I guess saying that it's pouring outside today would be a vast understatement. It really seems like God threw a little hissy fit this morning and decided today wasn't going to be my day. To make it even better, He decided to do it on my walk to a date. Fantastic.
I was going to meet the fair short haired maiden Naomi at The Grounder's, but I guess that's a no go, considering the walk I have left is a good 10 minute trudge through rain, mud, and the slippery side walks of hell. As water completely drenches just about my whole body, as well as nearly permanently blinds me, I speedily dip into a small cafe.
It smelled like newly brewed coffee and glaze on the top of donuts. The place was beautifully lit by overhead lights with small artificial candles placed on the tables, which were sporadically located around the room.
I look around immediately, and to my surprise, only see one person in the corner of the room, eating a muffin, and a worker whom looks at me with her big eyes with pity.
"A-Are you alright?" she widens her brown eyes and holds her hand up in surprise. I shrug my shoulders as a water induced chill sends it way throughout my body. The worker flies up and grabs a spare towel from a cabinet. She tossed it to me from across the small cafe and it landed just a few inches from the very tips of my shoes.
I pick it up and hastily dry myself the best I could, not thinking about my phone until I came across the damp pocket that encased it. I pulled it out and stared at the "water resistant" screen, which was caked in droplets of water. Of course, I know better than to sit here and try to turn it on before it's completely dry, from past experiences.
As if she could read my mind, the kind worker presents me with a half filled bowl of rice, a concerned smile plastered on her pale face. "Figured you might want this," her voice seemed to echo throughout the whole area.
"Thanks," I mutter, plopping my phone into the bowl and promptly burying it. I set the phone on a table as the worker moves back to behind the counter.
I notice an old payphone in the back of the room, near the counter. I'm sure Naomi won't be mad at me if I call her and explain, right? Surely not. She isn't the type to get like that.
Without contemplating it any further, I take out a quarter from my pocket and make my way to the old contraption, slipping the quarter in and dialing Naomi's number, which I'm not ashamed to say I have memorized. I listen to the slightly eerie dial tone until it stops, and someone picks up on the other line.
"Uh, hello?" Naomi utters.
"Hey, uh, sorry, I got caught up in the rain," I say shamefully.
"Oh, it's cool, don't worry."
"I'm at, uh," I look over to the sign on the wall, "Spring's Express. My phone's soaked."
"Oh, I can pick you up and we can just go to my house instead if you wanna."
"You sure?"
"Yeah, it's no problem. I'll be there in five.. ten minutes, alright?"
"Alright, bye."
"Bye," she says in a singsong-like voice before hanging up.
I put the phone back to its original state and walk over to a chair, my shoes making squeaking noises along the floor as I go. I collapse in a chair and close my eyes for a few, listening to the rain smack the top of the roof.
I hear some shifting and a couple of chairs move and I open my eyes out of curiosity. The man whom used to reside in the corner of the cafe now plopped himself in the chair in front of me, a mere three feet of table separating us.
He stared at me with a bone chilling stare, causing a large amount of the exact opposite of comfort to spread throughout me. He had a weird smell to him; like my dad's old cologne, but the bottle was pissed in and left outside for a couple of hours before it was sprayed on him, heavily. He looks like he hasn't shaved in maybe weeks, his growing beard unkempt, and his hair was mainly hidden under a hat I'd usually wear in the winter. His clothes, a light jacket, a stained tshirt and some cargo pants, we're wrinkled and loose on his form. I'm not saying this random man is poor, or even homeless, but he obviously doesn't wipe his ass with $100 bills every time he drops one.
This man continues to stare at me for a couple of seconds before I finally decide to speak up, "Uhm, hello?"
"Hey there," his voice was raspy and it's tone told me he wasn't in his heyday anymore, at least, when it comes to his age. The gaze of his dark eyes changed direction and looked outside to the pooring rain. "It's really raining down little bullets from Hell today, isn't it?"
"Yeah, I guess," I scooted my seat back away from him in the most nonchalant way possible.
"I feel like if I go out there, any drop of water that hits me will tear up my skin like acid. Seap through my body and into my organs and punish me slowly until I go back inside and stay safe," he said calmly, watching the rain drops outside pelt the pavement in fear. I look over to the counter where the kind worker once stood to only find I am now alone with this unsettling man.
"Because we are safe from all influence in here, y'know?" he speaks once more, his eyes piercing my own. Influence? Like, alcohol or drugs or something?
"Influence?" I say without thinking.
The man's face instantly contorted into an expression displaying both excitement and fear at once. He almost yells, "Yes, influence! The influence of the man whom controls. The influence of whom presumably made me. Him!"
"Your... Dad?" I blurt. Although this man is making my entire body shake, I'm just fascinated.
"No, you rotten banana, 'God'!" he put air quotes around the world God like it wasn't what He was called.
"What's wrong about someone great trying to protect you?"
"God... That being has not tried to protect me once in my lifetime! Everything that has ever went south was because of Him. Never, ever in my life has He done anything good for me," this old, rickety man stated.
"Well, of course, you don't always know when He's done something for you," I say, "You don't receive an email saying 'God's done you a favor'."
"Do I look like the type of person to be labeled fortunate?" his eyes squint.
"Well, uh, not particularly," I mutter, again scooting backwards in my chair.
"At least your honest. But, if this man loved me, I wouldn't be in the position I am."
"He loves you."
He sneers, "Oh, shush. This guy has such a stick up his ass that he was embarrassed enough with his creation to flood the world and start over again. If he really cared, why hasn't he just done that with me?"
I stare at this man, whom I didn't even want to persuade anymore, with a stare. After a second, I stand up and grab my phone out of the rice bowl, fed up. I pushed in my chair and left that old sickly man to sit by himself. I walked outside and frowned, thinking about his selfish words. I stood under the cover in front of Spring's Express that was shielding me from the rain, until a beaten up blue Honda pulls up to the curb.
I get into Naomi's car without hesitation and we drive off to her house. The whole night I was just slightly distracted by the words of that dumb, smelly old man.
Written November 2018.
