A Meta-Story

It will be winter soon, that will be an easier time for me. I won't have to struggle against happiness, consigned instead, to the drizzled-upon contentment of the season, which is the lot of those who live in the pacific northwest.

Life is, what you make it. Or, some such bullshit. I wonder what would happen if I ever managed to give myself over to some particular philosophy- fully embraced some stereotype. Geek or Goth or Emo or Hipster; then I might, at least, be able to tell you who I am.

As it stands, it's late summer; which isn't a metaphor, of any sort. Nah, I'm 26, it's maybe late spring/early summer. I'm too old, regardless, to be so wracked by indecision. Hell, I don't even know where this story is going, if anywhere.

I'm in a restaurant.

There's a cute girl, at the next table. She keeps making eye-contact, the darting sort, like maybe she's coy, but interested, or something. But, she had a ring on the wrong finger, it looked like it was probably costume jewelry, but there it was.

I could be a brilliant anti-hero, bitter and jaded. That would make for a good story. But not some misanthrope. I'd need some motivation and some compelling twist. I could be gay, or black, or atheist, maybe Muslim. All of the above? Hell yeah!- if I were a Black-Lesbian-Muslim-Agnostic trying to reconcile all that shit, that would be the most compelling mind-fuck of a story ever. Or I could just be a 30-something virgin or whore, that would tweak your sensibilities too.

All of that conflicts with how I began my story, with a cogitation intended to lead to a challenge of masculine stoicism.

Besides, I'm him and the rest would be him, even those of them which you think may be you, are in reality him. Sure, they may have your eyes or he may have borrowed some of your mannerisms, just superficial similarities, to mask some aspect of him. He could be a her, but it's the author regardless and in this case, it is him.

So, here I am, a self aware, do-nothing, slacker of a character, analyzing my roll in this story, which isn't a story at all. This is pointless self-indulgence, I suspect. A self-portrait.

The girl left. I followed, readying a cigarette, so it looked as if I were heading out just to smoke. She stopped at the counter to pay, I continued on to the outside.

Moments later, she emerged and I said “Hey,” then inhaled from the cigarette. We chatted a couple moments, she took off the ring surreptitiously, which I'd not have noticed, if I'd not been intensely aware of that jewelry.

Eventually she said, “Well, I've got to go. Maybe next time, you won't be so shy.” And it seemed to me, the right response would have been to kiss her, but I didn't. There was a pregnant pause, before she hugged me. During the embrace, I was hyper-aware of the warmth of her breasts pressed firmly against mine, I think it was deliberate on her part.

She pulled back, smiled, then frowned, before she turned and bounded into the night.

Anyway, the Star of David was chained around her neck, so she's probably Jewish. And the verb-tense is all wrong.