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A Walk With Norm

Russ Bickerstaff

    Norm had come a long way before he realized that he was lost. The further he walked, the more lost he became. It had gotten to a point where he normally would have panicked. He did not feel any tension at all, but he didn’t know why. Perhaps it was the fact that everyone else was being so nice to him. There were so many other people where he was and they were all being so very, very nice to him. Everyone said hello with such a warm and inviting tone. Norma was casually offered fine foods and warm hugs.
    Of course, the forced familiarity of everything felt a bit strange, but it wasn’t at all unpleasant and Norm could not detect the slightest hint of malice in anyone around him. Everyone seemed genuinely happy to see him even if they were complete strangers. Of course, if they weren’t complete strangers, he might not have known as the rush of events that had found him walking made it so very, very difficult to remember much of anything other than where he was at that precise moment. With no past and only a vague understanding of the present, there was really no reason for Norm to worry at all about the future.
    As nice as everyone was being to Norm, he couldn’t help but notice that other people weren’t being quite so nice to each other. For the most part, passing strangers were as nice to everyone else as they were to him, but there were a few who were being held behind chainlink fences who seemed to be treated with something less than warmth. It was a bit chilling to see everyone else smiling and carrying on while Norm continued to be offered such pleasant hospitality. He was handed a rather shiny piece of delicious fruit and moved on from the chain link fence as he went about his way on a sunny day.
    Norm had only noticed the disquiet at first out of the corner of his perception, but before long, those behind the fences all that he could seem to see. He saw them and their lack of happiness reflected in the smiles of passing strangers. He saw their tattered clothes as shattered phantoms of the clean, fresh new apparel being worn by himself and those around him. Norman new that his face was not quite as sunny as those he had been passing but they didn’t seem to notice. The discrepancy between happiness and sadness between himself and those around him had become a major issue somewhere in the back of his mind as morning had become noon had become afternoon.
    He resolved to ask the first person who handed him a snack after lunch about those people behind those chain-link fences that popped up every once in a while. It was, however, exceedingly difficult to open his mouth to speak when something was being shoved into it. It had grown to be something that was actively upsetting to him. He may have been slightly relieved when he looked around and noticed that no one else is really attempting to have any kind of a meaningful connection with anyone else. They were all just really happy. They were all just really happy walking along. And they’re all just really happy doing their jobs and handing things and consuming things and being so relentlessly cheerful.
    It took a great deal of effort and passion and frustration to finally move a Norm a few steps over towards the chain-link fence. The next time it popped up. As he continued to walk. Every time you try to get close to the chain-link fence to gaze into the faces of those who seemed less than happy, he got pushed away by others. Finally he managed to secure himself to one of those chain-link fences for just long enough to get a solid grip on it. Any case into the faces of so much sorrow which became ever more intense the more he gazed on it.
    Somewhere in the horror of it all, Norm began to feel the presence of something casting a shadow upon the faces of those he gazed into. It was a face that towered over everything else in uniform with a badge. The face was smiling just the same as all the other faces on Norm’s side of the chainlink fences. The face that rested atop the body with the badge told Norm that it might be nice to move along and so he did, trying not to look upon the faces of those he was now walking away from. He tried not to hear anything that might have been uttered as he was ushered away from the chain link of despair.
    Norm felt a wave of dizziness overcome him as he was ushered away from the chain link. The face with the badge walked away having bid Norm good day, but he couldn’t help noticing that it was late afternoon and the sun was setting, so there wasn’t really any day left to be good. Norm sighed and stumbled a bit as day turned to night. He tried to shake the memory of the faces beyond the chain link, but the more he tried the more prominent they became in the back of his mind.
    Stumbles became limps became crawls and staggers as he lurched in from one place to another trying to wash away the memories with bitter liquid that gradually receded until darkness overcame Norm entirely.
    Things flitted through Norm in the night.
    Somewhere in the light of dawn, Norm brushed off the clothes that had become tattered the previous night and began to stagger around amongst others who were similarly afflicted. It wasn’t a pleasant place where he had awoken, but at least others seemed to be sympathetic. They all seemed to have seen the horrors of those on the other side of the chainlink and they all seemed to have an unspoken understanding about it. Occasionally as Norm went about his overcast day, he would see people crowding around chainlink fences looking out to see sunlight they were blocking out. On the other side of those fences people smiled with irrepressible happiness. Occasionally one would glance over and notice them standing there trying to feel the sunlight coming through the chain link.

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