Cool
When I walked in, I could immediately tell they’d been talking about me. A couple of them sat watching the telly, and a few continued whispering while shooting glances at me. At least the music kept playing. The music did not pretend that it had not been playing before I came in.
I took a seat that had been left open for me and decided to play along. If they were not going to talk about the awkward situation I had put them in, I wasn’t either. I pretended to stare at the telly, though I could not figure out what was showing. Something about men in matching outfits running back and forth. I could feel each and every stare stabbing me repeatedly, and wanted to go around and punch each stare back into where it came from. But I had promised myself I would play it cool. Those are the promises I keep, so I sat there, cool like that.
She walked in and gave me the look reserved for strangers. The nerve! Her eyes tried very hard to tell me that she did not know who I was and couldn’t decide whether to head for the exit or not. She joined a whispering group and fueled the talk about me punctuated with silly laughs and giggles. Okay, I couldn’t hear them, but they kept looking up at me from time to time. I’m not crazy. I submit it for your judgment.
“What’ll you have?”
“Jack and coke.”
Everyone continued playing the self-assigned roles as I went through my drink. I pulled out a cool stick, lit it and took a puff. I’m cool like that. What happened to the whole idea of the human community and the rumors of man being a social animal? I saw no evidence of human connection in the pub, so I went outside to seek some form of contact.
I knew her car, and I knew how long she’d be inside talking to her friends. So I got my spray can and wrote a love letter on her windshield, her doors, her windows, the trunk, her hood, and then stuck a knife in her tires. It was all poetic. An eclectic collection of words that would bring a tear to her eye: an ‘F’ word, a couple of ‘C’ words, ‘whore,’ something about the ’suck’ verb.
Thoughts swirled in my head as I drove home. Maybe I should have asked her name. Maybe I should have told her mine. Maybe some of those words didn’t define her. Maybe I should have tried talking to her. Maybe I should not be having these thoughts. I’d had an amazing evening, because I’m cool like that.