He looked at the clock staring him in the face from the nightstand. 3:42 am. What the hell was going on? As he became aware of his surroundings he realized that his phone’s incessant pitch was calling for him from across the room. He rolled over trying to concentrate on the radio and let it drown out the ringing. Why the hell wasn’t the answering machine doing its job? It has one purpose for being and the damn thing only managed to do it half the time. It was over. He rolled back over and checked the clock. 3:43. He snapped awaked, 3:51, louder this time.

“Who the hell?” he mumbled as he stumbled to his caller ID. Asterisks. Picking up the phone with a deliberate yawn and a weak hello, he was angered to find a dial tone awaiting him on the other end. Almost mechanically he pressed the phone button off and then again to reactivate it. His fingers slid to the combo very quickly now, *69, the greatest asshole detection device on the planet. That familiar squeak greeted him with a voice following, “The last number to call your line does not exist.” That was a new one. Well, that imaginary son of a bitch just ruined his sleep. 3:54. Too tired to sleep now, he decided to head to the living room for a little TV and doze off.

He made his way over the empty beer bottles and through the hallway. I was 3:56 now and time for a cigarette. As usual he found that he had fallen asleep in his cargos, so he reached into his pocket, flipped open his crushed-up pack of Marlboro Milds and lit up a smoke. As he proceeded to the recliner where he spent most of his days, he glanced to the couch to see his roommate passed out with a shirt on as pants. 3:59he dropped the empty bottle he used for an ashtray and flicked on the tube. He flipped around for awhile until he found a movie he recognized. 5:01, he awoke to find his roommate missing from the couch. The TV was on, but the cable was out. He watched the battle between black and white particles, and when he was fully satisfied of a draw, the cable snapped back on. There was a face! It snapped back to fuzz. To the face again, and this time it stayed. He stared wide-eyed at a face he hasn’t seen in a long time. Bill Cosby? What the hell ever happened to him?