he’s been visible the whole time but never used to say much. he did, ages ago, before the discovery of the world.  now he claims to know. sometimes he concedes to his ignorance, without showing it; it is awkward where he lives and who he lives with and might be easier to pretend like nothing happened.

nothing did happen.

stories are told of trips to get ice cream, or that time when someone did something silly. ha ha ha ha ha. HA HA HA HA HA.

he makes awful sounds when he’s eating. he is aged but small and impotent in simple ways, like a child, asking his wife to choose his foods and spending his free time asleep in the fetal position. he eats quickly, looking upwards at the television and shoveling small bites into his mouth at a rapid pace, jaw snapping up and down

keeping time like a bird swallowing a worm in fast intermittent installments.

he makes awful sounds when working at home, or eating fruits after his lunch has been cleared from the table before him. he drums on hollow surfaces with stubby fingers, creating rhythms and beats that interrupt the room’s atmosphere and infuriate. or when he’s on the phone. repeating that same insufferable grunt, that “mm,” tenfold a minute. it is unbearable.

remember when we went to the beach and made sand castles? remember when that never happened? surely, he wouldn’t  remember the CD from New Orleans that had one song that stuck. he wouldn’t remember the paired walks to class that took place under pretenses of not knowing the way from the parking lot.