JEFF CALLICO has resided in the Atlanta area since 1975, but originally hails from Louisville, Kentucky. He is married, has two children, ages 13 and 8, two dogs and one cat. Currently there are no iguanas, ferrets, scorpions or tarantulas, and probably never will be.
minutiae
Two people are watching TV. One of them is a woman, the other a man. They have known each other only a few days. They decide to start out by watching TV together, to see if things between them fit.
They are at her house, sitting on her couch. There is a slight span of distance that separates them, approximately 14 inches. To her, this is just right, but to him, it is too much. He decides to move closer—pretends to reposition himself, as if trying to attain a new level of comfort. She notices, but is uncertain of his motive of movement.
“Pretty good show, isn’t it?” she says, her voice rather high-pitched. She has a naturally high-pitched voice.
He looks over at her as the TV flickers in the darkened room. “Yeah, kind of interesting. Good to see something new for a change.”
“But in some ways it’s the same as some of the others.”
He says nothing.
“I mean, look at the way it’s shot. Squared-off scenes, like a perpetual picture frame. Boring.”
“You know, you’re right. Actually it kind of sucks doesn’t it?”
She smiles. “Yeah.”
Rising from the couch, she goes over and turns off the set; she has lost the remote. He says, not knowing this, “Where’s your remote?”
She is turning from the TV as she says, “Oh, I lost that thing a long time ago. No telling where it is now.”
“You could buy a universal.”
She sits beside him on the couch, closer now. The 14 inches is reduced to 6. “Nah, I need the exercise anyway.”
He laughs.
“What?” She is searching his face for an answer.
“It doesn’t take much effort to walk from here to there.”
“I know,” she says, unsmiling, “but I do it a lot of times every day. I don’t just leave the TV on all the time. Like, I’ll watch a show, turn it off, then later when another show comes on, I’ll turn it on again, and on and on. I guess I turn it off and on about six or seven times a day every day.”
He has stopped laughing. “Okay.”
“You want a drink?”
“Sure.”
She gets up and goes into the kitchen and brings back two beers. She hands him one and he pops open the can. She opens hers and takes several swallows. He takes a couple and watches her.
“You must like beer,” he says.
“You bet,” she says, licking her lips. “It’s one of my basic food groups.”
This makes him laugh again. She laughs too. They laugh at this together for a little while, then finish off their beers and she goes and gets two more cans. They end up sharing a six-pack together.
“I want more,” she says, so they go out to a bar and order some drinks. He gets a little drunk, but she goes on ordering for herself. He realizes she is one who can hold her liquor. After two straight hours of drinking, they return to her place and fall asleep together in her bed.
In the morning, he wakes up and finds her missing from the bed. Soon he meets her in the kitchen and she is preparing a large breakfast. He rubs his eyes and says good morning. She smiles and says the same.
After breakfast, she cleans up and tells him she has to leave but that he can stay if he wants. He agrees to stay for a while, to watch TV, then leaves. They don’t see each other after this for a long time.
One day she decides to call him. He answers.
“Wanna come over?” she asks.
“No, I can’t.”
“Oh, okay.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be, everything all right?”
“My father died.”
There is silence.
“Hello?” he says.
“I’m so sorry,” she says.
“That’s okay. He wasn’t much a part of my life anyway.”
There is another silence.
“Well, thanks for calling, I got to go to the funeral home.”
She waits a moment and slowly says, “Okay, take care,” then hears him hang up, feeling dead herself. She hangs up her end, grabs a beer from the fridge and turns on the TV. This time, it stays on all night and into the next day. She leaves it on all week and ends up burning out the tube.
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Copyright © 2003 Jeff Callico
