Only Human

They say guilt is the ruiner of the soul, little do they know…

My name is Samuel Walsch and there is little I would like to share of myself with the rest of the world. Self security is my protector, and exposure is my ruiner.

So, I stay seated at a hole-in-the wall diner on 18th and Main. It is a quaint little shop I have been frequenting over the course of roughly five years, give or take. To be absolutely honest, the time ruins into days, into months, and into years as one granulated body forming the sands in the hourglass of destiny. After a while, everything seems a blur.

I take a sip of the pungent coffee, the tendrils rising to my nostrils that perk. While the coffee is nothing to be bragged about, the sole reason I frequent this diner is for the company.

Now nobody really acknowledges me. Not Sally, the waitress, who smiles at me, chomping away at the stick of gum she had been working on for two hours.. Not Rhajid the cook or even Len the dishwasher. Or Magda the second in shift, who dreads being there but is thankful that she would rather be at work than home with her boyfriend that gave her the shiner she so professionally covered up under a layer of facial powder.

No. She didn’t tell me these things. Hell, none of these people know my name, or care that I even exist. I just know. I can’t explain it.

Just then, someone breaks my concentration.

“Can you pass the salt?”

My eyes shift toward an older man of gray, matted hair, whose natural cabbage scent is clothed over by an overly lavished scent of rancid cologne which does nothing to lessen the effect, just enhances it. I must make polite conversation.

“Excuse me?”

“The salt?” The man spreads a watermelon slice smile, exposing cracked teeth, some of which were missing. None of which were his fault, to say.

I hand him the salt.

He grabs it, tilts his cap in respect, and begins sprinkling over pork chops. “You new around here? I ain’t seen your face here before…”

“I’ve… been around.” My throat balls as I picture the mutilation of the pig whose destiny brought it to a plastic plate set before on elderly man. I close my mind.

“Paul’s the name.” The man offers a handshake, and I take it. Coolness clouds within me in a welcoming blast of comfort.

I return, “Xander.”

“Xander. Eh. Unique.” Paul takes a bite of the porkchop. His teeth mashing the meat, he contemplates, “A man named Xander. Has a nice ring to it. Makes one wonder where someone who goes by that name came from.”

Not wishing to bring up my jarring past, the name “Indianapolis” slips from my lips.

“Eh? Is that right? My younger brother lives in Indianapolis.” Paul chuckles to himself. “Owns a trucking company down there. A made man, as some would say. He leads a different life… than me…” Paul’s voice drops. “Aw well, enough mongering. So what brings you to Philadelphia.”

A train skirts the tracks above the diner. Dishes and silverware rattle in a symphony of disruption. 

“This place feels like home to me.”

Paul brought up a glass of water to his lips. “Well I am glad some people still call Philly ‘home.'”

Sirens wails from behind like clockwork. Paul shifts to observe two police cars zip by, lights flashing in hues of blue and red across the windows. While curiosity toys with Paul’s mind on what might have happened, I know all too well.

Red flashes pang my conscience, as pain renders my skull. A room bespeckled in blood, two bodies lay limp as thrownaway objects. The distress call made is futile. The killer will never be found.

I lift the cup to my mouth, drown away my ill-fortunate thoughts with a wave of caffeine.

“You know what it is…” Paul said, “Now don’t go judging me by my name and blasting me as a prophet. I do not care for indecencies against scriptural works. It is not that I am a Christian by any means. I am nevertheless not a fan of insult. But I think this is the coming of the end times. Whether or not salvation can save us is as redundant to me as stepping on chewed gum thinking it will make me win the lottery. But this town. It never was great, but it has gotten much worse. It happened all so fast.” Paul chuckles over the disbelief of the craziness. “Can you believe my neighbor was robbed just last night and that very morning, her son was shot going out on a milk run?” He shovels a scoop of gravy-induced potatoes in his open maw. "Crazy world we live in, I say."

“Crazy... world…” Memories of the boy spring to my mind. I was just seconds away from saving his life. Had to make a choice that is hard for me to live with: save the kid or apprehend the criminal. Both options entail negative consequences. The killer… He’s still out there, and the boy is going to be buried six-feet-under as a reminder, a memento of my failure.

“You can say that again.” Paul pats the slop off his face with a paper napkin, balls it up and presses it between his hands, plays with it like a child at a ball of putty, “There is a silver lining to all this madness. There are good people out there. People who would sacrifice their lives to save others. But you never hear about them. It is like they are myths. Things for us to look up to that the world teaches us doesn’t exist. The Easter Bunny. The Tooth Fairy. Santa Claus. Superheroes, heh…” Paul lets out a cracked guffaw. “‘All in your head,’ they say.” The balled up napkin rolls out of his hand, landing adjacent to the half-eaten meal. “Santa…” His eyes tear. “You know what’s screwy, Xander… is that there is a part of me that still believes in Santa. I guess we always have to have something to believe in.” Paul reaches into his pocket, pulls out a photograph, his jaw stammers. “Millie… She used to be so excited when Santa used to come by for Christmas… Of course, it wasn’t Santa. I remember the feeling when I slipped myself into that overstuffed, red suit that smelled of holly and pine. How warm it felt, cozy in the heat of a crackling fire. Millie running up to me, arms wide opened, believing I was Santa.” He observes the photograph in sorrow, “She never lived to believe the truth. So, in a way, Santa is still real. To her at least.”

I observe the photograph of a brunette girl in pigtails, swinging in still life, her portrait immortalized for the eyes of her father to endure, his life to be forever haunted. The girl's face looks familiar, as if from some distant time lost in the fogs of ancient memory. 

Paul says, “We all need our heroes. So if Santa can be real, who can say different from the Easter Bunny, The Tooth Fairy, or even Superheroes.” He looks me in the eyes, grabs my hand. “It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t save her. Nobody could.”

My mind on high alert, I begin to get up. “Please,” the old man says. “Sit.”

I oblige, though reluctantly, feeling my insides compressing under the pressure of the moment.

“I remember you. From way back when. When she got hit by that livewire… I ran to her, but then stopped. In a blink of an eye, I saw this odd person in a trench coat, the very same you wear. Same design, same color, even that patch with the thunderbolt on the right arm. I thought for the longest time I was delusional. That it was just the shock of the moment playing tricks on my fault mind. But I know. Yes… I know.” Paul says, “I do not know who you are outside of Xander from Philadelphia who tried to save my daughter back in eighty-seven. Be it that my world shattered, it gives me some reassurance that the world is still being protected by people like you.”

Paul lets out a long sigh. “There wasn’t anything you could do. We aren’t perfect no more than we are free from the trappings that bring our lives to ruin. In the end, we’re only human.”

“How do you…” I cannot end my sentence… I want to flee, to break away from this city and find some other place to tuck myself into. I know I should have never returned. Paul is on to my identity.

“I saw you coming by a few weeks ago. I am a retired man now. Have nothing better to do. So I decided, what the hey. I could pay you a visit. Show you some respect.” Paul senses anticipation well deep within me. “You needn’t worry. I won’t tell a soul. If I did, who’d believe me? They would think I am under one of my ‘spells’ as they so poignantly like to express. With my luck, they would send me to the old folks home. I would rather die…” He chuckles. “So you see, my life is at stake with confining the secrecy of this pertinent information regarding you. In short, my lips are sealed.”

I take one last sip. Set a folded five-dollar bill under the saucer. “Paul? It’s been good seeing you.”

“I can say the same. You take care of yourself. The world out there is a cruel beast.” Paul gives a final cheeky grin.

I slip on my fedora and proceed to the door. 

“And Samuel…” My spine tingles as I freeze in shock. He knows my name. “Don’t be a stranger and don’t skip dodge. Lord knows we need heroes in our lives more than ever.”

I give one final look at Paul. In his eyes I see a world of pain, despair, and death. His life will end in tragedy, but somehow I know I can prevent it. The time will come when I will have to save him. But for now, my senses draw me somewhere else. I slip out the door like a westerner walking off into the sunset, and into the perilous city of Philadelphia, where innocent lives call for a great protector, when all I truly want out of life is to be only human.