people that don’t give you what you want (microfiction)

24.08.2025

‘How does it feel not speaking to people that don’t give you what you want?’ Alfonso asked me. He was reading over something I had given him and he looked over at me from the tablet in his hand. It suited him well, the look of a reader. My handsome, kind reader who gave me whatever I wanted. Unlike other readers in this world.

‘It is well.’

Alfonso laughed. He clapped his hands with the tablet in it. ‘Such a terse and cogent answer! And why is it well?’

‘Everyone talks to someone because they want something from them.’

‘Typical cynicism from one known for cynicism. Can you not be positive in life?’

‘Who has proved me wrong?’

‘Many people are kind to you.’

‘Except for the ones that I care about the most and that I wanted to be kind to me.’

‘You have an answer for everything.’

‘I am Punjabi. What do you expect?’

Alfonso laughed again. ‘And how does it feel now that you no longer make art any more?’

‘They say that art is worthwhile. But it is not worthwhile when you have brown skin. That is this culture. Nothing is worthwhile from you if you have brown skin. And then they talk about diversity, equality and fairness. Their culture is a joke and they are a joke.’

‘Be careful,’ Alfonso warned me. ‘You are in the position of least power.’

‘Yet I am the most powerful’, I said. ‘Because I am The Tiger’.

‘Let us return to the earlier question. Do you not feel awkward not talking to people, avoiding them, blanking them?’

‘Why? That is how they treated me. Like I was nothing. I’m merely showing them the mirror of themselves.’

‘No you’re not. They talked to you.’

‘Talk is cheap. Actions speak louder than words.’

‘They have done nothing to you.’

‘Precisely. They have made no investment in me. Therefore they should feel no loss.’

‘It is not good to use a cost benefit analysis on other people.’

‘Why not? It is what they have done to me. I was not worth their while. So they are not worth my while. I am merely reciprocating the sentiment. If I am not on their wavelength, they are not on mine. They are not worth wasting time and thought over.’

Alfonso rolled his eyes but held his tongue. It is useless to argue. No one ever changes their opinion. The Right fight against the Left. The Libertine fights against the Repressed. The Anarchist fights against the slaves to the state. The evil fight against the good. The enmities that have been set stand in stone. And The Tiger will fight forever. Because he was born to fight. He is loved because he fights. He is hated. Because he fights.