By: Reese Scott

He painted green lights all over his room. But it did no good. So instead he went to the corners of the street late at night and climbed up a ladder until he was able to remove the red, yellow and green lights. After he had gotten the green light out, he climbed back up the ladder and put back the red and yellow lights. He figured nobody would tell the difference and sadly he was right.

Each night and each morning he stared at the blinking green light. It controlled him. He had read every self help book. Seen all the therapists in the yellow pages. Tried every type of drug the doctors offered. But nothing changed.

Each morning he would hear the same voice:

“You fucking pussy get out of bed!”

“And stop looking at that stupid green light for Christ sakes. Green isn’t even a nice color.”

But the green light had very little to do with the color green. It had something to do with something he was unable to get in touch with. He had gone through a list of traumatic events in a psychology book. He wasn’t molested. If he were it would have been by someone green. And he didn’t want to start entreating alien probes. He was never been beaten up by dollar bills or dressed in only green clothes. The bread he ate growing up did not have spots of green from being old.

In fact he could find nothing wrong at all. As far as he could tell he had nothing to complain about. He had grown up in a middle to upper middle class. Had never known poverty. Grew up in a house with a garage. A Mother and Father. There was nothing there.

Except that green light that he stared at, watching it blink on and off. He tried to think of something positive about having a green light in his room. But he couldn’t think of anything. For a moment he thought maybe if he were Irish that would mean something. But if he were Irish it wouldn’t make any difference. He had read up on Irish history and there was nothing on green street lights.

He had an enormous pile of books stacked up against the wall that he had taken out of the library. He had taken so many out he wasn’t allowed back again. The librarian told him he was the first person she had blackballed from a public library.

“Why?” he asked

“You just answered your own question.”

He walked out feeling better until he realized he didn’t have a clue what she meant.

One morning, when he had read all the books he had taken from the library, he decided to return them all and see if he was allowed in the library. His apartment was a twenty minute walk to the library. Carrying a large amount of hard covered books wasn’t easy. He was able to put some in his backpack. Some in a small luggage bag and the remaining books he held in his arms. He felt like one of those models who is supposed to learn to walk right by putting a book on his head. Even though he knew this made no sense. Walking down the side walk he noticed the sky looked like it wasn’t going to rain. There weren’t many cars on the street. And there was a nice quiet scent in the air. He saw a dog on the other side of the street. It was looking for a tennis ball or something.

He waited at the sidewalk for the sign to turn to walk. When it turned he began to walk across the street. He saw the dog look up at him. It had a strange expression on his face. He didn’t hear anything after that. All he knew was he was on the concrete. A car was on top of him. He wasn’t able to move his legs or arms. He was unable to hear. The only thing he could see was the dog’s face, the blood flowing from his ears and the street light blinking green.