"There's just a lot of gay people who talk with a lisp," I said.
"My cousin talks with a lisp, are you saying he's gay?" David said.
"I didn't say that." I could hear it awkwardly turn silent. Nadine, who stood beside me, because I was talking to her in the first place, walked away from me putting herself back behind the front desk. I originally worked with David, but then I moved to a different facility. As I stood behind the front desk I could see his aggravated cracking eyes, calling for a fight. All I said, was that some gay people talk with a lisp. That's all! This guy, my coworker first of all, had to specify himself, as if every conversation was deeply concerned about how he feels and the world could only strike a conversation stricken to his rules and his depravity. FUCKING PATHETIC PEOPLE!
"Dude. . ." I put my hand out and chose my words carefully, "I didn't mean to offend you." The words came out broken, as I felt my insides tremble as I do every time I tend to hurt people's feelings without meticulously choosing my words. As if this conversation was the end of all things and all good people.
"Don't worry, you already offended me," he said proudly.
I remember walking into work 2 days later. I wasn't scheduled to work, but I had to talk to my supervisor, because apparently David said that there was a abrasive interaction, a confrontation, between him and I. I was the one who even planned on calling my supervisor first to seem like I wasn't the bad guy, thinking how would a douchebag deal with this situation. Obviously the true douchebag beat me to the punch. I sat in her office as casual as I could be, and line for line told her what had happened, all the while with her boss in the room too. I told her exactly word for word what I said, and the deliberate actions he took, the way he exploded, the way he took the situation further. How I walked away, but then walked back in to say I'm sorry, but also say how unprofessional it was for him to act this way at work, and how he replied with, "So it's my fault." And how I replied with, I'm just telling you how I feel. And what he said next, even though I was already finished talking. I said something about talking to him like a man, like an adult, and he said something along the lines as to, I shouldn't talk to him about being a man or an adult because he was older.
I thought about how I was a monster, stepping on the toes of everyone somehow. I also thought about this guy's racial category and how somehow his race has a trend of frustrated, cowardly, yet big on talk, yet big on stepping up, and stupidly going through life as if he has every right to step on everyone's toes and mean it, and somehow accepts his stupidity. I thought about how racist I was. I thought about how much he needed to seem better than me. How much he doesn't have friends. How much he must be one of those guys who looked at the way I would talk to Nadine, even though she had a boyfriend, and felt alone and sad, like the other guys who've tried their hand. He was just another one of them, pathetic and alone and jealous of me, and practically everyone in every way, and that's why he was mad.
* * * * *
A few weeks ago, I noticed Nadine deleted me off facebook. I believed it was because her boyfriend thought of me as weird. Somewhere in my mind I thought it was because of my confrontation with David. And somewhere in my mind, even though I would've lost a great friend, I thought it could be because David got fired over that confrontation, and that would be my karma. That would be my happily ever after, my settled score, my sunrise right before the credits. Those thoughts made me happy.
I quit several weeks after that. No reason, they just didn't have anymore graveyard shifts open for me.
I thought about it today. It practically happened several months ago, but I tend to remember everything that I try not to remember. I needed to know. I was just needing of an answer. I called work on a restricted number, a number I've never used to call work. The phone rang. I thought about how much this must be wasting my minutes.
A girl named Avery answered the phone. Should I back out now, just hang up, I thought. I didn't know an Avery though.
"Yeah, is David working there?"
I could hear the suttle confused hesitation traveling over the phone lines, "David doesn't work here anymore," she said. I could hear her giggle unprofessionally.
I smiled. He got fired. I started laughing.
