Chapter Text
Naib reflected on his life choices every day.
What went wrong in his life that he condemned himself, ALONE, to such a fate? Ah, yes. He was to blame, not entirely, not only, but mostly. He got himself into it, he fucking got himself into it all. He was in trouble, physically, spiritually, he was simply in trouble, damn the supernatural forces, FATE.
Norton lived with him.
But you can't just say that. So what if he lived there? Naib was willing to accept that. Say, "Okay." The most important and devastating thing for Naib, his wallet, his life, his future, his existence, and everything else, was that Norton fucking Campbell lived here completely rent-free.
It was like a tapeworm in his metaphysical belly, eating him from the inside out, draining him of energy day by day. Naib would sometimes think, "Oh well, I'm going to die," and then find a few gray hairs, or so he thought, or so he felt.
But that was only the beginning, when, without knowing why, he agreed to let Norton stay overnight for a few days. His financial situation wasn't the best. Or rather, it simply didn't exist. Norton existed beyond the concept of "financial situation."
Naib, however, didn't know why he was bothered at all. Some kind spirit of kindness had entered him, perhaps Mother Teresa of Calcutta had regenerated within him for those few moments of weakness.
"One night... maybe two," he'd told him once, as they sat on the university pitch, waiting for Ganji and William to stop being sports freaks. Naib was also sometimes that fit guy from your neighborhood with them, but today he wasn't in the mood.
“One” Naib said then, and he really thought he was telling the truth.
Naib sometimes wondered how his relationship with Norton had ever come to be. He concluded that the stars must have truly hated him to have condemned him to the Sisyphus of being friends with Norton.
At first, they weren't even close. They met through friends. Naib wasn't fond of Norton, who always seemed strange to him, very strange.
And yet it was probably Subedar who was chosen by Campbell, who began to treat him like some old friend of his with whom he had known for 40 years and who was the godfather of his child.
They'd usually meet up alone. Naib often went to KFC after work, and somehow Norton always found himself there, too, and it would end with Naib buying him chicken or Norton simply stealing his wings as if nothing had happened.
It irritated Naib, for sure, it must have irritated him like hell. But he never said anything. He just watched as Norton devoured his fries, pushing them closer to him.
It was a tactic, he thought. A clever one.
In general, despite considering Norton a complete loser, Naib sometimes appreciated his ingenuity. He always knew what to say to whom, how to react. Naib later discovered Norton's meticulous notes, which he kept meticulously documenting every detail about his friends. Naturally, to profit from them.
Naib wasn't there. But he wasn't surprised. What more could Norton get from him? He lived in his house, ate his food, slept in his sheets, wore his clothes even though his pants were way too short, and stole money from his jacket pockets. Naib knew all this, but over time, he simply stopped and adapted to the new environment of living with Campbell.
It's not like Naib hadn't tried to turn Norton away from his parasitic ways before, but he could have pointed it out to him, politely, rudely, playfully. He tried everything. He could have yelled at him and punched him in the face. But none of it worked. Norton felt at home, and nothing could change that, so Subedar simply stopped rolling that Sisyphean stone.
Yet, seeing Norton isolate himself more and more from the world day by day, doing more and more of nothing, lying on the couch or in his bed, was quite worrying for Naib.
A man shouldn't live like this. It's bad for him and the society he lives in. But Naib could do nothing but listen to Campbell's discourse, who was a quiet, mysterious presence in society, but a loudmouth in Naib's presence.
He talked about everything, about his passion for gold mines and the whole Klondike thing, about the injustice of the world, about some other stupid idea of his that would make him a fortune.
Norton, however, didn't talk about the past. Naib didn't bring it up either, because he himself wasn't willing to talk about it to anyone, not even Norton.
But he knew that Campbell was an illegal immigrant, just like him. Now they were both here. In the States, in a colorful neon dream, an American movie, as Norton said, is a completely different reality.
“You know what, Subedar?” Norton said once when they were both sitting on Naib's couch watching another cheap romance movie Naib had brought home from work.
“What?” said Naib in a sleepy voice.
It was late, maybe 2 a.m. Subedar had work in the morning.
“Our lives are the same,“ Norton pointed at the TV.
For some reason, this one always made me ask after each sentence when he was going to discover some other America of his mind.
Naib looked at the TV, where a woman and a man, whose actor Naib even recognized from other productions, were making out in a car.
“What?” he looked at Norton again, waiting for a metaphor.
“Like those stupid movies” Norton leaned back on the couch, resting on his hand, which he placed behind his head.
He waited for the next question, but Naib wasn't going to ask it, this was getting ridiculous.
"You know," Norton hesitated a bit, seeing where the scene on screen was leading. "It's just as artificial and unrealistic as that stupid movie, will she fuck him?" He paused for a moment.
Naib looked at the TV again.
"Back. We just play the same, we just perform our roles, just like them. We feel like it's all real, and there's really nothing," Campbell's thoughts unleashed a torrent of words, "but the worst part is that even though in this fucking American movie, everything is better than in real life, our roles are so insignificant and trashy that we're still, over and over again, just as tormented as before. Less so, of course, because it's America, but still this fucking fight with the invisible fucking soldiers of capitalism who defend these poor, rich people, so that only those who are condemned and whose role is to toil like slaves want for nothing. We," he pointed to himself, then to Naib, "we're here to work, and they're here to lie on their asses."
“You've been doing the same thing for three months” Naib couldn't stand it, but then he regretted it a little.
"That's different," Norton said, unconcerned. "We are different. Even when we're not lying around and doing something, our situation remains hopeless. Because we can't change anything. It's a lottery. You know, even if I worked like you, like some farmhand, what difference would it make?" he paused.
Naiba began to get a headache from Norton's subsequent philosophical outbursts.
"Nothing, exactly nothing. Because we're plebs, prudes, and we mean nothing. No matter what we do, if fortune doesn't smile on us, then fuck us." The couple on screen actually gives in to intercourse, and Norton's monologue is interrupted by the sounds of the film couple. "We can fight this invisible hand and achieve nothing. NOTHING. It's supposed to be America. It's supposed to be better, but it's still the same shit. That's why I don't see the point."
Naib closed his eyes as he did so, not listening to the cacophony of sounds.
"Everything sucks," Norton said after a moment of thought.
Naib often listened to his complaints about the unfairness of life and how he couldn't do anything about it. He partly agreed, thinking perhaps they really had it hard enough. But for Naib, what he had now was enough. Finally, some peace, right? Daily life, ordinary duties. It was so normal, a little strange, but normal.
The scene ended and Naib turned off the TV.
“That doesn’t make sense,” Norton commented.
“Go to sleep now, or I'll die at work tomorrow” Naib left the TV and stood in front of the couch, where Norton was sitting, still in a bad mood.
Subedar, seeing that he was still not moving, simply started walking towards the room.
“But you agree with me, right?“ Norton said after him.
Naib sighed, already exhausted beyond belief by this idiot. But Norton loved such topics and always dragged them on for so long that everything he said seemed to repeat itself, and Naib felt as if it could go on forever.
“Come to sleep or stay on the couch, because you won't be able to turn on the light.”
Norton groaned like an old man and got up from the couch.
“Okay, we'll talk tomorrow” he overtook Subedar and entered the tiny bedroom, which only had room for a bed and a not-too-big old wardrobe.
Naib followed him and automatically flopped onto the bed, face down on the mattress.
"Life is a misery," Norton said, also lying down on the uncomfortable, old mattress of their small shared bed.
They had been sleeping like this for some time when, one day, Norton decided the couch was uncomfortable and moved to the bed. Naib gave him a few slaps in the face, but he didn't get rid of him from his bed, which Norton often kicked out of initially. Fortunately, thanks to the discipline of inflicting pain on a sleeping Campbell, he learned to stop this behavior. Naib then commented that a sleeping Norton was a really quick learner.
And that's exactly how they functioned now. They slept in the same bed, ate and drank from the same utensils, and used the same clothes and towels.
Subedar was used to it being like this and didn't even think it would ever change in the future and didn't see it as a bad thing... Only Norton, who couldn't move forward and was stuck in one place, worried Naib.
****
Norton didn't talk much. He never did. That was just the way he was. Why should he talk? Speaking was difficult because he had to think of how to put his thoughts into words, but nothing ever sounded the way he thought it, so it never made sense. Besides, people didn't matter to him at all. They were there, and he was there, but Norton didn't feel that so-called species connection with them.
He was sitting in his room. Still his room, for how long? Who the fuck knows. He stared at the ceiling, just like he did yesterday. William had been there the day before, so Norton tried to pretend he didn't spend all day lying in bed and contemplating the absurdity of all his life decisions. But it was better, so why?
Never mind, he said, trying to silence his thoughts. Never mind.
He finally got up and decided he had to do something, that he couldn't stand to sit in this musty room filled with his farts any longer. As if Norton had anything left to fart with.
The last time he'd eaten was probably the day before yesterday, when William had been over and brought him a meal, because for some reason the man had taken it upon himself to take care of Norton. It wasn't that he had anything against it; in fact, he was glad to have William in his life, someone from whom he could get food for free. But at that moment, Norton was so fed up with his whining about rugby or whatever sport he played that he chose starvation.
He definitely needs to get out, get some fresh air, he thought.
Norton donned his well-worn black coat. He reached into his pocket, and a smile spread across his face. A smile so wide, so genuine, so real. There were a few coins inside. He pulled them out and began counting them carefully.
A dollar and forty cents, he calculated.
He closed his eyes and pondered. He reached into the deepest recesses of his mind to find a use for this saving money.
Food. Cheap. Fast food. He thought.
He began putting on his shoes, worn as they were, like his grandfather's coat, which were several sizes too big, and shoes with soles, though glued, stitched, and repaired in many other ways, were still a little falling off. But Norton couldn't care about that now. Not now, when he was rich, he'd take care of it, he assured himself as he looked at those moccasins with disgust.
He went out, and the day was warm, even though it was March, so Norton wasn't bothered by the lack of a scarf he'd sold a few days ago. Now Norton felt like he was in the best American movie. He was going out to eat, he was young, handsome, and had a wonderful future ahead of him. Life was good, wasn't it? Maybe the last one wasn't true, but Norton had chosen his delusion of being a future millionaire today and didn't care about anything.
He began to walk cheerfully, but not overly cheerfully. He still had to remain mysterious. Let his joy be mysterious. So he put on a faint smile, and his step quickened only a little.
He scanned the first fast food joint he came across. KFC. Perfect, Norton liked chicken. If he could afford something other than fries, ha ha.
He opened the door, elegantly, casually, without exaggeration, yet with a clear indication that HE was coming in to order something to eat.
But no one noticed. No one. There wasn't even anyone at the register. The place was practically empty. Norton wiped his nose and smiled at this new information. Very good. But something, or rather someone, caught his eye.
He glanced at the boy sitting at the table by the window. His back was turned, but Norton still found him strangely familiar. That green hood, Norton had seen him somewhere. No, not that green Irish clown. Ah yes, that's the guy, he thought, and without hesitation, he approached his table.
Once there, his thoughts suddenly returned to what he was actually doing. What was he doing?
The boy looked at Norton over the fries he was devouring, because it couldn't be called food.
"Campbell?" he asked Norton, still eating his fries.
“Oh it's you” Norton looked a little embarrassed.
They talked like that sometimes when they met up with friends. Well, he'd talk to Norton, and Norton would mumble something, but Norton didn't think he would even remember him, let alone his name, which he pronounced as strangely as everything he always said in English. He wasn't from the States, that's for sure. Besides, Americans didn't speak English properly, according to Norton.
Norton sat down across from him, and the brunette raised an eyebrow at him but said nothing. He drank his Pepsi.
It felt awkward, strange. Norton didn't understand why he'd sat there. He hadn't thought it through.
"So," he began, but he had no thoughts in his head. He hadn't prepared a question, so he blurted out, "Do you come here often?"
Naib Subedar, yes, Norton finally remembered. Thank God he doesn't have to ask his name.
“Often” Naib's answer was short and quick, which caught Norton off guard.
“How often?“ he asked without thinking for even a second.
Naib began to slurp from his glass cup and when there was nothing left to slurp, he set it aside.
“I don't know” he said, moving the straw to the second cup “Every day, I guess.”
"It's my first time," Norton said.
Naib looked at him.
"Aren't you ordering?" he asked. "You order at the counter here," he added, pointing a fry at the counter, where a woman was now standing.
Norton turned and looked at her, then back at Naib, whose expression was so blank and tired that Norton felt as if he hadn't been starving for two days, and Naib hadn't eaten or slept for a month.
“I don't have money” he didn't think again, he just said.
Naib's expression changed slightly, but Norton couldn't read it. He was usually good at that. Studying people's faces, then delving into their minds. Norton was sensitive to detail, but Naib's expression was unreadable. Perhaps it was the scars next to his mouth, one on either side, so symmetrical, that distracted him. Norton focused his full attention on them.
"William said something about you not having the best of luck lately," Naib finally said. "Have you had breakfast?"
It was half past two, so Norton should have had breakfast by now.
“No” he replied and wanted to stop looking at those scars, but they wouldn't leave him alone.
Naib pushed a plate of fries toward him. Norton automatically reached for them.
"Thanks," he said. "What happened to your mouth?" He pointed to the corners of his mouth with his finger and a French fry.
Naib narrowed his eyes, resting his face on his hand.
“Don't worry, you'll get a kick in the face” he replied.
Norton felt a little strange. He'd never heard that saying before, and it was said so strangely in English with his accent.
“Okay cool” he replied, continuing to eat Naib’s fries.
American cool, he thought proudly as he said "cool" in such a cool way.
"You can eat them all," Naib said as he watched Norton devour them.
“Thanks”, he replied with a mouth full of fries.
Naib just nodded. He looked so tired that Norton felt as if he'd just emerged from the mine after three days in the dark. Unfortunately, Norton knew what that felt like.
“A lot of work?” he asked.
"A lot," Naib replied, yawning involuntarily. "Night on the sink tonight," he said.
“Where do you work?”
"Everywhere I can," he replied. "I'm looking for something permanent."
“I know how it is” Norton patted him on the shoulder as if he were his son who came with an F in math.
“Are you looking for a job too?” Naib asked, going back to drinking his Pepsi.
“Yeah”, Norton replied.
Their conversation was interrupted, however, when another familiar face walked into KFC. It was Eli, he thought.
Eli Clark was one of his friends here. He actually owed the guy a lot for helping him find a place to stay when Campbell came here, lost, to another state, all alone. They didn't talk much after that, but Norton saw Eli as a good friend.
Eli quickly noticed him and immediately approached their table.
Naib turned around when he was already standing right next to him.
Norton stared at the brown-haired man and saw another mysterious expression cross his face. Not anger, not sadness, not irritation, what was it? But he saw his lips quiver slightly when he saw Eli.
They didn't like each other? They were good friends, as far as Norton knew.
Norton liked to research people he'd potentially see at least once a week. So he also learned a little about Naib. Not much. He knew he was friends with Eli, and they had other mutual friends. He knew he lived alone, now in an apartment because he'd recently moved out of his room, supposedly unable to stand his roommate. A quarrelsome type, Norton thought. But whenever he talked to Naib, he seemed completely calm, even pleasant, and somehow normal?
Norton didn't know why, but he always felt so comfortable talking to Naib? It was a mystery.
“Naib, we need to talk”, Eli said immediately.
He was tense, Norton could see it. Something had happened, something had to happen for sure. Norton waited to see how this scene would unfold.
“I already told you we have nothing to talk about" Naib went back to eating the fries he had offered to Norton a moment ago.
His face seemed calm, but his tone of voice and those still-twitching lips betrayed his concern. Fear?
"Naib, please." Eli remained standing, not even paying attention to Norton, whom he must have noticed first. But Norton didn't want to be noticed right now; he simply watched this bizarre scene in silent anticipation.
"I have nothing more to say to you, let me eat in peace and piss off," said Naib, shoving a handful of freshly offered and taken fries into his mouth, much to Norton's sadness.
“I'll call you tonight, okay?” Eli was still standing, and Norton suddenly looked so pathetic.
He should go now, Norton thought. He definitely should.
Naib didn't say anything to this, and after a moment Eli left. A strange silence fell.
“Is something wrong between you two?” Norton asked, but immediately wanted to bite his tongue.
What does he care, he doesn't care. But maybe he should ask, or maybe not? If Eli treated him like air, maybe he should treat what he saw like air too?
"Nothing," replied Naib shortly and sharply, looking at Norton with an icy look.
But he just pushed the plate of fries closer to him again and said nothing more. So Norton began eating as if the scene had never even happened.
Silence fell, and Norton began to panic a little. Sometimes the silence scared him, now it scared him, so he decided to ask.
“Where are you from? You have a strange accent.”
“From Nepal” Naib started doing something on his Nokia.
Damn guy has a Nokia, he must be really wealthy.
"Me too," Norton said, and Naib looked at him for a moment, intent. "I mean, I'm not from the states either," he explained.
"I know," Naib said. "You're from Ireland, right?"
“Yeah”
“Illegally?”
Norton was taken aback by the question. Previously, no one, except the guys he came here with illegally, had ever asked him whether he was here legally or not.
“Illegally” he said slowly, staring into the blue eyes that were boring into him from the inside, but they soon stopped seeming boring because Naib said:
“Me too.”
Norton felt the weight on his back, carried by God knows how much, fall off him.
“Why did you come to the states?” Naib asked.
“For money,” Norton replied.
“Too” Naib added quickly, still doing something on the Nokia 5000.
"And for a better future." Norton didn't know why he hadn't shut up yet. "Ireland is poor. You have to be born rich there to have anything, so cross there for me."
Naib nodded at this.
“It's not the best in Nepal either... “ but he didn't say anything more.
"But you know? America was supposed to promise us everything, and so far I don't see the difference." Norton leaned his hands on the table and rested his head on them.
“What does that mean?” Naib was clearly interested in some sentences that had not been registered by Nortin's brain.
“Life is just as shitty” Norton looked at Naib, who was staring at him again.
“It's better” Naib began “In my opinion it's better.”
Norton pondered.
"It's better," he began. "But it's not as it should be," he finished.
“So?” Naib asked impatiently.
"I'd like to stop working just to get through the next day. Toiling for next to nothing, knowing I won't build a future out of it. I'll have food, that's true, maybe even a place to sleep, but beyond that? Absolutely nothing. Because either you're born under a bright star, or you're just another gray mass whose only occupation is work, work, work, and getting paid for it. Does that kind of suck? No?" Norton hadn't said this much in a while, so his throat was dry, and besides, the salt from the fries had turned his esophagus into a sahara. So he reached for a Naib Pepsi.
“It's better to be a gray mass than to be left with nothing” he shrugged and didn't even notice when Norton poured him half a Pepsi.
“This is accepting the injustice of this world”, commented Norton.
Naib rolled his eyes. Oh how Norton now wished he'd drank all that fucking Pepsi.
"Listen," Naib began. "It's better to live a decent life than to live like garbage or not live at all, don't you think?"
"It's not even about choices. Nobody has a choice, doesn't that seem terrifying to you? You're born and either you face an uphill battle in life or you slide down it like a sled. So what if someone else has it worse than me? It doesn't mean I can't be angry at the world for having to be born poor, having to live poor, and even knowing I'll die poor. Just because that's what fucking fate decided." Norton hasn't said this much in a long time.
Naib thought for a moment and narrowed his eyes. Norton thought it was something the short man did when he was focusing all his brain cells into one.
“Don't you think it's pointless to waste your life thinking about all this injustice over which you have no influence?”
What fools. Any sympathy Norton had for this Naib had just burst like a soap bubble. He doesn't understand, Norton thought, he's narrow-minded, an idiot.
"You don't understand me," Norton interrupted nonchalantly and stuffed the last handful of fries into his mouth.
“As you wish”, said Naib and sighed.
Norton licked his fingers and looked back at Naib, who had leaned back in his seat, almost falling asleep. Norton could see the dark circles under his eyes and the sunken cheeks, and even the faintest hint of a crease between his eyebrows, or maybe his eyebrows had simply twitched and couldn't return to their calm form after his verbal defeat with Norton.
"Go to sleep," Norton said finally. "You look like a corpse."
Naib opened one eye and smiled, which confused Norton.
“Who's talking?” he said.
Norton snorted.
“Thanks for the fries” he started to get up.
"Cool, I hope you survive on them for the next few days before someone hires you for president or you win the lottery," he continued smiling. Stupid.
Norton, however, involuntarily smiled too.
“Hang in there,” he patted Naib on the shoulder and left.
He came home and went to sleep and then actually didn't eat anything for another day and then went to KFC again.