Pandemic Fantasy
The silence has a weight. It fills every space. It clogs the cells, like cement between the ears. The lack of human sounds.
She sits in her kitchen nursing a tepid mug of tea and straining to hear anything—the neighbour’s kids playing kick-ball in the street—their dad yelling at the cars going by, “Slow the fuck down! Where’s the fire? There’s kids here!” The boy, Jason she thinks, next door practicing his skateboard tricks—-slam, scrape, slam—his dark hair sticking out from under his backwards ball cap, his bony knees jutting out from torn, low-slung jeans. All of these sounds seem precious now. They were so annoying just weeks ago and now she misses them. Her heart aches for the noise of humans—the bubbling, rich, strident sounds of people living —alive—angry, joyful and sometimes supremely mundane. Now they’ve gone and there’s just this heavy, heavy emptiness.
She gets up quickly, the chair scraping on the tile floor. She dumps the remains of her tea in the sink, slamming the mug down on the counter a little too hard. “OK, OK” she says out loud, “Time for a walk.” I know we’re supposed to stay home, but I’ve got to get out. I’m going squirrelly here! And the word ‘squirrelly’ rises up in her head like a cartoon voice she must have heard when the kids were small.
She pulls her jacket on—a hat covering her stringy hair—overdue for a wash—but who’s noticing?
Out on the street—-empty, cars parked along the curb—dust settled on them. Somebody used their finger to print on the side of a truck—-‘Wash Me! I got a virus!’ Very funny, she thinks, I hope he washed his hands afterwards…probably not, people don’t care.
One lone person coming up the sidewalk—-two blocks away and yet she can feel how both of them alert and slow down. Should I cross the street? They continue walking towards each other. Maybe I’ll go up on the lawn if he doesn’t cross, she thinks. He’s tall, about her age—maybe 45 or so—sandy hair—a bit of grey on the sides. I like that. He’s close enough now that she can see laugh lines towards his mouth and creases near his eyes. He looks directly at her—-humour in those eyes—dark but with flecks of amber. I shouldn’t be this close, she thinks.( Don’t shoot til you see the whites of their eyes.) And yet a wave of sweetness flows through her —she feels safe—warm…and what is that? Hopeful….that’s it…an almost foreign feeling …but there it is.
She smiles at him—-they smile at each other. They step apart slightly to show respect, she thinks. They walk on, passing each other, but the wave of energy between them is electric. OMG, she thinks…who are you? She desperately wants to look back over her shoulder. What the hell, she thinks, we’re all going to die anyway!
She turns back and sees him walking backwards —-his hand (gloved she notices)—-waving at her. She raises her gloved hand at him, almost trips on a crack in the pavement and laughs. Turns to walk—the giggles pushing up into her mouth. If this was a movie, we’d run into each other’s arms and that would be The End—happily ever after. But this is not a movie—not even a public service announcement. This is a hard, scary pandemic reality.
She wipes the smile off her face and speeds up her steps. The heavy silence pulls around her again like a lead drape. But something breaks through, on a tree branch nearby—the open-throated trill of a robin.
She wrestles with her gloves to grab her phone. What time is it? 10.49 flashes on the screen. Tomorrow I’ll walk at 10.49 and maybe, just maybe , he’ll be there. And then what? she thinks. Who knows Buttercup? One wobbly step at a time.
And now she seems to hear a symphony—-her heart beating, birds singing, her shoes tapping on the sidewalk and then—what is that? On a balcony across the street someone is singing La Boheme.
Written on March 25, 2020 (before we were wearing masks:)