Monsters & Misperceptions.

6/2/21

When the store manager sent me to the nearby dollar store for supplies yesterday, I intended on buying two Monster Java drinks, but I only saw the Loca Mocha flavored ones in the cooler. Diasappointed, I thought that perhaps I’d stop at the Circle K on the way home, but I was too tired and lazy at the end of my shift. So I drove home that evening, vowing to myself that I’d stop by the dollar store before my shift started, where I’d settle for the Loca Mocha.

With the Mean Bean, at least, it was something I looked forward to on break and it would also give me sufficient fuel to drag my sorry ass through the latter half of my shift.

Despite the anxiety of driving in the rain today, I managed to do just that, but after I grabbed the two Loca Mochas from the cooler I was overjoyed to find some cans of Mean Bean hiding behind a row of the Mocha. Instinctively, I moved the Mocha cans over to expose them and took two cans for myself. Just as I did so, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was an elderly lady, an employee I had seen in there before. I had to ask her to repeat herself, but she said something akin to, “Thank you for moving those. We got it.”

“Sure,” I said.

I had woken up depressed and driving in the rain made me anxious, so perhaps that’s why I couldn’t read her vibe or tone of voice. I was too distracted, on overload, my head filled with noise. Perhaps that’s why I couldn’t ascertain whether she was being sincere or sarcastic.

Was she irritated because I was doing her job for her or did she honestly appreciate it — and why does little, subtle shit like this hang in my head, buzzing around inside like an irritating, cranial-dwelling housefly, and bother me to no end?

It reminded me a lot of what happened on Memorial Day, when I again couldn’t get a good read on a situation.

I was working, of course, because people wedded to this fast food shit show only get two unpaid holidays off a year — unless, of course, we’re lucky enough for those holidays to fall on our days off. I got off work at 9:40 or so and left to get beer for Gus at Circle K. Since I was going anyway and Marjie was dragging ass, I offered to get her a Red Bull as well, which she could just pay me back for later.

When I got there, of course, of course, of fucking course the place was packed. All I wanted to do was go home, to be alone and free, but behind it all, Gus is a good guy and he’s done a lot for me.

Still, I was getting angsty. Cranky. My people tolerance had been far exceeded.

I could hardly fit all Gus’s beer in my arms, let alone the Red Bull, so I couldn’t grab the two 24s I had planned on getting for myself. My fluid to kill the fire within. In irritation, I decided that once I dropped this all off at work I’d just stop by the other Circle K on the way out of town and get my shit there.

The long, long line at Circle K was slow, the 24s and Red Bull so damned cold they were inflicting pain on my naked hands and forearms. I thought I saw Monica walk by, but convinced myself I must be wrong — and then I heard my name from behind me. I turned around.

Indeed, it was Monica after all.

She spoke to me a bit, and I immediately asked her if she had found a place to live yet. She explained how she was still homeless and kind of preferred it. I’ve asked her this before, too, and her response hasn’t changed, so I’m inclined to believe her. If that’s her path and that makes her happy, more power to her, and I told her as much. Different strokes for different folks. What I’ve been telling her since forever and it seemed she’d finally come to agree with me about is the nature of the people she tends to associate nowadays — those that lie, cheat, steal — and how it would be in her best interest to get the fuck away from them.

She went on about a few things, like scams she might engage in to make money, but I told her she has to be careful or she’s going to end up in jail again — or worse.

She followed me from the counter to the truck and, for once in her life, seemed keenly aware that I was eager to go. She seemed authentically pleased someone had just taken the time to listen to her, and thanked me for doing so, and made some off-hand comment that prompted me to tell her that I did indeed care about her, despite what she might think, and that was why I was always so concerned.

Though I didn’t say it to her, the issue has always been that she’s a hyper-chatty extrovert and I was a hypersensitive introvert and I could only take her in small doses.

I politely escaped her tractor beam, told her to be careful, and drove myself back to the grease-laden fatty-food distribution center where I work. I put Gus’s beer in the trash bin by the corner, as usual, and ran in to give Marjie her Red Bull. I them stopped at the other Circle K, got my own beer, and headed home down that long, dark road.

As I’m driving, I find myself behind this car that’s driving at varying speeds — over the limit, under the limit, and occasionally swerving back and fourth a bit, playing pingpong between the white line and the yellow ones. At one point, the car swerved over the yellow line and came a bit too close to colliding with oncoming traffic, at least enough to make me uncomfortable.

It was Memorial Day. American holidays are an excuse to get drunk. And I’ve been behind drivers that seemed to be drunk before, and they did the speeding up, slowing down, pingponging back-and-forth thing. As I have before, I slowed down, kept my distance, winced every time they inched towards the ditch or swung towards oncoming traffic.

Its always stressful, being in this kind of situation. Draining as fuck. And I was already drained. So when an opportunity came, I decided to pass him.

I rarely pass people, always terrified I’m not going to get over in time. I’ve seen cars pass other cars and come so unbelievably close to having a catastrophic, Hollywood-style accident. I did not wish that to be me, even a close call. I don’t prefer to drive behind unpredictable and potentially inebriated dumb-fucks on the road, either, though. So yes, I proceeded to pass him.

When I do this, is pedal to the metal. I want this process to be swift, and for them to be behind me as quickly as possible due to the aforementioned fears, so my truck growls. And how it growled. But no matter how hard I pushed down on the pedal, no matter how aggressively the Tacoma roared, the car remained right beside me.

This motherfucker was matching my speed so I couldn’t pass him.

My anger was defeated by fear, and I slowed down and veered back behind him. Then I cussed him out in the privacy of my truck. It initially came out as an aggressive, pleading question:

Why? What the fuck?

Back behind him, he exhibited the same behavior as before. I awaited the point that my anger overpowered my fear and another opportunity to pass him arose, and when it did, I proceeded to pass him again.

The same thing happened. Fear of hitting oncoming traffic again overcame my anger and I slowed down and veered back behind him.

This time, I was enraged. Highbeams were on. I was laying on my horn. I was imagining doing violent things to the faceless driver. Screaming descriptions of the perverse, torturous things I was going to do to him in graphic detail, in grotesque poetry.

All I saw was red. I was spitting fire. Blood was boiling in my veins. I was roaring louder than my truck in my failed attempt to pass this irredeemable fuckwad.

Some guy in a truck a few cars behind me shot passed me and the irredeemable fuckwad with ease. No response from fuckwad. No change in his driving behavior.

Did he not see the guy coming? Was that guys truck just faster than mine? I know diddly shit about vehicles. Or was it that this fuckwad, this diahreah-gargling gutter-twat, had something against me specifically?

So now I was enraged, afraid, and irritatingly self-conscious. Its safety first, so caution won and I decided to stay behind him, but still, I felt homicidal rage.

Then another guy — maybe in another truck, maybe in an SUV — appeared behind me suddenly. On my ass. And he had those bright blue, shimmering, retina-scorching headlights. I was confused: was this an asshole defending the asshole in front of me, participating in making a strategic, autombolie sandwich in which the innocent victim, myself, was hopelessly wedged between these two, evidently-impenetrable asshole-slices? Or was this just the random and unlucky circumstance in which I happened to have an asshole both before me and behind me?

Or, perhaps, was this a good Samaritan stepping in to defend the person in front of me, thinking him to be the innocent one, having only witnessed the aftermath of when the asshole in front of me passionately refused to let me pass, specifically when I blasted my brights and started honking the horn like a maniac?

As often happens when rage or fear soar to such heights, I don’t recall what became of the vehicle behind me: he may have turned down a road, he may have passed us, he may have vanished into the ether or even teleported to another planet.

When it came time for my turn, I turned, and fuckwad kept going forward. Part of me hoped he sped up and drove into a brick wall, but that was the blind-rage part, and that part swiftly left the scene once I escaped the circumstance. Another part of me began to question my perceptions, however.

I found myself thinking: what if it was somehow me who was in the wrong? What if, despite the fact that he was driving slower than the limit, for some reason my truck just couldn’t exceed it as I attempted to pass him? What if he wasn’t a fuckwad and I overreacted to an absurd level and Captain Bluelights behind me was, in fact, just defending the innocent? What if I was truly the asshole?

What if I’m just bloody insane?

I suppose the simple solution to issues such as these would to stop giving a fuck, but I clearly have a bottomless bucket of fucks and have the irresistible impulse to give them out far, far too liberally.

I really do hope I’m not insane, though.