Patience's Impatience (Fiction)

A weary-looking man in an amethyst garment came forth from a very old street. The rocky passageways grew mosses; although the atmosphere was a bit foggy, ancient bungalows within the horizon looked very tired and sinking into the earth.

From deep down the city came various sounds: speeding vehicles, bangs of music instrumentals from speakers; howls from listeners and dancers, litanies in churches with scarce responders, grinding machines, radios,in them, casters ranting about poor governance...

"Isnt it ironic how we often can't be precise of where we are in our dreams..." The man paused. He downed in a few gulp from his water bottle.

"... But there's mostly a place we have been in reality that equally relates to this imaginary place but in a bizarre way" 

He expected me to say something but I wanted to believe he wasn't talking to me. I decided to focus on where I was going. Where I was going? Well, like every other dream, I didnt know. 

"Maybe your second self has to live his own world when the other half sleeps. The choices the other half makes in this abstract world has a mark on the physical and vice versa" 

I gazed back at him and he smiled wryly.

"What would you like to know about?" 

"Who are you?" I asked

"Is that everything you'd like to know?"

"We could start from there" I retorted. 

"Patience! My son..." he smiled. "...and I know you have judged me by my looks, I know that you and every other human don't believe that everything that glitters ain't gold. I mean Every shiny thing is gold to human as long as it promises even the slightest ostentation" 

He was outwardly joyous, grinning every now and then but I could feel the pity in his voice. 

"I know many parents who warned their sons to avoid friends who could do any inhumane thing to afford material things but would later cheer them after they've gotten that money whichever way; hail them for being unshaken in their decision. They reply people and console themselves with 'Judge not so that you may not be judged' and 'God knows best' after being accused of poor parenting" 

"What's your name please?" 

"Patience! boy"

"Patience is irrelevant here sir! I only asked for your name" I was getting upset "there's no point in conversing if you wouldn't tell me your name. 

"such a weird man! Perhaps his name was as awful as his looks" I thought. 

"My name is Patience" The bloke laughed.

"I'd just left the city because no one wanted to listen to me. I am tired of staying in this city. I wonder why God likes human"

I understood immediately what he meant. He wanted to go back to wherever he came from. 

"But why are you still here?" 

"Because my name is Patience" He laughed.

"should I take you around the city?" He asked

"perhaps" I said.

He held me by my right palm as we took a stroll down into the city. The city even looked more tattered from the inside. It had dunks and litters from passers-by and even humans dressed as cleaners, Thick clouds--from the multitude of smokers--hovering over a building which cop cars were aligned about, Gossips and hypocrisies constituted the fog that i had seen from outside of the city. 

We got to a rock on which he sat on feeling exhausted, he passed me his water bottle. 

I felt sleepy a bit, i felt like we had trekked the whole city and I needed to rest. Meanwhile, I realized that everyone he had attempted to talk to blatantly ignored him. 

"He is a loser" I thought.

"even in that perishing city, we had seen varieties of sophisticated smoked-window vehicles; although it was impossible to see what was going on in the coupés, the drivers didn't particularly care about running over anyone who got in their way; elegantly planted houses in certain distinguished places which we weren't even allowed to stare at twice, he unfortunately didnt own any" 

"Do you know about Telepathy?" He said. 

"I don't" 

He pointed to a Boy who was playing football on one of those littered environment. He hauled me closer to him and whispered into my ears "This is what Telepathy means" 

A teenager was in a taxi. The kid thought about how unimportant and how the boy on the pitch was fiddling away his life. He shallowly praised himself. 

At least he was on a go and clearly the boy on the pitch had nothing significant to do at that very moment. He of course had someone he could point to that he was better than. 

The bloke tapped lightly my cheek. 

"Did you read the thoughts of that boy in the taxi?" He smiled. "Everybody does feel they're better than someone. ..." He adjusted his position and continued 

"...Eve impatiently wanted to discover what would happen if she ate the only forbidden fruit in the garden of Eden. She must have earlier thought to herself the beauty that could be unleashed after eating from that fruit and The serpent dwelt on that thought eventually. They had everything in the garden and yet wasn't content. Humanity has always wanted more and more only for one reason: so they could feel like a god: a place in the sun; mere mortals asking for their permission to even respire; perhaps look back and jest with their colleagues of how stupid others are (those who are yet to tap from the knowledge they had). 

"I sometimes doubt my existence. I pity the waiting souls starving and hoping everything changes for good."

"But is God not bias?" I asked

"I don't know. Remember, I am not God. Perhaps their prayers are left unanswered because they'd repeatedly choked God with the same incense when they could have requested for something else. That something else, when asked, could grant them the original thing they'd wanted. Heard of king Solomon?"

The man ignored every gesture I shew. he wasn't expecting any response. He continued

"The dead wants to come back to life and correct whatever mistake they'd made; try other vanities they weren't able to. Most share their graves with sadness; on regrets they pillow. The unborn babies are forcing themselves into their mothers' wombs so as to partake in the rat race and hoard as many earthly vanities and feel like a god too. 

"What a cycle! They all are impatient at their present states: The dead are tired of resting, the babies have grown impatient of not having a specific body they could call theirs, humans are now struggling to reach the finish line with so much junks so they could display whatever vanity each had taken from a feeble one and make the feeble feel miserable.

"Now tell me is God not hardworking? Attending to every complaint?"

This time, the well that'd held every possible words I could think of had dried up, I had nothing else to fetch.

"Well" I said at last.

"Well, I know your body is right here with me but your mind has wandered off. I know you're like everybody else who is impatiently biting more than he/she could chew. I know you want riches and even if I showed you the damp earth from which your cravings were moulded from, you still wouldn't give up on chasing those earthlies. 

"Like I said, I wonder why God likes humans so much. This city is contaminated and needs ablution but who am I to do such? I am very impatient too, I'd given up on my beat maybe thats why no one would listen to me. I have exhausted patience too because I can't wait to leave the city"