Alex: Pursuit

"What's it about? Selflessness? Saintliness? Martyrdom? I'm not interested in sacrificing for others. I have sacrificed enough. I have studied hard, worked conscientiously--I used to stay late to do pro-bono work--and others--OTHERS--have reaped all the benefits and not so much as left me the threshing floor scraps." Alex paused after reading the concern in his companion's eyes. "I'm sorry. I don't even know your name. It's been a while since I spoke with anyone besides my grandfather." Feeling bashful, Alex rose from his seat, placed his notebook in his left pocket, and apologized again.

"Where are you going? Aren't you going to ask my name? What about our competition?"
"I don't know. I don't want to know you. I changed my mind." He walked swiftly towards the door, leaving a nub of donut on the young woman's table.
"You haven't learned your lesson!" the woman yelled.

Although he heard her, he did not turn around. Sounded stupid. Bellyaching. Blathering. It wasn't even cathartic. It was embarrassing. What good could have possibly come from talking to someone?

Alex huffed along the sidewalk, darting around other pedestrians.Where to go? No place worth going to. Want to disappear. Want to be asleep. Nothingness. Grandpa's? Bah. No money. No car. Stranded. On an island. I am an island. This man is an island. Sinking. Sunken. A car stereo interrupted his thinking. The tinny sound of soft rock unnerved Alex further. Turn it down! Turn it down! Pay to get the a/c fixed and roll up the windows! Attacked--I am being audibly attacked. Tweeter shot treble-arrows. Others--these are your others. Inconsiderate, unaware, cattle chewing their pre-digested cud and crapping out the preferences of celebrities and the opinions of the supposed authorities. Ron Paul and Che Guevara. Paul and Guevara! Really!(Two months prior, Alex had observed a sky blue car with a bumper sticker for the libertarian and the communist sharing space on the same peeling bumper.)What is wrong with these people? Hardly anyone thinks for themselves, but they all think they do.

Alex was dealt a glancing blow on the arm by the shoulder of a shorter man hustling in the opposite direction. Absorbing the collision without altering his course, he continued his quick pace.

A familiar voice from behind entered his ears. "Hey! Stop! Mr. Napkin--stop!" Slightly out of breath, the young woman from Dan's Donuts placed her hand on the same shoulder that had just been hit. Alex spun around and looked contemptuously at his pursuer.

"What?"
"Never leave a person in a bad way."
"What?"
"Another lesson for you." She smiled. "You win, okay? You've had it harder than me. Anyone who darts off like you did must have had it hard for a while. What's wrong with you?"
Shame rose within Alex. What is she doing here? She followed me? Probably crazy, too.
"Nothing is wrong with me. I made a fool of myself and I didn't stay around for the aftermath. Sounds reasonable to me."
"Foolishness is fleeing from aid--amongst other things. We were going to lighten each other's days a bit with a little conversation and you left me more frustrated than when we began. I'll not stand for it."
"You're full of one-liners, aren't you?"
"Truth is brief."
"Exhibit C."
"I'm not going to alter the way I communicate for you. I can't help it if I'm full of profundities." Her smile was persistent and aimed at disarming him.
"Why did you follow me?"
"Because I am a curious person. A man who storms out of a donut shop after being invited to sit by a pretty young woman like myself must have an interesting story."
"Forgive me for not satiating your curiosity, but I refuse to be the subject of an experiment," Alex stated sternly.
"Who said anything about experiments? I was only trying to help by..."
"Prying."
"No. By showing concern."
"You have no reason to be concerned for me."
"Exactly."
"If your after a letter of recommendation for sainthood, I haven't got the time." Alex moved away.
"Are you made of stone? Calm down...what is your name?"
"What's it to you?"
"Stop it already. If you didn't really want to talk with me, you would never have turned around. I'll start. My name is Anna."
She's caught me. It's true. I am lonely.
"My name is Alexander."

Alex: Lesson

Exhausted from a prolonged session of anxiety and inactivity, Alex fell asleep. 

He awoke to the golden warmth of midday and the sensation of being struck on the arm. Startled, Alex opened his eyes and flinched. A frisbee sat at his feet. The owner, rather than risk the embarrassment of a verbal apology, avoided eye contact. I'd like to tell him to get a job, but he could tell me the same thing. Need to get out of here. Can't go home. I'd like some food. Something cheap and sweet. Dan's Donuts is only two blocks away.

Walking again, Alex's eyes actively took in the scenery. A person with bags in their arms was yelling at a departing taxi cab. Movers were toting a walnut dresser up a set up steps. The sound of heavy breathing grew louder and he was soon overtaken by a woman is business attire running with two inch heels. Looks dangerous. A courier breezed by him on a bicycle weaving between pedestrians, parked cars, and planters at a surprising speed. More dangerous. I wonder when he last fell. I hope he has good insurance. Better than mine, I'm sure. None. I can't afford to be sick. What a pitiful thought! I'll probably die of something easily curable--the first to die of malaria in the United States in fifty years. Just curl up in a corner somewhere like Sparkles and give up my ghost.

The jangle of the overhead bell announced Alexander's entrance to Dan's Donuts.
"What'll it be?" asked a gruff-voiced employee.
"One jelly-filled donut...and...a small coffee."
"Cream?"
"No."
"$2.34."
Alex handed the man behind the counter a wrinkled five dollar bill from his bi-fold wallet. $197.66 left to my name. Shit. While waiting for the coffee, he grabbed the day's paper off a nearby table. Taking it, his coffee, and donut to a chair by the window, Alex settled in. After trying his hand at the cross-word puzzle (only filling in 46 of the 120 words), and being frustrated by the want ads, Alex withdrew a small notebook from his pocket. He took his time and wrote the following entry:

Why is it animals so frequently find a way to die with dignity and I am not allowed to live with dignity? The worst part of all of it: I have no one to blame. It's just the system. It's capitalism and the conventions of employment. Last hired; first fired. 'But I am a better worker.' It doesn't matter. 'But I put in more hours." It doesn't matter. 'But I actually don't steal from the company.' It doesn't matter. I have no one to curse at. I have been vanquished by an ethereal phenomenon. Slayed by the mist of circumstance. And

As Alex was writing, he took an unfortunate bite of donut. A slug of raspberry jelly shot out of the back of his snack and landed on his notebook. Red slowly fanned out around the edges of the discharge. Damnit. Alex grabbed for a napkin from the tabletop dispenser, but it was empty. Figures. Alex looked around and discovered that most of the dispensers were barren. The only dispenser that bore white was at the only other occupied table. Sitting at the table was a young woman wearing black framed glasses, and nibbling a bear claw whilst reading a book. She had delicate features, a thin, sharp nose, and rail-thin arms. Wishing not to intrude, he reached across the table and plucked a napkin from its holder. The woman looked up.

"Excuse me," she said sharply.
Alexander walked away.
"I said, 'Excuse me.'"
Alexander turned around and replied, "What?" She kept looking at him. "It's been a hard day. I didn't want to interrupt your reading or your eating. You looked to be enjoying both."
"Oh." The woman's face softened. "Sorry, it's been a hard day for me, too. I came here for a caloric remedy."
Still standing some distance away, Alex smiled at her now softened face. "I came here for a cheap snack."
Upon turning to return to his table, the woman said, "Aren't you going to join me?"
"That's a bit presumptuous, don't you think?"
"I'd say it's standard procedure. A girl makes small talk with a boy and the boy wants to keep it up."
"I haven't been a boy for a while."
"Looks like you still are."
It was true. Alexander was wearing a pair of khakis that fell just bellow his ankle, revealing too much of his dark socks. He normally loathed being referred to as young or having his baby face brought to attention.
A boy. 27? A boy? No. Save for living in a place that I don't own. Save for pilfering food out of my grandapa's pantry most nights. Still--she is pretty. Alex retrieved his half-eaten donut, wiped the jelly out of his notebook as best he could, and returned to the stranger's table.
"Let's have a competition. Who had the worst day?"
"What does the winner get?"
"That depends on the winner."
"Oh?"
"If I win, you have to apologize for being rude and promise not to be for the rest of the week. If you win, I'll let you go back to scribbling in your notebook."
"There's not much in it for me then."
"How so?"
"It's not that I want to write. It's just that it's better than being at home or staring at the wall."
"Oh. Well what do you want? And it can't be anything big."
"A job."
"A job is big--and I don't have any of those to give away either."
Alex cast his his hazel eyes down away from her brown ones. Why did I say that? Too much.
"What did you used to do?"
"I was a lawyer at Myers and Stanton."
"Never heard of it. What happened?"
"I'm still trying to figure that out."
"Hm. Well, at least your still alive and," casting a glance at the donut in his hand, "relatively well-fed."
He raised the donut, said, "Relatively," and took a bite.
She smiled at him, revealing a sliver of her teeth. He reciprocated, showing none of his.
"Prizes aside, what happened to you today?"
This is strange. Who talks to strangers? What's her angle? "I'm sorry, but why are you doing this?"
"Don't apologize yet, I haven't won. Why am I doing what?"
"Talking to me?"
"Because you were impolite and I had originally intended on teaching you a lesson."
"Don't let my day stop you. I could use a lesson."
"Well in that case..." she paused and looked squarely at him. Her eyes did not focus directly on his, but as though she were looking at a spot behind him. "There's never an excuse grand enough to be inhumane to another human being. Humanity is the only way we'll get through our days."
"We need more than that," Alex retorted quickly.
"What more could you need?"
"A job. A way to provide materially for yourself."
The young woman frowned. "No. If your employer had been humane, she would have kept you. Any man who writes in a journal and indulges a stranger in conversation ought to be employed."
"He--Them. They fired me."
"Myers and Stanton both?"
"Good memory, but no. A couple of my superiors sat me down and cut me loose."
"Did you do anything wrong? Steal post-it notes or sleep with a client's wife?"
"I stole post-it notes, but no one noticed. No. They said it was nothing personal. They said 'times are tough' and that they needed to downsize. They wished me luck, shook my hand, and had security escort me out within the hour."
"Ick."
"Yes, ick. Ick, ack, and yuck."
"Sounds more non-humane than in-humane. Can't help the economy, you know?"
"Know? I live."
"Right. Well, anyways, unemployed or not--you have to treat people better."
"And if people don't treat me better?"
"That's not what it's about." She slid a blue and gold bookmark into the crease of her book and closed it.

Out of Character

Nothing about Bernard Calloway's appearance was sinister. Halfway through his life, he was six feet tall with medium length thinning blond hair, and gray-blue eyes. He was slimly built and featured a well-groomed mustache that he had been growing for over fifteen years. His voice was unassuming, slightly above the average man's pitch. Air scraped against the bottom of his top teeth upon its exit, giving his s's a breathy quality.

Despite appearances and sounds, anyone who knew Bernard judged him to be an exceptionally terrible man. In the workplace, he never returned the greetings of his peers. Neighbors loathed his habitual practice of parking over the left-line of the condominium's parking spots. When he went out to eat, he never tipped. When he walked down the street, he would turn around and accost anyone who brushed against him. As a manager, he was cut-throat. As a son, he was inconsiderate. He was a friend to none. When he was a child he enjoyed dumping his food onto the floor. As an adolescent, he enjoyed shooting cats with his pellet gun. In high school, rumor had it that he was to blame for the fire set in the boy's dormitory. He made right turns on red lights when he should not have. As a teenager, he made a game of seducing young women. As a man, he made a game of seducing married women.

For all of his misdeeds, Bernard had an uncanny way of benefiting from situations. He was ever mindful of avenues for advancement. He took credit for returning a dog that had been reunited with the owner's anonymously, earning him $50 in reward money when he was ten. Bernard cheated his way through college. He took many pennies throughout his life and left none. Years ago as he was making his start, he would "rent" items from stores--buying them, using them temporarily, and returning them for full refunds. He forged the signature of his ailing father on a check in order to procure the funds necessary for a down payment on his first car. He pilfered the jewelry of his ailing mother years later to pay for three new Calvin Klein suits. He caught the eye of all of his superiors by making his coworkers look incompetent. He once blackmailed a vice president of a rival company into giving him insider information that, when acted upon, earned him his first vacation home. Even after amassing a small fortune, Bernard would not hesitate to relieve a lost wallet of its cash. It's what they deserve for being so careless.

Virtues became vices in Bernard's heart. Normally, to have egalitarian leanings is commendable. In his case, it was despicable. Bernard loathed all people equally. Being a highly competitive person, he viewed everyone as a rival for the world's limited resources. He justified his maniacal behavior as being natural. We are all struggling to survive. My way of struggling is more efficient than average. I not only keep myself going, but hinder others along the way. Bravery is employed on both sides of a war. Bernard was proof that it took courage to fight for evil as well. He risked apprehension and punishment in order to win the greater rewards of underhandedness.

He maintained his ways at home and abroad. He relished the anonymity that traveling afforded him. It is preferable to take advantage of a person you would never see again. There's less mess. On a business trip during his fifty-second year, Bernard acted out of character. He had packed his belongings into his overnight bag, complained of the smell of smoke in his non-smoking room (which he had put there by smoking a cigar upon his arrival) while checking-out, received a free breakfast and a discount on the room, and made his way to the street. A mob of people was clamoring for a taxi, so Bernard opted to move eastward to catch a westbound car earlier. Two blocks down, passing under emerald awnings and by wrought iron patio furniture, he stopped in front of an apartment complex.

A flustered woman with a small, wheeled black suitcase in tow descended the concrete steps and stood next to Bernard. She pulled at the ends of her shirtsleeves and ran her fingers through her hair. Exhaling loudly, she smiled at Bernard and said, "Some morning, huh? Something always comes up when you're in a hurry."

"That's the way it goes," Bernard responded as he turned his attention back to the busy avenue. He stepped off the curb and hailed the approaching cab. It decelerated and turned towards the customers-to-be.

"I'm sorry, but do you mind? I'm terribly late already. Could you, please?" In the cloud-filtered morning light, the twinkle in her eye she used to flash men was hardly noticeable. Still, the look was enough to disorient Bernard. Unlike the strangers he usually wronged, her humanity was convincingly established by the delicacy of her voice. Unlike the people that knew him, she had not assumed the worst of him. She simply and humbly asked him for a favor after recognizing her need for assistance.

Bernard stepped back. The woman opened the back door, slid her bag in, and followed after it. He watched the cab weave through the congested street until, after a right turn, it left his field of vision. He walked down another three blocks to a corner where a car with the white sign reading "Taxi" glowed, idled. Bernard cut off a man approaching it with a number of bags in his arms. As Bernard climbed in and shut the door, he heard the muffled string of expletives flowing from the burdened man outside the window. He stared back at him coldly.

"LaGuardia," Bernard commanded the driver.

Domestic Disturbance

The body has a curious, involuntary response to a disagreeable situation. In the creation of taste aversions, the body associates two contemporaneously (rather than causally) related events. When one eats a bowl of mint chip ice cream and shortly thereafter vomits and breaks out in a cold sweat, the body draws the conclusion that the mint chip ice cream is to blame. Every subsequent time a person so much as smells mint chip ice cream or sees the light green shade, one feels a tide of nausea rise inside her and she wishes to flee. Though the stomach flu was the real culprit, the mint ice cream is judged guilty by association. The creamy, clean sweetness has the same taste as it always did, but it's examined through a different lens.

The mind has an analogous, though admittedly less documented, response. Emaline Sortiere developed an aversion to her husband of 26 years somewhere in their second year together. Emaline Schlager married Lloyd Sortiere in the fall of 1928. Both were admittedly desperate for matrimony as the age 30 doggedly pursued them. In accordance with their yearnings, the two of them were blind to the premonitions of discord.

Lloyd was deceptive, though without the intention to be so. A man of few words and simple pleasures, he often gave the impression of being a sage. In truth, he was little more than an old, often sad, child. His inner waters were murky with unhappy tempests while his surface presented undisturbed. During their courtship, Emaline admired his affective consistency and Lloyd admired her talent in the kitchen.

Emaline was inconsistent to a fault. On a drive in his Chevrolet in the spring of 1927, Emaline vented at how "crusty" Bach's Organ Fugue in G Major sounded. When asked for clarification, she answered, "I think organs are simply dreadful instruments. So brash and abrasive!" In the winter of 1927 when the same fugue flowed in over the dining room radio, Emaline pleaded with Lloyd to buy her a phonograph of that "wonderful music."

Their marriage began as a symbiotic relationship. Emaline would tend to all things domestic; Lloyd would provide for all things material. So long as he kept her well-stocked and properly ornamented and she kept him well-fed and properly dressed, all was well. She could imagine that he wanted to be with her in a way the romantics wrote of in their poems. He could imagine that she wanted to nurture him in a way his alcoholic mother never managed to do.

All self-loathing people have disdain for their own company. Some self-loathing people have greater disdain for the company of others. Though neither understood it, only Lloyd belonged in the second camp. It due to this constitutional difference that he could stomach his dull, tedious work-life, and she was given to fits of depression in their dull, tedious home-life.

On a foggy early summer morning in 1930, the mind of Emaline Sortiere forged an aversion to Lloyd that would cast a pall over the rest of her life and sour what little sweetness was available in his. Lloyd had for the past month been putting in long hours at the office on a project not worth disclosing to persons outside the workplace. Emaline initially tried to make the best of her superabundance of time. She marked several items of off the "rainy-day list," including sewing a different set of curtains for the guest bedroom (canary yellow with little green star bursts throughout) and repairing a pocket in her favorite winter coat (long, black and red tartan). She picked up and put down several of the outdated magazines around the house. The diversions were insufficient to keep a nagging sense of disappointment at bay. This is not how marriage is supposed to be. He needs to be with me.

Emaline had been anticipating a pleasant Saturday and dropping hints about going on a picnic. Unfortunately for her, Lloyd had a major deadline and a callous boss looming. Early Saturday morning after he covertly crept out of bedroom, Lloyd wrote a brief apologetic note and promised to return in time for dinner. Infuriated upon discovery of the note, Emaline resolved to make a picnic lunch for herself and to go to the city park without him. Not thinking clearly about how far off lunchtime was, Emaline took to making a sandwich and introspecting. Wondering how it was the idyllic marriage she had patiently waited for all her life had eluded her despite the bold-faced fact that she was now married, Emaline sliced through the tip of her left index finger as well as the heirloom tomato. Shades of red mingled together on the wooden cutting board as she shrieked. Gripping her hand tightly with the other, she cried to release the torrent of pain and commiserate the ruination of her once beautiful hands.

My pointer! The pointer is the most important finger! It will be so ugly now! Damn! Damn! Damn! It's all his fault! If he would have stayed with me today, I wouldn't be so wounded! Oooooo! If he would have come home at a decent hour a few times during the workweek, maybe I wouldn't have needed to go on a picnic so damned much! Am I to be blamed for being lonely? A woman can't keep herself company--her husband is supposed to. People aren't supposed to be alone! He was so much more caring before we married!

Gripping the finger tightly within an increasingly bloody white dishtowel, Emaline collected herself and walked next door. She proceeded to ask her neighbor to take her to the hospital, where she received a topical anesthetic, stitches, and a bandage. Later that evening, she refused to explain to Lloyd the reason for the gauze on her finger. Her fingertip scarred over as did her heart.

Ever since, the mention of Lloyd's name prompted Emaline's blood pressure to rise. A nearly imperceptible grimace darted across her face whenever she heard his voice. Seeing the initials "LS" on the backs of certain models of automobiles made her left eye twitch with rage. Emaline blamed Lloyd for everything wrong with her life, except for her red hair--whose fault was her fair-skinned father's. Doors squeaking, nails chipping, boredom pervading, breasts drooping, paint fading--all were the products of Lloyd Sortiere. In their subsequent interactions, Emaline would vacillate between yelling at Lloyd and ignoring him. Lloyd stayed loyal to her because through it all, she never stopped making dinner.

In Character

Brandon Hayes was a man without airs. When he spoke, his voice was hardly audible. When he walked, his arms swayed slightly more than usual. In the privacy of his own apartment, Brandon often used his finger to scrape out the last contents of his favorite dishes. He owned more books than he could read and read more than he should.

As a child, Brandon was petrified of authority figures. He would cower when adults raised their voices around him. He had a guilty conscience that cast a pall over most of his childhood thoughts. In kindergarten, one of his few releases was on the playground. He loved to slosh around the pebble-filled surface, running, jumping, and sliding to a stop. He would fall to his knees, grip the rocks, and let them tumble out between his fingers. He would dig down four inches to the muddy bottom of the pit in search for treasure. Once, he fervently flung the rocks between his legs like a dog. A young passer-by was struck by a number of the tiny rocks. Unfortunately for Brandon, one rock made its way into her gaping mouth. Shortly after tasting its salty chalkiness, the girl wailed in the direction of the recess monitor. Mrs. Flareghety, the sloth in the midst of badgers, slowly digested the girl's frantic explanation. Dumbfounded, Brandon stared at their exchange. Mrs. Flareghty called him to her side. Looking down at him with stern eyes, she said, "Did you throw rocks at Rachel?" Brandon was scared and willing to admit anything the monitor wanted him to if only he could escape the situation. After he answered in the affirmative, a phone call was made to his parents. He was suspended for a day of class and grounded for a month. In his sparse room, he did not allow himself the pleasure of playing with the few toys he had. He laid on his bed, usually thinking confused thoughts about his own cruel motivations.

***

Assume pain can be measured on a scale of 10 units. You can feel 10 units for 1 minute or prolong the duration to 10 minutes and feel 5 units all the while. One might as well feel them all at once and move on. Example: when removing adhesive-coated bandages from one's self, everyone knows the key to the task is speed. "Get it done quick." If you pull slowly, you just feel it longer.

Sometimes in life, we are wounded. Some bandages we cannot reach. The hand of time slowly tugs at an even rate. Hair is pulled; skin is stretched. Never enough that the end will be met, that we will become unstuck. No, time just tugs and tugs and only prompts pain.
 
Brandon Hayes's family was a slowly pulled bandage. His mother and father fought whenever possible and it always pained Brandon. Brandon aged and his parents incorporated more topics to war over with each other. As a baby, they argued about whose turn it was to change his diapers. As a toddler, they argued about leaving windows open. As a child, they argued about credit card bills. As an adolescent, they argued about methods of laundering (Mr. Hayes thought Bounce sheets were a frivolous and wasteful expense). 

By the time Brandon was a teenager, they could bicker about anything and he overheard nearly all of it. He had a knack for blaming himself and entertained thoughts of his own demise in the hopes that it would allay his parent's mutual consternation. Oddly enough, the thought of him being spoken ill of after the fact kept him from every carrying any nebulous plans out.

The yellow and brown house he grew up in was not always a setting for sadness. His mother would let him lick the beaters after preparing baked desserts. His father would play catch with him now and again in the street in front of their house despite the fact that his own father never taught him how to throw. In the winter months, he would build an igloo every chance he got with the discarded snow that had previously covered the driveway. His mother was always boiling water for hot chocolate and Brandon was always burning his anxious tongue.  
 
It was from this source of self-loathing and simple pleasures that he grew into the soft-spoken man his co-workers thought of as aloof. 

 ***

On a mild summer afternoon during his twentieth year, Brandon was walking home from his desk job twelve blocks away from his house. He passed under a series of fading awnings and crossed two quiet streets, when a peculiar sound reached his ears. A little boy was sitting down on the steps of a duplex, sobbing into his backpack. After scanning the area for other signs of life, Brandon approached the child.

"What's the matter?" Brandon asked softly after squatting to the boy's eye level.

The boys red-tinged brown eyes looked at him distrustfully. "Nothing."
 
"Come on now, there must be something wrong. Boys don't cry like that for nothing."
 
"None of your business," the boy quipped between sniffles.
 
The corners of Brandon's mouth fell. Stubborn child.