Mercy Hug

This morning I walked to work, and on the way I passed a group of people, in their twenties I'd guess, looked like they just come out of some nightclub. I got past them and I hear a girl's voice, "Hey! Excuse me!' I thought it might be aimed at me, but I pretended not to hear and kept on. Then it came again, 'Hello! Excuse me!' Well sir, I had to turn around this time, I was caught you see. It was a girl all right, no doubt about it. Blond hair, big smile, big in other places, the right ones. She said, 'They told me to give you a Valentine's Day hug!' What did I say? I don't know, something like, "Oh!' Pretty smooth, huh? I went to hug her, to get it over and done with. It felt like a trap. Then she just had her arms out, like she was gonna start flapping them. Maybe she changed her mind. No, here she comes. We hug, a pretty clumsy one, and then it doesn't matter what she looks like. I could be hugging a cousin.

That's it. Show's over. She goes back to her laughing friends and I continue on my way to work.

Actually, it's not over, because I immediately start to go over it in my head. You see, I know there is always an angle to these things...

I must look miserable. I must look pretty damn miserable, and they saw it, and told the girl to give me a Valentine's Day hug. That would be it. It would be a laugh, and pretty amusing, and might cheer the miserable bastard up a little. And what about what the girl said? 'THEY told me to give you a hug' They did it. They told you. You didn't think of it. You wouldn't have thought of it. You just would have watched me walk by, or maybe not even seen me. I didn't come out of a nightclub. I'm walking to work. I was just trying to walk to work in peace, with my obvious misery, and what do I get? A mercy hug. I think of Jacob in A Simple Plan - the girl's friends dare the girl to go out with Jacob for the summer. It's not the same, but is kind of the same. It's condensed into a minute. But Jacob only got to hold hands, at least I got a hug. Maybe it's not so terribly depressing after all!