Take care, he said, as he rested his hand on my shoulder, tried to look me in the eye while attempting to shake my hand. Piss streamed out of me into the steel urinal trough, as I leaned back, away from the stench of his breath
Take care, he said. Eyes the foggy glaze of a man 7 or 8 drinks in, without a hearty meal in his belly.
Take care mate.
Take care.
He stumbled off, his journey made audible by the squeaking of his shoes on the water-stained, tiled bathroom floor. The smell of beer, fags, and old sweat lingering in the air. Until it mixed with the stench of stale piss, urinal cakes, and whatever else people had been trampling in that day.
Take care, he said. As he caught himself in the door, his jacket snagging on the latch, and his head thunking into the jamb. His bleary-eyed confusion, tragic, and hard to watch.
As he turned and locked eyes with me…
I don’t know if it was because he knew we’d probably never meet again, and the enormity of life and the infinite got to him in that moment. Or it was his own inability at (not) being able to walk through a toilet door, but he looked sad.
Not sad, like the day your first pet dies. And you learn about the inevitability of death through deep, howling, body-shaking sobs. But sad like a man trapped…
