pseudonym

"Ever feel like a pseudonym?" she asked,

"What?" he questioned,

"I mean, do you ever feel like someone other than you?" she asked,

"Well, that's not really a pseudonym...you write under a pseudonym specifically because you want to protect the real you...like you're scared that your real name will be negatively affected or something...." he replied,

She laughed quietly as if she didn't care or already knew what he was explaining,

"That's not being very honest...or open or whatever," she remarked,

"Well, it's a dangerous world...privacy especially is all fucked up now," he stated,

They lay quietly on the couch watching the flickering television, 

hypnotized by the images moving through the darkness of the room,

"Hey, are you going to come to the cottage next week?" she asked curiously,

"Um, is your Dad going to be there?" he asked,

"Uh, probably...why?...it doesn't matter...just come..." she replied,

"Then no," he said sharply,

He continued, "he's just going to put me through the ringer."

"What?" she asked smiling,

He replied, mimicking her father's voice, "You got a real job yet son?...you still working part time at that coffee shop?...how do you expect to provide for my daughter on shit money like that?..."

"Oh bullshit...." she said laughing loudly, "you're crazy."

As they lay there, the summer night breeze blew gently through the open curtains. She seemed to fall asleep as she lay against him. He puffed quietly on a joint as he flipped between fishing shows and an old Steve McQueen movie with the sound off. This apartment seemed to have become kind of like an oasis of sorts. Like some kind of peaceful space where he could be with her unimpeded by the usual demands of ever impending adulthood. 

"In a way, lately, I do feel like a pseudonym...I feel like someone else..but I don't know who," he said quietly in the dark of the room thinking she was asleep. After a awhile he began to drift away into flowing lacquered memories and old songs.

In the quiet she asked gently, "are you still awake?"

"mmm hmm," he hummed lazily,

"I'm still awake too," she whispered.