tsvetoslav shalev

I drew my first breath on yesterday’s date, some 34 years ago, at the general hospital of the city of Tutrakan, Bulgaria. Yes, the twilight of my youth is but a hazy memory of nothing and with no one in particular. There’s posh chocolate cake, a lovely birthday card, and a cup of lukewarm milky coffee waiting for me in the kitchen. As I sit here by myself, listening to the traffic outside, I think I could tell you with some degree of certainty about the past or the present, but my own future is no more clear to me than the contents of a lottery scratchcard – effort will invariably be exerted, but I suspect disappointing results await. After all, for the furiously hard of thinking, you can count me in that group, too. Life is a game of ‘She loves me, She loves me not’, but with onions. Each peel brings most of us closer to the crux of the matter, through rivers of tears and snot. Personally, I eat my onions raw, with a drizzle of organic apple cider vinegar and extra-virgin olive oil.

–

An old man, in a black raincoat, grey pants, and black shoes, with shoulders hunched, is walking down a busy street around 10 pm on a wet and miserable Monday evening. Only fast food joints are still open, with blue and yellow neon lights, their cold grills, and thin shwarma stands as the last source of questionable nourishment for alcoholics, riff-raff, and the working poor roaming the streets. The man is leaning to one side, his claw-like fingers clutching what appears to be the thick nylon handles of a faded shopping bag. The bag is half-full, judging by the swell of its bottom, but the contents are impossible to make out. A gust of wind picks up some of the paper that isn’t completely soaked through by the light, yet cold drizzle of rain. Clusters of homeless people, their temporary havens a mishmash of cardboard, old blankets, and sleeping bags, catch his attention for a brief moment, but then meld into a relief of different shades of black and brown, a scab on the city’s many seeping wounds, to be picked again in the morning when the cleaning crews start their routine collections.

“Hey, uncle,” the voice came from a matte-black VW Scirocco, tinted windows, the front one rolled down halfway. “These streets aren’t safe,” said with neither malice nor kindness. Waving his hand in a gesture suggesting appreciation for the information, the old man replied, “I will be alright, thank you. Home is not that far now,” a hint of a smile, his voice hoarse. He never looked at the person in the car but kept on walking past. The sound of the electric window closing up followed shortly, then the low-frequency rumble of what some refer to as music. K’s eyes followed the old man for a time, when a girl stormed through the front door of one of the cafes, with a bouquet of roses, and threw them, a display of anger, in a bin opposite the place. The old man stood there fragile, yet unmoving, a heated argument taking place mere steps away from him, between the girl and someone who was of import to her not long ago. “Yo, K, let’s go, man,” an impatient voice from the backseat rose above the loud music. K’s eyes, however, were still glued on the old man. For his part, he was now standing next to where the flowers lay, head bowed, looking at them, most likely completely oblivious to everything else around. “Yo, K,” the voice from the backseat rose again, even louder. K looked at his companion in the rearview mirror and said, “Relax.” When his gaze returned to the scene of the accident, the old man was nowhere to be seen, his bag leaning against the bin. Not hesitating even for a moment, K opened the door and stepped out of the car. “Yo?! What the fuck, man?” there was anger and confusion in his companion’s words, but K was already striding towards the couple, their fight reduced to a forced hug, the girl’s head turned to one side in defiance, while her boyfriend pleaded with her. “Did you see where the old man went?” but K’s question returned only confused looks. “What old guy?” asked the boyfriend, while his girlfriend managed to free herself from his grip and started walking towards a nearby bus stop. “Haven’t seen anyone, sorry,” continued the boyfriend, then left K standing there, while he followed after his ex, head slumped. K was dumbfounded, eyes frantically looking in every direction to try and catch a glimpse of the old man, but there was no trace of him. His companion whistled, a head popped through the rear door window, his face a grimace of confusion and exacerbation, but the urge to find out what had happened was far more compelling. He approached the shopping bag with an intention of taking it with him but nearly fell over when he tried to lift it. It was so heavy that he couldn’t move it with one hand from the spot it was left on. When he peeked inside, his eyes grew wide – shards of different shapes, thicknesses, sizes, and colours filled the empty space halfway. Glass. The bag contained tens of kilograms of stained glass. That old man was somehow able not only to lift it but also to carry it around with little effort. The flowers were gone, so the man must’ve left this junk and taken them instead. K ran down the street, ignoring the angry protestations of his companion, then turned left. There, he saw a small, poorly-lit park, with a long-unused fountain-come-monument, the letters engraved so worn out, they were almost illegible. The old man sat there by himself, eyes closed, flowers in his lap. Although the rain had stopped, the cold did not let up. “Hey uncle, you alright?” asked K, rubbing his hands together to stimulate blood flow. The man did not reply but continued to sit there, unmoving. “You left your stuff behind,” K continued. The old man turned his face towards him and replied, “Oh, it’s all here, don’t you worry,” the same hoarse voice from earlier. “You waiting on someone?” K continued, his efforts to stay warm coming with little result. “Yes, the end of the world,” the man said without a hint of humor. K chuckled, “You’re a funny man, uncle. Safe, aight,” and started walking back towards his car, sniveling.

Some weeks later, on a gorgeous cloudless day, K and his wife were passing by the little park, on their way to meet friends. When his eyes caught a glimpse of the fountain, he felt a strange and sickening sense of deja vu – there he was, the bronze statue of a man in his late 60s, sitting calmly, with a bouquet of flowers, once fresh, now withering in his lap.

…

That’s all I had to work with, all I could see, really. A bag of glass and flowers in a dumpster. Noir effect. The imagery borrows from my own nightly observations, as well as Neil Gaiman’s American Gods. While I haven’t read the book, the Amazon Prime show is not that bad at all. Do what’s right and follow the hollow. Until next time.