Advice

A Story by ZackOfBridge

Two instances of advice

All I wanted was a snack-bag of Cheez-its and a bottle of tea. I entered the student store of my campus and grabbed the essentials, even snagged a couple study-aid supplements, they smell like dog food, but they work. I paid for it with my student ID and that always makes me feel like the man. In the time of my purchase, the ID seems like a free pass, but really this school has torn me limb from limb with student fees that the least they could do is throw a card loaded with credit on the heap of my cashless body. I even tell the girl behind the cash register that she had better go ahead and double-bag my two things, and that is authority.

So I’m leaving the student store through the automatic doors and the exit takes me to the open outside sitting area of the student union center. There are metal tables where people sit and drink their powdered-coffee, and there are patches of grass outlined by the sidewalk. And there are these trashcans that read ‘recycle’ for recyclables and ‘landfill’ for everything else. It is like some kind of poorly executed guilt-trip and now I have taken to throwing everything into the recycle bin. Anyway, I step out of the student store, and alone on the grass is a bearded guy standing, holding a sign with his two hands. ‘Free Advice----(comedic)’ So what the hell, you know? I am at a point in my life where I find great authority in having an indifferent behind-the-counter chick double-bag my Cheez-its and herbal tea; some advice could prove to be helpful, especially if it can give me a cheap---(free)---laugh.

There I go up to him with the bag at my side, you can tell he is so proud of his sign and whatever it is he’s got to preach from his beard. I stood at his front and gestured to the sign held at his rounding stomach, “What have you got for me?”

“Don’t ever practice swimming in the forest while outrunning an angry bear.” He said. I chuckled for his sake.

“Got anything else?” I said. I had walked to him and I was going to get my steps worth of advice no matter how half-witted.

“Never ride a bicycle while dancing to the Macarena.”

“Thank you,” I said with a tongue of sarcasm and started away, “that has been troubling me for a while now.”

I walk away and get to the sidewalk, swinging my double-bagged goods at my side and for a lot of the walk to my dorm all I can think about is the bearded guy and his advice. How f*****g stupid, right? I mean, good for this guy for putting himself out there, but even so, come on, you know?

So the next day, I am walking back to the student store because, well, Cheez-its and a bottle of tea don’t really go as far as I’d like them to, I mean, I was practically finished with the Cheez-its by the time I was back to my dorm from that guy with the stupid gimmick. I'm walking back to the store, but am blocked by a collected mass of bodies blocking the contained outside area of the student union.

All these people are ooing and awing over something, and they speak to one another in inaudible nods of the neck. So what the Hell, you know? I’m trying to get my Cheez-Its. I was thinking about getting the spicy ones today, I know they are fifty-cents extra, but s**t, I’ll just charge it to my ID, so whatever you know?

I nudge through the crowd’s membrane with my elbow and my pleasant, polite voice. The crowd, my surrounders hush my ‘excuse me’ and I stop in place and listen. I hear ‘bicycle’ and ‘Macarena’ and I know it is the bearded dude, and when I see past the open spaces I see he has braided his wiry beard and scribbled out ‘comedic’ from his sign.

“Again with this f*****g guy?” I said and was hushed again by a finger pressed to pursed lips.

From behind me, “What was it he said now?”

The people around murmur amongst each other. They move their hands to weigh his words in the air.

“Oh it is powerful.” someone turns to face me and the bottle-necked crowd around. They must be a communications major because they took the crowd with their carrying voice. “When one is peddling forward and the wheels carry a steady, guiding roll, never taunt the handlebars with a dance of pride.”

“That’s what he said?“ I started.

“Surely he speaks in terms we may all understand.” Someone said.

“Yes!” Said another nameless body.

“Surely!---He has spoken all afternoon.”

The crowd is silent again, and I know the bearded dude is speaking again because ‘swimming’ and ‘bear’ rise and fall into the crowd.

“And now?” The guy next to me asks as though he can’t breathe unless to inhale the advice of the bearded guy.

“Remarkable---Truly remarkable----He says that beasts of the pines will thrash from the unseen shadows of the forest----Do not flail in the waters at its approach.”

“Is that what he said?” I asked again, but now I am stroking my chin and nodding. He is right, the bearded guy, one can never know what will come, but it is best to take it head on.

I guess there is benefit to standing at the back because forget the Cheez-its; this is a crowd I could really get behind.

© 2014 ZackOfBridge

Author's Note

Not a true story, but a true thought

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Reviews

Pax

one that stuck in my head the most is that why now a days education is much costly than it ever... very nice story, its fun and entertaining...

Posted 10 Years Ago

Chadvonswan

Hahahaha oh man. Double bag my Cheezits and Tea. That is TRUE AUTHORITY. This was really different. Nothing I was expecting, haha. He takes off the word Comedic and suddenly everyone thinks the bearded guy is Legitimate. Nice story man!

--Tobey Maguire