Waiting
Steven Meyer
December 2005
December 2005
In the line of a local video store, a young couple stood a few feet apart from each other. To a normal observer, there would seem to be nothing odd about this. But to the couple, that small amount of space represented an even larger gap in their relationship. At the very start, things were good. They were almost normal. Nobody really thought they would make a good couple, but somehow they persevered. The first few months of their relationship were a torrid affair of laughter and lovemaking.
After a while, though, their relationship began to sour. His self-confidence problems and her fear of failure mixed into some potent brew of doubt and anger. Every time she looked at him, all she could think about was how much happier she had been alone. Every time he looked at her, all he could think about was the first time they met.
They met at a party, like a lot of couples do.
What made it unusual was the fact that heavy drinking was involved. To anybody who has ever gone to college or lived in Wisconsin, this would seem perfectly normal. But the way it happened was anything but...
The man was the record time-holder for keg stands and he was going for an even bigger record. He was thirty-seven seconds into the keg stand when the girl walked into the kitchen where two friends were holding him upside down while drank copious amounts of semi-warm beer. She watched the boy with a wondrous eye, thinking how immature guys her age really were. He caught her glance, and by doing so, lost his concentration. The lukewarm beer flowing through the nozzle suddenly filled his throat as he lost his rhythmic breathing and drinking pattern. His face exploded in a foamy mixture of beer and saliva, causing the two guys holding his legs to suddenly jerk away in disgust. When they dropped him, his head slammed against the keg, knocking him unconscious.
Finally he came to, and she was standing above him with a worried expression on her face. He just smiled at her and said the first thing that came to his mind.
"Ow. You ruined my record."
Now they were standing in line, trying to ignore all of the hurt and agony they were putting themselves through. He felt like he could never really be himself around her. She felt that he was himself around her way too often. In fact, his off-the-wall sense of humor and behavior had always made her feel... normal. When she was single, she was the wacky friend; the one who was slightly odd, but in a good way. Now that they were together, she had lost that title to a man who once stood up in the middle of a crowded bar and serenaded her with a striptease to the theme song from "Shaft."
They moved forward in line, the man humming the tune of a They Might Be Giants song under his breath. The woman recognized the part of the song immediately.
No one in the world ever gets what they want and that is beautiful
Everybody dies frustrated and sad and that is beautiful
She always thought God had a good sense of humor, and even stronger sense of irony. As soon as these words popped into her head, a fifteen year old boy who had just received his learner’s permit drove his fathers van through the front of the store. The van smashed through the windows that usually separated the outside world from the inside, spraying glass onto everyone around them. The van careened into the store, screaming people trying to get out of its way. The girl turned and dove behind a candy display just in time to see the van fly by her. When she looked back, her boyfriend was nowhere to be seen.
After checking herself for any injuries (Just a bruise or two and some little scratches), she climbed out from underneath the pile of candy bars that had managed to shield her. She stepped over some of the wreckage, which included people, mangled and bleeding, crying out for help. She could feel them trying to grab at her as she walked by them, knowing how desperate they were for her help. She just had to see him before she could deal with anybody else.
She found him pinned between the front of the van and the Drama section. It seemed fitting in retrospect.
She knelt down next to her boyfriend and tried to take his hand. In it was the video they were going to rent. It was some stupid comedy with the guy from "That 70’s Show" that some friend had said was funny. Her boyfriend hated the actor, but trusted their friend enough that he would end up renting it anyway. She let out a small cry when she finally looked at his face. It wasn’t that it was disfigured or gory or anything. Instead, despite of a few scratches and some blood that was pooling in the groove of his right eye socket, he looked perfectly fine. He was alert and alive. When he saw her, he smiled a little. The first thing that struck her was how her stupid boyfriend couldn’t even die normally. The second thing that struck her was how horrible that last statement sounded.
His breathing was shallow, as if one of his lungs had been punctured. She didn't know about medicine, but she had watched enough ER to know that shallow breathing wasn't a good sign. When he talked, it came up sounding very watery, like his lungs were filling with fluid. She couldn't help but shake the feeling that she shouldn't have watched the show. Ignorance is bliss, and she felt she would be much better off not knowing exactly what was wrong. She didn't want to know he was dying.
"It kind of sucks when you think about it," he said quietly. She nodded, a tear streaming down the side of her face.
"You were really looking forward to seeing that movie," she replied. He smiled at her, knowing that he would’ve said the exact same thing if their positions had been switched.
She called the proper people that one should call in these sorts of situations. She tended to the people who required the most immediate care and couldn’t provide it for themselves. The people who were lucky enough to be nowhere near the front of the store helped her. By the time they were finishing up, the first ambulance showed up outside. The fifteen year old driver was sitting on the curb, crying his eyes out. He doesn't know that, even though he caused this horrible accident, nobody will hate him for it. He's young, he didn't know any better. He should take that and run with it as long as he has the opportunity.
Knowing there was nothing more she could do, the girl walked back to her boyfriend. He was still awake and tried his best to smile when she showed up again. They talked a little bit about the first time they met, and joked about how he was such a magnet for drama and injury.
He did end up dying, there’s no doubt about that. A human body can only take so much strain before it just gives in, and having a van hit you and drag you a dozen or so feet can cause a hell of a lot of strain.
After that, the girl was never the same. She didn’t become dark or drawn into herself. In fact, she became even more of an extrovert. She was once again the wacky friend, the funny one. She wasn’t normal or anything, but who wants to be normal anyway?
Two months after the accident, she had realized what her boyfriend had done. He hadn’t replaced her by being the crazy guy he was. The reason she felt so normal was that she was normal, with the tendency to go wild from time to time. All he had done was shown her how to be the crazy friend, and how to do it right.
Now, whenever people ask her how she got so funny, all she says is that a her boyfriend was the victim of a fatal hit and run accident in the middle of a video store. This would always be met with shocked expressions and stares, but she'd just smile back at them. It may have been horrible to them, but to her... It was the greatest gift her boyfriend had ever given to her. And that is beautiful.
Steve Meyer is a native of the Midwest, which explains why he is such an angry young individual who likes to beat old women and small woodland creatures (Sometimes he beats old women with small woodland creatures). He is now currently residing in Los Angeles. He is also currently writing this bio, and referring to himself in the third person. Because that makes him happy.