Charmaine
She lit her long cigarette with the grace and efficiency of an old pro. A tiny woman, she took up little room on the bench next to me. Her dyed blonde hair looked airy and soft like yellow cotton candy. It was cut in a chic bob that didn’t move an inch although the breeze was blowing warm and strong. Only the crow’s feet around her clear blue eyes gave away her advanced age.
From the corner of my eye I could see her close those eyes with each long drag and settle as far down into the metal bench as was possible. She held her Marlboro casually in the first two fingers of her left hand, flung out to her side. Her scarf, French in design, was wrapped tightly around her small throat and she clutched her wool pea-coat around her skinny frame. Each long sigh that escaped her body seemed to rattle in her chest. Her two suitcases that leaned against her dark slacks were quite small, and the design and olive green color looked vintage. I tried to read the name on the tags, but the tight cursive letters escaped me. Instead, my eyes were caught by the flash of jewelry. Her fingers were bedecked with several rings; gold bands provided bases for stones so dark and rich they couldn’t possibly be real. Finally, after catching me sneaking a peek, she addressed me in a smoke rasped, British soprano.
“Young lady, you don’t mind me smoking do you?” She was hesitant, searching my face rather bluntly, and I was initially taken aback. But her eyes weren’t accusatory or hostile; instead they held a look of slight amusement.
“No, no, not at all,” I answered, taking delight for the first time in the friendly, mellow of my American accent. “I mean, we’re in France. I should be used to smoking by now, right?”
“Quite right, quite right. I don’t like all this anti-smoking nonsense anyway. Nonsense is what it is,” she was leaning into me now, like two old friends sharing a secret. I smiled inwardly. “I’ll have you know that most of my good friends, who are older than I, smoke all they want. Not a one has cancer or a speck of lung trouble. Sheer nonsense, I tell you.”
I had no idea how to comment on such a statement so I simply nodded my agreement.
We sat in silence for a while on that airport bench in southern France, just waiting for the train station shuttle bus, the navette, to arrive. We had missed the first one by a mere two minutes and the next was not set to arrive for another twenty.
The bench was by no means comfortable, but I had been up and traveling for many hours by late morning and my body relaxed on its own. I was on one of the week and a half vacations given to exchange students. I hadn’t wanted to bother the other members of my program or intrude on their plans so I had planned a trip on my own. It was my second solo jaunt. The first had been a rather forgettable trip to Belgium. Belgium with company can be boring. Belgium by oneself is just a riot. This time, as my classmates were jetting off to sunny Greece, or rich Rome, or debauched Amsterdam, I was going to tour the parts of France I had yet to visit. My university was based in the south, near Marseille. I had chosen it over Paris largely because it sounded exotic and sexy. Perhaps I hoped it would rub off on me. The advisors at the program office had asked me about my travel plans once. They asked who I would be traveling with. When I answered that I would be alone they called me dear and said, “But won’t you be lonely?” I told them what I had tried to convince myself; if I traveled alone I could plan only the things that I wanted to do.
I made my way to the Atlantic, tried the seafood and watched the French people splashing about in the surf. My bathing suit wasn’t very fashionable, but at least it was black. Black is a good color in France. I spent a long day lying out, equipped with a towel, a wide brimmed hat, a good book, and Edith Piaf. I was too distracted to read though. I watched as lithe, gorgeous, bronzed bodies floated by while I did my best to keep from getting caught gaping at the topless sunbathers. There they were, young and old, large and thin, breasts to the world, nipples saluting the sun, mocking the leering men, all with looks of peaceful nonchalance permanently etched on their faces. In a moment of boldness, I decided to take my top off too, only to be greeted by a dirty old man that had migrated my way. He was so close when he surprised me with, “bon soir,” that when I jerked my head up my eyes first alighted on the bulge of his bright blue Speedo. I had recoiled instantly and whipped my head back so fast I heard my neck crack. Then, doing my best snake impression, sinking my torso as far into my towel as possible, and wriggling on my stomach, I frantically tried to re-tie the strings that kept evading my grasp. When I finally succeeded, I jumped up, gave the man my best glare, and scampered off. I could hear him chuckling after me. It was then that I had wanted to share the story and laugh with a companion. I called my mom long distance when I arrived back at my hotel, but she was out and didn’t answer. It wasn’t a story that would sit well on an answering machine.
I took the train next to the Loire Valley to visit the famous chateaux. I stayed in little inns where I hoped to meet other world travelers with exciting tales. Instead, the inn was filled with French couples and families who lost interest in me after a few sentences revealed my ineptitude at the language. In one village, after I was “castled” out, I rented a bicycle in an effort to explore on my own, away from the suffocating closeness of tour groups. I quickly realized what a bad decision I had made. The many hills winded me, the compact Peugeots and Citroens zipped by honking, and I cried due to frustration more than once. I returned to the inn sweaty, red faced, and scared. The innkeeper took pity on me and sent some coffee and a pain au chocolat up to my room.
I made it to Normandy next, and visited the beaches like I had promised my father. But it was grey day near the channel, and taking photos made me sad.
My next stop, Strasbourg, was just as uneventful as I had feared. I made several attempts to take pictures by myself, precariously perching my camera on a ledge and running into place after pressing the timer button. A young French couple watched my efforts for a few minutes before offering to take a photo for me. Their eyes were laughing at me as I fidgeted into place, and it suddenly felt far too intimate to smile at them. I decided to end my trip early and found the fastest way back to Marseille, a 7 am flight. I remember feeling relaxed as the plane took off, but on landing, my least favorite part of any flight, I was struck by that favorite question of mine: What now?
Now, I was sharing a bench with an eccentric old British woman. Our conversation was the longest continual human contact that I’d had in days. As the minutes whittled down waiting for our bus, she shared with me her many insights, most of them about the French, and none too flattering.
“Now the English, the English know how to run things.” She shot a look at my face and added, “Oh, perhaps the Americans too,” for my benefit.
“Germans too,” I added.
“Is that so? I’ve never visited.”
“Oh yes, everything in Germany runs remarkably well.”
“Well, that seems about right. We did have to rebuild them after all.”
Then, just before one more politically incorrect statement could escape her scarlet painted lips, the shuttle arrived. We held our place in line, two proud English speakers against the world; or in this case, a rather unfriendly French bus driver. As I held out my ten euros and a smile he shook his head disapprovingly and pointed past my shoulder to the shack with the sign, “Billets” (tickets) written on the top. He then explained to me the correct process of purchasing a bus ticket and rolled his eyes in exasperation at my halting French. As I turned from the line my companion clutched my arm.
“What did he say? Something about the tickets? Humph! What an incredibly rude man!”
I felt a sort of protectiveness for this little lady next to me. Perhaps it was her age, or her small size, but she seemed pleased to have my help, and I felt a kind of purpose in helping her. I spoke for her, got our tickets, apologized to the grumpy driver and settled the two of us into a window near the front. Bumps in the road are more jolting in the back.
When I ride on buses or trains, I like to sit by the window, gazing out at nothing and everything at once. That day, the sun was high that day and the landscape of greater Marseille was illuminated in the yellow-orange glow that is southern France. The etangs glittered through their layers of dirt, winking and smiling at me. The entire world beckoned me out; I felt like I was in a movie. I pointed out a bird to my companion and she nodded. It was clear that staring out the window did not hold the same magic for her. I asked her a question about herself and she was more than happy to oblige.
She had grown up in a small town just outside of London and her accent had that subtle, posh sound of the south. She had spent summers as a girl by the sea she said. She smiled as she told me how long her hair had been, so blonde it reflected the sun. As she spoke her small, sun tanned and spotted hands waved about. Her nails were immaculate; I hid my own ragged ones in my palms.
She told me with a strange kind of pride that she had been married three times: twice divorced and recently widowed.
“Oh, of course I loved that last one. Though I must admit, I partly married him out of boredom;” her tone was completely unapologetic, “We never even lived in England together. I’ve been traveling these last five years. He’s the one that left me the house in southern France. It’s just about an hour from Marseille.”
I smiled as I was suddenly struck with the idea of spending holidays in France at the behest of my wealthy, British benefactress. I would arrive in a rush of hellos and she would whisk me away to my room, a big airy square with tall windows adorned by sheer white curtains that blew backwards from the azure sea, creating a path for me out to a flower strewn balcony. There, I could be her companion, read to her in the garden, wear big white hats and strappy espadrilles as we sipped cold limonade in some seaside café and…
"My dear…have you ever been there?”
“Sorry, excuse me, umm, where?”
“Where my house is. It’s a very lovely place, very charming.” My overzealous imagination awaited the invitation, but instead I just shook my head “no” with a sorry little shrug.
“No matter,” she said, and carried on with her story.
She had five children, all with her first husband, the true love of her life.
“Like Liz Taylor and Richard Burton we were. Desperately in love, but not meant to be. The bastard’s six feet under now though…”
She talked of each of her children with due pride. Thomas was a small business owner in Bristol, Susan a homemaker in the southern suburbs of London, and Bridget was an accountant in Manchester. She was especially proud of her eldest two sons, George and Matthew who were both doctors in London.
“The noblest of professions in my opinion,” she said, “They’re the ones keeping me going like this, and they never bug me about the smoking. I don’t think it’s right for children to start acting like parents.”
I suddenly thought of my own mother back home. She had encouraged me to study abroad and here I was five months later. I didn’t know if I wanted to go home, I didn’t really know what I was doing abroad. I guess I told myself it was for a new experience, new perspective. Was it some dream of becoming like this lady next to me?
“So, how long have you been living in France?”
“About two years I think. After my third husband died I’d come to visit, but the weather in England has caused me to live here sixth months of the year.”
I wasn’t an expert but her French seemed greatly underdeveloped for someone living in France for so long.
“Have you taken any French courses since you’ve been here?”
“Oh, God no,” she laughed with derision; “I’m old enough and set enough in my ways. The staff at the house and the people in the village understand me well enough. No, no, this old dog isn’t learning any new tricks.”
“But it really is such a beautiful language.”
I hoped I sounded like I knew what I was talking about. She gave me a polite smile and shrugged as if to say “perhaps”.
“Learning languages is for you young kids. It’s so nice to see young people being able to travel like you.”
In those few words, she affirmed every reason I had for being abroad. I felt myself becoming easy in her company. I started to become more animated as I shared stories from my travels. She even laughed at my story of the topless sunbathing and said something especially rude about French men. Our chat ended rather abruptly however as the bus pulled up to the Marseille train station. We all filed off and shuffled straight into the mess of midday traffic.
I was expecting to part ways with my new friend when we arrived, but to my great pleasure, my companion took hold of my arm and made it clear we were sticking together. We must have made quite the pair, a tiny seventy-year old British lady and her awkward, eager, American escort.
The Marseille train station had the high ceiling openness of an airport hanger. It was open to the fresh air on one side and the air was chilly and uncomfortable. There was an obvious lack of chairs or benches in an attempt to ward off hobos and keep all regular passengers anxious and cranky. But, in all that bright openness, the ticket line was squashed into a small, closed off ticket office. With her encouragement, I went off in search of food and beverage as my tiny companion held our spots in line. Upon my return my fumbling attempt to regain my spot brought a few glares, but our closest neighbors were groups of stoic north African women, already far too used to such behavior to flinch a facial muscle.
My companion seemed oblivious to every own in line. She spoke to me in loud English, asking questions about her ticket and complaining about the line.
Another thing the French like to do in ticket lines is to short staff at exactly the worst possible moment. As we waited patiently together, the ticket attendants went from five to four to three, until there were only two employees to serve the now much enlarged queue. We marched up to the young, female attendant together and my companion looked up at me expectantly. I began to translate her questions and the young woman answered back clear and strong in English. She smiled at my embarrassment, but we were soon holding tickets and walking towards the platform. My companion had only an hour to wait while I had three and I felt the pinch of the clock. I wanted this last hour to be meaningful in some way. My swift melancholy was cut short by her strong voice.
“France does have quite a large problem with the Africans doesn’t it?”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, just look around; you can’t throw a stone without hitting some Moroccan or Muslim.”
“Umm, I suppose that’s true. People are making immigration an issue everywhere,” I answered, trying my hardest to balance her blatant racism with my need to have a pleasant last hour.
“Even in England, it’s getting bad. We have so many Indians now, barely anyone speaks English anymore.”
“Well, India was an English colony until fairly recently.”
“That’s true,” she said nodding. “But still, immigration policies really need to be enacted and enforced. These foreigners are plugging up our works, and costing all kinds of money. I don’t see why they don’t do more to make sure everyone enters legally.”
I held my tongue as I thought of her status as a foreigner in France. I was surprised by her attitude towards immigration, it sounded so, well, American.
It was then that she lit up another cigarette though we were several meters from the designated smoking area. She had an easy arrogance that I knew would keep her from being scolded. She blew out with a long sigh and checked her watch. She smiled at me and
“You know,” I said, “I don’t think I ever caught your name.”
She gave me a queer look, shrugged, took another long drag and replied out of the side of her mouth, “I never gave it.”
Then, she must have seen the dejected look on my face and simply replied, “Charmaine. My name is Charmaine.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard that name before. How did your parents choose it?”
“It’s a character from a book that my mother loved.”
“I think names are so interesting,” I replied, though the voice didn’t sound like mine. I didn’t know if I meant what I was saying, but it seemed right. “I think it says a lot about a person, a lot about their parents too.”
She shrugged, took another long inhale, “I don’t know if people even need to exchange names.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. I think you can have a pleasant enough time with someone without going too far into getting to know them. Don’t you?”
I backpedaled desperately.
“Yeah, I can see that…I just really like names and the stories behind them.”
“And I think we’ve had a lovely afternoon.”
I nodded.
“Sometimes you meet people and you’ll never see them again, so why go through all the mess of forming a bond?”
The image of my balcony room overlooking the sea vanished like paper in acid. I knew Charmaine wasn’t trying to hurt my feelings, but I tried all the same to hide the surprised hurt from my eyes.
Just as quickly as she shot me down, Charmaine effortlessly moved us on to another subject, and I was grateful. It was trite and flippant, but it took us all the way to the arrival of her train. She was going in a different direction than I and I envied her shorter ride. She looked hard at her ticket.
“I’m in car eight. Where do you think that is?”
I dutifully looked over the ticket, shouldered one of her bags and walked the side of the train scanning the compartment numbers.
“It’s here,” I called and waited as she scampered up. I could tell she was excited to continue on her journey. She handed her luggage over to the train officer, gave me a last look and said, “Thank you so much for your help. I had a lovely time.”
“Me too, I had a lovely time as well.”
“Alright, good bye now,” she said and turned into the train. She didn’t ask my name.
I sat back down on the little bench beside the TGV and watched her through the window. I lifted my hand in a kind of half wave, but as the train started to pull away she was facing straight ahead, her thoughts no longer with me.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Stephanie Kurz - Strangers
I made eye contact; that was my first problem. I sighed inwardly as I took off my headphones so I could hear what he was saying. I put on my polite face even though I felt like telling him to get lost. Being too nice, that was my other problem.
“I’m sorry, what was that?”
“I’ve got a spot right here on my handlebars for you.” He winked as he said this. I fought the urge to roll my eyes. This guy was trying to hit on me while riding his bicycle. I forced a smile on my face.
“No thanks. The bus will be here soon. Besides you’re going the opposite direction that I need to go.”
“Well I would turn around for you!” His face broke into a huge grin and I couldn’t help but return it with a genuine smile of my own. He was about 60 years old and absolutely adorable. He was one of the few older men who could hit on a young woman and it wasn’t creepy.
“Are you mixed?” This sudden question made no sense to me. My confusion must have been apparent on my face because he quickly clarified. “Are you all white?”
“Yeah, of course.” I was still confused. Did he think I was half black? Maybe half Asian? Half Hispanic? I was about as white as they come. What else would I be?
“You must be German. You’ve got German eyes.” German eyes, I thought, what did German eyes look like? He was right though, so he must be onto something. I nodded.
“My daughter is part German. Part Scandinavian too. Mixed with my black roots. She’s a beauty. I call her a black Shirley Temple ‘cuz she’s got these perfect curls. Pretty erotic huh?”
I was taken aback for a moment, but I quickly realized he had meant exotic. I faked a cough to hide the laugh I let escape. I didn’t bother to correct him. I was starting to feel sorry for this guy. Hitting on me while riding his bicycle and now he was talking about his daughter, whom he had mistakenly said was erotic. God I hoped he was mistaken.
“Well I suppose I should get going. It was nice to meet you.”
“Same to you.” I actually meant it too. He had made the wait a little more interesting.
“Stay pretty,” he yelled back as he pedaled away. I smiled to myself as I put my headphones back on. What a nice, but odd man.
As I listened to the tunes of Santana, I checked my watch. The bus was late as usual. I rocked back and forth to the beat of “Smooth.” I could never stand still when I was listening to my music. I was just happy to contain my urge to dance right there on the sidewalk. That sure would give other people something to look at.
I was impatient to get home. It was Tuesday, meaning American Idol was on TV tonight. Watching that show was my guilty pleasure, an hour escape from my homework. I often found myself singing along and dancing to these amateur singers with amazing vocals. It was a blessing that my roommates were usually gone on Tuesdays. The one time my roommate Aleisha came home early and found me dancing in front of the TV, I didn’t hear the end of it for weeks.
A woman passed behind me on the sidewalk where I was standing. I moved forward, realizing I was standing in the middle of the sidewalk. I watched the woman walk past me and then suddenly turn back towards me. I figured she was coming back to check the bus schedule so I moved out of her way. Instead, she walked up to me, grabbed my arm, and stomped on my foot. I froze in shock at this woman’s apparent anger at me. She was yelling something at me, her face contorted in rage, but I couldn’t hear once again because of my headphones. I caught something about my shoes. Did she have a problem with the boots I was wearing?
The woman let go of my arm and started walking away. She turned and yelled something else back at me, making an obscene gesture at me as she yelled. Still frozen, I hadn’t removed my headphones yet. I looked around, my mouth hanging open, to see if anyone else had witnessed this, but I was alone at the bus stop. I didn’t understand what had just happened to me.
Had I been in her way on the sidewalk? Was she just crazy? Did she not like the way I was dressed? I had just finished working at my internship, and I always dressed nicely when working there. I glanced down at my nice leather boots and saw a big scuffmark from the woman’s shoe. Aimlessly, I brushed the dirt away. Perhaps she thought I was too uppity for this part of town. Whatever this woman’s reason for stomping on my foot, I felt confident that I was undeserving of such hostility.
I looked down at my boots once more. They were pretty fancy, I thought. I had bought them on sale though, and from a retail store where everything was already cheaper. I smoothed a wrinkle from my khaki skirt, a gift from my mother. She had been so happy when I got my internship at a local grade school. The job market was virtually nonexistent right now and an internship was at least a foot in the door. I had always told myself I would never be a teacher, but now working with these kids was making me have second thoughts.
The bus finally pulled to a stop in front of me. As I swiped my bus pass, I took my headphones off. I was no longer in the mood for upbeat music. I wanted to run after that woman and ask her what had made her stomp on my foot. I also wanted to tell her to go to hell, because whatever reason she could possibly have, surely wouldn’t earn me the pain I was now feeling in my left foot. I slid into an empty seat while my thoughts still simmered over the strange woman on the sidewalk.
“Looks like you’re having a rough day,” someone sitting next to me said. I glanced to my right to see who had spoken and was pleased to see a very attractive man about my age sitting next to me. I had been so consumed by my thoughts I had not been paying any attention to who I sat next to.
“A bit,” I replied with a sigh. Normally I didn’t get into long conversations with people I didn’t know, but I found myself telling him all about my day, ending with the woman stomping on my foot. He listened to my whole story with apparent interest and laughed at my obvious anger with the woman. His smile made his green eyes sparkle, and I found myself grinning stupidly. I forced my smile to return to normal levels of happiness.
“Sounds like you’ve made a couple new friends today. And now you’ve made one more. My name is Steve.”
“Are you as bizarre as they were?” I had the sudden feeling that he was going to start ranting about politics, predicting the end of the world, or reciting poetry he had written himself. Surely, I wouldn’t meet a normal person today. Steve laughed at my tentativeness.
“I assure you I’m perfectly normal and boring. You won’t get any good stories out of me.” That’s what he thought. Sure, when I told my friends later about the guy I met on the bus, it wouldn’t be a story about how crazy he was. It would be a story about how gorgeous he was and how he had actually talked to me. That would make a great story. I realized Steve was talking to me and forced my thoughts back to the present. I desperately tried to recall what he had just asked me so he wouldn’t think I was an idiot. My name, he had asked me what my name was.
“Maggie, I’m Maggie,” I blurted out. God that was smooth. I could feel my face getting hot, but I tried to ignore it. I could see Steve trying to fight back a smile, which only made it worse.
“Well Maggie, it’s very nice to meet you.” He extended his hand for a handshake, shifting the grocery bag on his lap as he did so. His handshake was firm but not crushing. His skin was rough and calloused. He probably had a job where he worked with his hands. I loved that.
“What do you do for a living?” I was probably being too forward but I found myself intensely interested in him.
“I work in construction. You know the new building over on
“I see you did your grocery shopping today,” I said, pointing at the bag on his lap. It was an obvious statement, but I needed to say something to stop myself from daydreaming again.
“Yeah, I thought I would be productive today. Not too much for me though, most of this is for my dog.” My eyes lit up. Of course he would have a dog.
“Oh I love dogs! What kind of dog do you have? I have a cocker spaniel at home. I miss him terribly when I’m here at school. That’s my favorite part about getting to go home, seeing him.” Steve was laughing again, and I felt my face get hot once more at my sudden outburst.
“Whoa, calm down there! You must really like dogs.” He laughed once more before continuing. “I have a German shepherd. I bought her not too long ago, so she’s still just a puppy. She’s pretty mischievous but she keeps me entertained.”
“Sounds adorable. German shepherd puppies are so fluffy when they are really young. They are probably my favorite breed as puppies.”
“Would you like to meet her?” he asked me. “She’s right here with me.” I was confused at first, but then I noticed a leash wrapped around his wrist that led somewhere under the seat. I couldn’t believe my luck. I got to sit next to a good-looking guy on the bus who just happened to have a puppy with him. I was ecstatic.
I hesitated though because I knew something wasn’t right. Dogs weren’t allowed on the bus unless you had a handicap of some sort. I looked Steve over quickly once more and was fairly certain he had no physical handicaps. Maybe he had snuck his dog on the bus? If this was the case, I didn’t want to get him in trouble. No, I decided, you can’t sneak a dog on the bus. He must have gotten permission to bring her along. The bus driver was a woman; he’d probably just smiled at her and she had probably nodded stupidly. This thought made me feel better about my own incoherence around Steve.
“Of course! What’s her name?”
“Lucy. I’m a big Beatles fan and Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds is one of my favorite songs of theirs,” he explained. “Could you hold my bag while I get her out? She’s probably sleeping.” He handed me his grocery bag and bent down to pull her out from under the seat. He was calling her name softly in the baby voice everyone uses when they’re talking with their pets. When he sat back up, on his lap was a stuffed animal.
I blinked twice to make sure I was seeing things correctly. A smile half formed on my lips; surely he must be joking. The real dog must still be under the seat. The smile quickly faded when I realized Steve was still talking to the stuffed dog and softly petting its head. The leash was attached to a collar the stuffed dog was wearing. He looked at me expectantly, but I was at a loss as to what I should do.
“Go on, you can pet her,” he urged me. I glanced around to see if anyone was paying any attention to us. I didn’t want to be seen petting a stuffed animal that someone else thought was real. No one was looking so I quickly reached over and patted the dog a couple times on the head. I could tell he was waiting for me to say something.
“She’s, ummm, she’s really something,” I managed to say. Steve beamed and started rattling on about the cute things she had done that morning. As I sat there dumbfounded, I peeked in his grocery bag that now sat on my lap. Instead of dog food, I saw all the makings for an ice cream sundae. Whipped cream, chocolate fudge, maraschino cherries, colored sprinkles, and vanilla ice cream. Was this what he had planned to feed his “dog?” Good thing it wasn’t a real dog or she would die of a sugar overdose in a week. I glanced out the front of the bus and saw with relief that it was my stop coming up. I didn’t think I could deal with the fake dog much longer.
“Well it was nice chatting with you,” I interrupted him mid-story about trying to give Lucy a bath earlier that day. “My stop is right here though so I have to go.”
“Oh,” Steve said disappointedly. “Maybe we could get together sometime? Lucy seems to have taken a liking to you. I’m sure she would love to see you again. I know I would.” He gave me his beautiful smile and for a second I almost agreed, but then I looked at the fake dog on his lap that he was still petting and that thought quickly evaporated.
“Well, I don’t think so. I’m pretty busy,” I trailed off lamely. What more could I say? Steve’s face fell as the bus came to a stop, and I quickly walked to the door. I took one last look at Steve and his broad shoulders. A thought suddenly occurred to me. I passed by
Friday, May 8, 2009
This, this right here, is a great idea.
I just wanted to say that I am slacking at work and going on the computer....shhh, don't tell. That sounds like a twitter posting.... hi everyone.
Becca
Becca
Caution, Casi Butts
It’s not like you wake up in the morning and decide you’re going to kill someone. Consciously, you don’t have much say- if you ever have any say at all. Probably, your first thought waking up is whether you should have toast or cereal for breakfast, and whether there is any milk. You wonder, still halfway lost in the dreams of the previous night, what you should wear that day, and whether you will need a coat. The killing never occurs to you, you see.
You eat your bowl of cereal in front of the T.V. as you watch the daily forecast and the monotonous talking heads. When you are dressed and ready, you walk out the door, locking it behind you as any responsible adult would do. The air is chilly, and you are glad you brought a coat, even though you know you probably won’t need it by lunchtime. You start your car and notice that it doesn’t sound so great; you make a mental note to take it for an oil change over the weekend.
On the way to work, your mother calls. She hasn’t heard from you in a while, she says, how are things? You tell her about work, maybe you even bring up the car, but in general you tell her that everything is “fine” because when it comes down to it, there’s nothing more to say. You don’t tell her how you’re feeling unfulfilled, like you’re constantly waiting for something but can’t figure out what it is. The waiting depresses you, but you can’t tell her that because you know she’ll worry. You check the call time- less than five minutes- but already you’re anxious to hang-up, and so you make up an excuse and promise to call her back before the end of the week. She probably knows that you won’t call, and you know it too, but you tell the lie anyway. You finish your drive in silence.
When you get to work, you feel like you’ve been sucked into your own personalized version of hell. The mundane tasks of your career repeat themselves daily and the same old people bitch about the same old problems; you have a flashback to high school when you learned about Tantalus in Greek mythology. You have an important meeting with your boss, who looks right through you, and at lunch you sit at a table with some close friends who know almost nothing about you and whom you never see outside of work. You waste away a large portion of your afternoon shopping on EBay, and as soon as the clock strikes 5 PM, you’re out the door.
It’s on your way home from work that you see the face of the person you’re going to kill. Maybe it’s the woman who runs the dry cleaning shop, or maybe it’s the guy who delivers your pizza; maybe it’s the man waiting next to you for an elevator, or the woman in the car next to you on the street. And killing isn’t even on your mind, but when you see their face you just know, somehow, that whoever it is will change your life someday.
The face stays with you for the rest of the evening as you watch more T.V., as you clean the kitchen and scrub the sinks, as you look over that report you brought home from work and finally as you brush your teeth before bed. And you see it in your dreams that night, though you might not even remember who it is, or where you saw them or why you remember. Your dreams aren’t anything revealing or life-changing, and probably, you won’t remember them at all when you wake up.
The next day passes in much the same manner, except you don’t talk to your mother this time. The stack of paperwork on your desk has grown impossibly tall in the fifteen hours you spent at home. For awhile, you might sit there, watching it, willing it to grow smaller with your mind. Perhaps you look furtively around, to see whether your co-workers are busily at work, and perhaps you feel comforted that the man whose desk sits closest to yours is currently engaged in a game of Solitaire. You consider starting your own game, but don’t because it would mean turning on your very slow computer. At this point, you might sigh, even yawn, as you pull the papers nearer. Sign on the dotted line, turn the page. Sign on the dotted line, turn the page. Sign on the dotted line, turn the page.
You don’t see the face again for the whole day, or if you do, maybe you don’t consciously recognize it. Your boss tells you that he’s noticed a slight decrease in your work ethic lately, and he wants to know whether everything is okay. And you tell him that you’re “fine”, just like you tell everyone else, and that you’ve just been stressed out lately but you’re going to work really hard from now on. You could tell him that you’re just not getting that sense of satisfaction you expected from your career or that you feel his management style is repressing, but you don’t, because he probably wouldn’t care anyway. As soon as you can escape from his office, you do, and you turn on your computer and go back to EBay, where you’ve lost the bid you’ve been watching for three days. You might feel frustrated, but you don’t say anything because you really weren’t supposed to be on EBay anyway.
That night, you have the dreams again, and the face swirls endlessly through your mind amidst towering stacks of papers that need to be signed. You toss and turn all night, trying to forget, or at least to understand, but every time you wake up the face looses focus in your mind. You are dreaming about it right before your alarm goes off the next morning: you dream that you are running, and that the face is chasing you, pen and paper in hand, like a rabid dog. Any friendliness or gentle recognition is now gone. The alarm terrifies you when it goes off, and you feel like maybe you should write the dream down before you can forget it. Probably though, by the time you’ve found that pen and paper stashed away in your night stand, the opportunity has already gone. Later that day, you will tell your friends that you didn’t sleep well last night because you were having a bad dream about something, but you can’t remember what it is.
On your way home that night, you see the face walking past you down the street. The setting is unfamiliar; the person you see is a stranger, and you would have thought nothing of him if not for the terror that suddenly seized you, the adrenaline that coursed through your blood and set fire to your veins. The fear shames you: not the same, not the same one, you try to tell yourself. And perhaps for the time, it will be enough. You will regain your motor skills; the lump will disappear from your throat; you will go home, to where you are safe, until the face finds you in your dreams.
When you get home, you lock your door, and even check to make sure that the windows are shut up tight. There are leftovers in the fridge for dinner, but you can’t settle yourself enough to take them out, so you order a pizza instead. It’s getting late, almost too late to eat but you’ve already placed the order, and probably your credit card has already been charged. As you wait for the pizza, you think of the face, but then your attention turns to something else, and soon you start having the great big thoughts that you know would make you famous if you could only express them. You start coming up with titles for the book that you could write in your head, and you imagine the millions rolling in.
The pizza comes later than they said it would be, almost a half hour later. You’re probably frustrated, and starting to feel tired, and thinking that you should just give up and go to bed. You take your wallet, which you’ve been holding ready for the last twenty minutes in your hand, and slam it onto the kitchen table, at the same time as the doorbell rings. You leave the wallet there, determined to waste the delivery man’s time, and you answer the door.
It’s him. Is it him? He looks so familiar and the fear is there, but you suddenly aren’t sure. Is this the same man? His brother- a twin, maybe? He is probably apologizing for being late, offering a discount of some kind. You can’t hear a word he’s saying as you take the pizza box into your hands.
He’s holding out a little slip of paper, and a pen. Will you sign this, he is asking, I just need your signature. Your dream last night is like a memory: it’s so real as it flashes through your mind. The face, the same face is chasing you, pen and paper in hand through stacks of papers just waiting to be signed. You are trying hard to think, to hold onto his words; did he ask if he could see your card? You tell him to hold on, and you walk back to the kitchen, you set the pizza box down. Next to a knife.
There’s a knife on the counter. You left it out- why? Perhaps you had meant to put it away, and just forgot. You take the handle into your hand and then lift it, as if to test the weight. It’s a big knife, but it’s so light. You might not even remember why you had it out in the first place.
Setting the knife down, you go back to the door, credit card in hand and apologetic smile on your face. You could say that you’re sorry for making him wait, but you probably don’t, because he was a half hour late in the first place. He thanks you, turns away; you think of your knife as he leaves. Before he is even into his car, you are struggling into your shoes, pulling on a jacket. The pizza is still on the counter, growing colder; you grab the knife instead. Before he has even started the car, has even pulled away, you are racing toward your own and hoping, praying that he doesn’t see. And you don’t think that he does: he just drives away, perhaps a little faster than you usually drive, but you start your own car, start following.
You follow him through your neighborhood; probably, you have no idea what you intend to do, or why you brought the knife along. He’s threatening, you think you feel threatened; you want to sort him out, convince him not to do it again. You are probably thinking that you just want to talk to him, find out what his problem is with you, what the problem is. You turn the corner, still following. You drive for a while, through darker neighborhoods, neighborhoods that are not as safe, neighborhoods that you would have never walked into by yourself at night. You drive through them and out of them, relieved but still thinking of turning around toward home. You might reason with yourself: you’ve already come so far. Haven’t you? You think that if you could just talk to him, everything would be okay.
You drive into a ritzy neighborhood, on the other side of town from where you live. His car stops; you drive past him, turn the corner, park out of sight. You turn off your car, ease the door open so it doesn’t make a sound. It’s a good neighborhood, right on the edge of the city limits. It’s dark and there’s no one outside, not in a neighborhood like this, not at this hour. You walk back around the corner quietly, casually glancing around you, trying to see through the darkness behind the windows of the four, five, six houses now in your view. You might be amazed at how peaceful everything seems; your neighborhood is nice, but never so quiet as this. Still, you probably don’t feel entirely safe. Crazy things happen all the time, you think. You never know who the killer is until after you’re dead.
As you get closer, he is just walking away from a still-dark house, lighting up a cigarette as he moves. He’s facing you, maybe even watching you as you start to walk toward him through the dark. His gaze throws you off guard and you lose control of yourself: your body starts to freeze and your heart all but stops and it’s like you’re having an out of body experience, you see everything so clearly. You’re getting closer and maybe you’re slowing down, but you’re close enough now to look for recognition in his eyes. You see none, and you’re suddenly afraid that you’re dreaming again.
It seems impossible that the dreams started only days ago; it doesn’t occur to you. He terrifies you, this stranger, but you won’t wait for him to defeat you: you attack; you take out the threat before it’s ever there. Many years later, you will probably wish that you had taken it more slowly, taken your time. You will probably wish that you could remember how the knife felt as it cut through skin and soft tissue, mortally damaging his stomach, his lung, his heart. You will probably wish that you could remember the warmth of the first blood your hands ever felt, and how quickly it started to flow as you stab him again, again, again. You will probably wish that you could remember the terror in his eyes, but you don’t. All you remember is the fulfillment, the sense of purpose you had been missing that is suddenly washing over you in waves.
When you control yourself enough to finally stop, you will probably stab him one more time, just in case. You know enough from watching T.V. not to throw the knife away; you wipe it on his pant leg and then you take it back to your car; you walk away. Your eyes probably search the windows of the houses again as you leave, waiting for someone to run out to you, to stop you, but no one comes. You are careful as you get into your car, careful as you start the engine, careful as you drive away.
Your mind is unusually blank, something you will register only after that night, when the moment has long passed. There is fear, aggression, vindictiveness, confidence, fulfillment- but you are not thinking any of this: they are just there. It isn’t until later, when you’re washing the blood off your hands, that anything becomes real. You scrub your skin raw, and tear the clothes off your body like it was acid that you spilled, instead of blood. Screaming rings passionately in your ears for hours after you’ve returned home, and it alarms you. He hadn’t screamed when you killed him; there wasn’t time; he had made almost no sound at all. But the screaming is what makes you realize exactly what it is that you’ve done.
Probably, you run out of soap long before your hands start feeling clean. You think about the bottle of bleach that you have stored under the kitchen sink, wondering if it will wash your hands of the stain. They already look so red though, from the scrubbing- your hands look red like blood. So you stop scrubbing and you turn your attention to the pile of bloody clothes that are lying ominously on the floor. Walking into your bedroom, you throw on some sweats and then walk out to the kitchen trash, which is about half full. You throw the bloodied clothes on top of a banana peel and a stale loaf of bread; you open the fridge and add the leftovers on top of the pile. As you tie the top of the bag together tight, you will probably count the days in your head, hoping that the garbage collection is soon. And then you take it out, and once it’s gone, you can almost pretend that it wasn’t real.
You don’t sleep that night. You try to watch some T.V. but nothing catches your interest. Maybe you decide to take a long shower to loosen up those muscles that won’t un-tense in your back. But it doesn’t work, and for the larger part of the night, you just sit on your bed with your back against the wall, rubbing your hands together self-consciously and humming to yourself. You don’t want your neighbors to think that anything is wrong or different in some way, so you sit there alone, and everything is dark. When the sun comes into the sky again, you eat the pizza for breakfast.
In your head, you probably try to make sense of everything that has happened, but the only thing racing through your mind is fear. You’re not afraid of being caught, of being punished, or anything like that. People commit crimes all the time, you think. Many of them go unsolved. Right? Yes, you tell yourself. The only thing that scares you, the thought keeping you awake, is that you don’t feel scared, guilty, at all. The adrenaline is still rushing through your veins; you’ve replayed the night in your head about a thousand times. And still, you feel nothing. How effortless it is to become a killer- that is what keeps you awake all night.
You call in sick to work the next day, and spend a considerable amount of time worrying that everyone knows what is wrong. You never take sick days. You never take vacations. Surely, you think, everyone at work will know what you’ve done. You check the paper thoroughly: Yes, it’s there. A small piece. Police were investigating his last stop of the evening, but no suspects had been identified, you read; the family is baffled; they ask for anyone with information to come forward. They don’t know why anyone would want to hurt him; the president of the home owners association is dismayed that something so tragic could happen on her side of town.
You order take-out- Chinese, not pizza today- and you sit on your couch watching movies that you’ve already seen about a million times before. There’s a knock on your front door, which you don’t answer until you’re sure that whoever it was is long gone. Just a delivery man, probably Fed-Ex, dropping off a package that you’ve been expecting for weeks now. A couple of books that you ordered online- but nothing that you feel like reading right now. After the sun sets, you decide that you want to go for a walk to clear your head.
You probably aren’t surprised when you end up at the scene of the crime. Not that you intentionally walked back that way, because it’s a long walk, out of the way, really; not that you gave any thought to it at all, but it seems fitting, poetic somehow. You stand at the corner, less than twenty feet away from where you left the body. There’s yellow police tape. Caution, it says. Do not enter. Caution. No one else is around, and so you allow yourself to laugh a little, maybe to sneer. Caution, the sign says. Wouldn’t it be more fitting if the tape was around you?
Not that you mean to dishonor the man you killed. It’s this that stops the laughter in your throat. Because he wasn’t stupid, and it wasn’t meaningless. The police will never find you; if you are arrested, it will be many years from now, when you’ve turned yourself in. The man you killed will go unavenged, and for this reason you spend a few silent moments at the scene of the crime. To honor him. He is your first victim- your only victim. Until, that is, you kill again.
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