Are you scared?
A girl asked me a question. It sounded like she was sitting next to me, speaking softly into my ear, into the darkness, where no eyes could see.
No, I said.
Does it hurt?
I'm fine.
Is this better? It has to be better. You're not crying anymore.
I don't know why I'm here.
Would it make you feel better if you were somewhere else?
I don't know what to think.
Do you like what you see?
I don't know anything.
Do you hate it?
I don't know anything.
Do you hate me?
"Please let me have your urine."
I never thought I'd be saying these words to a woman, something I'd expect to only hear in a professional medical setting, like a clinic, between a doctor and a patient.
I was no doctor. And her? She probably wasn't old enough to get her own driver's license.
And I'd no choice but to force them out of me with everything I had. When the syllables spilled from my cracked bloodless lips, the moment almost became an out of body experience. I could feel the vocal folds vibrate against the wall of my flexed neck, my jaws grinding down then up, my tongue rolling back for the two L's and the two R's. That was definitely my voice. But I didn't know who was talking.
My whole life began to flash in front of me. First memory with mom and dad. It was a birthday party.
If someone could bring a timer into my own consciousness, the first five words would take around ninety seconds to come out. And the last one, another fifty seconds.
Urine.
A fairly innocuous word at first glance, a go-to substitute by all educated people around the world who wanted to talk about human waste without risking sounding like an underpaid house builder whenever they needed an excuse to skip work for a couple of minutes. Excrement would be another example.
But when put in the right context, even the most sophisticated-sounding or even the most poetic words could come off as depraved—incriminating, even.
Love.
Peace.
Togetherness.
Even the nicest words would sound unbelievably wrong to the ear as long as you knew where to twist them.
Love for minors.
Peace in the slave farm.
Togetherness in the gas chamber.
By the time my sentence reached the final word "urine", I didn't want to stop talking, didn't want to stop phonating, because I knew, with absolute certainty, that the silence that'd eventually follow would turn me deaf and existence itself would come to an end.
I didn't even know whether I was looking at her when I said it.
"Excuse me?" she asked.
She didn't hear it! All that effort was for nothing!
So I had to say it again. It felt quicker this time.
"Please give me your urine."
How did it get so bad?
I was born into a family of relatively good repute. My parents were respected scholars in one of our city's biggest universities. I wouldn't say that they were exactly head-over-heels in love with each other—any relationship would start to turn a little stale after the first two years, and that's being generous, let along twenty-five—but we got along and they gave me the best childhood any kid could ever ask for.
My upbringing was perfect and there wasn't much to complain about: good grades and good friends (or at least I hoped that they considered me a friend), got the degree in architecture from a really good school, and found a job that paid really well.
Ever since I was a kid, I always thought that I wanted to draw houses for a living. Even back then, I didn't just want to be an architect—I wanted to be a great one, or at least be decent enough to be considered a "professional".
I firmly believed that all the architects in the world shared one thing in common. They were all mad. Despite their differences in style and technical sensibilities, all the architects in the world shared the same impossible dream. We all secretly hoped to one day design a home so beautiful, so grand and perfect, that even God Himself would want to live in it.
When I asked my colleagues and former classmates whether they were thinking the same, they all silently and begrudgingly nodded in agreement. One of them even told me that I really hit the mark with the metaphor—they all strove for perfection, aiming to get the design as close as possible to that ideal initial conception in their minds. There was no such thing as a "perfect" house—a functional and aesthetically-pleasing house, absolutely, but the sky was the limit when it came to the grand experiment of shapes and forms.
This was the essence, the soul of house design. Although man did not have a soul, he found it in the things he created.
A different appearance, a different arrangement, another place to step your foot in that also felt different. It was all made of the same familiar pieces, but wasn't quite the same. Something that nobody had ever thought up before. That was the perfection that we were all aiming for.
Every architect's dream was to one day build a house so perfect that even God Himself would want to live in it.
Although I was being literal when I said that.
Atheism was great and all—but, it's God.
If there was even the slightest chance that God existed, he'd be your biggest potential client.
If God would one day show up by accident and he liked my work, I could charge him infinite dollars and be set for life.
In romance, I wasn't the best-looking dude out there, but I was lucky enough to run into a beautiful girl whom I proposed to while still in my twenties.
Well, I wouldn't attribute all of it to luck. If you stuck a fancy business suit on your torso and glued your feet to a matching pair of moc-toe slip-ons at all times—the shiny ones—you'd find that marriage would quickly turn into a free market. Of course this rule only worked if followed to a tee. The apparel should stay on regardless of location or occasion, be it in the shower or on the mattress.
Everything about me was done by the book. I lived my life in the most standard way possible. Some might even suggest that I didn't just have it good, but that I had it too good; and they'd be right. I always knew that there would be trade-offs somewhere down the line, lying in wait for me while I was just coasting on unwittingly. I just didn't know how they would pan out.
Sometimes I asked myself whether, even if I had been able to foresee this terrible, inevitable development—if only just a fraction of it—I would've been able to cope better and go through all of it with more acceptance.
While I was walking down the streets after leaving the office for home, I brushed past this girl on the sidewalk next to an antique-looking cafe. It was crowded so trying to get through them was a challenge. Due to the impact, some books fell out of a half-open bag she was carrying.
To be more precise, she was a high schooler. There was no uniform but you should be able to tell at first glance. The girl, in her black tank tops, had a tattoo on her neck, some kind of symbol or scribble in a language that I had never seen before. Although I was in a hurry to get home for the finals of my favorite soccer team, I suddenly decided to be courteous to a stranger and turn around to pick up the items she'd dropped.
"Sorry," I said hurriedly, reaching down for the red book on the warm, earthy concrete. The other three books were already in her hands.
That was the moment when I saw the most beautiful eyes in the world—big, round curves arcing around pitch-black marbles. Though the expression they wore was something I could not understand. Her lips were parted and quivering slightly, their corners turning upward. I didn't know whether she was smiling or she was about to burst into tears. It was as if her eyes were mirrors that reflected my own confusion.
I picked up the red book, feeling its leather-bound cover in my grip, and handed it to the girl.
"Thank you," she said, or I thought she did. Instead of mouthing those words, her lips were still trembling as before.
"Ah!" I yelped as she took hold of the book. Something had bitten me.
I raised the hem of my trousers on my left leg—a bite mark. It was probably a rat. I quickly looked around on the pavement but saw nothing.
"Really sorry about earlier," I said. "I should have been more careful. Hey, how about I buy you a coffee to make up for it?"
"No, thank you. It was nothing, really."
She gave me the stock full-stretched-grin you'd normally give your distant relatives whenever they asked to come over for an annual get-together. Or in this case, the kind you'd give to the might-be-rich-but-not-too-rich, trying-hard-to-seem-casual-but-still-coming-off-as-creepy old men who hit on you.
From the outside, it might really look like that and no one would blame her for being a little uncomfortable.
"No, no—I should be watching where I was going, but, hahahaha..." I thought I nailed that titter, like a middle-aged man trying to be friendly to a fellow visitor from the adjacent grave at the cemetery—clearly not really laughing, but passable enough to let the other person know that you were just trying to be polite and you meant well.
"It's fine, really."
"No—"
"I'd better get—"
I got in her way before she could say another word.
Why was I still going with this?
"My parents have taught me well," I said. "They've taught me if you ever did something wrong to someone you have to make it up for them."
What was I even saying?
"No, thank you," she said as discomfort was starting to creep on her face. "I already said I'm not interested."
She stepped to the other side to leave before failing the second time.
My parents also told me to not harass strangers on the streets, especially little kids, but I decided to leave out this insignificant detail.
"Why are you doing this, old man?" she asked, though I wasn't sure whether she actually said the two words at the end.
"Please, I just feel so awful. You have to let me make up for it. If you don't, I don't think I'll be able to sleep tonight."
"..."
"Come on, let me buy you a coffee."
"Kinda rude when you try to force something on someone."
"It's also rude to not accept them." I was making things up as I went along. "I know you might think this is a little weird, but they are still my values. It takes 60 seconds. You don't even have to touch it, just leave the drink on the table."
"I have to go." She walked out into the street just to get around me. A speeding truck swerved into the opposite lane to avoid her, the screaming driver hammering then holding on the horn.
"I'm still buying it!" I called out to the girl. "It will be on the table!"
Without looking in her direction, I headed inside the coffee shop.
Third time the charm as they said. She could have agreed from the get-go but she had to go through the rigmarole of refusing up to three times just to validate the ingenuity of my repentance.
What kind of high schooler would turn down a free cup of coffee from a suspicious looking middle-aged man? It's free coffee, served in public, in the middle of daytime.
Modernity had evolved to the point where men no longer stood at the top of the food chain. A slightest hint of distress from her and I'd be on the sidewalk with every police officer from this precinct on top of me.
She'd said I was old. Allegedly. I could be hallucinating that part.
I ordered a coffee—just one. I didn't have any. The cup sat on the table the whole time we were there, untouched, just like how I'd suggested. If she was the only one with the drink, it'd make her feel more special, like a good host cherishing his guests.
We sat while I prattled on about my extensive history with this coffee shop, and how I'd been coming here since I was still in elementary school. I talked about how the streets used to look like back then, how the world had become a lot more cramped due to increased population density, and how this would impact the socioeconomic background of the working class of future generations.
I talked about whatever I could think of to fill the silence, and no doubt was also effectively showing my age in the process.
She was yawning with her mouth closed; the watery eyes and slightly hanging jaws were the dead giveaway. She thought she was being so smart for doing it.
If you want to yawn, feel free. I wouldn't be offended.
"Before you go," I said, "I want to ask for your phone number, and I know what you're going to say. Look, I know you're not enjoying this."
"... I have a minute." She looked like she was about to explode—not from rage. She just didn't want to be here.
"That's great!" I clapped my hands together to celebrate. "Now I understand you don't have to like me as a person. I get that. We don't have to talk to each other again after this."
But we should still exchange numbers, I told her again.
She looked confused, so I said, "If you give me your number, I promise you will never ever get a call from me. Like I said, we will not be talking to each other after this, which is fine—it's not a big deal. I'm only here to make up for what happened on the sidewalk. However, when two people exchange their contact info, this is a symbolic act that shows good will from both sides. It's a cultural norm and part of the tradition."
"Whose tradition is it?" she asked, her face screaming with doubt.
I shrugged. "The human tradition."
Then I said, "If I ever decided to call your number after this meeting to harass you or whatever, then shame on me. But I also think that it would be rude to turn down a simple invite to exchange numbers. What do you think?"
"I'm okay with that."
Gritting my teeth, I gave a pacifying smile. My eyes were looking upon her with chastisement, though not without compassion. "When people act rude, more often than not, they do it for a reason."
"I mean…" She frowned and raised both hands, her palms facing my direction, while looking down at the coffee that had gone cold. I nodded with understanding.
"You're right. It's justified because in a way I'm forcing you to be here. But this is also free coffee that I'm paying out of my own wallet, so I hope the gesture cancels things out somewhat. But there's something else you haven't taken into account." I leaned forward a little. "I'm also doing this out of good faith."
"You made it all up, didn't you." she asked in a flat tone. "The tradition thing."
"No, that's absolutely real."
"Then it's a dead tradition," she contested. "I think that, at some point we all have to let go of things that don't serve us. Meaningless social etiquette is just collective dishonesty dressed up as politeness."
"Interesting." I rubbed my chin while fighting the urge to cross my arms and legs.
"If I give you my number," she explained, "and you give me yours. I think... the expectation is still there, you know? You say it's a symbolic act, but people only exchange numbers if they think there is something to gain from the other person. That's the reason they need to keep in touch." This whole time she'd never touched the coffee on the table. "If I give you my number, it means I'm admitting that there is still a chance that we will be talking to each other. It's almost like I'm leading you on, you know?"
"First off," I said. "The tradition is not dead. It's still around and doing strong."
"And why do you think that?"
"Because you probably take part in it."
She quickly averted my gaze, a hint of defeat in her eyes.
Then I said, "Whether you're at work or a family wedding, you will run into people who will ask for your phone number. Colleagues, customers, distant relatives, what have you. You know most of these people will not bother you. They'll probably never talk to you again. Happens to me all the time. But even if they won't see you again—and they know this for a fact—they still ask to keep in touch."
"..."
Still, she'd made a good point when she said that the act was meaningless.
"Why do we try to be nice to each other?" I said, leaning back into my chair. "What's the point? But we still do it. We give compliments and act friendly to our—in your case, it'd be your classmates, your cousins, the elders in your neighborhood. It's probably because there's something else we want from others, something beyond the material. We do it because, deep down, we want to believe that there is still human decency in the modern world."
"..."
"You know I could've gone to buy the coffee and you could've left me by myself. But you came back. It meant that you agree to the sentiment to some extent. You're also curious and want to see how this would turn out, hear what I have to say."
The girl shifted around in her seat. Both her feet under her crossed legs were pointed at the main entrance.
"Although we'll probably never see each other again," I said, "I just want you to know that I really appreciate your time being here with me."
Later, we parted ways.
She gave me her phone number—I got a phone number out of her, to be exact, and it was probably not her main SIM card, anyway. It was a number that required you to put in the effort to memorize; not a single digit repeated itself. Decent phone numbers were pretty cheap. Either she didn't care when she'd bought this or she really didn't expect anyone to remember it.
There was also the possibility of the number being fake, but that meant she would have to be willing to become a nuisance to someone else, which seemed unlikely.
So why was I being so nice to this stranger for no reason?
All that talk was baloney. Nobody would be insane enough to go out of their way and buy someone a drink just because they bumped into them on the street. She probably knew that herself.
Why did I have to get her number even though I had no intention of ever meeting her ever again?
She was right—about everything. The expectation would be there either way.
So what did I want from her?
As I sprawled under the duvet next to my wife in bed, pondering to myself, still, no answer came to mind.
I was never the type to make compulsive gestures like that without reason. If anything, this was the first time I'd ever done something so meaningless.
She was right for calling me an old man.
A forty-three-year-old like me shouldn't be so warped in the head as to fancy underage children who probably couldn't even pedal backward down a steep slope on their bicycles.
I wasn't infatuated with this girl.
I wasn't attracted to her at all.
In terms of looks, my wife was better hands down in every department imaginable.
If my wife was an eight, she'd be a five. I'd be a two of course but this was more about them.
The only good thing about her was that she had really big eyes, but that wasn't a good enough reason to justify the way I'd gone about doing the things I did.
If anything, I was rather repulsed by the tattoo on her body, a classic hallmark of a delinquent wanting to express their subconscious desire for self-destruction through "creative" means—as creative as the average Joe would think of them anyway. Some deviant had probably committed to the stunt for a joke and now, decades later, multiple generations suffered because of him.
The tattoo was probably fake so it wasn't exactly too bad, but where's the fun in that? The real thrill lay in permanent tattoos, to put something on your body that stayed there forever. Back then, only human slaves had brands on their skin. In this age, we willingly put them on ourselves.
Those curious enough to humor the fakes would ultimately settle for the real. It was human nature.
And her clothes—tank tops, seriously? She dressed like a video game character. That Black guy from that game about stealing cars back in the 2000s.
Yet, despite all that…
I thought I'd been in control of my own thoughts and behavior my whole life, but maybe that hadn't always been the case. The whole affair made me feel like I was a puppet and someone was pulling the strings—either my new-found compulsiveness or an outside influence, a person or a thing. I didn't know.
Whatever the case, my name should probably be on the Feds' watch list at this point.
The best-case scenario would be she hadn't reported me, but it seemed like wishful thinking.
Rather than feeling proud for doing something nice for someone today, I was deeply ashamed.