The Blind Man

This is a bit of fiction I wrote a few months back; I don't remember why, but I had a minor obsession with blindness for a few days. If you figure out what it means, let me know, and I'll try to finish it...

THE BLIND MAN

The blind man perched rigidly on the park bench, the contours of his body all sharp angles, his back held straight and unsupported, his shoulders square and level, his hands clasped contentedly around the cane in his lap. His skin was dark, the color of wet asphalt, and took on an ironic purity against the filthy stains that covered his white shirt and tan pants. His hair grew wild, curly strands jutting up haphazardly, like hands clawing from a great crowd, and all of it shot through with streaks of gray.
In spite of the fall wind that swept across the lawn in Bryant Park and gnawed passerby to the bone, he wore no coat, and seemed not to notice the chill. Indeed, a careless observer might easily have thought him some new addition to the Park’s statuary, or a mannequin forgotten after Fashion Week, so static was his aspect. His posture belied a powerful, almost yogic, concentration of will, the force of which strangely seemed to emanate from his eyes, black and depthless as a nighttime mountain pool. He wore no glasses, and his tilted head seemed to focus those eyes on the flowerbed across the path, but they burned through the tulips, hinting at unseen mysteries. Rather than the slovenly and vulgar slackness of most blind eyes, these narrowed and crinkled with life and purpose; they suggested not a handicap, but rather a superior awareness, a piercing of the veil, if you will.
These disparate, wild impressions blew across Tim Jones like blades of grass in the wind, and some of them brushed his mind before hurrying on, leaving him with a faint spine-tingle that had nothing to do with the cold. Tim Jones was a student at an obscure college in Manhattan, as well as a self-styled philanthropist, bequeathing turkey sandwiches and coffee to a misfortunate denizen of the midtown park every Thursday.
As those startling, unsettling impressions saturated his unconscious, Tim paused, cocking his head and pursing his lips appraisingly. Finally, he nodded, as though to say, “Yeah, he’ll do.” Tim walked toward the man, his stride confident and even, seemingly made to echo down marble corridors and conquer wide staircases. Reaching the bench, he sat down a couple feet away, and angled his body towards the blind man, formulating a gentle greeting.
As he inhaled the proper word order, the man leaned slightly his direction, a movement startling even in its minuteness, and spoke. “Can I help you?” he intoned, his voice resonant and deep, and faintly gravelly, like a blues singer’s. His eyes never lost that distant meditation, but his body suddenly directed its attention to this unknown presence, his shoulders and hands and forehead all tightening visibly.
Taken aback, Tim seemed to choke on his words for a moment, likewise stiffening with surprise. “Sorry, I’m sorry. I—I thought you might like to have lunch with me. I have sandwiches. Turkey. And coffee,” he finally managed, trailing off lamely.
The man seemed to chew on those words for a moment, as though sampling Tim’s voice and inflection for character flaws. He swung his torso completely towards the boy, placing his left elbow on the bench’s back, and his broad features split in a slow smile, the whiteness of his teeth shocking against his skin. “Well, now, lunch, hmmm? Turkey sandwiches and coffee. What brings these here sandwiches to my bench, son?”
Tim smiled in reply, feeling that he was back on familiar ground, and spouted off something about grace and how Jesus wanted him to bless others as he had been blessed. Tim spoke quickly, his words tripping over one another in their eagerness to be heard, and his eyes seemed to dwell on every phrase as it zipped across the gap, as though he were a spectator for his own performance, evaluating his delivery and intonation for future displays.
When he stopped, slightly breathless, the blind man smiled once more, this time a quieter smile, one that touched his eyes and dimmed their mystical luster. “I’m sure that’s true, son. Something like that,” he murmured, his voice a low rumble that echoed in the ears and seemed clearer the second after one heard it. After a moment, he shook his ragged head as though waking himself after a deep sleep. “Anyway, I’m hungry as hell. Haven’t eaten all day, matter of fact. So, yes, I’ll eat your turkey sandwich, son.”
Tim made some noise expressing agreement and elation, and extended his hand, saying, “I’m Tim Jones.” Though the blind man gave no hint of awareness of the waiting hand, Tim, in mulling over the conversation later, had the unsettling feeling that he had been summarily known and ignored. The hungry man paused in tearing the cellophane skin away from his sandwich, his face projecting puzzlement, as Tim sheepishly withdrew his hand. “I’m Jenkins. George Jenkins. I don’t put much stock in names, though. I’ll probably forget yours before we’re through talking. I’ve been blind so long that labels don’t mean much anymore. I think about good or bad, mean or sweet, hard or soft—everything else is just shiny bows and wrapping paper.”
Tim tried desperately to think of some intelligent reply to George’s abrupt remark, but his mind could find no traction. He began to feel some measure of panic as seconds stretched towards a full minute and his companion seemed content to munch his sandwich in peaceful silence. Finally, like a falling man catching at any branch he can reach, even the tiny and rotting, he blurted out—“How long have you been blind?”
George stopped in mid-bite, his teeth delicately pinching the sandwich like a tigress sheltering a cub. He softly set it down on the bench, and leaned back, taking a long swig of coffee and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “That’s a mighty strange question for you to be asking me, son…Do you know why?”
His mouth full of turkey, Tim made a negative sound and fought the vague sense of panic that erupted in his chest.
George continued softly, his words reverberating in the eddies of the breeze. “Well, I’ll tell you about these eyes I’ve got here. Some 20 years ago, I could see everything you see, but these here eyes only wanted to see one thing: flesh. Son, these eyes was darkened lamps, and my deep-soul was filled with darkness, so Gawd struck these here eyes blind so that the darkness would stop a’tricklin’ in through ‘em.” He finished heavily, his voice slowing and fizzling into nothing, and he hunched over a little, as though physically exhausted.
The wad of bread and meat in Tim’s mouth suddenly turned to charcoal, and he fought two conflicting urges—to choke to death, or to vomit his entire meal onto the pathway. After a moment, he mastered both, and grimly forced the bite down his esophagus, launching into an exaggerated bout of coughing to gain some time before he must reply. Finally, seeing that George, who had resumed his abnormally stiff posture and sat chewing loudly, had no intention whatsoever of carrying the conversation forward, Tim put forth a timid reply. “So…You think that God blinded you so you couldn’t lust?” He tried fruitlessly to keep the incredulity out of his voice, but it crept in like water through a cardboard box.
George hardly seemed to hear Tim’s response; for many seconds, his only reply was to raise his coffee to his lips and slurp loudly, spilling some of the warm liquid down his chin, where it dripped onto his collar.
Tim was fighting the urge to wipe George’s chin when the blind man suddenly turned and narrowed those dark eyes at him with so piercing an expression that Tim doubted his blindness for a moment. “Ain’t God ever taken something from you, son? Ain’t no Christian out there who God ain’t taken something from, that’s damn sure. It was my eyes—could be something else for you.”