Improvisation | by Sunnie Smith
“It’s all because of that goddamn bank teller,” Sheldon muttered to himself as he stumbled across the Galveston beach. “If it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t be in this goddamn situation.” He tripped over a wine bottle and wondered if he had left if there earlier in the evening. Had it traveled through space and time just to stand in his way? And where, pray tell, was he going? He was not aware of a specific quest, yet knew that he must continue onward in order to achieve something. But what, he knew not. And the wine bottle was just another obstacle in his path. Just like the bank teller. “If she would have just given me the money,” he continued to himself, “then I wouldn’t have had to jump out on that bar tab and start running.” The fact that he was running from a bar tab, however, did not account for the fact that he was also nude, striding across polluted Texas sands, toward something inevitable and unknown.
***
Anna arrived at home, exhausted. It hadn’t been a difficult day—just a typically boring one. She took off her heels, poured a whiskey on ice, and lay back on her dingy overstuffed couch, her feet propped on one of the arms. She wanted to lie there forever and never return to that world that she hated. The nine to five monotony of normalcy frustrated her. But also, she wanted to forget about the world that she loved. Her own imagination seemed to cause more infuriation than inspiration. She was exhausted. But, after sipping slowly with her dear friend Jack Daniels, Anna sat up with a heavy sigh and pulled her computer to her. “Maybe tonight I will actually write something worthy of being read,” she thought to herself with a noncommittal sigh. It had been three years. And she had little hope now, which made for little progress. She began three different stories, had the first three lines of three different poems, finished three whiskeys, and then she passed out. She had always loved the number three.
***
Sheldon’s feet were bleeding from the detritus of Galveston Beach. Broken seashells
and beer bottles had lacerated his soles. Yet Sheldon did not feel pain. In fact
he felt Christ-
***
Anna awoke suddenly. She stared at the ceiling with unbelieving eyes. After a moment’s shock, she sat up from her couch and grabbed her computer. Inspiration had come to her dreams. Finally. And she started writing.
***
The snow was turning to freezing rain as Sheldon waited for the 5:15 bus. “Goddamnit,” he muttered under his breath. “This bus is never on time.” He angrily tightened his scarf and wrapped his arms tightly around himself, trying to stay warm beneath his threadbare peacoat.
As he impatiently peered up the street, trying to catch a sign that the bus would arrive soon, he saw her. “That stupid bitch…,” he thought, “Power crazy…telling me I don’t have an account at her bank…who the hell does she think she is, anyway? Looking through me as if I don’t even exist. I’m going to give her a piece of my mind.” As Sheldon started toward the opposite corner, he was distracted by someone in a suit running down the street. The figure was a blur through the winter weather, and then the person was gone as suddenly as they had came, leaving behind an old woman, crumpled in a puddle of motor oil, crying for help. Her purse had been stolen. Sheldon started towards her, but then the bus came. He shrugged his shoulders and boarded.
***
Anna looked up at the frosted skyscraper windows, waiting for Peter to bring the car around. He had finally worn her down; she had agreed to go on a date. She didn’t like relationships. She didn’t even like dating any more. “Oh well,” she thought. “At least my lips won’t be chapped anymore.” The only time her lips were healthy was when she was dating. Then she actually took care of herself. The rest of the time she didn’t really care.
She shivered, pulling her coat close to her and resisted the urge to pick at her lips. How long did it take to get the car out of the garage anyway? She sighed and tapped her foot impatiently. Looking down the block she saw him on the opposite corner. “Oh god,” she thought. “I hope that crazy drunkard doesn’t see me.” He had been harassing her for months, coming into the bank, causing a scene, telling her that he had an account when he didn’t even have identification. Several times she had come close to calling security, but he always left right before. Their eyes met and he stared at her. Peter needed to hurry. At least in the bank Anna had some sense of safety. On the street she didn’t know what he would do. He started walking towards her when he was pushed out of the way but a ragged barefooted figure running down the street. He attacked an old lady, snatching her purse, and continued on his way. The mugger was gone as suddenly as he had come. When Anna went to the aid of the poor grandmother, she noticed that the attacker had left a bloody trail in his wake. Red footprints mingled with the motor oil and the flakes of snow that had just begun to fall.
***
Sheldon was happy that the weather was warming. There was nothing he hated more than being cold. Instead of catching the 5:15 bus he wandered into one of those downtown bars that specialized in serving those who lived on the margins. The lights were low enough that you could drink in peace without having to see anyone’s face or worrying that anyone would even dare cast a glance your way. He ordered a scotch on the rocks and sat in the shadows, staring into the darkness.
Then he saw her. She was a mere shadow herself, sitting in the corner, sipping from her glass in silence. He tried to make out the details, but couldn’t. It was too dark. He was now damning the thing he loved about this dive. It seemed as if she was looking his way as well, but he couldn’t tell. “What the hell,” he thought. “She could throw her drink in my face and that would be the worst of it.” He slowly rose from his chair and walked across the room. It seemed as if he was walking miles when it was only less than a hundred feet. He finally reached her table. “May I sit with you?” he asked.
“Yes,” she replied, pushing out the opposite chair with her foot. He sat and they stared at each other for ten minutes. When her drink was finished, Sheldon offered to buy her a new one. “Bourbon on ice,” she said. “And my name is Maria.” She smiled. He returned from the bar with a bourbon for Maria and a scotch for himself.
“I’m Sheldon.” He sat down opposite her. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen and she seemed familiar in an odd sort of way. It was as if he had known her all his life, yet, at the same time, it was as if he would never be able to fully know her. As they talked, everything she said surprised him yet was still totally expected. She was truly remarkable and they talked until the bar closed. Then they went to her place.
***
Anna woke suddenly. She had fallen asleep unexpectedly again. This was happening too often. “It’s just overwork,” she told herself, yet she still worried. She had woken from the strangest dream. It was about him—the creepy drunkard who had been harassing her at work. He had stopped coming into the bank a few months previous and that is when her obsession started to take hold. She dreamed about him. She saw him everywhere she went, yet when she would look again, it was never him but some other stranger. The only way she could exorcise him from her thoughts was to write about him, but at least she was writing again. He had become a recurring character in her stories. She didn’t mean to write him at first, but he would pop up in the strangest places. At first he appeared for some kind of ambient effect when she wanted to give the appearance of a seedy situation. As the weeks passed, however, he had risen to the prominence of a leading character. He was still dangerous and abrasive, yet she found him becoming romantically entangled with a number of women. None of them were right, though. Every time she wrote a partner for him, she would immediately delete the pages. As misanthropic as he was, none of the women were good enough for him. As she pulled her computer to her she sighed and hoped that this time she would get it right.
***
Sheldon and Maria walked on the beach, hand in hand. Things were blissful. He had never been so happy. Everything about her was right. The feel of her skin. The patches of freckles on her elbows. The way her eyes would smile at him and sparkle as if infused with starlight. And she wasn’t just beautiful. It was as if they were made from the same fabric, physically and intellectually. They didn’t need to talk. They could simply walk and be happy. And she could communicate volumes with the simplest touch.
“So do you think any of this is real?” Maria asked as she dug her toes in the wet sand.
“What do you mean?” Sheldon stopped running sand through his fingers and looked intently at Maria.
“I mean just that. Is any of this real? I mean, how can it be? I found you and you found me but doesn’t it all seem a little too good?” Maria sat on the beach, stretching her legs out in front of her, enjoying the licking waves of seafoam.
“Oh Maria…And I thought I was cynical.” Sheldon sat behind her, cradling her head in his lap. “I don’t see why not. I mean, isn’t it about time that we had happiness too?”
“Yeah…but this is beyond happiness. This is maddening bliss.” She closed her eyes tightly as tears started to moisten her eyelashes.
“You know, people have written songs and poetry and created art all because of love. It had to exist for someone at sometime. Why not us?” He played with her curls, leaving particles of sand, and stared at the horizon, lost in thought.
“I just keep thinking that I’m going to wake up tomorrow and you will be gone. That you will have never existed. And then I will be lost…” She turned on her side. Maria could never bear to let anyone see her cry and the tears were about to come.
“Maria, love, that’s just crazy. I’m going to be here tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that. You won’t be able to get rid of me even if you try.”
“Really?” She looked up at him through a film of tears.
“Really.” Sheldon bent down and kissed her forehead, brushing the sand and hair away from her face and wondering why she had thought anything as strange as that.
***
Anna was pacing around her apartment. “I’m losing my fucking mind,” she thought as she took her face in her hands. She still couldn’t stop thinking about the strange man. She had finally written a decent woman for him. They were happy. But Anna was not content. “I’ve become jealous of my own character,” she said with a nervous laugh. “What is wrong with me?” The last ten pages were some of the best she had ever written and now she was on the verge of deleting them, just because she could no longer bear to think of that interloper kissing him, laying with him, even touching him. “But I created her…how can I be jealous of my own creation?” Anna walked to the computer and stared at the screen. “If I can create her, I can also destroy her. It is entirely my own decision.” She highlighted the last ten pages and stared at the screen. Her finger hovered above the delete button, just waiting. She was about to destroy it all when the doorbell rang.
***
Maria’s number wasn’t in service. Sheldon was going mad. He went back to the bar where they had met. He had gone to the beach. She wasn’t anywhere that she should be. He had waited at the hotdog stand for two hours, knowing she would appear. But she didn’t. She was nowhere to be found. He thought about their conversation the previous afternoon. She had been worried that he would disappear, but now it was she who had disappeared. He walked the streets, wondering where she had gone. Perhaps their previous conversation had been about her will to disappear more than her fear of being abandoned. Perhaps Maria was just projecting.
Sheldon found himself in front of her building. Crushing a cigarette underfoot, he looked up to the third floor and saw that her light was on. He had no other choice than to go to her apartment. He didn’t want to. He only wanted to visit when invited. But, at this point, he had no choice.
He climbed the three flights of stairs and stood in front of her door for several minutes, hoping that she would miraculously exit, but finally gained the courage to ring the doorbell.
***
Anna answered the door. When she saw the strange man who had changed from antagonist to protagonist, she gripped the doorframe to stop herself from fainting. “What are you doing here?” Anna was trembling at this unexpected visit from someone she wasn’t even sure had ever even existed. He had become mythic to her.
“Why didn’t you meet me earlier?” Sheldon asked in a hurt voice.
“What are you talking about?” Anna felt her knees giving out on her. She hadn’t seen the strange man in months, yet he had become, at the same time, so real and yet so much fiction.
“Maria…I know you were concerned about our relationship. But I thought we cleared things up…Why didn’t you meet me on the beach? Why weren’t you there?” Sheldon’s eyes became moist as he spoke.
“Maria…Oh God…” Anna’s eyes widened as she looked at Sheldon, unbelieving. “Oh God…” With her free hand, Anna pushed Sheldon out of her doorway and slammed the door, turning her back to it. “This can’t be happening,” she thought.
***
“Why is Maria acting so strange?” Sheldon could not understand what was going on. “I’m not going to let this stand. I love her and she loves me. I know she does.” Sheldon stood back and rammed the door with his shoulder repeatedly. Screams came from the other side of the door, but Sheldon didn’t care. After several repeated blows, the door flew open. “What the fuck are you doing, Maria? Why didn’t you meet me? Why are you acting so strange? Everything was perfect yesterday…What is going on?” Sheldon advanced on the retreating Maria until she was trapped between his arms against the opposite wall.
***
“Why are you calling me Maria? My name is Anna. What the fuck are you playing at, anyway?” Anna could hardly get her breath. “Is this some new way to torment me? Is that why you haven’t come to the bank lately? Have you been planning this new psychotic torment instead of harassing me at work?” As she asked the questions, she somehow knew the answer. She knew Maria. She had almost deleted her. And Anna started to question her sanity. The man standing before her was not the one she had met so many months ago. This was the man transformed.
“Get out.” Anna could no longer deal with the situation. She was convinced that she was going insane. “Get out. I can’t deal with this any longer. Out. Get. Out.”
***
Sheldon was not going to be rebuffed in this way. “Maria, I love you. You know I love you. Why are you doing this? You were the one who was worried about me leaving you. So why are you acting so strange?” Sheldon wiped the tears from Maria’s cheeks. “We are perfect for each other. You know this. Just look at us. Just listen to us. Just feel us.” He took her hand and slowly drug her fingertips down his arm. “How can we deny this? We can’t…”
***
“Oh God.” Shivers ran through Anna as she touched Sheldon’s arm. “I have totally lost it,” she thought. “I need some time to think, okay?” she told Sheldon through veiled tears. “Please leave…please…” Anna was practically begging. At least she was begging for him to go. She could not bear to feel his touch. “Please go…” Sheldon stepped away and looked at her.
“Okay. You know where to find me. I’ll go.” He turned and walked out the door. Anna collapsed on the floor. “What have I done?” She cried. She wanted nothing more than to be in his arms. But she also knew that this wasn’t real. Would it be possible for her to even see him again? Had she completely lost her mind? “What would happen if I chose him?” she thought. “Could I even choose him? Would I even be a bank teller anymore? Where would my life go?” Anna slept in a crumpled heap, dreaming of what could be, of her deepest desires, and what strange turns her life might take.
***
Sheldon sat on the beach, pushing the sand around with his toes. “Why was Maria acting so strange? Why was she so distant?” She had reminded him of someone he had met long ago, so long ago that it seemed it was a different life. But he still loved her. And he still wanted her. He looked out at the horizon, remembering the last time he had been there, cradling her head in his lap. And as he watched the tide move in and out he remembered walking there, drunk, almost a year previous. He knew that his drunken night had been the beginning of all of it, though he didn’t really understand why. All he knew was that he wanted Maria.
***
Anna stumbled through the sand. She didn’t know what the consequences would be, but she was now determined. This was her shot at happiness. She could easily abandon her life. There was nothing for her. She wasn’t interested in Peter. She wasn’t interested in her job. She had finally been writing, yes, but that had taken a very strange turn indeed. She was now plowing her way through the sand to meet a man that she wasn’t even sure existed.
As she approached the horizon, she saw him. Sheldon was facing the sun, filtering sand through his fingers, lost in thought. Anna paused, wondering whether she was making the right decision. But as she watched him, she became resolved to move forward.
Crouching down behind him and touching his shoulder, Anna said softly, “Don’t worry. It’s Maria. And I won’t ever leave you again.”