RESENTMENT

How long can we resent? No matter how long, eventually, we will resent no more.

I breathed my last breath. I was done. My life was over. My existence was finished. Slowly my eyes closed, but undetected by the hazy figures standing before me, my lids didn't lower all the way. I saw them move, gesture toward me, reach near me as my vision slowly began to glaze. There was the faint sensation of my hand being grasped and returned to the opposite side of my body. I had reached across my chest to my opposite arm. My opposite shoulder. I had reached and they returned my hand back to my side. 

I heard the female voice inquire about what I was doing. The other voice didn't answer. 

I was remembering. I was remembering the wound of so long ago, on my arm. I felt the sensation. The results. And I remembered, until I could remember no more. 

They had been the memories of youth, when memories are strongest. I had all the desires of being young and any time those intentions fail, the wounds run deep and in some instances, they never heal. My shoulder. My arm. 

Then there are the sounds of laughter and even worse, the words of ridicule, mocking my effort, my futility, and I grew to detest those who were so easily condescending toward me. And I hated. 

The whole purpose of being with these so-called peers was the promise of development. It would take me a few more years to realize what a farce was that notion. So that left me with these people I was meeting in my teens and how things were emerging here. 

I was failing on all fronts. Excelling in neither academics nor friends. And I realized this. I sought to pinpoint when this started. What happened? I wanted to stand out from everybody. I wanted to fit in. I felt the pain in my shoulder. 

Where do friends go in their younger years, bound to the presence of a required ordeal? When dining is going on, of course. Was that where we were? Was that when it started? Was that the purpose to belong? I tried to see, myself sitting at the table with a group of others. Just to fit in, to belong. 

So I wouldn't be alone. 

It seemed to me trying to belong found me quite alone. I remembered those people, or were they strangers. I would never see any of them ever again. It all just seemed like so much irrelevance in these valuable years. What had happened? I tried to recall the occurrence. I hit him. Name-calling, insults took place, so I hit him. I didn't care. Oh, the apathy of adolescence. I quickly moved away as well, to another table, so he couldn't retaliate. 

I was told later I hurt him, made him unhappy. I didn't know about that. I shouldn't have hit him in the arm. The fleeting memories tried to hold on to this thought. I hit him in the arm. But I had the injury. It was my arm. But I struck him. 

More memories flowed forward in the darkness as I saw us still in that cafeteria. What was happening now? One person was absent, another one had band practice, this one had to leave early, until it was just he and I once more. We were the only two at the table. 

And we sat in stony silence. He had absolutely nothing to say to me. So we sat. I didn't speak to him. He didn't speak to me. So silent in the noisy, boisterous high school cafeteria. We barely looked at one another. I tried to deduce if this was before or after I hit him, but I couldn't recall. No matter how hard I tried. We weren't friends, but why did it seem we were so cold to one another? Did he resent me? I did resent him. I despised him. Why? I didn't know, but I thoroughly detested him. I sensed the notion he was better than me. Everyone thought he was friendlier. He made better grades. 

He stood to move to another table to speak to a friend he just saw. I watched him as suddenly it was time for our class to go, so as soon as he sat, he had to get back up. Maybe that was why I hated him. He really was a moron. Slowly we made our way back to class. 

I recalled the classroom. Not my favorite class. I actually failed it. Waste of my time. Was that what I was recalling? What I was revisiting? I hated the class and he was in that same class, but I had numerous other classes with him. What was it about this horrendous classroom located in one of these portable trailers. Terrible arrangement. Who thought this up, but it was this class. I knew it. 

He made outstanding grades in that class, the class I failed. 

The school year ended and we returned after summer. The boredom, the isolation, it was all now much worse. Thankfully, I didn't see this person anymore. We were off in different directions as far as this wretched curriculum goes. I didn't want to see him, hear about him, or his friends in his group. I didn't want to hear anything about any of them. Thankfully, my attention was now elsewhere, not that anything was successful there. She appeared only briefly, then she departed, but a part of me did like the impression it gave off that I seemed to hang around with her, however farcical it was. Nobody else had to know. There was actually a picture of us taken together at a Christmas party, her arm across my shoulder. 

This tenure in life, whatever it was supposed to be about, came to a close. It was over and I couldn't be happier. I was finished with it. I was so elated. Come that fall, it was a rather cool Saturday, and I had gone to the market with my mother. She shopped, since I wasn't working. I was totally aimless with no direction. We completed our task and made our way out of the building. Used to love coming to this store when I was smaller. I pushed the cart to the car. With the bags loaded into the back of the car, I turned to push the cart to its holding area, with one small bag still remaining within. I would retrieve it and then return to the car. 

That was when I heard the muffled sounds, quick and in unison. 

Pop! Pop, pop! 

I looked down to my feet to see the thick liquid oozing across my shoes, slowly cascading down the black-topped parking lot. My teeth were clenched so hard. I immediately looked up again to see what had caused the noise. I breathed in short breaths as I looked at him, about halfway across the parking lot, with a variety of his friends. I honestly think he had one lone black friend amongst them. I watched him as I continued on, leaving the cart, the final bag clutched in my hand. There hadn't been gunfire. Then what was it? 

I had dropped some of the eggs when I was so startled by seeing him again. Did I think he'd look across at me and smile? I made my way to the car, shaking off the goo from the eggs as I journeyed forth. 

I didn't want him to see me, but what if he did? What if he acted like he didn't know me, the same way I was now doing him, even tho I didn't know him. I knew nothing about him. I got in the car and sat down. Mother cranked up and slowly pulled out of the spot. I continued to watch the car where he had gone. They had all gathered in that one vehicle, the best of friends in these youthful years, off to find adventure. Quietly I watched the car pull out and depart for the open road. I guess it was a good thing I wasn't driving. I probably would have pursued them, chased after them. Act like you're better than me. Yes, it was definitely for the best I wasn't driving. 

But the memory held. There was blood on my shoes. Why was there blood on my shoes? There wasn't any blood. What was I saying? I wanted to watch that car pull away again, as we drove in the opposite direction. I wanted to see an eighteen-wheeler plow into it, atomizing it into pieces and hurling it all over the road. 

It wasn't blood, it was the eggs. So why was I seeing blood? 

It wasn't blood. I was seeing my shirt. I was wearing a red flannel shirt. It was very cool outside, so I was wearing this shirt. But it wasn't this shirt. It wasn't blood. But it was red. Slowly I opened the bag I still held with what eggs remained to retrieve the magazine my mother had bought for me; How To Succeed In Stand-up Comedy In Ten Easy Steps. I was definitely on my way. Far from wherever his life and his friends were taking him. 

It was a red shirt and there was blood. But not this shirt. 

It took me a while to sort out what I was supposed to do for stand-up comedy. Had to contact agents or comedy clubs, send them an audio-cassette of my jokes. Send who an audio-cassette? It would be four months before I looked at the magazine again and saw the names and addresses provided of clubs and agents. So I began compiling some of my best material, telling the jokes, trying to be calm and included a note about who I was and I wanted to get started right away in stand-up comedy. I had totally forgotten about the submissions when one came back to me, the tape enclosed, with a note saying I sounded much to eager. Of course I was eager. I was ready to make my mark on this world. I felt slightly dejected, but then the situation grew worse. 

"What's this?" mother asked. 

She read the letter, and she knew I had mailed off the cassettes. I told her not to worry about it, but she decided she would settle the matter. She had the address on the envelope and I could only stare in horror. Maybe I could get the letter out of the mail, but no such luck. It took a while, but eventually there was a response. Making sure she didn't see it, I raced to my room and read the contents. 

One of the most esteemed agents in the business of stand-up comedy threatened her with his lawyer if she contacted him again. I didn't know what she had written, but it didn't matter. Maybe he put my name on his blacklist and sent my name around to the clubs. At that age, I didn't know, but the imagination can run wild. I knew better to show her the letter and she never asked about it again. If she did, I told her I never heard anything and that was all she had. She had returned the first letter to me so she no longer had that one, so all ties were severed. 

I always heard rejections and bad encounters like this are supposed to be kept. I tried to keep them, but I was outraged. I actually destroyed one of the letters, I think the first one, but it didn't matter. Eventually they were both dismissed with time. 

The magazine would lose its cover and end up in a storage bin. Every once in a while I would find it again, looking for something else. I would look at the clubs and agencies. Probably none of them functioning anymore. They aspired for steady work as did I. Well, maybe they should have worked with me. I didn't even hear about that agent anymore. Didn't know if he was still doing anything. With another couple of years or so, and the arrival of the internet, I managed to look him up and discovered he was teaching somewhere. 

How ironic, I thought, that teachers in my adolescence provided me with no guidance or instruction, and now this man who I had hoped would introduce me to my desired field of interest would venture into teaching. 

I decided it was time to look at that magazine again, after all these years. I hauled down the box where it should be, turned over envelopes and papers and there it was. Still missing the cover. I wasn't sure what I thought; that maybe it would have grown a new cover?

I was prepared to open the magazine when I saw the book that was beneath it. My high school senior annual. 

I looked at it, dismissively. Absolutely nothing about it intrigued me. I thumbed through the magazine a bit, then tossed it back on top of the annual. There was nothing to see. 

As I put the box back, I wondered to myself; did I still hate him? Did I resent him? I hadn't seen him since that day in that parking lot, when I was so starled, I dropped the eggs and thought they were gun shots. Imagine that. Thinking breaking eggs were gunfire. 

But of course it was because I saw the blood, which I now knew was the red flannel shirt I was wearing, not blood. 

But there was blood, and the shirt was red, but not that shirt. Not that moment. 

Another moment. 

A bright, shiny shirt, like a disco shirt. I knew I would be noticed by everyone. Now I was seeing it all again. As the last embers of my thought died out, I was remembering. 

A shimmering red shirt, bright crimson. I just knew I was the envy of all who saw my bright red disco shirt. They couldn't believe how stunning I looked. How bold. How daring. That's right. I'm not afraid of anything. 

No one ever commented on it. No one said a word, but I didn't care. It wasn't a shirt for dialogue, it was a shirt you couldn't help but see. And I was wearing it. And now I was going to wear my attention-getting shirt to my next class. 

The class in the portable trailer. The class I failed. The class he excelled at. And I failed. In the trailer. And here I was in my cool shirt that saw me noticed. My shoulder. My arm. 

I reached through the window of the classroom to put my books on my desk, so I didn't have to carry them in, in my bright red shirt. 

There was no rip. The fabric seemed so light and airy, it just tore on the jagged pin of metal on the window. My outstanding shirt. I just damaged my shirt and stuck myself in the arm as well. 

Blood. 

I held my hand on the injury and walked into the class and sat at my desk. With my hand over the wound, I was pressing the shirt into the blood and it was just red on red, but still very visible. 

A few people noticed. 

"Ewww!" 

Apparently people who had never seen blood before. 

And I ripped my shirt.

More students came in, aware of what I had done. 

One fellow turned around and said something about I won't do that again, something like that. 

And there he was. Not a friend. He said something to the effect of what it had done to my shirt. I realized it was apparent if my arm was bleeding, then obviously my new shirt had suffered as well. I waited til lunch, then took off the restroom, to try to wash it, clean up the blood. From my arm. My shoulder. With the shirt torn where my hand had touched as I breathed my last. 

Mom sought to sew up the shirt, with matching thread, but it didn't matter. The shirt was vulnerable. It was no longer astonishing to see. It had a stick running up the side, on the arm. 

And there was when my animosity gradually formed into hate, total hostility. I could see it all now as my mind clouded over in shadow. I hated him more than I ever despised anyone else. He mocked my delight, my effort. 

Then I hit him. Or did I hit him first? I didn't know. And it wasn't a red shirt, it was a black shirt. A black shirt? I didn't know anymore. It didn't matter. Not even my rage toward this person mattered anymore. 

Why was I even thinking about him now? I didn't know, but then I realized why. 

I had seen him. I just saw him. Here. 

In the after-life. 

I watched him approach his moment of judgment. He never saw me. He never turned around. My thoughts departed as I detected him adorned in the bright robe, whitest of whites. 

How? 

I asked myself, how could he, a conceited individual who was cruel to the less fortunate as I had been, that he saw no reason to speak to me, could now receive the Heavenly blessings? He mocked my effort for recognition, in my adolescent years. He jeered at me when I was done, humiliating me. 

What had he done to be so blessed? 

I didn't know. I had no memory of him. After that last day I saw him in that parking lot, I never crossed paths with him again, until the day each of us died. I didn't know if I had died first or if he had. 

I moved forward, seeing him ascend the Heavenly staircase to the greatest award mankind should receive and I now comprehended I didn't know him, as I wanted to. 

I knew nothing about what he did that saw him anointed so. I lowered my head and closed my eyes. The memories were gone. The resentment, finally was gone. 

Finally.