Pulling a Paul on Paul

Paul plucked another piece of strawberry strudel and stuffed it into his mouth. Mumbling as he did around it, he mumbled something like Want Some? And all I could think about doing was shoving his face into the damn strudel.

Seven minutes remained of our lunch break and I’ve all but wasted the entire time watching Paul kill a pint of mint chocolate chip ice cream, a bag of hot fries, and now the damn strudel. He was a glutton, a not unlucky glutton with a fast metabolism.

On one previous night Paul mumbled around his food, “Yeah I got this fast metabolism..or else..ya know…”

Paul had a way of talking that made you want to punch his teeth in. He was the type to chuckle every time someone lent him money and never asked for it back. He was the type to have free food fall in his lap. He was the type to lose track of time on his breaks and give an aw shucks look. It was a wonder that the world hadn’t gotten rid of him, hadn’t chewed him up and stuffed him in a wet corner of a mouth then spit him out.

Our lunch break was ending and Paul took a long breath and sighed. I’ve heard his sighs many times. I know all of his sighs and this sigh was the kind that came at the end of breaks because now poor Paul had to go back to working. The only type of working that a guy like Paul could do, the half-assed half-efforted working. Sometimes his sigh was lined with a tinge of philosophical questioning of the purpose of working at all. In those cases I imagine myself smacking him hard in the face — How dare he! — in real life he seems to feel it. On those days I feel a sharp stab in my lower back when I think about all the work I’d be left with if Paul decided to stop working at all.

Then I consider pulling a Paul on Paul. I grin at the possibility of losing track of my breaks and heaving long sighs all throughout our shifts and taking my sweet ass time just staring into space. I think about pulling a Paul on Paul but how could I? The work would pile up! I’m left then feeling grateful for the little that he does and it festers…I’m being trained to be pleased with Paul’s complacency and dread the day that Paul is me and I am Paul.