Month: September 2015

Will you sleep with me?

 

Pardon?

 

Will you sleep with me?

 

Pardon?

 

I would like you to sleep with me.

 

What are you talking about? Why would you say that? That makes no sense! Where did that come from. We’ve never talked about this. We’ve never acted about this. Why are you saying this?

 

We’ve been friends for years. I know you like I know myself. I’ve known love many times, but it has always disappointed me. I feel like there’s a set formula, where you start by asking a girl to go out, 3-4 weeks after going out and after a night of a few drinks, you’re expected to stumble into bed. Once in bed, you play your games, make the noises you’re supposed to make, try to make it take the time its supposed to take, and then that’s it. Some people find it to be love, something true, something beautiful. For me, it’s always made me feel empty. Like an actor. So I want to get off the formula. I’m going to try to be brave and say what I really truly think. I want us to make love, I want us to explore each other, to talk and not be impaired, to say those things you actually think, to have an interaction instead of an action.

 

You’re honestly fucked up. The answers no, sorry, this is really fucked, and I don’t understand.

 

I don’t want to scare you or seem like a pervert or anything. I certainly don’t want to hurt our friendship, and I understand me talking much longer like this will destroy it, but still, this is something that I think is beautiful, something I don’t want to force on you but rather to share with you. If you find me unattractive, that is of course ok, but personally for me, everyone is beautiful, everyone has something to love, and I am not going to be a romantic and say that I’m in love with, or want to marry you or something bizarre, rather, that I love you as someone I know and genuinely enjoy. That it would be so much pleasure for me to give you pleasure. I want to talk about the things that it seems like people never talk about. We do not have to make love, but I would like to talk as lovers. In many ways, for my own sanity, I need to know that the talk of lovers exists, that its not some illusion sent from movies and books, that I can experience it, that I can impart it.

 

It’s not that you’re not attractive, you’re wonderful. I used to dream that we would go out on dates, that when we were sitting watching movies that maybe you’d kiss me. I never thought I’d tell you that, but I never really imagined this conversation happening either. If you want to back track, maybe we can try going out, take things slow, get to see how we work together. But you just said you didn’t want that, and that’s ok, but I don’t think of relationships as formulaic, I think of them as beautiful and wondrous, and I think its unfortunate that you seem so deadened to them.

 

Well, I like talking like this. Thank-you for just not standing up and leaving,

 

You’re one of the smartest people I know. You’ve said things to me many times in my life that have made me think. You’re making me think now. I just am not used to thinking this way. It feels like instead of running a race, just crossing the finish line, it feels like what you are saying would be cheating, and right now I can’t think of what the consequences would be, but I am sure they would be there.

 

You are completely right, there would be consequences from what we do, and I don’t understand them either. Our friendship would be different, and I would be a different person to you, and you would be a different person to me, and that of course could be tragic. We have shared so much why would I want to put that in jeapordy? But I want to. I desperately desperately want to. This isn’t about animal lust. This is the fact that I want to touch your skin, smell your hair, look in your eyes; to find recognition, to touch and be touched. This isn’t love, loves not something I want from you now, not that you’re not worth my eternal love, that’s a different conversation. This is more about the appreciation of the beautiful moment, the best way of spending this exact period of time. We could go out for dinner, or watch a movie, or go for a walk, and all those things would be wonderful, but we’ve done that. Love is something we haven’t done.

 

Ok. Fuck it. Lets do it. You didn’t talk me into it, to be honest, I think your answers aren’t really that sound, that really you’re just as confused as I am by this, but I think a corner of my brain understands. Love is a beautiful thing. Why shouldn’t we. What is wrong with it. Nothing I suppose, at least right now I suppose that, and I fervently hope that I think that again tomorrow. Do you want me to undress.

 

Know, we both undress ourselves every day, lets undress each other. I’m curious, I’ve known woman, but I have never studied, I’ve always thought its rude to look, even when my hands are everywhere, I’ve still thought it rude to look. I’m going to take your shirt off. And you’re beautiful. You truly are. You are wonderful. And I hope we are making the right choice. But no matter what, I am glad at this exact moment this is happening, I am glad to try something new, or perhaps something forgotton; so often love is animalistic, lets make love as humans.

I am running.

Where is the sun? Behind that cloud? Do I still get UV rays. Strange that looking at the sun can make me blind, yet I see it everywhere. I wonder if it’s worth it. Maybe I’ll try to take a peek.

What a lovely smell, fresh cut grass; fantastic. Yeah, I’ll sit right here, just take it all in, sunny day, people walking, kids playing, why not. These kids here playing on the playground, how lucky they are. I wonder why I ever stopped playing. That idea of free fantasy, how did I lose that. Fuck it. Do I really want to play house? Now I’m living the life I used to fantasize about, what a load of shit. I wonder what am I supposed to dream about now. Play retirement with the other men. Maybe when I’m retired we’ll play pretend death. What a load of shit.

I like those kids playing though, if I can’t do that myself anymore maybe that’s a reason to have kids. I could see that. Imagine going home after work, and there’s all these big studious eyes raptly waiting for my return; taking a break from homework because they really fucking love me. I could actually create things that would love me. I wonder if that’s why some people have children. Make yourself exist by creating things that take note of you.

Fuck, this bench is getting chilly or something, I don’t know, something that makes me not want to sit here any more, so back to walking. It would be nice to somehow have you just know I’m walking. Why do I have to say it? I know that I’m walking.

If I was somehow rich, would I give it away or hoard it all? I think I would want the house and the car, but I’d be weak and tempted and put it in some compound interest shit which would make me so so rich but I would never enjoy it. No, I’m a better poor man maybe.

I wonder if I just ran off this sea wall and into the water if that would be beautiful. I can imagine the scene. A point of view parallel to where I’m running, except already over the water, and my momentum carrying me towards the sea. The logical thing for me to do would be to stop. Anybody watching me would assume I’m just turning late. But then six steps away, with my pace perfect, not a step faster, not a step slower, it would be obvious I’d have no option to stop, I was going into the water. I can see it so ravishingly perfect in my mind. I would keep running in the air, not faster like some fucking treadmilling doll, not slowly, just naturally. For a second there my feet would touch the water and not go through it. I’d be walking on water. Then there would be that wonderful chaos of the splash, and all these people at the railing looking at me, and what I’d do What I’d do is swim forward a bit maybe breast stroke, then turn around and stare at all that confusion and just laugh with genuine pleasure, laugh at the wonders of the world, that such joy exists, that these chains can so easily be slipped. Maybe the people watching it would understand. Maybe it’s something they’d remember.

But oh well, I’m already around that corner, but its a nice thought. I hopped onto this big rock while I was thinking of that story, it was pretty sweet. I wonder if I could run forever. I wonder what would stop me? There must be a pace that I could run forever at. I could drink a bunch of coffee or learn to sleep while I run, and run through the supermarket to buy food, and I could just never stop. That would be life. I’d die, and spent so much time thinking about death in the endless thoughts of a mind casually distracted, and I would meet my maker or die and think of nothing and never know. but if there is something, and they ask why should I be allowed in, did I live a good life, I could answer honestly: yes. I lived beautifully. I was  a force of nature, benevolent but terrible, I was existing as one one. Or all that. I don’t know. It makes a nice amount of sense in how I visualize it. Or really maybe it doesn’t, but a mind must think of everything, wrong thoughts shouldn’t be excluded. If I am knocked down I will pick myself up. If I am a failure I will know my failings.

There’s this woman on this bike going so fast past me, I wonder why. Does she have somewhere to go, is she training, does she think she’s fat. She’s certainly driven. Kudos to that, it’s not the way I’d want to live, but I appreciate its attraction.

I continue running.

A moaning is softly lost against a solid wall. Again, and again and again the sound of a broken animal tries to push its broken humanity through cracks that don’t exist. Has this happened for just moments or decades? The wall does not break, will never break. The man from who this pitiful wale bales from is broken, has been broken, will always be broken. He is suffering and has suffered; one would wish for a solution.

We look into his small cell to understand. To punish a man so severely would imply a monster, but instead all that we find is a small huddled shape with the aura of what a banker could ultimately devolve to if all humanity is stripped away. This is no dungeon from times past or third world hell hole but a modern cell. The prisoner is dressed in the infamous orange jump suit, balding head neatly cut, nails just trimmed and hygiene genuinely good. Clearly, keeping him within the auspices of physical normalcy is taken with dutiful regularity. Yet his eyes are dead. He has not seen outside of the closed walls of his cell for so long and one wonders if he likes to look into the crevices of what used to be his memory. Can there be pleasure in remembering what has been lost if it will never be found again?

Why is he here? We can take a look into his mind, but past all the rubble is given no indication of monstrosity. Here is a man who will never leave prison. He will have no chance of rehabilitation. As long as he lives he will have his parole denied. He is not in here for what he did or did not do, he is here for what he thinks. No, this man of ours is not some dread political foe, nor is he someone whose physical or mental contagion means he must be in permanent quarantine. Rather, his physical self is attracted to a taboo that it is better not to name.

In our man’s life from as long as he can remember he was deviant.  Where life built a construction that said a man was made of this, this and this he felt like there must be more than one blueprint for these specifications did not fit his own mind. How could it be that all those things other people said were important were not important to him? How could it be that that him just being natural in the recesses of his own mind would be the horror of those around him.

As we are in the prisoners mind a quick flash of something beautiful appears. A memory half remembered glimmers to the surface in the space between tediums. It is nothing special or indeed horrible, just an arbitrary trigger in our man’s mind: here he is as a child sitting in a chair that is too big for him snuggled up against a large stuffed animal. The memory is quick, just a few imperceptible moments of that long lost feel of protection, warmth and comfort and then it is gone. Does the man even know that this memory flashed through his mind? He shivers.

There is no place for this story to go. Words could be endlessly thrown at the problems seen here, but they will mean nothing. Our man is someone who if he was natural would be a curse to our society. The question is not of whether he can control his deviance or if he will one day slip and irrevocably  hurt another, rather, the question is do the members of society want the mirror of a different world reflecting their own image. Who is to say those monstrous things you do are evil if most of the world partakes in similar weaknesses.

With our man the idea was to give a simple answer to a complex question. Simply put, we have put that thing we don’t understand in a box and thrown away the key. We will continue to take these pockets of difference and keep putting them behind a wall, we will continue to destroy individuals like our man. We need to keep the evil at bay, and even more, we need to keep the idea of evil far away unless one day we see it come to light, and we realize that it was also in our heart, unrecognized but a part of us the entire time as well.

Our man walked down the hall, quietly musing, going at an appropriate pace. The hall was clearly in some institution, a hospital or psyche ward, one of those places where cleanliness is held higher then godliness; where secrets  show up against the white monochromes.

Our man was bobbing his head slightly as he walked, looking at nothing, yet apparently walking to some internal musical beat. He bobbed a little left, a little right. Nothing drastic, but certainly noticeable. He had the countenance of a young boy walking on a slippery pool deck, so ready to let loose his energy but so aware that momentary excruciating slowness is necessary.

I dislike description, but I suppose the countenance of our man will have bearing on this particular story, or at least I imagine so. Our man, who has a name and hair color and all those inessential details, appeared to be near the end of his life. Aged perhaps eighty years, he was stooped and wizened though clearly in good spirits. He was a man who had seen much of the world, who had an aura of calm grace, who in another time would have been classified as having an aristocratic bearing.

Imagine him is this scene, if you will, as a man who has purchased something, something imaginable in our day and age but unimaginable a short time ago. He is going now, through this cheerless institution in a cheerful spirit, with the hope of finally bearing the fruit of this object he has purchased.

He walks down the hall, still, until he comes to the end of the hall, and here he must choose left or right. He casually turns around, looks inquisitively at the attendant behind him and heads left at the hand signal denoted by the attendant. The attendant slows down subtly, so that our man regains the distance in-between himself and the attendant he enjoyed previously, and then the attendant, too, carries on.

As our man passes an abandoned waiting room whose uncomfortable plastic seats appear to get little use, the attendant invoked clearly but respectively “that the room you are looking for is on the right, 1406.” Our man centered in front of this door, which was either made out of metal or thick paint, and raised his hand in the direction of the door nob and then paused, “Do I need a key, or is it unlocked?” “It is unlocked, we don’t believe locked doors provide a positive atmosphere,” the attendant said, drawing directly behind our man so as to look over his shoulder so that when the door opened the scene would greet his eyes with the same rapidity that it would our man; with the attendants’ head looming over our mans shoulder, and our man having his head turned to address the attendant, their lips were so close to each other that imagery of kissing must be invoked, though this is an entirely meaningless coincidence.

Our man opened the door, and was greeted with the sunlight that was so sorely lacking in the hallways. A large window, floor to ceiling, was directly opposite the door and took up must of the relatively large wall. On the other side of the window was a tree, perhaps a maple or an oak but certainly not a pine, that was in full maturity and currently filtering the sun into the room in a particularly sublime way. In the room, was a bed: double sized, and that was all. The room felt larger then it was. Doing push ups, in the middle of the floor, was a young boy, aged perhaps 11, that age right before puberty where one is still very much a boy but you question for how much longer.

The boy was clearly working hard, but not overly exerting himself. The attendant gave a short whistle and the boy stood up to attention with the air of saluting, though his hands were firmly at his sides.

The attendant walked with efficient steps to the right of the man, the left of the boy, so that the three of them were very much an equilateral triangle, and said, looking only at the man “That since he arrived last week, he has maintained his exercise regime. He has also maintained his strict vegan diet, as you requested. As I am sure you have been informed, his health is flawless and as you can see he is a prime physical specimen.” The man looked thoughtful, asked a few questions to the attendant which were of that minutiae detail which is not necessary in a story, and asked if he could observe the boy. Upon the attendant’s consent, our man walked up to the boy. Putting his eyes only centimeters away from the boys face, he just silently observed the boys face for what must have been a full minute. He then began circling the boyThe boy remained motionless, except for blinking, seeming to be either used to or trained for close examinations such as this.

Our old man pulled away, and walked back so that once again there was an equilateral triangle between himself, the boy, and the attendant, and then while continuing to stare at the boy told the attendant “I was never so thin at that age, but obviously that is not a complaint. He is perfect, everything I hoped for.”

The attendant nodded, looking neither relieved or pleased but rather just professional, and said “Then shall we go back to the directors office, and you can finish signing the papers? We can still arrange the transfer over this afternoon as planned” “Yes, lets. You may lead the way,” said our man, and he followed the attendant out of the room, no longer a bob to his step but now a smile on his face. He turned to shut the door behind him, gave one last look to the boy in the room, who blinked once and slowly, then shut the door.

Really, I thought I could breeze past this. It’s kind of a guilt thing. How many times, am I stuck in the McDonalds line up, going: I could leave, why don’t I leave, I could really leave. But instead, I don’t leave, I pay a stupidly cheap price, get a stupidly large amount of food, and sit where no one can see me and just gorge.

Really, I’m not proud of it, but it’s a part of who I am. I live in a bad area. Theres true addicts around. And I will be with friends, seeing these people who are in hell, and going through hell, and they talk to me, my friends, of how they don’t feel any empathy. I’d like to agree with them. But strange as not, I can’t, and even stranger it’s because of McDonalds. I am addicted. Truly. Laugh. Stop reading for a second, I promise, take a giggle and skip to the next line, it doesn’t bother me, I think, or I hope, that there is something to laugh at, at being addicted to those fucking golden arches. Carrying on. Howabout a new paragraph?

Fucking McDonalds. I go, and the problem is I’m cheap. I’ll argue that. How about, my friends call me cheap, I call myself efficient. And see, the problem is, I’m really good at being efficient. I know the value of a dollar. And I know ten dollars will get me a cheap pitcher of beer, two fifty will get me a bus, fifteen dollars will get me an okay meal at a restaurant, ten dollars will get me a taxi from here to there, but above all that, five dollars will get me two double cheese burgers and a junior chicken. McChicken sauce is free. That’s four patties and a chicken burger for half the cost of a cheap pitcher of beer. It’s dangerous economics. It’s almost, at least mentally, like, if I got a dollar, the best way I can spend that dollar, honestly I’m saying this, the best way to spend a dollar, is not on university, is not on rent, it’s on a double cheeseburger. Make sure there’s free McChicken sauce.

I feel bad for talking like this, I’m clearly a bad person. You should never talk about this, but I’m writing this, and I will write as the words come to my fingers. Fifteen minutes ago, I was at McDonalds. I went because I had not been there in a long time. As above I stated I’m a McDonalds addict. I went almost, almost to see what it was that I had made such a fuss about. Well, I did, it was cheap, it was delicious. It brought up memories. I remember knowing I had to walk an hour to a friends place; at the start of the journey there was  McDonalds, and I rembember not calculating now how much food it would take to make me full, rather, how much food would it take to keep me company over that hour long walk.

This is the problem. I hope it’s a problem with other people besides myself. I don’t eat there for food. I eat there for a time killer. For company. Because it’s the cheapest form of entertainment. I am shocked at myself for loving it so much, but that doesn’t change that I do love it so much. It’s an addiction. That’s not a witticism. It’s an addiction. When I walk past a McDonalds, I don’t question my hunger, I question the change in my pocket. I give it a jingle, the question is not how much money there is, but rather, what can this exactly buy me at McDonalds. I will spend within my means; however, unless I have no money, then I’ll put it on plastic, because it’s good to, ummm, I don’t even know my causality, to keep my credit up maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know. I just know I eat there a lot. I just know that I live a good, clean wholesome life and this is my badness in it. At least the badness I will talk about.

Well, that’s an awkward way to end a paragraph. But that’s ok, we’re both already past it. I’ve written a hefty chunk on my fast food problem. I’m pulling at the walls of my brain trying to think of what the point was. I hope for a point more then you hope for a point. You might go, shit, why did I bother reading this wall of text. To me, it’s the attempt to answer a lifestyle choice, and oh no, no answer is readily coming. I’m waiting, literally typing waiting for an answer to come to my finger tips. Is this it? Lets try. I do these things at McDonalds to my body and I know they’re bad. But the fact is, when I drink a bit, I want pleasure. And pleasure is hard to come by. You have to kiss a beautiful girl. Have someone say something wonderful to you. See lightning strike. Basically, magic has to strike for pleasure to really happen. And, maybe I’ll write about this in another wall of text, but magic doesn’t exist. I’ll never walk out at the start of the night, and be able to expect a night to remember for the rest of my life. What I can expect is to get drunk and eat a lot of delicious food and it will be cheap. And sad as it is to say, and I’m saying this right now completely undeppressed and content, I will eat this food on so many of these nights to make me happy. And that’s it. And that’s what the point of this entire  wall of text is. And my question is, I go to these fast food joints all the time; I always feel guilty; they’re always full; are you, are you my readers, are you there the same reason I am there? Us cheap, pleasure craving, lazy unhealthy mediocre monstrous normal people.

This fucking light, this fucking light, can’t it go away? It’s eating into his eyes, it’s killed the idea of darkness. Is this awake or dreaming, there’s that feel of unreality yet in his heart, hell not even his heart his head, he knows that all of this is real. This is what is happening to him. If he does not gain control, he will disappear. He needs to gain control. What can he do. They have worn him down. How is it he confessed? They are better then him.

What an ugly room to die in. Will this really be it. No, there has to be a next step. There’s always a next step. There will be a next step. What is the next step. Fucking Christ. Justin wants to panic, it’s all he wants to do. Is that the fucking rope being tied into a noose. What the hell are all these people saying. There is a noise in his ear that’s like a steam whistle. Are all the colors of the room more vibrant then usual, or is there a lack of color. How did the noose get around his head. Is he crying? Poor man, he’s not even going to appreciate that these are some of his last thoughts. The rope is grating at his neck, he wants to itch it. There has to be a next step. He is hanging, there is pain, but there is no time for pain. What is the next step. There has to be a next step. What is the next step. He’s stopped twitching.

We’re drunk and she’s naked in my bed and pulling my belt off. She’s ravishing, she tells me to kiss her, and I do, as hard as I can, I put my soul into her and pull back holiness. I touch her breast and her eyes light up and she unbuttons my pants, she is beautiful, she is touching me, how strange to be touched, how wonderful, how wondrous, emotion, life, love.

–

We wake up, we’re hung over, I’m in her bed, and we just lie there looking at each other, both awake, but both afraid to break that silence. She asks me if she was my first, I nod. She tells me I was wonderful. I ask her if she wants breakfast, she silently nods, I touch her shoulder, let my finger run up her neck, to her cheek, her hair, she is beautiful.

–

We’re eating, out conversation is stilted, uncomfortable, it’s dinner, our first date, and we don’t really know what to say. She asks me if I heard that a family was killed in a car crash very near her house last night. I tell her no, that that is terrible, that I’m so sorry, life is tragic, and short, you have to make most of the short time you have. Our eyes meet. I order two drinks.

–

We’re at the mall; it’s noon; we spent all morning and all afternoon in bed; life is good and beautiful and lovely. We’re walking and I confidently have her hand in my hand, and we’re talking ceaselessly. Yes, reality TV is stupid, I can’t believe people watch that trash. Yes, blue does look good on a girl with blue eyes. Her hands in my hand, its so soft, she leans against me, looks up into my eyes, and my mouth catches, time stops, don’t ever stop looking at me, don’t ever stop. Please.

–

We’re both quiet. I just told her I love her. I meant to. I meant it. I wait. She looks like she might cry, then she looks up, looks me right in the eye, then tells me she loves me. I say it again; she says it again. Like that, we’re in love. Lovers in more than just bodies. Love we have. It is ours, I can feel it, she completes me, she is perfect.

–

We’re shouting at each other. It’s a fucking stupid idea, it’s icy out, I won’t let her drive around, yes I’m a fucking control freak, but I’m sorry if I give a dam. She starts to cry, and leaves the room and slams the door. I yell good. Then I cave. I go to the slammed door, and I lean against it. Oh, you know I don’t mean to yell, it’s just I’m worried, you’re welcome to go, but what if something happens, what would I do, it would be my fault, what would I tell your parents, what would I do with myself; you know I love you. She opens the door. She kisses me hard. She kisses me harder. She tells me I’m a wonderful man, that she’s so lucky to have a star like myself watching over her, and that she’s sorry for being the fool. She kisses me the hardest I’ve ever been kissed; I can taste blood; she says instead of her going out, we should go to the bedroom, she’s beautiful, eyes fresh from tearing, cheeks still flushed from anger, I pick her up, a bit like a football I suppose, and carry her to the bed.

–

We’re sitting hand in hand, and her parents are looking at me. It’s dinner, and the conversation is stilted, like from that first date. Yes, I’m a university student; yes, I have a good job; yes my grades are good; I would like to an English teacher when I graduate; yes it is a good profession. Her father smokes, and he uses the cigarette like a maestro’s wand, I can tell he is playing me so that I sing the songs he wants. Even more I can tell he is pleased with my answers. Her mother is staring at the father, and when he looks away, to light another cigarette or what not, she looks approvingly at me, and when she thinks both I and her husband are looking away, she gives a conspiring wink to her daughter my lover. We go to the next room, and my heart goes and plays the piano while the mother cleans the dishes and I talk the stock market with her father. It’s a Renoir scene.

–

We’re hugging, she’s just pulled me from my knees and gave me a passionate yes. I wonder if it is ok to cry. I am ecstasy, I am wonderful, I am the happiest I’ve ever been, she is so beautiful, so wonderfully wonderfully beautiful. She cries, she cries my tears, we are one, oh my god, lord thank you for love, for these emotions, let life never be as happy as this moment, for fear I will explode, life, what wonders, what wonder, awe, awe, awe.

–

We’re married. We are middle aged. I know I am getting older, a few gray hair, but I look at her, and she is as beautiful as ever, more so, a line or two around her mouth provides her dignity, her hips have filled out to give her a shape, and her eyes have a confidence that was not there when I met her. She goes to the washroom, comes back, and tells me the news we’d both prayed fervently for, our hard work had paid off, life would continue on, our love would have a physical embodiment, we were joined forever, I kissed her, harder then I’ve ever kissed anyone, whispered in her ear thank you, and put my hand on her stomach and didn’t stop.

–

We’re all here around the breakfast table and she’s mad at him, our wonderful little boy, since he has slept in and might be late for school. She’s getting his bag together and giving him a lecture, but it is not mean hearted, it is parenting, and my heard fills with pride: my family, my wonderful family, my universe, my constellations, everything that I need, everything that I have. I give a laugh, and she looks at me, and sees that she’s being a bit over stern and starts to laugh to, and my beautiful son, my beautiful son, the son of my beautiful wife, looks at her, then looks in my eyes too, then starts to laugh. We all laugh and I tell them they had better run off or else be late to school. I had to hurry to my own school; teach English.

–

We’re so sad; shattered. He has left us, our beautiful boy, our son, has grown, grown like grass in the spring, when you look out and you wonder how, how did this happen; he is gone to school, in another city. She is crying, I go to her and hold her, wrinkles here and there, grey hair yes, but oh still so beautiful, so wonderful, all I want, and tell her I love her, that we have been good parents, that she is wonderful; I hold her, I hold her weeping frame, let my own tears fall in her hair knowing no one will ever know my sorrow, the sorrow in the creeping recesses at the back of my mind. We did good, I think, we did good.

–

We are old, my son, a man, visits us every winter, he brings his children, and we regale them with stories and games. My wife, my partner, has become frail. She radiates a glow when the kids come to play, three grandchildren, their laughter is infectious, we feel young, as young as our minds feel, we could play their games, we want to play their games, when did we ever stop, why? I see my son looking at his mother my wonderful wife and his face is pained; I look at her a second unguarded and my face is pained; she looks at the both of us, gives a laugh, and continues to play with the grandchildren, her withered frame breathing deeply every breath so deeply; poignantly aware it could be her last.

–

We are separated. She is dead. Died years ago actually, but I still wake up and expect her warmth to be next to me. Terrible start of the day, always realizing you’re alone, then thinking of why. My son visits often, and his children are getting old, thinking I’m a fragile piece of furniture, someone to whisper around. But they are beautiful; what an equation, she and I made so many who will make so many; live forever for sure. But they don’t visit every moment of every day, how could they, they have their own lives, their own loves, their own hopes, their own dreams; I spend much of my time alone; thinking. Sometimes I wonder if it’s good to think. I think that I’ve lived my only life, that the bottle is almost empty, and I suppose it’s natural to wonder if I chose right, if maybe I should have read the label more carefully, that maybe I should have drank quicker, that maybe I should have drank slower. My life ends, and I look at the receipt, and I see how it all adds up. I used to dream like everybody else, big dreams, emperor or something. I used to dream of love. Did I have love. It was good. Life was good. Beautiful family. What more could I want. Did I not have everything? What more could I want. What more would be fair to want?

 

It’s lunchtime and I’m going to play chess with Kwame. I put the chess board in the middle of the teachers table, and the other teachers put their lunches to the edge of the table, thinking not that it’s rude that I’m moving them, but rather looking forward to watching our game of chess. I walk away to go buy my lunch while Kwame sends a boy to go fetch his, and we exchange the usual banter about how the boy could just as easily get mine. Different cultures, we both understand, but the joke has become a part of our routine and we treasure it.

I walk over to the waakye stall and go to the back of the line, however the children push me to the front and the stall keeper has already started preparing my usual meal; I’m not so cultured as to not enjoy some perks and I buy some toffee for the kids who let me go to the front. I head back to the table, set up my white chess pieces, move my traditional first move, then begin to eat my lunch.

The interesting thing about Kwame and my playing chess is we only play each other. There’s no thinking about typical strategy, rather it’s about taking the historic precedents that we’ve built up and an intimate understanding of the other person’s logic and trying to out maneuver the other person. It’s satisfying and relaxing. Every time we play, I sketch my image of who Kwame is as a person a little clearer.

He always waits an inappropriate amount of time for his first move, believing that since I always do the same first move, he should highlight my recklessness. Typically, however, he himself does something reckless for his first move, like trying to throw me off my game by doing something he has never tried before. However, that doesn’t happen today; today, he does his classic start, leans back, gives a bit of a grin and a polite word pointing out what I know that this is a safe first move, and then he begins the act of waiting for me to make a move.

Now, for me, the first move is almost a joke, just a part of our vernacular conversation. It’s the second move that is so important to me. This is typically where I diverge, where I can use my usual moves to get myself into a strong defensive position and just keep hammering him waiting for him to make a mistake. This is guaranteed to be a long and satisfying game, meaning I’ll either whittle him away from his mistakes, or he too will have a strong defensive game and we’ll hammer each other down and it will become a game of few players with lots of space. Or I’ll make a mistake.

There is the other type of game I could play, which is of course offensively. I could begin moving my characters in either a way that looks like defense, then put myself at risk while trying to take a greater reward or just begin playing in a controlled chaos and hope that I keep the balance of the chaos better then Kwame.

I think today I’ll play my defensive game. This is because I have been losing to Kwame recently, which is only because before that I was beating Kwame too often. I got over confident and sloppy, he got thoughtful and determined. I’ve been embarrassed, everyone watching me lose, and today, I am going to beat him by taking as long as this game takes without making a single mistake. It’s his turn to be over confident and sloppy.

I make the defensive first move, a signal that I am building up my defenses, and he leans back, and my god but does he look confident and how it grates me! He seems to realize that I’m expecting him to be overconfident, but still he begins to make extremely offensive moves, the type of moves that you’re not sure where they’re going to lead to, you’re not even sure if your opponent does, but there’s that scary chance that openings in your defenses that you haven’t seen are being analyzed and exploited. It’s the sort of game I love to play when I’m on a winning streak, but hate when I want a grinding win. While I set up my defensive walls, which he knows what I’m aiming for since I’ve used this beginning strategy dozens of times, he’s situating his pieces to take advantages of the mutually known holes in my armor.

Well damn him! He is playing over confident, and he’s left me a chance. It means that my defensive game will be potentially compromised but I have the chance to take out a high level player with a low level player and I take it. First blood, his, and he know he’s been playing to open. However, he also knows it’s to late to stop his momentum now, he has to keep playing in a way that creates disturbances in my mind, play in a way where I leave his strangely formed line a path to the heart of my board, and he starts down this path by passing up killing the player that just killed his, even though it’s in striking distance of more of his players, and instead battering a hole into my defenses.

I look up, and give a laugh. Well if that’s how it’s gonna be! I take another bite of my lunch, thinking that he really did make a nice offensive move. Either way, we both lose a piece, and he gets a hole in my line out of it. But, as the problem with playing such a quick offense so often is, he’s made a mistake in another part of the board with his quick forward moves. I ignore both his player that battled far into my line, and my player in the middle of his line, and put him in check. But not just check, no, this is a sweet move, a check where my checking player can’t be touched, his king must be protected and, best of all, the same player is now in a direct line for striking the player who battered my defenses. He moves his king, I use my player in his line to take out one of his players and put him in check again, he moves his King again, I take out his player in my defenses, and he takes out my player in his midst. It was a major first battle, I still have a relatively strong defensive line except for the one breach, and I have thrown his side into disarray. He makes a joke about how that was not exactly good on his part, and it’s my turn again.

Now I realize that if I can just keep playing the game taking a piece for every piece he takes, I win. I realize my danger now is to become the one who is overconfident, the one who makes mistakes. I can see him analyzing the board thoughtfully and determinedly, realizing he has to play better then me to win. My present move has to be good. It has to show that not only did I win the first battle, but the lay of the land is in my favor, that he needs to reform on my terms.

I move a player to the center of the board as a test. He could easily move a character to take it out in the next turn, prompting me to sacrifice the player or move him back to safety, wasting a turn and taking away my hard earned collateral from the previous skirmish. But then he would be on offensive again, and he’s not ready for that no, he keeps making his defensive line, filling the holes, and has basically conceded the middle of the board to me. I quickly move my defensive line forward, filling the breach he made, putting myself into a strong position. The defenses I made while he was playing offense in the beginning are now coming into their own, and moving them forward gives me clear dominance in the center of the board, and enough room behind the front line for the maneuvering of my other pieces. The board is under my control.

We do a few small skirmishes, losing an equal number of pieces of equal value, but remember, I don’t need to win any extra pieces: every piece we both lose just highlights my numerical advantage. Have a one piece advantage when there’s thirty pieces on the board is not such a big deal, but when there’s ten pieces its far more pronounced.

Kwame does not look worried, it is just a game and he has won the last several ones, but the other teachers are getting angry at him for not being more dominant, for his seeming complacency on giving me the middle ground at no cost. They point out isolated moves he should make, but this is not their game: they don’t see the long term repercussions; really, it is more for their entertainment that they want us to do those grandiose moves which are painful and unrewarding.

It is now time for me to start assaulting him. This isn’t because of confidence, but rather because he’s refusing to start assaulting me and the game is stalling. I use a player that is a bit more important then a pawn and blast through his defenses. It’s giving up my numerical advantage, but it’s worth it as over the next couple of turns I flood him with a few of my most tactical players. I begin destroying his pawn line while he’s fleeing with his king, and I can feel victory in my sight.

But suddenly, it all comes crashing down! I was the over confident one, and it costs me bitterly. He knocks out my most tactical player from a gap I didn’t see, and in the same move puts me in check. While I take out the player putting me into check, he takes out my second most tactical player. Shit! The board now a mess, both our defenses are in chaos and I can’t tell who has the advantage. I decide that I need to keep pressure on his king to try to keep him boxed in while I reform my defenses, but he is a move ahead of me, putting me in check again. All the other teachers are giggling at the both of us, but more at me since I was so much ahead of him in the game. I feel my self become impassioned, and know that I have to throw that away, that any emotion will lose me the game. I have far more pawns then he does, and I decide to sacrifice some of them. I start that long walk to the other side of the board to try to get another queen, and it scares him. He wastes turns on pawns, and I still have more, and he’s realizing both that killing these pawns has overextended his line, but also that he has no choice. I keep the pawns where they are, on the far side of the board protecting each other and ready to move ahead at any time, and then begin encircling his king. He throws some low players away from the king hoping I’ll take the bait but we both know that he has left himself vulnerable.

This is the time when the game will be decided. We both know it and he’s the one trapped in a corner, dangerously flailing. He decided to take all my pawns out on the far side, and use that piece to try to get behind my king. I let him do all this because I am getting closer and closer to making a check mate, we’ve each given up a great number of pieces in this battle, but the siege is his end if I break it, while just costly to me if he beats me back.

There are few players left, and we’re each circling the other. But his flailing moves finally strike and he takes out my most key piece left. I don’t know what has happened, but the damage is immense to my cause. He has a big grin on his face, he knows what that was worth, and he leans back apparently sure that this next move of mine will take a huge amount of time on my part. But he hasn’t watched the entire board, so fixated on his move being brilliant he has left his own key player tactically open, and I take him out. He’s gives a bit of a shout, still in good humor but clearly affected by the intensity of the game, as well as by our fellow teachers mocking of him over his dismal performance.

His players left are weak, and while I am not much stronger it’s enough with so few players to make the inevitable unavoidable. This is my favorite feeling of the game, knowing that you’re just killing time until you’re unquestionably considered the winner. Knowing that all there’s left to use is my advantage in further devastating his mobilization and formations, and whittling it down until there’s just the king left.

Oh, I’m definitely cocky now, but that’s ok. I can feel all those other losses slipping from my shoulders, can feel my banter with Kwame becoming more playful, even my moves become almost mocking. He tries a few admittedly well played moves, but I’m too superior; a well placed bullet does nothing against a navy. I know so many times my cockiness has gotten me into trouble, but not this time.

And here we are, so close to the end. I have two tactical pieces left and my king, all he has is his king. I slowly but with assurance and even grace chase him to a corner. This is where Kwame knows all he can do is try to force a stale mate, but I won’t give him that luxury. My cockiness is gone as I chase him very slowly and carefully, not trying to knock him out right away, rather making sure that it is a real check mate. I see my move, I make it, and now it’s my turn to lean back knowing his turn will be a long one. He goes through every single option of where his checked King can go. He goes through them twice. He looks at my players. He looks back at his king. He gives a bit of a grin, sais that he has played very badly, and knocks his King over.

All the teachers lampoon Kwame, and I throw in a couple of shots, nothing heavy because this is the first time I’ve won in awhile and don’t want my previous failures brought up. But still it’s a great feeling. And then, without even asking each other, we begin to set the board up to play again. This time, I am black.

“Yeah I fucking said it. I’m the greatest. Everybody knows it. And oh you all look at me, safe in the frameworks of your skulls, and you think I’m nothing, but we both know the secret truth don’t we.”

 

He was spouting gibberish and his flatulence was terrible. He was not a very nice creature, and I sincerely hoped that either he would leave, or just shut up. The bus is only so large, I can’t drone out his banter, and what started out as amusing is quickly becoming aggravating.

 

“See, I live in a park. I go out, I catch a duck, and I eat fucking duck. When was the last time any of you, with your jobs, and your degrees, had duck? Huh? It’s a special occasion sorta thing, and I eat it every night.”

 

“Sir, please be quiet.” Why did I say that? Fuck. Now I’m involved. The ragged looking man looks up right in my eyes, breathing contempt.

 

“Oh, kid with a gold ring said something? What the fuck do you know? When I was your age, I was like you, I was all pretty and dolled up, and I was miserable, and I’m happy now, and if you’re lucky, maybe one day you’ll be like me.

 

“Sir, while that may be true, I’m not asking you for your opinion of me, and the people on this bus aren’t asking for your views on life. We just want to get to where we’re going, and to do it in peace.”
“Scared?”

 

“Sir, I’m neither scared or unscared, I’m just trying to lean back after a long day and not have someone interrupt my peace with his musings on why I should be miserable.”

 

“Well, fuck you, you’re blind, sitting there high and mighty, like you own the fucking earth, but oh, I know you, I can see you, your penetrable heart, the things you think about when you think openly, and I know their darkness. You want me quiet. Superficially, its because I’m annoying you. You think me nothing. Some drugged up brain dead fuck up who just happens to be a drugged up brain dead fuck up whose near you. Well, its not like that. See, I am you. I’m the you that you’d see if you spoke all those pretty fancy words dancing through the back of your mind. I’m the honest you. The you who you dream about being, and look how depressing it is.”

 

Christ. Now everybody’s looking at me with the same expression of resignation they reserve for this guy. How did I get drawn in? Why didn’t I just shut up.

 

“Sir, I don’t want to talk to you. Frankly I’d rather you just not talk. But say that’s not a choice, say it’s a choice between the both of us talking or just you talking, then I’ll choose just you talking, and I’ll sit here, and I’ll listen to some music, and look out the window and frankly try to pretend you don’t exist. You think you speak wisdom. That there’s hidden depths to what you say; You try to make me into you, and I don’t want to rebut you, because to feed you is to satisfy your ego, look at how you’ve made me talk as proof, but the real truth is, the real truth is, and this truly is the last thing I will say about it, is you look at me, and you want me to be secretly unhappy, you want me to be secretly miserable, because in some strange sense, this justifies the way you have chosen to live. However, and in some way I’m sorry to say this: I’m happy. I’m content. I acknowledge the limits of the world, and instead of trying to cast them aside and grasp at the nothingness you seem to have achieved, I live life by the rules of life. So continue sitting there. Blabbering on, that I know nothing, that I am delusional and the universe sides with you, or whatever the fuck it is you think, but realize that every single person on this bus is thinking the same thing in the privacy of their own minds, and that it’s both arrogant and  obnoxious of us to say it out loud. And now I’m stopping, and my stop is coming up, and I can’t perceive myself talking to you again, here or anywhere. Enjoy your day.”

 

Ahh, he got me, I talked, and I talked on his terms. I can sense him building up. Formulating a rebuttal, looking at what I said, and not hearing me. Not even knowing what he thinks himself. Just prepared to give me a lecture on who knows what just because I decided to call him on his arrogance. How great the world would be if everybody would just shut up. I pull the string for the next stop; I don’t care that it’s not my stop. I look out the window and wish I could shut my ears like I shut my eyes.

 

“Oh thanks all knowing one, any other fortune cards to read. You think you know everything, maybe. Pshh. You think you know everything, but look at this bus, you’re the youngest one here, and age really does count for something. Intelligence doesn’t exist, only time, and time is always spent on something, and cumulatively all these people have more life then you. I see your fucking bag with your fucking books. University must be nice. But you’re an ignorant piece of shit. Thinking reading books might teach you life, just shows you know nothing, nothing at all. You want to know something…

 

And I snap. I am just tired. Not tired angry. Not angry, something a word can’t contain. That animalistic urge to howl at the moon for being so bright when all you want to do is sleep. That recoil against the world for being imperfect. I look up. I stare him in the eye.

 

“I don’t want to know something. I never purported to know anything. And I certainly never asked for you to tell me anything. You look at me, and you tell me: we’re the same. And fine, we are the same, maybe we’re all the same, but that doesn’t mean we act the same. You call me ignorant: I think you’re obnoxious; but what we both are is two people speaking different languages who are miscommunicating. You think that I think that you’re on drugs. Well, I do drugs, I understand drugs, and what I really think has nothing to do with drugs, or poverty, or alcohol, or anything peripheral. No, I look at you, and what I see is weakness. Life is like boxing, and you’ve gotta play by the rules, and you’re right, I don’t know much yet, but I’m learning to fight, to stay in the ring. I know the ring is meaningless and the fight is meaningless, but those are abstractions. Doesn’t change the fact the guy is going to hit me. That’s a reality that affects my reality. And I’d vastly rather be myself, somebody whose learning to sidestep, to hit back, to operate in the world around me, then some wretch like you, someone who doesn’t learn to fight, somebody who crouches down and puts their head in the sand saying that now they see reality, yet, what they are really saying is: don’t hit me, stop hitting me, if I don’t see you, if I don’t acknowledge you, I can pretend the pain is pleasure and that my ignorance is enlightenment and oh, how this is wrong, how this is not a way to spend your collective conscience. You want a reality? Here’s a reality. Life isn’t perfect. We operate under imperfect conditions. And you are on a quest in life that you won’t complete, that you shouldn’t complete. You want to swim across the ocean but you’ll barely get away from the sight of land and drown. I am a creature of the land, and I understand that that is a meaningless abstraction, that really I’m an entity and I should be able to exist as anything, but goddamned it, if life’s a fight why pick an unnecessary fight? So I’ll be that creature of land like that creature whose womb I popped out of taught me to be and I’ll operate as a creature of the land and learn as a creature of the land and when some drowning creature like you comes to tell me that I know nothing, I’ll have no response but that you’re drowning, dying slowly and painfully and unhappily while thinking and hoping that everybody else is having the fate that you are suffering. So in a sense fuck you, and I’m sorry to everybody on the bus, but sometimes, somebody sais something that you respond to, and I’m sorry to interrupt your day, and here’s the stop that I pulled the wire for even though its not my stop, but I’ll get off anyway: to avoid this man, and to stop bothering you. Good day.

 

And I get off, and I’m blushing, and I feel like an idiot, because really I just reduced myself to this mans standard, made myself speak his language, and it’s one of those languages that is designed to sound like intelligence but truly sounds like pretension and anyone with a hint of learning can hear nothing but overwhelming ignorance. I truly am blushing, And walking away thinking maybe I’ll go buy some cheap delicious food to distract me until this fades from my short term memory, and hopefully doesn’t enter my long term. And then I look up, and here’s this wretch behind me, and he came off the bus at my stop, and he looks mad, like he might hit me, like he might hurt me.

 

“So you think you’re a fighter. Great, I get it, you think. I already said you think you know everything and here you go trying to prove it. No, don’t you fucking walk away. I swear to god, I will kill you if you walk away, and you already think I’m fucking crazy so that had better stop you. Oh good, you stop, and I’ll walk towards you, and we can settle this man to man. Oh don’t look like you’re going to fight me, you were the one who just talked about life like boxing, so let’s box. I know nothing about you but the fact that you know nothing, and that’s more then enough. Shut the fuck up. I can see your eyes wanting to talk, and I’ll answer your own fucking question. You want to tell me that I know nothing too. Great, aren’t you a philosopher. But really, words don’t speak what I need to say to you. Maybe I should just fucking hit you. Pain can be like a drug and expand your mind; but you, you’re the type of guy who would lap it up to get a clever witticism out. So you’ve got something to say to me. You said things to me. I’m going to respond. I’m not going to hit you. But oh, I want to, to take that smug look out of your eyes. You think I’m the one whose outside of reality, but the truth is I’m disenchanted from reality. You make it all into some philosophical game, swimming and boxing and all that shit. And what I want to do is make you feel pain. Make you get to the point where you can’t play mind games, can’t wonder at reality, make you get to the point where cells are running through your nervous system paralyzing your brain with their resounding feedback. You think I’d say things like ‘you don’t exist;’ well fuck that, what I say is you do exist, right now, and what you are is a pile of cells that have somehow decided to be conscious and that this isn’t a beautiful thing to make you appreciate life but a terrible thing, a thing to make you conscious of the pain and wretchedness that is the fate of everything in the universe. Cells divide, stars explode, the land ruptures. Thank god nothing but humans  have become conscious, imagine the suffering of the universe if it was conscious for the big bang? But oh, we don’t have that luxury. What we have is to be deteriorated, for our cells to die and flutter off, for our bodies to be blasted constantly into decay. Oh, you think I think of life poetically! Nothing is further from the truth. You in your tower of reason is the poet. Me, I sit around, do drugs, talk to strangers, and don’t give a fuck because why should I? I was always dead: from birth on, my body just didn’t know it. I look at you. And you know what I see? Some boy with a comfortable upbringing who tries to be sad to impress his friends, to artificially make drama in his life to make the good times seem better, someone who dreams about sadness and whose greatest dread is reserved for thoughts like ‘do I exist when I die,’ and what happens to my memories. Well, here’s the truth, and I’m not preaching, I’m talking from one universe of cells: one to the other: we are dead. We were never alive, we are walking nothings, and your deciding that this is not the case does not change its reality.”

 

Is he crying? For a second I feel like offering this man my change, I feel like he is a beggar on the side of the street, someone to feel secret pity for. But then I collect myself. I think. I suppose. I have two choices: to run or to talk. I’m a good runner, I could run; but I was not joking when I said life was like boxing and here this man has tried to bloody me and I need to prove myself by showing that both his technique was nothing, and that I can go for the knock out.

 

“You know, I think I like you. I like just you and me and nobody else because I can talk in this brutally honest fashion, this way that I could never if anyone was around because this is just not the way for people to talk. But you want to, so thank you, I don’t like you, but I like the fact that you talk. You are an ignorant, unhappy man, who likely will die with no one around and you might make some philosophical debate about how that doesn’t bother you but everyone wants to die in glory, with people missing you, with people going ‘there goes someone who participated.’ Personally, I want to die surrounded by grand-kids thinking that if life is a delusion, thank god for such a  beautiful imagination. And that’s where we differ. Oh, don’t look at me so venomously, but thank you for not interrupting, I shut up for your monologue and I can see you are enough of a man to give me mine. See, we are the same. Maybe everyone is the same. You say this is all a delusion, and want to search for something concrete. Some underlying reality. Something for you to rest your hand on and go ‘yes, this exists’ and that would be enough; enough to make the decay of your cells and the loss of consciousness manageable; oh you fear death like me; you just think your goal is within reach and it will let you stop the fear. You are more delusional then I. What I say is let the delusions exist. Let me think happiness and have it be happiness and if I spend a life believing I am happy then truly that is a happy life. You think one day happiness might come, and perhaps it will, I don’t know how far you will swim, but I know I am happy, and I shall continue this, and that is a good life. And you mock me, and will continue mocking me, I can see on your lips a rebuttal. But you do not hurt me. In fact, I pity you. Because this entire argument we have is about you trying to take my happiness away and say it is all a myth. What sort of a game is this? What sort of a creature are you? Who would want to take the happiness of another? I cannot spread my beauty onto you but at least I take nothing away, so what I say to you is: stop. Stop blindly fighting life. Trying to hurt everything you pass. You have swum to deep and are convulsing, lashing at me, safe on land, and I look at you. I have pity. The land I am on is not the universe of water: I am not drowning. I would like to save you. But I would take you on land, where you would thrash, where you would hate my helpful arms. You would push me in to those noxious seas and jump in again with me; you would try to make me drown too; to save one I have to let you drown. And this is ok, because I am the one who is happy, the one on land and I know you could save yourself. It is so easy but you will not. And I am going to walk away. And I hope never to see you again, because if I see you again, I will have to feel the remorse of not saving you, I will have to fight your drowning claws again, I will have to futilely talk to you while you try to injure me once more. All you do is scratch and bite and participate nothing; perhaps your scars will be on me forever. But you have scratched enough, and, frankly, you can scratch yourself because I am going to walk away right now, on this street, this street you said I could not walk away from you on, and I will walk into my beautiful delusion and forget you, since you are worth forgetting. I will not say good day, since the day will not be good for you, but I will say good luck because you are taking a different route in life them me, and maybe, if you have good luck, you will touch reality, and I pray and pray and pray that you do, because if not, you did worse then never existed, you existed and squandered and made the universe of yourself unhappy. Now get the fuck away from me.”

 

And I walked away, and he did not come after me, and he was no longer angry. He looked thoughtful for a second, like a man waiting for a bad aftertaste, then opened his mouth to reply, then shut it thinking better. We both knew the truth, and it was that we knew no truth. I think he saw his greed in trying to exploit my ignorance, and I think he felt pain in me trying to reveal his. He looked, for a second, into my eyes, then turned around and walked away. I went back to the bus station, turned on my music, wondered at the beauty of my view, and waited.

“They said his brother paid for the funeral.”

“Mmmmm, Yes they, would they’re good people, those Raven’s. So much done to them, and still they do the right thing.”

“Robert wouldn’t have wanted an extravaganza anyway, this is perfect, just a few of his close friends and family members.”

“It’s too bad Keith couldn’t be here though, brothers are brothers, and business should always take second place to family.”

“Really, don’t date yourself, I remember growing up, my father said he would miss my wedding if it was during his market season. His market was only downtown, Keith is in New Zealand”

 

These people bantering at a funeral, my best friend’s funeral, make me want to leave. Conversation carried on endlessly, gossip with only a pretext of sympathy. Already, I can plan out the entire conversation: start with the sympathy, mention how nice the service is, note how small it is, and how it was at the expense of Bob’s brother David, then the whispering would start. Casual at first, but always accompanied with a lighting up of the eyes, the real joy of the conversation.

Subdued talks of how good it is of David to do all this for Bob, considering all the bad Bob has done. That Bob, always perfectly nice, but died so tragically, so needlessly. If only that Bob had finished his degree, if only that Bob had worked harder, if only that Bob could have been reasonable. I know what they’re trying to say: good riddance, Bob, a nice guy, but what did he ever participate to society, what did he ever do.

My poor friend Bob. It’s been a week since I heard, a month since it happened, and ten years since I last saw him. Likely, I’m the only real friend of Bob’s here, and it’s only a fluke that I ended up coming. Running into a friend of a friend at work, who had been invited, wondering if I was coming to; when she found out I was not invited, she was so embarrassed, like she’d let out a secret, like me, a scoundrel, had no business in mourning

Well, invitation or not, I came. Certainly no one rude enough to tell me to leave, but everyone polite enough to tell me I’m not wanted in as friendly a way as possible. But what do I care of slights, they’ve been hurled at me for years. No, today is about Bob.

 

Bob and me collided in our last year of university. Neither of us were finished our degrees, but the time was over. We shared an apartment, I put an ad in the paper, he took it, that was it, my life changed by me being cheap in rent. Bob would have liked to talk about a little detail like that.

We lived together for four months. We would each have class at nine, and wake up at noon, and the first action of the day was to be eating some Brunch, and looking guilty at each other, like we’d each been caught running down the hall in grade school, knew it was wrong, but still could not understand why this teacher wanted us to feel so bad. The fact was, we each felt so good.

Those months are so crystal clear in my head. The maker of them in a box ten feet away, yet here I am remembering the both of us fighting hand over fist for the last piece of bread, remembering the talk we had where I realized that school was going to destroy my soul, remembering the time he came home and I was shooting up, and he gave me a hug, told me the world was a hard complicated place, and he had to move out.

Years passed by in those months, my entire life passed by, maybe. Everything we did was so alive. Dinner a pleasure to make with music blaring, wine pouring, and new chefs mastering simple dishes as if they were after Michelin stars. Always a joke about the washroom, how it was easier to wear sandals then to actually clean. Sitting in good lighting, listening to good music, talking to each other about anything that flittered through our minds. We did do some action, we went to some amazing parties, saw some amazing things, but when I look back, all I remember is us sitting side by side, and talking. And now that head which expressed so much of itself to me, sits silent forever, feet away.

 

 

Bob, me, and the rest of the world, we all took different paths in life. I walk down a street, I don’t fit in. The rest of the world walks down the street, and there’s nobody who doesn’t fit in, and Bob, well he doesn’t walk down the street, maybe he’s skipping, or running through the forest, or even in the gutter. He does what he does.

I remember Bob suckered me into working at this after school charity with him. He loved kids, knew he’d never have em, and still liked to be around them. Anyway, we’d just finished a few hour session, had a lot of fun, and me and Bob are around the corner having a smoke. Now, something you need to know about Bob, is that he’s a chameleon, he’ll fit in anywhere. But he doesn’t like it when those lives intersect, and when some little tween girl walks around the corner and sees her happy go lucky counselor doing something like smoking, Bob, he aint happy.

She lectures him, saying “You know smoking’s bad for you.”

Bob goes, “What does it mean it’s bad for me.”

She gets that little superior look on her face, that one only 12 year old girls can get, and lectures, “smoking will make you die young, is what I mean by it’s bad for you.”

And Bob looks at her straight, not a hint of a chuckle, but not a hint of darkness either, just stating a fact: “What if I die young anyways, then why would I care about smoking.”

The little girl had no answer, and she took it as a joke. They laughed, and Bob said some shit about how he’d quit just for her. I think he even meant it too, that’s probably the only thing that could make him quit, a promise to a little innocent. She took it as a joke, but it made me think; it wasn’t a joke. Not at all.

That night I asked Bob about what he meant he wasn’t going to live long. He thought about it, you could tell it was a conversation he wasn’t to pumped on. He said “You know, when I was sixteen, I was with some friends, sitting on a rooftop, looking at the city and stars. We were really happy. We had some wine, and we started talking, and I told them that if that was the last night of my life, I was happy. I’d drunk the cup of life, and what greedy person asks for seconds. Everybody said I was bullshitting, that if there was a gun to my head, I’d obviously choose life. And that is true. But that does not contradict that I’ve already lived a full life. That night was years ago, I’m on my third or fourth cup of life now. What right do I have to ask for anymore.”

 

 

It’s been a coupla years now since me and Bob, we last met. It hasn’t been voluntary, at least on my part. I love the guy. I’d see him everyday. No, he was the one that made it so we wouldn’t see each other.

One day, this was after we’d both dropped university, he came over to my house. I hadn’t seen him in about a week, and he never stops over, it was a surprise. He wasted no time with niceties. The first thing he told me was that he would never see me again. He didn’t word it so brusquely, he made a joke out of it, he made it seem natural. But that is what he said.

Naturally, I asked him why not, he got a problem with me, I do something wrong? He told me he was just trying to be happy. That being here, he feels pressure, the weight of the world’s eyes on his shoulders. That he was running away like a little boy, so he could live the life of his dreams. I asked him what that dream was, he told me it was to talk to people. I told him we were talking now, and he nodded, and said how he wished we could just do this for an eternity. He told me that money was a step to happiness he didn’t want to take. That work was something you did so that after work, you would have free time. That TV is something you watch so you don’t see your life. That drinking is something you do, so you feel like you’re doing something. He told me that everybody thought they were going somewhere, making more money, buying nice cars, getting families, but really they’re just treading water. That he wished no ill to these people, but he is unhappy, and why on earth should a person be unhappy. So he was going to leave that which was making him so down. Which was apparently everything.

He didn’t quite word it like that, there was a lot of how he’s the happiest and saddest person in the world, and that everything is balanced. All that bullshit. But he was serious. And that was the last time I ever saw him

 

 

Every now and then, in these last few years, I would see something that reminded me of Bob. A crosswalk where I pulled him back so a bus wouldn’t hit him. A road that we would walk up and down, up and down, talking, and letting our conversation end before the walk. A restaurant where he made the waitress fall in love with both of us. There’s a painting of his life all around me, and I’m stuck seeing new colors every day.

I would see something, and wonder. Where is he right now. Is he happy. Is he better off then the rest of us. Is whatever he’s doing just another way of living an unhappy life like the rest of us. I’d see  things and I’d wonder.

Then one day, I heard about this funeral. Now there’s all these people around us, those faces of the crowd he was repelled from. Everyone looking at the cheap casket, making the motions of mourning, but the silent hiss of superiority fills the room. Here was a man who thought he was better then us, the crowd seems to inhale, and now he is dead and we are not, the crowd seems to exhale.

“Such a tragedy, to die so unfulfilled,” One says.

He was the happiest person I ever met.