Before I Forget Eric
Sturdy shoulders, reflective green eyes.
Tattoo peeked out from his left shirt sleeve. It was of two salamanders, and they coiled up his lean arm in dark green curves.
They were beautiful. I traced the perfect lines contouring his muscles. The details were fascinating.
A crocodile covered his left rib, a prehistoric fish his right chest. Right arm: comodo dragon standing on a rock.
*
“I might fall asleep on you, so sorry in advance.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll push your head off.” I’m blunt to strangers.
He smiled. ”Oh, and don’t let me fall asleep on my back, they’re new.”
Referred to: two tattoos of his friends’ faces on his upper back.
“What if you end up hating them one day? You’re stuck with them. Kind of forever.”
“Ah, it’s part of the journey.”
He tells me how he’s starting a collage of faces, faces of those he’s traveled with. A back full of faces, of places.
“How many tattoos have you got?”
“Hm… seven.”
“…three, four, six, where’s the seventh one?”
He looks at me sideways, and says that’s one he can’t show me.
*
Didn’t ask me if the seat was taken, just smiled and threw his luggage above.
When a stranger comes and picks the seat beside you, you’d better put on your glasses, pack that book up and look forward to a lot of talking.
*
“Have you seen a map of the world upside down?”
“Nope, and to say the truth I’m not sure I can tell the difference. Retarded at geography.” True fact.
“It puts a new perspective on things. It’s hard to tell that it’s the same world we’re looking at. What’s the difference between up and down, and who decides that?”
“I’ll make sure I google it.”
*
Some people, we blow up with conversation and then dwindle.
Others, we struggle to initiate dialogue then eventually give in to a better silence.
With him, I wasn’t quite myself - there was a cautious air, a warning against spluttering words - I was to reveal myself in increments, to match his pace, to take turns holding on to suspense.
Because we knew by the end of the train ride we’d somehow both be dangerously vulnerable.
*
“Toy Story 3 made me cry like a baby. No, a hungry baby. Basically a lot.” True fact.
“How good was the porcupine?”
“What about him?”
“He talked in Old English.”
“Oh right. And the clown! I forget his name. He smiles at the end!”
“Pixar’s the shit. I love animated films.”
More talk on cartoons. Funny parts. How Russell is Asian - “What?” he says, “I didn’t know that.”
“You know you’re a fan of Disney when you can sing along to their songs.”
He proceeds to hum a bunch of melodies.
“You know you’re a girl when all you sing are princess songs.”
“Hey, three sisters growing up you bet I know the princess songs.”
His favorite princess movie: Beauty and the Beast. Recalls songs even I can’t remember, me, a pretty hardcore Disney person.
“How can you like that over Aladdin? Jasmine was so hot. Beauty and the Beast is so… so girly.”
“What about The Beast is girly? And Gaston? And them throwing each other off of cliffs? That’s some manly shit right there.”
I blame it on his sisters.
*
We fell asleep and woke up to each other’s pokes if one got too bored.
*
He’s from Ohio. Three sisters, all settled down within 20 kilometers of their old house where the folks reside.
“Didn’t want to follow up?”
“No,” he shook his head, “Can’t stand it.”
He’s from Ohio. College in Ohio. Then it was Austria, and New York. Peru, Colombia, New York again, and how he’s off to South Africa in a few.
“They made me promise to visit every time before I took off. Other than that, they’re really supportive… of everything.”
“My parents are really supportive as well. Sometimes I wish they’d boss me around just so I could get a sense of direction, so I could be lazy about decisions.”
“I think you should consider yourself lucky.”
“I do, really.”
*
“Life is only a short-term thing if you think about it.”
“But life is everything we know for sure.”
“That’s why it’s about enjoying the moments, the intervals that we’re sure of. These tattoos - my body is only a temporary canvas.”
“If forever is much longer than life, and there is the concept of forever, than doesn’t that make what comes after life much more significant than we deem it?”
“And it’s what we don’t know.”
“Exactly.”
“This reminds me of the world scale. If only I could google it for you right now - it shows the scale of the world to the universe. Really shows how tiny the world is.”
“Then us people would be tiny tiny. Like really, really tiny.”
“And pretty insignificant.”
“But we’re all we know in this temporary life that happens to be all we know.”
“I guess we know pretty little.”
*
We talked of the people in our lives. Of the college life, of the crazy partying, of sex, drugs, and not rock n’ roll but his favorite band Fuck Buttons and of Daft Punk; we agreed on how they were overplayed, especially in the East Village; we talked of meeting random people in New York, of his eccentric friends, of my not as wacky but pretty crazy friends; we talked of working, studying, languages, his German, my Mandarin, our Spanish, how he played the trumpet and not the piano, how I played the piano but not the guitar, and how we both wish we played the guitar…
Marriage? Kids?
Not for me, he said.
So for me, I said.
I told him about the T-shirt my friends wanted to make me: Baby Maker Insert Token. He laughed.
You really don’t want kids? Steady life? Someone you love?
That’d be nice. The person would have to feel the same way I do. Towards life, traveling, evading conventions. Kids? Not for me.
It was difficult grasping the mindset of someone so different.
*
“I don’t talk much with my Dad. Actually, what I’ve just told you would probably amount to more than I’ve ever told my Dad my whole life.”
“Really? What are you going to do about that 30 minute car ride home?”
“Sleep. Mention the Cavs. You know, you’d probably have more to talk about with my Dad than me. He’d like you.”
I did love the Cavs. But not anymore. Of course he doesn’t know that.
*
The feeling of nearing Ohio, gradual loss of mountains, slow realization of fields all around; the morning was blushing pink and purple.
He asked me for a pen. I didn’t have one.
I told him if he asked around he’ll probably find one.
I didn’t get why he wanted one.
Or perhaps I didn’t want to…
Beauty is fleeting, and this was beautiful, so let it be fleeting too was what I thought of it.
He got off first.
“Bye.”
“Bye.”
I’ve googled upside down maps, world to universe scales, disney songs, and I’m listening to Fuck Buttons, Eric. Just thought you should know.
