I
According to spectators, the most notable thing about Dan, aside from his big bushy beard that covers most of his face, is his apparent need for his lonesomeness. With a cigar always present and lit in his mouth, and hardly ever uttering a word, and his glass of beer in front of him, Dan sat there looking at the young drinking, talking, smoking, dancing, and kissing around him. Some speculated that he likes being around youth, always unable to touch it yet the act of observation is enough for him to be reminded of his own youth and keeps his soul alive and youthful. Some reckoned that he “likes them young.” Some said he used to always come to this local pub with his wife, and they usually meet their friends and neighbors here. And now that they are gone, he, with all the faith his soul can muster, kept the traditional alive. The speculation even went to say he could see his wife sitting beside him looking at him with her soft and loving eyes as he smoked and drank.
Every time a new person visits the pub, it is always the case that Dan’s out of place presence is noted and brought up in a conversation filled with whispered rumors. But as the person makes more visits and almost becomes a regular that interest, that once was so intense that a person would think of becoming a spy to figure out the mystery, dims and withers away. A spotlight drops on Dan, he becomes a superstar for a couple of nights, then the crowd circles around him and he is buried under the shade of the mass of young bodies.
Some said that he liked the attention his mysterious presence brings to him from time to time. They went so far to say that once he was prom king in high school. He was the popular kid, married his high school sweetheart, his prom queen, and they went to start their beautiful and exciting life after high school. As age caught up with them, and as the beauty of youth decayed, both of them realized the grave mistake they both made as young and beautiful high school kids. At that point, never leaving their small town to pursue more ambitious jobs, thus knee-deep in debt and crushed under the heavy burden of responsibility and the stability of suburban life, things turned into an ugly battle of divorce and custody of their two daughters. His high school sweetheart won both, on the grounds that he is a “drunken irresponsible fool,” and took their two daughters to another town, one that he is not aware of, where she became a very successful real estate agent and raised the girls on the hatred of their “abandoning father.”
Not all stories warned of the tragic fall of a man that once was a great hope for all young kids in the community. And not all of them necessary involved a wife, or even kids. One story that went around for a while in the pub and was told to every new comer reeked of hope. The story went that he was actually the owner of the pub, and he comes to have his alone time away from the worrisome and quiet life of the suburb. Here, he can enjoy his cold beer and cigar without worrying about the cost of living, taxes, his kids’ college funds or the constant nagging of his wife. He comes here for the chance to be immersed in the energy and movements of youth, for the hope and excitement that shine from their faces and dancing movements, and to remember the time when he, himself, was just a spec of dust drifting aimlessly with the relentless movement of life at its beginnings, when one is innocent and unburdened. But even this story, which admittedly had some tragic elements to it, was not proven like every other story. Also, like every story told about Dan, it got no reaction from Jimmy, the bartender, who would respond to every story with the same scoffing statement “Just leave the old man alone in peace.”
The passionate tone that overwhelmed Jimmy’s annoyed and angry response led some to believe that he was actually his biological father that once gave him up for adoption and in his recent years came back to him seeking forgiveness. The striking resemblance between the two gave this new theory the push it needed to circle around enough to reach Jimmy. When it did, Jimmy laughed as he was immersed in one of his bartending duties and said “My father is long dead. Goddamn these kids! They will not let them both rest in life or death.”
II
Ever so composed and quiet, Dan never gave heed to these rumors. He would rather give other things his devoted attention. Yet, hardly anything really caught his attention. For him, he simply liked to burry himself in the company of others while he swam across oceans and flew over fields and mountains of pure imagination. His most joyous moments were lived inside of him, in thought, when he leapt back into life’s natural state of unconsciousness. The spectators can stare, they can whisper with their young freshly kissed mouths. They can even come and sit at his table. Nearly nothing bothered him, which made those mysteries even more enticing.
The way he saw it is that the world thought of him, and thus every single action of his, as symbols and indicators. He saw his actions as extensions of his human nature; the same human nature that he spent a considerable amount of his life contemplating over. As he knows it to be a major factual and practical part of his psyche, that same human nature believed that it will not be understood in a matter of seconds, days or even years. And it will not be understood even when it is told in a story that has a linear, or even a non-linear, narrative and infused with metaphors, symbols and images. For his life was embedded in chaos for the most part, and the fact that he considers that chaos to be enchantingly beautiful will not change the truth that it is chaotic.
For Dan, the world is decisively divided into two groups in that aspect; those who embraced the chaos as it is and never tried to strip it out of its inherent beauty, and those who went idiotically against it, suffering and raging and surely falling without reaping any kind of solace from any of it. Those who sat idly as the world moved around them, adhering to their animalistic and innate nature of letting the world go by without bothering to control it and submit it to their whimsical human made up order, they are the ones that knew what true solace meant. Those are the ones that lived in the moment, letting the light die as it was intended to. As for the others, they quiver uncomfortably, denying reality and its limits, and denying the existence of the chaotic forces of nature, trying to gather the pieces and make sense of the senseless and give meaning to the meaningless. Those, even in their imbecile belief that they are the victorious ones with their small attempts to rage against the dying of light, are on the losing side.
Yet, he knew he needed those as much as he needed the ultimate belief, which was opposed to theirs, his own human heart held. Even though he knew the chaos is too powerfully true to let light be ragingly alive. Despite his own truth and conviction, he needed those with wishful feeble hearts; those who kept bleeding with hope and danced with love to light the fire of their youthful nights. It is a great contradiction that he, alongside his unshaking belief of the truth of life that he held, learned to live with and accept.
Perhaps it was his old and dying heart playing their idiotically hopeful game, yearning with nostalgia, and raging against the dying of light. He does not have the power to fight anymore. Life has stripped him of any source of energy that could help him in this endeavor. Similarly, and following his own belief system of passive nonresistance, he could not give heed to those rumors even if he tried; for he has learned with age and struggle that he only has himself to offer to the world, and if the world is not okay with it, he is okay with that fact.
III
It was a cloudy night with a heavy dampness that coated the atmosphere, yet the sky did not threaten of any gloom. The college students came in clusters and quickly filled up the pub. The empty cold spaces were filled with warm half drunken bodies. Dan, as usual, moved around adjusting himself to the loss of vastness, settling in the end in a corner closer to the backdoor of the pub’s closed patio area. He sat, as usual, with a pint of cold beer sitting on the table in front of him dripping with sweat and a recently lit cigar dangling from his mouth. His eyes moved around never really settling their gaze on anybody, and seeing through everything at the same time.
As the usual suffocation filled the room, intensified this time by the dampness that lingered in the air, Dan felt tightness in his chest. He moved his hand to the pint and held it and felt the coldness caressing his warm hand and its sweat seeping down through his fingers. He loosened his grip and removed the dangling cigar from his mouth. He looked intently across the room with a gaze sifting through the masses. He closed his eyes and felt the tightness to try to control his body. His attempt failed. The pain did not get any worse or lessen; it just lingered for a while as it is. He kept his eyes closed, and darkness was all there is for a moment. After a considerable amount of time the pain started to fade. It felt as if it got bored with Dan’s chest and moved to another place seeking more excitement from facing a real challenge.
Dan opened his eyes, and it felt like he was seeing the place for the first time as the place took shape slowly. He placed his big hand on the table, pushed himself back a little, and then stood up. His sudden action did not bother or alert anyone. He stood up in his place for a while, still holding his burning cigar in one hand. Amidst the masses, Dan spotted Jimmy, who is used to getting out from behind the bar to mingle with regulars and smoke, wearing his usual bright white shirt that contrasted his growing almost-bushy dark beard. For a second, after the mist began to cover everything, their eyes met. Holding his cigarette and engaged in conversation, Jimmy’s eyes glittered when he saw the old man like the stream of life ceased and he is suddenly awake. A faint sincere smile appeared on Jimmy’s face. A striking pain was now apparent in Dan’s eyes. He attempted a similar move, but he was not sure he succeeded. Dan nodded a gentle and graceful nod, which in return made Jimmy’s smile more visible, and Jimmy slightly nodded back. The mist began to thicken and move quickly making everything seem like a nostalgic childhood memory.
As the first drops of rain began to fall on the already wet earth, Dan, unusually early, stumbled out of the door of the pub. He stopped and looked down at his hands that were not holding a grip anymore, and realized that he must have dropped his cigar along the way. Slowly, he walked gently into the dark rainy night. When he reached the corner of the pub to make his way out of the back, he saw a dashing young man leaning against the wall. The young man was talking to someone on his phone away from the noise. “I mean, come on. I am only 18! How can you expect me to make such a choice that I’ll probably think is dumb later in life!” Dan heard him say with a voice that was cutting through the quiet. The words seemed to shudder across the drops of rain, which increased now but still dropped ever so tenderly. Dan looked at the young man, and the young man looked back flustered. “You’re 18. It is okay to be dumb at 18.” Dan said with the words flying swiftly out of his mouth.
Dan made his way across the small parking lot behind the pub. The noise of youth began to fade away as he stumbled towards the trees that rested at the edge of the parking lot. It all felt solemnly together, that now everything is in order. There was no other sound but the sound of rain peacefully and repeatedly tapping his body. A tempting darkness engulfed everything behind the trees. Dan looked ahead and saw the familiar lit alleyway in the distance nestling between the sleeping buildings.
He has crossed it so many times since he was a young kid. As he was crossing it now, a memory of him as a kid playing with his friends in this alleyway that was across from his home passed through his mind. The rain seemed to linger in the air now turning into mist yet again. The small, nearly invisible drops of mist reflected the light, through which he saw everything. He can see his dimly lit home now across the street at the end of the alleyway.
He put his hand on the handle of the door. It came as no surprise that the handle was as warm as his hand. He turned the handle to open the door. The door made its usual squeaky sound. Dan stepped into the warmth, and closed the door behind him. Everything dropped into silence after the sound of the door closing vanished. With a gravelly voice he said, “Honey, I’m home!”
محمد حسيّان العنزي 