Hallway Surreality

I'll set up the scene:

An unemployed, somewhat bored Tom is sitting in his apartment, browsing the Internet, listening to music, when a light tap at the door perks his ears up.

A tall, thin, white man with a dark winter coat and a black beanie, peers at with his pale, but piercing blue eyes at me.

He apologizes for bothering me and explains to me that he's my neighbor's cousin from Nebraska. I guess I had heard him earlier because he was talking loudly in my neighbor's apartment.

The man brings his hand out and I shake it. He repeats his apology and again says he's my neighbor's cousin. I'm getting a weird vibe from this guy.

He tells me that he's leaving and that he wanted to give me his cousin's spare set of keys. I say, 'Okay, sure.' He hands them to me and then says, 'I better check with my cousin. I'll call him.' I ask where my neighbor is and the man replies, 'I think he's at class.'

The man pulls out his cell phone from his pocket. The screen is cracked. He dials and puts it on speaker.

I look down and see the neck and bottle cap of a brown glass beer bottle sticking out of his jacket pocket.

Two rings later my neighbor picks up the phone.

'Hey, man,' my neighbor says, his voice somewhat distorted over speaker phone.

'Hey, so I'm leaving. I was going to leave your keys with your neighbor.'

'What? No, I'll be home in like ten minutes. Did you give him the keys already?'

'Yeah, but we're standing in the hallway right now.'

'Just - I'll be home in ten minutes.'

'Okay.'

'Okay, bye.'

I hand the keys back to this guy and I start to turn away. Out of the blue he asks very enthusiastically, 'Do you play XBOX?' He asks it in a way a shy kid who wants to hang out with you and builds up the courage to ask, but it comes out a bit overly friendly.

He pulls out the beers in his jacket pocket and sets them on the floor.

I say, 'I just have a PS3.'

'Oh, what games do you play?'

I think for a few seconds. I've mostly been using the PS3 as a Netflix machine. I tell him, 'Well, the last game I played on it was The Last of Us.'

A moment of silence.

I break the ice. 'I've been replaying Resident Evil 4 though.'

He smiles, 'Oh, cool, is that a two-player game?' Again, he asks it as if he wants to hang out and play video games and be my friend.

'I don't think so, I think it's only single player.'

The guy apologizes again for bothering me. He reaches down grabs one of the bottles of beer and hands it to me. I hold it and the label says, Fat Tire.

'Oh, thanks, but I don't like beer. I'm more of whiskey guy myself.'

He laughs. He apologizes again. He shakes my hand again. I think he's high or drunk or something.

So I ask, 'Are you okay?'

He replies, 'Yeah, do I sound weird?'

'Well, I'm wondering if you've had something strong to drink recently or had smoked something.'

He looks worried, 'Oh, no, I drank last night, but is that what I sound like? Do I sound like an asshole?'

'Oh, no, not at all, I was just wondering if everything was okay.'

'My mom died two days ago.'

'Oh shit,' I say, 'I'm really sorry to hear that.'

'Yeah, I'm supposed to be at the wake today but I don't even want to go.'

I don't really know what else to say other than another meek, 'I'm sorry man'.

He starts to tear up.

I try to be a problem-solver and say, 'Hey, it's okay man. Have you looked into grievance counseling maybe?'

I realize now as I write this that this was very unhelpful to say, but I wanted to help at the moment and had no other idea.

He says, 'No. But, like, she's gone, man. Who is going to take care of the family? Who is going to pick up the phone? Shit, I'm crying and I didn't want to cry today.'

He apologizes again and then says, 'I don't need a counselor. All you need is family, you know?'

I nod. What else could I do?

He asks, 'Was I being too loud earlier? Because I thought I was being pretty loud.'

He's scatterbrained. I lie and say no, he wasn't being too loud. I feel really bad for him and I don't know how to end this conversation. He shouldn't drive.

So I say, 'Look, your cousin is going to be home in like ten minutes. You should go back into his apartment and chill.'

'Can I rock out to just one song?' He asks as if he needed my permission to do so. He asks as if he knew that I actually had heard him earlier.

'Totally, man.'

He finally turns around and goes into my neighbors apartment. I stand there wondering if I was talking to a hallucination.