My fate is Seal
If I ever needed clinching proof that the universe is a sucking void of utter meaninglessness, I got it at 3:26 p.m. on Saturday, September 25, 1999.
At that moment I was standing outside a multiplex cinema in downtown Vancouver, waiting to buy a ticket for a film I will not name since it is irrelevant to this story.
Suddenly, my friend turned to me and spoke in a low voice. “Is it my imagination, or is the man standing behind you a famous musician?”
I turned and looked. There was a black dude standing behind me. There wasn’t anything terribly notable about him, except that his cheeks looked like they’d lost a fight with a disc sander at some point in his personal history. No recognition occurred.
I turned back to my friend. “Uh, I don’t know,” I said. “Who is he?”
“Seal,” my friend murmured. I glanced back again. The black dude was unchanged. I turned back to my friend and shrugged.
Then, as if some unseen force had decreed that the issue be settled, a young teeny-bopper arrived on the scene. I watched out of the corner of my eye. With timid extroversion, she approached the black guy and asked him, “You’re Seal the singer, aren’t you?”
The dude looked at her. He did not speak. There was a barely perceptible, almost subliminal nod.
The teeny-bopper launched into a long and vapid monologue. I can no longer remember precisely what was said, but I do recall it being painful and deeply embarrassing to witness. Every few sentences, she asked him an insightful and probing question such as “So you’re here in Vancouver, huh?” and look at him with wide, expectant eyes. Again, he did not speak. He just ever-so-slightly twitched. Then she continued her chatter.
Suddenly, about a half a minute after it started, it ended. “Well, I’ll let ya go,” the bopper said. “Goodbye! And enjoy the rest of your day!” She happily ran off, already building in her mind the heroic epic of her encounter with the mighty Seal.
I looked at Seal, for that was indeed his name, and I was impressed. You see, the guy got through the entire encounter without saying a single word. Not one. Using only a few barely perceptible prompts, he got her to quickly say her piece and leave. And what’s more, she seemed to think she actually had a two-way conversation with him, which she didn’t. It was brilliant. Exactly the sort of people-managing skill I’ll need when this column-writing gig takes off.
Then my friend and I bought our tickets. I walked into the theatre foyer, and found myself face-to-face with a dark figure from my past.
Connie.
Actually, that isn’t her real name. Her real name rhymes with Connie, though.
Connie was one of my floormates during my first year at university. She is one of the most evil humans I have known. I swear, candles sputter when she enters a room.
How can she be so evil, you ask? Allow me to explain. Connie had a modus operandi in her love life that her floormates came to know well in the short time they lived with her. She had a sixth sense for finding guys with just the right type of insecure, fragile ego. These men were her prey.
She would find her victim, seduce him, and fuck his brains out for one to three weeks, during which time she’d worm her way into the core of his emotional being. Then she’d abruptly “lose interest,” and start screwing some other guy right under his nose, which would drive him mad with jealousy. Then she would dump him, after which he would go completely mental, stop shaving, and devote as much of his time as possible to stalking Connie. Which she, of course, thought was really cool. Then the cycle would repeat with a new victim.
In the first semester we lived with Connie—I kid you not—she did this nine times. Well, technically eight. She tried to do it nine times, but her ninth victim didn’t really care when she started screwing someone else, and was totally indifferent when she dumped him. So she got back together with him, fucked his brains out for another month, and then tried again. Still, he didn’t care. So she kept at it. Then, towards the end of the following semester, he dumped her.
And the moral of the story is: Ha!
Anyway, there was Connie in the theatre foyer, excitedly waiting for Seal to enter the building. I knew what was going on. She had this look in her eyes like there were a couple of balls she desperately wanted to balance on her nose. Connie wanted to entice Seal into her twisted web of sex and emotional cannibalism. Draw him in, trap him, and destroy him.
I can’t let this happen, I thought. I must warn Seal. I must tell him about the danger.
Then I abruptly lost interest in the entire situation, and went off to see my film. I didn’t see what happened next. I didn’t see the imminent collision of Seal and this heinous orca of a woman.
But in retrospect, I’m sure that Seal has survived much worse in his day. A man of his fame and stature probably has to contend with internationally notorious, Bond-calibre femmes fatales on a daily basis, so a small-time dormitory man-eater like Connie would have been nothing to him. Besides, Seal already had a woman with him, and she didn’t look like the kind of girl you want to mess with. All things considered, I had nothing to worry about.
So ends my little tale of fate and circumstance. Without warning, in the space of less than a minute, I came face to face not only with a famous pop star I completely failed to recognize, but also with an evil force from my past.
But this is what makes me think. My new-age friends tell that there is no such thing as a coincidence. That seemingly meaningless encounter didn’t happen out of sheer random chance. It happened for a reason.
So what was the point of it all? What was the universe trying to tell me, by engineering such an improbable happenstance?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
I hope. •
Originally published in The Peak, October 18 1999.
* * *
Epilogue
Overheard in the Peak offices:
“Glen, that’s horrible!”
“What?”
“The thing about Seal’s cheeks. That’s horrible.”
“Why?”
“Because you shouldn’t make fun of his disease.”
“His disease? What are you talking about?”
“You don’t know?”
“No! What?”
“Seal had lupus as a child. That’s why his cheeks are scarred.”
“He had lupus? Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh. Someone told me he scarred his cheeks on purpose, like as a gang initiation or something.”
“No. It was lupus.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. But nonetheless, his cheeks really do look like they lost a fight with a disc sander.”
“That may well be, but it’s still tasteless and offensive and I don’t like it. I’d like you to cut it.”
“Aw... come on...”
“No. Cut it, or the piece isn’t going in.”
“Alright, fine. I’ll cut the disc sander.”
“Thank you, Glen. You know, I was a bit worried about you when you first arrived, but I think you have a chance at fitting in around here.”
“Yes, ma’am. Thank you, ma’am.”
“You may go.”
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