Spectator Sport

            The man was playing a game.  Now he was behind a gravestone, now he wasn’t.  Now he was crawling, now he was crouching, now he was leaping once more from behind a gravestone.  The game had started out fairly simply.  No real intention or motive, just an urge that had been followed through with.  He found himself behind a gravestone, nose nearly touching the delicately mossy back and he thought to himself, now, what would happen if I just jumped out from here?  He almost let out a little laugh with the thought because it was just so ridiculous, but he realized that if his leap was to really be a surprise, he mustn’t make any noise before hand.  His head swiveled right, left, no one in sight.  Again, a little giggle nearly escaped, but he swallowed it.  He was going to be sneaky, and sneaky people didn’t give themselves away on whim.  If he were to sneak properly, he’d have to focus.

            He let out a deep breath, slowly so only the moss could hear. After a good pause, to be sure all would be caught unawares, he leapt from behind the stone with a fair sized bellow.  He had gone for medium volume, not wanting to shock any of the people whose houses bordered the cemetery.  Perfect execution.

            For his second tombstone he’d chosen one Albert Greeley, enjoying the way the man’s last name reminded him of grated cheese.  The third, Tabitha Greeley, because it was next to Albert’s.  By the fourth though, the man had figured out that if he ran in a crouched zigzag, he left only a small margin of time within which anyone would be able to spot him.  By now, the dew had begun to infiltrate the worn canvas of his Chuck Taylor’s leaving a pattern around the soles resembling a small mountain range.

            The fourth was Elliott Cassover, then Jane Howard, then Howard Jay, a match he had found particularly pleasing.  By the seventh, the man had abandoned his zigzag pattern, favoring instead an all out commando crawl.  Scuffing up his jeans and leaving grass stains on the elbows of his newly pressed flannel shirt, the man sped from one stone to another, feet trailing, tummy tight.  He perfected his technique with each stone, cutting down on traveling time so as to maximize the anticipation time spent hiding behind each grave.  He found the longer he hid, the more satisfying the end result, so he pressed his face against he lichen-carpeted backs of the stones breathing in the smell of loam and willing himself to stay just a little longer.  Sometimes, the urge to leap was too great, and he jumped too soon.  Mostly though, the soft dew against his face was enough.  The moss sent out its little hooked tentacles and steadied him, clinging to his stubble, getting stuck in his eyebrows, so that when he jumped he felt as fierce as the Loch Ness Monster.

            Or at least, that was how I imagined it had all started.  Sitting by my study window watching him sneak and leap and creep and steal and jump, it would be a lie to say I was not a little envious.  I had started watching almost an hour ago when a medium sized bellow had shocked me.  And for all intents and purposes, I decided that this had been the first leap, and had been watching ever since.  My tea had long gone cold, and the chess pieces had long lost hope of ever finishing their battle.  I was fixated on this creeping leaping figure, and could not, even if I had wanted to, tear my eyes away.  Fierce as the Loch Ness Monster.          

            He moved, making the rounds from the daffodils by the stone  wall, to the weeping willow and the wrought iron fence, until he was directly under my window.  It was now eleven in the morning, and the sun was behind my house.  He found the shadow between the plaster wall and Blethyn Jones, and waited. 

            I had shrunk away from the window as he sped towards me, elbows whirring and feet trailing, and now, with his back to my wall, we breathed together.  My house contracted around me in anticipation.  A minute went by.  Having moved back from the window so as not to be spotted, he was now completely out of sight.  I didn’t have to see him to feel the spring building inside.  Each breath we took synonymously rattled my throat and shook my shoulders.  We breathed, building the spring.  Another minute.  We were still breathing together, but now I wasn’t so sure who was doing more of the breathing.  Did we have an equal share of breath anymore?  The third minute.  Was he getting enough oxygen?  My house was still contracted in anticipation, but I was gulping now, with every breath we took together.  Too much oxygen.  But he was sneaking, and that’s what sneakers do, they surprise you.  Any moment now.  Fourth minute.  I was worried.  He was sneaking, I knew, but I was still worried.  Fifth minute.  Was he dead?  What was he doing under my window?  Didn’t he know the anticipation had gone long enough?  We were ready to keep playing the game.  Sixth minute.  The only thing left for me to do was to check on him.  I was going to break protocol.  It had existed, unspoken between us, and I knew he trusted me to uphold it.  This game was no ordinary game after all.  But a fallen soldier is never left behind.  I eased my chair forward, allowing the wheels to roll gently over the wood floor.  Seventh minute.  Just half a meter before the man would be visible.  I focused on breathing and keeping the squeaky wheel quiet.  Eighth minute.  I had reached the window.

            Gently craning my neck, careful not to let my glasses slip from my nose, I peeked past the window sill.  Past the newly repainted cedar sill with eggshell finish, I directed my eyes downwards.

            There he was.

            “Whoa,” he said, affronted, zipping up his fly quickly and crossing his arms across his chest.  “Can’t a bloke pee in peace?”

            I retracted my head.

            “Wanker,” he said.

The Tea Party

            Jessica approached the stuffed rabbit, teapot in hand.  The water inside sloshed about and a little escaped from the plastic spout, landing on the mauve carpet.

            “Would you like to come to my tea party, Mr. Rabbit?” she said.

            “No,” he replied.

            Jessica began crying, and the teapot fell.  The carpet turned purple.

Cameron

            Cameron had never been very good with technology.  Now, trying to lift the TV, he realized only after it turned on that he had forgotten to unplug it. 

            Now you, too, can be HARDER BETTER FASTER STRONGER, the small black box blared.  Shocked, he dropped the TV, leaving the swimming image of a tan and muscular man parallel to the beige carpeted floor.  Wow, Jim, it really works came a woman’s voice-over as the attractive man gave a wink.  Cameron desperately fumbled for the controls.  Whipping the remote out of his bag, his finger found ‘mute’ just as a light turned on down the hall.  Panicking, he looked for the door, but the Daft Punk allusion had got his brain started and he couldn’t think for all the electronica crowding his head.  Work it Make it Do it Makes us sang Cameron’s brain as he rushed towards the nearest window.  But too late.

            “Hey!  Who the hell are you?” came a man’s voice from behind him.

            HARDER whirling around BETTER eyes focusing FASTER the man had a bat STRONGER “cameron.”

            “What?”

            “Uhh...” Cameron’s throat was dry.  “Umm...” he placed his backpack gently on the floor in front of him and held up his hands. “Cameron,” he said once again, eyeing the bat.  “That’s my name.  You said ‘who the hell are you’ and I said ‘Cameron’ because that’s my name.”  His collar was beginning to itch.  more than our hour never pulsed Cameron’s head.

            “Oh,” replied the man, his grimace giving way to a broad grin, “that’s my name too!”  Still wielding the bat, he began to approach Cameron.  “What a coincidence that another Cameron should show up in my house in the middle of the night stealing all of my things!”  He was raising that bat over his head.

            ever after work is over went Cameron’s head, his eyes on the bat.  Rawling slugger.  uhoh

            “I don’t know if I’ve ever even met another Cameron,” the man continued.  He adjusted his grip on the bat, closing in on Cameron who was now stuck in the corner.

            over over over over sang Cameron’s head, stuck on the last note.  over over over over the bat was clouding his vision, gleaming blue in the vicarious light of the TV set.

            “Hello, CAMERON,” the man said, putting extra stress on the name.  Still grinning, he swung.

            over over over over over over over over        

.........

            Cameron allowed one of his eyes to open a crack.  “Be harder than ever before!  It really works!” read the TV screen.  The steel surface floated among the tops of Cameron’s hairs.

            “Haha,” the man laughed, “I’m just joshin’ ya.”  He gave Cameron’s arm a playful punch and retracted his bat hand.  “I couldn’t do something like that!  Especially not to a fellow ‘Cameron’!”  His grin had returned.  “Here, see?  I’ll just put it down over here.”  He placed the bat on a nearby desk, and still grinning reached out and ruffled up Cameron’s hair.  “No harm done, right?”  He extended his hand.  “Friends?”

            Cameron was numb.  With no feeling in his jaw, his mouth hung open, his left hand twitched and the right side of his body was slumping.  He was in no way equipped to deal with that kind of shock.

            “Friends?” the man asked again, a flash of malice finding expression in his voice.  It was enough to return the feeling to Cameron’s right side.

            “Mmm.”  Sliding his jaw shut, Cameron swung his hand out to meet the man’s sweaty palm.  He forced the corners of his mouth upwards.  His tongue felt like a sesame stick.

            “Well then, I suppose you’re free to go.”  The man stepped aside, allowing Cameron to slide out from the corner. 

            Cameron crept across the living room, gaining momentum as he went.  He kept his eyes fixed on the television screen, watching the handsome man dance with two bikini-clad models.  He didn’t want to seem too eager to leave.  Making it to the door, he nearly cried out in relief as his feverish hand made contact with the cool iron handle.  He could feel the man’s eyes on his back as he turned the knob.  Click went the lock.

            “JUST KIDDING!”

            The door wouldn’t budge.  Cameron whipped around, his right side once again nearly giving out from shock.  He grabbed a coat hook on the wall opposite just in time to stop himself from crashing to the ground.

            The man was laughing.  “You can’t leave yet!  You still have to pay me for emotional damages!” he managed to spit out in between spurts of laughter.

            “What?”  The tanned man on the TV gave a wink and a thumbs up.

            “Well you don’t think it’s been easy for me, do you?  Having someone break into my house, scare me nearly out of my wits.  I know you’re really a great guy now, but when I first saw you... you could have been a stone-cold killer for all I knew!”  The man’s mood had once again turned somber.

            “Well, but I don’t have any money,” Cameron grappled desperately.  He tried turning the knob behind his back, but had no more luck than before.

            “Mmm...”  There was a thoughtful pause, and then the man’s eyes lit up.  “Ahhh, I do.  I can just give you some!”  His hands flew towards his robe pockets and emerged with wads of bills in his fists.  “Here you go!” he said triumphantly, flitting across the room towards Cameron, scattering the excess notes as he went.  “Here, you take these.”  He stuffed the pieces of paper into Cameron’s hand, “and then I’ll go out and pretend that I’ve just discovered you.”  He was beaming.

            Cameron mustered a nod.

            The man bustled towards the hallway from which he had come, and once out of sight, yelled back to Cameron “Alright, are you ready?”

            “Mmm,” replied Cameron, a weak affirmative, as he shuffled towards the nearest window.

            “Look dangerous!” the man instructed him peppily, “Start pretending to steal stuff!”

            Cameron grabbed a chair, allowing the money to fall to the floor in the process.

            “Are you stealing stuff?”

            “Uh huh... yeah,” answered Cameron, heaving the chair up over his shoulder.

            “Alright, I’m coming in!” the man yelled back.  “Be threatening!”  His voice was bubbling from excitement.

            There was a pause, and a shatter of glass.  Cameron was out the broken window in a moment, leaving a mist of floating bills in his wake.  Just a moment too late, the man’s look of feigned anger slowly melted, giving way to one of deep sorrow as he arrived in the room just in time to see Cameron’s back disappear from view.

            “Wait!” he yelled, at Cameron’s retreating shadow.  “Wait, come back!  You’re supposed to come back now!  You’re not supposed to leave!  That’s not how it--”