8:18 am
Looking up, the sky flashes white behind a blanket sheet of dark clouds. You can hear the crackle and pop of lightning in the distance, as the foreboding storm begins to consume the little corner of the world I occupy. I trail Marie a few feet back, watching her push past the doors to the office building we both work in. Finally inside the building myself, I’m welcomed by Taylor the front desk security guard.
“They got you to work today huh?” he asks, peering over his issue of today’s newspaper, glancing me over before returning back to read. I mumble a reply, while my eyes stay locked on Marie.
Freeze for a quick second.
Rewind the clock a few minutes back, and you’ll find me once more inside the car, thinking about this girl I barely knew. A voice tells me to not move. To remain still, and let her walk by. Let this be a fleeting moment, that you allow to escape. To be an after thought for you to stew over in your little cubicle. Gives you something to think about all day at least. I begin to feel it. The urgency of the situation. I feel it dying as the somber voice of reason silences the reckless impulse that bangs against the jail cell contained within me.
*Buzz. Buzz. Buzz*
I turn to the glove compartment, and hear my phone clawing and gnawing trying to escape. Trying to alert me about another text from my girlfriend perhaps. Maybe a sports alert. Or maybe it’s just a stupid Face Book status update from someone I meet at some random dinner party who I couldn’t give a shit about.
I begin to have a moment. It’s an introspective one.
It’s funny. In movies they always seem to show these moments occurring to the main character when something completely awe inspiring or deeply profound happens. A friend dying. Saving a person from a burning building. A superhero struggling with his identity. A divorce. In reality moments like these can occur from just the smallest of triggers; little things that push you just over the edge. It doesn’t have to be anything earth shattering. It can be a simple slight from a person from work. Waiting in line one minute too long for a pack of gum. Or just a telemarketer calling you at the wrong time.
In my case, it happens to be a phone buzzing inside a glove compartment. The face of youthful abandonment flashes a shark toothed smile, while laughing mockingly at my resistance. Enough with safe and boring it says. It was time for dumb and stupid. Fuck it.
“Hey. Josh? You okay?” asks Taylor who now looks me over with a worried look. He motions with his hands, seeing if my mind was still all there.
“Josh. Hey. Everything okay with you?” I don’t respond back. I simply move forward. In the background I can hear his voice yelling out my name. My eyes focus on Marie as I move. Each step I take I walk a little faster, quickening my pace to catch up. She stops for the elevator, pushing a button for it to come barreling down. My footsteps echo inside the lobby, clicking loudly with each mad lunge towards the elevator. She begins to step inside. She notices me frantically dashing to catch up. A moment of hesitation twinkles in her eyes, before she sticks her arm out in between the closing elevator doors to cease it from shutting.
I stop, trying to catch my breath. She blinks a few times, before finally speaking. “This is the part where you step inside so we can go up.”
I flash a faint smile, and step inside. The elevator doors closes and we proceed up. I shuffle around uncomfortably, while wondering on what to do next. I didn’t really think things through. I assumed I would know what to do when I finally caught up. But being here now, all I could draw was a blank. My mouth felt wired shut, my throat dry and coarse, as I reach for something in my head to say. She notices my unease. I can sense her eying me with my peripheral vision but I keep staring straight ahead. She sips her coffee with one hand before suddenly reacting with a irritated moan. “Ow. Hot.” she mutters to herself in discomfort.
I finally glance her over. She looked to be in the same exact state from yesterday. Her hair a jumbled up mess, her eyes bloody with red streaks. She even seemed to be wearing the same exact clothing as before, with the exception of now sporting a red trench coat. Viewing her, I now understood the appeal. It was the way she carried herself. She displayed a sort of cool, indifferent aura that seemed to pulse out. It seemed like nothing could dislodge her from her Zen like blissful state. It was because of that, I both admired and envied her. I feel a lump growing in my throat. Finally, I stop thinking and decide to just throw a hail marry.
Words begin to form as I finally speak.
“You look the way I feel.”
