one thing, you're here. You're not dead.

Chase: For another thing, you know as well as I do that I'm alive and well and off somewhere busily pursuing a dead-end journalism career.

Chase: For ANOTHER thing, if this is your dream, then that means it's about like... something you think about me?

Chase: Maybe this isn't a dream about meeting dead people, it's a dream about meeting people who you feel like you've lost?

Leo: You get that from Jenna?

Chase: Well... I kinda thought 'what would she say?' a little. Yeah.

Okay. That makes sense. I can calm down.

My head is still pounding though.

Maybe no more to drink right now.

Leo: Actually, do you have like an aspirin or something?

Leo: I feel a headache coming on.

Chase: You been getting headaches recently?

Leo: I... guess?

Leo: Everyone gets headaches sometimes, yeah?

Chase: You haven't noticed you've been having more of them? Or more frequently?

Leo: I dunno, maybe.

Chase: That's maybe a bad sign, Leo. Back when I was having my real bad days, there were a lot of headaches involved. You should see a doctor.

Leo: I don't suppose you can pour one of those out of a bottle.

Chase: Looks like I'm fresh out of doctors.

Chase: But we might have some ibuprofen in the back?

He points his thumb at another door.

I'd swear that's where the Emergency Exit used to be, but now it says Employees Only.

Chase: Oh, don't worry about that. Just tell the guy back there I said to give you something for your headache.

Fair enough.

Leo: Uh, hello?

This is the cleanest and best lit room I've seen all night.

Leo: Anyone here?

The only person here is a fox taking a selfie.

Fox: I don't think you're supposed to be here.

Leo: Sorry, Chase sent me from the front, said to ask you for something for my headache?

Fox: Chase? You said... Chase... sent you?

Leo: Yeah, the otter, tending the bar in the front.

There's a time I would have punctuated that with a growled 'my boyfriend.' He gives me a look like he's about to make a really stupid joke.

Fox: Ohhhh, well, if... Chase... says it's ok, then. No problem.

He disappears behind the shelves for a moment.

I look around. Weirdly very little of what's back here is booze. There's big plastic tubs, and there's wooden crates of chunks of rock. There's bins of rubber tarantulas. There's what looks like old-timey jars of grain and herbs and saltpeter and stuff, the sort of thing I'd expect to see in a Living Historical Recreation village where they pretend not to be able to see you holding your phone.

I dunno where this place keeps its booze but it isn't back here.

Fox: Sorry about the delay. It's been a while since there was a guy around to man the Pharmacy.

He smirks, like that's a joke. I don't get it.

Maybe cause the headache's starting to get serious.

I take a close look at the two little red pills he's handed me first.

Leo: These are ibuprofen, right?

Fox: Right.

Leo: Just ibuprofen?

Fox: Just ibuprofen.

Leo: And all they're gonna do is take care of the headache I have?

Fox: That's what ibuprofen is for, yeah.

Leo: They're not gonna send me off on a heartbreakingly vivid vision of being reunited with my ex-boyfriend?

Fox: ...buddy, I dunno who you're getting your ibuprofen from, but if that's what it usually does? You need to go back and get a LOT more, because that's a guy who doesn't realize yet that he's put the really good psychedelics in the wrong bottle.

Ok, ok, I get it.

I pop them in my mouth.

Fox: You want some water or something?

I swallow

Leo: No thanks.

Fox: Ok, great job impressing me with how you can swallow. Much appreciated.

Fox: Good luck with the headache, and get out of my stockroom?

It was kind of a relief that it was someone I'd never met before. I was afraid it was going to be, I dunno, Janice from the diner or something, or Deacon Ramirez from down canyon street who died when I was like... eleven. But it was just some fox. Nothing to do with me.

I take my seat again, just sit quietly for a while. Chase waits, wiping a glass like bartenders do in movies.

I do my best to enjoy the feeling of being in the same room as him, not doing anything. Just being with him.

While it lasts.

Chase: They kicked in yet?

Leo: Yeah, I think so. Head feels a lot better.

Chase: Great!

Chase: You want me to get you another drink?

[I THINK I'VE HAD ENOUGH FOR NOW]