Chapter 4
At five A.M., Oscar rose. Slowly and invisibly a bubble climbed out of his throat, yawning, and his tendrils furling and spiraling, flexed their fleshy muscles. It was morning, and the machine started churning once again.
To awaken, Oscar showered. The water hugged him softly, drumming his neck and rolling its venous path down his body. Turning the handle, the gentle comfort of a warm shower came to an end, and Oscar shook his head and tentacles, flogging his body before dabbing his head gingerly with a dry towel, making sure to get every spot beneath and in between his tentacles.
In the mirror, he lifted his tentacles with a broad hand from below, exposing his beak, black and bijou. With an electric toothbrush he buffed and polished the chitin, as a human would with their thirty-two white teeth.
A sensitive cleanser, pore-opening exfoliator, and premium liquid moisturizer were all applied gently and deliberately to maintain his skin’s clammy glow. The cherry on top: a special blended Eau de Toilette to accentuate and compliment his naturally oceanic musk.
From the shower he walked to his closet, naked and with no one to hide from. By merit of his large bulbous head, Oscar always appeared to be well-dressed. T-shirts and sweaters were always difficult to wear due to their human-centric design, as the head-holes were too narrow. There was a button-up shirt for every occasion. An English spread collar worked best for work, usually in light blue, to compliment his fiery-coral complexion. Flannels and shirts of various funky designs for adventurous days peppered random portions of his closet. There was even a tennis polo with an extra tailored button, custom-made to give additional head room for sporty activities. They all served as the grounds for what people would think of him: a form of non-verbal communication. Humans were, after all, doomed to be influenced by their sights and impressions. One could only embrace the game and turn it in one’s favor.
Bones and all he swallowed them: a plateful of finely selected anchovies with a light olive oil drizzle and flaky salt. Oscar was careful to only take small pinches of sea worms during breakfast, as their flavor can quickly become overwhelming and saccharine. The oysters, naturally, always came last; it was essential to savor their taste long after breakfast was over. The shells were left licked and slurped rightfully clean. A real man eats with his hands—or tentacles.
Outside he then waited for the train, and the city’s familiar noises began showing their faces and greetings. The pigeons flocked and tapped the metal streetlights with their scaly feet. Cars honked in the distance while the purr of another’s engine rumbled softly. Oscar greeted the screeching halt of the train by boarding its crowded interior. He greeted the steps and shuffles of heels by accommodating himself to the natural congestion of people. He greeted the yawn of another with a yawn of his own; humans do as they see.
***
Oscar had no plan that day and nowhere to go, as was usually the case for him. Besides work, there was no overarching compass that would dictate his life, and he would simply take things as they came. He was like a sheet of paper that wasn’t light enough to be taken away by the wind.
The reason he took the train that morning was simple and two-fold. First and most importantly: He felt lonely at home and being in public made him feel a little less alone. Secondly, and least importantly: He accidentally bought an unlimited yearly transport pass a few days ago, instead of the weekday commuter’s package, and thought he might as well get his money’s worth.
Despite his meticulous routine, Oscar left home with nothing, but a pair of keys, his mistakenly purchased train pass, and a stick of Vaseline balm should his tentacles feel dry. And thanks to this, he could only guess the time of day based on the position of the sun in the sky, and the type of clothing people wore on the train.
He started early enough to catch the people who were barely ending their nights, fueled by lukewarm beers and whatever overnight foods were available. Some were stumbling or trying to hold back vomit. And others, like Oscar, were watching the warm sunrise envelop the city in an orangey-purple embrace.
The go-getters came next. People dressed in suits ready to work overtime on a Saturday morning, construction workers wearing helmets and neon vests, athletes carrying their equipment in clunky bags. If he thought about it too much, he would begin to reminisce about the cool morning’s silence, and an uncomfortable nostalgia would wash over him. He wondered if the others watching the sunrise with him felt the same way, but they were probably sound asleep by then. Every type of person came and went that morning, and Oscar’s eyes followed without ever leaving his seat.
He looked at faces and tried to guess what people were thinking of. Between wagons, he looked through the windows, and tried to imagine conversations between people talking, dubbing their conversations with his own internal monologue. When he felt too shy at the prospect of making eye contact, he looked at their hands and how many rings they wore, or whether they looked rough and calloused, or pretty and manicured. At times, he watched the beautiful legs of women passing by, or the tattoos on their thighs, or the bracelets on their ankles. Other times, he stared at lap dogs and puppies who followed their owners and thought about how far canines evolved from their natural origins. He wondered if they ever missed walking on grass.
Sometimes people would look at him too. Mostly stares and double takes of people walking by. It was something he had become used to and stopped taking personally after a lifetime of being looked-at, and he couldn’t help but wonder what sort of deeper psychological effect that might have had on him.
Mid-thought, Oscar was interrupted by the intercom blurting above him.
“Next stop, Main Street. Please exit to the right and make sure you take all your belongings with you when you leave the train.”
The doors slid open, and a bearded man entered with his guitar already strumming, playing his very own fanfare. Oscar could tell he was very old, based on the unstable tremble of his voice, and a line of white, thick saliva that never broke between his thin lips.
“Now I’m going to play a song for everyone… So, if you want to get with the groove, just go on and clap and let your feet stamp or do whatever you want. Just feel it.”
With that, the guitar let out a light jig, and he began to sing:
“It began on a lovely spring sunset:
I was the most handsome frog around,
She was the hairiest toad.
She was my lover,
My hairy lover,
My toad.
We used to sing so well together,
Back then.
We only wanted to swim together.
Swim around the world.
But one sunset, one lovely sunset,
We decided to swim too much.
Together we missed each other.
And I heard her voice
It was lovely, so lovely.
And then I lost her
Oh no! Oh no!
I never found her.
My sunshine.
My lovely sunshine, forgot about me.
Five-hundred years later, I hear her singing.
I see her hairy legs.
But still, she is in my thoughts.
I think about how it all changed that sunset,
That lovely spring sunset.
My heart hurts... yow!
When I think of that hairy nurse,
That hairy toad and me.”
There was an occasional light applause with a few coins thrown here and there, but the old man didn’t seem to pay mind to the people around him.
He seemed to be channeling something within him, bursting through every note and movement through his old, shaky vessel.
Oscar couldn’t find a specific reason why, but he found himself enraptured by the old man and his strange lyrics. And people would mount and dismount the train, but no amount of movement, or crazy outfits, or pretty faces could divert his attention. Before he knew it, the sun was well past noon, and the old man had amassed a pretty pile of change in the bowl beside him.
“What’s your name?”
The man’s talking voice startled Oscar.
“What’s your name?” He repeated.
Oscar hesitated to answer, afraid that he would begin to improvise a song about him.
“Hey, um, sorry, but I don’t have any change. I don’t want you to waste your time-”
“Son, I asked for your name. I wasn’t asking for money.”
Oscar’s head flushed in a fiery-red color.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.” Oscar stopped himself from continuing his explanation, afraid that the man would interrupt him again. “Oscar. My name is Oscar.”
The old man stared at him with his head slightly tilted back and a slight smile on his face. His eyes seemed small beneath his wrinkles, but Oscar could still catch them glistening lightly with the movement of the train.
“Well, Oscar, thank you for the company today.”
Oscar smiled and nodded, unsure of what to say.
There was nothing left for the two men to say between each other, and Oscar continued listening well into the evening, until he was called away by hunger and the call of nature. He felt less alone that day, comforted by the anonymous warmth of those around him— a feeling that would follow him well into the next afternoon and every hour in between. He laid in bed that night wondering what the man’s name was, and was bothered by the regret of never having returned his courtesy.
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