God, you look old when you stand next to him.
“Leave me alone.”
You on a date?
“No, I’m at an award show. Shawn and I are just friends.”
Friends with benefits?
“No.”
Friends that like to tickle each others’ ballsacks?
“No.”
Coochie coochie coochie.
“Is that the ticking noise?”
Yes.
“We don’t do that.”
I notice that even though Shawn’s taller than you, your hand is on his shoulder and his is on your back. Is that a dominance move?
“It is not.”
Is he your pup? Do you two engage in silicone-based genital plumping? Do you make him sleep on the floor and call you Master Noodles-And-Beef?
“You truly, truly need to get off the internet.”
Why is he glowing and you’re so greasy? It can’t be the lighting, because you’re in the same light.
“Can we be done?”
Wanna get into that shit?
“No, I just hate you.”
We’re not done.
CELL PHONE NOISE
“Hate you so much.”
…
“You’re on with John.”
“Hållo. Describe everysing you did today. Leåve nossing out.”
“Who in God’s name is this and what the hell kind of accent is that?”
“I am Karl Ove Knausgård, and I have decided to write about you, John Mayer. This morning, I awoke at 0612. The baby was fussing in her room, not crying or even babbling, but making low murmurations. What could they mean? Are they infantile poetry, and by this I ascribe intentionality to her sounds, of meter and rhyme as though these could exist in the pre-verbal world of this infant, this child I have created. I am barefoot and quiet as I enter the kitchen which my wife, a failure of a cow, has left in disarray from the previous evening. The balcony is there and so is my packet of Pikk cigarettes. There are 14 left within the soft paper-and-plastic wrapping with the outsized warnings printed upon. I regard the warnings as I do my daughters burbling. Perhaps they mean something, and perhaps they do not. I piss off the balcony and steam rises from the wet parabola, as it is May and therefore the temperature is below 10 degrees. Inside the house–”
“Excuse me.”
“–my coffee is making itself. I have pressed the button to begin the process, but otherwise am uninvolved. The beans have come from Ethiopia, a country I have never been to, but–”
“HEY!”
“–mean to visit one day. Excuse me?”
“I have literally no idea who you are.”
“My presence here is a sop to the more literary of the readers.”
“Uh-huh. I’m gonna pass on the whole thing. Did anyone ever tell you that you look like Brad Pitt?”
“I’m sure it has nothing to do with my success. I am one in a long line of Norwegian diarists to find worldwide fame.”
“Gotcha.”
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