“What a pain. What a pain you are.” The woman grazes a hand over the chair headrest, like a sheep across a meadow.
“You don’t function as you should.” She spits out the words. Straight into the elder man’s ear. His body quakes in the seat, but not to the woman’s cold demeanor. He thought, there’s an awful chill running through here. Why won’t she shut the window?
“You’re worn and ragged. I wish you’d swap this jacket for another.” In the moment, words are enough to at least leave a slash on the weary heart. But later? The man will have forgotten, and it will all amount to a shrug of the shoulders. He wants to remember. It’s no fun having to live each day on the brink of rigor mortis, nor the thought of approaching anything close to that. And so, “I will go find a new jacket,” says the man.
The afternoon is quiet. The man misses the way his curtains would shift in the breeze, swaying from side to side like someone he used to know. No—not curtains. They were blinds. Yes, he misses the manner in which the sun would shed its mortar lines of sunlight in between the gaps, the golden hour never blinding him in his chair. On his way to the store, he stumbles across a cookie stand.
“5 for $35!” shouts a little girl, no more than ten years old. The old man covers his precious ears.
What a voice she has on her, thinks the man.
The little girl leaned to her right. She holds a hand on the green table placement displaying her company slogan: If they aren’t sought, they’re bought. “5 for $35, sir,” the girl repeats.
The old man searches for cash. Pockets are empty.
“I’m sorry, miss. I have no money for you.”
He begins his trek away from the girl, but he abruptly ceases. Where was he walking to? To get a jacket? It is chilly out, not sunny like it used to be. The cumulus clouds protect their sole star in the sky, though their puffy exterior reminds the man of a marshmallow. That’s right! He wanted to go to the store.
“Have a good day, sir!” responds the girl to his pseudo-silence. He was breathing heavily and anxiously throughout the solitary exchange. Maybe the notion of consuming cookies was a bit too filling for his brain.
Water sprays along the rows and rows of vegetables. The green shells of lettuce flap to one side, and then to the other. It lasts for only a few seconds, which the man doesn’t find to be enough. The healthy fibers get artificial sunlight and limited sustenance? This is not the kind of torture chamber he wants to be in, but deciding on which items to get is already enough torture.
“Need any help finding anything?” asks a young employee. The elderly man looks over at his new acquaintance’s face, shocked by his complexion. Possibly paler than a ghost. Heck, he could’ve been one. The man had no sense of time. The features with zero wrinkles and pliable eyelids—what is this creature?
“I’m just looking around,” replied the man, haunted by the comparison between the youthful employee’s semblance and his own amorphous being.
“Well, if you need anything, don’t be afraid to ask.” The employee only steps a foot away before being called back.
“Actually, I-I have these children. My children, of course. They really have a hard time eating their greens, and . . . I’m sure there is no loophole into getting them to eat their vegetables, but perhaps there is? My wife’s friend claims—her name is Gwendolyn, by the way. Just a disclaimer, yes, but my wife’s friend told my wife about some method to assorting veggies, and I don’t remember if she said something about slicing and dicing or plucking random types out of the mix. Anyway, it all seems much too superfluous, but I think I’d like to give it a shot. Do you have any recommendations?”
The employee stares, eyes lazily drawn apart to avoid the man’s confusion.
“I bet Brussels sprouts can be seared nicely.”
“Oh, that’s great. That’s great.”
The elderly man goes up to the register with a bag of this new green breed. Hopefully his wife will know how to prepare this meal, or else the kids will hide them under the leftovers of their dinner.
“Is that all, sir?” inquires the cashier. A lot of sirs have been thrown around today. ‘So, the recent generation is polite after all.’
Prior to before, the old man gropes at his pockets, but to no avail. He’s supremely confident that candor and a happy smile cannot solve his problem.
“I’ll have to cancel this order, ma’am. I don’t have sufficient cash.”
“Oh, that’s fine. You can just use Apple Pay.”
“. . . The apples are really far away. I’m not sure my knees can take much more.”
The cashier sucks on her lips with distaste. Suddenly, another man saunters over to the side of our friend.
“Don’t worry, pal. I’ve got it covered,” assures the human, more like a dredge against the elderly man’s fugue of a seabed. The cashier nods her head with a smile. “You’re all set.”
The elderly man grips a wallet that is not there, staring at the shopper. “Thank you.”
“It’s no big deal. Keep a wallet tied on a leash, alright?”
The customer walks out just after the elderly man exits the sliding doors, busy shoving a basket into the heap of other carriers. It was a menial interaction, but it really helped the man. What else is he worth if he cannot remember the simplest of tasks?
The waves crash loudly against the concrete walls, just barely reaching over the metal bars that surround the edges of the barrier. Sitting on a bench by the bay, the elderly man cannot find his faith in direction. He knows his house should be to the left and all the way down the street, where his wife awaits him, but he didn’t come from the left. He came from the right, where that mean woman heckled him about his wardrobe. That’s right! He could’ve walked into a clothing store, grabbed a jacket, and waited for a kind customer to pay for him there. Then he could flex off his belongings. Then he could be a little less than a polarizing pain.
Wheezing. He hears wheezing a little off towards the right. Someone in the distance is panting, neither beyond nor behind the overhead flock of seagulls by the shore. Not a passerby, but a woman running straight towards him, skin flush with pink from the chill. She waves her two arms in the air before buckling over just a few feet away. The seagulls snap at the waves in the sky, flying past the two.
“Oh my lord,” mutters the woman, holding her knees in exhaustion. Beads of sweat seep into the pavement. “I didn’t know where you were.”
“I didn’t know where you were, either,” says the honest man. He didn’t know the woman, so technically, he didn’t know where she was.
After a minute more of rest, the woman straightens out her spine, making her appear slightly taller. If the man weren’t so hunched over all the time, he might be towering over her. Despite imaginary debate, the woman sits down beside him and cups her hands. “Why are you out here alone?” she asks, worry flowing through her throat.
“I’m trying to figure out where I’m supposed to go,” responds the old man.
“Man, that’s always a tough one.”
“How so?”
“Well,” starts the woman in a singsong voice, “that way is intriguing,” (pointing to the right), “because it has a fish market. It’s important to seagoers. But that way (to the left) has a very friendly dog that I like to pet. And behind us? There is a pretty view, but I like to exclude it.”
“Why?” asks the old man. Views are what he lives for, or tries to.
“It’s behind us. We could turn around and stare at it, but it will eventually disappear.”
“If I walk away without looking, I might think about it. What if I wanted to take a picture for memory?”
“That’s true. We can look at it for a little, but try to look away before sundown. You might be more saddened by it being gone than it ever being there.”
If the elderly man wasn’t already confused during his conversation with the employee, the girl’s babbling is certainly the equivalent of bupkis. However, she’s right about one thing: he has met that neighborly dog, and he would surely like to pet it again. The two stare at the view until the ripples of purple, pink, and orange fade into a bright yellow stain on the horizon. Then they walk to the left.