The Guy from the Counting Crows (first published in Rabid Oak)
I was telling them that I used to have long hair, and they wondered about what I used to look like. I had big hair in tight curls with hoop earrings and all manner of jewelry, and they looked at me in front of the chalkboard with my red tie and white shirt, and they couldn’t believe it.
Back in those days, people used to tell me I looked like the guy from the Counting Crows. They never told me the guy’s name. I guess he was famous, but he was not famous enough to know his name. It was always the guy from the Counting Crows. I could be running in the rain in the middle of the night, trying to get back home without an altercation in my sketchy neighborhood, and a man would be turning away from the dumpster where he was occupied and he’d say, “Hey, you look like the guy from the Counting Crows!”
I knew the band but didn’t know what any of them looked like, so I assumed it was true. One day, I was at a nice outdoor cafe with my girlfriend, and we had ordered cabernet sauvignon with our splendid lunch. My girlfriend was the hottest girl in sight. The San Francisco sky made the atmosphere on that little stretch of sidewalk shine only for us. When we took sips from that wine, it came with a slight olive aftertaste that could only be experienced to be comprehended, and I couldn’t believe it was just five dollars a glass. I went inside to go to the restroom, and when I came out, the entire staff of the establishment was lined up on both sides waiting for me, and the manager brandishing a large smile told me, “You’re the guy from the Counting Crows.” I told him I was not the guy from the Counting Crows. But they wouldn’t believe me. He kept asking me if I was sure. I guess they thought I was putting up a front because stars don’t want to be bothered while taking time with their hot girlfriends. Maybe the staff were determined because they had a bunch of autographs I needed to sign or something. I told them I was not the guy from the Counting Crows, and the manager said, “Okay,” never dropping the smile. Back at the table, we ordered two more glasses of that amazing wine, and when I got the bill, I noticed the wine was twice as much as I thought it was. That made the wine the largest accessory of the bill, and I got the waiter’s attention to tell him I thought there was some kind of mistake. The manager came out with the same large smile and he said that there was no mistake but that it was okay, that they would charge the amount I had assumed. And then he gave me a wink.
If I were the guy from the Counting Crows, I probably wouldn’t have said a thing. Think about it. Well, things went on like that, with the occasional outburst when someone thought I looked like the guy. I was now convinced that I must have been his double. And then one day, I saw him. It was a chilly Thanksgiving. My girlfriend and I were out of town in a cheap hotel, and it was one of my only opportunities with a TV set, since I did not own one. She was sleeping behind me as I sat mesmerized on the bed, flipping through the channels when I found a guy in dreadlocks and some scattered facial hair talking to a mike, and under him it said that he was the guy from the Counting Crows. It’s a shocking experience to come across your double. There’s a primal danger to this, as if there were really some truth behind the stories of doppelgangers, and I was wondering if I were his doppelganger or he were mine. But the worst part about it was that not only was he not good-looking, he looked like a bum that needed a wash, and yet there was no denying that I was looking at myself.
I finished my story in my red tie and white shirt, and they never interrupted. I was telling them it was uncanny, because it wasn’t just that the guy looked like me or that we partook in the same fashion styles; he had a certain something beyond words that matched my certain something. They were like oh my god, they couldn’t believe it, but they had never heard of the Counting Crows.
— Rey Armenteros