People like us.

Here’s a lil short story for you people to eat up. Enjoy!

#???-People like us.

I walked into my home to find an old man sitting in my chair, and for a moment thought he might be dead.

He sat in the chair, slumped over, eyes closed, wearing nothing but a raggedy, stained white tee (that looked more yellow than anything) and some torn up long johns.

He was anything but a large man, but had a slight beer belly sticking out of his torn shirt. The hair on the top of his head had long ago vanished, looking something like a homeless Einstein with whisps of white hair flaring out on the sides and a scraggly, patchy beard.

As I approached him to check for signs of life, he stirred, and when his eyes met mine, his look of disorientation quickly turned into a skowl that stopped me in my tracks. Neither of us made a move for what seemed like several minutes.

“Wut in the fack ‘re you doin?” He barked, breaking the silence. I could smell the whiskey from half way across when he spoke.

“Sir, do you know where you are?” I asked.

“Well I’m in my fackin house aren’t I, the fack do’ya think yer doin here” he replied corsley

“Well, sir, I’m sorry but this isn’t your home. Is there anyone I could call for you?” I replied, becoming increasingly concerned.

He sat there in the chair grumbling to himself under his breath and digging into the cushion beside him before pulling up a pipe along with a lighter. He cleared his throat and spit out a big ol loogie, then hit the pipe, coughing out a large puff of marijuana smoke. He looked up at me, smiling for the first time, a yellow, rotted smile. He held the pipe up, offering it too me, “hit?”

“Sir?” I said perplexed, disturbed by his lack of awareness and on the verge of calling the police. He said nothing, lowering the pipe and looking down into nothingness, he looked like a man life had defeated.

“Sir?” I repeated, hoping to garner a response. He began coughing harshly and, fearing he was about to die in my favorite chair, I rushed to his aide. His coughing subsided and he threw his arms up at me and hollered “get the fack off me ya sum’bitch”

I retreated and sat on the couch opposite of him. I had no idea what to do and didn’t want to get the cops involved, but didn’t see many other options. The old man leaned over in the chair, his hands fumbling around the ground, eventually finding a pack of cigarettes and a whiskey bottle, both of which I hadn’t noticed. With a shaky hand he pulled a cigarette to his mouth, lighting it and taking the cap off his bottle.

“Mister!” I said, now frustrated, “No smoking in here!” I reached for the cigarette trying to snatch it from him but he quickly pulled it away

“Fack you, you don’t smoke here in here. I know all about you, ya sum’bitch”

His response threw me off and I wasn’t sure how to react. I began considering the possibility that I would have to get physical with this old man and wondered how well that would go over. He was a a small man but he looked scrappy and I wasnt prepared to get into it with an old man.

“What’sa matter, cat gotch yer tounge” he said cackling. “Yeaaaaaaah, that’s right. I know all about you, ya lil scum bag.” He pulled off his whiskey

I was taken aback, what the fuck did this old man just say to me?

“That’s right, ya lil bitch…” he continued, mumbling something under his breathe that I couldn’t quite discern.

“What was that?” I asked, puzzled about what was going on here.

He looked me in the eye, cleared his throat, spit on my carpet again and went on, “I said, you caint. You caint do nothing, ya pussy”

I stood up angrily, and  searched my pockets for my cell phone.”that’s it, I’m calling the cops”

“I wouldn’t do that” he muttered. Putting his cigarette out on the arm of the chair

“…what?”

“They’ll call you crazy…”

I began trying to form a response but before I could get a word out he interrupted…

“You ain’t ever gonna become shit. You ain’t nothing. It’s about time someone put you in your place.”

I was frozen.

“See, people like you and me, we ain’t nothing, we worthless. We ain’t never gonna mean nothin to nobody.” He paused…”this is God’s work, you see what god did to us” he hollered, getting louder and angrier. “he cursed us! And now, now we will never be happy! We don’t get that, we don’t deserve that!”

“….people like us?” Was all I could muster for a reply.

“Your gonna die drunk and alone just like your real daddy!”

“Fuck you ! You old fucker, what the fuck do you know about me? Who the fuck are you!?”

“Yer nothin” he said, hitting the pipe again and coughing harshly. He had gotten under my skin but I found myself unable to do anything. I just sat there trying to understand why in the hell this old man was saying these things and who he was.

“You know I’m right, that’s why you ain’t called no cops yet. Now be a good boy and grab me a beer.”

“Fuck you old man” I whispered under my breath.

“Stop being pissy. I was just telling you like it is, now grab us a couple drinks and drink up with me.”

“Who the fuck are you?”

“Im nothing more than you, dear boy. I’m the rejection. I’m all yur damn failures. I’m the damned dredded, but yet, beloved whiskey. The stogies you never quit. You know, you remind me a lot of myself at yer age. Full of cum and witherin hope. One day that light’ll die though, and you’ll look just like me. Ugly, and alone, and disgusting, and confused about how n the hell you got here. God knows I don’t know how I came to be this.”

“Your wrong, I’m nothing like you. Fuck you.”

“Oh, but to the contrair buddy boy, you are me…”

I closed my eyes in frustration, ready to tell this man off before calling the cops, but when I looked back to him, he was gone. I scanned the room but saw no one. I looked into the empty television and saw something strange where my reflection should have been. The old man was right, and I suddenly saw everything he had talked about. The regret. The failure. The rejection. The loneliness. The misery. The ugliness.

I picked up my pipe remembering that I had loaded it before going to bed, but found it empty. I found my pint of whiskey sitting next to my feet and killed the last drink. I grabbed a cigarette off my desk and sparked it up, and walked to the fridge for a beer, wondering what I would eat for dinner.

When I cracked the beer, I rose my beer in a cheers to nobody. “This ones for you, old man”