Maladroit

He cannot shake this choking feeling. Telling Brian Fonda he needs the data for first quarter should be an easy task, but not for John. He awkwardly shuffles over to Brian’s cubicle and knocks softly, nearly inaudibly, on his cubical wall. Brian, used to John’s painfully self-conscious behavior, has tuned his ears to listen for John’s subtle movements. He politely responds to his request and hands him a folder from his wraparound desk.

“I’ll quickly copy this and return it to you right away,” John solemnly vows.

“Don’t worry about it,” Brian attempts to calm him as he briskly walks away.

He begins making copies, enjoying the tedious solitary activity. He removes the stack of papers from the folder, inserts it into a tray of the copier, and hits start. The machine whirrs and eats the top sheet, depositing it upside-down in the tray below. It spits out a replica in a tray on the other side as it eats more paper from the original tray. He watches the repetitive motions of the paper as the machine moves it through itself. He watches as each blank paper enters the machine, more useful when it is dropped from tray, warm from the whirring parts, inscribed with copied information.

Nearly three quarters of the way through the stack of papers, a motion, a flash of a bright red blouse, catches his eye and pulls him out of his temporary escape. A woman walks by, wearing a long, beaded necklace. His eyes briefly follow the red pendant at the end of her necklace. Her dark brown hair blows back slightly in the wind of her walk. As she approaches, he stiffens and watches her out of the corner of his eye. She glances at him briefly, not noticing him watching her. He keeps his head down and she keeps on walking. She would have said hello if he had looked up, but he emanates an uncomfortable air that turns her and many others away.

She moves past him but he keeps on watching where she walked, even when she turns the corner and is completely out of his view. Little did he know that his copy had finished a minute ago.

“John?” a voice from the back interrupts. He jumps, embarrassed and ashamed for getting caught staring at Julia. He looks down and sees the finished copy and assumes the voice saw him watching Julia.

“Oh, I-I was just….uh…finishing.” He shuffles the papers into his hands and feels a need to explain himself. “Julia…sh-she was just…just walking by…” he stumbles out as he clutters the papers. He turns around and nearly bumps into Rose, another colleague, waiting to use the copier.

“Jules? What does she have to do with anything?” she questions, surprised by the mention of Julia.

“Oh…it’s nothing….” He attempts to dismiss the issue, now worried that he said too much. He shuffles around her to give her access to the printer, mumbling small apologies in the process.

Still muttering to himself, he drops the clutter of originals on Brian’s desk. Startled, Brian hears John talking to himself and looks at the disorganized pile of papers. He attempts to ask what is wrong but John had already returned to his desk.

At his desk, John mentally tortures himself. Why did Julia bring him out of his daydream? No one ever does. She even seemed to notice him, which no one ever does. What if she had said hello? How would he respond? He coasts through life invisible, which makes him comfortable.

Distracting thoughts prevent him from getting back into his work and five o’clock comes sooner than normal. After an unproductive afternoon, he saves the little work he did and shuts down his computer right as the second hand reaches twelve. In one fluid motion, he stands up and slings his messenger bag onto his shoulder. He hustles out of the office without talking to anyone.

His office lies in the middle of a block across from a park. Rather than walking through the middle of stopped traffic, he walks all the way down to the crosswalk and waits the extra time to get the signal to walk. As he walks across he hears several different cars honk and then the screeching of tires. All of a sudden a red car stops just before it hits him and the driver drops his phone. John jumps in surprise and fears for his life. The driver’s eyes express distress and apologies, knowing he made a nearly fatal mistake. John’s emotions go immediately from surprised to scared to angry, not because he was nearly killed but because the driver broke the rules.

He glares at the driver and continues walking, following the sidewalk of the park to his bus station. Sitting on the bus bench, he pulls out exact change for the fare. He stares straight ahead at the blank brick wall ahead of him, ignoring the passing people who briefly notice how awkward he looks, then forget him and walk on. The bus arrives a couple minutes behind schedule, which bothers him slightly. He gives the driver a glance as he put the change in the coin slot. The bus is nearly empty but he takes the first aisle seat so no one will sit next to him.

The doors close and the bus begins to travel down the road towards his apartment. The roar of the engine drowns out his thoughts and he loses himself in the passing sights. He sees all the people he will never talk to, all the unknown faces he attempts to avoid. All the buildings he always passes but will never enter, all the gum-covered sidewalks on which he will never walk. The signs of Citizen’s Bank business building and the neon signs of a cleaners pierce his mind. After 33 years of constant advertising, he has learned to ignore it. He normally loses himself in his thoughts. But today is different. Today his thoughts are filled with Julia. He needs to find an escape from his mind.

He hopes to find salvation from his internal torment when he is safe in his apartment. If only the bus would move faster. Traffic blocks his path to escape. While he normally does not pay attention to his surroundings, today feels like the traffic is heavier, making him take longer to get home the one day he needs to be there. He needs to get out of here.

“Hey,” he interrupts the bus driver’s concentration. “Is there any way to hurry this up?” he asks rudely.

“Sir, there are hundreds of cars in front of me. I can’t do anything,” the bus driver retorts defensively. The bus moves forward a couple feet and then stops again with the traffic. The driver briefly looks back to look at the face of the voice, as if to confirm the silent, awkward man, who has never uttered a word, actually spoke. John’s leg begins to tap impatiently, needing to be at home, needing the bus to move faster. It is too far and too cold to walk home.

“I don’t know what’s up with the traffic. It’s heavier than normal.” The driver adds, attempting to make friendly conversation. John barely nods in response.

“I heard there is a fire down the street,” a college-aged woman adds, looking up from her phone. “Just read it on the news. Sounds like it was a big fire. That’s probably why there’s traffic.”

John looks down the road looking for the fire, for the end of the traffic. Why would this fire come at such an inconvenient time?

Twenty long, silent minutes later, the bus finally pulls up to John’s stop, about a block and a half from his apartment.

He slings his bag over his shoulder and steps out, smelling smoke. The fire must be near. No wonder the traffic was so much thicker the closer he got to his stop. He walks down the street, his legs heavier than normal. As he turns onto his own street, he hears the distant sound. A red fire truck blares past him, sirens wailing. He looks down towards his apartment building and sees the flashing lights, the black, billowing smoke.

In a daze, he approaches the choking air, unable to comprehend how this will inconvenience him. Walking slowly, he moves around a temporary barrier, ignoring policemen and firemen who attempt to prevent his entrance. With glassy, distant eyes, he looks to the firemen to his right.

“What happened to my apartment?” John asks quietly, pointing a limp finger to the burning building. The policemen and firemen immediately release their grip on the poor man.

“You live here?” John nods. The men around him express sympathy for this strange, awkward man. One policeman ushers him away from the other men.

“You got anyone you can room with for the night?”

 John remains quiet.

“You got a phone you can call someone with?”

He thinks to the old flip phone deep in his bag and nods. The policeman pats him on the back and walks away.

He remains paused, stuck in the reality of the present. His apartment, his haven, is gone? It cannot be. But, the policeman, the law, told him to call someone. He flips open his bag and reaches down, past old lint and a protein bar he never ate, to his phone. He presses the red power button and waits for it to turn on. Opening his contact list, he sees his one contact: Brian Fonda. As he waits for his call to connect, he looks up. Smoke continues to billow out. Firefighters run in and out, some empty handed, some with people. Fire hoses spray from all angles, dousing the slowly dying fire.

After several rings, a voice on the line answers, “Hello?’’

John remains silent, unsure what to do.

“Hello? John?”

He takes a breath and responds formally, “Hello. Brian. This is John Maladroit.”

“Yes, I know. I saw on the Caller ID. What’s going on?”

He pauses again. “I need a place to stay.”

Brian is quiet for a second, blind sighted that John would be asking him for a place to stay. Then generously, “Come on over. I got a fold out couch you can borrow. I live at 56 Beckonly Street, apartment 7C. Ring the bell when you get here and I’ll let you in.”

“Thank you. Goodbye.” John presses the red <End > button and hangs up. Beckonly Street is only a couple blocks over, so he shifts his bag and begins to walk. Traffic he was once in honks up and down the street, annoyed at the fire that burned his apartment down.

He reaches 56 Beckonly Street and enters through the big, wooden doors into the main entrance. After buzzing apartment 7C, a voice says, “Come on in,” and the door clicks unlocked.

In his stupor, he misses the elevator and walks up seven flights of stairs, his mind on the fire. Exhausted, he knocks on the door with 7C written at the top. It opens to reveal Brian, shocked at John’s exhausted post-traumatic state, somehow stranger than the way he acts every day. Brian catches him as he stumbles into his apartment.

“Come in,” he ushers him in. “Sit down.” He sits him down on his bed and takes a seat across from him on a small bench.

 He stares at him in silence for many moments as John stares at a random spot on the floor. Brian has never seen him in this state of mind. In fact, John has never called him for anything. He agreed to be his emergency contact and gave him his cell number, but he has never used it before. He decides to break the silence.

“What happened?” As soon as he said them, the words did not seem to fit the atmosphere. It was too soon to ask. For a moment John does not respond and he figures he did not hear him or is ignoring him.

Then, a tiny, quiet voice responds, “It’s gone.” Brian could barely hear him and attempts to politely ask him to repeat it.

“My apartment. It’s gone. Burned down.” A small gasp escapes Brian’s lips. He heard about a terrible fire from the news, which he turned off just as John knocked on his door.

“Oh, John,” he attempts to express his genuine sympathy. “You can stay here as long as you need to.”

There is quiet, and then John emits a small, “Thank you.”

John sits on Brian’s bed a moment longer. Brian leaves him to sit alone and walks to the kitchen. John does not follow time passing. He sees Brian eat pasta out of a pot and hears him talk to someone on the phone, but none of it registers in his mind. All of a sudden, he realizes he has no clothes.

“Jules and I want to take you out for drinks tonight. You can borrow some of my clothes tonight and we’ll go shopping tomorrow. I’m sure the boss won’t mind if you miss work tomorrow.”

John starts to protest, then hesitates and swallows his words.

“Don’t worry about it, John. It’s just one day. Jules and I will watch out for you. We’ve got your back.”

John sits back and observes his new situation, and, despite his sorrow, he smiles.