I was sitting. Sitting and waiting, two of the most boring things I hate doing. Can time go any slower, I thought. It's not every day that I get to sit and do absolutely nothing. At Least, I'm not in doors cooped up in the same dingy office where I spend most of my days. The new park across the road has given me a reason to go outside. My eyes begin to watch. I watch kids playing, I watch a mother chase her restless son who doesn't want to leave. I watch a man walking his dog. As I watch the world move about without me, I begin to hear mumbling. “Pardon me” I say.
It was an older man trying to make conversation.
“Are you happy?” He asks.
I looked at him with a confused look on my face and he remarked,
“Ah, my dear that's not happiness.”
I replied “But I haven't given you my answer...”
he then said “Well I don't need to know your answer, your expression answered my question” he continued “ I have a gift, I want to give this gift away, but this gift comes with a price. This gift is far from ordinary, it's a powerful gift, but also a dangerous one.”
I looked at him and wondered whether he was drunk or possibly on drugs. Hard to tell, he didn't look homeless. He looked about 80, and was reasonably dressed wearing a tan blazer and chinos with a spunky dress shirt.
He appeared to be friendly. But then again, nowadays, you can't tell good from evil.
The old man reached into his pocket which made me tense up, he smiled and pulled out a piece of paper.
“So” he asked “ you seem like you might be in search for a dose of happiness, would you accept my gift?”
Smiling at me, he inched forward and handed me the piece of paper. I looked at him even more confused than before. Should I take the paper I thought to myself. I was in a microsecond flux wondering if this would open the door to him sitting next to me or further a nonsensical conversation.
I hesitated and cautiously asked him what it was about.
He smiled and said “It's happiness.”
I was about to say no thank you, when he begins to talk.
“It's just a paper my dear, what you'll find inside is what you seek, if you so decide to seek it. You just have to take a chance and accept my gift.”
With hesitation I grab the paper from his fingers.
He smiled and said, “May you find the happiness you've been seeking for” and proceeded back to the path he was on before.
It must be some religious crap I thought. After 80 years of life the old man has finally found God.... I stared at the paper it looked old. It was yellowing from the edges and the creases were overly creased over. It had but a single illegible word or shape on one side and what appeared to be a small glistening diamond or glass on the center of the shape...too tiny to tell.
I glided my finger over it and cut it. “Fuck, what is this glass” I bled slightly got some on the paper and the rest in my mouth. Surprised and confused, I unfolded the paper to see my so happiness in detail form. To no surprise there weren't any images, nothing related to God or religious beliefs, not even a joke, just words in red.
(If all the ifs were memories for bliss
What kind of life would this if take and give.)
Weird old man I thought, I folded the paper back and placed it in my back pocket and grabbed my phone to look at the time. It was near meeting time and I headed back to the grungy office that numbed my senses.
