Lucas began his walk towards the Sawmill Theatre on his normal route down Poplar Avenue, when he noticed a man sitting on a small heap of old clothes outside the clinic. The man was quite disheveled, and he was holding a dented copper bowl. Lucas carried on his ordinary way to work, but suddenly stopped. Lucas knew he had change in his pocket. He could feel the dull edges of an old dime, and the smooth circumference of a nickel. As he crossed the street to make his petty donation, he noticed a red and white cane lying next to the man. Upon seeing this, Lucas realized that the man was blind. Lucas pitched his fifteen cents into the man's copper bowl, and quickly walked away. Lucas hadn't made it more than ten feet when he felt like he was being watched. He abruptly stopped and turned around. The blind man was standing up and facing him, silently. Lucas spun on his heel and briskly continued towards the Theatre. He heard the man shout a phrase, but he didn't pay attention, all he heard was something about silence. Lucas laughed to himself, "He probably has heat exhaustion, what kind of person wears a wool cap in this heat?" He rounded the corner onto H Street, and passed the Forever 21. Lucas wondered "Why the hell would anyone ever build a store like that in this town?"
Lucas pushed open the door to the Theatre, his mind wandering for a second to the eerie abandoned shed in the back. Maybe he would explore that tonight. But for now, it was time to work. He cut through the lobby into the access staircase that lead to the tech booth. Once there, he carefully placed his script "Whispers of Dawn" on a stool in the corner, and sat down in the old spinning chair to begin his work. Or, at least, what he considered work. Lucas would sit at the control board fiddling with the various switches and knobs until it was time for him to go, or until one of the other crew members asked him to do a job that they didn't want to do.
As Lucas was just beginning to get bored, he suddenly noticed a book laying open in the upper corner of the control board. He picked it up and looked at the cover, Oedipus Rex. He flipped back to the back it was open to and read the first line his eyes fell to. Immediately, his heart sank and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. The line was so distinctly familiar to him, but to where he heard it was a mystery. His palms were sweaty, and his heart raced. He re-read the line "What will come will come. Even if I shroud it all in silence." Lucas continued to stare at the words, until they ceased to look like words, or even letters. He stared until they looked like foreign, nonsensical jumbles of lines and curves. A theatre tech quietly entered behind Lucas. The techie squeaked "Hey Lucas." Lucas jumped, terrified. "Mother of God, Margaret. You scared the living hell out of me, don't do that again." "Oh, sorry...I just came in to ask you if you could fix a light on the catwalk, you know how I'm afraid of heights." Lucas heard her, but he wasn't listening. He was thinking about how beautiful she was. "Okay, I'll do that. Where is the light?" "...On the catwalk." "Ohhh, haha, right." said Lucas, "I'll go up there now." Lucas scrambled up the narrow staircase on the back wall of the tech booth through the hatch and onto the small, terrifyingly decrepit catwalk.
He walked out to stage light #17 and shimmied underneath it. The bulb had just come loose. As he unscrewed the access hatch, he had a terrible realization. "Holy shit" Lucas mumbled, "holy shit, holy shit, holy shit." "Lucas?!" Margaret yelled from the stage below, "are you okay?" "I'm fine! I just, um, burned my finger, that's all" Lucas continued his terrible epiphany, the phrase, that heart-sinking phrase that he read in the tech booth, was what the blind man had yelled to him. He knew it couldn't simply be a coincidence. He screwed in the light and quickly climbed back into the tech booth. He was shaking. He decided to leave early. He poked his head inside the theatre room before he left, "Hey, I'm leaving early tonight, I don't feel well." "Okay...well, feel better Luke, I hope you'll be here tomorrow." He exited the Sawmill Theatre and walked directly to Larry's Bar for something to calm his nerves. He walked in and saw that damn Augie Emerson bartending, then turned directly back out. Augie had tried to pick up his position at the school after he had been fired, but from the looks of it, he wasn't hired, at least.
Lucas decided to simply call it a night and headed towards the Castle Apartments. He saw a hazy figure in the distance, moving slowly away from him. Only as he passed the hazy figure on the sidewalk did he realize that it was the blind man. The man had headphones in, and he was loudly playing "Everybody Hurts" by R.E.M. Lucas panicked and began walking briskly. The music behind him stopped. "What will come will come. Even if I shroud it all in silence." said the man, solemnly. Lucas heard it, but didn't acknowledge him, he continued walking at his fast pace until he reached the doors of his apartment, he didn't even bother to wait for the elevator, he ran up the stairs to the eighth floor, to the last room on the hall.
He fumbled with his keys, then remembered that he hadn't locked up and entered. He began thinking about R.E.M.'s break-up as he walked into his bedroom.
He stopped.
There was a wrapped present sitting on his bed.
He tore the wrapping off and immediately felt dizzy.
In his hands was a copy of Oedipus Rex.
