Long Icy Walks

Winter has arrived and more people than ever are slipping on the sidewalk and cracking their heads open. I am not one of them, yet.

Yesterday on my long icy walk home from the train station a funny thing happened. I met a new person who wants be my friend. I don’t want to be his friend though. Hopefully after reading this you will understand why.

Early on in my trek home, I passed a house with a man standing on the stoop with the door open. He had a strange voice, like the kind you expect to ask you for change with some sob story. He did ask me for help and with a sob story about how he has a heart condition and if I could help him while he goes inside and gets his other dog. He was worried he might pass out going up the stairs and no one was home.

Since the door was already open, the worst case scenario was that he murdered the family that lived there and was now stealing their dogs. This was unlikely and since I was not in too much of a rush to get home I offered to help him. Plus I have a soft spot for dogs and I pass his house every day and he might have murdered me if I didn’t offer help.

As he walked up the stairs to get his dog I saw her appear from the bottom part then run up the stairs. So basically he didn’t need my help at all and the story should have ended there. Unfortunately it didn’t.

He was rather chatty, and I learned quickly that in addition to his heart condition he had a girlfriend, was looking for another girlfriend and had it narrowed down to a bartender and hairdressers, took a $60,000 paycut for his new job, and will pop an ecstasy pill once a year. Already thinking he was a scumbag, I lost faith that we would ever be friends when he asked me what I do for fun. People still have fun? I thought we just exist then die.

The man came off to me as a bit of a troublemaker. He had a steady job and apparently lots of money so he’s not a complete waste of human life. I found out way too much about his ex-girlfriends in the 30 minutes we walked together and this instability made me feel really uncomfortable. Maybe the openness hurt too as I knew I could never live up to what these girls were giving him. By the fourth Portuguese restaurant we passed I decided I would avoid this man the next time our paths crossed.

Unfortunately he was walking in the same direction as I was and on my street so he would know where I lived. I was very careful to plan ahead and passed my apartment building then three blocks later told him I was going to stop at the store, which I had already planned to do. At this point he asked me to take down his number and said we should hangout sometime. If there’s one thing you should know about me it’s that if I want to spend time with you I will give you my number. For him, I just typed it in the notes section of my phone that I never look at.

The conundrum here is odd. I don’t really make friends, nor do I hangout with the ones I have very often. Years ago I would have been thrilled to make a friend who wants to hangout with me. He lived nearby too which would be perfect. Now though, I have more years of being a piece of shit to reveal to him. When you’re 20, you only have two decades worth of being a loser. At 27, I have almost 3.

Since he apparently is loaded with money and knows everyone in fucking town, I thought more about maybe actually giving him a call. I’m afraid of where this might lead though. What if he needs me to help him move shit? Not like the good kind of moving shit where I feed him oatmeal and it opens his bowels. I mean like picking up a couch.

I can’t see this friendship going anywhere. I can’t see myself being completely open and honest with him. I’d end up making up lies and stories just to seem more sane.

The only thing I have to do now is cross the street each day on my way home to avoid passing by. Thankfully he’s sick so I could always just pretend like we never met and freak him out to the point where he thinks his meds are having weird side effects. Yeah I think I’ll do that.