Life and Death and Love and Fate and Lies and People

The story I am about to tell doesn’t include any characters based on real people, any similarities are solely coincidental. 

‘There are three things in life young man that you have to have: something to do, someone to love and something to hope for.’ The old man croaked at me, he was standing so close that I could almost taste the brand of cigarettes he smoked. His features were extremely defined; a nose which seemed too large for his face, his ears were also very large and so were his eyes, but I think that was the fact that they were magnified so much by his thick glasses. His jaw line for an old man was impressive; perhaps it could have cut glass back in the day. I did not know this man, which was surprising because I lived in a village with the population of about four; but I obviously looked like a friendly face to approach on a mild spring evening to talk about life. ‘I’ve got two of them. Thank you.’ He gave me a cold look and continued walking down the road to where I could only guess where his final destination lay. 

In my right hand I held two books, one of which was Breakfast at Tiffany’s and the other, poetry by Allan Ginsberg. I was meeting a person on a bench which overlooked the small village that I lived in. No matter what the weather was the bench was always cold, someone must have died on it a very long time ago. I was meeting a girl, a female, a person without a penis if you must know. She wasn’t a romantic option, trust me. Don’t get me wrong she was beautiful, she had hair a dark brown, so dark that it was almost black, but get it in the right light it glinted brown. Her eyes were very nearly black as well, but look for long enough brown was visible even if for a few seconds. Anyway, we had swapped books and we were just switching back, that was the only reason for our rendezvous, don’t get any dreamy ideas.  

I sat down on the bench, it was cold; she turned up and sat next to me about five minutes later. We sat there for about another five minutes looking down at the village, for some reason we found it strangely fascinating; we didn’t talk, we just breathed. Then to break the silence she asked if I had the books and I said yes, there was no need to lie. I put the two books in between the little gap between myself and her, she returned my book, A Clockwork Orange. ‘Walk?’ She asked. I looked into her eyes which seemed to have no end and then I finally nodded; to get to the forest where walking would usually take place we needed to wind our way through the alleyways and streets of the village. 

We strolled down the hill on which the bench was placed. There wasn’t much to talk about when it came to the village and its inhabitants. It was dull to say the least; I can only describe it as being an only child without any cousins and parents that rarely talk to you, and grandparents that don’t give you a sloppy kiss on the forehead when you see them. That is how lonely and depressing the village was. The girl was new to the village.
‘Why?’ I asked.
‘I didn’t want to, trust me, I could see no reason as to me moving to a place where they have the most boring people on the planet...no offence.’ She quickly replied.
‘None taken.’
We reached the end of the hill and started to walk past the first or last few houses of the village, it depended where you were standing. It was pretty much night time, the clock if I was at home would have struck ten when we turned to the conversation of people; people in general. We both decided that we did not much rather care for them. We did not like the way they lied, and talked and could let you down in so many different ways. We both had trust issues; that was obvious. She asked who had let me down; and I treated her to the story of my old school friend. He was new at my primary school, I would have been around six or seven, and so was he. After he had been rejected and laughed at by a boy who was supposed to show him around the school I volunteered to show him the disappointments of our prison; the way all of the taps leaked in the toilets and the way the basketball hoop had fallen down and was now merely propped against the post rather than on top of it. Then one day in high school when we were growing into men he posted a half naked picture of himself on the internet. People liked it; he grew self confidence, then he became a dick. That was that, the friendship was over. Just like that. Over. I then asked what made her so cold and she simply replied, ‘Someone promised they would always be there for me, but they weren’t.’ I left it at that, perhaps half a tear would have been in the corner of her eye; but I couldn’t see; but I sensed one was there. 

The village felt cold even though the air was humid. I think it was that kind of atmosphere. The village was still; if something moved you would know. There were about three people walking about; myself and the person without a penis beside me happened to meet all three of them. The first was a fairly young gentleman, he was cleanly shaven, but looked a bit socially inept. His hair was thick and red and it was pushed back with the help of a hair-band, his cheeks were rosy and his double chin was hard to miss, it seemed to engulf the collar on his freshly ironed shirt. He was on the other side of the road when we saw him, he was outside the butcher’s shop smoking a cigar, it wasn’t a Cuban cigar, they were hard to come by in these part. It was a long thin cigar. He spotted us over the road, and as soon as he did he took off his hair-band swiped back his hair with the hand he wasn’t holding the cigar in. He put the hair-band back on and whistled; the loud whistle that people do in the films when they’re in New York. It was ridiculous to do it in such a small village when the sky was virtually black. Anyway, beside this the person without a penis and I looked at each other and gave the look of ‘Oh God, another weirdo.’ Saying this, we still crossed the road, we even looked both ways before we did, that was ridiculous in itself, cars weren’t even parked, let alone driving at this time of night.
‘Gotta be careful you two.’ He whispered. I had no idea why he was whispering. He seemed to be a man of contradictions.
‘Why’s that sir?’ The girl asked, she was whispering and that was something that I had never seen before, the times I had had the pleasure of hearing her speak she was usually confident with her voice.
‘Fate and all, it’s all bullshit.’
‘Oh, don’t worry sir, I don’t believe in that.’ She replied quickly and had a slight smirk on her face.
The man with the hair-band struck his eyes to mine and questioned, ‘Do you?’
‘Well, I don’t know, sometimes I think so.’ I wasn’t going to lie; I was really bad at the whole act. I used to become sweaty and look all over the place. It was obvious. But as soon as I said ‘sometimes’ I knew that I had made a mistake.
‘I believe that you are an idiot. Why would the human race have a purpose or a reason to be here, or the reason for a person to be with another person? It’s stupid. Only people who cannot take the realities of this world believe in such fairy tale statements.’
‘Oh.’ I mumbled. I didn’t know what to say, he seemed like a timid man at first, but now his voice had raised and a cat had jumped onto a low wall to see what all the ruckus was about.
‘You probably think that you’re meant to be here. You think you’re meant to be walking with this lady. The lady you feel so much for. You probably think that you’re meant to spend the rest of your life with her.’ His eyes didn’t pull away from me during the speech.
‘Well, I don’t know about that.’ I replied.
The person without a penis interrupted and asked, ‘Oh, you don’t think that?’
‘I didn’t say that I do not not like you.’
‘What about the fact that you may not not not like me?’
There was a pause.
‘I’m going, thanks for the chat sir; I’ll take it in mind; it might become useful one day.’ And with that I crossed the road again and looked both ways. I didn’t wait to see what the reaction on the man’s face was; probably one of confusion. The girl came running after me and asked if I was okay. I nodded my head. The girl continued to say that she didn’t mean to make me uncomfortable and that she was just pulling my leg. After a short silence the girl uttered that she sort of believed in fate, but if she had shared it with the weird socially inept man there would’ve been an in depth conversation. ‘You need to learn to lie.’ That was her words of advice on that humid but strangely cold evening. 

We were half way through the village when I saw my neighbour June. She was a nosy old bag. She never let anyone have any secrets, so when I saw her I immediately thought that she would tell my mum about the little rendezvous I was having with the person without a penis that was stood next to me. I like friendships where it’s just you and another person; you don’t have to worry about meeting their friends, and being openly affectionate in public. When you truly get along with someone you don’t have to worry about always having a conversation in hand, their company is always enough.
‘Oh, hello, hello umm...’ The old bag stuttered.
‘Hello June.’ I wasn’t going to tell her my name. I told her every time I saw her.
‘Aren’t you going to introduce me to your little friend?’ She asked.
‘Of course, this is Miss. Fate.’ I smirked and looked at the girl, we were standing under a lamp post, so I managed to see a little brown in her eyes and it glinted, but as soon as I saw it the shade seemed to disappear.
‘What are you doing out this time of night?’ She continued to stammer.
‘I’m just dropping Miss. Fate home. She’s new to the village and she was lost. I hope you understand June.’
‘What I nice young lad. He’s a keeper isn’t he Miss. Fate?’ She managed to be looking at me and the girl at the same time. The person beside me just smiled and gave me a slight prod; I took the hint and said my goodbyes to June. 

We reached the forest, when entered the trees covered up the sky and the paths were pretty much pitch black. I found it relaxing. We talked about films, books and music; all the things I enjoyed about life. We managed to get to the end of the path without falling in the mud and making an embarrassment of our selves. At the end of the trail there was a junction; a left path and a right path, ‘Which one?’ she asked. I suggested that we should flip a coin; and so we did. The answer turned out to be left. The path was beside a lake, it was picturesque. The sky was also stunning. It seemed to be so many different colours.
We looked at each other and said, ‘Pick a colour on the count of three.’
‘1...2...3!’
‘Purple!’ I blurted out.
‘Peachy!’ She yelled.
We looked at one another and laughed.  Perhaps it wasn’t meant to be, like I said at the beginning. After walking another five or ten minutes she complained that her legs needed a rest. With that we turned off and went down a small pathway. It ended up by a stream, we decided this was a good place to sit; the ground was slightly damp, but not enough to leave a mark on my jeans and her dress. We sat down and talked about life, and talked about death, neither of which sounded too appealing. ‘Write me something.’ She said softly. I looked at her and said that I didn’t have any paper, or in fact a pen. As soon as I uttered those words she brought out a pen from her inside jacket pocket and held out her forearm. ‘I always needed a tattoo.’ I smiled and held her arm in front of me ready to write. It was very difficult. I was usually full of words but now I was empty. She said I could just sit there, it’s fine. I did just that and thought. She placed her head on my shoulder, it was heavy, I liked it.
‘Your heart’s beating quickly.’ She whispered.
‘I’m sorry. Maybe I’m just really unfit.’
‘I can feel it; I don’t like it.’ With that she raised her head back up and just sat next to me. After a few minutes a finally wrote, ‘I have created an idyllic creature who turned out to be true.’ She glanced at me and said, ‘I like it, it’s pretty.’ She brought her legs up to her chest and looked down. We sat there for a while in silence; even though we weren’t speaking I still enjoyed the company of her. 

‘Hi.’ A voice broke the stillness, and it was neither one of ours. We both jumped, I went so far as to stand up. Behind us was a young boy, he must have been around six or seven, he was holding his shoes under his right arm. His T-Shirt was red, so it illuminated terrifically in the dark.
‘Hey.’ The girl said.
‘I don’t want to get my shoes muddy.’ The little boy replied.
‘I’m sure we can take care of them for you.’ The girl replied to the reply.
‘What are you doing out here little man?’ I added.
‘My parents were arguing again.’ The boy continued replying.
‘I hate parents, they’re so frustrating. But it all blows over, come on let us take you back home.’ The girl suggested. The boy was happy to walk with us; he talked about how his parents shouted over the most stupid things. The girl contributed to this to say that her parents were divorced and that no-body would ever be as bad as them so his would be fine. She said that sometimes adults just shout at each other and argue to one another as to express their love, if everyone and everything was all hunky dory the world would be a rather terrible place. I didn’t have much to add on the subject because my parents used to sit in the living room at night and just fall asleep on different sofas without uttering a word. So maybe my parents were the least happy of all, more sad than those who shout and moan. 

We dropped the boy back home; he lived in one of the homes on the perimeter of the cold village. The door was open so we gave him a slight nudge and that was that. I never saw the child again. I never knew if his parents stayed together. I never knew if he became a slob. I never knew anything about him. 

I started to walk the person without a penis home and our hands brushed a couple of times. I think I looked into it a bit too much.
‘I don’t feel.’ She said out of the blue.
‘What?’ I replied, quite taken aback by such an abstract comment.
‘I don’t feel; me and you won’t go anywhere, it’s the closest I’ll get to liking anybody. It’s not your fault, it’s just the fact that I don’t love anybody and I won’t feel for anybody. I’ll let you down. I’ll make you cry. I’ll be a burden.’
‘You won’t be a burden.’
‘I will, you don’t know me.’
‘I know, but I want to.’ 

I saw her day after day after that day, every day was surreal, it was like I found someone that I could talk to about nothing in particular. Every day was a good day. 

Months’ past.

‘I found a guy. We go for walks. I just thought I’d tell you.’ She said on another cold evening overlooking the cold village.
‘Do you feel for him?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know.’

That was the one answer that said I would never be adequate. That was the answer where it justified all of my thoughts on people who lie. That was the answer that answered my queries on fate. That was the answer of my existence. 

I don’t know. 

D.R. Hayes