Clark
By Ben Merkle
He stood puzzled, looking around with the sort of weary, confused
expression generally worn by a kitten who has just ridden the extra-fluff
cycle of the clothes dryer. For a moment, he had forgotten where he was
and what he had been doing. But then it all came back to him. The answer
lay across the sidewalk, on the building with the mirrored windows. From
where he was standing he could see his own reflection clearly. And this
explained everything.
He had once been told that he looked just like Brad Pitt, and, whether
the charge was true or not, the damage had been done. Clark was utterly
convinced of his Adonis-like form and frequently found himself coming back
to his senses from some hypnotic state, only to find that somewhere nearby
stood his own reflection. In third grade Clark had once received the
comment "Delight to have in class" on his report card. Clark,
extrapolating somewhat, interpreted this remark to be indicative of the
consensus reached by the world in general on the relative worth of Clark
Purvis.
It must, however, be noted that Clark’s impression of the esteem that
the world held for him was not entirely unfounded. In fact, Clark did have
a certain sort of appeal to a large cross section of humanity. There is,
you see, an odd quirk to the female psyche that will send what appears to
be a healthy, balanced woman into a mouth-foaming fit of teen idol
hysteria. We can’t explain the phenomena, we can only observe. For
instance, this is why we see posters of Leonardo DeCaprio selling like
hotcakes. It’s why the world stood still when Michael Jackson caught his
hair on fire. In every day and age there will always be several persons,
classified male by experts in the medical profession, who, while seeming
to lack any redeeming qualities, still drive women nuts.
Regardless of the reason, Clark had this strange effect on girls. But
what is worse, Clark was aware of his charm, and probably was more
affected by it than most of his victims. Clark was utterly absorbed by the
fact that he had the sort of face that made women weak in the knees, the
sort of hair that looked fabulous when dried in the wind, and the sort of
frame that, while perhaps taking the adjective lanky, was just the type of
physique one might find on this year’s Sweaty Firemen with Ripped Shirts
calendar.
Clark had just been noticing how his eyebrows were such a perfect shape
without even being plucked when he had slipped into this trance. But
somewhere, in the midst of the daydream, the weather had turned for the
worse. In fact, he now saw that what had brought him out of the coma was
the first drop of a brewing storm. The sky above had grown dark and
threatening. Clark looked about for shelter and noticed the nearest door
was the entrance to the SUB. He took his time crossing the pavement to the
entrance, remembering how much fun it was to run his hands through his
hair when it had been lightly misted.
Once inside the SUB, Clark surveyed the crowd. "Who to
bless?" was of course the question he was asking himself. The
possible field was limited to the female of the species. Men, at least at
this institution, didn’t give Clark the sort of attention he craved. The
Food Court was crowded that afternoon. The rain, now beginning in earnest,
had driven in a large collection of the student body. Finding an
unoccupied booth began to look impossible, but this was hardly a negative.
Clark had already picked out his afternoon company, a slender brunette
bent intently over a large hardback, alternating between chewing on a
pencil and sipping from a paper cup.
As he approached her booth he began to wonder why he hadn’t made this
acquaintance earlier. At a distance she had clearly been attractive, but
at close range she took on a form that could only be described as
drop-dead gorgeous. The poet might have drawn a wealth of similes from her
features, the most obvious of these being the likeness of her hair to the
fine threads of the caterpillar’s cocoon, spun in hope, the remarkable
similarity between her neck and the ever graceful ankle of the antelope
and a number of possible comparisons between various aspects of the
brunette and the greater marvels of nature, not to mention at least one
haiku focusing on the scent of her conditioner. However, Clark was not a
poet, and the only description that his mind had given itself to remember
this young lady by was "hot stuff." He sidled up to the table
and slipped into the seat across from her.
In order to appreciate the situation more fully, we must break the
train in our thought for one moment and consider the entrance that Clark
made from the perspective of his prey, a certain Susan. So please clear
your mind while we backtrack a bit.
It had been dreary and overcast since dawn, but that was not
necessarily a bad thing. In fact, overcast days can prove to be some of
the most enjoyable occasions, provided one has the right attitude and
accoutrements. Susan, knowing the delight of a rainy day well-spent, had
begun her work with high hopes of finding herself eventually snuggled into
a little corner sipping a double shot mocha with extra whip cream and
rereading her copy of The Princess and the Goblin. But her day planner
contradicted and thwarted her at every turn.
First, she was required to endure three lectures, beginning with a
literature class whose curriculum was devoted entirely to works using
gender inclusive pronouns, then a zoology class informing her that her
chronic back-pain was the result of the fact that she was not really meant
to walk upright, and lastly a sociology lecture celebrating the sex lives
of the Samoan natives. The lectures were then followed by a two and a half
hour chemistry lab centered around the art of titration and accompanied by
her lab partner’s description, lasting the entire length of the lab, of
the upcoming Phi Delt’s Love Boat Overnight Cruise. The description
finally closed with the surprise ending that she was actually being
invited to attend.
Both the titration and the lab partner failed miserably, and Susan left
for her dorm room with the consolation that, from where she stood, things
could only get better. That was until she discovered the entire dorm
population evacuated and waiting on the lawn for the volunteer Fire
Department to turn off the howling fire alarm that had been pulled moments
ago by a clever freshman boy. But, having been a Campfire Girl, Susan was
resourceful. She began working her way across campus and finally settled
on a remote booth in the SUB food court.
The mocha had begun to take its effect and her book had drawn her into
another place. Now, the sort of absorption that a book, particularly a
book of fairy tales, can wield is a touchy thing. It’s quite unwise to
abruptly disturb anyone in the act. Reading a well written story is
somewhat like peering into a deep canyon. The more drawn into the story
one is, the closer to the edge of the precipice one creeps, drawn by the
breathtaking view below and not noticing how dangerous the position might
be. When someone interrupts the reader, it can have the same jarring
effect as suddenly poking the man at the edge of the cliff in the ribs.
The considerate way to begin a conversation with a person dangling over
the edge of a good story is to stand at a distance and softly whisper,
"Yoo-hoo."
Clark, unfamiliar with good stories, was unaware of this tactic. Now
the reader will recall, that before we backtracked to rehearse Susan’s
day, we had left off with Clark sidling into the booth in the seat across
from Susan. We will now resume the story at this point. Seeing that his
presence had not yet been felt, he coughed. Not wanting to aggravate his
throat tissues, it was a soft cough and closely resembled the sound of an
asthmatic gerbil visiting an aquarium equipped with fresh straw.
Susan, just reaching the point in her novel where Curdie, the miner’s
son, attempts to sneak the granite shoe from the sleeping Goblin Queen’s
foot, was oblivious to the squeak. Clark coughed again with the same lack
of results. He rethought his approach and tried a new angle, this time a
sneeze that was more howl than sneeze.
Curdie had just been reaching for the second granite shoe when he was
suddenly interrupted by a piercing bellow, reminiscent of the mating call
of the Saharan camel, causing both Curdie and Susan to jump with a start,
flinging book, mocha and granite shoe into the air. Susan, the patroness
of modicum, quickly began to compose herself, holding her eyes shut until
her heart beat approached its resting rate. Then, calmly, she began to mop
up the spilt mocha as she looked about to see what had caused the
interruption.
Her eyes landed on the tender features of Clark Purvis. He returned her
gaze, running his hand through his misted locks. Deep inside, Susan
groaned with a despair equal to that of a jolly flock of Russian peasants
interrupted by the company of the monk Rasputin. Stoking the coals of
loathing, she poured out on him a venomous glare, then reached for her
book and began flipping through the pages in search of her place. Clark
had been impervious to the glare, and thought to himself that his wooing
was progressing swimmingly.
"Hi there. Mind if I sit here?" He asked, waggling his
eyebrows as if their movements added all sorts of irresistible innuendos.
"Did the rain cancel the cheer squad’s practice?" She
responded, avoiding eye contact.
Clark, unfamiliar with Turkish cruelty, was unsure how to take this
remark and sat contemplating a response.
She continued. "Are you one of the ones that they throw, or do you
just hold the ‘Make Some Noise’ sign?"
Clark suspected that this young lady didn’t seem to be taking his
visit in the spirit it was intended. He waggled his eyebrows once more and
using his most amorous voice, said, "You looked like you needed a
little company. I thought I’d help out."
Susan cheered herself and decided to make the most of a bad situation
and gazed at him sweetly. "My older sister brought a boy about your
size home from college once. But he was only in the house for twenty
minutes before Papa asked him to help him get some firewood. Several
minutes after they were gone we heard two gunshots and papa returned
shortly for a shovel. The police asked us a lot of questions that next
week, but none of their accusations stuck. Papa said the next time he
might not be so lucky, so we’re not supposed to talk to boys
anymore."
Her conversation was cryptic to Clark, but she seemed to be smiling as
she spoke, especially at the part about the shovel. He took this smile as
an encouraging sign.
"Do you study here often?" Her cynicism seemed to be escaping
notice, so she put her back into it.
"Only on the first Thursday of the month. That’s when Mom comes
into town to refill my Prozac prescription and she lets me read in here
while she gets it filled. We used to come twice a month, but now Mom makes
my Ritalin at home."
"Huh." He was still oblivious to her disdain. But he knew
that something was going wrong. Then it dawned on him. He was asking her
all the questions. Usually, by now, the girls were asking him all sorts of
questions. He would tell them what a hard day he was having and the girls
would ask if he needed a backrub or help with his homework. That was where
the conversation had taken the wrong turn, and he began to right it.
He rubbed his shoulder dramatically. "Man, I’m a little
tight."
"Wimp." She was tired of games. It was time to free herself.
"I was working out yesterday. I’m just a little sore now."
"Hoof it, laddy."
"What?" This was an entirely new experience.
"Beat feet. Make tracks. Leg it. Shove off. Scram. How else shall
I put
it? Be gone."
Clark understood the situation vaguely. That is to say, he knew that
this girl was coming unglued. And, in Clark’s vast experience, he knew
that when the a woman comes unglued she needs a man to do two things—stay
calm and compliment her. He leaned back in his seat. "Did you know
that you’re beautiful?"
Susan was tired of the entire conversation. This boy was tedious and
irksome and she wanted him gone. She stood and walked over to his side of
the booth. His countenance brightened. Perhaps he was going to get his
backrub after all. But just as he thought that she was beginning to be
wooed a sharp pain shot through his earlobe. In an instant he was on his
tiptoes following wherever the whitened knuckles clenching his earlobe
led. He tiptoed his way in a delicate dance, following her every lead with
a precision matched only by the Royal Vienna Lipizzaner horses. Through
the booths they wound across the food court and into the salad bar, where
she finally left him blowing bubbles in the Blue Cheese.
She returned to her booth warmed to the bone with the satisfaction of a
job well done. But as she rehearsed the story to herself, she began to
grow disappointed. It would have been much more fun to watch her dad
handle it. Had he been here, there would have been actual blood. But she
consoled herself by resuming her reading of The Princess and the Goblin,
knowing that she could call her father that night and tell him all about
it. She always made her father so proud.
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