Apple in the Earth
Page 30
Chapter 9
The chime above the entrance to Syderski’s Gas and Go had not been jostled for hours. Peter was using his slow shift to check expiration dates in the coolers along the back wall. Opening one section after another, the cool air began to numb his nose and slow the circulation in his fingers where the slippage marks from a ballpoint pen grazed over his fingers earlier that day.
All through school, he was a ‘B’ average student. He played sports with friends but never excelled at them or tried out for the school’s teams. Looking at the dairy case, he was starting to realize he was always alone. Peter’s memories were being alone on the swing set, alone in front of the television, alone in a crowded room.
His first memory was during recess at daycare when he was watching a girl cry after falling off the slide and scraping both of her hands. He felt sorry for her, but he could not go over and help her. Peter did not even go to get one of the people who ran the daycare to help her. He just sat on a wooden border of the sandbox and watched her cry into her bloody hands.
He did not have anything better to do. He was not interested in many of the options of the playground, so he spent most of his time watching the other children. Peter just could not feel comfortable helping her. That event seemed to echo throughout his life. He would start to make friends, but whenever they started showing a lot of emotion or even started talking about the more intimate details of their lives, he could not stand to be around them.
There were a few reasons why he liked the job so much at Syderski’s. One of them was the long hours afforded him a healthy excuse not to develop any relationships with anyone. Another reason was it gave him the kind of interaction with other people he was most comfortable with. He thought it was serene to meet someone, make small talk, and never see them again. He was even comfortable seeing the same people buy their pack of smokes from him every day, or their scratch-off tickets.
“Good luck” he would say, but he would not be required to prove that he meant it.
But there was loneliness. Comfort is not the same as happiness. Other than working at the gas station, he did not feel of use to anyone. It was not that he showed any promise growing up, as he was so average, he just thought he would grow out of it. He thought he would grow out of the shyness or whatever it was that kept him from connecting with people. Peter did care about people. He cared about his mother, his friend in high school who hung himself when he was worried about everyone finding out what they did.
The chime over the door clanged as the door opened. Peter closed the door to the dairy case and walked behind the counter.
“The regular today sir,” he asked as he reached for two packs of Marlboros.
He worked a shift and a half that day, and drove his old white car back to his apartment complex. He could afford to drive a new car, but he did not want anyone to notice the car he drove. It was not so old that it made any obscene noises, and he could get away with driving it without notice in all the different classes of neighborhoods in the town.
His apartment complex had eight units and two stories. His was on the second level in the front. He chose this so because it was closest to the front door and he would have to navigate fewer awkward passing of neighbors.
He had a bag of food from Syderski’s that he started to put away in the cupboards and the fridge as soon as he was inside and set his keys down. He was allowed to keep anything that was past the ‘sell by’ date. The food did not go bad that quickly, and Peter was not picky, so he did.
The car, the small apartment, and the free food combined with entertainment provided by television made his existence extremely cheap. Peter had saved up nearly thirty-thousand dollars. He was not saving it up for anything important or anything at all. He just did not spend much money on himself, and did not have anyone else around to spend money on. He had not spent a Christmas or birthday with anyone in his family for years, and his boss did not expect anything from him. Nobody mattered. Not even his slow breathing in a silent room mattered.
He sat down on his couch and started drinking a bottle of expired root-beer, and eating an egg-salad sandwich. The television brought scenes of romance on one channel into Peter’s world. When he changed the channel an infomercial stung at his senses, then the news.
Peter tuned in on the international news. While he masticated an egg-salad sandwich, he was told about carnival in Bolivia. Nobody could walk outside for three days without the threat of water balloons and friendship. Maybe I could go there, he thought. He imagined getting a small apartment there like the one he had, and working a job or two. Everything could be the same, but when carnival came around he would be forced to talk to his neighbors who threw water balloons at him. Being forced to interact with people would be the trick. He could learn the language.
Soon, his sandwich was gone and the news faded into a sitcom. Bolivia was as far away and dusty as any imaginable future, but dimmer light than what he was already doing. Peter was already so tired from work that he took off his shoes, stretched down on the couch, and fell asleep.