I Only Know Kansas

 

A lot of people in my life have told me that I don’t know how to live. They say I don’t get out much and that when I do, I feel every pebble under my feet.  The truth is I have always felt like I was in a permanent world of black and white because there was never anything to color my interest. Up to this point my life has been a blind canvas. If I run my fingers across it I can feel a faint outline of something but that’s it.

 I’m out at night, just like everyone else except I’m walking the streets alone and everybody else is in Oz. On this particular night, I’m walking the road lining the beach right where the breeze from the ocean feels like God’s breathing on you. The boards walk stretches out in front of me but I turn aside off the tired hardness of the road toward the beach where a lifeguard shack rests in the sand. I slip off my shoes and allow my feet to soak in the pleasantness of the sand

  As I get nearer to the shack I can hear sounds coming from it so I know I’m not alone. With a closer look I realize someone’s got a lamp on. I hated camping. I’m about to turn around and leave when two people emerge from the shack giggling and holding hands. Squinting, I realize that one of them is my roommate, Shura. He’s with a girl I see in the Student Union a lot.

“Connor?” says Shura, although I’m pretty sure he knows it’s me. He’s just in shock. “This is a first!” Ok Shura it’s not a secret that I almost never go out except to go to class…oh wait, it might be a secret because nobody really knows me because I really don’t get out much. Damn!

Shura turns to introduce me to Sara but she has already moving forward to shake my hand. “ I know him.” she says, “ He is the only desk clerk in the Union that lets me keep practicing my GRE even after the Union closes.”

It’s true, I remember when I first got the job sitting desk in the Union she would be there almost night curled up in a couch in a corner studying away at her book. She would always buy three sodas before actually sitting down to study and she almost never drank through one. Some days she wore a frantic expression on her face and she wouldn’t dare take her eyes away from the book out of fear that she would forget everything she was trying to learn. She wouldn’t notice the time and I’d be closing up and she’d still be curled up tight. I don’t know why but I never could tell her to leave and it wasn’t like she stayed particularly long after. She began to notice that I was waiting on her every day and would give me the two sodas she never managed to drink every time she kept me. Then there was that one day when she was taking longer than usual so I walked up to her and realized she had fallen asleep. She looked at peace, the come in from work and slowly pull off your shoes kind of peace. I shook her gently and she woke with a start.

“Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry!” she began but I told her it wasn’t a big deal. She glanced at her watch and shrieked. She jumped up and started tossing books and folders into her bag and then swinging the whole mess over her shoulder she sprinted out of the union.  I decided right then and there that if I ever became a man I would date her. It wasn’t because of her sweet brown hair or her ample breasts but because of her eyes, they were big and hazel and…..they were staring right at me the whole time I had been in a day dream and they knew too.

“Sorry.” I muttered but she and Shura had already burst out laughing but I could tell it wasn’t the kind of laugh that though I was stupid or weird. Or was it?

“Conner, your one funny dude!” said Shura still laughing a bit. “But I am surprised you know Sara, you don’t get out a lot.”

“If a man goes for walks at night on the beach and his shoes are in his hand instead of on his feet then he probably knows somebody.” Says Sara and I am keenly aware that those hazel eyes are still watching me, searching, but finding nothing. Shura suggests that we go to eat at Denny’s or something so we head back toward the road and head for the boardwalk because Shura actually has a car. We are in the parking lot when Sara suddenly remembers something and turns to me.

“Weren’t you about to do something when you met us at the shack?”

It wasn’t really her asking but those hazel eyes. They weren’t through with me yet.  I’m not going to tell you that I had been about to go into the shack and sit down with my back against the cool damp wood and think of you, there is just no way in HELL I am going to do that. I’m not going to say that the one day I actually planned to do something and was going through with it until you showed up and ruined it! You and your stupid hazel eyes which are probably wide open when you kiss him anyway!

“No.” I say and reach for the car door.

I woke up the next morning but didn’t get out of bed. Is it really morning or is it the afternoon? With college you can never really tell.  I really didn’t have any reason to stay in bed so I got up and took a shower. It’s 3:45.I didn’t hear any noise from the room next to me so I figure Shura is still asleep. Getting dressed I went down to the dining hall and had a quick bite to eat before returning to my room. I tried to do some studying but it wasn’t really in me. I sat and stared out the window watching a girl play with her dog in the courtyard. The little thing kept jumping up at the leaves that were floating down from the big oaks trying to catch them before they reached the yellow brick of the walkway. The girl was laughing at her dogs antics for a while and then scooped it up before heading back to the girl’s dormitories on the far side of the courtyard.

  There’s noise coming from the kitchen and when I go out it’s only Shura in his boxers standing with his nose buried deep in the refrigerator. He manages a sleepy “what sup” before sticking his head back into the fridge. Smiling I grab a box of crackers from the fridge and sprawl onto the couch and watch Shura do his thing. I think it is almost a ritual with Shura to wake up late on Sundays but it’s also really interesting with what he does once he wakes up. He almost always comes out in his boxers, sticks his head into the fridge, and grabs the same things: A shrink wrap covered bowl of seasoned diced chicken and a few potatoes and two cloves of garlic. He then stands at the stove cooking everything wearing a flat expression on his face wincing every now and then when a little oil splashes his bare chest. He finishes cooking and plops down on the chair next to me.  We talk awhile about unimportant things: classes, homework, that sort of thing and then he goes to get ready for his fraternity chapter meeting. You should really see the change this thing has on Shura. During the week he is usually sour and unshaven; the result of 10 hours of accounting and business classes and working most nights as food runner at a restaurant. When Sunday nights roll around, Shura becomes a different person almost altogether. You should see the way he gets ready for his meeting. He hops in the shower for about 20 minutes fogging the whole dorm up with steam ( I thought the place was on fire the first time he did this) and then pats himself dry with a towel he uses for only this occasion. He then slips into a blue dress shirt and khaki dress pants and finishes the whole thing off with an elaborate golden tie. By the time he’s finished Shura, the student, the food runner, is now Shura the man. He calls out to me from the bathroom where he is straightening his tie.

“It was nice to see you outside for once but you really ought to get out more.”

To refrain from answering I crunch on another cracker but he goes on anyway.

“When are you going to come out and meet some of the guys? You’re a nice guy and I think they’d like you but you must get out there and meet them. Nobody will know you’re nice if you keep hanging out here.”

Here we go again. He has been trying to get me to meet his fraternity brothers for a while so that I’d be prepared for spring rush and would probably be one of the first to get a bid. I really have been meaning to give it a try but I always hold myself back.

“I just don’t think I can do anything for you guys”.  I say, “I can’t really relate to people very well. 

“I’m not you”, I add quietly.

Shura walks back into the living room giving me glare. For a second it looks like he wants to punch me.

“I’m about to talk now and I want you to just shut up listen because I know what your problem is!” He says flicking some lint from his shirt.

“You’re so obsessed with perfection so much that you can’t even get started with anything, not even your own life! You think you’re not good enough to belong among people in this world and that’s wrong because nobody should ever feel like that! Every day I see you and I wonder how somebody can live being alone! That’s the worst feeling in world”!

Shura glares at me again and stomps back over to the mirror. I’m shocked. Shura has been to Kansas?

There’s no mistaking it, Shura has been where I am now. Shura, the guy who never misses a beat, the guy who practically makes his life a craft, has been where I am and I never noticed it. As I watched him work furiously to straighten his tie I truly realized what he had done to get where he has gotten himself.  I bet the first thing to ever stain his canvas was his own blood and he just went with it. He finishes checking himself and gives me a curt nod as he goes out.

 As the door closes behind him I’m sure I can hear a tornado rushing to wisp him away. The room seems to go gray and all our stuff turns black and white. Suddenly I’m in Kansas and Shura is gone away to Oz. I go to my window and though I can’t make out the yellow brick of the courtyard but I see the girl again, the one who was playing with her dog earlier, standing under a light post.  She’s rocking back and forth pausing every now and then to click her heels together. She’s looking back and forth like she is waiting for someone. She stays there awhile but no one comes so she leaves.  I drop the shades and go back into the living room. I pop another cracker in my mouth but it tastes bland. I throw the rest of the box away.  There is a knock at the door and it turns out to be Sara coming to look for Shura but I tell her he is in chapter. Why doesn’t she know that?

“Oh really!”  she says, “Well then what are you up to?” There go those hazel eyes working on me again. I hate them. What does it look like I’m doing! I’m sitting in this room by myself doing absolutely nothing! Why are you asking me to state the obvious? I know you’re not blind, I can see the hazel in your eyes! As a matter of fact, it’s the first bit of color I’ve seen in about an hour! Why would you come back here, to Kansas?  Are you trying to torment me about the fact that I don’t have an escape in life and that I’m so rooted in reality that it has become black and white!

“Conner?”

And don’t even think of telling me that I ought to get out more! It’s miserable enough knowing damn well that I should get out into the world with you and Shura telling me every other day. If you think that I don’t want to know people then you’re wrong! I’m too plain. Everyone else is full of color. The whole damn world is full of color except maybe Kansas. I have no color so I belong in Kansas. For me the rest of the world is a dream; an imagination I can’t have because everybody knows that the best imaginations come in color.

Something in me breaks and suddenly I notice the red that is slowly growing on Sara’s face. She’s standing there looking at me a little confused. I don’t know what else to do so I burst out laughing and she’s stands there for about a second still looking confused but then a smile creeps on to her lips and she’s laughing too and the sound of it floods the whole room in color. Finally we calm down so we don’t look stupid to people passing in the corridor.

“I was just about to go for a walk in the courtyard.” I say “want to come?”

Sara brightens visibly. “Sure, at least until Shura gets back.”

We walk for about twenty minutes in the courtyard and looking down at the yellow brick passing underneath my feet somehow I feel different. The wind starts blowing for a bit and then I’m certain I’ve left Kansas.

The next day I find myself walking out of my last class in a dream. The whole day has felt like a dream in fact. Except for accidentally cutting my hand fixing breakfast, everything has been fine. The kitchen held a faint scent of garlic when I woke up this morning and the sky outside had put on its best azure dress instead of its usual bell bottom blue. When I finished reading my short story in my writing class this morning a girl in front of me tapped me on the shoulder and told me she thought my writing was beautiful. It was the girl who played with her dog in the courtyard.  I never noticed she was actually in one of my classes. She is one of those really beautiful, really strong, really independent types. She is the kind of girl that has been on an adventure before and knows how to navigate things herself. Her name is Dorothy. I’m going to meet up with her meet up her later so we can walk her dog Toto together. We might even go to Denny’s with Shura and Sara after that because she already knows Shura and has met Dorothy once. I go out into the courtyard because I know that there is a pig roast going on and a bunch of guys are all hanging around. They are about to start a chant and Shura is there in his fraternity wear and so is Sara who is wearing a white rose in her hair. Shura breaks into a smile when he sees me and quickly beckons me over.  Suddenly I feel a pain in my hand and realize I didn’t bandage my hand well so it’s bleeding again. I don’t know why but I smile at the wound. I’m hurt and damaged but I’m alive.

Reviews

[Coyote Poetry]

A very good short story. I like the main character. You gave her strength and weaknesses. I like the location and the situations. Good conversation and action gave life to the short story. I like the way you ended the story. At least she was in one piece. Thank you for sharing the excellent story.
Coyote

[Stefon Napier]

Hey All Please Comment at this I seriously want some feedback on this. This is my first short story.