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Bill’s head is low as he stares down at the dark streets of L.A. He leans his body against the balcony and takes a drag of his cigarette, the nicotine burning his throat. He’s not usually a smoker but he feels odd today.
He places his hands on the cold steel of the balcony and watches the ash fall and drift downwards in a slow, gray spiral.
Bill sighs and rests his chin against his hand before closing his eyes. As soon as his eyes close he sees an image of a young boy, no older than thirteen, staring at him. He has dark, flat, brown hair and eyes to match. He looks wide-eyed and innocent. Too young and afraid for anything but somehow, Bill knows he’s strong and incredibly brave.
The boy frowns. “Big Bill?”
Bill’s eyes fly open and he jumps, dropping his cigarette. He could hear the boy. Like he was right next to him.
He looks around, heart hammering in his chest, but he can’t find anyone. He takes a shaky breath and scrubs his eyes with the heels of his hands.
“Bill?” A voice comes from behind him. “Are you–”
“I’m fine.” Bill snaps before dropping his hand. “I’m fine Carter.” He turns to the man. “Let’s just get this over with.”
Carter nods and leads Bill back into the building.
Bill thinks about the boy and he wonders who he is. He felt…familiar somehow. And no one calls him Big Bill, they never have, but it didn’t feel strange coming from that boy it felt somehow…right.
“Bill?” Carter says, shaking Bill from his stupor.
Bill blinks at him. “Hmm?”
“Are you sure you’re okay?” He asks. “I’m sure we can reschedule–”
“No need.” Bill says, buttoning his suit jacket. “I’ll see you later.” He takes a step towards the door and plasters on a fake smile before stepping in and beginning his speech.
—-------------------------------------------------------
Bill walks beside Mason, one of the few people at his work who doesn’t hate being around, as they walk back to the office after lunch.
Mason is telling him about the trip that he and his wife have planned. Bill only partially listens, instead choosing to focus most of his attention on his leathered shoes and the sound they make on the pavement.
A glint of silver hits his eyes and he pauses. He kneels down to take a closer look and sees that it’s a silver dollar. He picks it up, the metal warm against his skin. God, Bill hadn’t seen one of these since he was a boy. When did he see one last? He thinks he knew someone who had them. The person had thick hands and they had something to do with hay. A farmer maybe?
He shakes his head and stands up, sliding the silver dollar into this pocket. He has an odd feeling in his chest and as if on its own accord, his head turns to the left. His eyes land on a man, probably around his age. The man has dark brown hair, well built with a goatee. He’s walking while talking into a phone, smiling a wide, comforting smile.
Bill tilts his head at the man, he feels like he knows him, like he saw him in a dream once, just a vague recognition.
“Bill!”
Bill turns from the man to see Mason standing about twenty feet from him, waving him over.
Bill takes one last look at the man only to find him gone. He shakes his head and walks towards Mason.
—-------------------------------------------------------
“I have to call you back.” Bill says into his phone as he pushes open the door of his favorite coffee shop.
“I’m serious, sweetie,” his mom says on the other end, “I think you should move out of L.A.”
He sighs as he walks towards the counter. “You say that every time we talk, mom.”
“I’m telling you it’s not safe.” She persists. “I heard on the news about these muggers and they take everything you have.”
Some part of Bill thinks that he’s been through worse things than simple muggers but he can’t recall what.
“I’m hanging up now.” He says into the phone before doing just that. “I’ll have the usual…Matt?” He looks up from the counter to see not Matt looking at him.
The man has a dark mop of hair and thick, black-framed rectangular glasses and some part of Bill wonders why there’s no tape holding the frames together though the glasses don’t look broken.
There’s something almost familiar about the man but Bill can’t put his finger on it.
The man in front of him smiles awkwardly. “Uh, sorry sir, Matt’s out sick.” The man says. “What can I get for you?” He asks, pushing up his thick rectangular glasses with his forefinger.
Something aches in Bill’s chest.
“Sir?”
Bill shakes his head. “Right, sorry. I’ll have a large black coffee with cream and sugar please.”
Bill watches as the man nods, putting that into his computer.
For some unexplained reason, Bill’s hands begin to shake so he shoves them into the pockets of his pants.
The man looks up from the computer and a face flashes before Bill’s eyes. A boy with thick glasses that make his dark brown, almost black, eyes look much larger than they are. The boy grins then it’s the man again.
“Name sir?”
Bill blanks, his heart hammering in his chest.
“Billy-Boy!” A young voice yells with laughter.
“It’s Bill.” He says almost automatically, his voice coming out harsher than he intended.
The man nods, not caring or just not noticing Bill’s tone and writes his name on the cup before heading to make Bill’s coffee.
For some reason, Bill finds himself wishing that the man had said something, insulted him perhaps, gave him a noogie like the ones…who used to give him?
—-------------------------------------------------------
There aren’t many parks in L.A and Bill isn’t really a park kind of guy but for some reason on a Tuesday afternoon he finds himself walking into a small park.
He thinks maybe he wants to look at birds but he has no clue why. Bill doesn’t partially like birds nor care for what they do. But for some reason he wants to go to the park to perhaps catch a glimpse of one.
He takes a seat on a metal bench, a few feet away from a man reading the morning paper.
The man looks up at Bill and he’s slightly annoyed that he decided to sit next to him when there’s a bench just three feet from where they sit that’s completely empty.
The man huffs and turns back to his paper, Bill doesn’t notice.
Bill watches the trees sway in the wind and a small smile graces his lips. He watches as a bird swoops down and lands mere feet away from his feet, pecking at the ground.
“Passer domesticus.” A young boy’s voice mutters and it sounds like he knows his stuff.
Bill turns to the man next to him. “Pardon?”
The man looks at him over his paper. “What?” He says, voice much deeper than that of the young boys.
Bill frowns, maybe the man hadn’t heard the boy. “Sorry.” He turns away from the man.
While the man turns back to his newspaper Bill turns back to the bird. He tilts his head at the bird and watches it walk around.
“It’s a sparrow,” Bill finds himself saying, though he doesn’t know why, “but it’s also called a passer domesticus.”
The man gives him a final annoyed look before rolling his eyes and standing, walking away and grumbling under his breath about idiots and damn birds.
Bill doesn’t really care, he’s more confused on how he knows what the bird was called. He’s certain he never looked it up nor does he recall ever learning it in school but he’s sure that sparrows are also known as passer domesticus.
He closes his eyes and he sees an image of a young boy with curly, dark blonde hair under a light blue yamaka. The boy’s eyes are a soft brown, almost amber, color. He’s wearing a button up shirt that is crisp and devoid of wrinkles. He looks like a little boy desperately trying to look like a grown up.
“And that’s a stercorarius parasiticus.” The same voice from before says though this time it’s coming from the boy. “Also known as parasitic jaeger. They’re kleptoparasites which means they steal other bird’s food.”
Bill’s eyes fly open. “Hello?” He says, looking for the boy because he’s surely here, Bill had heard him.
He doesn’t see anyone nor does he get a reply.
“Hello?” He repeats, louder this time.
Again, he gets no response.Bill closes his eyes once more in hopes of seeing the boy again but he doesn’t. It seems he can’t even recall what the boy looked like. Were his eyes brown or green? Was he wearing a hat of some kind? A beanie maybe?
Bill shakes his head, feeling lost and confused. He stands up, brushes the seat of pants and leaves the park wondering vaguely why he wanted to go to the park in the first place.
—-------------------------------------------------------
“Bill honey!” Audra’s voice yells as she looks for him in the small house. “Where are you?!”
“Bedroom!” He yells back, placing a magazine he had just bought on the shelf beside his bed. It’s a fashion magazine about up and coming fashion designers. Bill isn’t a fashion kind of man (he wears jeans and flannels to most everything) but he bought it immediately when he saw it in the convenience store for some reason.
Audra walks into the room to find Bill just standing, looking at the bookshelf. “Right, well, I’m off.” She walks over to Bill. “I love you.”
He nods, still staring at the bookshelf. “Yeah, love you too.”
She smiles and kisses him before walking back out of the room.
Bill suddenly feels sick.
He heads to the bathroom and turns on the cold water before ducking his head under the faucet, scrubbing at his face with the cold water.
He comes up for air, panting. He grips the sides of the cold linoleum of the sink and stares at himself in the mirror. He looks old and tired. He has bags under his eyes like he hasn’t slept in years, his eyes are red and bloodshot and he’s on the verge of crying and he doesn’t even know why.
And cry he does.
His tears fall hot and fast.
When he looks back up at the mirror he sees himself but younger. He’s not younger by a few years, no, he’s younger by almost two decades. He looks like he’s thirteen, all big grins and that stutter. But he’s not alone.
There’s a girl with him, right next to him. She has short, bright red hair. Her eyes are a bright blue and they twinkle in amusement. Her smile is wide and she looks like she’s laughing. She wears a red blouse and around her neck is a chain with a single bronze key on it.
He looks around and finds the girl not there. He looks back into the mirror to find his reflection is his again. He stares at the mirror longer, willing it to show him that image again because he swears he knows that girl, swears that if he could just see her face again he’ll be able to say her name and he won’t feel this lost.
After ten minutes of nothing, Bill shakes his head and heads to bed.
—-------------------------------------------------------
Bill dreams of swimming.
He doesn’t know where he is and his body is smaller, less muscles, but he feels stronger than he ever has before, like he can do anything.
He hears laughter and swims to the surface to find a group of kids, their faces are blurred but for some reason, that doesn’t matter to Bill.
“Hey Big Bill!” A voice shouts.
He feels water splash his face and the sound of children giggling.
He finds himself grinning. “Oh yuh-yuh-you’re guh-gun-gonna get it n-n-n-now!” He shouts before diving back into the water and swimming again.
Bill grabs onto a warm leg and pulls the boy under the water with him. Someone shoves him as he resurfaces and he laughs and he feels so free, so utterly free that he can hardly breathe from it.
“Suck it Billy-Boy!” Another voice shouts before shoving his shoulders and pushing him back under.
Bill comes back up to face the blurred faced boy and he and the boy wrestle for a bit. The boy gives him a noogie and pokes his side and Bill pulls his hair and pinches him.
“Get him, Captain Haystack!” The boy shouts in a terrible British accent once it’s clear that Bill is winning.
The larger boy shakes his head. “No way!” He yells. “You’re on your own!”
“How about you, Spaghetti?” The boy continues. “Bird-man?”
“Don’t call me Spaghetti.” Another voice says.
“Beep-Beep.” Another boy replies, shaking his dark blonde curls.
“Boys are idiots.” The lone girl with red hair remarks but she’s laughing so none of the boys take it to heart.
“So are girls!” A black boy remarks, splashing the girl.
Then they swim some more and there’s laughter and Bill feels safe and…whole, more so then he has ever felt before.
—-------------------------------------------------------
When Bill wakes up he’s crying though he doesn’t know why. He can’t remember what he dreamed about but that must be the reason for his tears. Maybe it was about someone he loves dying. Something inside of him doesn’t think so.
He turns his body to look at his digital alarm clock which shows 4:30 in blaring red script.
“I don’t know you.” He finds himself whispering into the darkness. “But I need you.”
Who he needs, he doesn’t know. Why he said that, he also doesn’t know but he finds that it’s true.
When he would wake mere hours later, the dream would be nothing but a distant memory.