Wildlife I’ve never grasped the human capacity for possessiveness. I wish I had – it may help explain away the dry humping going on in the booth adjacent to mine. They’re sitting; her on his lap, legs together; him with his calves wrapped around her shins and his hands atop hers, which rest on his thighs - a cloistered circuit, conducting desperation. I’ve watched them since they entered, giggling hysterically at an inane aside made by the boyfriend and stumbled to the counter as she sheepishly whispered her order into his ear, which he then relayed to the cashier. She attempted to pay – this seemed to offend his sense of propriety – and he desperately batted away her hand, producing a fifty of his own that was thrust upon the counter. She feigned outrage and then slapped him playfully in the stomach. He cracked the giddy grin of a dullard who knows no better. She stared dimly at the counter whilst resting her head on his shoulder. I wondered if it embarrassed her to be with someone so short.
They’re splitting an horrendously large iced coffee, doused in cream and several other carcinogens. This pleases me. Despite being provided two straws, he makes a point of drinking from the same one as her whenever she passes him the bucket. I’ve stopped reading my book, and decide to listen to their conversation. I prefer to critique the lives of others, because providing such studied scrutiny to my own life makes me fidgety.
"Did you end up going to, umm…" he asks, trailing off.
"To….?" she responds, nuzzling further into his jugular.
"To…you know?"
"Do I remember going to you know? Do I? Babe, you have to
tell me!" she squeals.
"I’m
trying to!" he yelps, squeezing her hand harder.
"You’re
useless!"
They suck the enamel off each other’s premolars for another fifteen seconds or so, then he laughs again for no reason. I cannot convey how strongly I yearn for him to be on fire. The anthropologist in me would like to conduct a Pavlovian test on them; provide stimulus (a text message riddled with malapropisms and “xoxox”s; matching sets of manacles; familiar scent on a pillowcase) and watch them salivate rivers over the table.
They’re beginning to bore me. I remember the pot of tea I’ve had at the table for the past half hour. It’s unsalvageable; the leaves at the bottom have coagulated into a dense mesh and will doubtless taste like peroxide.
"What are you thinking?" she asks me from across the table.
"Things."
"No shit?"
She goes back to her book. It’s unlikely she wanted an answer.
There’s a group of middle-aged men at a table in the corner. They laugh too boisterously at each other’s jokes because they each individually have an enduring dread within them. The loudest of them, wearing a dress shirt that fits too tightly in the arms – the sleeves don’t reach his wrists – bangs on the table to accentuate his point and the rest of them seem impressed with his story. There’s nervousness in the way they drink their coffees and they seem ashamed to be here. None of them wear rings.
Out on the street, groups of drunks amble past hollering the last song they’d heard at the pub. A guy with no shirt whose forehead is far too close to his chin yells across the road at a cab, before leaning face first against a stop sign, waving his phone as if conducting some cretinous orchestra. A pod of plastered bleached blondes in stilettos strut past, one of them exclaiming:
"I’m ready for some DICK!"
This offends the man sitting by the window with a group of friends. He raises his eyebrows and looks at his girlfriend; seemingly abhorred, but secretly wishing she’d talk like that sometimes. She gives a blithe smile and continues talking to the man next to her. Their conversation is vibrant, peppered with laughter and fleeting brushes of thighs and hands. The boyfriend appears rightly concerned, and smiles from beneath a mask of restrained, irreconcilable torment. Despite frequent interjections, he doesn’t seem as canny as the other guy, and is unable to wrest control of the conversation from him. The boyfriend looks like a Phil, which is what I decide to name him as I imagine the nature of their conversation.
Girlfriend: “Oh, wasn’t it brilliant! And the casting was just spot on…”
Unscrupulous Buzzard: “That’s so true. Like, you just get the impression they knew it was the right role for Jodie Foster, and she is brilliant, I mean…have you seen Silence of the Lambs?”
Girlfriend: “No, I haven’t…”
UB: “Well it’s nothing like that, obviously, but she’s very good in it.”
Phil: “Yeah, she was…”
[Ignored by both parties.]
UB: “But I also thought the score was just tremendously done as well…you know, just the…emotion…that they managed to put into that and it really…well, I don’t know, but I’ll definitely pick up a copy of the soundtrack.”
Girlfriend: “I’m not really into classical…I like my music like my wine: Simply Red.”
[Laughter]
UB: “U2?”
[More laughter.]
Phil [Belatedly]: Gee it’s a bit hot in here…maybe we should go to the Beach, Boys?
[Silence.]
Phil then loses it and pours his hot chocolate all over his head before soiling himself and rolling around on the linoleum whilst the girlfriend excuses them both and says he’s had a very long day and it’s time for bed.
The reality of the situation is far less entertaining. Unscrupulous Buzzard is drawn back into the general conversation of the table, where the men are discussing something blokey. Phil makes a lewd joke, which elicits genuine laughter from the table until he realizes the girlfriend is looking disdainfully over her napkin at him and he quietly sips at his drink, allowing the conversation to stagnate until one of the women takes orders for the second round of coffees. The big wheel keeps on turning.
Phil’s struggle has a strange personal resonance. I recall feelings of abject despair; of terrible, unyielding sweats on winter nights; of frantically clawing at something that seemed such an imposition when it was attainable, but near-illusory the moment I allowed it any significant stake in my psyche. A thousand memories of a thousand paeans to futility and temporality… I’m uncomfortable.
"How’s the book?” I ask.
“I’ve already told you.”
She has, and I take this as a gut-searing personal defeat.
"Oh yeah. One day I’ll start listening to you. Maybe."
"I’m giddy."
The droll bitch has me, though there will be further exchanges. Redemption is not unattainable. I’m slightly flushed and I don’t want to know why because there’s probably no lesson here.
"Let’s go."
And we do.
