Realisation

He woke late as he was now prone to do, his head throbbing from oversleep. He looked around at the room and wondered about his life. Thoughts swirling through his head, horrible thoughts. He wondered if it was the thoughts themselves that were his enemy, then reminded himself that no matter how bad it got, it could always get worse. He thought about all the university study that he had done and suddenly felt horrified: was it actually possible that it had all amounted to nothing? Still, he had school teaching, and he thanked his lucky stars for that. How many times had it propped him up? And, how exposed he was without it! Memories of nights spent, working in call centers. And yet, that, at the time, even that wasn’t that bad either, was it? And yet, he shuddered at the thought of it. No, he couldn’t go back and do that again. He realized, for the millionth time, that it was mostly a matter of perception.

He got out of bed, thinking, wondering how people did it, how they actually survived in the world without faith. For the horror of it all, the shame, the self-recrimination; surely, it was too much to bare. No-one could bare that alone. And yet, they did. God only knew how. He looked around the room and again wondered what it all meant, realized that comparing himself to others could actually kill him, got up and stepped into the bathroom and looked at himself, saw an overweight man looking back. He took his shower and got dressed and stepped out into the day that was bright, stinging his eyes, put his facemask on and sunglasses, started walking. Other revelers walking the roads; some, the lucky ones, in relationships. A couple walked past; their faces hidden by their face masks. He looked at them and wondered what they were thinking, walked past the same construction site that he would pass every morning when he would take his walks, saw the same girl smoking a cigarette while she held her stop go sign. He crossed the road and came to the local café where he would get his breakfast, stopped outside and waited for the waitress to catch his eye, watched her eyes smile at the sight of him. Was that what the world ran on? Love? Was she truly happy to see him? Or was she just happy to be in a job? It was hard to tell.

‘Hi, how are you?’ She asked.

It was a strange accent and he couldn’t place it. Mexican? She had the black hair. Latina? He didn’t ask, though he wanted to. It somehow felt rude.

‘I’m ok, you?’

‘I’m good! Please, sit anywhere you want.’

‘Thank-you.’

He looked around the empty café, at the boarded up area and felt all the usual sadness and anger, walked to the empty seat in the sun, sat and waited for her to come over and take his order, marveled at how much he had missed these little things, and in the next moment, she was standing in front of him, and taking his order, and he wondered if he was having a sort of a mid-life crisis, for everything seemed so finite, all of a sudden, including his life.

He looked around at the plants and the day outside. Indeed, one day he would be dead, and even this moment here, that he was currently having, would never happen again. And the thought came back again: but, what did it all mean? He looked up at her, at her pretty straight hair and suddenly wanted to weep. One day, it would all be over, including her; one day she would be a decaying skeleton in the earth. Surely, in light of all of this, everything was extraordinary, wasn’t it? The pot plant, the cracking bright day outside, the tables and chairs, the tiled floor, the women, standing outside in their clothes, underwear underneath, the women behind the counter working, the tradesmen drinking beer at the opposite table, the Latina girl behind the counter... 

Reviews

[roarke]

Your story had a good flow to the narrative. Realization comes on in the midsts of scenes like this, you encapsulated the feeling perfectly. Nice work.