Feeling Wrong!

Pulling Ginger away before the fight escalates and anyone is seriously hurt, Alicia pushes her down in the nearest seat and screams out, “What the hell is wrong with you? You can’t cut into the line. You must wait your turn!”

Huffing and puffing as Alicia prevented her from moving, she rolled her eyes, glancing around, and fumed, “he is lucky you are here to stop me! I would have smashed his skull in!”

In frustration, Alicia demands, “You are almost thirty years old. Why do you keep doing these things? Can’t you see that they are wrong?”

Shocked at her best friend’s rage, Ginger fought back, her eyes scanning the restaurant’s interior as a waiter walked towards them, carrying two menus, “And how come you always seem to do the right things?”

“Nobody does that,” Alicia says glaring at her, accepting one of the menus from the waiter.

“You do,” Ginger said, taking her menu from him."

"Thank you," they said in unison without looking up at him.

"Signal when you are ready to order, " he said. "I will be behind the counter to your right," as he turned away, heading in the right direction.

“I make mistakes like all humans,” Alicia accepts her wrong.

“Girl, all of your mistakes take you to something or someplace better.”

“Because I can feel wrong, and I learn from all of them.”

“You can feel what?” Ginger asks, her eyes moving around like a searchlight.

“Look at what you just did? What if I wasn’t here to stop you again?”

“I would beat the daylights out of him.”

Alicia battled with her tongue and anger, which wanted to speak the truth. Instead, she said, “Do you remember when Fresh Foods hired us?”

“They fired me after two months and kept you,” Ginger regrets.

“Our supervisor, Mrs. Hollis, put her job on the line to get us an extra fifteen-minute lunch break?”

“How do they expect to give us only thirty minutes for lunch,” Ginger complains.

“They changed it to forty-five minutes. You took one hour, and you do it every day.

They gave us a fifteen-minute break. You took thirty.”

“You didn’t have a problem with that?”

“Of course, I did, but taking more than the allowed time, I felt as if I would be doing something wrong.”

“How do you feel wrong?”

“You can’t?” Alicia asks her eyes widen in shock. Then reality hits her and she unconsciously let out. “Damn, I forgot you can’t.”

“Your wrong is different from mine,” Ginger said, her eyes roaming.

“I know. You let a nice guy who truly loved you get away because you cheated. You stole from your grandmother, who was a better mother to you than your biological mother. You lost three well-paying jobs in the past five years because of lateness, you. . “

“Ok!” Ginger snapped, pulling her eyes back to attention. “I get it. I don’t know the difference between right and wrong. I wasn’t raised in any religion.”

“Neither was I,” Alicia informs. “But I can feel the wrong thing I am about to do, and sometimes their consequences too.”

After a brief silence, Ginger sighed heavily and long, then apologized, “I am sorry. It’s just that I always do what I want. My grandmother, mother, and other family members allow me to do that. You are the only person in my life who tries to stop me from doing certain things.”

“I understand,” Alicia says calmly. “But we have been friends from elementary school, and over the years, you have done many things that threaten your existence and cause you a lot of pain. But the next day, week, or month you go right back to doing the same things. Something inside you, or the pain from the last episode, should remind you that this is wrong.”

“So that’s how you feel wrong. Pain reminds you,” Ginger asks.

“Sometimes, but my conscience and instincts never go to sleep. They help to guide me too. I also learn the difference between right and wrong by the results, ramifications, and rewards of my actions and reactions.”

Ginger sighs, then release, “I have been to death’s door, so many times I am afraid of nothing. I don’t want to die because I am too stupid to know what is right and what isn’t.”

“And you will if you continue on the warpath with everyone,” Alicia warns.

Ginger sighs loudly, roamed her eyes without any head movement, then releases, “they said always be yourself.”

“As long as being yourself makes you happy,” Alicia adds. “Are you? Go back into your life. Are you happy with most of the things you have done?”

Ginger nods too quickly, then says with sorrow and regret, “that’s the only way I know how to live.”

“Is it the right way for you?” Alicia interjects.

“How would I know if it isn’t?” she asks, giving Alicia all of her attention.

“By the results, ramifications, and rewards,” Alicia said, reaching over and caressing her best friend’s hands, sadness clouding her eyes.

“Even with the pain?” Ginger asks, holding on to her hands.

“Try it. If you don’t like it, go back to what you know.”

“And if I like it?”

“Then change yourself. Your ways. Your life. How you live it. Change can be an antidote. It doesn’t come in pill form, though. It must be injected.”

“Girl you know I am terrified of needles,” Ginger reminds.

“Then you are afraid of change.”

“So, you are saying that change comes with pain?”

“Life and living come with pain,” Alicia said. “But how we live our lives will determine our level of pain.”

They began to read their menus.

I have something inside me that stops me when I am tempted to do the wrong things. Ninety-five percent of the time, I listened. When I don’t, I get the opportunity to feel the 3 Rs. Results, Ramifications, and Rewards. All three comes with pain or pleasure.

I can feel wrong.

Can you?

Thank you for reading this piece. I hope you enjoyed it.