I'm Happy

         "Listen, listen, hey are you listening?" An excited voice called out.
         Each time he spoke it sounded as if he was singing a fast paced song. Each syllable was a change in tune, he was patting me on the cheek. I had been asleep and, was woken up by this odd man. As I opened my eyes to see who it was, I instantly felt the need to puke. I quickly rolled over onto my side and vomited. It was orange and there were clumps of half digested food floating around in the pudgy material. Some of it had flowed onto my arm.
         "There, there." The mysterious man said calmly. "You'll be good in no time! No, you know what you'll be better than good you'll be great!" His words kept getting faster and faster.
As I turned to him I began to take stock of where I was, the first thing I noticed was the smell. Besides the smell emanating from my fresh vomit, I noticed the distinct scent of sharpie. I was staring at a dumpster from where I was laying on the ground. On the dumpster was a cat, it was orange with darker spots all over it. Strangely, part of its fur was also black its pattern was a zigzag and, it stretched around one of the cat's shoulders as if he was wearing a sash. it was staring down at me judgmentally. The man noticed I was staring at his cat and, moved over to it.
         "I see you've met Sweetie, she's a real sweetie isn't she?" He started to pet her, she remained staring uncomfortably at me.
         My eyes then wandered to the man who had awoken me, at first I thought I was just seeing things, my mind struggled to comprehend. I rubbed my eyes, I started to wonder if this was a dream. The man in front of me was shifting between two forms, in one of them he was wearing a red suit. His shoes were black and white. On top of them appeared to be a sticker of the generic yellow smiley face. He was wearing a white tie and, on it the word smile was written in red multiple times. As you got lower and lower on the tie it was more hastily written. He was wearing a black top hat with a red band around it. Written, in red shakily, on the front of the hat was the word happiness. He also wore white gloves and, sown on each digit was a letter that spelled out happy, on each separate hand. His face reminded me of a hyena's, he was smiling widely almost scarily how happy he seemed to be. He was clean shaved and, strands of black hair were popping out from under the top hat. His eyes were the most distinct part about him one was light blue and, one was dark green. Each time he blinked the colors switched eyes, this alone would have been quite peculiar but, there was something else. Every couple seconds his clothes would vibrate and change. He would then be wearing a heavy brown coat, its pockets overflowing with used tissues. He was also wearing a t-shirt, at the collar large quantities of snot had started to congest there. The stark comparison to the rest of the shirt only made it all the more noticeable and, disgusting. He was wearing grey sweat pants, his pockets were filled with teeth each movement he took I saw some fall out and, scatter. He was barefoot, his toenails were long and, had amassed a decent amount of dirt. His hands were covered in calluses and cuts. He was no longer wearing a hat instead, he showed off his black messy hair. His face had a crescent shaped scar on his left cheek, he had a slight stubble. His eyes remained the same blue and green.
         "What the hell are you?" I asked hurrying to get up.
         I must've gotten up too quickly cause everything started to spin and I had to lean against the nearby wall.
         "You want to know what I am, buddy?" He said cheerfully, inching closer to me with each word until he was eye to eye with me.
         He blinked his eyes a couple times and, rested his head on my shoulder for a second.
         "I wish I was in a cartoon." He said dreamily.
         He then hopped away from me.
         "Anyways what was I going to say?" He said shrugging his shoulders staring at me as if I should know the answer.
         "Oh yeah I remember now." He began to sing and, twirl around. "I'm happy, so happy, so goddam happy, Hooooooooray!" Upon finishing he got down on one knee and, did jazz hands in my direction.
         My head had stopped spinning and, I needed to get away from this freak so I began walking. Before I could leave however, he placed himself in between me and, the exit.
         "Now listen buddy, pal, friend, ami, copain, amigo, etc." He said while putting his arm around my shoulder.
         He must have noticed that this had made me a little uncomfortable.
         "I'm sorry some people have said that I'm too handsy or touchy feely. Whatever you want to call it. It's just that well, when you always feel like you're slowly falling into a dark frigid abyss it helps to be able to hold onto somebody else. I guess it makes me feel more grounded, if that makes any sense. Anyways, I'm going to tell you the secret to being happy. The trick is, and it's real simple, to smile." He was staring deeply into my eyes now hypnotically so.
         I no longer had control of my body my thoughts felt like they were stuck in mud every time I tried to think, I have to get out of here, it was pulled back into my subconscious.
         "Just smile, and smile, and, smile some more. It doesn't matter what happens, how you feel just smile!" He looked at me after the last part as if he had just said a funny joke. His head was nodding slightly, waiting for me to understand it and laugh. I didn't so, he continued.
         "The best is that you can say whatever you want while you're smiling, it doesn't matter cause you'll still be happy. For example, I'm slowly dying inside, now if I hadn't been smiling that would have been sad. But, don't worry I'm smiling see."
         He put his fingers in the edges of his mouth and stretched it so he was smiling. Upon examining his teeth they were perfectly white except for, his canines which were painted red. He then proceeded to laugh a high pitched cackle, not unlike a hyena's, he wiped away a tear.
         "Oh god, that was good ahhh, I like you man you're a good guy. I feel kinda bad to be honest, I've been talking this whole time." I started to open my mouth to speak, he cut me off. "But, it's okay I'll do enough speaking for the both of us. Now listen to me okay, just be happy, nobody likes a sad soul they aren't fun to be with so just, be happy okay? Happy, happy, happy. I need you to realize that everything matters... Well actually that's not true but, everything I do matters... Sorry, actually again that's not true. The point is my repetition matters, you see if you say something enough times it has to be true. You want to know how I know this?"
         The question knocked me out of my trance, I noticed now that we were dancing. More specifically we were doing the waltz, we were going so fast that everything was a blur around us. I wanted to leave but his hands held me tight no matter how hard I tried to pull away.
         "Because, it just has to be. Sometimes I feel like I'm crazy, you know? Actually, I'm sorry man that's all the time but, lately I feel like I'm unraveling." His voice started to break and, for a couple seconds he sounded like a little child on the verge of tears. "I'm scared, please just, just hold me."
         The dancing stopped, the world jerked back into clarity. He embraced me, I stood there dumbfounded.
         "I just, I just want to be happy." His voice shook.
         He then pushed off of me and, began skipping around me in a circle.
         "Don't worry I'm happy, so happy. I've wasted enough of your time." His voice had returned to its creepily cheery sing-songy way.
         He pushed me away, he tipped his hat to me and, then proceeded to throw it at me. He was obstructed by the hat for a few seconds, as it glided gracefully to me like a Frisbee. When he was in my vision again, he was smiling the biggest grin I had ever seen, an inhuman one. It was covering a third of his face and, he was laughing, only it sounded like it was all around me as if he was laughing right into my ear. Tears were streaming down his face and, a gun was in his mouth. The way the moonlight hit the metal it looked like it was sparkling, it was a beautiful scene in a way. I started to reach my hand out to say something to him, before I could the gun roared. He did not fly back like I had expected instead, his right arm, which was the one that had been holding the gun, went limp. He was swaying back and forth, still smiling. Finally, he fell backwards, a puff of dust was knocked up from where he fell. When he hit the ground his legs kicked up and then fell back down. This reminded me of a cartoon, suddenly I couldn't stop laughing. I had never laughed this hard before, I couldn't stop it was getting hard to breath. The sound reminded me of hyenas, the top hat he had thrown to me looked awfully comfortable, I put it on. My clothes began to vibrate and change every couple seconds. I began to approach his body, I picked it up and, stuffed it into the dumpster. Sweetie was looking up at me, I started to pet her, she purred.
         "Hi Sweetie, you're a real sweetie aren't you?" I said in a voice that did not sound like my own.
         I heard someone stumbling my way, he burped.
         I walked deeper into the darkness.
         I began to sing. "I'm happy, so happy, I'm happy, so happy."