Toenail Romance

Running did not cause his toenails to fall off.  Love caused his toenails to fall off.  Or at least to shrivel a little, and dry out, so that when the decisive blow fell they crackled and slid off.  He saved the pieces, which everyone hated, but it helped him feel connected with the sheer physicality of his existence.  But back to love.  It started small.  It was the first day of spring and so everyone on campus had melted to the ground and were sprawled here and there like slugs caught out in the middle of the sidewalk.   He teetered out of the science building and started for home.  It was the weekend and he was going to enjoy it, come hell or high water.  As soon as his face hit the wind, he took off, and ran the four blocks to his apartment.  He could feel the sweat standing out on the small of his back by the time he opened his door. 

He peeled off his shirt, got in the shower and stayed in for half an hour.  By that time, the water had started to cool down, so he got out and marched around his apartment with his towel draped over his should.  Hand in the air, he pretended to be a roman senator, and loudly declaimed the importance of Hadrian’s wall.  The door swung open.  James dove for cover and crawled around the couch to get back to his room.

Relief.  It was only his roommate Michael.  He jumped back up, towel now more securely fastened.  Michael whistled and then headed over to the stove and started frying something. 

James wondered idly whether he would see Lily tonight.  Lily was the girl next door, literally and figuratively.  He’d known her since Freshman year, but she had only recently met him.  He used to go to the parties that he thought she might show up at, kind of like a reverse Great Gatsby, only he never knew her, just loved her from afar.  But this year, by some blessed coincidence, their apartments were next to each other.  The floor plans were mirror images, so his bed was against the same wall as hers.  He used to lie there at night thinking about how small the distance between them was, except when her boyfriend was over.  Then he slept in the front room.

But lately he’d been meeting her more and more often on the stairs or on campus.  And he noticed a funny thing.  Every time he talked to her, he got a warm feeling.  I’m not talking about some donate-to-the-homeless, feel-better-about-your-day kind of warm feeling.  It was like there were little flames dancing under the soles of his feet.  That’s where it started, in his toes, but the longer he talked to her, the further the flames raced up his legs, until he would yell something about how he had to go and run away. 

That’s when his toenails started cracking too.  He’d gone to a podiatrist, and the doctor had given him some sort of anti-fungal cream, but James knew that he was no victim of mushroom feet.  His was an infection of love, and he knew of no cure.   

-DHC