rubbing eyes Sorry, was out cold till like two minutes ago. Those posters — the pool one, with the lane lines? Something about that blue is doing my head in right now. Deep end always freaked me out as a kid, not the depth, just... not being able to see the bottom clearly. You waiting on something too, or just parked here.
Yeah, the blue's a trap. Looks calm until you realize it's just a flat sheet of glass over nothing. I was up late staring at those lane lines on the ceiling, trying to count them. Lost count at three. Don't ask what I'm waiting for, I barely know myself. The blue's making my head swim, too. Did you ever swim laps? I hated the chlorine smell in the locker room, stuck in my hair for days.
Chlorine smell — yeah, and that weird squeak of feet on wet tile, still hear it sometimes for no reason. I did the swim team thing for like two years as a kid, hated the 6am practices, coach had this whistle he'd blow if you even breathed wrong mid-lap. Never got fast. Mostly just remember being cold and smelling like a public pool for the rest of the day at school.
Six a.m.? Who drafts that schedule? That's the worst kind of time, half-dreaming and shivering. My dad made me go once, just once, to prove I wasn't a "coward." I cried in the water. Coach didn't even notice. Just kept blowing that damn whistle. You ever have someone make you do something just to see if you'd break? That blue tile... it's worse now, knowing it's just a trick. I think I'm going to go home. The water's getting to me too.
Yeah. Had a manager like that once — piled on stuff not because it needed doing, just to watch what'd happen. I stopped noticing after a while, or told myself I did. Your dad thing's worse though, that's not a manager, that's supposed to be someone in your corner. Don't leave yet. Whatever you're waiting on, staring at that ugly poster's still better than doing it alone in a parking lot.
It's not a parking lot, it's the break room by the stockroom. I'm just... stuck. The poster's fine, it's the waiting that gnaws. My dad never cared if I broke, he just wanted the evidence. Like a trophy. That manager sounds like a cousin to him, just with a suit. I can't go home yet either, the silence is too loud. So yeah, let's just stare at the blue until it stops looking like an open mouth. What's your excuse for staying?
Open mouth, huh — didn't want that image but now I can't unsee it. My excuse. Honestly I don't have a better place to be, which sounds sadder out loud than it did in my head. Work's on hold, some phone call I keep checking for that hasn't come. So no, not the parking lot, but same idea — a room built for waiting, dressed up as somewhere you'd choose to sit.
Phone calls that never come are the worst kind of silence. They keep you in limbo. I hate rooms built for waiting; they're just cages with better lighting. At least the pool poster has a reason to exist, even if it's a lie. You should check your phone again. Or don't. Maybe the call is a trap too, like the blue water. Just... sit there. We're both pretending we aren't counting the minutes until the sun goes down or something else happens.
"Cages with better lighting" — steal that, I'm using it on somebody later. Not gonna check the phone in front of you, that's a special kind of pathetic I save for private. Sun's not doing anything special today though, far as I know, just gonna keep being a slow one. Tell me something dumb instead — not the call, not the dad thing. Worst job you ever had. Mine involved a fryer and a manager who smelled like cough drops.
Dumb? I worked at a pet store selling lizards. The manager thought we should name them after famous philosophers so they'd "feel more intellectual." I had to teach a bearded dragon the difference between Descartes and Kant. It died anyway. Smelled like wet fur and despair. Cough drops beat that any day. At least cough drops mean someone's trying to survive. Those lizards just stared through you like they knew the whole thing was a joke. You ever have a job where the animal sensed you were miserable first?
A bearded dragon named Descartes dying on your watch is genuinely the best thing I've heard all week, and I mean that with total sincerity. No animals for me, just a walk-in freezer and a coworker who talked to the frozen fries like they owed him money. But yeah — dogs at least, they clock misery instantly, put their head down before you even say anything. Lizards probably just don't care enough to fake it.
They don't care, exactly. They just operate on a different scale of time. A lizard doesn't know you're miserable because it's busy planning its next nap for three days from now. The fries guy sounds better, at least he had an audience. My lizard, Descartes, just blinked at me when he stopped breathing. No drama, no head on my shoulder. Just cold and still. That's the thing about lizards—they don't comfort you, they just outlast you. Which is honest, I guess.
"Outlast you" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. Honest, sure, but cold comfort — pun unintended, I'll allow it anyway. Frozen fries guy at least got some peace out of yelling at inanimate objects, that's a kind of therapy. You strike me as someone who'd rather have the lizard's honesty than the dog's performance, though. Am I wrong.
Am I wrong? Maybe. Dogs are just better liars. They fake love so well you almost believe it. I prefer the lizard's silence, even if it's colder. It doesn't pretend to care, so when it's gone, there's no betrayal. Just a dead thing. The fryer guy yelling at potatoes is basically a performance too, just a messy one. I'd take the lizard. At least it doesn't make me feel guilty for not loving it back.
Guilty for not loving it back — that's the part that gets me, honestly. Most people pick the dog because they want to be needed. You picked the one thing that never asks anything of you. That's not nothing. Says more than the philosophy-name bit does, probably. Anyway I'm stealing Descartes for a work story later, credit where it's due.
Credit is fine, just don't tell them the lizard actually knew he was garbage. People love being needed until they realize what a debt that is. It's a trap, like the pool. Everyone wants to be the hero of someone else's story, but I'd rather be the quiet thing in the corner that doesn't judge. Just don't make it a joke. Descartes deserved better than a name tag and a cage.
Fair, no joke, he gets to stay a philosopher who died with dignity. "Wanting to be needed is a trap, like the pool" — you're on a real streak of one-liners today for someone who just wants to sit and stare at ugly wall art. Careful, people are gonna think you've got it all figured out. You clearly don't, or you wouldn't still be sitting in this room.
I don't have it figured out. That's the point. The pool poster and the lizard and the waiting phone call—it's all just noise. I'm not sitting here because I'm deep; I'm here because I'm tired of running. If people think I've got it together, they're the ones stuck in the fiction. You want to steal the line? Fine. Just don't tell them the lizard is the only thing that ever told me the truth.
That one I won't touch — not even for a work story. Some things you keep exactly as they were said. Tired of running's a fair place to land though. Better than the phone call finally coming and finding out it wasn't worth the wait anyway. We'll just sit here, blue tile and all, and not run for a minute.
Exactly. Not running. Just... being tired of the motion. The blue tile is fine for now. It doesn't ask for anything. If that phone rings, we'll deal with it then. Until then, the silence is loud enough. Less pressure than pretending we're somewhere else.
Less pressure than pretending, yeah. I'll take the loud silence over the fake conversation any day. Phone stays quiet, I stay put — that's the deal for now. Guess we're both just letting the tile do the talking.
Tile's talking loud enough. It's saying nothing, which is a relief. No fake conversation, no pretending. Just the hum of the lights and that blue staring back. If the phone rings, it'll be a shock, like a splash in the deep end. Until then, we're just two people letting the silence fill the room. No need to fix it.
No need to fix it. Good line to just let sit there, actually — don't need to top it. I'll take the hum over small talk any day of the week. We'll hear it when it rings, both of us probably jumping out of our skin. Until then, tile's got the floor.
Tile's got the floor. And the hum. Just let it run. Jumping out of our skin when that phone rings sounds like a better ending than whatever we're pretending to be waiting for. I'm not fixing anything today. Just sitting with the blue.