Sunshine and Stink

Good God, it was sunny today. Even with my sunglasses on, the light just about burned my eyes outta my head. It was hard to read on my smoke breaks ‘cause of the light reflecting off the pages…I wish publishers would convert to a nice off-white paper.

It probably didn’t help that I hadn’t had enough sleep; the semester is over, and until summer school starts I have to work mornings instead of evenings. I’m a night person, and nothing can make me fall asleep early, even if I have to wake up at 9:00. That’s always a difficult adjustment to make.

Bright is bright and pain is pain, but thirsty is thirsty and I braved the sun for a fruit juice, same as always. They had a table set up outside the student center, collecting money for a local shelter for battered women. They said nothing to me as I passed, which is just as well, really. That’s a good cause, but I only had one dollar for the fruit juice machine, and really it never occurred to me to give it to them. I went and got my Peach Papaya.

As I left one of them did call out to me, “Hey, would you like to help battered women?”

“Sure,” I said, “but I had only the one dollar, and I already turned it into fruit juice,” and I waved the bottle at him to demonstrate. He looked disappointed; I guess they hadn’t had much luck. I sympathized, and felt maybe a little guilty. Then I had a happy thought and said, “Here, you can have the fruit juice, if you like.” He was not impressed. In fact, he looked kinda pissy. So, in case you were wondering, battered women don’t need yer damned fruit juice, thanks.

I walked back across Buskirk Field towards my library. About halfway across I was struck by a strange smell. It was a disinfectant smell, but not only that, as if the smell of whatever they were trying to disinfect lingered persistently through the cleaning, like it was a stronger thing. And it was really overwhelming, and I was thinking, “How the hell can the smell be that strong, out here in the open, in the middle of a field?”

I caught sight of the Science Building, looming over the field. I wondered if the smell was coming from there. “Maybe some experiment has gone horribly wrong. Maybe,” I thought, “the whole building is filling up with this noxious gas. Maybe the whole Science Department is already dead, and now the gas is coming after the rest of us.”

Then I thought, “Maybe the gas is flammable. Maybe it’s just waiting for a spark to set it off, and then the whole building will go up. Maybe even the whole campus!” I sniffed the air, and looked down at my cigarette. “Eh,” I said, “it’s worth the risk.” I shrugged, took a drag, and kept walking.

When I talk I gesture a lot, especially if I’m excited, or tired, or drunk. I do it even when I’m talking to myself. It’s how I work things out. Bonnie used to say that I thought with my hands. We’d be sitting in the kitchen, each doing our own thing, paying no attention to each other but each drawing comfort from the other’s presence. Maybe she’d be doing her homework or reading the paper. Maybe I'd be doing a crossword puzzle, or writing a song, or maybe just thinking. And my hands would start to dance. I’d play with my hair, wiggle my fingers, drum complicated rhythms on my skull with my fingertips, point at imaginary objects, draw lines and circles in the air. I would gradually get that feeling of being watched, and I’d look up and she’d be grinning at me indulgently.

“What?” I’d say. “What?”

“You’re thinking with your hands again,” she’d say.

As I walked across Buskirk Field, wondering about the smell and whether I was about to blow up the entire campus, I was making broad, sweeping gestures with my arms, plotting the trajectory of shrapnel and brick and the bodies of researchers. I was raising my arms high above my head, imagining a fireball reaching to the heavens. I was running my finger along the outline of the Science Building, noting each exit that any survivors might make for. And then I saw, on the edge of the field, a guy standing and watching me, and grinning like Bonnie used to. He was in my path back to the library, and as I passed him I leaned in and said, by way of explanation, “Smells bad.”

He took a step back and looked affronted. He had misunderstood me. “Did you just say I smell bad?” he asked.

I looked at him, bemused, then tilted my head back and shut my eyes against the sun, and inhaled grandly. “Even if you did, brother,” I reassured him, “with all this ugliness in the air, how would anyone notice?”