Greg's Walk

By Sean Tarjoto (tarjoto@hotmail.com)

Greg toppled over, thinking on the way down how hard the concrete would crush the bridge of his nose. Hopefully, he'd twisted his ankle enough to warrant enough a juxtaposition of a free fall; so that the other 90% of his might slap expendably onto the asphalt of sidewalk, sparing precious vital organs from a nauseating rib-caged juggle. No such luck.

"Jesus." Bridget was standing across the street, safe from modern city traffic. Bridget was a pretty sixteen-year-old with fiery red hair, green eyes, and a stonewash blue short sleeve T-shirt. She'd already correctly anticipated Greg would trip midway or something, and thought, this was a bad start.

Greg was face down in the divider sidewalk, halfway sprawled across its curb. Dead tree leaves wandered in the traffic wind and browned grass blades spiked the perimeter of his body, crushed at the root. Their unfortunate siblings flattened under Greg's enormous, overweight love handles and chunky calorized arms. If he'd been in a field of grass, face down, it might have seemed like the sea of blades were fleeing the disaster his body had unexpectedly caused by gracing their populace so violently. Like a Japanese monster movie gone bad.

His legs are going to be splattered by a Toyota, Bridget frowned. Greg was still three feet into the road, and the only thing stopping that 3 feet from utter oblivion was the red traffic light. She heard an expletive cursed as Greg stumbled to his feet, and didn't know whether it was Greg himself or one of the drivers swerving to avoid him.

"Christ, Greg!" Bridget yelled. A Pepsi truck screamed past her.

A Pepsi truck crossed Greg's path, stopping him more or less from moving toward Bridget. Greg turned, avoiding eye contact with any of the angry drivers who'd were now regretting their defensive maneuvering.

He sighed. Kneeling slowly and carefully wondering what the hell he'd tripped on, Greg paused to take a moment and retie his shoelace, which he'd suddenly felt squeeze his toes. It had actually tightened and was now cutting the circulation off. Apparently it caught on something. Greg flipped the laces onto the grass, and then double-bunny-looped his way to a comfortable size 11 fit.

Bridget was pacing around, impatient. She was pulling on the hook of her belt with her thumbnail. Damn, he's such a &$@*-faced klutz. If it weren't for that crazy green plant thing with spikes sticking out all over the place we wouldn't be waiting around like this. She blinked, watching Greg a moment. Dang, he just stepped on it. She heard a siren.

Traffic started slowing, as drivers on Bridget's side of the street began slowly parking on the curb. A red '98 Beetle and the police car chasing it cleared the way for Greg, who promptly stood there, oblivious.

"Greg!" he heard. It was Bridget.

"Move your butt!"

Damn, she was cute when she yelled, Greg thought, who promptly jogged the white stripes and cement. He hopped a puddle and landed on the sidewalk. He scratched his knee, where it felt like a bruise was coagulating. "Thanks for waiting."

"Yer a certified freak." She said, and jabbed him in the deltoid.

"Ouch. Hey, I'm hurt you know." Greg joked. "I nearly got kilt by traffic, in case you didn't notice."

"I noticed." Bridget said, moving down the corner of sixth and Burnside. "But I wasn't gonna run an' risk my life or anything."

"Glad to know yer there for me."

"Just watch yer step."

"I will." Greg said, shortly before falling over the manhole Bridget was referring to.