How to impress your father.

A very short story on the nature of failure.

I ask the sliding doors politely to open up as if they were automatic, but the reality of the night is that it's one in the morning and I had forgot to leave the back doors unlocked. I finish the rest of my tequila on the lawn. I am drunk and cold outside on the dewy grass trying to think up fresh poetry. I try to remain silent because I am curled up right under my mother's window. But it seems I have a frog or some other amphibian stuck in my throat. I have nothing left to drink, to muffle the cough so I shut my mouth. My throat decides to release a grenade within my lungs. It comes out a low grumble and I sit in numb panic, thinking that somehow the miniscule sounds I am making will vibrate their way upwards, then through the stucco walls, past the insulated windows and finally deciding to take the pathway of my mother’s eardrums.
"Shit." I announce to myself and the only company I have on this backwashed end of the night. A sly cat who lurks the streets. The street cat and I have a staring contest from our opposite ends of the road. Her eyes are glowing under the streetlamp, and I wonder if she can even see my eyes at all. She sulks over and leans up next to me.
"Hey Cat", I try, lying back down on the wet lawn.
The cat does not answer. She faces me with a look of disdain. I am pathetic to this cat. I can't even find a way back into my own house. This cat rules the night streets, and I can tell I have no place here. The cat doesn't need to say this as she turns on her heels to continue her night patrol down the block.
New determination in mind, I rummage through the carport. The tin garbage can crashes onto the ground in an atomic explosion as I attempt to grab a ladder. My mission in making little noise is failing. I abandon the carport. I back away from the house and survey the perimeter.
I decide my next quietest bet is to climb onto the lower roof. I head to the basket ball hoop. I wrap my arms around the black glossy pole, and attempt to shimmy my way up. This plan proves to be futile and I continuously slide down the pole in a clumsy stupor.
"Fuck it", and in the style one would enter a minefield or war zone under open fire, I pull the garage door about 2 feet up, and roll in, to shut the garage door again swiftly. I lunge through the darkness of the garage itself, walking into boxes and the lawnmower and the car and a pile of old shoes. I also manage to knock over the four bicycles and their kickstands. My entrance is less graceful than a dog being forced into a bath-tub, it is less civilized than a coyote in a suburb and is less tranquil than a gorilla in heat.
I am drunk and confused and I am stumbling through my own house, waking up the bodies still stuffed with their dinner and their dreams.