Thanks to Tova7 for her keen editing assistance. Please leave me a comment to let me know what you think of this.
“I just can’t take it anymore,” he said, sitting across from me, nervously tapping an unlit cigarette on the side of his empty coffee mug like a mini drum stick. I wanted to ask what tune he was playing but refrained. I knew it wouldn’t be cheerful.
“It feels like I’m wading in quicksand from the moment I wake until I close my eyes at night. And sleep doesn’t provide much respite either.” He twitched back and forth, looking over my shoulders.
“Would you rather sit so you can see the door?”
He shook his head but continued twitching anyway.
I wanted to reach out, give him a big manly hug, complete with firm gripping and back slaps. But he’d react like I just jumped out of the closet at him.
And therein lay most of his problems. He was never able to accept affection at face value, instead wondering what ulterior motives followed. It is a particularly sad way to exist.
I smiled my sympathies at him. He wasn’t having any of it. For a second, I tried empathising but simply couldn’t put myself in those shoes. I’ve can’t wear pessimism, at least not well enough to look good in it.
The question hanging between us begged and pleaded until I asked, “What is it this time?”
He stopped his silent tapping and scowled at me. “Exactly that.”
Wide-eyed and shrugging, I held up my hands in protest. “Hey, mate; I’m not your problem.”
“I didn’t mean you specifically. I meant that everyone thinks I have problems.”
I replied gently, ever aware of how easily he flies off the handle. “Maybe you just need to lighten up, mate?”
“I can’t keep it bottled up in me, you know that. I think sometime if I did, I’d explode. Its not as though I’m the only one with problems, is it?”
“Well, I suppose so but I think some deal with them better than others.”
He didn’t respond but I could see him filing it away to dredge up later. He had a habit of not responding to implications immediately then using them in the future to use as darts of frustration.
He changed the subject. “C’mon, let’s get out of here. I need a cigarette.”
I paid for our coffees and made small talk with a cute waitress while he fussed around in his back pack looking for a lighter. Then he stood behind me bobbing up and down impatiently while I flirted a bit more.
He slouched out ahead of me. Once outside, he attacked. “Why do you do that?”
I knew what he meant but replied anyway. “Do what?”
“You know, that small talk shit with people you don’t know. It’s bloody annoying.”
“Annoying for whom? For me or for her? Or for you?”
“Ah, you know what I mean.” A standard response for anything he felt unnecessary to explain.
But, there is only so much anyone can take. I wanted it out of him.
“No, I don’t know what you mean. You always say that and leave me wondering if I’m being an ass. Are you pissed because I was talking to her and she was enjoying it, because I have a girlfriend and you don’t or because I kept you waiting? God, man, you really do need to take that heavy chip off your shoulders. I was innocently flirting, mate, not trying to get her to sleep with me. Jeez…”
He stopped walking. I could feel his eyes stabbing the back of my head, like visual punches. I steeled myself before stopping to turn and face him.
His response was predictable, face twisting between disgust and anger. “What got up your nose?”
He still didn’t answer my question. I berated myself silently but acquiesced.
“Ah, don’t worry about me, mate, I’m alright.” I felt stupid but didn’t want to spend the afternoon arguing. Experience taught me that once we started, he’d never let it end.
He shook his head then lit his cigarette. “Where do you want to go?”
“Let’s go to the park. We can sit in the sun and watch pretty girls walk by.”
He screwed up his face again but followed without saying anything more.
We walked in silence until we got to the park. We spotted an empty bench and quickly sat down, sprawling out so no one else could sit with us. He took a bottle of water from his back pack, took a big swig then passed it to me. Like always, I waited for him to speak first.
“I don’t know how to deal with it all. Work is boring; I can’t find anything that interests me.”
I nearly smirked. He worked for himself as a freelance architect and made about ten times what I did. He didn’t have a boss to cajole or timesheets to keep. His office was a desk in his oversized lounge room. I was completely envious. Yet he couldn’t see how good he had it compared to most of us.
“I sometimes wonder whether I’m going to be single for the rest of my life. Most of the girls I meet are either bimbos or not interested in me. How did you end up with someone like Terry?”
Another of his little gambits, something to justify his misery. I was wise to them but nevertheless reacted. He often made it difficult for me to control myself.
“Oh, don’t be like that, mate. Terry is the best thing that has ever happened to me. And you know she’d say the same of me. It’s why we're so good together. Mutual respect, mate, mutual respect.” I waited for his reply.
“Yeah, but why can’t it happen to me? I’m just as good as you, aren’t I?”
Silently, I responded “no, you’re a misery-guts” but instead said, “Of course you are, mate. You’re a catch just waiting to happen.”
I threw my arm around his shoulder and shook him a bit.
He shook my hand off and gave me his ‘don’t touch me’ look before continuing. “What’s wrong with me then? Why should you have the luck of finding a great girl while I end up feeling so fucking miserable all the time? I mean, it’s not as though you’ve got a lot…” He stopped short, realising he was probably going too far.
I stood up quickly, knocking the bottle of water on the bench between us to the ground. The lid popped off and water ran onto the pavement. I bent down and picked the bottle up but not before most of it drained out.
He started in on me. “Oh for fuck’s sake, now I don’t have any water. You know I get dehydrated easily. What am I going to do?”
I snapped. “You know what? I don’t give a damn what you do. I’m tired of being your whipping boy. I'm tired of your insinuations about me. I’m tired of your petty jealousy, your even pettier envy and that you can’t see how good you’ve got it. I’m tired of you pissing all over anything decent I might have going for me. Can’t you just be fucking happy for someone else or is that too damned hard and depressing for you?”
Predictably, he was acting like he did nothing wrong. He sat there, looking up at me, with a shocked expression on his face, as though I’d hit him. I didn’t wait for him to respond. Instead, I turned and stomped off across the grass, heading back towards the city centre. I heard him start to say something but simply waved my hand dismissively over my shoulder.
He must have followed me out onto the grass. He hated grass, said it made his skin break out and eyes itch. He called out to me again.
I couldn’t help myself. I turned to look back at him.
He was standing off the path, about 20 metres behind me in what appeared to be a patch of mud. As I walked back to him, he sank another couple of inches into the ground. He looked up at me then back at to his feet. “What the hell is going on?”
I heard something in his voice I never heard before.
Fear.
“I don’t know but just hold still, alright?”
He sank another inch or so, squealed a little, and reached out to me. “Pull me out, will you?”
I grabbed his hand and gave it a good yank. He swayed and nearly fell over. Instead, he sank another couple of inches.
Again, he squealed and held onto me, sinking up to his knees until it looked as if he stepped in a hole.
“What the hell is going on? Pull me out of here, damn it.” His voice went up a register as he panicked.
The weird thing was I stood right next to him, hardly making an impression in the grass.
I went around behind him, slung my arms under his shoulders and pulled up as hard as I could. He screamed but didn’t budge. In fact, as I was pulling, he actually sank further into the ground. He was buried almost up to his waist and wiggling frantically.
I looked around the park to see if there was anyone else who could help. An elderly couple walked by and I waved to them. They waved back and kept on walking. I started to run after them, but he called out.
“Don’t leave me! For God’s sake, don’t leave me.” He struggled some more, pushing down on the ground with his hands, trying to push himself up. His hands disappeared into the grass up to his wrists. He screamed loud and long. A few distant people on the other side of the park looked over our way but none moved towards us.
I wanted to say something encouraging, something to calm him down but nothing would come. As I watched, the ground claimed more of him. He was in about half way, chest hitching, as he tried to draw breath. I knelt in the grass in front of him and took hold of his shoulders.
“Mate, I want you to look at me, okay? I’m going to have to leave you and get some help, okay? I don’t have any other choice.
He struggled to find breath, to say something. I leaned a little closer. His voice was ragged yet containing more venom than ever before. “What have you done to me, you bastard? What have you done?” He ranted, swore and struggled against his earthy entrapment.
I couldn’t believe he was actually blaming me for this. I stood up and stepped back from him. He was red-faced and sneering while gulping like a fish out of water.
I shook my head in disbelief.
The earth sucked at him, almost to his shoulders. His eyes nearly popped out of his head, but he still looked as though he wanted to hit me.
His mouth opened and closed, trying to form his last words. He looked up at me and swore. The earth sucked, this time to his chin.
I knelt down. I wanted to say something to help ease his fears, something to take his anger and panic away.
Instead, I said, “You know what, mate? I always said you should learn to lighten up. Now it’s just too late.”
The earth sucked once more, to just below his eyes.
I sat there a few more minutes until he completely disappeared.
I stood up and examined the spot where he disappeared.
There was nothing to indicate anything had happened. I put one foot right in the middle of the spot. It held my weight.
I shook my head, chuckled to myself and walked away.
