Let Me Tell You a Story

Word Count 1212



    The power goes out in my apartment.  The power is always going out in the immediate vicinity of my apartment.  Seemingly, if anyone does anything, like belches or cuts the cheese too loudly in a five hundred yard radius of my little corner of the world, the power goes out.

    I am hungry, so I decide to go into town and get something to eat.  I never do that.  I think that it will be a treat.

    I go to the local diner.  It is nearly empty.  I ask if I can plug my cell phone in because it is almost dead.  The hostess says sure.  She points to another phone on the counter already plugged in and charging.  Someone else with no power is here too.  I ask if I can sit at the counter.  She says yes.

    The only one at the counter is a young waitress who sits opposite an equally baby-faced bartender.  I sit down a ways from them.  I look up.  Although the volume is off, the T.V. is on overhead.

    “You guys have Rocky on the T.V.,” I say happily.

    They look at me with confusion and I realize that not only were they not watching Rocky, but they have never seen it.  I feel as if I should pull them by the ears, plop them down where they can see it, turn up the volume, and tell them to pay attention because there will be a quiz on it when it’s done.  Instead I just mumble some unintelligible comments about what a great movie it is, as I look at the menu.

    I order.  I wait.  The waitress leaves, as does the bartender.  I am alone.  My food comes.  I begin to eat.  I do not feel like it is a treat.  I am sad.  I eat it mechanically.

    A guy wanders over from a table in dining area with a glass of wine.  He sits at the counter.  The bartender comes over and the guy asks for a rocks glass to replace his wine glass.  The bartender is confused as to where the guy came from.  The guy explains that he came from a table where he just ate, and then he goes into this long spiel about why he wants a rocks glass for his wine rather than a wine glass.  I don't like him already.  The bartender looks baffled.

    I'm not confused.  I know what is going on.  The guy is weird.  Plus, he’s half in the bag already too.  It’s as simple as that.

    The young bartender doesn’t seem to realize these things yet.  The man is short, but he is rather on the handsome side.  Handsomeness can throw people off.  People tend to give the handsome too much credit.

    I hear the guy say, “Let me tell you a story.”  I cringe - this speaks volumes to me.  The guy might as well have said, “I am lonely.  I don’t have any one to talk too.  Plus, I am a blowhard who tells pointless stories, and I am about to launch into one right now.”  Then I chastise myself.  Maybe it will be a good story.  I mean who am I to judge?  As of right now the only one telling a long, boring, self indulgent story is yours truly.

    Anyway, the guy launches into a long, boring, self indulgent story.  Something about him driving down the Taconic to see a friend and blah, blah, blah, blah.  It never ends.

    He looks over at me.  I refuse to make eye contact.  I want to interact with this guy like I want the proverbial hole-in-the-head.  He watches me eat.  The wheels in that neurotic head of his are turning.  I think, God what now?

    “Hey, you know what?  I didn’t get a pickle and coleslaw with my dinner,” he says to the bartender.

    I think to myself - are you fucking kidding me?

    I can’t hear what the bartender is saying in return.  But the guy keeps complaining – him I can hear plain as day.  He latches onto “Just take a dollar off of my bill."  He says this, and the bartender's reply, is again, inaudible to me.  This goes on back and forth each time the guy repeating his new slogan a little louder, “Just take a dollar off my bill.”

    Finally, the bartender disappears and I think he is going to get the manager, or fix the bill, or something.  He comes back and says something to guy.  I can’t hear him, but apparently the bartender is sticking to his guns.  He is not going to take a dollar off of his bill.  They go back and forth some more.

    Again I think – are you fucking kidding me?  If I was the bartender I would have taken the dollar off of his bill.  Not because he deserved it, but because I don’t care.  And if I couldn’t have done that, than I would add my own stinking dollar, out of my pocket, to make up the difference.  Or I would have gotten him that highly prized pickle and coveted coleslaw.  I mean who really cares?

    At this point I just want to get the hell out of there.  So I ask for my bill.  It is thirteen dollars and something cents.  I leave the whole twenty.

    I ask for my phone back from the hostess.  I have terrible timing, as the guy is getting his phone back too.  We leave together, and the whole time I can feel this palpable vibe radiating off of him.  The vibe is - if you acknowledge me in anyway, if you say hi or even look at me, you are immediately going to become my new buddy and I will regale you with countless stories starring me (the guy) right here in front of the diner.  My first story will be a blow-by-blow account of what just happened in the diner.

    However, I am resolute and I still refuse to make eye contact and I am silent, even as we walk into the dark parking lot to our cars.  And as much as I think he is an ass, I can’t help but think that we are also brothers – this weird, broken man and me.  We are the lonely, lost, bachelors of this world.  We only come out when something disturbs our isolated lives; like when we lose power, or when a Star Trek Convention comes to town - only then do we make our way into your world.  And then we don’t fit in.  And then we remember that’s why we don’t like it.  We are the Cicada Men.  We only come out once in great while, then we tend to come out in droves.  We are a nuisance at best and a pestilence at worst.

    I head home and pray that my power is on.  Please be on.  Please be on, I think as I approach my apartment.  As I pull into my driveway I see that my living room light is on.  Thank God.  It is lonely in my apartment, but I feel much more alone everywhere else.

    I turn on my computer.  I think about what I want to write.  I type a title.  The title is, “Let Me Tell You a Story.”