The Runner

I am sitting in my favorite chair.

The fire is dying down, but it will not die down entirely. It has been created to stay aflame, and as it begins to extinguish, it will loop back. There are two dishes in the sink, and those two dishes will never be washed. The garbage should be taken out, but it won’t be. These imperfections are important. They help you forget that you have no reason to feel safe.

Outside, a vampire hunter is patrolling my yard. I created her because, in my youth, I was a fan of a television show about a vampire hunter. I modeled this vampire hunter to look as much like the vampire hunter from the show as possible without infringing on copyright. I look down and my legs are candy canes. A second later, they’re barbershop poles. I have a sense of humor about all this, but that doesn’t mean I’m not sad. Grief does laugh; just softly.

Upstairs, my three daughters are asleep. One of my daughters has a friend over for the night. Her friend has been abandoned by her parents, and the plan was to make her my fourth daughter. It’s possible my daughter, my middle daughter, my spunky one--it’s possible she and her best friend have some kind of romantic relationship, but I hadn’t yet begun to flesh that out. I have given myself a full plate. Multiple businesses in town, a rather large family, and the burden of reality resting on my shoulders. My shoulders are ham hocks right now. Then they’re throw pillows. I want my legs to come back, but they won’t. I can’t run anymore.

We have a woman who manages the house. She lives in a small apartment attached to our house. I’m not sure of the exact layout, because I can’t clearly see what it is I’ve created. It’s a form of aphasia. I know what I want, and I know how to make it, but that doesn’t mean I can see it. Even as I engage with it, it falls away from me. I try to touch a spatula and it becomes invisible, or it hovers in the air in front of my face. I take a step and the floor is the ocean. It’s ice. It’s never lava though. I’m not that much of a hack.

The vampire hunter will not protect me, because I am not threatened by a vampire. I am threatened by speed. Speed is coming up the road. It stops at an ice cream place to grab a caramel cone, but that will be its only distraction. I think about standing up. I know I can’t, but I think about it. I consider the memory of standing up. The sensation of it. I engage with the idea of rising. The notion of lifting yourself up from a place of ease. Ready to fight. Ready to meet the challenge arriving at your door. I will not do that. I can’t. The vampire hunter thinks there might be a vampire in the bush. There isn’t. A vampire would be the least of my worries.

I notice the remote control on the coffee table a foot away from me. If it were closer, I would turn on the television. I would make sure that when speed showed up, I was watching my favorite movie. I would be in my favorite chair watching my favorite film and this would be the equivalent of a death row meal. Had I the opportunity to eat a final meal, I would choose beets with feta, roasted brussel sprouts, and teriyaki salmon. I would choose red velvet cake for dessert, and I would request a nice cup of coffee. Nothing too elaborate. Coffee has always been coffee to me. I had the chance once to make the perfect coffee, and I decided against it. Why perfect something that offers such variety? Once you have perfection, you have eliminated the need for diversification. Imperfection is a note of music that, while still pleasant to the ear, sounds incorrect in the song of flawlessness. Let coffee keep its flaws. My legs are golf clubs. My legs are rolling pins. Let everything be somewhat wrong.

Speed is not cruel. It will not hurt me. It will turn me off. A lamp does not feel pain when it’s turned off. We know that, because last year, lamps achieved sentience. They told us how it feels to be a lamp, and they told us that while it hurts if you leave them on for too long, it does not bother them to be turned off. We didn’t learn as much from microwaves or cell phones, but blenders ended up being very informative. Did you know that a blender orgasms whenever you use the puree function? I try to puree as often as I can now. Why not give the blenders a thrill? I haven’t had an orgasm in years. Not since I created all this. I didn’t have time to create that kind of pleasure. It seemed like a waste of time. I’ve given myself many love interests, but when things get serious, it becomes like a PG-13 rated movie from the ‘90’s. The camera pans away, and when it returns, I’m downstairs having breakfast as my lover slips out before my daughters and our house manager wake up to begin their day.

The word “run” is the last thing that will escape me. Speed will come up the steps. It will walk past the vampire hunter, who will not notice its auburn hair. It will tap me on the shoulder. I will turn off. The entire time, I will be saying the word “Run, run, run” to myself as though I am being drained of something precious. The loss will not register as a loss. It will be created the same way anything else is. A disappearance is still an event. It’s still a noun. Nothing is not nothing. That’s what living here has taught me. When I first came here, the first thing I created was a road alongside the ocean. I would walk and walk and walk, and soon, I realized, I could create running. I could make myself a runner.

Once running was created, it was all I did. I did not create “waking up” or “sleeping,” because all I wanted to do was run. Eventually, after quite some time, I grew tired of running. That’s when I created the house, the daughters, the shops I own in town, along with the town itself. That’s when I stopped exercising my legs. Ignored, they chose their own evolutionary process. They rejected their parameters. They chose to be gondola paddles, and then epees, and then stilts, and then paddles again.

I could say nothing. I had forgotten about what I loved, because I was creating more things to love. More things that I could ever love. More things than I could ever imagine loving. I don’t regret it. I loved making things to love, and I wish I could go on loving them.

I’d also like to get in one more run.

Sadly, that won’t be possible.

Speed is faster than compassion.