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Artifex Ex Machina (or A Good Idea Is Hard To Find)

What I Would Say To You Now

The Streetlight Goes Out When You're Underneath It

The Art of Rejection

Rapture

Untitled

Amber

Intangibles

"Do you ever wish you could see the future?"

The boy's eyelids were struggling to stay open; his mouth hung unhinged, and his tongue looked to be trying to lick the back of his front teeth clean. He was a sullen looking youth, about fourteen or fifteen, with dark mussy hair, deep set sullen eyes bored into his skull, and sharp, perceiving features. It was mid-afternoon on a hazy Saturday, and dust and oak-coloured light shone through the windows into the dark shop.

I had asked the boy who the chocolates and card were for. At first, he didn't say anything; he just looked down and continued fishing for money in his deep blue jeans, his cheeks turning a deeper shade of red. He mumbled little fragments of thoughts under his breath, searching for coherent words but finding nothing. He probably wasn't expecting to have to say anything to complete the transaction, save perhaps a short but polite 'thank you'. He seemed the type that never knew what to say unless he had taken time to prepare. But then he went and asked me about the future, and I wasn't sure what to say. I'm an old man, after all. What used to be my future is now the past, and there's not much future left for me.

"What's so special about the future?"

"Well, um, I don't know, you know. And that's the problem," he said, "that's why I wish I could see it. It'd make things so much easier."

"Is it a girl?" I asked as I bagged the items and handed them to him across the counter; he turned an even deeper shade of red and didn't say anything. "It's OK, I know how you feel," I smiled.

"She has Mona Lisa eyes, you know. I don't know whether they follow me, or if it's just my imagination. A matter of perspective. An optical illusion. There's just so much I don't know. I wish I could see the future." And with that he distractedly left the store, a twinkling little chime playing as he walked out the door.

When you work in a card store, you see a lot of people and their problems. Every card is a little mass-produced piece of meaning that has the words that someone doesn't. I've owned my little gift shop for fourty years now, and trite as it might sound, it's the people that are my favourite part of the job. Sure, a lot of folks just come in to buy the obligatory birthday cards for in-laws, but every so often someone comes in and buys something out of genuine purpose, out of an intense desire to connect with another person; to actually say something to someone.

Long days came and went before I saw that boy again, the sun rising and setting with the repetitive pulse of a heartbeat. Sometimes, on slow business days, I'd try watching it - try to see if I could actually notice it fading behind the skyline, perceive the subtle changes as it turned from golden light to a red glow to darkness. I never could, but the days beat on regardless.

He walked in late one evening, when I was about to close shop, wearing a coat and a smile. His lips and his face looked a shade brighter than usual. It was turning to autumn, but the lingering scent of cologne and perfume that mingled in the air around him reminded me of spring. I don't mean to nit over such little details of his entrance that day - it's just that it was clear to me then that things had gone well with the girl.

He quickly picked out a romantic card from the shelves and brought it to me. Without a moment of pause, he shut his eyes and began reciting off the back of their lids.

"Listen, um, I just wanted to thank you for the card and everything. Things went really great, you know, and I'm just really really thankful and grateful, you know?" And then, after a moment, he laughed. "Do you even remember me?"

"I never forget my customers," I replied, going through the familiar motions of selling a card. Truth be told, I was glad he came back, and glad things went well. I was curious as to what happened. He seemed like such an unusual person, and I was rooting for him. "You don't need to thank me, you know. It's not like I write the cards. It's not like the cards even matter. It's all about you. It's all about the intangibles."

"What intangibles?"

"Intangibles. Little things you do, little things you say. They seem meaningless, but they add up. You can't ever really know what's intangible and what isn't, but maybe that's for the best. Knowing could drive you crazy. Maybe ignorance is bliss."

He just nodded and didn't say anything as he left the shop. He was still smiling, and it seemed like he'd never have to stop. The chime chimed again.

Since that night, I've often wondered about what I said to him. How much do these small, individual gestures mean? Could one little action, one clever turn of phrase, change everything? It was like looking at a forest and wondering what difference a tree makes. One person in a crowd. Maybe ignorance really is bliss.

Things fall apart as autumn ends. They were falling apart in autumn as well, but we don't notice, we're so caught up in the beauty. Then, suddenly, you realize the trees are dead and the grass is asleep under the powder of a snowy wasteland, and the horrific power of time suddenly dawns on you, a few months too late. We let this happen to us every year, over and over. I don't think we'll ever learn.

It was a snowy day, and every now and then I'd look out my front window into a soupy gray. Hooded creatures without faces swam about while thick dandruff flakes from cloud-scalp that were sprinkled down upon them. Just from looking at it, I shivered and was glad I was indoors.

One of the mysterious beings ran into the store and revealed his visage. It was the boy. He was breathing heavy and hard, like he had jogged there. Shining little tears of sweat rolled down his furrowed brow, in spite of the cold outside. "I need a card," he panted, with a strained look of intensity in his eyes.

"Well now, what for? Is it the girl?"

"Yes. I mean, um," he stopped and gathered his thoughts, resting his hands on his knees as his lungs worked overtime for air. "I mean, I thought...I thought everything was going great, you know? And we went out on a date, and she was acting all distant, and, um, then she just turned to me and said 'I think we should break up'."

I frowned and titled my head at him, a little. What was he doing here for a card, again? What would a card do? "Did she say why?" I asked him, walking out from behind the counter.

"Well, um, that's the thing. I asked her why, and all she did was tell me...well, tell me that she couldn't see it, anymore. She said it wasn't there."

"What's 'it', now?"

"I don't know. Maybe it's like you said...?"

"But it doesn't matter, does it? What exactly do you need a card for, son? What difference is a card going to make?"

"Well," he said, looking at the floor, "I mean, I don't know...it's just that I can see it, you know? It is there, it is, I'm sure of it, and I just don't know how she couldn't see it. And I know there has to be a way to make her see it, but I just don't know it. But there has to be a card. A card always said what I didn't know how to say."

I looked at him sadly, without words. A look can say a lot, I think, and I knew that he understood what it meant. He sighed deeply, straightened himself out, and turned to go with a slow, heavy weight in his movement.

Just as his foot stepped out into the cold, as he reached up to throw that hood back over his head, I called to him. "Listen, kid, I know this hurts, but you shouldn't go out there and drive yourself crazy over those small things that you can't change. It's not about mistakes or intangibles. It's not about the right words on a card. She's right - it's about what you can see. You just have to keep looking until you find someone you can see eye-to-eye with."

The boy nodded and left the shop, turning and giving me a faint smile as he disappeared into the foggy liquid air; he never bothered to put his hood on. I didn't ever see that kid again, but that's alright, I think. There are things you can tell just by looking at a person, and even though I never knew his name, I knew that he would be okay.

Still, sometimes I wonder about him and her; if she ever saw what was so obvious to him, or if that thing wasn't there at all, or if he ever met anyone else who could see that same strange thing. We all assume we have some common connection on the basis of what we mutually perceive. But how can we really know that? The shade that I call 'red' might be what you call 'blue'. The way I feel cold might be how you feel hot. Maybe we all sense reality in entirely different ways. Our perception of the world around us, what we all see, might be the sad truth that keeps us apart.

Years have passed since then, and I'm going blind these days. My sight has gotten so bad that I've had to close up my shop. It doesn't matter, really. Big card company franchises will come and fill the space I leave; slick and glossy, but I like to think just a little more hollow, just a little less sincere. People will still be able to buy cards to tell each other how they feel when their own words aren't quite enough. Still, I'll miss the days I spent behind that counter, watching people and their problems, forgotten birthdays and lost loves, come out in their cards. As my vision fades, I'll miss the sunsets and the skylines, the lush greens of summer and the fiery oranges of fall, charming smiles and intoxicating eyes, of course; but really, all that I want to see is people, and I think the same could be said for anyone.