The Altoids

The Altoids were addicting. They offered a sense of rebellion during the montonous workday I had found myself in. Being an intern wasn't particularly difficult, but it wasn't particularly interesting either. Stealing Altoids, hand sanitizer, and gum, among other things, from the desks of poorly-paid staffers, on the other hand, just made life a tad more flavorful. I would have a field day during the staff meetings when all the staffers pretended to be important by locking themselves in a single conference room to discuss next to nothing, besides what "lucky" high school the Senator would be visiting next. To me, along with rest of the subtly dissident interns, the looting of cookies and other snacks seemed far more important than whatever proceedings were going on behind those doors.

"Just summarize some editorials," said Judie, the self-appointed mother hen of the office. She may as well have told me make like Sisyphus; summarizing editorials was the equivalent of never-ending busy work. No matter what anyone said, that stack of editorials was only going to grow. Moreover, there was no way in hell that one man (that man supposedly being the Senator) was going to read a years worth of summaries from several different news sources. Let alone in one car ride. It wasn't happening. I'm not one to argue, so I typed along on the terribly slow "Intern Computer", hoping God would strike down someone or something, just so I would have something else to entertain me.

           

Then, suddenly, it was as if the glow around her seemed to bounce off my cheap Dell keyboard and hit me square in the face. Her mesmerizing, soft brown hair shimmered as the final rays of the setting sun hit it through the cheap blinds. Her eyes seemed so happy with everything they set their gaze upon. And that radiant and carefree, yet playful smile. Wow, it all blew me away. Just overwhelmed me completely. It took me by surprise. She took me by surprise. 

I had yet to meet a happy soul in this decaying office that I called my home during the week. Having a girlfriend who essentially found me to be annoying, for a lack of a better word, I was unaccustomed to someone who just looked so nice and radiant. Meanness, once again for a lack of a better term, and constant bickering was what I was used to. I had no clue who she was or why she was where she was. But, sitting on that dilapidated excuse for a 'rolly chair' in front of that godforsaken computer, I could say that God had indeed struck someone down, and it was me.

           

Judie had the job of picking my jaw up from the floor when she waddled into the room and surveyed her domain from atop cheap reading glasses she most probably purchased from a convenience store. Destroying the now beautiful and joyful ambience of the room, Judie pulled the girl to the side as she was elegantly making copies of what seemed to be call sheets at the decrepit, belligerently human-hating Xerox machine. 

           

As you do, I tried to eavesdrop from over the behemoth that was my monitor. All I could make out of their conversation, over the din of my sputtering machine and the blood-thirsty roars of the Xerox machine, was that the seventy year old, chain-smoking receptionist was scolding the only ray of sunshine that had walked down my street in a long time. Watching that smile erased and hearing the tidbits that I could pick up, put a hole in my heart.

            

I'm not sure why it effected me so much, but I just looked away. From the few scraps of the conversation I picked up, I gathered that apparently she wasn't dressed up to Judie's standards. Honestly, none of the staffers were that nattily dressed. Judie wore some hippie llama-wool poncho that reeked of smoke. I assume she bought it in the 70s. Yet, for some reason, the lowly intern was supposed to look professional. Wouldn't that make the rest of the actual staffers look worse in comparison? Whatever, I didn't think too much about it. After all, I basically got dressed in my car while driving to the office. Donning western business attire while driving with your knees most definitely meant that I wasn't the most put together individual in the office.

Anyways, regardless of Judie's loathsome presence, that intern's smile was burned into my brain, like a tattoo of the sun. And, to be fair, I should show Judie some appreciation. Had it not been for her wheezy berating, I wouldn't know the girl's name. 

Maria.

I found out that she only worked part time. So, I only saw her on Tuesdays and Thursdays. 

Now, I don't want to lie to sound sappy and romantic and say I endured the torturous week just to see her innocent and refreshing face twice a week. I had a girlfriend, one that I was no longer in love with, but a girlfriend nonetheless. Therefore, thinking about other girls, especially ones that I had only caught a fleeting glimpse of, was just not in the equation. 

           

However, there was the first time she spoke to me that still stays fresh in my mind. I was carefully avoiding her, pretending to do something of importance, as I usually did. She walked up to me and, like the inexplicably shy kid I was, I pretended not to notice. She then proceeded to tap my shoulder, and I turned. I constantly tried avoiding her gaze because I knew her goddess-like visage would lay me down.

           

She butchered my name when she tapped me to get my attention, but that was expected.

           

"Jenny wants to take a picture of every intern and put it up on the wall so the staffers can recognize us," she told me laughing. The sound of her laugh alone was enough to put a stupid smile on my face. 

           

"Oh. Okay. Sounds good," was all I could muster.

           

"Yeah, she wants a picture of you next." 

           

"Oh alright," I replied. I really was some ladies man, eh?

           

She went on to tell me to go outside where Jenny, another staffer who had rather disastrous mood swings, was waiting for me. I was hardly paying attention, concentrating all my effort on keeping a straight face and acting as normal as possible in the face of such a beautiful person, inside and out. I was an awkward kid. We'll leave it at that.

           

As soon as I walked by her, I dropped the facade, and the huge, stupid smile spread across my face as I readied myself for my photo. 

           

However, seeing my face up on the wall the next day, I could say that that smile made for a good picture. The only other picture I could remember was hers. It seemed to embody exactly what I thought her to be. Her pose, her hair, her smile; it all just fit. She was at that point the happiest person I had ever encountered. She almost seemed too good to be true.

     ~ ~ ~ ~

Early winter was treacherous. Lyla, the girl who couldn't find happiness in anything, had once again slipped into her shell. I was in for a rough time. Her emotional absence and the pesky cold of the New Jersey winter was enough to send anyone to a shrink. Yet, by this time I had found solace in the office that smelled like smoke and old folk. While I was there, I was away from it all; I wasn't able to make personal calls (had no service anyways), or use the internet for personal reasons. I was completely engrossed in a world of frustrated, depressed, and at times irate constituents looking for quick-fix ways to expedite immigration procedures and processes that were meant to be slower than molasses.  

           

I concentrated on the work I was given, and every once in a while I would talk to my passionate ex-army, Brother of Islam supervisor, Grant, who could rattle on for hours about anything and everything. Whether it was contrasting the socio-economic conditions of India to China and America, or certain episodes of the 'Da Ali G Show', the guy had something to say about it. He was peculiarly talkative, and good at it; a real charmer when he wanted to be. And, he had an uncanny, but quite fitting, resemblance to Malcolm X. With this broad knowledge, and passionate oratory skills, he could be persuasive as hell. The office had uniquely atypical personas, but my Malcom X -esque immigration supervisor was the saving grace.

           

His advice was distinct and unusual, especially when I started running into roadblocks in my relationship with Lyla. He could tell something was wrong; I wasn't my usual self. So Grant called me over.

           

"Just get with her sister." That was his advice.

           

"She doesn't have a sister, just two brothers" I said back trying to smile.

           

"What about a best friend or cousin?"

           

"All way outta my league," I said smiling this time thinking of Sophie and Melanie, Lyla's dangerously beautiful friends, "and plus they are absolutely crazy."

           

"Well whatever. I was mostly kidding. I always say that kinda stuff when my friends come to me with relationship problems. Just makes them feel better."

           

"Thanks G," I laughed a little. He had told me that all his friends called him G. I took this as a sign that one, we were friends, and two, he preferred that I called him G. I want to clear this up because I don't want anyone thinking I was calling my boss a gangster. 

           

"But seriously, you should have come up to me before man," he told me.

"I know, but I just didn't know what to say. I don't really want to think about it."

            

Then he said somethings that I have held on to even now, after all these years.

           

"No dude, don't say that. These are feelings you will never experience again. You have to face them head on my man," he spoke to me like we were good friends that were the same age, when in reality he was my boss and quite a bit older than me. "She's probably your first love; the pain and sadness you feel now, you will never feel anything like it ever again. You need to be here now," he told me, along with numerous other words of wisdom that I honestly cannot remember now.

           

But at the end of his half-hour long sermon all I could say was, "Be Here Now. That's an Oasis song."

           

He wasn't impressed with my knowledge of 90's Brit-rock. But. Be. Here. Now. It stuck.

Judie broke up the little pow-wow so I would get back to work. Work was basically recording the results of the most obscure elections in our state's districts. I was jotting down the winners for positions I had never heard of. Finding the results for these elections was like finding the one silver needle among a pile of rusty ones. So many different sources gave so many different results. It would have been easier just asking the five people who voted in these elections who they had voted for, and tally up the results.

           

"Just help Maria. She has already started."

           

"Oh. Alright," I said thinking of how badly I would mess up essentially my first interaction with her.

           

Sitting down at that table for giants, I was messed up on so many different levels. I really didn't feel like talking, but I knew I had to. I was nervous, but on the surface I must have looked fine because for some odd reason I am good at hiding things, whether it be emotions or my grades. So we just talked, and it was fine. Moving past the awkward bullshit that arises whenever I initially start talking to people, I tried to open up as quick as usual. I told her about Lyla and how I loved her, which by that point was only half true, even though everything was quickly going south. Maria felt bad for me. As her pity showered down for me, I felt weak. 

           

We finished whatever we could and then went back to our respective supervisors. I spilled my life all over that oversized table, and she listened. I felt emasculated. Yet, she listened and cared. A person of the opposite gender listening to me was, again, not something I was used to. As I talked, her eyes emitted a sense of tender affection. With her there, I felt I should just tell her everything. But editorials had to be summarized so I went back to my Altoids. 

Walking back to my car in the semi-hazardous parking lot grew more arduous as the sun set earlier and earlier. The pitch black night seemed to set in as soon as I stepped foot outside the sad, little one story office building. The machinery and random chunks of wood lying in the back of the neighboring lumber yard set up quite the obstacle course. The only light to guide me were the blinding headlights of a staffer's immense white Ford pickup truck that barreled down the narrow parking lot road. It lit the path, but in the meantime scared the crap out of me. The ogre of a vehicle looked like it guzzled oil faster than James Franco chugged water at the end of 127 Hours. Could Mike, the staffer, an employer of a democratic Senator, really own such a car? How did they hire him? After all, he looked like he hunted endangered animals for a living. 

           

As the days got shorter and the nights snuck upon me quicker, the days of my internship dwindled. During one of the last staff meetings, we interns decided this would not be the end. A sort of breakfast reunion was planned, where we would all meet up and discuss our lives over pancakes. It would essentially end up with me sharing embarrassing stories in front of everyone. Many of my encounters with people ended up like that for quite a while. 

The breakfasts were good, but deep inside I kind of just wanted it to be Maria and myself because she was really the only person I ever really wanted to stay in touch with. The bullshit piled up, but Maria managed to make me laugh.

           

We got closer.

           

It was then that she started opening up to me. I think a part of me wishes she never did. Because that's when I learned about Brian. I knew I had a girlfriend, who I loved on most days, but it still hurt when I learned Maria was in love with someone else. It was this someone who was the cause for all her happiness, her infectious joy. Yet, regardless of this blow, we continued to talk every once in a while. 

           

I even told my closest friends about this divinity I had found, especially towards the end of my crumbling relationship.

           

"Just be careful. You still have a girlfriend, and she still has a boyfriend. You guys shouldn't be talking this much; its not normal," was the wisdom bestowed on me. It was exactly correct, but that didn't mean I listened. 

           

"I know. I know. We are just friends, but this girl is ridiculously amazing," I would say, "We just talk a lot."

           

I decided to go with the flow. She was a friend to talk to, and I could count on her.

Like all good things, it all came to an end. The internship was over. There were the occasional reunion meals, but people started dropping off like flies. These meals, which at this point had been strictly prohibited to breakfasts, slowly morphed into meet ups between just Maria and myself. Could I ask for anything more?  

By November, I found myself in a familiar location, Michael's Family Diner. Sitting for breakfast, still shaken up from The Breakup. I won't bore you and bother me with the details. It was messy, and we can leave it at that. 

But, now, across what looked like a dark, faux-mahogany table was a different yet familiar smile. And I can't forget to mention those caring eyes. It was in those eyes looking at me from across the cheap diner table, which I'm sure had to be replaced frequently due to the accumulation of odd phrases scrawled out by patrons over the years, that I truly found some peace and happiness. I spoke. She listened. Yeah, for once the guy didn't have to do all the listening. It was glorious. 

After finishing our short stack of deliciously-unhealthy chocolate chip pancakes, she reached into her purse. She pulled out something I hadn't seen in so long. She offered me an Altoid, smiling.

"Remember these?" they were the exact same flavor as the one's from the office. How did she even know about days of larceny? Was she watching the whole time?

"How do you know about that?" I asked, awestricken. I took an Altoid, looking forward to something minty fresh from the past.   

           

A Trigger Left Unpulled

Stars are something, aren't they? I promise you this isn't one of those NOVA specials. Some of you may stop reading here. 


I  probably have no idea what I'm talking about, but stars can really change the entire mood of a place. I remember the way they made that vast, sandy terrain I once found my feet sifting through so inspiring. I recalled that the inspiration hit me just a couple hours after my feet left the hot sand, whilst on a cross-country coach bus in South America, as I witnessed the sun setting behind the dunes streaked with fresh, criss-crossing sand-boarding routes. The routes were like little channels that would disappear with the wind and then reappear somewhere entirely different, as if they were secret enchanted passages to an ancient treasure. This memory really made the romantic element of the "starry"sky over New Jersey's suburbia, which I now found myself under, seem rather pathetic.


Nevertheless, I stood there. The world darkened around us. Or, at least as dark as it can possibly get in this place. The lights up above started popping and twinkling just as they had in my memories. They glimmered back at me, the stars, almost as if they were winking at me saying, "We got your back tiger. She's all yours."


"Damn, thats a lot of stars," I said, far more crudely than I had intended, knowing full well that there weren't that many stars out all.


Ana looked up, "Yeah, you're right. Some night."


I guess we were still arm in arm. I hadn't noticed till just then. We just stood there, in the empty parking spot next to her car. If it weren't for the fact that both our heads were tilted up towards the unimpressive New Jersey night sky, you could say I was stalling. Some would argue that I was stalling regardless of the angles of our heads.


You would think that the moment had passed. What, with the awkwardness and all. But the silence was pretty loud in itself. Silence is a pretty relative word. We were, after all, in the parking lot of a New Jersey mall. The state's pride and joy. The malls, not the parking lots, that is. Cars were driving in and out. Restaurants were still pretty busy, and the commercial hunger of suburban families had yet to be satisfied. Compared to that desert and its starry friends, this place was in a state of pandemonium. Yet, despite all the clamor, our body movements, which had replaced words, were still so very audible.


I can't remember who moved, or rather shuffled, first, but my arm found its way around her waist. It's difficult to determine when the mind stops working, and instincts and feelings take over. I pulled her in close to me. One doesn't really think in these situations. It's nearly a state of black out. If you're conscious of what you're doing in these situations, you could argue that you're doing it wrong. "It" referring to something I can't really articulate, but you get the idea.


I retract the earlier statement where I claimed that I was pulling her in, close to me. Strike it from the record please. Pulling isn't the right word; it implies that some force was applied. In this case, you could almost say that it was her body that was guiding my arm. At least that's what I would like to believe. Or, maybe both bodies were guiding each other. Anyways, whatever.


As this interplay between bodies was going on, the bustle from the dinner parties at the nearby Chinese, or rather Chinese-American, restaurant had died down. The restaurant, whose name evades me now, started cleanup procedure. 


Her adorable, perfectly up-turned nose nuzzled up under my neck.


"Uh, oh,"I thought, "there's my cue to become less of a man". I let out an obviously restrained giggle under my breath. My neck was super sensitive. At any given moment, if it was touched, or caressed in this case, in a certain fashion I would be transformed into a small school girl. It was the perfect mix of pleasure and pain. She snuck in a little snigger of her own to acknowledge my effeminate outburst.


This was it. That tickle and that high pitched giggle that followed my own huskier one. That was the cue. This was my moment. Or, more unoriginally put, our moment. It was no longer just me who was holding on to her; she was holding on to me. But she clung on not with just her arms. Her head rested on my shoulder, with her breath and soft lips making each and every hair on my neck stand at attention. It was as if her entire body had been instructed that its sole purpose was to bind me to her, ever so tightly.


Everything about her was perfect at that point. Very foolish to say, I know, but I think this is the part where my brain stops working. So you'll just have to humor me here. 


I could always wait for her. I would change for nobody but her because she would always get her way with me. Like I said before, bear with me here. At that point I could hear her loud and clear, even when she was saying nothing at all.


I'll stop now. Anyways, moving on.


Making that move, it's an art. Everyone has their fair share of success, and more than their fair share of failure. I'm no pick-up artist (and no, I haven't read the book), but I'd like to think I'm not complete rubbish at the whole process. Yes, I would consider it a process. I would say it's similar to the process of firing a gun. As dark and as terrible of a comparison that may be, there is some truth to it. For one, once you fire a gun, there's no un-firing it. Once that move is made, you are totally committed. The consequences are yours, and solely yours. But I am getting ahead of myself. 

Firstly, you need a target. Check. Ana. If she had been a literal target, it would be physically impossible to miss her at the distance she was from me, which was basically zero as she embraced me snuggly. Secondly, you need to take aim. Aiming, in some cases, is something that takes time. I suppose for me it had been done tonight and for the past six months. If you don't put in the proper time and effort, you're going to miss. The same can be said for firing a gun; you need to have a calm heart and sound mind, and have your finger on that trigger, ready to fire at the exact perfect moment. This was the "check" I wasn't exactly a hundred percent certain of. There I was in that parking lot with Ana in my arms, in my sights. I think my finger was on the trigger too. All that was needed was a slight nudge. The tiniest of signals, and that was it. This was the last check mark. You have to pull that trigger. 

In me, the clocks were stopped. The stars were watching, waiting. But time was passing around me. Even in that South American desert from my memories the sun was still setting over the Andes. The luscious green valleys, just south of that dry and seemingly endless expanse, filled with vineyards, were still falling into a lulling and peaceful darkness. Sun light was still just kissing the icy tips of the mountains; the shadows were encroaching, but you would still just be able to catch a last glimpse of those lofty giants. The last drops of mountain water, melted by the retreating rays, would still be running down those slopes, into those splendid little valleys. And, finally the caballos would still be able to get their last sip of cold, fresh water for the night.     


As time passed over my world, she looked up to me. That tender look was expecting something. Expecting, but not asking. She could never be a bother. And I saw her quiet smile, elegant and wild. She had been on my mind, and there was nothing better. I decided to look back down at her to catch her eyes. It was all part of the plan. And then, just like your average Keira Knightley-esque, Victorian-era-themed movie from the 2000s, Ana averted her eyes timidly. Her shy, smiling gaze betrayed just a hint of vulnerability. She looked down now. Waiting for me to push her chin back up. 


I knew my face shone with a thin layer of sweat. It was summer after all. Yet, the skin on her forehead seemed to defy the laws of nature. It seemed serene. Just like those verde valleys that from a distance seemed almost still and perfect in time. This is how I knew it was the sweat from my cheek that made our faces stick together, as my cheek made the two inch voyage to hers. My short bristles (I thought not shaving would make me seem more burly) microscopically caressed her milky skin. 


Actually, scratch that. I don't understand why some women like a bit of a shadow on their men. I have felt it against my hand, and its not exactly a comfortable feeling. Those little hairs are deceivingly sharp. I can imagine they are quite annoying, like a soft sheet of sandpaper against bare skin, especially on skin as soft as hers. 


She clutched me like a purse. My shoulder nudged her chin up, her lips now looking up at mine and our eyes kissing. Our foreheads amorously conjoined. Nothing else was needed, aside from the obvious. 


"Pull. The. Trigger." Every part of my body was screaming it at me.


No more nudges. There was nothing left to be nudged. It would be like beating the proverbial dead horse. Turning The Moment into the awkward moment. 


This was it. I moved in closer. My sweaty finger on that cold, unyielding trigger. Bound to slip, but too determined to do so.  


It happened. It was so obviously fated to happen. Stupid to believe anything else would have happened. The target was there, the aiming had been done, and the finger was on that bloody metaphorical trigger. But the sweat was also in attendance, not to mention the heartbeat slamming against a rapidly undulating rib cage. Everyone and everything looked on with such great anticipation. The show of the century. You would be a fool to miss it. 


And then the slip. A mistake, if you will. The extra nudge. The kiss on the cheek. Confusion. Followed by the kiss on the forehead. A domino effect. The fallen eyes. Two disappointed faces. 


A missed mark. A bad shot. A trigger left unpulled.