May I Walk You Home, Sarah Morgan?

The steam kettle blew a harsh whistle. Jon made what he thought was reasonable instant coffee. It seemed the right color, dark.
Sarah returned and snapped off the tasseled lamp as if it had been violated. The two sat knees-to-knees in the nook's dim light while the Kit-Cat's Klock's eyes rolled back and forth above 2:27. She lit up, her flaring match breaking the still atmosphere that seemed determined to enshroud them since they left the bar.
“I like matches,” she said. “I like the sound they make.”
“So how long have you been married?” he said.
She exhaled her smoke to the side. “I'm separated.”
“How long?”
“Last year sometime. I wasn't paying attention.”
“What happened, if I may ask?”
“You may. I hated the prick, but he couldn't take the hint. So I pulled this kid in one of my classes, made sure he caught us here.”
She reflected, smiling with the tip of her tongue between her teeth, apparently a favorite mug.
“Took a few times,” she said, “but when he figured out he was never again going to open the front door without seeing me fucking some guy on the rug, he split.”
He wondered how many times it took, trying not to visualize.
“Not the first asshole thought he could own me if he knocked me up,” she said.
Sadness flashed across her face and was gone, but she hadn't moved, not a twitch.
“That's it?” he said.
“You want details?”
“I guess not.”
“I don't want support. He stays away from Sky. I get everything, over and out. He’s irrevler… “
“Irrelevant.”
“Whatever. He shall not be mentioned again, ever.”
“Where's guy number two, the one from your class?”
“You wouldn't believe the creeps I've sent packing.”
“I would.”
“He left right after he found out I didn't worship him, either. Artist type, only nineteen. Too sensitive, really. Way too …”
“Innocent?”
“Romantic. He was tall enough for me.”
Ouch.
“Silly mama's boy, though. Always grinning at me moony-eyed. Thought he was a poet, but hardly had any hair on him.”
She nodded in the direction of her son’s room. “Hadn't seen enough to join the survival games.”
She appeared to be contemplating the grave matter until the ash fell from her cigarette. She shot out her legs and flicked the ash off her zipper.
“He has now!” she crowed.
She threw back her head and laughed, her shoulders heaving until she hacked out smoke. He got her a glass of water while she coughed away. She took a swig.
“Had a great cock, though,” she said, gravel stuck in her voice.
She covered her mouth and tittered at her indiscretion until she was again overcome with her own joke, bent forward and cackling into his face with the hilarity of the mad.
Could someone please tell me what I've walked into?
When her entertainment had spent itself, she sat back, a wide grin stretched below her eyes gazing aside at nothing, her tongue between her teeth again.
He began plotting his escape.
“My, my, you are a circus,” he said.
The stillness of the night intensified, flooding the room with a pressure that froze everything into stasis. All sense of location and time melted away. He felt weightless and teetering as if levitating.
He gasped, then relaxed. He had not left his chair. Everything in the room shone with ethereal light.
Basking in the indelible calm, he could not focus his thoughts, but he was soon glad to be rid of them as his spirit swayed in the ecstasy, wanting to slip away … into the heavenly heights of … and never have to do any of it … ever again … until a cold impression seized his innards. All that existed, anywhere, anytime-ever, was the beauty before him. She sat motionless, shadowcast within plumes as if she'd crystallized from a sourceless ray to hover before him.
He could not even say his own name, but his naked essence had always resided in this timeless realm, beholding only this vision. All sense of his life and mind vanished, sucked into the fog of yesterdays spiraling away. He now understood the single thread of his destiny—to drift in these narrow wavelengths forever, knowing only this serene moment with the apparition before him. …
“Mom!”
Sarah sprang across the living room and peeked her head inside the mystery door. She spoke in low, comforting tones.
“I don't want it in here anymore!” Sky whined.
She slipped into the room and closed the door.
Exhaustion pressed down on him as he smoked and waited. The whole scene was bizarre, but he had to dismiss the skip as eye tricks—from fatigue and the evening's substance abuse, no doubt.
Sarah emerged. “He's afraid of a little statue I'm using for a model,” she said. “Creeps him out. I put it in the closet. All is well again.”
She sipped her coffee, grimaced and headed for the sink.
“By the way,” she said, “since you're very smart, you figured out you're not getting laid tonight.” She dumped the coffee and rinsed out the cup. “So you don't have to pretend interest in chit-chat with the crazy bimbo artist chick.”
He concealed his disappointment, but he was not looking forward to a mile's cold walk to Nelson's flat through working-class Lansing at three a.m. He would somehow hang in there until five or so, more terrible coffee, a bus to the flat, sleep until afternoon, settle in. What's another ruined day on the already frightening pile of ruined days?
“I'll stay for a while,” he said, “if you don't mind.”
A classic telephone ring startled him, jangling his nerves.
“I don't,” she said. “You may.”