TELL ME A STORY
There is beauty in falling and grounding both palms to the floor to lift yourself up. At least, that’s what I’m thinking when I hear a sudden erratic noise from a man sitting two benches away from me at the park. He is greeting a clan of uniformed women, and they greet him back.
I think, Are they greeting him out of pity? But he seems gratified.
I am fasting this morning, hoping God will turn the course of my life around. I want to be somebody, but instead, I am part of the unemployment statistic.
I blog about people and their dreams while I figure out my life, and today, I am here at the park for an interview with Jessica, a New York artist. Noon strikes, marking the end of my fast, and I chew down a few biscotti, the best meal I can find from the nearest coffee shop.
“Hey,” someone says, and I am startled to find another man sitting on the bench next to me with only an armrest separating us. He is wearing a yellow t-shirt tucked into gray khaki pants, and both of his hands are resting on his knees while he stares at me and waits for me to acknowledge him.
Someone told me God answers prayers with signs. So, I stay alert and look for them.
I remove one of my earplugs and mechanically check my phone, debating if I should flee or stay. But something glues me to my seat, and eventually I mouth a nervous “hey.”
“I just need a friend to talk to,” he says. “Do you understand that?”
“Yes. As humans, we need to communicate with one another. It is crucial to our existence,” I tell him. His words bring about a flashback to my time in college when I struggled to make friends. I too once needed a friend to talk to, I think. I still do.
“That’s more of an answer than I was expecting,” he mumbles as he turns his head away from me.
I stare at him and his uneasy movements as he searches for what to say next. Is he my sign from God?
“Tell me a story,” he says.
I think of telling him that finally I understand how people become bitter with age. Instead, I clench my phone and backpack and survey my surroundings.
“I scare you?” he asks. I let out a soft, nervous laugh. No, I say.
He doesn’t believe me. He stares at me. Eventually, he swings his head from left to right to examine the park.
“Tell me a story,” he repeats.
“I don’t know what story to tell you. What exactly do you want to know?”
“I don’t know,” he shrugs. “Tell me a story.”
I let out another nervous laugh. If I tell him my story, will it help? I’m in pain, I want to tell him. It’s the kind of pain that numbs your nerves so you don’t feel anything anymore. I want a future. Is that too much to ask?
I want to ask him all the questions I’ve been tearing apart. How does God choose who gets to be happy and who doesn’t? When do you stop begging? How do you revive dying dreams?
He looks closely at me before turning his gaze away and then right back at me.
“Did I scare you?” he asks.
“No, you didn’t,” I insist.
He smells like alcohol. I watch him as he brainstorms his next comment.
“You’re a mystery,” he says. “Everything about you is beautiful.”
Then he starts to pinpoint parts of my body: my eyes, my nose, my lips, and my belly fat. He pauses on the last part as if he is expecting a reaction.
“You want me to tell you a story about my belly fat?” I ask. He shakes his head no.
He puzzles me. I analyze him: his gray hair, his big brown eyes, his hardy hands, his word choice, and the way he pronounces the word “to” (like “thoo”).
“Are you a writer?” I ask him.
“I would love to be.” He goes on: “You are magnificent.”
“You have beautiful hair,” I reply. He scoffs, hisses, and goes back to his routine of turning his head left and right. It’s good that his hair is long. It adds volume to his delicate, unshaven face.
The man is not shabby. His fingernails are well-trimmed, and there are no black stripes of dirt underneath them. He’s relatively polished. And a truth that was looming since I found him sitting next to me sets in: he’s lonely.
I believe in destiny, and despite feeling like I’m on a ride down a cliff, I still want to think that nothing is accidental, including him. I am desperate first and foremost, but in the dark vault I’m in, I want a beam of light, a sign from God.
I look at my phone and zip my backpack. Then I turn my body fully towards him.
He starts again with his litany of questions and remarks.
“What do you think I am?” he finally asks.
“I think you’re a tourist,” I point to his black messenger bag. He glances at it and shakes his head in protest before looking back at me.
“Scared?” he asks again when I check my phone.
“No, I have a meeting with someone in a few. I’m waiting for her to call me.”
“The woman’s heart is a mystery,” he says and stresses on the importance of women and their intelligence. “I would love to have a woman’s heart.
“As a woman, you must focus on your mind,” he adds, tapping his temple with his index finger. “Don’t let men use your body.”
I ask him where he is from, but he carefully dismisses the question.
“Tell me a story.”
“Why don’t you tell me a story?” I riposte. He reaches into his bag, takes out a flat glass bottle containing a clear substance, and sips it. He puts it back in his bag.
“I can’t tell you a story,” he says. “You’re a stranger.” I laugh.
I envision him to be a mathematician or astronaut, a man of great virtues. I try to think of the people in his life and imagine them worried about his health. I think of what he might have done before coming to the park. Maybe he doesn’t live too far. Maybe the park, with its joggers, beggars, families, and performers with buckets of dollar bills, helps him cope with his loneliness. Maybe he usually sits by himself, but today he gathered enough strength to talk to someone.
“What is your name?” he asks. I give him my middle name and ask him for his. He seems hesitant at first, afraid to leave traces, but eventually he gives me a name.
He asks me again for a story, but I remind him that he didn’t tell me his.
“I didn’t?” he asks.
“No, you didn’t.”
He thinks of it for a second, brushes his short beard.
“I didn’t shave this morning,” he says. After a few seconds, he asks again for the story.
“Yes, but you didn’t tell me your story.”
We go back and forth for about thirty seconds. He takes a deep breath eventually and gives in.
“When I was a kid, I wanted a raft,” he begins, taking short, sharp breaks between each thought. “I asked my dad for a raft. But he didn’t give me the raft.”
As soon as he finishes this sentence, I receive a text from Jessica. I try to ignore it, hoping to have time to hear the whole story. I am sitting at the edge of my seat at this point, clenching my knees.
He doesn’t look at me when he tells the story. He makes soft gestures and keeps his eyes straight ahead. I don’t think he’s looking at anything. I think his eyes are looking at internal images, searching for bits in his memory or helping him craft his imagination.
“My uncle, he was a great guy,” he goes on. Pause. “He said to me: ‘I’ll give you a raft.’”
My hands are now gripping the edge of the bench. I want to tell him to hurry. Finally, I look back at my phone to read the text: Jessica is waiting for me on the east side of the park.
I’ll try to find you, I text. I take a deep breath and gather my stuff to leave.
“I have to go,” I interrupt.
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do,” I almost swear, showing him my phone so he can see the text. He barely glances at it.
“You can’t go,” he says.
“I have to.”
“You can’t just disappear from my life.”
“Isn’t this the way of life? You meet someone one day, only to never meet again.”
I leave him sitting on the bench. Who is he, I wonder. Was he the solution to my problems? The answer to my questions? The bearer of my comfort? If I stayed a little longer, would he have mended me somehow? Would I have mended him? I feel guilty as I walk away.
As soon as I see Jessica, I lead us to where I sat with the strange man. We chat about the city, our dreams, and the forthcoming bad weather. I hope to see him still there so I can give him a proper farewell. I want to show him his plea for connection hasn’t left me unmoved, the way I wished others had shown me. But he’s moved on, and I see his silhouette in the distance, fading away.
