jamesclark.com

“Tell me my story,” I said as we were leaving the store.

The cold night air greeted us as we stepped out of the brightly lit store and into the parking lot. There was no moon in the sky and it had become incredibly dark since we had started shopping.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Tell me a story, about me,” I said. “It’s a writing exercise, for the website. Tell me a story about my life.”

“I don’t get it,” she said, taking my hand as we entered the parking lot. “Why would I do this?”

“So I can get another perspective about myself. It will help me figure out how to better write about myself and events in my life if I can get an idea of how someone else sees my life.”

She crinkled her nose at this. “I’m not good at telling stories,” she told me.

I looked around in the dark for my car, but it was nowhere in sight. I led her by the hand towards the far end of the lot.

“You don’t have to be good at it, just do your best.”

“I’m not the storyteller here. You know I can’t even tell a joke.”

“I’m not asking you to tell a joke. Wait… are you saying my life is a joke now?”

“No, you know that’s not what I’m saying, goofball,” she said. “You can tell me a joke and I could immediately repeat it back to you and it wouldn’t be funny at all. It wouldn’t even be the same joke.”

“Well, try anyway. I’m not going to judge you.” I tried to sound reassuring.

“Um, okay.” She shrugged her shoulders and sighed. “There’s this guy, Jim, and he was born in Oklahoma but he’s not an oakie. He moved around a lot when he was a kid and ended up in Washington. Then he moved to California, and he went to school at—”

“I’m not asking you to write my obituary,” I interrupted. “Just tell the story.”

She stopped walking. “Look, I told you I’m not good at this!”

“It’s okay, you’re doing fine, just go ahead.”

“If I’m doing fine then don’t tell me how to do it. You’re making me self-conscious.” She turned and began walking again. “Where the hell did you park?”

I looked around the row of cars. Nothing looked familiar—I didn’t recognize the surroundings at all.

“I’m not sure,” I said, peering around in the dark. “I could have sworn I parked somewhere around here. Weren’t you looking?”

“No, I wasn’t paying attention. I was putting on my jacket while we were walking over to the store.”

“Oh.” I looked back towards the store. “Maybe it’s back over there.”

We began walking back the way we came.

“Look,” I continued, “nobody is going to grade you on it. Just tell me a story, my story. The story of my life, as you see it.” I gently squeezed her hand and pulled her closer as we walked. “I want to know what you think because I value your perspective, sweetie. It means a lot to me.”

She sighed again and smiled. “Fine,” she said, reaching over to hug my arm with her other hand. “There’s this guy who is not such a bad guy. The best guy in the world, actually. The best guy a girl could ever hope for.”

“I’m looking for a perspective I don’t already have of myself,” I said, grinning.

“Very funny.” She stopped walking and let go of my hand. “Wait a second,” she said, looking around. “Where the hell are we?”

We had walked several more rows of cars and were now standing in the middle of the parking lot. I couldn’t see my car anywhere. “I could have sworn I parked somewhere over here,” I said.

“You said that before.” She put her hands on her hips and cocked her head. “You don’t have any idea where you parked, do you?”

I furrowed my brow and looked past her. “Let’s try over there, I remember walking past that truck… I think.” I began walking towards the back of the lot, confused and lost.

She walked slowly, looking at the ground in thought. “I’m not sure how to tell this story thing,” she said. “I know it sounded like a news article before, but that’s because I don’t really know what you’re looking for.”

“I’m not looking for Pulitzer material. Just tell it however you want.”

“I could tell it much better if I wasn’t so cold. Where is the damn car?”

“There it is!” I pointed down to the end of the row where I could see the familiar taillights of the Buick. “See, I told you I knew where it was.”

As we got closer it became apparent that the car was a Buick, but it wasn’t my Buick. I turned left and started down the next row, feeling stupid.

“Okay,” she said, following after me. “I’ve got your story for you. There was this moron who parked his car somewhere and immediately forgot where he left it, then he froze and starved to death in the middle of nowhere while his wife took a cab home and changed all the locks.”

We finally found the car after several more minutes of wandering around aimlessly. On the ride home, once she was warm and comfortable, she began to tell me my story.

She told me the story of a boy raised in a difficult environment, always getting into trouble and constantly at risk of going to jail, who moved away when he was old enough and started an entirely new life in a new city. “The boy totally reinvented himself,” she said, “and he grew into a young man who had a new chance to become someone responsible. He was very smart and learned a lot about computers, and now he has a great job. And it’s all because he met this really great woman who saw that he was a total mess and straightened him out and he would be absolutely lost without her.”

“You got that right,” I said.

“Don’t you forget it.”

“See, was that so hard? That was fine.”

We drove on for a few more miles.

I asked, “Is that the end?”

“It’s only the beginning,” she replied. “The best is yet to come.”