Joseph Conrad, "Heart of Darkness and The Secret Sharer"
(This is part 8 of an 18-part story, which begins here. Part 5 is here. And here is where you find part 10. Part 15? Right here. And the end of this entirely too long story is located here. After that, you�re on your own.)
(8:15 a.m. � Oakland Airport � 25th hour.)
Oakland.
Shit.
I�m still only in Oakland.
And okay, I don�t care how great Apocalypse Now is (and it is fucking great, at least until Marlon Brando shows up, and even then it�s still pretty damn good) � this book SUCKS. My god. I actually tried to read this when I was in Hawaii six years before, and I put it away because it was boring me to tears.
Am I supposed to emphasize with Marlow, the narrator, just because he has to travel down the Congo to find this Kurtz guy? Hey fuck you, Marlow, try spending 25 hours in the Oakland International Airport! That will give you a fucking Heart of Darkness. You want to see a snail crawling over the edge of a straight razor? Try staring at the clock waiting for the off-hand chance that you MAY be able to get on the next flight. You think you�ve seen hideous acts of utter nightmarish depravity? You haven�t seen the group of fat tourists that are sitting next to me in various pastel shorts.
The horror! The horror!
My body is now so out of whack that I can�t even smoke anymore. All I can do is stand in one spot with bleary eyes and unwashed skin, all the while involuntarily swaying back and forth. Though I�m supposed to stay out of sight of the manager until 8:30, I can�t find the strength in my legs to move more than ten feet away from the counter.
The manager seems me staring at him and flashes a quick smile.
�There are 379 seats on this plane, and 375 people have checked in,� he says to me. �And you have 15 minutes more to go. Oh, look! Here comes another person! Excuse me.�
The bastard is enjoying this!
As the minutes slowly tick by, no one else happens to appear. At least twelve people who were in the line behind me move in close to the counter, smelling blood. The hippie family presses in closest, directly behind me. I halfway expect to get a shiv in the back.
8:20.
8:25.
8:28. The manager smiles beatifically at all of us, surveying the crowd. I want to beat him around the face and neck with my bare hands.
8:31, and he�s tapping his sign-up sheet with his finger, opening his mouth like he�s going to call the first name, then stops to make one last check for any passengers arriving late. Finally he points at me and demands fifty bucks. I hand it over, while various people murmur amongst themselves, wondering if I�m bribing the guy. Really, it�s more like extortion.
He takes my bag and hands me my shiny new golden ticket.
�Have you been in constant possession of this bag at all times?� he asks.
�Absolutely,� I answer.
I quickly run to the line for the security checkpoint, pulling off my belt, unlacing my shoes, putting everything in my backpack to keep the metal detector from going off when I pass through, thus delaying me again, which would practically ensure that I would miss this flight. I don�t have any problems. Right before I pass the gates, I sneak a look back at the ticket gate and see the hippie family being turned away with no ticket. I realize that if I hadn�t been here, they very well may have been on this flight. I almost feel bad, but at that same moment my leg starts to itch again. Then I realized that I alone prevented three hippies from coming to Hawaii.
What I ought to get is a fucking medal!
I pass through the security gauntlet and I�m suddenly in an entire new world � a world filled with big cushy chairs, ottoman lounges, beautiful shops, and food chain restaurants; a place where plants line the middle of the room and artwork hangs on the walls. But all I have time for is to run to a phone to call my dad, saying, yes, I have a flight, come pick me up, because I can not stand spending one more fucking minute in an airport, no matter where it is.
I run back to my gate just as they call my seating area for boarding. It turns out that I have row 2, seat C - located in the front of the plane next to the emergency exit. This means that I have no seats in front of me. It�s actually prime real estate for a sardine flight such as this.
I throw my bag under my seat and plop down next to an older couple. They look at me as I kick my feet out. I can feel them staring. I don�t care. Finally, I look over, and they�re both grinning at me.
�I...� I say slowly and deliberately, �have been in this airport lobby for the past 26 hours.�
�Oh, you poor dear,� says the woman next to me. �What was the problem?�
�It�s a long story,� I said.
They nodded and then quickly looked straight ahead, never glancing at me again.
And again, I just realized something � they probably thought I had been detained by security.
But who cares? I�m finally � FINALLY � on the plane. I fold the page over on the corner of my book, put it in my lap, and lean back into the seat, closing my eyes and waiting for sleep to wash over me. I have a five-hour flight where I can just sleep.
And within two minutes, the child behind me starts to kick the back of my chair.
