It’s a few miles to get across to the other side of town, not far enough to be entirely daunting, but just far enough that it’s a little bit too far to walk. I decide to walk, anyways.
The city, of course, is not the safest place at night. But safety has never really concerned me that much. Plus, I have walkedthese streets so many times for that note, though to follow it and not to retrieve it.
It occurs to me for the first time since it has been mine that maybe thew note has noithing to do with this city – maybe it is a part of something else entirely. Maybe the map was not meant for here at all, maybe I have been chasing the wrong thing all along.
It is this sort of amoment that I feel I should find a park bench somewhere, watch small children on playgrounds, and ponder the meaning of my life. But I never really have been that sort of a girl. Not so much for the pondering, more for getting so drunk that I do not remember what it was that I meant to ponder.
But maybe today is the beginning of something different. Maybe this is a change, a neew beginning, an open door. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m sober for the first time I can recall (at least, as sober as it is possible for me to be). Maybe it is the man. Maybe it is the note. Maybe it is just me. Maybe I am finally becoming something that is worth something.
And there ius always that chance that I am not qiuite so sober as I would like to believe myself to be. A bit of a hangover, sure. Well. More than a bit. More like three years worth of hangover. So I find myself that bench, the one in the park, looking out on a playground full of small, happy, children. I watch them run around in circles, up and down slides. It is the sort of thing that everyone wants to do on a late August evening, but only children actually do.
Maybe that is why people sit and ponder things while watching small children run around on swingsets. Maybe there is something nostalgic in it: something worth chasing or going after. Maybe life was all the better when everyone was young and had no worries or cares about, well, anything really. Watching the kids giggle and squeal, spinning in circles, running uphill on slides, merrily chasing one another around, I cannot imagine that there is anything all that terrible in life that a very good swing could not fix.
But you must understand, it has to be the very best kind of swing, the kind with those heavy chains that seem to stretch on into the sky, perhaps beyond what small eyes can see, or at least they would like to believe that it is taller than reality would dictate possible.
It occurs to me that reality has never been that much fun. Reality, how overrated, how misused. Better to drink and forget it all.
It also occurs to me how very much I would like a drink right now, and as I am, after all, headed toward a bar, it seems logical to hurry onward in that direction. It slips into the bvack of my mind that Jack – or whoever this fellow happens to be – is unlikely to allow me to drink anything. Except water, he might allow water. Nonetheless, I push these thoughts aside for cheerier ones, like the idea that I am going to a bar, after all. I could certainly get something.
As I get closer, now perhaps half a mile away, I break into a jog, then two blocks away, a flat out run. And it seems strange, even to me. I do not at all understand the compelling drive to get there absolutely as soon as possible. I just… feel like I have to. There is no logic whatsoever at this point, but then, has there really been any logic for some time now? There was certainly something, way back when all of this started, some sense of reason guiding where I have now ended up and what I have become. But now, it is entirely possible that I have lost any trace whatsoever of reason.
I once again toss around trhe possibility that I am a schitzophrenic, but dismiss it the moment I walk through the doors. The familiar scent of alcohol overwhelms me, and an altogether too familiar voice greets me.
“Anna, darling, I have been waiting for you,” he pauses, “took you awhile. You look a bit breathless, run the whole way?”
I shrug, “something like that. Can we just make this trade? And could you get me a drink while you are at it?”
“Well, you see” he explains, “you are underage, and I am a bartender, and that means that would be altogether illegal. Nonetheless, I do wish to speak with you, and I have a feeling that you would handle what I am anbout to tell you a great deal better if you were slightly inebriated. In light of this, what would you like?”
“I don’t even care, just get me something. The faster, the better. Something decently strong.”
“Alright, my apartment is in the top of the building. Would you be alright with going there to discuss matters of some importance?”
“Yeah, that is fine.” He hands me a clear liquid across the counter. “What is this?”
“Water.”
“Shut up,” I pass it back.
“You were the one who said anything. Alright, though, I will humor you and get you something else. Even though you did not specify…”
“Wayer does not even remotely qualify as something strong,” I point out.
“Ah, well, it was worth a try.”
I scowl, or something along the lines of a scowl, and he handsw me something else, “what about this?”
“My own creation. You will like it, I promise.” He motions me to follow as he leads through the back and up a flight of stairs into a small room containing an ugly pink sofa and a worn-out leather chair, “so, this is home for me. It is not much, but hey, it’s something.” He flops down on the couch, stretching out, so I take that as my cue to monopolize the chair.
“So what are these deeply important matters that need to be discussed?”
“Well,” he takes a drink from a glass I had not realized he was holding, “it seems that I like you quite a bit.”
“I’m not looking for a boyfriend.”
“Good, because that is not at all what I meant, and you are certainly not my type. Can we call acquittal to the arrogance from the beginning?”
“Yeah, sure, whatever. What did you mean by that, then?”
“I mean, here you are, in possession of the note,” he produces my map from his pocket, “which is clearly and distinctly in my handwriting, and on my stationary. Now, this looks to be decently old. Would you mind explaining how you came into possession of this?”
“A man gave it to me a very long time ago. I promise you that it could not have possibly been you. He was older.”
“I promise you that there is a very decent possibility that it was, in fact, me.”
“Are you just trying to say the most inane things possible?”
“Yes, of course, that is what I always strive for,” he casually places his hands on the top of his head, and awkward-looking position, but at the same time strangely comfortable looking, “in reality, Anna, which I am sure you are not very familiar with, since you can barely remember the last time thatyou were sober-“
“No need to be insulting.”
“I see every need to be insulting.” He pauses, glancing at me in what I imagine is meant to be a meaningful way. I grasp no meaning from it, “now then, shall we get down to business? See, the universe is a very large and vast place that I do not even expect you to understand or even begin to grasp. This is alright, of course, there are very few who even care to learn, but considering that you have this note in your possession, I must assume that you are one of the very few who actually do care to learn. Now I will let you in on a secret,” he sits up and leans in toward me, “the learning is not at all the difficult part of anything. It is the caring that is the hard part. Now tell me, Anna, do you care?”
“I don’t even know what you are talking about.”
“Yes you do, think about it. Somewhere deep inside, you know. You know if you care. Are you an adventurer? Do you search? Do you wonder? Do you look for answers even when answers are beyond the point of logic?”
“I guess so.”
“Then do you care?”
“About what?”
He jumps to his feet excitedly, “about the answers, Anna! It is always about the answers! If you have no answers, you really do not have much of anything at all, now do you? So tell me, do you care? Do you want to know? Do you care at all?”
“I care,” my voice is hesitant, but, to my own surprise, certain.
“Then I will tell you,” he says, returning calmly to his seat, as though he had been there all along, “I will tell you the answers to anything you could possibly ever want to know. Would you like that?”
“Who are you, Jesus?”
“Perhaps to some.”
“That sounds more than a little bit blasphemous.”
“Perhaps to you.”
“Okay, I thought you said you had answers, not relativity. So give me answers. Who are you?”
“I am a man, certainly.”
“I figured that one out on my own. I’m buzzed, but not that out of it.”
“Fair enough. I suppose I am like you.”
“Perpetually drunk?”
“No. Not that. No. I mean, I am an adventurer. But the difference is, my adventure has already begun, and your life has simply been spent in self pity.”
“Okay. If I am supposed to be not arrogant, could you try to be a little bit less insulting?”
“Fair point. I will be less of a jerk, promise.”
“Now continue, who are you, sir?”
“I was raised in Brooklyn by a man and a woman, neither of whom were my real parents, and they were not even married to eachother. They said they had found me on the streets when I was terribly young, but I suspect it more likely that they took me away from some family when I was terribly young. I knew this was probably true from a young age, though it never bothered me all that much. They were good parents, if parents they could be called. For all their faults, I do believe that they loved me very much. They spoilt me, both were from rich families, entitled to money, playing grown-up while they were hardly more than children. They died a few years back, now. It was a terrible accident. Awful. I was too far away, did not even make it back for the funeral. I regret not being there, but really, what could I have done? Well, more than I would like to admit, I suppose, but that is entirely a different story,” he pauses to recollect his thoughts, “They were good people, but then I already said that, haven’t I? Well, after Brooklyn, I moved on somehow got in with all the right people, and eventually ended up here. I would not change it for the world.”
“You are a bartender,” I point out, “in a city that… pretty much sucks.”
“Ah, now, it’s not all that bad. Because somewhere in the middle of all the politics and plastic, there is a little bit of magic. A little bit of magic like, for example, an old note with a map on it.”
“Where does the map go? If it is yours, then you would know that.”
“I haven’t the slightest clue where it leads. I imagine this means that I’ve not written it yet.”
“I feel as though you are suggesting time travel.”
“Your feelings on the matter would not be incorrect.”
“Are you telling me that you are a time traveler?”
“What do you think?”
“I think that is exactly what you are suggesting.”
“You would be correct.”
“That is impossible. What are you tripping on?”
“Absolutely nothing. See, silly humans. You have this problem, you don’t believe that anything you do not understand could be possible. In reality, the world is a great deal bigger than your logic, or even your imagination. You cannot begin to imagine the things I have seen.”
“Okay. Now this is just stupid. You should start making sense again. Am I asleep? Am I dreaming right now?”
“I garuntee that you are very much awake and the things I am telling you make every bit as much sense as it does that the morning follows the night, if you would just allow them to. Of course, you have all of your own preconceived notions, and I am certain that you havce thought yourself to be on the brink of insanity for some time now. This is far from insanity, though. It may appear crazy to some, but really, if you think about it, they are the crazy ones. Because who, given the chance, would not pursue every bit of truth they came across? Crazy people, that’s who. Truth is not always boring or depressing. Sometimes truth is seeing life in all it’s beauty and pain, in all it’s love, and all the ugly parts of the world, and realizing that in this big universe, your life means something. You mean something. And that, just that right there, is a pretty big deal in and of itself. But it is not just about meaning something. Are you going to really be a part of it or not? See, most, even if they have had a chance to see that type of reality, are far too timid to chase it. I was not. I went after it. And as much of an awful person that I think you are, some miserable, self righteous girl who has never had the slightest thought beyond herself, I think that you are one of the few who would go after it, too.”
“I actually have no idea how to respond to that. You are absolutely the most insulting person I have ever met.”
“And you are absolutely the most miserable person that I have ever met. What do you have to say to that?”
“Well, that is probably true. I am hungry. Have you got anything to eat?”
“Well, I don’t usually entertain, so you have a choice between peanut butter and… well, actually that is pretty much it. I am not certain I even have bread.”
“How do you live?”
“I have friends.”
“Okay. Fine. Just give me peanut butter and a spoon.”
“That is a little bit gross.”
“Do I look like I even care?”
“Good point,” he disappears for a few moments and reappears with a jar of peanut butter and a spoon, handing it to me, “enjoy.”
So it is in this way that I end up on a stranger’s sofa, eating peanut butter with a spoon and listening to fantastical stories about the universe for the next several hours. Most of these stories, I realize, I will not remember later.
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