My hand goes up to touch my hair out of reflex, and he looks away and smiles. Not a good smile, though, kind of like a smile that says 'wow, you're an idiot.' The urine stream stops and he flushes the toilet and looks at me again, and I stand there with my toothbrush sticking out of my mouth, waiting.
He just raises both eyebrows, still smiling, and leaves the bathroom, fixing his pajama pants.
And I stand there, my heart pounding, cold washing over me, a bit of toothpaste foam dripping from the stem of the toothbrush now, and I want to scream. I want to slam the door to the bathroom so hard it opens the wrong way. I want to break the mirror. But instead, I grab the toothbrush and finish brushing my teeth. And I guess I don't realize how hard I'm brushing, but when I spit into the sink, what comes out is mostly blood.
I wipe my mouth off and rinse and go downstairs to finish getting ready.
*
There's something about watching Martha creep up next to me out of the corner of my eye that makes me want to run screaming into the office, but I just stand there and let her think she's being sneaky. She likes to watch how I fill out the manager book sometimes because she has a hard time remembering what goes where.
I look over at her when I'm sure she's out of stealth mode.
“I'm doing sandwich boards for a while,” I tell her.
And she looks at me like I've just said I'm going to hang myself from the flag pole. Believe me, I've considered it. It's too complicated.
I look at her and smile and say, “You're in charge up here until the other kids come in. Then I'll come up and take over.”
She nods, and kind of smiles. And I laugh a little. Poor, sad Martha.
And I go to the back and get ready, washing my hands and putting on gloves, and I go to the main board, where Danny is already working.
He looks at me like I'm an alien. I only do sandwich boards when I have some aggression to get out.
And you know, for the first hour, things go smoothly. But as it gets busier, I start to lose control of the board, the screen filling with orders, and I'm making them too fast, throwing them together and Martha is demanding them faster than I can make them, customers glaring at me and Danny through the openings in the heat chute and fry dump. And I remember how thankless this part of the job is.
And Martha looks at me, her face all pinched, and says, “Aaron I need those whoppers.”
And I throw them up on the chute so fast that they hit her in the gut, one after the other, and she looks at me like I'm stabbing her. Believe me, I could do better than that. I could take these fucking whoppers up there and smash them in her face and twist so that the pickles fly out and then pick up the drinks waiting to go out the drive thru window one by one and hurl them into the car waiting there.
And out of the corner of my eye, I see some of my employees filing in, and I feel a wave of relief. I start to feel like going out to the dining room and slitting my throat and bleeding all over strangers' food.
When one of the kids takes over, I go to the office, throwing my gloves away and shutting the door.
I guess a couple hours pass. Martha comes in once in a while, making requests for the authority to give out free food or clean the shake machine or piss on the floor or whatever she's doing up there. I'm holding her hand through it all from the office.
And a novel idea strikes me: This store is filthy. I have to clean it.
And I'm out the office door and rounding up idle employees to assist me. I send them to take out the trash and sweep the floor and I take a broom and dust pan outside to do the dirtiest of all the jobs: sweeping the parking lot.
And let me tell you, I hate every second of it. But it allows me time to think.
For a while, my mind wanders. I'm sweeping up cigarette butts and fry cartons and thinking about shoving all this shit into the mouths of the people who tossed it there. I look up at the cars in the drive thru and imagine going up to one of them and just beating the shit out of the windshield with the broom.
And I see Warren's car pull into the lot. It's lunch time, I suppose.
*
And there's still no comment on my hair. We've run out of small talk, and I'm sitting there ready to leave at any second, ready to burst into hysterics and overturn the table and break a window.
But I just sit there.
And finally, over his fries, Warren says to me, “What did you do to your hair?”
And I laugh, because it's like being slapped.
“I cut it,” I tell him.
And I'm ready to grab the ketchup pump and smash it on the ground, sending dead tomato paste across the quarry tile floor. I'm ready to break my hand on the table.
He's so quiet for a while that I have to try to tune out the conversations at other tables. And finally he raises his eyebrows and laughs and says, “Why?”
I stare at him for a second, considering the consequences of each possible response, and finally I settle on telling him, “Because I knew everyone would hate it.”
He looks away and shakes his head, still smiling. “I don't hate it,” he says, “I just don't understand why you did it.”
I put all of our trash on the tray and stand up and I say, “Are you done?”
He looks at me, all shocked and innocent.
I pick up the tray and clear it into the trash can and carry it back to the dish sink at the back of the store, letting the door to the dining room slam shut behind me.
I spend a few minutes doing the dishes, my heart beating me to death, my teeth clenched, throwing the clean dishes into their places, then I stalk to the office, running a hand over my buzzed blue hair and slam the door there too.
*
And it's almost halfway through my shift. There's a fearful little knock at the door, and it opens without waiting for a response. I'm already looking at the door. I've been staring at it for a long time. Martha stops and blinks and says, “You okay Aaron?”
I just sit there, the forms I was supposed to be reviewing sitting on my lap untouched.
“You want me to take over so you can leave?” She asks.
I sigh and look around me. I look up at her and say, “If you don't mind, Martha.”
She smiles and nods and leaves the door open as she goes back up front.
*
I go out to my car and scream until my throat hurts.
*
I'm standing on the bridge over the highway now, my car a few yards away, the hazard flashers blinking. There's something about this moment that seems like fate to me.
I look out over the road below, and in my mind I'm falling over the edge and plummeting to the pavement, parts of my body exploding and bending the wrong way, and semis mangling me beneath them, cars hitting me like a dead deer, motorists pulling over to inspect their bumpers.
And I close my eyes, smiling. I start to laugh. And when I open my eyes, I see the trail of blood still fresh on the highway below me. I look down and I realize it leads to where I stand.
*
When I get home, I go in and cross the living room to the hall and go up the stairs, not looking out the window upstairs, and I go into the bedroom and get out of my disgusting uniform and just stand there in front of the mirror looking at myself in my underwear, my buzzed blue hair and my tired face. Then I pick up the jeans I've laid across the bed for myself and pull one of Warren's hoodies out of the closet and I put them on and go downstairs, my mind a mess of insecurities.
I really hate my life right now. I hate this house and these clothes and my hair. Anything and everything. I hate every person I've ever known, and every opportunity I missed.
And I've missed plenty of them.
My mind goes to the Vegas Motel as I leave the house, thinking of Harrison's arms around me, the water rising.
And I know that I've died. I'm dead as fuck. I'll never be alive again, but ironically I'm still here. Death is just as fucked as life, the same people, and every day the same shit.
I start down the road toward campus, my feet small against the cracked pavement. I'm walking past cars and houses and buildings I don't even remember right now, quickening my pace, quickening my breathing, almost running.
And when I get to University Strip, I stop and collapse against the side of a building, people passing me, and me wishing I was dead.
*
I feel like every second of my life is spent running away from something.
I've been against this wall for a while, waiting to die.
But I decide it would be better to go into the book store across the street from where I'm standing and try to calm down. My chest is tight and I'm sweating.
And right as I push myself away from the wall, the door to the bookstore opens and Harrison comes out, carrying text books, his hair new and green, and our eyes connect. I want to run away. I don't want to be here, with him seeing me right now, and me shitting myself from how it makes me feel to be so close to him.
He waves and I just stand there, panicking. He crosses the street when it's clear and comes over and hugs me, and I just stand there still, arms at my sides, and he laughs.
He pulls away and looks at my hair, his blue eyes wide, and he says, “You look great!”
And inside I'm screaming, but I don't know if that's good or bad.
He runs a hand over my hair, then his own hair and laughs again and say, “You inspired me to color my hair too.”
And I force a smile, my stomach in knots. I want to cry.
He hugs me again, and I finally am able to hug him back, closing my eyes and breathing him in, remembering us laying on the bed together, and I start to tremble. He pulls away and holds me by the shoulders, and says, “I was just about to get some iced coffee downtown. You look like you could use some, too.”
And I have to admit, iced coffee sounds amazing.
*
So we take the bus. Silent dancing crazy lady is on this bus again, and we watch her all the way to the station, which is a few blocks from downtown. We get out and start the walk to Starbucks.
“I don't know why I cut my hair,” I tell him, without being asked.
I look over at him and he shrugs his shoulders and says, “I like it.”
He looks over at me, and our eyes lock uncomfortably, and I look away, thinking about dead animals.
*
And then we're sitting in Starbucks, watching the cars and the buses and people passing the building, all on their way to destinations I will never know.
“What happened today?” He's asking me.
And I can't really tell him can I? What difference would it make?
“I'm just having a bad day,” I tell him.
I look at him, and he's frowning at me.
“You can tell me,” he says.
I look out the window again. Not really, I think.
“It's just a really bad day.”
And he lets it go for a minute, and then he says something that makes my heart stop.
“You ever wonder what it would be like to leave?”
I look at him with my mouth hanging open, scenes of us leaving town in my head.
“Leave?” I ask, sounding like I don't even know the dictionary definition of the word.
“Yeah,” he says, a smile crossing his face for a second. “Leave.”
I look down at my iced coffee and I shrug and say, “Where would I go?”
And he says, “Anywhere.”
I look up at him, and we're making eye contact, and I don't look away. I can't. I'm trapped. I think for a second I might even piss my pants.
“Sometimes I think about running away,” I tell him, my voice quiet.
He laughs and sits back in this chair.
“You're great, Aaron,” he says.
*
The light's fading as I'm heading back from University Strip, Harrion's voice in my head: You ever wonder what it would be like to leave?
I smile, staring down at my feet, still so small against the pavement, and then I look up at the cars and houses passing silently on either side.
I wish I was gone already. On a bus out of town, my backpack in the next seat, a middle finger to the life I know.
*
I spend a nice long time doing the dishes from this morning, waiting for Warren to get home.
I wash each plate and bowl and cup as though it might break if I handle it too harshly.
I look up at the pink siding out the window and I laugh.
It's just like me.
That stupid pink siding will never change. It will just keep peeling until it's gone.
Lost and forgotten and dead.
I picture myself dead, and the tombstone says, 'He was good at dishes.'
And I laugh until I start to cry and then I'm kneeling in front of the sink, my hands gripping the counter, screaming my throat raw.
*
Warren gets home and I have dinner ready. Spaghetti as always. I just don't have the energy for anything else.
And he laughs and says, “At least we're back to normal.”
And in my head I think FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU.
And I smile at him, my throat sore.
*
Who am I? I'm watching TV with Warren in my own home and I don't know who I am. I'm sitting on the sofa in the living room, and I couldn't tell you what we're watching.
“You okay?” He asks me.
“I'm okay, yeah,” I tell him.
And a while passes before he speaks again.
“I'm sorry about earlier at lunch.”
And I say, the words coming before I can think about them: “Shut up.”
And the words are so harsh that I surprise myself.
And I feel his eyes on me.
I look over at him.
“What's your problem?” He asks me.
And I just stare at him. I put a hand up to my hair and then retract it.
“You need pills,” He says, his eyes cold.
And I can't do this anymore. I can't just sit here and take it. I reach over and grab magazines and remotes off of the coffee table and start throwing them at him, and when they're gone I'm just hitting him with my hands, and he's grabbing for my wrists, and finally catches them, his lip bleeding, his eyes wide.
And our struggle is over. We stare at each other, breathing hard, and he sits up from the slouched position he had assumed, his eyes wide and scared. He lets go of my wrists. And all I see is a flash of fist. Then blackness.
*
So we're laying in bed now, and we've both got cut lips and eyebrows, sore gums and I've got a black eye.
And I just lay there waiting to die.
But I don't die.
I think of Harrison.
I could run away.
I could.
But I probably won't.
(c) 2011 Roman Theodore Brandt
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