So the story is, I had a conversation with a cockroach last month.

We met in my apartment, in the kitchen. It was a cold November morning, and I hadn’t been awake more than an hour. I was busy mincing onions and bell peppers for an omelet when I noticed him standing in front of the sink.

“Morning,” he said, tipping his head slightly.

At first the whole thing made me uncomfortable. This was my home. I paid rent, and utilities. I tried not to be rude about it, but it was unpleasant thinking this stranger could just waltz in on my life.

The cockroach sensed my unease. He told me it was ok — the last tenant had given him a similar reaction. In fact, most of the people he’d met in the building were the same way.

“At least you’re not gonna squash me, right?” he joked.

I felt bad. We’d only just met, after all. Where was my open mindedness?

I offered him some coffee, something to eat maybe. He politely declined, saying he’d just help himself to some garbage later.

“Right.”

We started out chatting about little things, small talk mostly. He was a very nice guy and a great conversationalist. The weather was starting to get nippy I commented. He laughed and asked me how long I’d been living in the city.

“This is nothing,” he chuckled. “Just wait another few months. February is a real bitch, lemme tell you.”

I smiled and cracked some eggs into a bowl. I asked him how long he’d been living here.

“A long time I reckon…” he said, thoughtfully. “Well, for my kind you know. I’m an old man.”

I told him I couldn’t tell, and he laughed heartily. Diet and exercise, he said.

“Do you have a family?” I asked, turning the yolks and whites over with a fork. “Wife, kids, anything like that?”

“Oh sure,” he retorted. “I’ve had a few of each. I’d wager I’ve probably got a few hundred great grandkids running around at this point.”

This comment made me uneasy, but I didn’t let it show.

“Yes sir, quite a few,” he continued. “It’s funny how quickly they come and go. One moment your house is full of them running around, making messes. You get sick of it. Then, before you know it, they move on out of your life. Even the youngest rarely call anymore.”

There was a twinge of sadness in his voice. I tried to imagine what it must be like to have thousands of kids. I stopped beating my eggs.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I replied. “I should probably call my parents more often.”

He laughed again.

“That you should,” he said. “But ahh…”

He stretched his legs and fluttered his wings restlessly. I pulled a skillet down from the cabinet, careful to step over him in the process.

“I remember being your age,” he said. “Full of energy, on your own for the first time, ready to take on the whole damn world. I sure as hell couldn’t wait to get out of the house.”

I clicked my tongue in agreement, nodding my head slightly. A twist of the stove knob brought a burner to life.

“Boy, you shoulda seen me when I was younger,” he grinned. “I was a real stud, believe me.”

He began punching the air with his tiny feet, dodging imaginary retaliations with little swooping motions.

“I used to run this whole place — the world was my goddam osyter. The best food, the best nests… and the parties!”

He scuttled over the tilling to the trash bin to get a look at his reflection in the dented steel. His speed was impressive, given his age. Diet and exercise, I thought to myself.

“Those were the days kid. There’s nothing like being young.”

I sliced a small wedge of butter into the hot skillet, where it landed with a satisfying hiss.

“What I wouldn’t give to be your age again,” he said, turning up to me.

My reply was a weak smile and a half nod, but the insincerity of gesture did not go unnoticed. Despite the size of his brain, he was a remarkably perceptive.

“Hey now,” he quipped, “Don’t let me be another old man trying to tell you about his glory days.”

That wasn’t it at all, I said. I tossed my vegetables into the pan and stirred them around with a spatula. We stood in silence for a while.

“Look, I know I should be enjoying all of this,” I blurted out, pausing for a moment as I watched the onions and peppers sizzle away. “But it can be strange sometimes too, you know?”

The cockroach cocked his antennae curiously.

“How do you mean kid?” he asked.

“Oh I don’t know…”

I flipped my concoction over itself with a flick of the wrist.

“Sometimes I just feel like I have so many questions, and so little answers…” I went on.

“Everything is new and exciting, sure. But every day that goes by just makes the world seem bigger, and sometimes I get to feeling like it might be impossible to find the right place in it.”

I regretted my honesty immediately, and tried to focus on the business of pouring my beaten eggs into the skillet. I could feel the sting of his gaze on the side of my head as I blushed.

“Sorry,” I said.

Eventually he sighed and turned back to his reflection in the trashcan. He laughed again.

“Ahh, kid…”

I looked up from my eggs.

“I’m not saying that this isn’t a great time or anything like that,” I said defensively. “But, some days I just feel like I have no idea what the hell I’m supposed to be doing, you know?”

The pan was getting too hot. I set the burner down to its lowest setting.

“I just think there’s a lot I want to know, and I wish I knew it now,” I concluded. “I mean, look at you — kids, grandkids, a whole lifetime of experiences and adventures under you belt. Isn’t that wisdom satisfying?”

The cockroach was still focusing on his mirror image in the bottom of the bin.

“Sure is,” he said. “Sure as hell is! You wouldn’t believe the secrets of life I know.”

My eggs were almost done. I turned off the heat completely.

“But nothing good happens overnight kid,” he continued. “Nothing in this life comes easy, believe me.”

I pulled a plate from the dishrack and slid my breakfast from the skillet. We moved to the living room, where I sat on the couch, and he crawled halfway up the leg of the wooden coffee table. No matter what he said, it was a brisk morning in my apartment.

“So what, be patient, trust the process, is that what you’re saying?” I ground pepper and sprinkled salt over my plate. “I’ve heard that one before.”

Morning light poured in from beyond the drawn blinds, reflecting off of the glassy blackish-brown body of the cockroach.

“In as many words, I guess I would say something like that,” he replied. “But you brought it up kid.”

I looked at him and could tell that my words had offended him. Again, I felt bad.

I took a bite of my omelet and chewed for a while. “I just wish there was a clear path forward sometimes.”

The cockroach twitched his antennae philosophically, then climbed the rest of the way up the leg onto the table top where he dodged by empty glasses and bottles to perch next to the ashtray.

“You know, I used to be just like you,” he said. “Wanting the whole world on a silver platter. You mind if I smoke?”

I shook my head and kept eating. The cockroach produced a tiny cigarette, but had forgotten his lighter. I walked to the coat rack and produced a box of matches from my jacket pocket. I lit a candle on the table and returned to my plate. He crawled over to the flame and carefully held his cigarette to the base.

We just sat there for a few minutes, me eating and him smoking.

“How did you know what you wanted to do with your life anyway?” I asked, pushing the remnants of my finished meal away.

He took a few more drags of his cigarette.

“Well, I tried a lot of different things when I was younger…” he told me. “I started out as a mechanic actually. Worked in finance for a while too. I was kind of all over the place now that I think about it.”

The tip of his tiny cigarette illuminated as he puffed it.

“You didn’t like any of the things you were doing, or what?”

He took another drag and stubbed the butt out in the ashtray before responding.

“Well honestly, I liked most of it. I liked all of it matter of fact. Working my hands, working my mind… every little thing taught me a little bit more about myself. I think that’s what I was after most of all. Just to understand what kind of man I was going to be.”

He stroked what I imagined was the cockroach equivalent of a chin, pensively. I sat back on the couch hanging on his every word.

“Those were strange times in many ways. But also very beautiful. I had my highest highs and lowest lows back then. No matter what you think you know, you can always feel. I lived my life trying to feel my way to knowledge, I guess you could say.”

He reached out his front legs and balled his hands up dramatically.

“It always seemed to me that you never really know what you actually want until you’re holding it in your hands,” he continued. “And even then, sometimes what you think you want more than anything else in the world doesn’t feel quite right when you finally grab ahold of it.”

The central heating fired up with a sudden crack in the wall behind me, and I jolted in surprise. My guest didn’t budge. I shook my head.

“I don’t get what you’re saying exactly,” I said. “If you can’t know what you want, how are you supposed to know what to do?”

The cockroach chuckled.

“You should trust your instincts a little bit more kid,” he replied, lighting another cigarette on the candle. “You’ve made it this far.”

More silence for awhile.

He turned around slowly, surveying the apartment. He noticed a stack of tattered paperbacks on the counter and pointed.

“You like to read?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

He turned to a guitar perched in the corner of the living room.

“You play?”

“When I can.”

He walked over to an open notebook lying on the table next to the candle, crawling onto the page to read my handwriting. I thought it must be difficult to read words half the size of your body.

“You write too?”

“Every day, if I can.”

The cockroach stayed on the page and kept reading, smoking as he did. For some reason I didn’t feel the slightest bit of self-consciousness as he took in my work. Eventually he hopped back onto the table and perched next to the ashtray.

“That’s good kid,” he said. “Keep it up. You’d be surprised where the little things are gonna take you.”

The cigarette dangled from his mouth as he spoke.

“All of the things I’ve done, the places and people I’ve encountered. I didn’t know it then, but it was all building towards something.”

He opened his eyes and gazed into the candle thoughtfully.

“Building to what?” I asked.

“A realization I suppose,” he said. “That moment when it all suddenly makes sense…

I thought about that. The apartment was finally warming up. Suddenly, he put out his cigarette and rose up on his tiny little legs.

“Hey look kid, I should really get going,” he said. “You’ve been a great host.”

He fluttered down from the table and started scuttling off towards the kitchen. I stood up and grabbed my plate before following him.

“Yeah, I understand,” I said. “It sure was nice to meet you.”

When the hardwood of the living room gave way to the tile of the kitchen the cockroach seemed to move a little slower. As he was passing the trashcan he stopped one more time to look at himself.

“Like wise kid,” he said. “I’ll be around.”

I put my dishes in the sink and started to run some hot water. The cockroach moved on from the trashcan towards a small crack in the floor molding that I now felt very conflicted about.

“Hey,” I said. “One more thing. That thing you found out, or discovered or whatever. What was it?”

He paused at the mouth of the hole and let out a deep sigh.

“Well, guess I woke up one morning, and it just clicked…”

He seemed lost for words.

“What?” I whispered.

He looked up at me and gave one final, roachy grin.

“Im a cockroach, kid,” he smiled. “It’s just what I am.”

He turned round and disappeared away into the infrastructure of the wall. After a moment, I simply shook my head, and went back to doing dishes.

But, then, inevitably, this intoxication would slowly but surely drain away as the days’ moments aggregated into the same dull geometry they usually formed. One obscure lecture led to another. Acquaintances passed by, greeting him with their same tired idiosyncrasies. At the library, no amount of stale coffee motivated him to take his readings seriously. The once pregnant hours would melt away, unenthusiastically, until all that was left was to shuffle into the soul crushing monotony of a job that would rob him of the remaining daylight.

By the end of the day, the hope he had invested in the potential of what could have been was gone, soured and fermented until it sat in his heart as a longing ache for what never was. Punching out meant facing this feeling all alone on his return home.

Despite relative highs or lows, the uneventful passing of another day always weighed him down on these treks. It wasn’t sadness, but something like it. Each step towards his home confirmed that the pleasant surprises of life had skipped him over that day, totally and finally chased away by the rising moon.

***

On this evening he carried this feeling with more intensity than usual as he emerged from the soulless building where he was employed. The sun had fully retreated to who-knows-where by the time he pivoted towards the road home. With his first steps he tried to think back on the occurrences of the past few hours, but found he could recall nothing. His worst days weren’t marked by negativity necessarily, but rather by emptiness.

One foot followed the other, but locomotion was difficult. The soles of his sneakers were heavy, sticky, keeping him from moving smoothly down the sidewalk. His backpack, which was practically empty, weighed a million tons and pulled him down towards the pavement as he trudged on. He’d discovered on other days he felt this way that the only thing he could do to fight against such malaise was to keep moving, keep battling the raging thoughts and anxieties that made every shadow menacing and every passing face grotesque.

So he pushed on through the night and the bitterness, hoping that his feet could deliver him against current of his own consciousness. With each passing step he tried to distract himself from the dark conclusions the night inspired within him.

When he noticed the figure standing in his path he was already off of the sprawling campus and well into the small town where he lived. One more left, two rights, and he would be able to unlock his door with the small brass key he kept in his front right pocket. He made the trek so often that stopping now to take stock, he discovered he could not recall any distinct memories from the walk he had so automatically completed. At that moment however, he became fully aware of his surroundings- it was about three in the morning and completely dark, save for a solitary, flickering streetlight between him and the figure. The small houses lining the street had turned off their lights long ago when their reasonable tenets had gone to bed. In the sudden loneliness of the hour he realized that it was freezing cold out.

He stopped walking and pulled his arms into his shirt as he studied the figure. In the vacillating glow of the lamp he could make out only a few details. The figure was imposingly tall, standing on gangly legs emerging from its elongated torso. It was draped in some sort of strange black cloth that clung sadly around its freakish shape. Its arms lay at its side, bent awkwardly at the elbow and culminating in thin tapered fingers that gnarled into savage angles. Where a face might have been there was only darkness which the streetlamp could not illuminate. The figure was not moving at all, simply facing the young man like an old western villain waiting to pull his revolver.

For a while neither he nor the figure made any attempts to break the deadlock. He wasn’t necessarily scared of this figure; after all the town was filled with drunks and drug addicts and all manner of menacing folks who might be feared at 3am. No, it wasn’t fear, but something wasn’t right. The way it stood so steadfast, an unintelligible mass planted firmly in place, made him uneasy and anxious. There was something oddly familiar about its presence. What did it want from him?

“Hey!”

His yell was shrill. He could see his breath. The figure did not acknowledge him.

“HEY!”

This time louder, with more confidence and aggression. The figure remained still, silent. He could feel his heart beat beginning to increase. His palms were clammy and he balled them into fists. What was this thing? Where did it come from, and why was it here, now?

“Who are you?! Answer me!”

The figure persisted in its stoic blankness- a terrible sage in the darkest hour of night. He became sick to his stomach, made nauseous by the thought that this figure might not ever move. He dropped to his knees and clutched himself on the sidewalk.

The figure did nothing.

Unease had been replaced with desperation. Waves of aching chills pulsed through his limbs. He wretched and contorted. Hot tears stung eyes that struggled to keep the figure visible.

The figure remained motionless.

Pain shot through every inch of his body, accompanied by the hopeless feeling that nothing would make it stop. Not while this figure stood in his way. As blood rushed to his head he struggled to form words.

“LEAVE ME ALONE!”

Nothing. Still as stone, the figure held its positon coolly. He sprawled on the asphalt in agony while overwhelming sobs choked his air supply. Nothing could be worse than this, but what was he to do? The figure was there, and it did not seem to be going anywhere soon. He was practically screaming now as he fought against the dread imposed by the figure. Where was everyone? Why could no one hear him?

“HELP ME! HELP ME! HELP ME! PLEASE!”

The houses flanking the scene stayed dark. The figure stayed locked in muteness. He was losing his mind now, thoughts racing at a million miles a minute trying to unlock the secret to extinguishing the demon before him. What was this thing, this horrible apparition? What right did it have, he wondered, to set itself in the young man’s path? He focused through the disorienting pain and stared directly into the face of this ghost. Slowly, a grotesque gap began to form, twisting into a grin lined with the foul and crooked semblances of teeth rotten to their roots. It was the grimace of pure evil.

In that single instance time stood still. Reality and time were suspended. In this strange state, something began to bubble up inside of his gut. It grew from deep within, and pushed outward like air inflating a balloon. All of the terror and hopelessness he felt was replaced with an anger of such intensity that he imagined his entire body to be aflame. Another moment brought him to his feet, blazing wildly under the streetlight which seemed to flutter faster and faster. Rage at this figure consumed him, unadulterated and pure.

And he did not stop it. He did not fight this feeling. He embraced it, opening his soul to the power of retaliatory might.

This ends today.

From deep in his chest a sound began to emerge. Not a yell, not a moan. Through his clattering teeth the audible vibration of anger and pain and hopelessness grew louder and louder, until his jaw flung open and his throat strained to support the manifestation of his emotions.

He took a step towards the figure, then another, all the while his temperature rising and his groan increasing in intensity.

Now he was moving quickly, step, step, step and he realized he was running, straight at this horrible creature, and it still wasn’t moving, but he didn’t care anymore because he wanted to reach it and grab it and rip off its terrible clothes, and expose its wretched flesh and rip that apart too because he was so tired, tired of facing this nameless, soulless demon with no recourse but fear, and now he was sprinting, and he could feel his heart racing but it felt good, and he felt alive, and he reached out his arms crazily and could see that the distance between him and the creature was closing in for the first time in his life, and he got closer and closer and still the figure remain motionless so he sped up even more with absolute power coursing through his entire body like a wild animal until he was just feet away from the figure and he could see him clearly for the first time.

He stopped dead.

They were face to face. He looked up at the thing and examined it closely under the flickering light. It still wore that awful smile, under a disfigured, crooked nose and sunken eyes bearing no semblance of a soul. Its tattered robes fluttered slightly in the breeze.

“Who are you?” he asked.

No reply came. The light went in and out.

“What do you want from me?” he whispered.

Silence.

The light shut off completely. Complete blackness filled the street.

For a long while he stood still in the dark, unsure what to do. When the light returned, he was all alone again.

It was very late now, and cold. The sun was coming up soon. All of the houses around him were still unlit. If he wanted a shot at decent sleep he should have been in bed long ago. He shuffled the weight of his backpack and resumed walking through the space where the figure had stood, towards his home.

Maybe tomorrow would be different.