I was riding the bus the other day, listening to Modest Mouse on my IPod shuffle and reading my copy of Kafka On The Shore, when a small child, about six years old, walked up to me to say hi. I waved politely - acknowledging his presence and reassuring his mother, sitting a few rolls back, that her wandering boy was okay. But the little boy anxiously tried to tell me something, motioning for me to take out my ear plugs. I played along and took out the earphones and motioned for him to sit down in the seat beside me. I asked him how his day was going. And like any precoious young boy, he recounted his day in detail. He informed me that his mom had taken him to Gyro Beach for most of the afternoon. He went on the swing, the slide, and the monkey bars - he was quite adept at the monkey bars, a fact that he was proud to share. I smiled and commended his proficiency on the bars; confessing that I was no good at them when I was his age. Then I asked him whether he got good at the monkey bars while playing with his friends. But he responded by shaking his head.
"I have no friends," he said, erupting into a laughing fit. I smiled and pressed that surely he had shared time on the playground with other kids and they could be considered friends - even in the broadest of terms.
"No friends," he said again, as his face took on a bleaker pallor. I tried to reassure him that his superb ability on the monkey bars would surely impress in the future and win him friends.
"I won't ever have any friends," he said, but this time with a wry smile that seemed out of place on the face of a six-year old. "Damien tells me that friendship is not for me."
"Who's Damien?" I asked him, now slightly perturbed by his responses.
"Damien's in my head...he tells me things."
"Oh, I guess Damien could be an invisible friend." I said, unsure of whether I wanted to know what Damien was telling this boy.
"He tells me you are a...kind red spirit..." he paused, as if waiting to relay the last of Damien's message, "...and that you will not burn...when the time comes."
Once again, I smiled. I couldn't help but smile. And of course, I didn't know how quite to respond, apart from posing the obvious question.
"When what time comes?"
"When it is time for all to sleep," he replied with a slightly less innocuous giggle and ran off to join his mother, as the bus pulled up to their stop. I waved bye to them and put my earphones back into place. As I watched the boy and his mom walk away from the bus stop, I noticed a couple preoccupied with a gaggle of shopping bags walk past a man sleeping on a bus bench and wondered if we weren't already all asleep.
