The Tail

You’ve all seen him. He’s that guy. The guy who comes whether he’s invited or not. The guy who makes sure to stand around and wait for you to walk by so he can follow you and make the once jolly trot miserable. You take longer and more difficult paths to your destination to avoid having to converse with the guy. A quick pulling out of the cell phone and placing a bogus call would definitely throw him off course, right? Just remember to fake a good conversation. No one always says: “No,” “Yes,” and “mmhmm” over and over again on the phone. But, alas, he has followed you home and now what? Sitting conveniently in your chair when your back is turned to fumble for an excuse as to why they need to leave, the unwanted guest cozies on up to the fire and makes himself at home…for hours. There’s no way to easily kick the bloke out. You have to put up with him while he talks about things that he thinks he knows about but really doesn’t. Because that’s his superpower: the ability to believe he knows all. It doesn’t matter if you just wrote your thesis on the molecular biology of the Icelandic tree weasel, somehow he knows that that weasel’s microscoptic make-up is in some way double and/or covalent bonded in a certain way that deteriorates the bone marrow in the third week of the summer solstace in the year of the Cock. After you bludgeon the poor man to death in your mind’s eye, you proceed to… BLUDGEON THE POOR MAN TO DEATH. You drop the tire iron on the carpet, not caring about it staining anything as the now warm corpse in the reclining chair has sufficiently done so already. Knowing the sound of the metal tool of death didn’t permeate the walls of your quaint village homestead, you take some time to burn off all of your finger prints and pack a suitecase. The flight to India will be a litte over 20 hours. On the plane, cruising at an altitude of 5,000 feet, you think to yourself, “All this because of that freaking tag-along.” Don’t be a freaking tag-along.