circles except the codes for the shared bits of data, that somewhere a pack of plotting terrorists is standing in their own little circle, bouncing on cold feet and ululating not about the great American devil but about Ahmed’s skank- ass trippy girlfriend and Mahmoud’s bus’ ride, and that’s when I picture
“Wait,” one of the felons interrupts my time-dilated self-pity; it’s tattoo-necked Jamie, the reliable one, quiet leader, and he leans in close: “Dude! Aren’t you…like.
And the thing is, bouncing on soaked socked feet outside this apartment building, blowing on cold hands that seem to belong to someone else, thinking of my sons at home in bed and the many ways I can still let them down, it’s true-
Yes! I am so! Starving!
But maybe we’re all starving
hungry for the warm lights
and tight aisles of nacho-corn-
sour-cream-onion-and-chive-
barbecue-goodness-and again
I drive my boys, Skeet and Jamie
– And I’m hypnotized by the set of cat-eyed taillights I’m ordered to follow as we arrive-because where else can you find the hungry, a community of the hungry-you tail the dude in the tricked-out Festiva-
…another 7/11. And here I am, just like my mother feared, stoned off my nut, unemployed, a week from losing my house and maybe my wife and kids, and I file in with my new friends, as per-(1) banger in sweats (2) dude in baggie jeans (3) kid in hoodie (4) another banger in sweats (and my slippers) and finally (5) middle-aged unemployed man in Chinos, pea coat, golf shirt and wet socks-
Straight to the freezer case and a siren of a meat-and-bean burrito which I tear into, unwrap and microwave- bouncing in squishy socks, watching that thing turn under the light like baby Jesus in an incubator-and that’s when Skeet freaks, he completely freaks! loses it! “Turn it off, man! That shit’s poison, man! They’re nukin’ us with that shit, turning us into radiated zombies!” Jamie trying to calm the poor kid through gritted teeth, “Chill, man,” but Skeet won’t chill, he just screams and points at the humming microwave oven as the clerk, this store’s Rahjiv yells: “Get that trippin’ guy outta here before I call the cops!” And everyone’s yell
ing, “Chill, man, chill!” and “What else he on?” and “He always be trippin, yo!” and “Don’t call the cops, dude’s on probation!”
And that’s when I remember:
“Skeet. Look at me. It’s not nuclear radiation. It’s just waves. Like sound waves,” my voice getting softer, slower: “Tiny…waves.” A deep breath. “Like good vibrations, right? That’s why they call them micro…waves. See?” And he’s still breathing heavily when I nod and the microwave beeps, and Skeet looks over, still panting. And it’s quiet in the store.
After a second, Skeet nods back. Smiles. It’s gonna be. Okay.
And I pat Skeet’s shoulder, grab my steaming burrito and get in line to pay-take my place with the starving and the sorry, the paranoid, yawning with fear, the hungry lonely lost children let down by their unemployed fathers, men zapped by history’s microwave, a generation of hapless, luckless, feckless fathers with no idea how to fix anything, no clue what to do except go home to face the incubated babies staring at their dry bowls of Crispix and confess-
Oh, I am such a shit father, shit husband, shit son, shit human being…and I’ve lost my shit job, am losing my shit house, am at the bottom of my shit-self when I glance over at the endless wet roll of the Slurpee machine and it’s instantly hypnotic-
Banana-blackraspberry-cherryCoke-pinacolada! So peaceful. Around and around it swirls and I could watch the wet blend of flavors forever-when Jamie sidles up and whispers, “I’m gonna mix ’em all, man,” like a soldier volunteering for a suicide mission.
“Go with God,” I whisper, and Jamie does, straight to a pinacolada icy blur, and then down the line, cherry Coke, black raspberry, and he smiles back, and I’m insanely proud as I step forward to pay for my burrito, eyes falling on the clerk’s wristwatch when…
for just a second…I can’t tell…if I’ve forgotten…what the numbers mean, or maybe…I’m just imagining…what it would be like…to forget what they mean…
I spend days staring at this guy’s watch before the second hand finally moves-and the position of the hands against the little numbers correlates to a memory of how this particular mechanism works (a memory from kindergarten: Miss Bean in go-go boots standing above me moving the hands of a sun-faced clock)-and I connect the relation of these symbols to a system of tracking the movement of the earth around the sun as across a forest of synapses there sparks a pattern of theoretical constructs (time, space, go-go boots) flaring into an evolutionary fire that represents a near miracle of abstract comprehension, an Einsteinian leap of cognition:
And in my mind, the Nissan Maxima of my responsibilities follows the Ford Festiva of my unraveling into
Hey!
But that shit’s like nine dollars a gallon.
Outside the store, Skeet and Jamie go off with the dude in the Festiva and I wave goodbye with my new white jug and I am in love with the predawn cool black, in love with my boys, in love with two percent.
The drive home is glorious-streetlight rollers like tide at dawn.
I blow laughter through my nose. Key in quietly. Like I’m sixteen again. My old senile father is asleep on the hide-a-bed in the living room, TV still on ESPN. This is what we were watching together when I left to get milk… almost four hours ago. Dad doesn’t stir. I try to take the remote control from him but he’s holding it against his cheek like a security blanket, so I turn off the set manually, old school. Every day now they show the top ten sports plays of the day-and I think: what if life was like this, and at bedtime we got to see our own daily highlights (No. 4: Skeet freaks over the microwave).
Lug my jug to the kitchen, milk in the door of the fridge-the food inside is also glorious: cheese stick, martini olives-