might as well jump

He excused himself to go to the bathroom, less because he had to pee than because he just needed a break from the hard silence that penetrated their dinner. He’d pee, wash up, linger at the mirror a few seconds checking the lines forming on his forehead and the bags under his eyes, maybe glance at twitter on his phone before heading back out to the table. Just a reset of sorts.

He pushed opened the door to the one stall unisex bathroom. There was another guy in there and Tom muttered an apology about the door being unlocked, but the guy didn’t answer. He was wearing an expensive suit and Tom noticed how shiny his shoes were. Tom fixated for a moment on the way the guy was dressed and barely noticed was what happening until his brain started sending him signals that something was off.

The dude was peering into a hole in the wall. Well, it was more of a tear. Not just the wallpaper, but the drywall underneath. The tear was about three feet long and about a foot across. And behind that tear was not more drywall, not cement, not anything Tom expected to see. There was grass. And a few hills. For a second Tom though the hole led to the outside, but it was 8:00 pm in October and dark as hell outside. The grassy hills were bathed in daylight.

The suit wearing man was peering into the hole, sticking his hand and waving it around. He was oblivious to Tom standing behind him, watching him. Tom quickly recounted how many drinks he had. One. One martini. He wasn’t drunk. He wasn’t even buzzed. But here he was, standing in a bathroom watching a guy stick his hand into a world that existed behind some ugly gold wallpaper. He shook his head as if to clear it, closed his eyes, opened them, and the suit guy was still waving his hand in the hole. But now, now he was lifting his leg and putting it through the bottom of the tear.

“Dude!” Tom couldn’t help himself. What was this guy doing? Was he really going to walk through that bizarre hole in the wall into who knows what? What if it was another dimension? What if he couldn’t get back? Someone would surely be waiting for him in the restaurant, they’d probably send someone into the bathroom to see if he had a heart attack or something after a while, and Tom would be standing there, pointing at this tear in the wall, pointing at the grassy hills and daylight on the other side, and the guy would probably be long gone. He didn’t want to have to get stuck explaining to someone’s wife why her husband disappeared in the bathroom of a Mexican restaurant.

Suit guy turned around and stared at Tom. “You see this? You see it, too, right?” He was sweating and looked a little pale. He was standing with one foot in the hole, one foot on the bathroom floor. He was holding on to either side of the opening. “I’m going in. I have to go in. I have to know.”

“Know what?” Tom whispered. He did not know why he was whispering.
“What’s there. What this leads to. Aren’t you the least bit curious?” Tom was indeed curious, and thought about stepping through the hole himself, but he was a coward and stood back a safe distance.

Suit guy didn’t wait for an answer. He dangled his right foot for a minute, as if he were a kid contemplating jumping into a cold pool. Then Tom heard someone shout “Hey!” and the suit guy disappeared into the hole. He didn’t jump. Whoever shouted had pulled him in. Tom walked over to the opening and peered in. Besides the grass and small hills, there were several dirt paths. On one of the paths he could see suit guy being pulled by the hand by a man at least two feet taller than him. He looked back at Tom briefly and Tom gave a small wave.

How is this happening? Maybe I did drink a lot. Maybe I’m still home, sleeping, having a weird dream. Maybe the bartender slipped something in my martini.

“Maybe,” he said out loud, “ I should go in after him.” But he hesitated, as he always did when a situation made him anxious.

And then the wall closed up, as if an unseen hand zippered up a coat. The tear healed itself, the wallpaper pulled together, and like that, the opening was closed.

Tom blinked. He stared. His hands shook. His head pounded. What the fuck was going on? And how would he ever explain this to anyone? He ran his hands along the wall looking for a seam, but there was none to be found. It was as if it never happened. But it did. It did. He was positive of what happened. He was not hallucinating.

Meredith. She was out there, waiting for him to get back from the bathroom. The whole episode had only taken a minute or two, but he felt like he’d been gone forever, like Meredith would come storming in any second demanding to know what the hell he’d been doing this whole time.

Meredith. Suddenly he wanted the wall to open again, he wanted to jump in and run down the dirt path to wherever it led. It would be a way out, a way to avoid the confrontation awaiting him, a way to avoid watching his marriage dissolve in real time. Every time Meredith asked him to go out to dinner, he was sure it was to tell him it was over, to get that d-word out in the open once and for all. And he’d be relieved. He wouldn’t tell her that, wouldn’t give her the satisfaction, but he would slowly exhale when she asked him for a divorce, breathe out all the negativity he’d been holding in for the past year.

He felt the wall again, desperately wanting it to give way. He glanced at the door, at the wall, at the door, at the wall, a man trapped between two bad outcomes. He thought about Meredith’s infidelity, the way she matter of factly told him she’d been sleeping with cop who lived two doors down. A cop? She couldn’t sleep with a co-worker or some guy she met at paint night at the cafe, she had to sleep with a god damn cop? And she knew. She knew he’d be too non-confrontational to kick her out, she knew his cowardice and knew he’d just accept the adultery and move on as if nothing happened. They continued on, eating breakfast together, perfunctory talk about their work days, dutifully having protected, missionary sex once a week, silently watching DVR’d shows until it was time to go to bed. He felt the wall, hoping against hope it would open up against his hand. But it didn’t give and he began to claw at the wallpaper, his short nails not getting enough traction to begin a tear, but clawing anyway, little scratches forming on the wall.

He realized he was crying and went into the stall, locked the door and when someone else walked into the bathroom, he flushed the bowl so the person couldn’t hear him sobbing.

“Is there someone named Tom in here?”

Meredith. She had sent someone in to look for him. He could stay still, he could say no, he could do a lot of things that would make the person leave.

“Yea, I’m here.” He immediately regretted saying it but there was no getting around it, he wasn’t going to escape Meredith. “Please tell my wife I have a stomach ache and I’ll be right out.”
“Yea, sure.”

The bathroom door opened and closed and Tom cautiously walked out of the stall. The wall was still solid. He put his ear against to see if he could hear the sounds of the world that existed beyond that drywall, but there was nothing but the hum of the building. He splashed some water on his face, dried off, took a deep breath and pulled on the bathroom door. He knew he could never tell anyone about what happened. No one would believe him, least of all Meredith. He’d write it off a some kind of spontaneous hallucination brought on by depression and exhaustion. But he knew he’d never be able to let it go. He had a chance and his cowardice held him back. He lost his one grasp at a great escape.

When he got back to the table Meredith asked if he was ok.
“I’m fine, just wasn’t feeling well for a few minutes.”
“Sure, ok.”

They got out to the parking lot and Meredith, as she usually did when she had a drink or two, baited him.

“I might go out when we get home.” A small smile curled around her lips and Tom knew this was her tell whenever she was alluding to being with the cop. He said nothing, as always. He just took it.

“I left my phone in the bathroom, Meredith. Why don’t you wait in the car, I’ll be right back.” She slid into the car, and Tom made his way back to the restaurant, back to the bathroom. No one was in there this time. He slid closed the lock on the door, took a deep breath and said, “Please.” He thought about Meredith sitting in the car, just waiting until she get out again without him. He thought about suit guy, wondered what he was free from. He ran his hand along the wall again, whispering, pleading, begging it to open up.

The wallpaper made the sound of a zipper as it started to rip. Slowly at first, then faster, then the drywall crumbled before him and revealed the glorious site of the grass and hills and path. He didn’t care what waited for him beyond the wall. He didn’t care about the unknown. It’s what he knew that scared him. He put his arm through the hole and the air felt warm and welcoming. He just had to jump. He just had to jump. Just. Jump.

Meredith was impatient when he got back to the car.

“Took you long enough.”

“Meredith, I think we should split up.”

Just jump.