Thu, 19 May 2005

Toppling Tyrants, Or
Would it kill me to try? maybe, and Pascal informs me that any wager with death as a potential makes the bet unworthwhile. But I’ll try.

David drove us to work, it was his week, it had been his week for two weeks but he had air conditioning and no one seemed to mind. Out where 30 becomes 197 David hit a small dog. He pulled over and got out of the car and the dog was flapping, like a fish, David picked it up and set it in the grass, the dog kicking at his forearms, as we watched from inside the car. The dog relaxed, stopped thrashing, but remained alive. David laid down in the grass, facing the dog, staring into its eyes. We couldn’t get him to get up. Eventually I got into the drivers seat and the rest of us drove to work, half an hour late.

David came in around lunch; no one thought to mention what had happened, no one particularly cared. David was like that. I went up and offered him his keys when he said “don’t, I’m not here.” He refused to answer any more of my questions. David drove home and in midweek it became my week.

David showed up, at times, but more often than not called in sick. Sometimes, when I was out of my cubicle, people would say “Hey, look, he’s doing his David impression again”. For a while, this loss bothered us, but we found it bothered us less as the days went on. And on.

I met David’s wife at a party a few weeks later; I did not know it was her at the time. She was talking to someone nearly as beautiful as she herself was, and I was smitten, confused, afraid. The music was too fast, but that entailed her jumping up and down a lot. On the way to the bathroom, a man in a booth offered me the chance to shoot at targets with a small pellet gun. On closer inspection these targets turned out to be small pictures of Elvis presley. I declined.

She didn’t recognize me until we were getting into my car. “Ah! hey, do I, do you know David?” “yeah. We work together. You know David?” “yeah. I’m his wife.” And we laughed, a little.

What happened next is connect-the-dots. I would tell you about their marriage trouble, about his denial of existence, about his stillness, but this would be rationalization, and not completely true. “Ow, uh, sweetie, you’re on my hair…” but I didn’t hear her, because I saw David standing in the closet. She turned and saw him, following my eyes, and we stopped for a moment, then she held me by the hips and rolled me onto my back. She began to move, and I began to move, and David began to move, and soon he stood beside us, and she would slow, and speed up, and slow, and speed up, and look at me as though I was to tell her something. And then I felt strange, and cold, and she began to speed up and not slow down, and I forgot to look for David, and then I was lost, and I felt colder, and I remember being a little kid lying on the grass and the other children stood over me, and they pointed at me, and they listened but heard nothing and they told me, oh, oh he looks ill, oh he’s sick, he’s dying, he’s dying, he’s dead.

We have decided to pretend there was never a David. We share the apartment now, and my car as well, and I’m thinking of inviting the guys from the office over to see my new place. David is gone, and people don’t remember; when his name was once mentioned we all became confused, and felt like there was something just past us we couldn’t hold anymore. I remember, because David still watches, not when her and I are together, but when I am alone, in the kitchen, staring at nothing. And I wonder about him, but when I turn to look, something shimmers, for a moment, and is gone.

I could be wrong.
(12:11.05.19.2005) [/alpha] #