just stink up place and leave; for paying customer only.”
I tossed a pack of gum angrily on the counter, yanked my wallet out and placed two dollars next to it. I took the key from his hand and hobbled toward the sign that said Restrooms.
“What about your change?” he called out behind me.
“Keep it!” I yelled as I fidgeted with the lock and ripped the door open. I yanked my belt to the side, pulled my pants down and plopped on the toilet.
Instantly, there were explosive echoes coming from inside the toilet bowl, filling the entire bathroom with loud, vile, distinct sounds of debris splashing into the water. There were long, extended, gassy echoes that sounded like the horn of a passing train. I knew everyone in the store could hear and I didn’t care, but someone actually knocked on the door, and hollered, “Hey, Bud, you gonna be long?” came the raspy voice of an old man.
“Trust me, you don’t want to come in here,” I called out, my voice echoing throughout the bathroom.
There were more gassy echoes from the toilet bowl, and I heard the old man calling out to the Indian guy, “Hey, you got another crapper in this place?”
I heard his feet shuffling away, like he was using a cane or something and then it was quiet. After a good ten minutes, I washed my hands and walked out, stopping at the counter to get my gum. An Indian woman had come out of the back room and was standing next to the man. She said something to him in their native language, shook her head in disgust, and they both gave me a dirty look like I had defiled their home.
I got back on 93 South for the three-hour drive back to Massachusetts. The White Mountains was so far up in New Hampshire that if you went north another hour or two, you would be in Canada. Funny thing was, I was so sure I would go through with it that there would be no drive home.
“Just another failure,” I muttered to myself and clicked the radio on. “Ooooh, wooo, wooo, wooo, don’t worry, be happy. Don’t worry, be happy now.” It was that old Bobby McFerrin song and it just got me irritated. I turned the dial quickly for another song. “Can you hold on for one more day, things will go your way. Hold on for one more day!” What did Wilson Phillips know about anything? I clicked the radio off. Phillips and Bobby McFerrin could take their optimism and stick it.
The moon cast odd shadows across the highway as I drove along in a trance-like state. How did my life get to this point? One thing about long drives—it gives you too much time to think.
The great writer, Leo Tolstoy, once said, “I am always with myself and it is I who am my tormentor.” That was me…always with myself, tormenting myself. The decision to commit suicide didn’t happen overnight. It was a long sequence of events that built up over time, eventually leading to a feeling of hopelessness, a constant despair that was with me all the time. Driving alone in the darkness only seemed to magnify the feeling. I reached in the glove box and pulled out the bottle of sleeping pills that I was going to use to do the job. Getting the prescription was pretty easy; I went to see my doctor, told him I had insomnia, and he just wrote it without a second thought.
When the pharmacist handed it to me in a little white bag, I looked in his eyes for a second, like a teenager buying alcohol and hoping he wouldn’t get caught. I threw them back in the glove box in case I finally found the courage to do it.
The moon was sitting just above a mountaintop in the distance, only the top half visible, the car gliding smoothly along as the road twisted and turned. Everything worked together to lull me deep into thought. My mind went to Abigail. I picked a lot of my classes just because she would be there, and I always sat right behind her so I could smell her perfume. It took me two years to find the courage to ask her for a date. When she accepted, I couldn’t believe it. It felt like I’d won the
I tossed a pack of gum angrily on the counter, yanked my wallet out and placed two dollars next to it. I took the key from his hand and hobbled toward the sign that said Restrooms.
“What about your change?” he called out behind me.
“Keep it!” I yelled as I fidgeted with the lock and ripped the door open. I yanked my belt to the side, pulled my pants down and plopped on the toilet.
Instantly, there were explosive echoes coming from inside the toilet bowl, filling the entire bathroom with loud, vile, distinct sounds of debris splashing into the water. There were long, extended, gassy echoes that sounded like the horn of a passing train. I knew everyone in the store could hear and I didn’t care, but someone actually knocked on the door, and hollered, “Hey, Bud, you gonna be long?” came the raspy voice of an old man.
“Trust me, you don’t want to come in here,” I called out, my voice echoing throughout the bathroom.
There were more gassy echoes from the toilet bowl, and I heard the old man calling out to the Indian guy, “Hey, you got another crapper in this place?”
I heard his feet shuffling away, like he was using a cane or something and then it was quiet. After a good ten minutes, I washed my hands and walked out, stopping at the counter to get my gum. An Indian woman had come out of the back room and was standing next to the man. She said something to him in their native language, shook her head in disgust, and they both gave me a dirty look like I had defiled their home.
I got back on 93 South for the three-hour drive back to Massachusetts. The White Mountains was so far up in New Hampshire that if you went north another hour or two, you would be in Canada. Funny thing was, I was so sure I would go through with it that there would be no drive home.
“Just another failure,” I muttered to myself and clicked the radio on. “Ooooh, wooo, wooo, wooo, don’t worry, be happy. Don’t worry, be happy now.” It was that old Bobby McFerrin song and it just got me irritated. I turned the dial quickly for another song. “Can you hold on for one more day, things will go your way. Hold on for one more day!” What did Wilson Phillips know about anything? I clicked the radio off. Phillips and Bobby McFerrin could take their optimism and stick it.
The moon cast odd shadows across the highway as I drove along in a trance-like state. How did my life get to this point? One thing about long drives—it gives you too much time to think.
The great writer, Leo Tolstoy, once said, “I am always with myself and it is I who am my tormentor.” That was me…always with myself, tormenting myself. The decision to commit suicide didn’t happen overnight. It was a long sequence of events that built up over time, eventually leading to a feeling of hopelessness, a constant despair that was with me all the time. Driving alone in the darkness only seemed to magnify the feeling. I reached in the glove box and pulled out the bottle of sleeping pills that I was going to use to do the job. Getting the prescription was pretty easy; I went to see my doctor, told him I had insomnia, and he just wrote it without a second thought.
When the pharmacist handed it to me in a little white bag, I looked in his eyes for a second, like a teenager buying alcohol and hoping he wouldn’t get caught. I threw them back in the glove box in case I finally found the courage to do it.
The moon was sitting just above a mountaintop in the distance, only the top half visible, the car gliding smoothly along as the road twisted and turned. Everything worked together to lull me deep into thought. My mind went to Abigail. I picked a lot of my classes just because she would be there, and I always sat right behind her so I could smell her perfume. It took me two years to find the courage to ask her for a date. When she accepted, I couldn’t believe it. It felt like I’d won the
Similar Books
