Lane Change
"Can you feel it?" He said, gesturing outside the car.
"Feel what?" I asked, keeping my eyes steady on the road. Els had this way of never finishing thoughts, though he started plenty of them. And I felt like this would be the situation again. I sighed quietly, not wanting him to feel the frustration building up inside me. I shouldn't have bothered hiding it. He didn't notice.
"The wind." He said, as though that explained everything. I glanced over at him; his eyes were closed and his hand was tumbling gently on the wind outside the window. It comforted me that his eyes were closed. I could never look into them anyways.
"It's like, well," he paused and mussed up his face trying to think of a way to explain it to me properly. Something I don't think Els has ever done or is even capable of doing. "It's like when you have this cake. I don't know, maybe it's yellow or chocolate or some sort of marble whatnot. But, you're frosting it, and you can smell the frosting; it's palatable––isn't that what they call it when you can taste something even when you aren't eating it?" I nodded, but I wasn't sure if he noticed, so I said yes, that's it.
"Right, so you can taste it and feel it, and the smell's everywhere, right? Like salmon, when you cook it on a Monday an'you can still smell it on Sunday, even with you taking out the garbage on Monday night." Not that Els has ever taken the garbage out. Ever.
I veered into the next lane; the exit sign was coming up. "It's like that." He said. "You know?" He looked at me. I wasn't looking anywhere but the road, but I could still feel him looking at me. I don't like it when he does that. I wish he'd wear sunglasses or contacts or something. It's disconcerting.
Obviously, I didn't know.
"The wind?" I asked, trying this time.
"Yeah," he said, and I feel like if he had been smoking, he would have exhaled a puff here. But Els doesn't smoke. At least, not using his mouth.
~Hammeh
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