Short Story: October Analysis

Short Story: October Analysis

It has been October for seven days now, and although here we don’t have the same seasons as we do back home, I can feel that things are changing. Autumn, or Fall as those Americans like to call it, is a season of change just as is Spring. I guess because as the leaves fall, so does the temperature. In April, things spring up, like flowers and babies and what not. God knows the true origin of these words but that’s how I thought it was, things rising and falling, growing and dying, seasons changing and never just meeting a constant.

Here the changes are more subtle. The temperature has altered slightly, faintly cooler than before, with more of a breeze and less summer rain. It’s comfortable. Things aren’t visibly changing, no naked trees or thicker coats, which makes the seasons more of a state of mind. The calmer sun made me realise it’s October, oh and of course pay day, which is a signal of change for about a week and then you realise you have paid all your bills and then it’s just an ordinary day. But also, I took the Kidnapper back to the Glass Bedroom. I know I said I wouldn’t, but you know, that was last season.

Autumn, I find, is a season for analysis. Summer is like a hot whirlwind of adventure, revelry and romance. Then Autumn comes and suddenly life once again hits a steady pace, you’re back in reality. Three months already in Taiwan and they shot by so fast I didn’t even see October coming. Now the black coffee is back out, me with writer's block and little positive to say apart from the bit about the kidnapper, no exciting stories to tell. So I’ll just analyse a few things instead. Black coffee filled to the brim.

Well, first of all, I’m learning new things about these Taiwannys. They’re not so innocent as they like to make out. For a start, and I swear I’m not being paranoid, they talk about me. At work. I know I don’t understand Chinese but what I do understand is, ‘wa wa wa wa wa Joanne, wa wa wa wa wa Joanne, wa wa Joanne ma?’ I look up from my books and Sonia catches my eye, looks away and then starts to whisper, ‘wa wa Joanne.’

Not so innocent, but possibly stupid. But hey, whatever, I’ve had to put up with some shit at work before, what people used to say about me in the office in Germany I could understand and I used to go home and cry.

Plus, what goes on in that place really does amuse me. I actually enjoy being there two hours early, just for the entertainment factor. I just sit quietly, sipping my green tea, analysing things and silently laughing in my own head. You’ve got the witch, who has cornered Colleen behind the copier and is asking her one thousand questions, 900 of which Colleen probably doesn’t understand. I can spot Ivy over there, buying a handbag on a Chinese version of ebay, looking over her shoulder every five minutes hoping none of the other Chinese staff have caught on. The cleaner is bopping around with her cloth and broom, attempting to sweep under people’s feet, dusting a telephone that Amber is using, just because she’s too polite to ask people to move so that she can do her job. Then, on the days the boss might be popping in, they’re all up there, frantically dusting and scrubbing everything that doesn’t even need to be cleaned. Apart from Colleen of course, she will be hiding in the bathroom which has a diagram of poo on the door (I’ve spent hours staring at it, trying to figure out what this actually means, to poo or not to poo?) Anyway, she’ll tuck herself behind the sink, hoping that the witch doesn’t find her and ask her another hundred pointless questions, just for the sake of asking them. And it’s a shame, I really do like Colleen, ever since that time the girl with Alopecia drew a picture of the two of us, sat on the back of dinosaurs, sharing a lesbian kiss and surrounded by love hearts. She may have found it creepy, since I just happened to be stood there with a black marker in my hand, but ever since then I think we’ve been getting on all right. That’s why I stand up, walk over to the copier and make up a meaningless question of my own, such as, ‘Colleen, what’s the meaning of life?’ just so I can rescue her from the witch.

When I’m not at work, the Taiwannys continue to do hilarious things. I had gone to the hole in the floor, a toilet in an all you can drink nightclub on a Saturday night. I was last in the queue. The Kidnapper had been left outside holding four beers for about ten minutes. I hoped he didn’t think I’d fallen in, after all, I had expressed my fear about this before I entered the bathroom. He’d coped with the camel toe joke all right so I stepped it up a notch.

I turned to the girl next to me, who looked about ten years old in her Minnie Mouse Tshirt. Then I could see it, vomit trickling out of the crack in her fingers which she was holding over her mouth. Not so innocent now? That was my first thought. Then I realised, this girl was standing right next to me, if it turned projectile, I was directly in her aim of fire and my date was waiting right outside. Somebody get this girl to a hole, was the second thing which sprung to mind.

A toilet became available and, despite her urgent need to vomit somewhere else than her own hands, she turned and looked at me. As if I had some sort of superior right to go first. Meanwhile, her cheeks were filling up like a hamster’s. Go, you stupid fool, I signalled.

I may be white but my shit isn’t made of gold. I myself have been in those puking situations and I can tell you one thing for sure, I wouldn’t give up a toilet for anyone. Back in our student union, I once barged about ten girls out of the way to get to what I thought was a free cubicle. Then I found Porna, passed out in there on the floor with her knickers around her ankles. ‘It’s all right, we can share,’ she slurred. That’s the British way of doing things. I wasn’t going to stand by and watch Minnie Mouse get puked on just so I could be the first one to squat. The Kidnapper could wait.

In spite of the suspicious twenty minute wait outside the girl’s bathroom, the night didn’t go too bad for the Kidnapper, if I don’t mind saying so myself. I thought Panjita and Canadia could have been kind of pissed about it all, but in the morning Panjita made him a brew with her last tea bag, and I have known her long enough to know this was her seal of approval. I think the poor guy may have been a bit overwhelmed. He takes a seemingly nice girl to an Indian restaurant followed by ‘a few drinks’ and the next thing he knows he is waking up in a room with voile material pinned to the windows and a Manchester accent poking itself through the blind asking if he wants a cup of English tea.

Now most would be planning their escape route, wondering if they could survive if they jumped from a fourteenth floor balcony. But not this one. Instead he hung around with me on the sofa all day, sipping his brew and comforting me through my hangover since it was all-you-can-drink for eight pounds. I still had the inky stain ‘Pig Pen’ across my arm (the nightclub stamp) my hair was as huge as it had ever been and I had no foundation on to cover my huge nose. It was he who mentioned the nose, not me, I would never dare bring that hideous thing up in conversation. But he did, he did the weirdest thing, he stroked it with his finger and told me it was his favourite bit.

So, from this day forward, we have to assume that the Kidnapper is either blind, has a nostril fetish or is just completely insane. I am hoping it’s insane, because I’m sure that’s the mental state required to spend more than a day in my company.

I recited the whole story to my mother and nana on skype. Nana knew I was going on a date because I’d called the hospital that morning. The combination of my mother, alcohol, a paragliding trip and a tattoo had just been too much for the seventy three year old. Now the two party animals are stuck in Tenerife with a 3000 Euro hospital bill. Still, when I call it seems like they’re having a good old laugh. Mum is probably pinching all those Spanish doctor’s bums whilst she’s wheeling my nana out back for a cigarette. They’ll be living proof that the English will continue to invade Spain and wreak havoc for the rest of eternity. Never mind those 18-30s. It’s the 40-80s they’ve got to worry about.

‘I hope you got all you wanted from your date, if you know what I mean,’ my nana chuckled.

‘Don’t worry Nana, he just left,’ I assured her.

I don’t think October is going to be too bad.

There are further dates planned with the Kidnapper, I’m the topic of a Chinese conversation, never thought that would happen and most importantly, I discovered all you can drink for the equivalent of eight pounds.

Unfortunately, the wicked witch won’t be fucking off back to the West, Autumn is still hot enough here that the glass bedroom also serves as a sauna (not the best for accommodating guests) and worst of all, I have to call Autumn Fall, in a shitty American accent which makes me sound like I’ve been inhaling helium.

I’m going to need more black coffee.