by Chris McGinty
Two men walked down the street. They approached each other from opposite directions. For reasons unknown, both felt like a confrontation. It could have been dissatisfaction in their jobs, or their marriages. It could have been that they were both experiencing a temporary chemical imbalance. It could have been that they just didn’t like the way the other looked. It could have been the tidal forces of the Earth’s gravity pulling on its only moon. It may have been fear that the other was a threat who needed to be threatened first.
They started yelling at each other as they got near. Some of it was standard threats of violence that you might hear on a schoolyard. Some was original in its way, but nonsensical as sentences. Some of it was grunts and slurred speech that had no communication value without the context that these two would be fighting each other any moment.
When the one man finally pushed the other, it was unclear whether he knew that there was a police patrol vehicle approaching that would stop the fight from escalating. The officer pulled up on them and asked, “Is there going to be a problem here, fellas?”
Each of the men responded with a disgruntled, “No, officer,” as they continued to stare each other down. They each threw their arms out as invitations to continue the fight and walked past each other, knowing they would not continue now. They walked on never seeing each other again.
Chris McGinty is a flash fiction writer who may or may not have just written metaphorically about science and society, but let’s face it folks. It was probably just an idea he got last minute, and the light metaphor nonsense was probably just incidental.