I wasn’t supposed to stay here – here in this matchbox town, here in this falling-down house – it just kind of happened that way. I was supposed to become rich. That was my dream. My dream was the house and the cars and the toys and the girls. How I was supposed to manage to do that is an entirely different question. The vagueness of it all no doubt contributed to my failure to realize it in any way. I am not rich. I am no more than your proverbial average Joe, living the proverbial average life. The colour in my life exists because I live in a small town, where there is no choice but to be colourful. The mass mental imbalance could possibly be normal, and is simply more obvious because of the closeness between people who literally live on each other’s doorsteps. But whatever the case, the madness certainly is there, and sometimes, when something particularly bizarre happens, it almost makes up for the not being rich part.
I work at the only hotel in town. Nothing special about that. I have no idea how any of us ever get paid though considering we hardly ever have guests. I think perhaps the sale of alcohol in the hotel bar is the only thing that keeps the place solvent. Townsfolk drinking their sorrows away must be a lucrative business.
The hotel is situated on the only double lane street in the whole of our unbalanced town. I kind of do all the things that are left over once everyone else has done their jobs. A bit of inventory here and there. A bit of handyman work when it’s needed. It’s my job to figure out what to do when no one else knows (like the time the kitchen caught on fire and no one else really seemed to come to the conclusion that putting it out was probably a good idea).
Also, I am the only person who knows how to keep the swimming pool from going green. I suppose that makes me relatively useful.
When you live in a small town it’s only during the very early hours of the morning that it’s ever quiet. It’s the only time you ever get to be invisible. There’s no one to greet or make small talk with. There is nothing that needs to be done yet. You get to be all alone with the quiet sound of crickets and frogs in the summer, and the quieter sounds of nothing in the winter. In my case, I get to be alone with Sasha, of course.
The poor dog followed me out of the back door even more reluctantly than she got out of bed. I imagine that frosted grass is not an entirely welcome feeling when you’re not wearing any shoes. Her enthusiasm in summer can be noted as hysteria, but in winter she becomes the polar opposite. I can’t say I blame her. She did follow me though, and seconds later there it was as always: I closed the gate behind me and everything began to feel different. Nothing existed because it had all been locked away. The loneliness of waking up alone was gone. The leak in room 206 that I still hadn’t been able to fix was gone. The desperate desire to pack up and leave this place behind forever was gone.
Tap-tap tap-tap tap-tap.
I had to breathe slowly at first because the cold air burned my lungs. It felt bad in a good way, and I knew it would get better. And it wouldn’t be long before I stopped noticing the slicing pain in my knee.
Tap-tap tap-tap tap-tap.
I turned left onto the main road and headed out of town. It’s always the same. No room for changes or adjustments.
Tap-tap tap-tap tap-tap.
And there the thoughts should have begun to go, melting away into nothing for a while. Disappearing further and further as I pounded out a steady pace.
Tap-tap tap-tap tap-tap.
I couldn’t get them to go away that day though. My mind simply refused to switch off and I could only think of Sarah. Perhaps it wasn’t cold enough, or I had put the wrong shoe on first. Or perhaps thinking of Sarah was my cue to turn back.
I imagined her in her bed, huddled with the down duvet up to her chin, sleeping soundlessly, alsmost as if she were no longer breathing. I wished that I was with her, to see her face as she started to wake, because that is when she is at her most beautiful. Her hair pulls away from the ponytail she always goes to sleep in and it tousles in kinks around her face, and her eyes get this bemused look as if to say oh yes, it’s morning now. She yawns a lot and she rubs her face with her hands like a kid, and she is definitely at her cuddliest and most loving. And she functions in the cutest fog-like way until halfway through her second cup of coffee when she starts transferring into her usual more useful self.
Loving Sarah is like reading a particularly good book. That pressing and overwhelming need to just devour it as fast as possible is matched only by the need to savour it slowly and completely, lest it all come to an end too soon. The all-consuming emotions are so many and varied that it is almost impossible to pick out one for a few minutes attention, and so they mainly stay jumbled and unattended, and for the most part not entirely understood. But then, maybe it is in the understanding of our love for someone that it disappears altogether. If so, then I don’t want to understand, and I remain content to simply experience her. Somehow, the more I learn about Sarah, the better I understand myself.
It says something when you have been together with someone for so long and you still can’t get them out of your mind.
Sarah knows all the words to all the songs that were ever written. That is why I love her. Because that’s crazy right? You can’t turn on the radio or put on a cd without her singing along softly, mouthing the words and bobbing her head as if they were meant just for her. Her eyes and her face dance and her fingers and feet tap gently to beats that the rest of us aren’t hearing. She listens, and she listens with her whole heart.
She has this amazing capacity for delight that outshines any that I have ever known. Any of us should be so lucky to experience passion in such a childlike way. The joy she finds in the simplest things creeps into the corners of her smile, like she has a secret that she loves not telling, but she still wants you to ask her about it.
She watches movies with her whole body. She can barely sit still if something bad is about to happen, and she scrunches her whole body up on the couch, or squeazes your hand if she’s holding it. She squeals, she chokes, she laughs hysterically, she cries, and anything she deems magical puts her body in a breathless trance where she just stares in amazement as if she is experiencing it with all her might. And if she has already seen the movie that you’re watching, you always know when something is about to happen because she turns her head and expectantly watches for your reaction with joy dancing in her eyes.
Her favourite thing is to introduce people to new things that she thinks they will love. Whether it be music or food or places to visit, she loves nothing more than being the reason someone falls in love with something. It delights her endlessly to share with others the things that bring her joy.
She laughs with her shoulders. And if she’s leaning against you while she’s trying not to laugh, you can feel her stomach muscles vibrating as she concentrates hard to keep a straight and sober face.
She’s a compulsive fidgiter! If she’s not playing with her rings or bracelets, she’s taken out an earring and is playing with that. I swear it’s the only reason she wears jewelry!
She’s a terrible dresser. And I say this is the sweetest way possible. Usually she really dresses just fine. She manages to fake it. But sometimes, she will wear the most ridiculos thing, every time reassuring me that she still really has no clue.
She has absolutely no idea just how beautiful she is.
All these amazing qualities that I adore so much, in such a small firey package, and yet sadly her capacity for delight is matched by another. Sarah holds within her a degree of sadness that she finds impossible to let go of. And so while all I want to do is love her, all Sarah wants to do is not fall in love.
She loves me, I know, but not quite in the way that she needs to. And not in the way I do her. Sarah’s love for me is a lot closer to simply giving in instead of the necessary love act of letting go. And though I know she will never feel for me the way she wants but refuses to, I still find it impossible to walk away from the possibility that maybe one day she will learn to love me properly. Because she sings while she bakes. And she showers with the lights off. And ladybirds excite her. And she always smells like vanilla essence.
In fact, I could almost smell her as I continued up the road towards the outskirts of town. And I could see her smile.
Sasha moved with ease and grace beside me, soundlessly at first, but she would be panting heavily misted breaths later.
Tap-tap tap-tap tap-tap.
The smell of her hair.
Ta-te ta-te ta-te ta-te.
The feel of her skin between her neck and her shoulder.
Tap-tap tap-tap tap-tap.
The way she wrinkles her nose when she smiles.
Ta-te ta-te ta-te ta-te.
Past the petrol station we ran. Past the police station with it’s lone cop car parked out front. Past ol’ Uncle Howards house with the boarded up windows and the fallen down post box. Past the park that nobody played in anymore because of the broken down merry-go-round and the tire swings that you can’t sit in without getting your legs scratched and the rusted slide. Down the dip and up again. Out of town. Away…with mental images of Sarah playing in my mind.
When the car hit me from behind I felt my body lurch forward and hit the tarmac with a dull thud, the rough tar slicing my cheek and hands with its jagged edges. I heard Sasha bark loudly twice and then whimper softly before coming over to lick my face. And then there was nothing…