Hell Is Other People by Danielle Bellwood (books under 200 pages .txt) 📕

She stopped and looked at him with raised eyebrows. The sea of pedestrians slowed around her, tiny waves of individual walkers lapping against the edges of the walkway. The concentrated center of the horde of humans came to a standstill as she stared at the stranger hailing her.

“It’s me! Arlo.”

He gave her an awkward little wave, a nervous chuckle escaping for a moment before he could cover it with a cough.

“Do I know you?” she asked.

He held out a fist in front of her surprised face.

“If you take the blue pill…” he began but wasn’t able to finish his favorite quote before Gillian shoved past him.

“I’m trying to free your mind, Gillian,” Arlo said with sincerity. He was practically running to keep up with her stilted pace.

“Are you crazy?!” Her words drifted over her shoulder to his ears as she reached the door to Java Joe’s.

“Well... I don’t really like labels.”

Labels like: Borderline Personality Disorder. Or Narcissism. Or maybe just maybe A Complete and Total Break from Reality…

The white bulletin board placed smack dab in the center of the glass door perfectly at eye level made a stark contrast to the black glass. Written on the board in blood red letters were the words ‘You can’t fail if you never try.’

Arlo giggled nervously. Java Joe, you sly dog, you. Always reading my mind.

“What does that even mean?” Gillian asked softly.

“Kind of makes you think, doesn’t it?” Arlo said from right behind her, thoroughly invading her wide personal space bubble.

The old couple in the island style shirts crowded close to Arlo. He could feel Time backing up again like a clogged toilet ready to regurgitate its unholy contents all over his holey couture jeans.

Gillian shoved the door to the shop open, barging toward the barista as Arlo stuck close to the heels of her heels, refusing to give her any space. He was determined to make her see… somehow.

“What’ll you have?” Joe Jr asked.

“A medium latte-ˮ Gillian started. Arlo interrupted. Blurting his own order on top of hers.

“A large caramel-ˮ

“With a single shot-ˮ

“Macchiato-ˮ

“Of espresso-ˮ

“Hot-ˮ

“Skim milk-ˮ

“Extra whipped cream.”

“Iced.”

Jr stared back and forth between the two of them with wide eyes, not tapping away at the register. Not sharpieing cups.

“Ummm…” Jr mumbled.

“You know what,” Arlo said with a wave of his hand. “Forget the coffee. We weren’t going to drink it anyway.”

Gillian spun in a drill instructor’s wet dream of an About Face to frown at him. Her hands were balled into fists at her sides and for one fleeting moment, Arlo wondered if she was going to hit him. Hey, at least it’d be a change of pace.

“Who the hell do you think you are?!” she thundered.

He stuck out his hand.

“Arlo Black. Pleasure.”

“Order up!” Joe Jr’s voice called from the pick-up counter. And just like that, Arlo lost her again.

A wave of confusion washed over Gillian’s face as she turned back toward the counter to grab the white paper cup with “Villain” written on the side.

Arlo groaned. Until a couple of days ago, he’d felt like every day of his life was exactly the same as the one before. But since becoming aware he’d tried everything he could think of to make her aware as well. His plan wasn’t going too good so far. Although, to be fair, Arlo couldn’t think of a whole lot of things to try. He was woefully lacking in the Imagination Department and the Brains Department was in the red, all outta vital office supplies and currently using recycled photocopies as toilet paper.

As Gillian breezed by with her burning hot brew, the barista set another, taller cup on the counter.

“Order up,” he said, nodding his head in Arlo’s general direction.

Arlo grabbed the obligatory java and darted out the swinging door after Gillian.

She was already seven Saguaro down the sidewalk before he caught up with her. He watched as she lifted one foot to step off into the street and almost immediately yanked it back as a bicycle blew by. A second later, she stepped off into the gutter and strode purposefully toward the sliding glass doors of the boxy structure that made up the medical billing firm where she worked.

Arlo shivered slightly as he watched her enter the office building. For one fleeting moment, he’d thought she might have remembered. That instinctual foot retraction had been interesting. But now, once again, he must follow her into the dreaded hall of dead-end temp jobs.

Arlo’s greatest fears in life included: high-waisted jeans, flip phones, dying alone, and getting stuck in a dead-end job. Not necessarily in that order. The façade of the billing office that stood across from him in the hazy light of Downtown practically screamed Dead End. It was blank concrete with no windows and only one set of doors. It covered an entire block with no quaint little shops on either side to soften the look. And it had a large billboard sign on top of the roof that proclaimed the business name: Forever Pharmaceuticals. Underneath the name was written their slogan ‘You’re going to die no matter what. Might as well be with a 4-hour erection.’

To Arlo, the billing firm looked almost exactly like the head office that fronted the factory back home in Calamityville where Arlo had grown up. Calamityville, a tiny town just outside Bleaksville, Mississippi, contained a large canning factory where 90% of the citizens worked, including Arlo’s mother, Constance Black.

The canners worked long hours at the Calamityville Cuttlefish Cannery. “Four tens,” his mother always said, “Are better than a sharp stick in the eye.” Arlo never understood why anyone, even his mother, would consider that to be a reasonable comparison. Quite a few things were better than a sharp stick in the eye, after all. Things like tepid coffee, or too-tight tennis shoes, or even a dull stick in the eye.

Arlo followed Gillian through the sliding doors and into the foyer of Forever Pharma. He caught up to her standing still before the door to the employee restroom, coffee