DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.

Dunkin Donuts Part IV

Part I

I decided to go to the Dunkin Donuts one Friday after track practice.  The clouds were obscure, and the moon was a thin crescent hanging in the sky.  I crossed the intersection just as the walk signals flashed, like an out of control strobe light, but only in my head.  I fear flashing lights because they cause seizures, and I have had seizures before.  I have had one seizure before, at a Girl Scout outing, where I blacked out and fell to the floor from my seat. It’s funny how dangerous situations parallel with memories of dangerous situations.  Now the greatest fear that filled my mind was not getting homework done in time, so I decided to hang out at the Dunkin Donuts for a while, the one where I have been confronted by three (at first) seemingly ambiguous strangers, who have talked to me about random yet interesting yet strange things.  The thing in me knew that four is a charm just wasn’t a phrase in my vocabulary, so I took a chance and strutted in, walked past the sign advertising chestnut mocha and dark chocolate peppermint mochas, overly the freshly mopped tile floor, and found my seat at the back of the store, where I was almost out of site from any potential customers that entered.  At the moment I plopped my bag down next to my feet, the guy with black curly hair, who engaged such interesting conversation with me on one occasion, walked in the store, with his hands dug in his pockets and a curl hanging over his right eye.  Without looking anywhere else in the store he walked directly to where I was sitting, pulled out the chair in front of me, sat down, and smiled.

“What are you doing here?”  I asked, trying not to laugh. 

“I heard you thinking from the Jewel across the way,” he said, pointing east of the store.

“The Jewel is like half a mile away; and how can someone hear someone if they don’t talk to them?”   

“How can you love someone you don’t know?”  he asked, smirking with the corner of his left side of his mouth.  “How can you put one foot in front of the other without the other?”

His creativity struck me.  “Wow, where did you learn to talk like that?”

“Where did you learn to tie your shoes?”

“Don’t you mean who?”

“Ok,” he said, “Who taught you to tie your shoes?”

“Ok,” I said, “I still don’t see your point, but, okay.  You were the guy that walked up to me and started talking about heaven, right?”

“That was a while ago, but, yes, that is an adequate memory revisited.”

“And, you said you were an angel, right?’ I said, wondering if my bullshit would get anywhere.

“I guess.  I was one of the ones that gave into the thing in the dream proposed the night before I converted.”

“What do you mean,” I asked, nervously twirling my hair in my finger.

“I had a rough day at work, and I came home, passed out on the couch, and the next day, in their, the ones who are in charge, third eye, their dimension, I earned my halo and wings.  I could only see them in my bedroom mirror, and sometimes, after a heavy rainstorm and a rainbow stretches across the sky.”

“Like in a fairy tale,” I said, trying not to be sarcastic.

“Kinda like that, yes,” he said, his foot tapping nervously. 

“What was the dream about?”  I asked, feeling repetitive.

“The dude to my left looked at me with big brown eyes and asked me did I miss my brother.  And I said yes.”

“Is he dead?”

“He is,” he said quietly.  “And the guy asked if I had the power to bring him back, would I.” 

“HUHHH,” I let out a deep exasperating breath.  “What did you say?”
“I said I would, but not until I knew for certain that is what he’d want.”

He stopped tapping his foot. 

“And that’s why you became an angel, that was the test?”

“I guess,” he said.  “I think the main thing was that I was honest, and that if I had the power to do such a thing, I would only do it for good.  And since him and his friend died in the accident, I honestly didn’t know if he would be okay with coming back to confront all that he left behind; the death of Pete.”

“I think he’d still want to come back,” I said.

“So, did I,” he said,” “After thinking about it with the guys eyes’ bored into mine.  And then started to cry, and then I told him I would, of course.”

And then he was quiet.  And I couldn’t take it anymore.

“So, what happened next?”

“I don’t know what they were looking for, but I guess I fit the criteria.  My tears marked my honesty.  So, I was put in the new department.”

And he was quiet again, looking at me like I owed him something.

“And what department is that?”

“The show-people-heaven-and-hell-and-ask-them-what-they-think department.”

He leaned back in his chair, and rocked back and forth. 

“So, are you interested?”  He asked.

‘Would I earn my halo and wings?” I asked.

“No, it would be more of a survey type thing, just to say if those in charge are doing a good job.”
“How can someone be in charge of hell?”  I asked.

He folded his arms in front of him.

“That’s a fair question- no one is, really, but there is the Sentinel that guards the entrance of hell.”

My eyes widened in response to the neutral look in his face.  I breathed in deeply, again, and looked around the store, feeling a little dizzy.  Up to that moment I thought the guy was partially insane, but I had seen the movie, The Sentinel, and I remember how the girl’s eyes lost their pupil at the moment she was named the next one.  I didn’t know what to do.  What he was saying was almost too crazy, but still really interesting at the same time.  The clock to my right ticked so slowly I was wondering if I was losing my mind, like time was stopping just for me.  Was I sleeping?  Was I awake?  Was I dreaming?  Maybe it was  dream, one of those times where the clock stops and then you look down to the bottom of a cliff that had just proposed itself and held your breath so that whatever was in charge of what was going on wouldn’t let you fall, but you do anyway and that dropping feeling in your stomach makes you wake up. 

But I knew I wasn’t dreaming.  And I was awake.  So, third was a charm. 

“What’s the catch?” I asked.  “Why me, what do you want to show me?”

“Because you are a good listener,” he said.

“…Is that it?  Because I listen to your ramblings and don’t look seem scared?”

“That’s good enough for me,” he said.  “And I get bored easily.  No one around here would be able to just watch and listen like you do.”

He took the notebook that was in front of me, along with my pen. 

“Hey, that’s my decomposition notebook,” I said. 

“I want to draw it for you,” he said, “So you could better understand what I’m talking about.”

He opened to a blank page and scribbled something on it in a few seconds.  Then he flipped it horizontally so that I could see. 

It was just a diamond.

“How does this explain anything?”  I asked.

“Look,” he said, the bottom point is where we are now.”

He scribbled a star by the bottom point.
“The right is heaven,” he scribbled at the right point.

“The left is hell, and the grand finally is that,”

He scribbled an especially big star at the top of the diamond.

This is where no one can get into, until heaven or hell wins,”

His eyes almost crossed.

So.  This is where I need your help.  Are you in?”

I put my elbows on the table and cupped my face with my hands.

“Sure,” I said.

“Ok, then we are an all go.  Just plan on getting a good night’s sleep, okay?”

And he walked out of the store.

DRAFT: This module has unpublished changes.