This is a short prose I wrote in response to the short story “Dressing Up for the Carnival” by Carol Shields.
I hope the same feelings can go around.
He Fakes Sleeping All the Time:
a Creative Response to Dressing Up for the Carnival by Carol Shields
It is quarter past four in a lazy afternoon, and a young man is sitting on a bus, curled up in his seat, looking sleepy. He is, indeed, not tired in the slightest; on the contrary, his mind at the moment pounces from seat to seat, curiously (wishing that he can be) inspecting his fellow passengers. He and his devious alertness anticipates the consequences of letting his eagerness take over: there will be the awkwardness of avoiding eye contact with the elderly ladies sitting across; there will be the boredom of constantly staring out the window into the eye-stabbing sunlight; and there will be the face-reddening jolt when caught sneaking a glance at the pretty auburn-hair two seats ahead. He concludes that the best course of action, though requiring certain self-restrain, is to look sleepy.
And hence he yawns (A lazy widening of the mouth to, first, an “Ah” then an “O”). He feels the warm moisture of a tear gathering mass at the squints of his eyes. Heavy are his eyelids. He closes them. He opens them really slowly. He shuts them again. The young man knows that the trick to looking convincing is to act with deliberate slowness, and not too forcefully.
He juggled his facial expression a tad more –for effect—before continuing.
The backpack becomes a teddy-bear on his lap. He clings onto it tightly with both arms, and he lets his chin rest gently atop. At this moment, the elderly ladies across from him see (instead of a stranger,) a harmless little boy tugged into bed with his little blanket. In this instant, they are the parents who can finally – with sighs of relief – gossip about the neighbours (not too politely) when their child is absent. The young man smiles inwardly, not unlike a toddler who has caught a glimpse of where his parents is hiding the cookie jar.
Eyes closed, he listens in on the conversations that chance around him.
Occasionally – if he chooses—, his lashes would flutter. His lips would smack together lazily, seemingly burdened with the aftertaste of a slumber. Lifting his leaden head, the young man would sluggishly pan his gaze from the leftmost to the rightmost of the bus interior. His complexion would be impassive but not without a hint of fatigue. He acknowledges solemnly the importance of not letting any of his real excitement show through his face. This demeanor, as goes to-plan, grants him undisturbed view of the surroundings. No doubt, people notices: the pair of chatting seniors steals a glance at him; the businessman in suits peeks up from his phone; the afro-head teenager (bobbing to her loud headphones) stares at him, shamelessly, until she becomes disinterested like the others. The young man’s blank, glazed expression comes across as unthreatening and quickly loses the attention of all the other passengers.
“Good acting,” he thought to himself mischievously. He made his eyelids heavy again, having satiated his curiosity for the duration between the last and the next bus-stop.
