Fajitas From Heaven

Following a freak accident, a man begins developing creative insights into science, women and the value of a good chimichanga!

 

            I’m not exactly sure what we were discussing when the iron skillet filled with sizzling fajitas fell from the heavens onto my head. It could have been anything, really.

            I do remember a discussion over what to name a pair of parakeets my mother had rescued from her dysfunctional neighbors, who had stored them and their cage in the dark recesses of their cavernous garage. Apparently, they’d been condemned for the heinous crime of being birds. As I recall, my girlfriend suggested calling them either Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum or Buttercup and Snowflake, but then Brad, my brother, drawled, “How ‘bout Sonny and B***h”?

            He’s a little bitter.

            I’m sure he feels justified, having recently been burned by Alison, his former fiancée, who broke up with him because he wasn’t enough of a “challenge” for her. At one point, he suggested going over and beating the crap out of her, to see if that would pose enough of a “challenge”, but I talked him out of it.

            So, one moment we were sitting in Humberto’s, one of those large-scale Mexican food margarita pick-up establishments, and the next, I’m sprawled out on the slab floor, my plate of tamales and refried beans spilt from my innards onto the floor beside me. Brad, Sonia, and half a billion patrons stood over me, looking pitiful and inept.

            “What?” I cackled.

            “Are you okay?”

            I tried to determine which Sonia to focus on, the one on the left or the right. She kneeled down by my side. “He doesn’t look good.”

            My tongue felt thick and sticky, but I spoke anyway. “Who talking to?”

            “Stay still, hon. You had an accident, we’re going to get you some help.”

            I squinted at her. “Accident?”

            “Do you remember anything?”

            “The Alphabet Song. Want me to sing it?”

            She didn’t smile.

            At least, that’s what I think happened. I’ve had to invent some transitional threads to piece the story together in my head. Your brain does that. Disconnected thought bubbles get woven together by creative elucidation.

            From what I’m told, a waiter with a platter full of lunch plates on the second level of the restaurant was distributing the food, when the platter tilted, and the flaming skillet tumbled over the ledge and down one story below onto my noggin. You would think there would be some kind of warning that would happen, at least a “heads up!” or “fore!” Nothing.

            I should have followed Sonia’s advice and gone to Chang’s Chinese Bistro instead. It’s on one level and they serve on spongy Styrofoam platters. 

            Head injuries are a funny thing. Not funny “ha-ha”, just funny. After Brad hoisted me up and sat me down at the table, I smiled and waved in acknowledgement at the spectators around me, who shook their collective heads and went back to their burritos and beer. Twenty minutes later, I managed to stand up and hobble to the men’s room, where I then collapsed and fell to the floor, hitting my chin on the urinal on the way down. I would have been livid if I remembered it happening.

            I do remember the dream I had while I was out. I was on a spaceship heading toward Mars to analyze signs of life, and was contemplating the rugged, rocky terrain I’d seen from the pictures beamed back by the NASA rovers. Suddenly, the premise of the Dr. Seuss story of “Horton Hears a Who” flashed into my mind, and I realized we were going about it all wrong. What if there actually was life on the planet, I speculated, but just not visible on the same plane as us? In other words, there could be Martians the size of microscopic specks scurrying about the planet’s surface, only too small to be distinguishable by our limited tools of measurement. We assume they’re not there because our cameras don’t see them. 

Conversely, taking the concept of size into consideration, on a larger scale, we could be the specks; our planets like different balls on a pool table, all coexisting on the same plane. Worse yet, we could be like the pixels on a movie screen, where, stepping back, we form a picture, ever crisper by the distance, but individually distinct as our microscopic selves. And what if we were never really apart at all, but were in fact all at the same place, in the palm of my hand or on the period at the end of this sentence, folding upon ourselves in a gyrating pattern of consciousness?

            I was abruptly jolted awake by something beyond scent, like my head was exploding from its impact. Some stranger was standing over me, and Brad was gaping at me with a stupid grin.

            “Now what?” I cackled.

            “You passed out again, bro.”

            “What the hell just hit me?”

            “Ammonia tablets”, answered a balding man by my side.

            “Who are you?”

            He grinned. “Name’s Stan. You were out cold, so we found these in a first aid kit.”

            “Lucky me.”

            “The paramedics are here,” a voice proclaimed from behind me.

            A young spiky-haired EMT with big biceps hurried into the room, followed by an attractive brunette with a familiar face.

            “Alison, what’re you doing here?” I heard Brad say.

            “My job,” was her clipped reply, as she knelt beside me and strapped a blood pressure monitor onto my arm.

            Alison, Brad’s former. Go figure.

            “Hey, Al,” I said groggily.

            “Hey back, Sam. Save your voice, okay?”

            “You know the patient?” asked the spiky EMT.

            “Yes, I know him,” she answered.

            “He’s my brother,” Brad added.

            “What’s his name?” spiky EMT inquired.

            “His name is Sam Leighton.”

            “Hey, I’m right here. I can talk,” I interjected.

            Spiky EMT opened his bag of tools while I glanced dreamily at Alison. “Welcome to the men’s room,” I said.

            She smiled.

            “Ever seen a urinal before?”

            “Yes, but not as closely as you have, apparently.”

            I laughed. “Oh, that hurts!” I said, reaching for my injured chin.

            “You smacked it pretty hard, Sam.”

            “When have you ever seen a urinal, Alison?” Brad asked.

            Alison continued squeezing the inflatable ball on the blood pressure monitor. I could sense the tension on her face as she carefully licked her lips, then glanced up at him with the subtle nuance of an American Idol judge at a hootenanny. “Are you still here?”

            “He’s my brother.”

            “You said that.” She took a deep breath. “Tell you what, could you please ask everyone to clear out of the room, to give him some space?”

            “Sure,” he responded, and motioned for the spectators to leave.

            “But I have to use the john!” someone whined.

            “Use the women’s,” he responded as he ushered them out the door.

            “Excuse me,” said a man with a thick moustache as he wrangled his way into the room. “Excuse me,” he repeated, looking at spiky EMT and motioning toward me. “He going to be okay?”

            “He’s sustained two head injuries.”

            “Two?”

            “He collapsed and hit his chin on the commode.”

            “Wow. Well, he’s pretty accident prone, isn’t he?”

            “Who are you?” asked Brad, who was standing in the doorway.

            “Javier Mendez. I’m the restaurant manager.”

            “Mr. Mendez,” Brad responded as he grabbed the man’s arm. “You need to get the hell out of here.”

            After ushering the man out, the room finally became quieter. Alison finished taking my blood pressure, and then kneeled in front of me. “Sam, I need you to look at me.”

            “Why?”

            She gazed into my eyes, and then shook her head. “Ed, look at his pupils.”

            “Who’s Ed?” I asked.

            Spiky EMT looked into my eyes and nodded. “Yep, we’d better take him in, to make sure there’s no intracerebral hemorrhaging.”

            “You Ed?” I drawled.

            Spiky EMT acknowledged me for the first time. “Yes, I’m Ed.” He cleared his throat. “Mr. Leighton, we need to take you to the hospital to run some tests.”

            “Tests?”

            “We think you may have sustained a concussion.”

            I stared at him bewilderedly. “Did you hear that?”

            He scowled. “Hear what?”

            “I think I heard a Who.”

            “A what?”

            “Never mind.”

 

            Brad and Alison had a bit of a dysfunctional relationship, although some would say that’s a bit of a redundancy. During their dating days, they would alternatively have their lustful hands all over each other, have a misunderstanding leading to a fluid stream of profanities and threats toward each other, then flow right back into stripping each others clothing off.

            And that’s just how they behaved in public.

            In the hospital, Brad stood over me, asking no less than six times, “Did Alison say anything about me?”
            “No, Brad.”

            “You sure?”

            “Yes, Brad.”

            “Man, I didn’t expect to see her.”

            “Me either.”

            “Jeez,” he’d respond, stroking his chin. “You sure she didn’t say anything?”

            After he left, I fell asleep and dreamed again about the microscopic Martians, existing on a different plane of existence, immeasurable by the ineffectual scientific measures available to humankind. It occurred to me that if our tools of measurement were so ineffective in detecting alternative life forms, then perhaps the same patterns of confused misunderstanding continued to exist with each other, like some distinct quantum mechanical separation on a subatomic scale that we have yet to understand how to bridge.

            Could it be? Maybe we’re all doomed to destinies of endlessly trying to utilize fruitlessly inaccurate tools with each other, never ever fully understanding just how incredibly misdirected our efforts really are.

           

After being released from the hospital, I pondered the question, and then ran it by Sonia, who stared at me impassively.

            “So, you think we’re like Martians?”

            “What?” I responded.

            “You’re comparing women to Martians.”

            I scratched my head. “I didn’t say that.”

            “You know they say men are from Mars, not us.”

            “Okay, but that’s not what I’m saying.”

            “What are you saying?”

            “I’m just, I guess, contemplating . . .”

            “But you think we’re the crazy ones.”

            “I never said that. You’re trying to trap me.”

            “Why are you so defensive?”

“I’m not . . . s**t.  Never mind.”

“You’re the one who brought the subject up.”

            “And that gives me the right to end the discussion.”

            Sonia blew out an exaggerated sigh of irritation. “I’m going shopping.”

            “Now?”

            “You have a problem with that?”

            “No. Look, I just wanted to share with you what I was thinking, that’s all.”

            “Fine. After I return, I’ll share with you what I bought.”

            “I don’t care what you’re going to buy.”

            “Voila,” she said.

           

A week after I returned from the hospital, I was contacted at home by Javier, the restaurant manager, who asked how I was doing.

            “Fine,” I responded.

            “You’re doing fine? That’s terrific!” he responded, a bit too enthusiastically.

            I hesitated. “Considering your staff dropped an iron skillet onto my brain.”

            He cleared his throat.  “Yes. That. Listen, Sam. Can I call you that?”

            “You can call me Rumpelstiltzkin, for all I care.”

            “Okay. Well. Have you contracted the services of a legal representative on this matter?”

            “Huh?”

            “Do you have an attorney?”

            “No. Do I need one?”

            “Goodness, no. Can I meet with you on this, Sam? We’re prepared to make you a generous offer.”

            And that’s how I ended up back at Humberto’s, chewing hungrily on a massive beef chimichanga, along with Sonia and a reunited Brad and Alison.

            “I can’t believe you wanted to come here again,” said Sonia, between sips of her melon margarita.

            “One gots to eat,” I responded, grinning.

            “You don’t feel like you’re defecating in the face of fate?” Brad asked.

            “What?” said Alison.

            “He’s taking a chance coming here.”

            “Then say that.”

            “Bite me,” Brad hissed.

            “So,” I interjected. “They’re giving me free food for a year. How can I pass that up?”

            No one responded, Brad and Alison emitting invisible fumes of irritation with each other.

            “You could have sued them,” Sonia added.

            “Yeah, but what would that get me?”

            “Enough money to buy your own restaurant.”

            I pondered that for a moment. “Yeah, I guess there’s that.”

“You didn’t consider that before?”

“Well, I might have thought of it if I didn’t just have a head injury.”

            “You’re hopeless.”

            I chuckled, then took another oversized bite of my chimichanga, and pondered my distorted strand of circumstances. To my compromised brain, it all made sense, on a grand cosmic scale. I had my reward now, right in front of me, not invested some nebulous cloud of uncertainty. We scurry about every day, making decisions and choices based upon such inadequate, flimsy slices of data, it often seems as though one decision is as good as another. Besides, what were the chances another plate of fajitas could ever land on my head? It was laughable. 

            Little did I know, fifteen feet above where I sat, a waitress was moving clumsily along the upper ledge, carrying a piping hot plate of tamales.

Reviews

[Deep in the Woodline...]

�They�re giving me free food for a year. How can I pass that up?�

I guess you know the Testosterone Police are probably headed your way as you read this, beau. You KNOW that is the one secret about men you were never supposed to give up -- free food cures all. Oh well, cat's outta the bag I reckon.

Enjoyed the piece. Well crafted and paced with just the right amount of snarkiness to it. Kind of smacks of Thurber. Good job. Looking forward to other works.