The process of losing friends is a funny one. You usually never know why it happens until after the fact, and then it’s downright sad to think that you could ever have lost a friend because of something so silly.
It can be falling love with someone else. It can be getting a job far away. I can be a single comment taken the wrong way. It can be jealousy over a job. Over money. Over an accomplishment.
One thing that it always means is you just really weren’t friends to begin with.
A wrapper from an old Kit Kat bar sits on the table. Being a diabetic, he couldn’t remember the last time he ate one. But there was a wrapper, staring back at him. Almost mockingly.
His old lamp was full of beer caps. Years worth of collecting led to that lamp finally being full. Each cap different than the next. Yet it’s hard to enjoy it now. Simply because he can no longer drink beer. Hell, drink anything fun. It’s V8 juice and water and homemade smoothies from now until the day he joins Jack Lalane in the ground.
“I’ve got to get out of here,” he thought sitting in his cubicle.
He hadn’t really moved in the last three hours. And certainly hadn’t done any work. But this is what his boss wants. Sometimes he believes it’s actually punishment for some sin done to the Napoleonic bastard.
“If you can’t do anything to fix the problem, don’t complain about it,” a co-worker said softly to another, but with just enough bile in the inflection that the meaning was conveyed.
“It is what it is,” was the boss’ favorite saying. He never fixed any problem. He let them fester and fill with puss. He was miserable, and he wanted everyone else to be so too.
“Fuck it,” was another favorite.
Somehow, the publisher never saw this side of him. Or if he did, chose to ignore it because he did plow through a lot of work. Unbelievably, he never was called on his stealing of ideas or images or words from others, snide comments from me notwithstanding.
Karma’s a funny bitch. Sometimes she bites you quick and you move on, other times she just slowly jabs you with a knife, inching it further and further into your gut with a dirty blade. Oh how I wish she’d turn her attention elsewhere for a while. But, I guess one gets what one deserves. And now, this is what I deserve.
The fog settled in on the island. The warm February days were still not normal for her. The water was cold and the days when the temps dipped back to the 20s made damn sure she wouldn’t feel normal for a while.
Today? It’s supposed to be 70 degrees with severe thunderstorms.
“Maybe a tornado will come and fucking wipe that shithole off the face of the planet,” he thought casually about the place of employment. “Maybe a bit harsh,” he continued to think, “but dammit, it may be the only way to get out of there alive.”
“Have you ever fucked in a booth in a Denny’s?” she asked with all seriousness.
“Nah,” he said. “But I’d sure give it a go.”
“Awkward,” she said with a snort. “We’re in a Waffle House.”
“Who said I wanted to fuck you?” he said, trying to be funny but knowing before the words finished coming out of his mouth that he’d regret them.
“Oh really,” she snapped. “That hard on you had last night while we were watching “Full House” was because of the Olsen Twins then?”
Blood rushed to my face. I could feel it. I’d pretty much thought that my strategic placing of a pillow moments after the erection saved me this embarrassment. But alas, she was once again, smarter and quicker than me.
It’s why I dug her so.
“I’ve always been a Bob Saget kind of guy,” I replied.
“Weak,” she said. “If you’d said Joey Gladstone I would have blown you in the parking lot.”
“Kind of like knowing the name of the guy who played Matt Houston,” I replied.
“What? Lee Horsely? The poor man’s Tom Selleck?”
“Dammit.”
“You know you love it.”
“More than you know.” Once again, too much information coming from my mouth.
“I think I’ve got a pretty good read on you Mr. Jones. And you have no reason to be worried. I like you too.”
“You want to get out of this place?”
“No, not yet. I want my bacon.”
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