All About Eddie

Eddie passed through airport security without much waiting; less the time it took to put his shoes and belt back on and suffer through chastising by a short, plump female guard for packing cuticle scissors in his carry-on bag. He paid little attention to her scolding, rather wondering what, if anything, she could do physically in the event of a real threat. Her flushed face and haggard breathing seemed a major hindrance should she need to take down a terrorist.
“You could mail these back to yourself or I could throw them away,” the guard said in a heavy-smokers voice.
A patronizing smile came over Eddie, “No, throw them away.”
Eddie’s neurotic need to be early for every scheduled part of his life — an oddity since he’s incredibly impatient — now stranded him at the departure gate 45 minutes before his flight.
He found a quiet corner to catch up on some work, but quickly reconsidered. This was to be his third business trip to St. Paul overseeing the opening of a new retail outlet for fine home décor and jewelry of the Southwest, and it was becoming more of a headache than Eddie could stand. Instead he withdrew comedian Bob Smith’s novel Selfish & Perverse from his bag and flipped it open to Chapter Four.
Eddie was enjoying the read; he especially liked the main character, Nelson, with whom he relates. They’re both Capricorns, sharing traits of lechery, shyness and clumsiness.
As he read, his mind absently drifted to when he was a child growing up in Texas, and how he had an overt tendency to cause injury upon himself. In his fourth grade classroom a loose desktop slipped out of place when he put his weight on it, causing him to fall neck first into the metal bracket of the desk. Luckily, it wasn’t very sharp and the injury required minimal stitching.
Once, when he was 10 years old, and with great sportsman-like skill, he hit himself in the mouth while practice-swinging a baseball bat, breaking a tooth. And at the age of 15, there was the day he thought it would be fun to race his bicycle against an oncoming car, down a steep road, only to painfully lose when his foot slipped from the peddle and twisted under the back tire, fracturing his ankle. Unfortunately for Eddie, the driver of the car merely swerved around him and his mangled bike to win the race.
In the terminal, Eddie smiled to himself, realizing his apparent need-for-speed was still with him to this day. His friends find his driving too aggressive and his constant cursing at other motorists extremely tense.
Again he reflected, pondering about an unusual need to play games with himself. Nearly every day on his drive into work he plays a game in which for him to win, he must reach his destination before the song playing on the radio ends. If he loses to himself, he has to pull over and walk the rest of the way; he’s lost the game a few times, but has actually never pulled the car over.
And nearly every morning irrational thoughts of the shower curtain being ripped open by a murdering pyschopath forces Eddie into speed-showering. Eddie’s wondered on occasion if it’s a rare phobia, a fear of not being squeaky clean upon death.
Unable to concentrate, he marked the page he was on, slipped the book back into the luggage and decided to get a cup of coffee. On his way to the small deli in the terminal, he wondered if his idiosyncrasies stemmed from his upbringing.
Could it have started when his mother insisted that he sweep away the roller marks from the carpet after vacuuming? Could it have manifested when he was 7, and his father left him and his little sister in the truck for more than an hour while he drank beer with his golfing buddies in the country club lounge? Could it have happened when, at 11, an older kid at school named Dick — whom, Eddie realized a few years later, he had a major crush on — pressured him into having a dip of chewing tobacco? Eddie had accidentally swallowed it, threw up, and then fainted from light-headedness.
Eddie ordered a coffee, black, that was much too hot to drink right away. When he returned to his private corner in the terminal, an unexpected passenger had taken over his seat. Eddie immediately noticed how handsome the man was as he clicked away on a laptop. Black curls drooped slightly over his eyes, his thick lips pursed in concentration. The man turned his head. Eddie’s eyes darted as if being chased.
“Hello,” said the handsome man in a low pleasant voice.
“Uh ... hi,” Eddie scrambled for the word.
The man nodded at the seat next to him, “Please, sit!”
Without a word, Eddie sat down, forgetting the bag slung on his shoulder, which knocked the laptop over.
“Oh crap! Sorry,” Eddie apologized.
The man retrieved the computer from the floor. “No harm,” he assured Eddie and smiled at him. “Where are you headed?”
“St. Paul.”
“Really,” said the man with more enthusiasm than Eddie thought necessary. “Flight 642?”
“Uumm ... Yeah I think so,” replied Eddie.
“Me too,” the man’s smile grew wider. 
To be continued ...