I'm lost. Damn. What the hell was I thinking? I'd have sworn I smelled Jessica's perfume, but... how stupid is that? This is a sewer - nobody ever comes down here except me. Why would she be here? What would she be doing here? Stupid stupid stupid. I should've just hid in the entrance, cooked up a hit, and gotten out like I always do. Didn't even think it over - just barged in and started wandering around. And with the party in three hours, too. Goddammit.

I feel like I've been wandering for hours. The fact that it's almost pitch black in here isn't helping. This place doesn't feel much like a sewer, though. I've been using my lighter to follow this stream of water and it looks clean - there aren't any clumps of toilet paper or little piles of shit or plastic kid's toys. It doesn't smell bad in here, either. It smells...musty, like grandma's attic. I passed a room back there with light streaming in through the ceiling and vines dangling down. I tried climbing up, but the walls were too high and the vines just slipped off in my hands. I yelled for help, too - screamed until my throat was sore - but there was no answer. It was a long shot. Nobody ever comes here.

I keep smelling her perfume. It's some expensive European brand, very unusual, but so familiar it makes my chest ache. I catch a whiff of it when I round a corner, then smell it again when I reach an intersection. I'm still not sure why I went chasing after it in the first place - this half-formed notion of finding her neck-deep in some shit-pit, I guess, and either rescuing her or throwing bricks at her face. Maybe both. Anyway, I wonder if somebody dropped a bottle down the drain, and it washed up here. I kind of want to find it, if only to know for sure.

So I'm back in the room with all the vines, except...the sun's gone down. I watched the light fade from white to blue to purple, and finally to black. It doesn't make any difference - I could barely see where I was going anyway, but...the sun's gone down. I've got this uneasy feeling in my chest, like I'm falling down a long chute and I don't know if there's anything to catch me at the bottom. There's something else, too. There's this design spray-painted onto the wall - this bunch of zig-zagging, cris-crossing lines maybe four feet across. I guess I was too out of my head to pay much attention to it last time, but now...well, it almost glows in the dark, and the lines make my eyes spin. I feel a little dizzy looking at it, a little sick. When did I take my last hit? I really don't want to go through an entire eight ball wandering through some stinking sewer, but...I can't focus. I'll just cook up a little more, and then I'll hold off 'till I get out.

I think there's someone else down here. I definitely heard a noise behind me. It sounded like footsteps, but when I turned around there was nobody there. I ran around, sweeping my lighter in circles and yelling for help, but nobody answered. There wasn't even an echo, like the walls are eating the sounds, trapping them here so that nothing ever gets out. I have this funny thought. I wonder if the artist who drew that design is still here. I wonder if he's been wandering here for years - decades, maybe - surviving on rats and sewer water, slowly going bugnuts from loneliness. Okay, never mind, that's not funny at all. God, I really need to get out of here.

There's something wrong with this place. I've been following the stream of water this whole time, and it just led me back to that room with all the vines. I could smell her perfume, too, smell it so heavy in the air it made me nauseous. I end up staring at the design, following the cris-crossing lines that look like tunnels in some weird alien space, and the more I look the more my head spins. I finally have to turn away and end up nearly killing myself when I step on something that rolls out from under my foot. It's a can of spray paint. Was that there before? I feel this fury, this unreasoning rage looking at it, like the can somehow lured me down here and got me lost in a sewer on a Saturday night, so I kick it as hard as I can, sending it flying down the tunnel into the dark. And I hear the sound of tin striking stone echoing from behind me. What is going on here?

I'm being followed, but I can't see who the HELL it is. I can hear him walking behind me, but he's never there when I stop. He's never there when I turn around. Christ. Jesus Christ.

Back in the room again. This time, though, there's something new in the corner, barely visible by lighter flame. I wander over, and I'm not particularly surprised to see that it's a man, sitting upright against the wall underneath the design. He's been dead a long time - barely more than wispy hair and shriveled skin stretched tight over bone - and a can of spray paint's lying a few feet away from where his hand fell. He's not wearing shoes or a belt - he must have eaten them. Maybe drank the water running through the room too. I'm feeling a little sick, a little light-headed, so I sit down across from him and take a hit from my much diminished stash. When I look up, he's right in front of me, his hollow sockets boring into my eyes, and he says, "You're never getting out. It's not going to let you go. You're gonna die here, just like I did. Like everyone else did. And then it'll eat her, too." And he laughs.
Red. I see bright, burning, bloody red, and before I know it my hands are wrapped around his neck. Mummified skin flakes off like scraps of parchment, but he keeps laughing - this raspy, hacking, mocking laugh that scrapes like nails on my brain. I dig my thumbs in, squeezing harder, snarling under my breath, until I feel his windpipe crackle and crumble in my grip. His head lolls to one side, the laughter cut off, and I let her fall to the floor in a heap.
Him.
I mean "him."
Oh no. Oh god.

I really ought to just admit that I'm a pathological liar. There is no sewer. What would I be doing in a sewer? Stupid. I'm sitting at home on my couch, cooking up a hit on my coffee table. I put a rock in my pipe, heat it up, take a long drag. The sun's gone down, but I don't care, 'cause I'm riding high before the party tonight. I offer a hit to the dead guy lying against my couch, but he just smiles at me. I smile back, because I'm home. There is no sewer. My couch feels cold and hard beneath my legs, but I ignore it. A vine brushes against my head, but I ignore that too. There is no sewer. I lean back against the wall and kick the can of spray paint across the room. Wasn't Jessica supposed to come by? All her things are still here. I wonder if I'll see her at the party. I can already smell her perfume.

There is no sewer.