Odds and Ends

It was supposed to be chess club, but instead, it was Gambler’s Anonymous, and that’s what you get in Moline. That’s what you get in church basements. It might be fried chicken, or it might be stale donuts, and I should have left right then, but I didn’t. I stayed. I don’t know why I stayed. I wrote “Reg” on my nametag, which was maybe the first lie, and some guy was talking about basketball. He said that CBS music made him feel whole and complete and ready to bust through a wall, and he was going to listen to it tomorrow. He was going to watch every minute of every game he could. Every TV in his house was plugged in in the living room. He’d already called in sick. His heart rate was going to rise, and he would cry and scream ecstatically by himself, and it was going to be okay because he was a goddamn force of titanium will, and he swore. Swore to Christ. There weren’t going to be any bets.

It’s hard to describe exactly how the room reacted to this. You’re not supposed to judge, I guess. You could tell, though, people thought it was a real shit idea, and I sat there, trying to hide my face. Trying to hide it without putting anything in its way, and I smoked a cigarette with this guy, after the meeting. He called himself Bigby. He said, “You don’t look right,” and the air smelled all cold and refreshing and dead, and I thought about all kinds of possible responses. “Who does, though,” or “Fuck off, asshole,” or maybe just kind of walk off like that. Like a goddamn scene from Chinatown or whatever, and all this must’ve taken forever because Bigby dropped some ash on my boot. I looked up.

“Seriously, man, you look like shit.”

“Drowned rats,” I said.

“What?”

“I used to walk in the door after practice, and my mom would say that. ‘You look like a drowned rat.’ I never really think about stuff like that.”

“I don’t think about much of anything.”

“Because thinking is overrated, I bet.”

“Don’t bet.”

“All bets are off,” I said, and I also think I fucking winked.

Bigby shook his head a couple of times, and then he left like I should’ve, and I followed him, followed him all the way home. Safe distance. Laying back and letting these pickups tuck in between. His house was in that part of town by the interstate, and there was a lot of brick and lawns trying as hard as they could, and he had a big front window. You could see practically the whole first floor. There was a picture of Jesus and an Old Style sign, and the real obvious thing was there was not one fucking TV. A bookshelf. Christmas tree lingering. I thought about how maybe the screens were all in the basement or all under lock and key or some shit, and I don’t know, man. Something about March. Something about snowmelt. It asks some pretty fucked-up questions, and I drove home thinking about all of them. Lies upon lies, and all I remember is the lights of the Burger King. Maybe that French fry smell is the only thing true.