The Shoveler: Existence
Mom got a job at a used-car lot two weeks ago. She gets off at four on weekdays and she has weekends off. We’ve been able to share the car so I can go to Marla and Gottfried’s house to work, but she’s getting fed up with it, even though I’m the only one who puts gas in the tank. All I want is a shower after a long day. She seems to want to complain about how we need to figure out what to do about the car.
“Maybe one of the guys at your work can find me something cheap,” I say.
“You’d need insurance.”
“I can pay for insurance,” I say.
She doesn’t like that I make enough money to afford insurance. I’m not even sure if I can. I’m not even sure if she can. I’m just trying to find a solution to her being pissed off that I take the car the minute she gets home. It’s not like she goes anywhere at night or on weekends. Mostly, she texts Mike next door even though he’s right there, in his house, watching baseball and controlling his mind.
I decide to take a walk.
I’ve been painting Marla and Gottfried’s house for three weeks now. My arms hurt, but I can feel them getting stronger. I like the relaxing art of house painting. I like to think it’s helping me somehow. I don’t realize how fast I’m walking until I get ten blocks away inside of what feels like five minutes. So much for being relaxed.
Slow down.
Take a deep breath.
I pretend like Mom being mad at me doesn’t affect me, but it does. Not just her, either. If a stranger was mad at me, I’d feel something deeper than I should. Like shame or something. I can’t explain it. I’m guessing it’s my father again, like a part of me is always going to be nervous and ashamed of him and me and Mom. But mostly me.
I turn around before I get to the center of town and I start walking back toward our apartment. There’s a sound I can’t figure out, but I’m walking toward it. It’s too late for anyone to make this much noise. Sounds like someone digging.
“Can you help me out of here?”
This question comes at me from the rain drain at the bottom of our block. I’m hearing things. Clearly. I keep walking.
“Come back! It’s me!”
I look around. The people who live on the corner have a big hedge. I look behind it. No one.
“In the drain!”
I look into the drain grate and she’s there. The girl who tried to light snowflakes on fire. She says, “Can you lift this?”
I lift it and she climbs out.
“Thank you so much,” she says. “That place is fucked up.”
“The sewer?”
“It was like a submarine,” she says. “Lots of people down there.”
“Okay.”
“I’m stoned. Sorry,” she says. “It’s been a while and what do I have to lose, right?”
“If I was trapped in the sewer, I’d probably get stoned, too,” I say. “How’d you get down there?”
“How do I get anywhere?” she asks.
She grabs my hand and it instantly starts sweating. I try to make it stop, but it just gets worse. We walk toward my house.
“Can’t go to my house. My mom’s in a mood,” I say.
She keeps walking.
“It’s nice to see you,” I say.
“Stop being so nervous,” she answers. “It’ll all work out fine.”
I want to ask her what “it” is, but I just follow her up the road. She still doesn’t use sidewalks, it seems.
Mike’s house glows with TV light—probably more baseball.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Don’t have a name.”
“Everyone has a name,” I say.
“The Freak,” she says.
I don’t know what this means. She notices.
“My name is The Freak. Or just freak. Or The Freakish one. Lady freak. Whatever twist you want to put on it. Freak. That’s me.”
“Okay.”
“I’m The Freak and you’re the shoveler.”
I’m embarrassed now. Carrying a shovel around with me like some crazy person. She obviously heard.
“You’ll find a lot underground if you keep digging,” she says.
I’m puzzled. “I’m not digging. It’s a snow shovel.”
“Shovel’s a shovel.”
I never really liked stoners. This is why. “Okay.”
“You can do whatever you want. You’ve got arms. You’ve got legs. You’ve got existence. Don’t waste it. Trust me.”
I have existence? What the fuck is that supposed to mean? I’m suddenly sweating all over my body.
“Got a smoke?”
I smile. I nod. I grab her hand this time and we walk to the bench in front of the church—the one on the opposite side from my house.
She sits with her legs out and leans back so relaxed and I envy her. She truly doesn’t give a shit about impressing anyone. Her feet are splayed out. She doesn’t push her chest out like most girls do; she lets it sink into the gap between the sky and the bench.
I’m surprisingly relaxed by this, but my brain won’t stop the variables. Why did she wait three weeks to show up again? Where did she come from? Where does she live? Why is her name The Freak? How do I show her that I’m a brain man? The movies I make run one after the other. All the variables. “What did you mean when you said I had existence?” I ask. Sounds smart. Brain-man kind of thing to say.
She inhales from the cigarette and holds it in and then exhales while answering so the smoke escapes her mouth as she forms out the syllables. “Existence is wasted on the living.”
“You’re stoned.”
She takes another pull off the cigarette. “What do you think happens when we die?” she asks. “You believe in Heaven and Hell and all that shit?”
We’re outside a Catholic church, sitting on a bench next to a statue of Mary. “This is the closest I ever got to a church. Wasn’t even baptized,” I say.
“So?”
“So, I don’t really believe in Heaven and Hell, no.”
“So, you’re an atheist.”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. I believe in something but I don’t quite know how to explain it.”
I try to ignore the feeling inside me. I can’t breathe. My chest is tight and there’s sweat running down my back. I try to take a deep breath.
“You ever know anyone who died?” she asks.
“Yeah.” I think of my dad. I don’t know if he’s dead or not, but he may as well be. Dead. Never existed. Existence is wasted on the living, I guess. At least for my dad.
“Wanna know what I think?” she asks. “I think when we die we all become part of a larger thing—a place where everyone who ever died lives. Not like Heaven. Not like Hell. Nothing really exists there. There’s no beer or anything. Or swing sets or shovels. It’s just thoughts. Ideas. Like a big bubble of ideas.”
“I like it,” I say.
“You’d better,” she answers and flicks her cigarette into the bush next to the statue of Mary.
“I really like you,” I say. My eyes are closed and my sweat is soaking now, through my sweatshirt. I flick my cigarette toward the same bush she flicked hers into. I wait for her to say what she said in my movie. Same movie’s been running through my head for three weeks. I say I really like you and she’s supposed to say I really like you, too. But she isn’t saying anything at all.
I don’t want to open my eyes now. But I do, and I find I’m sitting on the bench alone.
Look left. Look right. No one. Just the statue of Mary.
I run around the church. No one. I run home and grab my shovel from the front porch and go to the sewer drain. I try to take the grate off it again, but it’s bolted down.
This makes no sense.
So much of my life makes no sense.
I think about going to watch baseball with Mike. We’ve been doing it pretty regularly and I was right about him being my only friend here. I don’t want to see Mike, though. I want to find The Freak.
I walk my shovel back to the nearby rich area—it’s a little town on the edge of this city with a fountain on its Main Street and a big park. Maybe she’s here. Maybe she’s rich. I walk around for a few hours, and when people look at me sideways because of the shovel, I just start pretending to shovel with it. Why not, right? I have existence. I can do whatever I want.